[Extract from Chesterton's Book "Orthodoxy" (1908)]

THE MANIAC

THOROUGHLY worldly people never understand even the world;

they rely altogether on a few cynical maxims which are not true.

Once I remember walking with a prosperous publisher, who made a

remark which I had often heard before; it is, indeed, almost a

motto of the modern world. Yet I had heard it once too often, and

I saw suddenly that there was nothing in it. The publisher said of

somebody, "That man will get on; he believes in himself." And I

remember that as I lifted my head to listen, my eye caught an

omnibus on which was written "Hanwell." I said to him, "Shall I

tell you where the men are who believe most in themselves? For I

can tell you. I know of men who believe in themselves more

colossally than Napoleon or Caesar. I know where flames the fixed

star of certainty and success. I can guide you to the thrones of

the Super-men. The men who really believe in themselves are all in

lunatic asylums." He said mildly that there were a good many men

after all who believed in themselves and who were not in lunatic

asylums. "Yes, there are," I retorted, "and you of all men ought

to know them. That drunken poet from whom you would not take a

dreary tragedy, he believed in himself. That elderly minister with

an epic from whom you were hiding in a back room, he believed in

himself. If you consulted your business experience instead of your

ugly individualistic philosophy, you would know that believing in

himself is one of the commonest signs of a rotter. Actors who

can't act believe in themselves; and debtors who won't pay. It

would be much truer to say that a man will certainly fail, because

he believes in himself. Complete self-confidence is not merely a

sin; complete self-confidence is a weakness. Believing utterly in

one's self is a hysterical and superstitious belief like believing

in Joanna Southcote: the man who has it has 'Hanwell' written on

his face as plain as it is written on that omnibus." And to all

this my friend the publisher made this very deep and effective

reply, "Well, if a man is not to believe in himself, in what is he

to believe?" After a long pause I replied, "I will go home and

write a book in answer to that question." This is the book that I

have written in answer to it.

But I think this book may well start where our argument

started -- in the neighbourhood of the mad-house. Modern masters

of science are much impressed with the need of beginning all

inquiry with a fact. The ancient masters of religion were quite

equally impressed with that necessity. They began with the fact of

sin -- a fact as practical as potatoes. Whether or no man could be

washed in miraculous waters, there was no doubt at any rate that

he wanted washing. But certain religious leaders in London, not

mere materialists, have begun in our day not to deny the highly

disputable water, but to deny the indisputable dirt. Certain new

theologians dispute original sin, which is the only part of

Christian theology which can really be proved. Some followers of

the Reverend R. J. Campbell, in their almost too fastidious

spirituality, admit divine sinlessness, which they cannot see even

in their dreams. But they essentially deny human sin, which they

can see in the street. The strongest saints and the strongest

sceptics alike took positive evil as the starting-point of their

argument. If it be true (as it certainly is) that a man can feel

exquisite happiness in skinning a cat, then the religious

philosopher can only draw one of two deductions. He must either

deny the existence of God, as all atheists do; or he must deny the

present union between God and man, as all Christians do. The new

theologians seem to think it a highly rationalistic solution to

deny the cat.

In this remarkable situation it is plainly not now possible

(with any hope of a universal appeal) to start, as our fathers

did, with the fact of sin. This very fact which was to them (and

is to me) as plain as a pikestaff, is the very fact that has been

specially diluted or denied. But though moderns deny the existence

of sin, I do not think that they have yet denied the existence of

a lunatic asylum. We all agree still that there is a collapse of

the intellect as unmistakable as a falling house. Men deny hell,

but not, as yet, Hanwell. For the purpose of our primary argument

the one may very well stand where the other stood. I mean that as

all thoughts and theories were once judged by whether they tended

to make a man lose his soul, so for our present purpose all modern

thoughts and theories may be judged by whether they tend to make a

man lose his wits.

