To attempt in these days a definition of religion may seem like taking a wanton risk of intellectual confusion. Even a rough classification of religions is difficult. The mass of data is so vast, the varieties of religion so manifold, that no sooner has a scheme of classification established itself than it begins to sag under the weight of material thrown upon it. The old schemes which hinged on a fixed distinction between the religion of the Bible and all religions outside the pale of Biblical revelation, succeeded by dint of excluding a large part of the phenomena. But, as things are with us, no classification is better than a working hypothesis into which, as a constituent element, enters the knowledge of its own mortality.

This paper is but a fragmentary contribution to that study of the “Varieties of Religious Experience” which William James has so significantly brought to the attention of students of human nature. I propose to sketch some personal peculiarities of the founder of Quakerism, George Fox, and in the end to show what place was filled in his life by what may be called his experiences as a mystic. Every one knows that the typical Quakers have made prominent amongst their spiritual exercises what they call “silent worship” as conducted in their meetings, and that they have held that this “silent worship” often brings the worshipper under the direct influence of the movings of the Divine Spirit. I have here no concern with any question as to the truth or as to the ultimate merits of this or of any other tenet of George Fox or of his followers. I intend simply to show the place that the experiences of silent worship occupied in the mental life of Fox himself, and why he found this form of what is technically called mysticism a valuable feature of his religious consciousness. This study will bring us into somewhat closer contact with the mental complications of a remarkable personality—a personality in which the normal and the abnormal were in a very interesting way united. We shall see how certain tendencies that, in another context, would have proved highly dangerous to the sanity of their possessor were so combined in Fox that the ultimate result was prevailingly good, both for himself and for his environment. Religious history contains many instances where men whose mental life showed numerous abnormal traits still were so constituted that they retained their essential self-control and accomplished a great work. The study of Fox presents one more such instance, and may also possess genuine psychological interest.

Since my discussion deals with Fox as a mystic, I shall first have to explain what one technically means by mysticism in religion. Then I shall have to show that Fox had many traits which were not those of the typical mystic. And, finally, I shall try to point out what part Fox's mystical tendencies played in determining certain aspects of his mind and of his career.

It is not a little significant that several books have appeared within the last year or two which deal with the subject of New Testament Theology in its whole extent. For a considerable time there has been a shrinking from this large enterprise, and the work of Holtzmann was allowed to maintain its place without serious competition. The attention of younger scholars has been more directed to the literary and historical criticism of the New Testament than to its theology; and while the theology has been by no means neglected, it has been discussed in many separate monographs rather than in works of a comprehensive nature. Now, however, we have the three books of Weinel, Feine, and Schlatter, appearing almost simultaneously, while the monumental work of Holtzmann is being reissued in a fully revised edition.

The question about the whence and whither of the drift of our cosmic weather is an old one and cannot be lightly brushed aside. It is both a forced and a momentous issue. It is a forced issue, because we cannot help taking an attitude towards it, whether we make it explicit to ourselves or not. It is momentous, because such an attitude is a serious index of our deepest practical faith as regards the value of life, and cannot help determining our conduct. There have been three distinct types of theory in the past as regards this drift—Mechanism, Finalism, and Vitalism.

A few great books, for those who know them well, make unnecessary a countless number of lesser books. From the higher point of view, all can be seen that is visible from the lower, and much more. To have carefully studied the works of one of the world's great men is to have immensely widened one's own life. To comprehend the scope of his thought and the variety and extent of his sympathies is to have an essential element of a liberal education. An enthusiastic and undiscriminating discipleship, at least at first, is not to be deplored, for a realization of the limitations of great men and the incompleteness of all systems is sure to come later; but no one understands any view of the world who has never been able to feel its plausibility. There is no delight in life like the companionship of a noble mind. A long comradeship with a great man, one in whom intellectual power, ethical elevation, all-inclusive sympathies, and wholeness and wholesomeness of view are united, is one of the greatest of our human privileges. To it we turn for consolation in our sorrows, for a refuge from the petty irritations and vexations that so constantly beset us, and for help to rise above them to serenity and peace. Through these great souls we are able in some measure to realize the Emersonian ideal of a life of activity and at the same time of poise and power, the hands being in the world of action while the head is above the storm. No service is more real or precious than that which such men have rendered to humanity. By living on the higher planes, they appeal to our latent instincts; they help us to understand our own best selves, and to be what without them we could never be.

Of those who have served our race in this way one of the greatest is Plato.