in our earliest mystical writers. One of the most charming examples of
it other than this lyric, is the chapter "Of Love" in the _Ancren
Riwle_, or Rule for Anchoresses, written probably early in the
thirteenth century. An account is there given, quite unsurpassed for
delicate beauty, of the wooing of the soul by God.[54] On the whole,
however, this type of mysticism is rare in England, and we scarcely meet
it again after these early writers until we come to the poems of
Crashaw. The finest expression of it is the Song of Solomon, and it is
easy to see that such a form of symbolism is specially liable to
degradation, and is open to grave dangers, which it has not always
escaped. Yet, in no other terms known to man is it possible so fully to
express the sense of insatiable craving and desire as well as the
rapture of intimate communion felt by the mystic towards his God, as in
the language of that great passion which, in its purest form, is the
best thing known to man and his highest glory. "I saw Him, and sought
Him, I had Him and I wanted Him." Could any words more completely
express the infinity of love's desire, ever unsatisfied even in
possession, than does this love-cry from the heart of Julian the
anchoress of Norwich?

The intensity and freshness of religious feeling of a mystical type in
England in the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries are often
not realised, partly owing to the fact that much of the religious
writing of this time is still in manuscript. The country was full of
devotees who had taken religious vows, which they fulfilled either in
the many monasteries and convents, or often in single cells, as "hermit"
or "anchoress." Here they lived a life devoted to contemplation and
prayer, and to the spiritual assistance of those who sought them out.

The hermits, of whom there were a large number, were apparently free to