Page:The World as Will and Idea - Schopenhauer, tr. Haldane and Kemp - Volume 3.djvu/446

430 lies in its denial, we see all religions at their highest point pass over into mysticism and mysteries, i.e., into darkness and veiled obscurity, which for knowledge signify merely an empty spot, the point where knowledge necessarily ceases; therefore for thought this can only be expressed by negations, but for sense perception it is indicated by symbolical signs; in temples by dim light and silence; in Brahmanism indeed by the required suspension of all thought and perception for the sake of sinking oneself profoundly in the grounds of one's own being, mentally pronouncing the mysterious Oum. Mysticism in the widest sense is every guidance to the immediate consciousness of that to which neither perception nor conception, thus in general no knowledge extends. The mystic is thus opposed to the philosopher by the fact that he begins from within, while the philosopher begins from without. The mystic starts from his inner, positive, individual experience, in which he finds himself to be the eternal and only being, &c. But nothing of this is communicable except the assertions which one has to accept upon his word; consequently he cannot convince. The philosopher, on the other hand, starts from what is common to all, from the objective phenomenon which lies before all, and from the facts of consciousness as they are present in all. His method is therefore reflection upon all