But the monk meditating upon Christ or Buddha has in his mind
an image of perfect health, a thing of clear colours and clean air.
He may contemplate this ideal wholeness and happiness far more than he ought;
he may contemplate it to the neglect of exclusion of essential THINGS
he may contemplate it until he has become a dreamer or a driveller;
but still it is wholeness and happiness that he is contemplating.
He may even go mad; but he is going mad for the love of sanity.
But the modern student of ethics, even if he remains sane, remains sane
from an insane dread of insanity.

The anchorite rolling on the stones in a frenzy of submission
is a healthier person fundamentally than many a sober man
in a silk hat who is walking down Cheapside. For many
such are good only through a withering knowledge of evil.
I am not at this moment claiming for the devotee anything
more than this primary advantage, that though he may be making
himself personally weak and miserable, he is still fixing
his thoughts largely on gigantic strength and happiness,
on a strength that has no limits, and a happiness that has no end.
Doubtless there are other objections which can be urged without
unreason against the influence of gods and visions in morality,
whether in the cell or street. But this advantage the mystic
morality must always have--it is always jollier. A young man
may keep himself from vice by continually thinking of disease.
He may keep himself from it also by continually thinking of
the Virgin Mary. There may be question about which method is
the more reasonable, or even about which is the more efficient.
But surely there can be no question about which is the more wholesome.

I remember a pamphlet by that able and sincere secularist,