It is true that some speak lightly and loosely of insanity as

in itself attractive. But a moment's thought will show that if

disease is beautiful, it is generally some one else's disease. A

blind man may be picturesque; but it requires two eyes to see the

picture. And similarly even the wildest poetry of insanity can

only be enjoyed by the sane. To the insane man his insanity is

quite prosaic, because it is quite true. A man who thinks himself

a chicken is to himself as ordinary as a chicken. A man who thinks

he is a bit of glass is to himself as dull as a bit of glass. It

is the homogeneity of his mind which makes him dull, and which

makes him mad. It is only because we see the irony of his idea

that we think him even amusing; it is only because he does not see

the irony of his idea that he is put in Hanwell at all. In short,

oddities only strike ordinary people. Oddities do not strike odd

people. This is why ordinary people have a much more exciting

time; while odd people are always complaining of the dulness of

life. This is also why the new novels die so quickly, and why the

old fairy tales endure for ever. The old fairy tale makes the hero

a normal human boy; it is his adventures that are startling; they

startle him because he is normal. But in the modern psychological

novel the hero is abnormal; the centre is not central. Hence the

fiercest adventures fail to affect him adequately, and the book is

monotonous. You can make a story out of a hero among dragons; but

not out of a dragon among dragons. The fairy tale discusses what a

sane man will do in a mad world. The sober realistic novel of to-

day discusses what an essential lunatic will do in a dull world.

Let us begin, then, with the mad-house; from this evil and

fantastic inn let us set forth on our intellectual journey. Now,

if we are to glance at the philosophy of sanity, the first thing

to do in the matter is to blot out one big and common mistake.

There is a notion adrift everywhere that imagination, especially

mystical imagination, is dangerous to man's mental balance. Poets

are commonly spoken of as psychologically unreliable; and

generally there is a vague association between wreathing laurels

in your hair and sticking straws in it. Facts and history utterly

contradict this view. Most of the very great poets have been not

only sane, but extremely business-like; and if Shakespeare ever

really held horses, it was because he was much the safest man to

hold them. Imagination does not breed insanity. Exactly what does

breed insanity is reason. Poets do not go mad; but chess-players

do. Mathematicians go mad, and cashiers; but creative artists very

seldom. I am not, as will be seen, in any sense attacking logic: I

only say that this danger does lie in logic, not in imagination.

Artistic paternity is as wholesome as physical paternity.

Moreover, it is worthy of remark that when a poet really was

morbid it was commonly because he had some weak spot of

rationality on his brain. Poe, for instance, really was morbid;

not because he was poetical, but because he was specially

analytical. Even chess was too poetical for him; he disliked chess

because it was full of knights and castles, like a poem. He

avowedly preferred the black discs of draughts, because they were

more like the mere black dots on a diagram. Perhaps the strongest

case of all is this: that only one great English poet went mad,

Cowper. And he was definitely driven mad by logic, by the ugly and

alien logic of predestination. Poetry was not the disease, but the

medicine; poetry partly kept him in health. He could sometimes

forget the red and thirsty hell to which his hideous

necessitarianism dragged him among the wide waters and the white

flat lilies of the Ouse. He was damned by John Calvin; he was

almost saved by John Gilpin. Everywhere we see that men do not go

mad by dreaming. Critics are much madder than poets. Homer is

complete and calm enough; it is his critics who tear him into

extravagant tatters. Shakespeare is quite himself; it is only some

of his critics who have discovered that he was somebody else. And

though St. John the Evangelist saw many strange monsters in his

vision, he saw no creature so wild as one of his own commentators.

The general fact is simple. Poetry is sane because it floats

easily in an infinite sea; reason seeks to cross the infinite sea,

and so make it finite. The result is mental exhaustion, like the

physical exhaustion of Mr. Holbein. To accept everything is an

exercise, to understand everything a strain. The poet only desires

exaltation and expansion, a world to stretch himself in. The poet

only asks to get his head into the heavens. It is the logician who

seeks to get the heavens into his head. And it is his head that

splits.

It is a small matter, but not irrelevant, that this striking

mistake is commonly supported by a striking misquotation. We have

all heard people cite the celebrated line of Dryden as "Great

genius is to madness near allied." But Dryden did not say that

great genius was to madness near allied. Dryden was a great genius

himself, and knew better. It would have been hard to find a man

more romantic than he, or more sensible. What Dryden said was

this, "Great wits are oft to madness near allied"; and that is

true. It is the pure promptitude of the intellect that is in peril

of a breakdown. Also people might remember of what sort of man

Dryden was talking. He was not talking of any unworldly visionary

like Vaughan or George Herbert. He was talking of a cynical man of

the world, a sceptic, a diplomatist, a great practical politician.

