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Copsford and the Nature Mysticism of Walter JC Murray

Introduction

Copsford is a remarkable and haunting book which many readers find themselves returning to time and again. Its author, Walter John Campbell Murray, was not only a great nature writer, he may also be one of Britain’s most important unacknowledged Nature Mystics. In this brief paper I hope to both encourage people to read and understand Copsford itself, but also to attempt an assessment of Murray’s Nature Mysticism.

Copsford relates the story of the twelve months that Murray spent, as a young man, living in an isolated and derelict cottage in the Weald. A more detailed analysis follows below, but here it is essential to provide an introduction for what follows.

Copsford was first published in 1948. The date of publication is very misleading and has led some reviewers in the past to visualise Murray’s experience in the period immediately after WWII. It is true that the life lived by Murray during the twelve months at Copsford was one of an austerity and simplicity which would fit well with the rationing etc. of the post-war years. However, Murray’s year in residence at Copsford actually took place much earlier than this, I calculate around 1925-26.

This puts a slightly different complexion on the book, as it could be fitted into the canon of literature and philosophical movements that arose in the traumatised aftermath of the World War I. Again, this will be considered in more detail, later on.

Murray’s year-long residence at Copsford thus takes place in the 1920’s. He had previously resided in London and he moved to Copsford, both to escape the misery of the urban life-style, but also to live closer to nature. In this latter he certainly succeeded, living alone but for a dog, a bitch called ‘Floss’, who he purchased from the postman in the nearby village. Murray’s plan was to sustain himself by freelance writing, producing contributions to daily newspapers and periodicals, and by selling herbs harvested from the surrounding countryside and dispatched for sale in London. All of this he did, with varying degree of success.

For a year he scraped a living in this way, finding an intimate connection with nature and the surrounding countryside, experiencing weather in the raw in all its forms. His mode of living was Spartan, simple and almost aesthetic and totally lacking in the artificial distractions of the ‘modern’ world. This made him much more conscious of the natural world around him, and it is this which makes the book so captivating. In the end Murray was driven out of Copsford after rainfall so heavy that the cottage was flooded even though it stood on a hill. And the climatic storm at the end of the book is one of its symbolic highlights.

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The book though becomes more than the account of a year spent close to nature. On repeated reading it becomes apparent that it resembles Henry Thoreau’s masterpiece Walden. Indeed although written nearly 100 years apart, Copsford and Walden share certain characteristics. In both cases the author, disillusioned with the lack of meaning in modern urban living, abandons the city and retreats to a cottage in the ‘wild’. Neither flee to a rugged or total wilderness, but find the ‘wild’ closer to home – and this is part of their significance. The wild is within as much as without. Nevertheless both authors live in an isolated cottage or hut, set apart from the lives of their fellow man and both opt for a simplistic life-style.

Copsford is both charming and haunting at the same time. It is also inspiring and heart-warming. And Murray himself never quite got over the experience of the year he recounts in the book.

Walter J C Murray

Finding out details about the life of Walter Murray is difficult – and I am still engaged on this task. I have been in touch with members of his family and former pupils, but clarification is still pending and the internet – often a surprisingly useful tool for research – is disappointingly mute on the subject. Likewise, I have not yet located an obituary, which is surprising. Altogether, so far, I have found very little that throws much light on Murray’s life and work, but what I have gleaned is offered here as a starting point.

Walter John Campbell Murray was born on 20 th August 1900 and died in January, 1985. His death was recorded at Eastbourne. We do know, that by his own admission he was ‘born and bred in Sussex’. 1 He may have served in the Royal Navy towards the end of the First World War, because in Copsford he refers to being in the radio hut of a ship in mid-Atlantic, listening to the sound of submarines.2 British submarines were fitted with hydrophone equipment during WW1 and so it is likely that Murray was conscripted in January 1918. After the war he may well have gone to university and then moved to London where he appears to have obtained some work as a teacher or as a journalist. By about 1924 he seems to have been living in the poorer part of Pimlico. He recalled his time in London as an unhappy one. In Copsford he recalled;

“When I lived in London I cannot recollect a single instance in which I took notice with pleasure of what the wind was doing. I remember, during that last winter, that I was cold when a north-easter blew down my miserable street and pierced my threadbare overcoat. I remember watching the smoke roll sombrely away from the four black satanic chimneys of the power station, and was uncomfortably impressed on January evenings when the dull fire of sunset was trapped among their belching columns; and although the wind blew chilly off the cold grey Thames and whistled in the iron rigging of the bridge which was my vantage ground 3, I thought nothing of it except as another unpleasant element in this dramatic setting of enslaved humanity.” 4

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At the time Murray was living in a bedsit in King’s Street (one of many streets which may have disappeared during the clearance after WWII) which he described as ‘that third-floor-back with its tiny gas fire, its naked electric light and its distressing view,’ 5 A few pages later he again remembered that “…appalling view of roofs and chimneys and slum yards.”6

Unfortunately, Murray’s inclination to write was being starved of the very oxygen that it needed to survive. As he confessed later in Copsford, he had “just managed to keep myself on the uncertain income of a freelance journalist” but he was not the sort who could interview refuse collectors and write about them. ‘…my heart was not in it. I was of the country. I could not dip my pen in the life-blood of the city streets. I needed the very song of the shadow-dappled brook to write, with the sound of wild wings in my ears and the scent of wild flowers in my nostrils.” 7

But it was clearly not just the urban grime that made his life in the city unbearable. As he later recalled in Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom:

‘At one time when living in the city, alone and sick at heart, occasionally I would snatch a few hours, when all the other fellows were at their work, and go down to Kew. Spring beckoned. Ah, how I longed for her caress…There one early spring day when a blustering nor’-easter had swept all visitors away, I saw the geese take wing. They swept across the water and round the long island, up the clearing and above the trees…in steep bank they wheel, sunlit wings against a cloud-decked sky – and the whistle of their pinions, shrill keen, exhilarating. What other spur was needed? Within a month I had left the city behind me forever.’ 8

It is abundantly clear that Murray needed to be able to connect with Nature. It had probably become ingrained in his psyche from a young age, and although he searched for it in his city environment – as the above extracts show – it was never there in sufficient presence to satisfy his need. It was to satisfy this need that he retreated to the Weald. However, this is not the complete story. Murray had already developed an attraction for a young woman to whom he referred rather obliquely and coyly as ‘the music teacher’ and who had taken a teaching post at a school in Horam in East Sussex. It was with her assistance that, when he decided to break away from London, a cottage was found for him nearby. Somewhat impoverished, Murray could not afford a comfortable cottage (even then!) and was forced to rent a badly dilapidated cottage which had not been occupied for years. In fact it was in such a state of dereliction that the farmer on whose land it stood was both suspicious and puzzled at Murray’s interest. Notwithstanding, Murray occupied the lonely cottage for a year, during which time his relationship with the music teacher developed and, sometime after he was forced to abandon Copsford, the two were married. Given that both Murray and his wife had teaching experience it was decided to open a small private school, Murray’s School, in Horam which ran for several decades.9

Murray’s experience at Copsford had confirmed in him a need to be close to nature and although he never returned to live at Copsford, he eventually found himself trying to recreate the experience.

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‘Far from forgetting that freedom of meadow and marsh which I had enjoyed I was frequently almost overpowered by a desire to return to it. I longed for the smell of crushed mint in my nostrils, for the hum of insects and the song of birds in my ears, for the close contact with nature that I had experienced. Instead I had to be content with the briefest visits to the woods and streams, with the shortest of holidays among the hills, and from this occasional communion to renew health and strength and try to satisfy my heart.’10

We will return to this comment again a little later, but for now it will suffice to note that this longing resulted in a plan to create a nature reserve which he called ‘The Sanctuary’. The work on this began with the help of his wife and young son in the late 1930s on a plot of land adjacent to the school on the south side of the London Road through Horam.

