CHAPTER VII

NATURE NOT SYMBOLIC

Mysticism and symbolism are generally regarded as
inseparable: some may go so far as to make them practically
synonymous. Hence the large space devoted to symbols in most
treatises on Mysticism. Récéjac, for instance, in his treatise on
the "Bases of the Mystic Belief," devotes about two-thirds of
the whole to this subject. Whence such preponderating
emphasis? There are, of course, many conspiring causes, but the
conception of the Absolute is still the strongest. Given an
Unconditioned which is beyond the reach of sense and reason,
the phenomenal is necessarily degraded to the rank of the
merely symbolical. Nature, being at an infinite distance from
the Real, can only "stand for" the Real; and any knowledge
which it can mediate is so indirect as to be hardly worthy of the
name.

To this degradation of the phenomenal the true nature-mystic is
bound to demur, if he is to be faithful to his fundamental
principle. He desires direct communion with the Real, and looks
to external nature as a means to attain his end. To palm off upon
him something which "stands for" the Real is to balk him of his
aim; for the moment the symbol appears, the Real disappears:
its place is taken by a substitute which at the best is Maya--an
illusion; or, to use technical phraseology of the metaphysical