MYSTICS

A party which arose towards the close of the third century, distinguished by their profe ing pure, sublime, and perfect devotion. They excuse their fanatical ecstasies by alleging the pa age of St. Paul, “The Spirit prays in us with sighs and groans which cannot be uttered.” They contend that, if the Spirit prays within us, we must resign ourselves to its motions, and be guided and swayed through its impulse by remaining in a state of mere inaction. The principles proceeded from the known doctrine of the Platonic school, which was also adopted by Origen and his disciples, that the Divine nature was diffused through all human souls; or that the faculty of reason, from which proceed the health and vigour of the mind, was an emanation from God into the human soul, and comprehended in it the principles and elements of all truth, human and divine. They denied that men could, by labour or study, excite this celestial flame in their breasts; and therefore they disapproved highly of the attempts of those who, by definitions, abstract theorems, and profound speculations, endeavoured to form distinct notions of truth, and to discover its hidden nature. On the contrary, they maintained that silence, tranquillity, repose, and solitude, accompanied with such acts as might tend to extenuate and exhaust the body, were the means by which the hidden and internal word was excited to produce its latent virtues, and to instruct them in the knowledge of Divine things. For thus they reasoned: Those who behold with a noble contempt all human affairs; who turn away their eyes from terrestrial vanities, and shut all the avenues of the outward senses against the contagious influences of a material world, must nece arily return to God when the spirit is thus disengaged from the impediments that prevented that happy union; and in this ble ed frame they not only enjoy inexpre ible raptures from their communion with the Supreme Being, but are also invested with the inestimable privilege of contemplating truth undisguised and uncorrupted in its native purity, while others behold it in a vitiated and delusive form. The number of the Mystics increased in the fourth century, under the influence of the Grecian fanatic, who gave himself out for Dionysius the Areopagite, disciple of St. Paul, and probably lived about this period; and by pretending to higher degrees of perfection than other Christians, and practising greater austerity, their cause gained ground, especially in the Eastern provinces, in the fifth century. A copy of the pretended works of Dionysius was sent by Balbus to Louis the Meek, in the year 824, which kindled the holy flame of mysticism in the Western provinces, and filled the Latins with the most enthusiastic admiration of this new religion. In the twelfth century, these Mystics took the lead in their method of expounding the Scriptures. In the thirteenth century they were the most formidable antagonists of the Schoolmen; and, towards the close of the fourteenth, many of them resided and propagated their tenets in almost every part of Europe. Among the Mystics of that time we may notice the Dominican John Tauler, of Strasburg, A. D. 1361; Henry Suso of Ulm, A. D. 1365; and especially John Ruysbroock, called Doctor Ecstatic us, A. D. 1381, who of all the Mystics was the most dreamy and enthusiastic. Among Protestants there have been and are many Mystics, but they have not formed a sect.— Mosheim. Gieseler. NAG’S HEAD FABLE. (See Consecration of Bishops .)