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knowledge of y, it cannot be asserted that only x does so, unless
all alternatives reduce to self-contradiction. But such a process
is impossible for the mystic who denies the validity of inferential
knowledge with respect to God. The mystic, then, has no
ground except his experience in terms of which to deny the inferential
knowledge of God, since every other ground would
itself be an inference, as would the mystic’s own denial. If
therefore the ex- [[Page 140]] perience of God cannot refute the
possibility of knowing God inferentially, the mystic cannot refute
such knowledge at all.
But even more seriously: in strict logic, the mystic who denies
the inferential knowledge of God can say nothing about his
experience either to himself or to anyone else: for every such
statement would be an inference and would refute the denial of
the inferential knowledge of God. And still more basically:
could the mystic be spoken of as having an experience at all?
To have an intelligible experience is all the same as the understanding
of particular data through a series of systematically
consistent propositions in thought. Unless the mystic is ready
to say that his own religious experience is unintelligible, he
cannot deny the validity of an inferential knowledge of God.
But in fact, he cannot even say that his experience is either religious
or an experience. What an admirable basis for the knowledge
of God! Thus the very assertion---that God is unknowable
by inference but knowable by direct encounter---is therefore
shown to be self-contradictory.
Finally, if all these difficulties could be transcended, how
could one discern between a false and true experience of God in
his own life, or among the conflicting claims of various mystics
whose allegations rest on a purely intuitional basis? Either reason
and coherence must be introduced here, or chaos rules the
waves on the sea of religious experience: