The period of transition and trial known to European mystics as the Dark Night of the Soul, is not mentioned in Indian manuals as an episode of the spiritual life, for such an interruption would hardly harmonize with their curriculum of regular progress towards enlightenment.  But mystic poetry testifies that in Asia as in Europe this feeling of desertion and loneliness is a frequent experience in the struggles and adventures of the soul.  It is apparently not necessary, just as the incidental joys and triumphs of the soul—­strains of heavenly music, aerial flights, and visions of the universal scheme—­are also not essential.  The essential features of the mystic way, as well as its usual incidents, are common to Asia and Europe, and in both continents are expressed in two forms.  One view contrasts the surface life and a deeper life:  when the intellect ceases to plague and puzzle, something else arises from the depth and makes its unity with some greater Force to be felt as a reality.  This idea finds ample expression in the many Brahmanic systems which regarded the centre and core of the human being as an atman or purusha, happy when in the undisturbed peace of its own nature but distracted by the senses and intellect.  The other view of mystic experiences regards them as a remaking of character, the evolution of a new personality and in fact a new birth.  This of course need not be a denial of the other view:  the emergence of the latent self may effect a transformation of the whole being.  But Buddhism, at any rate early Buddhism, formulates its theory in a polemical form.  There is no ready-made latent self, awaiting manifestation when its fetters and veils are removed:  man’s inner life is capable of superhuman extension but the extension is the result of enlargement and training, not of self-revelation.

CHAPTER XV

MYTHOLOGY IN HINDUISM AND BUDDHISM

1

The later phases of Buddhism, described as Mahayana, show this feature among many others, that the supernatural and mythological side of religion becomes prominent.  Gods or angels play an increasingly important part, the Buddha himself becomes a being superior to all gods, and Buddhas, gods and saints perform at every turn feats for which miracle seems too modest a name.  The object of the present chapter is to trace the early stages of these beliefs, for they are found in the Pali Canon, although it is not until later that they overgrow and hide the temple in whose walls they are rooted.

It may be fairly said that Buddhism is not a miraculous religion in the sense that none of its essential doctrines depend on miracles.  It would seem that such a religion as Mormonism must collapse if it were admitted that the Book of Mormon is not a revelation delivered to Joseph Smith.  But the content of the Buddha’s teaching is not miraculous and, though he is alleged to have possessed insight exceeding ordinary human knowledge, yet this is not exactly a miracle and it is a question whether an unusual intelligence disciplined by meditation might not attain to such knowledge.  Still, though the essence of the doctrine may be detachable from miracles and even be scientific, one cannot read very far in the Vinaya or the Sutta Pitaka without coming upon unearthly beings or supernatural occurrences.