The creation of the ‘Sanctuary’ was subsequently detailed in A Sanctuary Planted, published in 1953 from which it is evident that the work continued throughout the war years. However, neither Copsford nor A Sanctuary Planted were his first published books. Murray’s first book was Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom, which was published Allen & Unwin in 1946. It seems probable that Murray’s earlier writing for periodicals and newspapers had attracted enough attention for him to obtain work on radio, work which seems to have continued through the 1940s-1950s. Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom however was a curious work. At first reading it appears to be a light, sometimes chaotic ramble through the natural world of the British Isles, randomly picking up flora and fauna to examine in the process. However after several readings certain passages begin to stand out and it becomes apparent that nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom is an appeal to people to reconnect with nature, the so-called ‘Undiscovered Kingdom’ of the title.

Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom went into three editions in 1946, and was then reprinted in 1947 and 1948. Two years later, in 1948, Allen & Unwin also published Copsford, undoubtedly Murray’s finest work. Four editions were published in that year and Copsford has been republished twice, in 1950 (three editions) and then a single edition in 1986. The fact that the prices of second-hand copies of the book have escalated over time gives testimony to its enduring appeal.

The early 1950s were Murray’s most productive time. Working with the broadcaster and entomologist L Hugh Newman, Murray co-wrote three books, Stand and Stare in 1950 seven editions), Nature's Way: Questions and Answers on Animal Behaviour in 1952 (single edition) and Wander and Watch 11 published in 1954 (four editions). He also wrote two more books on his own, both published in 1953, the previously mentioned A Sanctuary Planted, and Romney Marsh. A Sanctuary Planted was published by Phoenix House and further editions were published in 1954 and 1955, while Romney Marsh was published by Robert Hale, and was re-issued in 1972. The problem with the jointly-written books is that it is impossible to tell who contributed what to the work. The books are scarce, but a quick reading of Wander and Watch suggests that Murray made no attempt to insert any of his more philosophical thoughts into them. Romney Marsh is a delightful travelogue – an exploration of the history and geography of the Romney Marsh with, as one might expect, strong attention given to the natural history of the area. Much of its charm lies in Murray’s

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narrative which is written as though addressed to a travelling companion – and is suitably quirky. There is however, no evidence of Murray’s more philosophical side within the book.

Although I have so far been able to find out little more about Murray or his later life, I am assuming that he must have retired as a teacher by the 1970s, and appear to have written no further work. Indeed, the re-issuing of Copsford in 1986 may have been prompted by his death.

Copsford

Although I have already referred to Copsford above, I make no apology for going into more detail here. The book is Murray’s most important book and the one through which most people will approach his work. As we have seen above, after several years in London Murray felt the need to flee from the urban environment. Financial restrictions helped forge what happened subsequently, but Murray also had a strong idea of what he wanted: “…perforce I must find a cottage in the heart of the country; a cottage that cost next to nothing to rent…a cottage which had the open, flower-filled countryside at its very doors.” 12

With the help of his future fiancé, Murray located a derelict cottage on an isolated hill to the north-west of the village of Horam in Sussex. It was isolated, but it was not a huge distance from adjacent farms nor was it much more than an hour’s walk to Horam itself. It was, in a sense, metaphysically isolated. Murray described it as ‘peculiarly situated’ and a mile from the nearest lane. “In other directions tracks and roads were still further away…no road or cart track or any sort of footpath led through the fields and woods towards Copsford. There had been rough tracks in the past, but nothing recognisable remained except here and there grass-covered or hedge-filled depressions. These I only found and traced many months later.” 13

An inspection of 1930s OS maps confirms this to be the case. In the late 19 th

century Copsford, or ‘Copford’ to give it its real name14, had been a smallholding consisting of the cottage and several outbuildings in the form of a small barn and a byre. The latter had been demolished before Murray’s arrival, though scattered brickwork is still there on the site today. The OS maps confirm that a track had originally run close to the site from Hook Farm to the north-east before turning away to the south. 15

Murray provided further information about the location of the cottage. “Copsford stood just back from the summit of a low, round hill. About the base of the hill…a brook meandered, and with a tributary, cut off the cottage…on three sides.” This brook is the Darn or Dern and now there is a narrow footpath bridge over it, though at the time, the bridge may have been a little more substantial. Murray also tells us that, right on top of the hill , was a small pond, about 20 yards from the cottage. This is still there, though now it is a rather stagnant pond in a large and very deep depression, rather like a tree-filled quarry. Today there is also another similar pond to the south-west. Murray doesn’t mention this

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and, as it doesn’t appear on the earlier large-scale OS maps, it may not have been there at the time.

From the outset Murray was struck by the solitude of Copsford. He noted at the beginning of the book that the cottage was protected by “…some intangible screen which shrouded the little hill and veiled the mystery of the unwanted cottage.”16 The building itself was surprisingly small. Murray wrote that the cottage faced east with a chimney at the south end, and a half-ruined brick and slate shed on the north wall.17 He says the living room was 12’ wide and was the full width of the cottage, but adjoining it was a small brick-floored scullery with a grey stone sink under the window facing north. One window on the first floor also faced west. 18 Apart from the fact that the cottage appears to have faced, south-east, the other details seem correct. The only photograph we have of Copsford, taken some years later when it had fallen into greater dilapidation, shows the shed to the side of the house. He added more detail later in the book. “About Copsford cottage there was an enclosure which in the past might have been a well-cultivated garden…There was a narrow strip across the front between the tumbledown fence and the cottage; this widened on either side, and at the back there was quite a piece of some seven or eight rods. But the hedges on either side were fifteen feet high, and suckers, nettles and brambles encroached many yards. Also there were dense tangles in the centre, and about the old well, and beyond there was the tall, shady, overgrown shaw.”19

On his first visit he heard the cottage long before he saw it. Heard the wind moaning through its open windows and rattling loose casements. In fact, the place was in a worse condition that he had envisioned. But standing on the doorstep he had a presentiment of what Copsford might offer him:

“There was rain in the wind now, and the sky was as grey and sad as ever, yet there was something magical in this lonely countryside with its rough pastures, its unkempt hedges, snowy with ragged blackthorn, its woodlands hazy green, its winding brooks…..As I looked at the view from the top of the hill I thought of summer days. Through the grey curtains of rain that were now drawing across the wooded landscape I saw in imagination, summer blue, when all the shimmering countryside would be at my very door…I saw the possibility of doing what it had often been my great desire to do, to live alone and at one with Nature.” 20

Copsford had offered a moment of transcendence and Murray was quick to detect it. His next visit, the day on which he took up occupation seemed to confirm this. “It was a glorious day for my second visit to the cottage. One of those days which are like jewels among the many-coloured beads of spring. A day when we seem to breathe not air but sunshine….” 21

This appreciation of the importance of sunshine is but one of the many clues we have to Murray’s inclination towards Nature Mysticism. The second part of this paper will explore this in more detail, but for now it is important to note that Murray’s psyche responded quickly and intensely to the weather. We have noted above the affect that it had on him in London, but at Copsford it had a more important relevance.

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Murray’s first intention had been to spend as much time as he could at Copsford, writing. However, he realised that this would to be restricted to days when the weather was poor, so that he could use the finer days to seek and harvest the herbs from which he was to make his main living. In practice, however, he found that when the weather was bad it had a depressing effect on his psyche and his ability to write withered away. It was not the only difficulty he had to overcome.

When I first read the book, at the age of 14, I was disturbed by two sections at the beginning of the book. The first involves Murray’s initial sense of hostility from the cottage itself. It is as though the building is trying to expel him and, indeed, it does for a while. The quietness and solitude are overwhelming and he suddenly has to flee the building. It is only out in the open air, in the sunshine that he recovers. However, determined to take up occupation, he re-enters the building creating his own wave of noise, imposing his own presence on the place. This tactic succeeds and he senses that the cottage and he reach a state of mutual-toleration. But then comes Murray’s war with the resident rat population.

