The Varieties of Religious Experience - Penn State University

The Varieties of Religious Experienceand excellently, and meets best the secret demands of the universe,is the truth of which asceticism has been the faithful champion.The folly of the cross, so inexplicable by the intellect, has yet itsindestructible vital meaning.Representatively, then, and symbolically, and apart from the vagariesinto which the unenlightened intellect of former times mayhave let it wander, asceticism must, I believe, be acknowledged togo with the profounder way of handling the gift of existence. Naturalisticoptimism is mere syllabub and flattery and sponge-cake incomparison. The practical course of action for us, as religious men,would therefore, it seems to me, not be simply to turn our backsupon the ascetic impulse, as most of us to-day turn them, but ratherto discover some outlet for it of which the fruits in the way of privationand hardship might be objectively useful. The older monasticasceticism occupied itself with pathetic futilities, or terminated inthe mere egotism of the individual, increasing his own perfection.219But is it not possible for us to discard most of these older forms ofmortification, and yet find saner channels for the heroism whichinspired them?Does not, for example, the worship of material luxury and wealth,which constitutes so large a portion of the “spirit” of our age, makesomewhat for effeminacy and unmanliness? Is not the exclusivelysympathetic and facetious way in which most children are broughtup to-day—so different from the education of a hundred years ago,especially in evangelical circles—in danger, in spite of its many advantages,of developing a certain trashiness of fibre? Are there nothereabouts some points of application for a renovated and revisedascetic discipline?Many of you would recognize such dangers, but would point to athletics,militarism, and individual and national enterprise and adventureas the remedies. These contemporary ideals are quite as remarkable forthe energy with which they make for heroic standards of life, as contemporaryreligion is remarkable for the way in which it neglects219 “The vanities of all others may die out, but the vanity of a saint asregards his sainthood is hard indeed to wear away.” Ramakrishna his Lifeand Sayings, 1899, p. 172.326