Hitherto, all that you have attained has been-or at least has seemed to you-the direct result of your own hard work. But some word we must have, to indicate the real cleavage which exists between the second and third stages in the development of the contemplative consciousness: the real change which, if you would go further on these interior paths, must now take place in the manner of your apprehension of Reality. It at once suggests to him visions and ecstasies, superstitious beliefs, ghosts, and other disagreeable interferences with the order which he calls “natural” and inclines him to his old attitude of suspicion in respect of all mystical things. The hard separation which some mystical writers insist upon making between “natural” and “supernatural” contemplation, has been on the whole productive of confusion rather than clearness: for the word “supernatural” has many unfortunate associations for the mind of the plain man. 126 CHAPTER IX THE THIRD FORM OF CONTEMPLATION
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