The Varieties of Religious Experience - Penn State University

William Jamesnamely, the degree to which we abandon ourselves to the remorselesslogic of our love for others.”197But in all these matters of sentiment one must have “been there”one’s self in order to understand them. No American can ever attainto understanding the loyalty of a Briton towards his king, of a Germantowards his emperor; nor can a Briton or German ever understandthe peace of heart of an American in having no king, no Kaiser,no spurious nonsense, between him and the common God ofall. If sentiments as simple as these are mysteries which one mustreceive as gifts of birth, how much more is this the case with thosesubtler religious sentiments which we have been considering! Onecan never fathom an emotion or divine its dictates by standing outsideof it. In the glowing hour of excitement, however, all incomprehensibilitiesare solved, and what was so enigmatical from withoutbecomes transparently obvious. Each emotion obeys a logic ofits own, and makes deductions which no other logic can draw. Pietyand charity live in a different universe from worldly lusts and fears,and form another centre of energy altogether. As in a supreme sorrowlesser vexations may become a consolation; as a supreme lovemay turn minor sacrifices into gain; so a supreme trust may rendercommon safeguards odious, and in certain glows of generous excitementit may appear unspeakably mean to retain one’s hold ofpersonal possessions. The only sound plan, if we are ourselves outsidethe pale of such emotions, is to observe as well as we are ablethose who feel them, and to record faithfully what we observe; andthis, I need hardly say, is what I have striven to do in these last twodescriptive lectures, which I now hope will have covered the groundsufficiently for our present needs.197 J. J. Chapman, in the Political Nursery, vol. iv. p. 4, April, 1900,abridged.293