It wasn’t until I re-read the book many years later that it occurred to me that Murray’s violent conflict with the rodents might have been a metaphor for something else entirely, especially as he only ever actually sees one of them in the house. It was only when I tried to see the rats as a metaphor for unnamed fears – loneliness, isolation and failure perhaps - that Murray’s violent reaction to them made sense. The episode Murray describes to us is really his own psychological struggle to create the psychological space for the peace and tranquillity which he really needed. The cottage has much to offer, but Murray has to purge his mind first. It is, after all, to overcome loneliness that he acquires Floss. And it is noticeable that Murray’s victory over the rats is achieved with the arrival of a borrowed dog – a companion.

But to achieve what he wanted, required not just a clearing of the mind. It required the elimination of distraction. Poverty may have been a large factor in dictating his life-style at Copsford, but Murray also did what so many of us wish we could do, he adopted a life of frugality and simplicity. Like Henry Thoreau, he ate and lived as simply as possible, stating “…simplification is, I believe, what millions are a-seeking, particularly in the appreciation of life and beauty.”22

Having cleared the path and settled into the cottage in his new life-style, Murray was ready to connect with the natural world around him, or as he frequently referred to it, the ‘undiscovered kingdom’. About three months after moving in, he woke to a perfect June morning:

“It sometimes happens, at rare moments in our lives, we are suddenly aware of an altogether new world, different completely from that in which we commonly live. We feel as though we stand at the threshold of an undiscovered kingdom; for brief moments we understand life interpreted, we perceive meaning instead of things. In those golden minutes I understood every word on a single page of the magic book of life inscribed in a language neither written nor spoken. There was sublime tranquillity in the level white mists of the valley, a symphony like the ascending melodies of Greig in the sun rays that climbed aslant

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the hill, a quiet strength in the stillness of the trees, a brotherhood of life in all living things. I was no longer a single life pushing a difficult way amidst material things, I was part of all creation…It was a baptism into a saner way of living and thinking. The soreness of the slave-collar was salved. It was an outward and visible sign of my inward awareness of at-one-ment.”23

To my mind, this is a hugely important passage. It contains some of the key indications of the moment of revelation experienced by the Nature Mystics, and which I will explore in more detail below. It is also important to note that Murray often used music as a metaphor to help describe the ecstatic sensation that came with heightened consciousness. Clearly it is on this particular morning that Murray first strongly felt the overwhelming sense of being at one with the cosmos which is the characteristic of the Nature Mystics. It is with this heightened awareness that he is able to continue his work for the rest of the year, and which he attempts and indeed does convey to us through the pages of Copsford. In fact his initial reaction to this joyous moment is to go and leap naked into the nearby pond, a suitably sensual response to this mystic occasion.

Having achieved the state of ‘at-oneness’ with Nature or ‘the Kingdom’ around him, Murray proceeds to share with us his experience for the rest of the year, with its repeated moments of ecstasy as well as its disappointments. For it is part of the power of Copsford that it is not simply another book of ‘idyllic’ wish fulfilment. There is still hardship to come but Murray counters these darker moments by sharing with us his elated state of consciousness, his joy, and the consequent rich observation of Nature.

At times Murray attempts to explain the change that came over him. The fact that he sometimes refers to himself at this time as a ‘Green man’ reveals that he recognised the significance of the mystical transformation in his relationship with Nature, and that he saw an echo here of the ancient manifestation of it in the mythical Green Man of the Medieval period. For example, at one point in describing his hunt for the herb Centaury, he records,

“ The search for it… sent me far and wide through deep woods and forest rides, into flowery clearings and bracken-clothed commons. I was no longer a fellow of the open lanes and hedgerows, I became a denizen of the woods. I travelled by spinney and copse, through shaw and forgotten corduroy, at first because there I expected to find my herbs, but later because I became secretive and shy. Living so close to the wild, almost instinctively I copied creatures of the wild. I travelled swiftly, silently and unseen. I learned woodland behaviour, I heard woodland sounds.” 24

Murray has become animal. There are moments too when we can see him coming to terms with his own new-found Mysticism: “…at Copsford there were seasons when time almost stood still, and I too learnt to be still. At first I was restless, miserable, a gnawing discontent tried to eat my heart out, and if I had not been blessed with an inborn love of the countryside it would have succeeded. But I slowly learned to stand and stare. The leaven was working. I not only stood and not only stared, but I began to see. I saw lovely things and rare things...saw the play of light across meadow and wood, saw a shaft of sunlight fill a spring-green copse till it glowed as though the glory of the Light of the World dwelled

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within. I caught an occasional glimpse of the intricate and complex pattern of life, and once or twice, as fleeting as the rainbow-flash from a trembling dewdrop, I perceived that all these things were but the external signs of a kingdom such as I had never dreamed of; that these colours were as a drop-curtain which, while it might never rise to disclose the stage within, grew transparent before my wondering eyes.” 25

But Copsford is not just about learning to ‘see’. It is also about finding an intuitive connection with nature. Murray’s animism is one demonstration of this, but there are others where he emphasises the need for empathy with Nature, for ‘feeling’ Nature. For example, “Sometimes at the height of a summer day, when the sun is warm and the bees hum and all seems set for an endless season, suddenly for some slight thing, almost unconsciously discerned, the end is determined, the first breath of autumn is drawn in the midst of summer. I have known the same thing in the depth of winter, a twitter of bird-song, hazel catkins shaking loose their gold dust, perhaps the scent of a mimosa or just a patch of blue sky, and one hears the first rustle of spring’s awakening. Winter is doomed.” 26

And again:

“Before the leaves of autumn fell I gathered sweet chestnut. The woods beckoned and I was not disobedient to their gentle summons…There was a quiet magic about the hush before the fall. Seed was ripened, fruit was full, new life was born. Rest and sleep were coming to the woods; and pervading the rides and brambly clearings there was a serenity and peace that beggared all telling. Work was done, nothing that was done could be undone. Life had expressed itself unstintingly, in energy and growth and sound and colour, life had made manifest in a thousand forms, and now it was all over, work was done, rest and sleep were coming.”27

It is not surprising that both of these instances relate to the changing of the seasons. They are dramatic periods in the natural world, phases to which all living things respond to some degree, and where Nature and humankind interact most closely. And it is here that Murray’s consciousness ‘feels’ the change as much as sees it.

The climax of the book comes at the end of his herb harvest, when Murray sits down to consider the cheque that he has received for his summer’s crop. It is another critical moment, but it is best to leave this to Murray’s own words:

“I sat staring out of the uncurtained window for a long time. The countryside was empty and bare. The hedges were leafless, the woods toneless and stark, the rough meadows flowerless and dull with withering grasses. All the abundant life and luxuriant foliage of the spring and summer seemed to have come to naught. All my work, my care, my gathering, my journeying, one year of my life, seemed to have shrunk to no more than this [a cheque for payment for the herbs] …it was the fact that all my experiences, all my struggles, all my triumphs, should be summed up as so much cash, that discomforted me. To receive money for all those labours somehow seemed hopelessly inadequate, a pathetic anti-climax….I had found immense pleasure in toiling among the wild things of the countryside, in brushing through the dense herbage of the marsh, stooping in the blazing sun among the agrimony, stealing through the shadowy woodland, returning loaded with great bales to the

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aromatic cottage. I had been heart and soul in my task and what one gives one’s life to can only be rewarded by fabulous sums or nothing. My work was ended, and it was valued at £34:4:2.