Such men are indeed to madness near allied. Their incessant

calculation of their own brains and other people's brains is a

dangerous trade. It is always perilous to the mind to reckon up

the mind. A flippant person has asked why we say, "As mad as a

hatter." A more flippant person might answer that a hatter is mad

because he has to measure the human head.

And if great reasoners are often maniacal, it is equally true

that maniacs are commonly great reasoners. When I was engaged in a

controversy with the CLARION on the matter of free will, that able

writer Mr. R. B. Suthers said that free will was lunacy, because

it meant causeless actions, and the actions of a lunatic would be

causeless. I do not dwell here upon the disastrous lapse in

determinist logic. Obviously if any actions, even a lunatic's, can

be causeless, determinism is done for. If the chain of causation

can be broken for a madman, it can be broken for a man. But my

purpose is to point out something more practical. It was natural,

perhaps, that a modern Marxian Socialist should not know anything

about free will. But it was certainly remarkable that a modern

Marxian Socialist should not know anything about lunatics. Mr.

Suthers evidently did not know anything about lunatics. The last

thing that can be said of a lunatic is that his actions are

causeless. If any human acts may loosely be called causeless, they

are the minor acts of a healthy man; whistling as he walks;

slashing the grass with a stick; kicking his heels or rubbing his

hands. It is the happy man who does the useless things; the sick

man is not strong enough to be idle. It is exactly such careless

and causeless actions that the madman could never understand; for

the madman (like the determinist) generally sees too much cause in

everything. The madman would read a conspiratorial significance

into those empty activities. He would think that the lopping of

the grass was an attack on private property. He would think that

the kicking of the heels was a signal to an accomplice. If the

madman could for an instant become careless, he would become sane.

Every one who has had the misfortune to talk with people in the

heart or on the edge of mental disorder, knows that their most

sinister quality is a horrible clarity of detail; a connecting of

one thing with another in a map more elaborate than a maze. If you

argue with a madman, it is extremely probable that you will get

the worst of it; for in many ways his mind moves all the quicker

for not being delayed by the things that go with good judgment. He

is not hampered by a sense of humour or by charity, or by the dumb

certainties of experience. He is the more logical for losing

certain sane affections. Indeed, the common phrase for insanity is

in this respect a misleading one. The madman is not the man who

has lost his reason. The madman is the man who has lost everything

except his reason.

The madman's explanation of a thing is always complete, and

often in a purely rational sense satisfactory. Or, to speak more

strictly, the insane explanation, if not conclusive, is at least

unanswerable; this may be observed specially in the two or three

commonest kinds of madness. If a man says (for instance) that men

have a conspiracy against him, you cannot dispute it except by

saying that all the men deny that they are conspirators; which is

exactly what conspirators would do. His explanation covers the

facts as much as yours. Or if a man says that he is the rightful

King of England, it is no complete answer to say that the existing

authorities call him mad; for if he were King of England that

might be the wisest thing for the existing authorities to do. Or

if a man says that he is Jesus Christ, it is no answer to tell him

that the world denies his divinity; for the world denied Christ's.

Nevertheless he is wrong. But if we attempt to trace his

error in exact terms, we shall not find it quite so easy as we had

supposed. Perhaps the nearest we can get to expressing it is to

say this: that his mind moves in a perfect but narrow circle. A

small circle is quite as infinite as a large circle; but, though

it is quite as infinite, it is not so large. In the same way the

insane explanation is quite as complete as the sane one, but it is

not so large. A bullet is quite as round as the world, but it is

not the world. There is such a thing as a narrow universality;

there is such a thing as a small and cramped eternity; you may see

it in many modern religions. Now, speaking quite externally and

empirically, we may say that the strongest and most unmistakable

MARK of madness is this combination between a logical completeness

and a spiritual contraction. The lunatic's theory explains a large

number of things, but it does not explain them in a large way. I

mean that if you or I were dealing with a mind that was growing

morbid, we should be chiefly concerned not so much to give it

arguments as to give it air, to convince it that there was

something cleaner and cooler outside the suffocation of a single

argument. Suppose, for instance, it were the first case that I

took as typical; suppose it were the case of a man who accused

everybody of conspiring against him. If we could express our

deepest feelings of protest and appeal against this obsession, I

suppose we should say something like this: "Oh, I admit that you

have your case and have it by heart, and that many things do fit

into other things as you say. I admit that your explanation

explains a great deal; but what a great deal it leaves out! Are

there no other stories in the world except yours; and are all men

busy with your business? Suppose we grant the details; perhaps

when the man in the street did not seem to see you it was only his

cunning; perhaps when the policeman asked you your name it was

only because he knew it already. But how much happier you would be

if you only knew that these people cared nothing about you! How

much larger your life would be if your self could become smaller

in it; if you could really look at other men with common curiosity

and pleasure; if you could see them walking as they are in their

sunny selfishness and their virile indifference! You would begin

to be interested in them, because they were not interested in you.

