Like so many others, notably Whitman, who have realized a more or less full
degree of cosmic consciousness, Tennyson was deeply and reverently
religious, although not partisanly connected with church work. Tennyson's
early boyhood was marked by experiences which usually befall persons of the
psychic temperament. As he himself described these states of consciousness,
they were moments in which the ego transcended the limits of self
consciousness and entered the limitless realm of spirit.
They do not tabulate with the ordinary trance condition of the
spiritualistic medium, who subjects his own self consciousness to a
"control," although Tennyson always believed that the best of his writings
were inspired by, and written under "the direct influence of higher
intelligences, of whose presence he was distinctly conscious. He felt them
near him and his mind was impressed by their ideas."
The point which we emphasize is that these peculiar states of consciousness
are not synonymous with the western idea of trance as seen in mediumship,
although Tennyson uses the term "trance" in describing them.
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