What wonder I sat staring out of the window! Copsford was a suitable place to muse on the intrinsic value of things. Those herbs, whether they were to be used for medicinal or culinary purposes, whether they were to be tonic or tobacco, seemed to me beyond price. They were the sweet plants of our English countryside. They had grown there, each in its own peculiar habitat, rich in sunshine and shadow, rain and the good earth. They had been gathered with toil, harvested with patience, stored and dispatched with care. Yet their market value was only a few pence a pound. Did those who ultimately bought them, I wondered, benefit to the extent of copper, or did they receive the riches which I fancied in them were stored?” 28

It is the point at which Murray finally has to come to terms with the conflict between his new world and that of materialistic modernity. Undeterred, Murray begins his plans for the next year’s work. He survives a bitter winter, but is finally defeated by a fierce storm which drives he and Floss from the cottage. He never returns, and for the reader there is sadness at this juncture in the narrative. But, Murray is not depressed, for he takes with him the lesson that Copsford has offered.

“It was over. I was glad and very sad. All the trials and tribulations, the loneliness, the dreariness, the stark wretchedness of that derelict, desolate, inhospitable, mean little building were finished with. I had triumphed, but had been beaten at the post. It had defied me, it had endured me, it now drove me out without so much as a stool under my arm. Drove me out into the wind and the rain as empty-handed as I had first come. I had nothing but the sodden clothes in which I stood. Nothing? Ah, indeed, I had everything! Clivers had twined a sweetheart round my heart. Foxglove had brought me freedom and centaury the fragrance of the countryside. Agrimony had skinned my fingers and given me a new sense of touch. Clematis Vitalba had brought me traveller’s joy. I had discovered a new world following along the scented trail of meadowsweet and tansy. Eyebright had washed my eyes that I might catch a glimpse of a kingdom. Yarrow brought me to mother earth and sweet chestnut showed me the hearts of men. Copsford, that mean little cottage, untenanted for twenty years, rat-ridden, rain-sodden, had been the talisman.”29

Although not quite the final words of the book, - Murray continues to describe his flight from the cottage with Floss - it is the ending. A beautiful ending to a truly beautiful book.

PART 2. Murray and Nature Mysticism

In the second part of this paper I want to focus a little more on the evidence for Murray’s position as a Nature Mystic. Undoubtedly some readers will already have recognised a great deal of significance in the extracts from Copsford given in the previous

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section. But ultimately I want to strengthen the claim by bringing in evidence from some of Murray’s other work. However, before doing so it will be useful to explain what is meant my Nature Mysticism.

Nature Mysticism

In his classic work on Nature Mysticism James Edward Mercer offered a general definition of his subject as ‘the causes and the effects involved in that wide range of intuitions and emotions which nature stimulates without definite appeal to conscious reasoning processes.’ 30

It is not an easy definition and indeed, defining Nature Mysticism is difficult. But in essence it is the spiritual response to the emotional or intuitive reaction we have to contact with Nature. Or, to put it another way, what Mercer was exploring was the spiritual sense that develops as a result of an intense communion with Nature. By ‘communion’ I mean an interaction that takes place between the individual and Nature – whether it be the landscape (or a feature of it), organic life form, weather or even the stars. In other words, it is about an interaction between the individual and the Cosmos.

The important thing, as Mercer realised, is that as individuals we all have the capacity to have a relationship with Nature which has a deep impact upon us and which can lead to a sense of greater well-being or heightened creativity. Conversely, alienation from Nature can lead to a much more negative condition – dulling of the mind, depression, and mental ill-health. And these individual reactions have a wider social consequence. Even writing in 1912, Mercer predicted that it was man’s growing distance from Nature that was creating social, economic and political unrest that would lead to catastrophe. And how prophetic he was!31

City and urban life distances us from Nature. It offers unnatural and artificial stimulation which in fact over-stimulates some of our senses, while depriving other senses of activity. As a result, those other faculties decay. As Mercer put it. “The eye and ear…are deprived of their native stimulants. In short, city conditions unduly inhibit the natural development of many elements of the higher self.”32

Humankind feels an innate need for nature. At the beginning of weekends and holidays in the urbanised West, the population movement is usually away from the city, not towards it. And the traditional ‘seaside’ holiday still has its association with relaxation and healthy activity – even if it has come to seem unfashionable more recently. Country walking, even off-road cycling, have become increasingly popular activities by the early 21 st

century. Behind all of this lies our desire to be in our natural environment rather than the artificial cityscape. The health implications may seem obvious. Clean air, exercise, de-stressing activities, and a degree of space or even solitude perhaps, which the city denies us.

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Furthermore the use of natural environments as an aid in the treatment of both mental and pathological illness is now a common practice in some countries.33

For the Nature Mystic, however, the natural environment is more than a landscape serving as a pleasant backdrop for more absorbing activities. Mercer observed, “The Nature Mystic goes deeper down to the heart of things, and holds that to lose touch with nature is to lose touch with reality as manifested in Nature… it is not mere lack of education of the senses…but the stunting of the soul-life 34 that ensues on divorce from nature, and from the great store of primal and fundamental ideas which are immanent therein.” 35 Furthermore: “The Nature Mystic… desires to hold communion with the spirit and the life which he leads and knows to be manifested in external Nature,…he hears deep calling unto deep…The life within to the life without – and he responds.”36 “

A Nature Mystic, then, is someone who not only becomes aware of the interdependent relationship he or she has with nature, but also seeks to strengthen that connection and develop their consciousness of it.

Being fully engaged and connected with Nature means understanding that we are not only a part of nature, but that we are connected in some way with every part of it, that we share a ‘oneness’ as an inherent part of the Cosmos. It is an understanding that gives perspective and meaning to our existence. It also gives purpose – because once we understand our connection to Nature we come to realise our responsibility towards it and towards everything within it. Although it is sometimes claimed that humankind has a higher level of consciousness than any other species – it is not necessarily the case, since we can, after all, only measure this by our own understanding and definition of consciousness itself.37 But it does mean we should be conscious and aware of our own responsibility towards the rest of the cosmos, its inhabitants, environment and future.

Attempts have also been made to give a more ‘scientific’ cause to a heightened sense of connectedness with Nature. In Biophilia (1984) Edward O Wilson hypothesised that humankind might have a deep, subconscious affiliation with other living life forms. Wilson’s ideas have subsequently been developed and set in the context of evolutionary process, our innate love of Nature might stem from deep within our biology itself. Even more recent studies have suggested that our connection with Nature might be embedded deep within our DNA, and that it might be part of our inherited biological memory.

What all scholars of Nature Mysticism seem to have in common, however, is the vital personal experience of the deep and intuitive encounter with Nature, the moment of connection. It is a moment of revelation, of deep emotional response resulting in elation, joy, or ‘ecstasy’ to use an earlier term. Everyone who experiences this moment of heightened consciousness is suddenly aware of a changed relationship with the cosmos around them. It is a profound and life-changing event. But this is not to say that all encounters with Nature have or are expected to have this effect upon us. So what is it that makes this moment so special?

In The Story of My Heart, published in 1883, the great English nature writer and Mystic, Richard Jefferies, explored his understanding and experience of Nature Mysticism

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and its meaning. He also attempted to convey the moment of heightened consciousness, the sensation of that mystic encounter, the moment of “intense communion” with the earth, the sun and the sky, a feeling so powerful that he “became lost, and absorbed into the being and existence of the universe”. He had already attempted to describe the moment in one of his novels, Restless Human Hearts. He wrote of one of the characters:

”He reposed upon the grass under the shadow of a tree, til the warmth of the sun filled his veins with a drowsy, slumberous yet intense vitality, while the leaves danced in slow and intricate measure between him and the sky…He lost all sense of his own separate existence; his soul became merged in the life of the tree, of the grass, of the thousands of insects, finally in the life of the broad earth underneath, till he felt himself as it were a leaf upon the great cedar of existence …Time, thought, feeling, sense, were gone, all lost; nothing remained but the mere grand fact, the exquisite delight, the infinite joy of existence only”.38

Whilst there are resonances here of the experience of the Buddha, there is a critical difference for Nature Mystics. Because, unlike the practitioners of some Eastern religions, this moment of heightened consciousness is not a moment of transcendence into some spiritual, ‘other’ world. It is a moment of complete connection with the reality of Nature. It is a moment of absorption. The body is neither denied nor abandoned. On the contrary, it becomes more alert to sensation – to touch, smell, taste, sound, sight. Nature becomes everything.