You would break out of this tiny and tawdry theatre in which your

own little plot is always being played, and you would find

yourself under a freer sky, in a street full of splendid

strangers." Or suppose it were the second case of madness, that of

a man who claims the crown, your impulse would be to answer, "All

right! Perhaps you know that you are the King of England; but why

do you care? Make one magnificent effort and you will be a human

being and look down on all the kings of the earth." Or it might be

the third case, of the madman who called himself Christ. If we

said what we felt, we should say, "So you are the Creator and

Redeemer of the world: but what a small world it must be! What a

little heaven you must inhabit, with angels no bigger than

butterflies! How sad it must be to be God; and an inadequate God!

Is there really no life fuller and no love more marvellous than

yours; and is it really in your small and painful pity that all

flesh must put its faith? How much happier you would be, how much

more of you there would be, if the hammer of a higher God could

smash your small cosmos, scattering the stars like spangles, and

leave you in the open, free like other men to look up as well as

down!"

And it must be remembered that the most purely practical

science does take this view of mental evil; it does not seek to

argue with it like a heresy but simply to snap it like a spell.

Neither modern science nor ancient religion believes in complete

free thought. Theology rebukes certain thoughts by calling them

blasphemous. Science rebukes certain thoughts by calling them

morbid. For example, some religious societies discouraged men more

or less from thinking about sex. The new scientific society

definitely discourages men from thinking about death; it is a

fact, but it is considered a morbid fact. And in dealing with

those whose morbidity has a touch of mania, modern science cares

far less for pure logic than a dancing Dervish. In these cases it

is not enough that the unhappy man should desire truth; he must

desire health. Nothing can save him but a blind hunger for

normality, like that of a beast. A man cannot think himself out of

mental evil; for it is actually the organ of thought that has

become diseased, ungovernable, and, as it were, independent. He

can only be saved by will or faith. The moment his mere reason

moves, it moves in the old circular rut; he will go round and

round his logical circle, just as a man in a third-class carriage

on the Inner Circle will go round and round the Inner Circle

unless he performs the voluntary, vigorous, and mystical act of

getting out at Gower Street. Decision is the whole business here;

a door must be shut for ever. Every remedy is a desperate remedy.

Every cure is a miraculous cure. Curing a madman is not arguing

with a philosopher; it is casting out a devil. And however quietly

doctors and psychologists may go to work in the matter, their

attitude is profoundly intolerant -- as intolerant as Bloody Mary.

Their attitude is really this: that the man must stop thinking, if

he is to go on living. Their counsel is one of intellectual

amputation. If thy HEAD offend thee, cut it off; for it is better,

not merely to enter the Kingdom of Heaven as a child, but to enter

it as an imbecile, rather than with your whole intellect to be

cast into hell -- or into Hanwell.

Such is the madman of experience; he is commonly a reasoner,

frequently a successful reasoner. Doubtless he could be vanquished

in mere reason, and the case against him put logically. But it can

be put much more precisely in more general and even aesthetic

terms. He is in the clean and well-lit prison of one idea: he is

sharpened to one painful point. He is without healthy hesitation

and healthy complexity. Now, as I explain in the introduction, I

have determined in these early chapters to give not so much a

diagram of a doctrine as some pictures of a point of view. And I

have described at length my vision of the maniac for this reason:

that just as I am affected by the maniac, so I am affected by most

modern thinkers. That unmistakable mood or note that I hear from

Hanwell, I hear also from half the chairs of science and seats of

learning to-day; and most of the mad doctors are mad doctors in

more senses than one. They all have exactly that combination we

have noted: the combination of an expansive and exhaustive reason

with a contracted common sense. They are universal only in the

sense that they take one thin explanation and carry it very far.

But a pattern can stretch for ever and still be a small pattern.

