[Footnote 146: _Enn_. vi. 7. 34.]

[Footnote 147: It would be an easy and rather amusing task to
illustrate these and other aberrations of speculative Mysticism from
Herbert Spencer's philosophy. E.g., he says that, though we cannot
know the Absolute, we may have "an indefinite consciousness of it."
"It is impossible to give to this consciousness any qualitative or
quantitative expression whatever," and yet it is quite certain that we
have it. Herbert Spencer's Absolute is, in fact, _matter without
form_. This would seem to identify it rather with the all but
non-existing "matter" of Plotinus (see Bigg, _Neoplatonism_, p. 199),
than with the superessential "One"; but the later Neoplatonists found
themselves compelled to call _both_ extremes [Greek: to mê on].
Plotinus struggles hard against this conclusion, which threatens to
make shipwreck of his Platonism. "Hierotheus," whose sympathies are
really with Indian nihilism, welcomes it.]

[Footnote 148: The following advice to directors, quoted by Ribet, may
be added: "Director valde attendat ad personas languidæ valetudinis.
Si tales personæ a Deo in quamdam quietis orationem eleventur,
contingit ut in omnibus exterioribus sensibus certum defectum ac
speciem quamdam deliquii experiantur cum magna interna suavitate, quod
extasim aut raptum esse facillime putant. Cum Dei Spiritui resistere
nolint, deliquio illi totas se tradunt, et per multas horas, cum
gravissimo valetudinis præiudicio in tali mentis stupiditate
persistunt." Genuine ecstasy, according to these authorities, seldom
lasted more than half an hour, though one Spanish writer speaks of an
hour.]