It must also be made clear that Nature Mystics view this encounter in a completely different way to Christian Mystics. For two thousand years, Christian mystics have claimed that the moment of heightened communion with the cosmos and its attendant feeling of elation, are encounters with God (or perhaps some messenger of their deity) and that Nature is just a manifestation of ‘His’ presence. This position, of course, reduces the comparative status of Nature and the cosmos.

Mercer argued that a belief in an ‘Absolute’ entity was not compatible with Nature Mysticism. In fact he was rather scathing about the traditional Christian hypothesis. He rejected the claim of the Christian Mystics: “By a ruthless process of abstraction they have abjured the world of sense to vow allegiance to a mode of being of which nothing can be said without denying it…It swallows up all conditions and relations without becoming any more knowable…It lies totally and eternally beyond the reach of man’s faculties and yet demands his perfect and unreasoning surrender.” 39

In fact Mercer went on to urge Nature Mystics to repudiate the idea completely, saying that they would lose nothing by it. Strong sentiment from a Christian Bishop!

In Varieties of Religious Experience, published in 1902 the American academic William James explored the nature of the ecstatic ‘moment’ experienced by mystics and proposed that it consisted of four main characteristics:

1. It was Ineffable.— He commented, “ no adequate report of its contents can be given in words…its quality must be directly experienced; it cannot be imparted or

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transferred to others…mystical states are more like states of feeling than like states of intellect. No one can make clear to another who has never had a certain feeling, in what the quality or worth of it consists.”

2. It has a Noetic quality.—“Although so similar to states of feeling, mystical states seem to those who experience them to be also states of knowledge. They are states of insight into depths of truth unplumbed by the discursive intellect. They are illuminations, revelations, full of significance and importance, all inarticulate though they remain; and as a rule they carry with them a curious sense of authority for after-time.”

3. They are transient or short-lived—“Mystical states cannot be sustained for long.“4. The receiver does not actively seek the encounter or experience. It is given not

sought. James added “the mystic feels as if his own will were in abeyance, and indeed sometimes as if he were grasped and held by a superior power.”

So the moment of connectedness experienced by Nature Mystics is hard to describe in words, it provides heightened consciousness through an intuitive rather than intellectual activity, it is momentary, and it produces a sense of awe. These are the qualities which we expect to find in the moment of Mystic connectedness. However, there is a dilemma. How can Nature Mystics convey something which is ineffable? The problem is that they can’t, not completely. But they can make the attempt, and this is where the paths of artists, poets, musicians and nature writers cross.

Britain’s most well-known Nature Mystic is the poet William Wordsworth. In The Prelude, Wordsworth attempted to express the beginning and development of his consciousness as a Nature Mystic. His famous Mystical encounter while rowing on Esthwaite Water one evening is worth quoting here:

“I dipped my oars into the silent lake,

And, as I rose upon the stroke, my boat

Went heaving through the water like a swan;

When, from behind that craggy steep till then

The horizon's bound, a huge peak, black and huge,

As if with voluntary power instinct,

Upreared its head. I struck and struck again, 380

And growing still in stature the grim shape

Towered up between me and the stars, and still,

For so it seemed, with purpose of its own

And measured motion like a living thing,

Strode after me. With trembling oars I turned,

And through the silent water stole my way

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Back to the covert of the willow tree;

There in her mooring-place I left my bark,--

And through the meadows homeward went, in grave

And serious mood; but after I had seen 390

That spectacle, for many days, my brain

Worked with a dim and undetermined sense

Of unknown modes of being;”40

Here the poet brings all his skill to bear in attempting to convey the experience to us despite its ineffability. However, the extract is also powerful because he wonderfully conveys the sense of awe created by the towering crag and, in the final line, exhibits James’s Noetic quality – the consciousness of ‘unknown modes of being.’

Wordsworth’s Nature Mysticism is however, more powerfully expressed in another poem, Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey. Wordsworth wrote of the longer-term impact of a moment of mystic connection felt while walking in the Wye valley and of its continuing inspiration:

How oft, in spirit, have I returned to thee,

O sylvan Wye! Thou wanderer thro’ the woods,

How often has my spirit retuned to thee!

…And I have felt a presence

That disturbs me with joy of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime

Of something more deeply interfused,

Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,

And the round ocean and living air,

And the blue sky, and the mind of man:

A motion and a spirit, that impels

All thinking things, all objects of thought,

And rolls through all things, Therefore am I still

A lover of meadows and woods,

And mountains; and of all the mighty world

Of eye, and ear, - both what they half create,

And what perceive; well pleased to recognize

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In nature and the language of the sense,

The anchor of purest thoughts, the nurse,

The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul

Of all my moral being.”41

It is hardly necessary to emphasis here Wordsworth’s final statement about the central role of Nature as the guide, guardian and soul of his (moral) being.

The Victorian Nature Mystic Richard Jefferies gives us a very clear statement of the ineffability of the Mystic connection: "With all the intensity of feeling which exalted me, all the intense communion I held with the earth, the sun and sky, the stars hidden by the light, with the ocean—in no manner can the thrilling depth of these feelings be written—with these I prayed, as if they were the keys of an instrument, of an organ, with which I swelled forth the notes of my soul, redoubling my own voice by their power. The great sun burning with light; the strong earth, dear earth; the warm sky; the pure air; the thought of ocean; the inexpressible beauty of all filled me with a rapture, an ecstasy, …”42

Jefferies gives us many clear examples of Nature Mysticism in his later writing. Here, he is writing about a moment of connection while lying next to a tumulus on the Wiltshire Downs: “Two thousand years being a second to the soul could not cause its extinction. . . Resting by the tumulus, the spirit of the man who had been interred there was to me really alive, and very close. This was quite natural and simple as the grass waving in the wind, the bees humming, and the lark's songs. …. Listening to the sighing of the grass I felt immortality as I felt the beauty of the summer morning, and I thought beyond immortality, of other conditions, more beautiful than existence, higher than immortality."43

The idea of timelessness or of time stopping, is a common feature of the experience expressed by Nature Mystics.

But there are numerous other writers to whom we could turn for examples of Nature Mysticism. Thoreau has already been mentioned. But we could cite names like R W Emerson, W H Hudson, Henry Williamson, Nan Shepherd, etc and much more recently Robert Macfarlane and Rob Cowen.

Having now produced an explanation ( however inadequate) of what Nature Mysticism is, it is time to return to Walter Murray and to consider where he sits in relation to it.

Walter Murray – the Nature Mystic

I want to begin this analysis by drawing together two quotations – both of which I have already used. The first from Richard Jefferies, the other from Walter Murray.