They see a chess-board white on black, and if the universe is

paved with it, it is still white on black. Like the lunatic, they

cannot alter their standpoint; they cannot make a mental effort

and suddenly see it black on white.

Take first the more obvious case of materialism. As an

explanation of the world, materialism has a sort of insane

simplicity. It has just the quality of the madman's argument; we

have at once the sense of it covering everything and the sense of

it leaving everything out. Contemplate some able and sincere

materialist, as, for instance, Mr. McCabe, and you will have

exactly this unique sensation. He understands everything, and

everything does not seem worth understanding. His cosmos may be

complete in every rivet and cog-wheel, but still his cosmos is

smaller than our world. Somehow his scheme, like the lucid scheme

of the madman, seems unconscious of the alien energies and the

large indifference of the earth; it is not thinking of the real

things of the earth, of fighting peoples or proud mothers, or

first love or fear upon the sea. The earth is so very large, and

the cosmos is so very small. The cosmos is about the smallest hole

that a man can hide his head in.

It must be understood that I am not now discussing the

relation of these creeds to truth; but, for the present, solely

their relation to health. Later in the argument I hope to attack

the question of objective verity; here I speak only of a

phenomenon of psychology. I do not for the present attempt to

prove to Haeckel that materialism is untrue, any more than I

attempted to prove to the man who thought he was Christ that he

was labouring under an error. I merely remark here on the fact

that both cases have the same kind of completeness and the same

kind of incompleteness. You can explain a man's detention at

Hanwell by an indifferent public by saying that it is the

crucifixion of a god of whom the world is not worthy. The

explanation does explain. Similarly you may explain the order in

the universe by saying that all things, even the souls of men, are

leaves inevitably unfolding on an utterly unconscious tree -- the

blind destiny of matter. The explanation does explain, though not,

of course, so completely as the madman's. But the point here is

that the normal human mind not only objects to both, but feels to

both the same objection. Its approximate statement is that if the

man in Hanwell is the real God, he is not much of a god. And,

similarly, if the cosmos of the materialist is the real cosmos, it

is not much of a cosmos. The thing has shrunk. The deity is less

divine than many men; and (according to Haeckel) the whole of life

is something much more grey, narrow, and trivial than many

separate aspects of it. The parts seem greater than the whole.

For we must remember that the materialist philosophy (whether

true or not) is certainly much more limiting than any religion. In

one sense, of course, all intelligent ideas are narrow. They

cannot be broader than themselves. A Christian is only restricted

in the same sense that an atheist is restricted. He cannot think

Christianity false and continue to be a Christian; and the atheist

cannot think atheism false and continue to be an atheist. But as

it happens, there is a very special sense in which materialism has

more restrictions than spiritualism. Mr. McCabe thinks me a slave

because I am not allowed to believe in determinism. I think Mr.

McCabe a slave because he is not allowed to believe in fairies.

But if we examine the two vetoes we shall see that his is really

much more of a pure veto than mine. The Christian is quite free to

believe that there is a considerable amount of settled order and

inevitable development in the universe. But the materialist is not

allowed to admit into his spotless machine the slightest speck of

spiritualism or miracle. Poor Mr. McCabe is not allowed to retain

even the tiniest imp, though it might be hiding in a pimpernel.

The Christian admits that the universe is manifold and even

miscellaneous, just as a sane man knows that he is complex. The

sane man knows that he has a touch of the beast, a touch of the

devil, a touch of the saint, a touch of the citizen. Nay, the

really sane man knows that he has a touch of the madman. But the

materialist's world is quite simple and solid, just as the madman

is quite sure he is sane. The materialist is sure that history has

been simply and solely a chain of causation, just as the

interesting person before mentioned is quite sure that he is

simply and solely a chicken. Materialists and madmen never have

doubts.

Spiritual doctrines do not actually limit the mind as do

materialistic denials. Even if I believe in immortality I need not

think about it. But if I disbelieve in immortality I must not

think about it. In the first case the road is open and I can go as

far as I like; in the second the road is shut. But the case is

even stronger, and the parallel with madness is yet more strange.

