I
I have always sought to bring my mind close to the mind of Indian and
Japanese poets, old women in Connaught, mediums in Soho, lay brothers whom
I imagine dreaming in some mediaeval monastery the dreams of their
village, learned authors who refer all to antiquity; to immerse it in the
general mind where that mind is scarce separable from what we have begun
to call "the subconscious"; to liberate it from all that comes of councils
and committees, from the world as it is seen from universities or from
populous towns; and that I might so believe I have murmured evocations and
frequented mediums, delighted in all that displayed great problems
through sensuous images, or exciting phrases, accepting from abstract
schools but a few technical words that are so old they seem but broken
architraves fallen amid bramble and grass, and have put myself to school
where all things are seen: _A Tenedo Tacitae per Amica Silentia Lunae_. At
one time I thought to prove my conclusions by quoting from diaries where I
have recorded certain strange events the moment they happened, but now I
have changed my mind--I will but say like the Arab boy that became Vizier:
"O brother, I have taken stock in the desert sand and of the sayings of
antiquity."