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”He reposed upon the grass under the shadow of a tree, til the warmth of the sun filled his veins with a drowsy, slumberous yet intense vitality, while the leaves dance in slow and intricate measure between him and the sky…He lost all sense of his own separate existence; his soul became merged in the life of the tree, of the grass, of the thousands of insects, finally in the life of the broad earth underneath, till he felt himself as it were a leaf upon the great cedar of existence …Time, thought, feeling, sense, were gone, all lost; nothing remained but the mere grand fact, the exquisite delight, the infinite joy of existence only”.44 (Jefferies)

“It sometimes happens, at rare moments in our lives, we are suddenly aware (passive reception) of an altogether new world, different completely from that in which we commonly live. We feel as though we stand at the threshold of an undiscovered kingdom; for brief moments we understand life interpreted, we perceive meaning instead of things. In those golden minutes I understood every word on a single page of the magic book of life inscribed in a language neither written nor spoken. There was sublime tranquillity in the level white mists of the valley, a symphony like the ascending melodies of Greig in the sun rays that climbed aslant the hill, a quiet strength in the stillness of the trees, a brotherhood of life in all living things. I was no longer a single life pushing a difficult way amidst material things, I was part of all creation (connection)…It was a baptism into a saner way of living and thinking. The soreness of the slave-collar was salved. It was an outward and visible sign of my inward awareness of at-one-ment.”45 (Murray)

Richard Jefferies was a fully committed Nature Mystic and his later writings are full of his attempts to express his sense of connection and his thoughts about its significance. Indeed The Story of My Heart is dedicated to exploring the process whereby he became aware of this. Walter Murray, on the other hand, was not self-consciously a Nature Mystic - or at least he did not express this explicitly in his printed works: but then neither did Wordsworth. However, there is clear evidence in Murray’s writing to support the view that he was.

The extract cited above, from Copsford, is in many ways comparable with the quote from Jefferies. Both attempt to describe the sense of communion with Nature. Both record a sense of merging, of feeling at one with Nature; both imply that the moment of connection begins while the mind is in a passive receptive state, as defined by James. With Jefferies the moment comes when he I reposing on the grass, when his veins are full of a drowsy vitality. Murray’s account conveys that passiveness in the form of a sudden awareness of the landscape around him: there is ‘sublime tranquillity’ in the mist, a’ quiet strength in the stillness of the trees’, and as noted previously, Murray uses music as a metaphor for emotional response. Note also how Jefferies emphasises sensation – he feels the warmth of the sun, sees the leaves dance – until he intuitively connects with Nature, becomes a leaf upon the tree of existence. Murray too has an epiphany and again the lesson is not delivered via a written or spoken language, it comes intuitively, and in the process he merges with all creation.

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To my mind, both extracts offer superb examples of attempts to convey the moment of communion with Nature which lies at the heart of Nature Mysticism. Both record the discovery of a greater existence though ‘feeling’ at one with Nature. In both cases there is an overwhelming awareness of greater consciousness – of knowing more than can be told. Both lose their sense of separateness, of individual identity. Both passages note the presence of the sun – a vital force in Jefferies expression of Mysticism.

Referring back to William James’s characteristics of the Mystic Experience, we can see that all are present in the writing of Walter Murray.

Ineffability – We connect with Nature through a level of consciousness of which we are usually unaware, that is, as Carl Von Essen emphasises, until we attempt to put it into words - to describe it.46 However, it is the function of the Nature poet and Nature writer to craft the words to convey this experience. Murray was certainly aware of this and tried to explain the difficulty. In A Sanctuary Planted he made the following observation: “There have been those few, those very few, who have pointed the way, but always we seem to have wandered off the track to become bemused in a maze of superficialities, and more recently, helplessly lost in a labyrinth of nomenclature and classification….As I sit in quiet contemplation in the Sanctuary among the company of trees I have gathered about me, I become aware of and feel the presence of life...I begin to feel the first wonder of a life so unlike my own. …While I am aware that that music is always there, and that only occasionally do I feel its full intensity, the experience of entering into the life of trees is preciously rare. Find words to understand that experience I cannot, for how can one describe things in an entirely new world with the words of the old? I can only struggle with analogy and simile, and even then perhaps only those who have had similar or near experiences will understand.’47 (p54-55)In Copsford, Murray is even clearer, stating on one occasion (cited already) that his empathy with the change in the Seasons ‘beggared all telling.’ 48

A Noetic quality. The mystic encounter is not only intuitively understandable, it fixes itself in the mind. Murray tells us (see above) “We feel as though we stand at the threshold of an undiscovered kingdom; for brief moments we understand life interpreted, we perceive meaning instead of things. In those golden minutes I understood every word…” The moment of communion with Nature provides a flash of understanding, a sense of comprehension of something which is both immense and complete in itself.

Transiency – James noted that although the moment of Mystic encounter is brief, its impact is long-lasting. Murray refers to ‘brief moments’ and ‘golden minutes’. And the longer term impact of his experience at Copsford has already been identified.

Passivity. The mind is not searching for or seeking the encounter with Nature, it happens while the mind is in the passive-receptive state. As Murray noted in Copsford. “Many a time while at Copsford, and since, I have

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blundered accidentally into some untrodden dell or little clearing and found beauty there enshrined that, but for the merest chance, none would ever have beheld.” 49

But perhaps the most explicit statement by Murray about his Nature Mysticism comes towards the end of Copsford.

“The freedom that I won by living in that lonely cottage brought me into touch with real Nature in a way that I had never understood to be possible. ‘Into touch’ is a poor, worn-out phrase, yet I find great difficulty in expressing in comprehensive terms exactly what I mean. It was closer contact than touch, it was almost union. All about me seemed to have an importance for me, they entered into my life and I into theirs. The birds, animals, trees, plants, insects, all meant or brought something to my life. I felt their presence. Gradually I became vividly aware of sound and music, form and colour, and not only of living things but of the elemental things which make their world our world. I became, as I have said, more sensitive to light, my sense of smell brought me new contacts, movement was language. I found delight in simple things which before I neither noticed nor heeded.” 50

And then, like Jefferies before him, he recalls spending long days in the sun just watching the wind playing on the grass. Could we ask for a clearer expression of Nature Mysticism than this?

Copsford gives us the most beautiful account of a man connecting with Nature. But it was not the first time that Murray had referred to Mystic encounters nor his concern for our relationship with Nature.

In his introduction to Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom, published two years previously, he made the following very clear statement about man’s alienation from Nature: “Man lives his own life, goes his own way, and sees well-nigh nothing of the teeming life around him, and, when he does, only in relation to himself. Man has striven against the life of the wild so long that he no longer understands its expression, like an old man who no longer understands the life of little children.

The world of wild life is like the world of music, full of haunting melodies and rich harmonies, charged with messages for the spirit; yet to a man, to whose ear music means nothing, a symphony is no more than a noise, meaningless and interfering. In like manner the world of wild life has become meaningless, without melody or harmony. Man has been so long wrestling with nature that he has quite forgotten that Life is common to all living things, and that he plays but his part in expressing it.

Man is so concerned over his own affairs, that he can only see other expressions of life in the light of and in relation to, his own. He fails to see that all the other expressions of life around him have a way of life wholly different from his. Yet he puts his constructions, his ideals, his sentiments, his conjectures, his fancies, as interpretations of their behaviour. But he is so often mistaken that the inner understanding of wild life is hidden from him.”51

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This feels a very modern statement. Murray is railing against the same alienation from Nature that troubled Wordsworth and Mercer, and which troubles so many of us so much today. But it was a theme to which Murray returned time and again. Like earlier Nature Mystics, whether he was aware of it or not, Murray saw the reconnection with Nature as the path to real happiness, to a better future. Not only this, he noted that humankind, as an integral part of Nature, helps give shape and expression to Nature itself.

Like the earlier Nature Mystics, Murray was also distressed at the uncontrolled growth of the city. In A Sanctuary Planted he warned: ‘The countryside is continually being invaded by the town and the townsman. Thousands of acres a year are overlaid with city and town, suburb and prefab, roads and railways, bungalow and amusement park. Unique habitats are destroyed, common and forest razed to the ground, and the living space of wild things for ever compressed. We must reserve. We must secure sanctuaries, no matter how small. They will be oases in the desert, and to them living things will come for life’s sake.’52

Murray’s warning could have been extracted from a modern environmentalist manifesto, though it also reflected a concern that dated back to the early 19 th century and was a constant feature in the writing of Nature Mystics. It was certainly current in the post war years and the idea of creating ‘sanctuaries’ and ‘nature reserves’ had been advocated during the war years by A G Tansley, President of the British Ecological Society. 53

Another of the themes adopted by Nature Mystics is that of connecting to Nature through empathic means, or through ‘feeling’. The ‘intuitive’ connection with Nature was, for Mercer, one of the essential characteristics of the moment of connection with Nature. Connection could not be actively sought, it occurred when the recipient was in a passive receptive state. Murray’s Mystic moments at Copsford usually came upon him when he was not looking. He may have described it as blundering accidentally into Nature, but in a sense it was the beauty that found him. He had merely entered Nature’s shrine, and that by accident.