For it was our case against the exhaustive and logical theory of

the lunatic that, right or wrong, it gradually destroyed his

humanity. Now it is the charge against the main deductions of the

materialist that, right or wrong, they gradually destroy his

humanity; I do not mean only kindness, I mean hope, courage,

poetry, initiative, all that is human. For instance, when

materialism leads men to complete fatalism (as it generally does),

it is quite idle to pretend that it is in any sense a liberating

force. It is absurd to say that you are especially advancing

freedom when you only use free thought to destroy free will. The

determinists come to bind, not to loose. They may well call their

law the "chain" of causation. It is the worst chain that ever

fettered a human being. You may use the language of liberty, if

you like, about materialistic teaching, but it is obvious that

this is just as inapplicable to it as a whole as the same language

when applied to a man locked up in a mad-house. You may say, if

you like, that the man is free to think himself a poached egg. But

it is surely a more massive and important fact that if he is a

poached egg he is not free to eat, drink, sleep, walk, or smoke a

cigarette. Similarly you may say, if you like, that the bold

determinist speculator is free to disbelieve in the reality of the

will. But it is a much more massive and important fact that he is

not free to raise, to curse, to thank, to justify, to urge, to

punish, to resist temptations, to incite mobs, to make New Year

resolutions, to pardon sinners, to rebuke tyrants, or even to say

"thank you" for the mustard.

In passing from this subject I may note that there is a queer

fallacy to the effect that materialistic fatalism is in some way

favourable to mercy, to the abolition of cruel punishments or

punishments of any kind. This is startlingly the reverse of the

truth. It is quite tenable that the doctrine of necessity makes no

difference at all; that it leaves the flogger flogging and the

kind friend exhorting as before. But obviously if it stops either

of them it stops the kind exhortation. That the sins are

inevitable does not prevent punishment; if it prevents anything it

prevents persuasion. Determinism is quite as likely to lead to

cruelty as it is certain to lead to cowardice. Determinism is not

inconsistent with the cruel treatment of criminals. What it is

(perhaps) inconsistent with is the generous treatment of

criminals; with any appeal to their better feelings or

encouragement in their moral struggle. The determinist does not

believe in appealing to the will, but he does believe in changing

the environment. He must not say to the sinner, "Go and sin no

more," because the sinner cannot help it. But he can put him in

boiling oil; for boiling oil is an environment. Considered as a

figure, therefore, the materialist has the fantastic outline of

the figure of the madman. Both take up a position at once

unanswerable and intolerable.

Of course it is not only of the materialist that all this is

true. The same would apply to the other extreme of speculative

logic. There is a sceptic far more terrible than he who believes

that everything began in matter. It is possible to meet the

sceptic who believes that everything began in himself. He doubts

not the existence of angels or devils, but the existence of men

and cows. For him his own friends are a mythology made up by

himself. He created his own father and his own mother. This

horrible fancy has in it something decidedly attractive to the

somewhat mystical egoism of our day. That publisher who thought

that men would get on if they believed in themselves, those

seekers after the Superman who are always looking for him in the

looking-glass, those writers who talk about impressing their

personalities instead of creating life for the world, all these

people have really only an inch between them and this awful

emptiness. Then when this kindly world all round the man has been

blackened out like a lie; when friends fade into ghosts, and the

foundations of the world fail; then when the man, believing in

nothing and in no man, is alone in his own nightmare, then the

great individualistic motto shall be written over him in avenging

irony. The stars will be only dots in the blackness of his own

brain; his mother's face will be only a sketch from his own insane

pencil on the walls of his cell. But over his cell shall be

written, with dreadful truth, "He believes in himself."

All that concerns us here, however, is to note that this

panegoistic extreme of thought exhibits the same paradox as the

other extreme of materialism. It is equally complete in theory and

equally crippling in practice. For the sake of simplicity, it is

easier to state the notion by saying that a man can believe that

he is always in a dream. Now, obviously there can be no positive

proof given to him that he is not in a dream, for the simple

reason that no proof can be offered that might not be offered in a

dream. But if the man began to burn down London and say that his

housekeeper would soon call him to breakfast, we should take him

and put him with other logicians in a place which has often been

alluded to in the course of this chapter. The man who cannot

believe his senses, and the man who cannot believe anything else,

are both insane, but their insanity is proved not by any error in

their argument, but by the manifest mistake of their whole lives.

They have both locked themselves up in two boxes, painted inside

with the sun and stars; they are both unable to get out, the one

into the health and happiness of heaven, the other even into the

health and happiness of the earth. Their position is quite

reasonable; nay, in a sense it is infinitely reasonable, just as a

threepenny bit is infinitely circular. But there is such a thing

as a mean infinity, a base and slavish eternity. It is amusing to

notice that many of the moderns, whether sceptics or mystics, have

taken as their sign a certain eastern symbol, which is the very

symbol of this ultimate nullity. When they wish to represent

eternity, they represent it by a serpent with his tail in his

mouth. There is a startling sarcasm in the image of that very

unsatisfactory meal. The eternity of the material fatalists, the

eternity of the eastern pessimists, the eternity of the

supercilious theosophists and higher scientists of to-day is,

indeed, very well presented by a serpent eating his tail, a

degraded animal who destroys even himself.

This chapter is purely practical and is concerned with what

actually is the chief mark and element of insanity; we may say in

summary that it is reason used without root, reason in the void.

The man who begins to think without the proper first principles

goes mad; he begins to think at the wrong end. And for the rest of

these pages we have to try and discover what is the right end. But

we may ask in conclusion, if this be what drives men mad, what is

it that keeps them sane? By the end of this book I hope to give a

definite, some will think a far too definite, answer. But for the

moment it is possible in the same solely practical manner to give

a general answer touching what in actual human history keeps men

sane. Mysticism keeps men sane. As long as you have mystery you

have health; when you destroy mystery you create morbidity. The

ordinary man has always been sane because the ordinary man has

always been a mystic. He has permitted the twilight. He has always

had one foot in earth and the other in fairyland. He has always

left himself free to doubt his gods; but (unlike the agnostic of

to-day) free also to believe in them. He has always cared more for

truth than for consistency. If he saw two truths that seemed to

contradict each other, he would take the two truths and the

contradiction along with them. His spiritual sight is

stereoscopic, like his physical sight: he sees two different

pictures at once and yet sees all the better for that. Thus he has

always believed that there was such a thing as fate, but such a

thing as free will also. Thus he believed that children were

indeed the kingdom of heaven, but nevertheless ought to be

obedient to the kingdom of earth. He admired youth because it was

young and age because it was not. It is exactly this balance of

apparent contradictions that has been the whole buoyancy of the

healthy man. The whole secret of mysticism is this: that man can

understand everything by the help of what he does not understand.

The morbid logician seeks to make everything lucid, and succeeds

in making everything mysterious. The mystic allows one thing to be

mysterious, and everything else becomes lucid. The determinist

makes the theory of causation quite clear, and then finds that he

cannot say "if you please" to the housemaid. The Christian permits

free will to remain a sacred mystery; but because of this his

relations with the housemaid become of a sparkling and crystal

clearness. He puts the seed of dogma in a central darkness; but it

branches forth in all directions with abounding natural health. As

we have taken the circle as the symbol of reason and madness, we

may very well take the cross as the symbol at once of mystery and

of health. Buddhism is centripetal, but Christianity is

centrifugal: it breaks out. For the circle is perfect and infinite

in its nature; but it is fixed for ever in its size; it can never

be larger or smaller. But the cross, though it has at its heart a

collision and a contradiction, can extend its four arms for ever

without altering its shape. Because it has a paradox in its centre

it can grow without changing. The circle returns upon itself and

is bound. The cross opens its arms to the four winds; it is a

signpost for free travellers.

Symbols alone are of even a cloudy value in speaking of this

deep matter; and another symbol from physical nature will express

sufficiently well the real place of mysticism before mankind. The

one created thing which we cannot look at is the one thing in the

light of which we look at everything -- Like the sun at noonday,

mysticism explains everything else by the blaze of its own

victorious invisibility -- Detached intellectualism is (in the

exact sense of a popular phrase) all moonshine; for it is light

without heat, and it is secondary light, reflected from a dead

world. But the Greeks were right when they made Apollo the god

both of imagination and of sanity; for he was both the patron of

poetry and the patron of healing. Of necessary dogmas and a

special creed I shall speak later. But that transcendentalism by

which all men live has primarily much the position of the sun in

the sky. We are conscious of it as of a kind of splendid

confusion; it is something both shining and shapeless, at once a

blaze and a blur. But the circle of the moon is as clear and

unmistakable, as recurrent and inevitable, as the circle of Euclid

on a blackboard. For the moon is utterly reasonable; and the moon

is the mother of lunatics and has given to them all her name.