Similarly, Nature could not be ‘learned’. There was a clear danger in ‘naming’, ‘categorising’, dissecting. In The Tree John Fowles argued that the harder one tried to see or understand nature, the further away it drifted. He pointed out that in creating a discipline which involved the cataloguing of nature, Linnaus had introduced a false relationship with Nature, one which actually removed us from the reality of nature itself and made us see it through an artificial frame. Studying Nature in such a way destroyed the “possibilities of seeing, apprehending and experiencing” nature itself.54 . He pointed out that the human cost of focussing on the mechanics of nature was ‘…the ordinary person’s perception of it, in his or her ability to live with and care for it.’ 55 Nature itself was no longer seen, only the symbol of Nature. Humankind becomes distanced, alienated from Nature and then loses any reason for emotional investment in it. We no longer care.

It was a view shared with Murray. In Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom he observed: “…to know the life history of every bird, beast and insect, to be proficient in every branch of botany, this is knowledge, not understanding…. The inner significance of wild life shall not be understood by much learning…the humble novice [may], in an unknown world, catch a

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glimpse of things so new that he has not the wherewithal to interpret it….Perhaps then, certain impressions, conveyed through the bare medium of words, may reflect, if only momentarily, a flash of light, of understanding, of the inner meaning and significance of wild life.” 56

It was simultaneously an appeal to abandon the mechanic approach to Nature and to learn to feel it instead. It is classic Nature Mysticism. Another important link with Nature Mysticism comes with Murray’s appeals to learn to ‘see’ nature.

In A Sanctuary Planted Murray reiterated. ‘We must drop the scales of the commonplace from our eyes, we must take off those wise-looking spectacles of learning, we must throw open the magic casements of imagination, and see; and not only see, but perceive, hear, feel. With sublime simplicity; and then, and then only, may we perhaps enter the kingdom.’57 This reflects Emerson’s direction that to truly see Nature one had to become a transparent eye, to see without egotism. As he put it in Nature: “Standing on the bare ground, - my head bathed by the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite space. – all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent Eye-ball. I am nothing. I see all .’ 58 And in Copsford Murray made it clear that his domicile in the ruined cottage had also helped in this way. “It is good for us sometimes to wonder. Without imagination the light that is in us may well be darkness. And it is a fact that during those summer months at Copsford, when I was oppressed by no anxieties or worries, when no evil bore me down, when I lived to the full every carefree hour, when perhaps my eye was single, it was then that light had its strongest hold upon me. Do we not take light too much for granted?”59

In Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom Murray made another point which, again, was later reflected by Fowles. It reinforces not only the need for us to ‘see’ and ‘feel’ Nature without attempting to catalogue or interpret it, but also to see it on its own terms, to avoid the temptation to animate it. “Those who have closely studied bird behaviour are convinced that birds, by display and song, occupy a tract of land and warn off all intruders. To man’s thinking it appears they do. We analyse their behaviour into terms of challenge, possession, display, advertisement. I think that we shall never enter into the full joy of communion with nature, of the deeper understanding of the spirit, made manifest in the life of the wild, as long as we are content to stamp it with second-rate traits of human nature. I believe that by so doing we lock a gateway upon a whole garden of joyous things, we turn our backs upon a kingdom… – Keats, I am sure, knew this. “60

In the writings of most Nature Mystics we find not only concern for our growing alienation from Nature, from our own cosmos, but also alarm at the growth of materialism in contemporary society. Nature Mysticism is posited as a pathway back from this situation. And it is important to emphasise the fact that a reconnection with Nature is available to anyone, to everyone. It is not the property of an elite group or caste. Because we are all part of Nature, of the Cosmos, there is nothing to stop us reconnecting with it but ourselves. Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom is, in some ways, an appeal to the ‘common man’ to move in this direction.

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“All that I have written in this little book goes to show that every one of us, at almost any time, in almost any place can with a little trying, a little quiet contemplation, find kinship with all creation, maybe in the garden, or in the wood, on the moor, by the waterfall, among the mountains. But…most of us are blunted to that fuller understanding of nature; and perhaps only by such simple experience as that of watching birds from a hide, shall we discover a kingdom, and learn the first words of its language.” 61(p80)

The Unconditioned Absolute

Mercer warned that it was fatal to try and square Nature Mysticism with religious monotheism. The traditional Christian view that all of Creation is a sign of or symbol for the existence of God, simply reduces the status and importance of Nature and the Cosmos itself. It is a reductionist view which not only deprives Nature of meaning, but denies it reality itself. And one of the most important tenets of Nature Mysticism is that Nature is Reality.

There is another element to these opposing perspectives. Nature Mystics would argue that when we recognise our true relationship with Nature, we understand that not only do other life forms share it equally with us but that we have a responsibility to care for it and for them. We are equals. This contradicts the traditional biblical view – and the teachings of St Augustine – that all Nature is put there by God for the benefit of man, and therefore for man to exploit.

The problem then is that ultimately, a belief in Nature as absolute Reality is not compatible with the idea of a supernatural Deity as expressed in fundamentalist Christian views. Certainly this was the position adopted by Richard Jefferies. He reacted bitterly against attempts to reduce Nature to the status of a subject of Deity. In his communion with Nature he sensed an existence that was greater than the concept of Deity and, in rejecting the idea that all of Nature is the work of a ‘Creator’, he attracted the antipathy of many conservative minds. In fact he was more or less accused of blasphemy.

Wordsworth appears to have held an ambiguous position. In his younger, more radical days, he appears as more of a humanist, though like Thoreau later, he would possibly have avoided having to take a position: When questioned, Thoreau famously replied with the ambiguous statement ‘I have no argument with God.’ The fact that in later life Wordsworth became more conservative in his religious beliefs , has encouraged attempts to claim him back for Christianity or at least to give a Christian ‘spin’ to his Nature Mysticism.62

However, we also have to recognise that social convention had its own influence. Richard Jefferies’ atheism attracted significant Christian opprobrium, partly because of his clear repudiation of a monotheistic God, but also because the Church was defensively sensitive in the aftermath of Darwin’s revelations. Under the circumstances, Jefferies position was an outstandingly bold one – and one which would have been less out of place after the First Wold War. Given that Murray was writing after the Second World War we

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might have even more reason to anticipate him adopting a similarly atheistic position. After all, Mercer is very clear about the necessity of this. However, as suggested at the beginning of this paper, while Murray was clearly a Nature Mystic, the degree to which he was self-consciously so, remains unclear. If Murray had indicated that he believed Nature to be the work of a Divine entity, then we would have to consider whether he tended towards Christian Mysticism. The problem for us is that Murray not did make a clear statement of his beliefs on this subject, and such statements that he did make are ambiguous.

In Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom, he makes the following observation while considering a mountain beck after heavy rain: ‘It was a living thing. The sun shone, and the water leapt into the mountain air a-sparkle of foam and spray…I was translated. It was the river of life, water, the superlative allegory; in the cloud, the rainbow, in the beck, the lake, in the ocean, in a myriad forms yet all one. Life in the heather, in the fish, the bird, in the lamb, in man, in a myriad forms, yet all one, one and the same with the source of all life.

But I knew more than that in that ecstatic hour. The water and the life are one. No thing, animate or inanimate, can exist outside the mind of the Creator…I cry out to the tumbling water..As thou art one with the least dew-drop even to the ocean, so am I one with thee and all life – even the Giver.’ 63

The words, ‘Creator’, ‘Giver’, capitalised as they are, echo doctrinal phraseology, but the idea of a creative spirit is not the prerogative of monotheistic religions. A few pages later Murray is writing in praise of the South Downs and observes: “Life, the vital element, spirit, mind, God, if you will, is made manifest up here in majestic simplicity, in unimaginable complexity. The cloudscape, the atmosphere, the rolling Downs, these are the simple elements of the Artist’s canvas, raised high above the level Weald, which is overlaid with the chequer-board pattern of man’s designing. Every stroke of the Artist’s brush leaps to intricate life. The paint He uses Life. Just as we human painters express our emotions and ideas, indeed ourselves, in water colours and oils, upon our little sheets and canvases, so does He express Himself in Life upon the infinite mural of the Universe. It may well be that we can begin to understand the Artist up here on the Downs, the detail of the brushwork is so wonderful, so lucid, so tender.” 64

Here again we have ambiguity. Life Jefferies before him, Murray identified something that is ‘other’ than deity. He gives it alternative identifications, it is ‘Life’, a ‘vital element’, ‘spirit’, ‘mind’ or, significantly, if the reader finds it more acceptable, ‘God, if you will’. Not only does Murray then make use of a familiar metaphor, that of ‘the Artist’, a few pages later he suggests that an appreciation of the Downs might bring us closer to a discovery of ‘the very thoughts of God’.

It seems here that Murray can’t quite make up his own mind about what he is trying to say. In Copsford he makes a passing reference to ‘the Creator’ when asking ‘…is there not, in fact, magic enough in a single leaf for our minds to conjure with? Did not a child learn from them something of the soul of a tree, of its sturdy strength, its steadfastness and courage, its open arms and friendly welcome., its voice awakened with every wind? A tree is an individual life, and wherever there is life we may apprehend ideas, the ideas of the

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Creator’. 65 But this is a rare reference. And in A Sanctuary Planted there is what appears to be a single reference to ‘The Architect’s masterpiece’, when describing the aftermath of a snow storm. 66 Ultimately the ambiguity of Murray’s position vis-à-vis the Unconditioned Absolute should not detract from his huge importance as both Nature writer and Nature Mystic. In the published works available to us Murray felt no need to clarify where he stood with regard to deity, and in fact in the canon of Nature Mystics, Richard Jefferies is almost unique in the clarity of his rejection of Deity.

Conclusion

In some ways, Murray’s position regarding the ‘Unconditioned Absolute’ is academic. With the clear exception of Jefferies, none of the other Nature Mystic writers adopted clear atheistic positions. Wordsworth, Blake, Thoreau, Williamson etc all felt it sufficient to reflect their communion with Nature without getting caught up in a controversial issue which might detract from their work. And to my mind, this applies to Murray too.

But the most important point is that Murray did not write as a Christian claiming Christian Mysticism. He wrote as a nature writer and his aim was to encourage others to make the re-connection with Nature that he thought so important for the future. He did not write to claim Nature for God.

Because of this Murray was able to write of his experience at Copsford in a way that can appeal equally to everyone and which offers a special vision which is intuitive to us all. In becoming the ‘Green Man’ of the Weald, Murray was connecting us simultaneously with an ancient past with which we can identify and a present Nature with which we can connect. Copsford gives us a vision of a meaningful immersion in Nature and allows us to feel the enrichment it brings. However it is also a haunting book, because the world it depicts has already vanished or has largely done so. And this is part of the book’s continued importance. It offers us an alternative to our materialistic urban existence and reminds us of what we are losing.

Tom Wareham.

January 2016

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1 See Romney Marsh, p 10.2 Copsford p1403 Probably Vauxhall Bridge4 Copsford p134-1355 Ibid p36 Ibid p167 Copsford P508 Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom, (p67)9 According to one former pupil the curriculum was somewhat limited. Murray taught Geography and Natural History, while Mrs Murray taught music. There were no examinations and, by all accounts, Murray was a very strict disciplinarian.

10 A Sanctuary Planted, p1311 Nature in Wales noted the publication as follows: By the authors of Stand and Stare'Wander and WatchWALTER J. C. MURRAY and L. HUGH NEWMANThe beautiful illustrations with a vividly written text go to make a book that will be welcome to all lovers of the countryside, for in these pages many living creatures are described with that intimate knowledge and fascinating detail that we have come to expect from these two authors whose work has so often delighted us before. Vol No 3, Autumn 1955.12 Copsford. P213 Ibid p514 I do not know why Murray changed the name slightly in this way. It is not a big enough change to have been an attempt to disguise the location, so the addition of the ‘s’ may just have been an unintentional variation of name acquired during usage. Indeed, the landowner may have introduced the cottage by this name at the outset, and as it is unlikely that Murray would have any need to consult a map, he may not have realised that the name was wrong.15 Hook Farm was probably owned by the farmer who owned the site of Copsford at the time. It is now owned by the very helpful Gingell family of Copford Timber Mill.16 Copsford, p617 Ibid p918 Ibid p15.19 Ibid 14120 Ibid p16.21 Ibid p2022 Ibid 12023 Ibid p6624 Ibid 69.25 Ibid 84-8526 Ibid p12927 Ibid p16028 Ibid p186-18729 Ibid p20530 James Edward Mercer. Nature Mysticism. (1912). P 231 Indeed it was the postwar recognition of the negative effects of alienation from Nature or ‘the land’ which led to the resurgence of interest in returning to Nature and healthy outdoor activities in the inter-war years. Ironically, of course, it was also used by the Nazi’s in their propaganda campaigns. Cultural activity during the period is peppered with the call to reconnect with Nature, evident on manifestations as varied as the foundation of The Woodcraft Folk (1925), Rolf Gardiner’s quasi pagan ‘rural revival’ community at Fontmell Magna in Dorset, or Henry Williamson’s book Tarka the Otter (1927)32 Ibid p169. 33 In Japan ‘Forest Bathing ‘ or Shinrin-Yoku is now a recognised therapy. But the practise has now spread widely. See http://www.spafinder.co.uk/blog/trends/2015-report/forest-bathing/

34 The concept of ‘soul-life’ as an expression of a more heightened level of consciousness and connection was Nature was adopted by Richard Jefferies in The Story of My Heart. Mercer refers to Jefferies very positively as an example of a leading Nature Mystic.35 Ibid p17036 Ibid p17337 The 19c German physician and physicist and founder of experimental psychology, Gustav Fechner, proposed that as plants have nervous systems they must have a consciousness and a soul.38 Restless Human Hearts (1875) p226-227.39 Nature Mysticism p6-740 Wordsworth. The Prelude – Book The First. 1798-9941 Wordsworth . Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey. 1798.42 Jefferies. The Story of My Heart.43 Ibid.44 Restless Human Hearts (1875) p226-227.45 Copsford p6646 Ecomysticism: The Profound Experience of Nature as Spiritual Guide. Carl Von Essen. P12247 A Sanctuary Planted pp54-5548 Copsford. P16049 Copsford p13450 Copsford p13551 Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom. P vi52 A Sanctuary Planted p 14953 See Our Heritage of Wild Nature: A Plea for Organized Nature Conservation. 1945. Cambridge University Press.54 The Tree. John Fowles. P3155 Ibid p35.56 Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom pvi-vii57 A Sanctuary Planted. P 5758 Nature. R W Emerson. (See Essen p55)59 Copsford p9060 Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom, p94. 61 Ibid p8062 See for example The Christian Wordsworth, 1798-1805. William A Ulmer. (2001)63 Nature’s Undiscovered Kingdom. P 90. Note also the similarity here to Jefferies reverie about a spring.64 Ibid p92.65 Copsford p18066 A Sanctuary Planted, p67.