Heraclitean logos and flux in T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets: 'cosmic consciousness' and 'the still point of the turning world'
A. Wessels
Koers : Bulletin for Christian Scholarship June 4, 2013 DOI: 10.4102/koers.v66i4.400 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Mysticism |
| Keywords | Cosmic consciousness Four quartets Heraclitus Ts eliot |
| Key points | Argues that T.S. Eliot's "Burnt Norton" configures the Heraclitean logos/flux paradigm to investigate the intersection of temporality and eternity, God and humanity, and art and chaos, with Christ representing the ultimate union of the temporal and eternal. |
Abstract
T.S. Eliot prefaces “Burnt Norton”, the first of his Four Quartets, with two quotations from the Greek philosopher, Heraclitus. By means of these epigrams, Eliot points us to the Heraclitean opposition and paradoxical interdependence between logos and flux as a paradigm in the poem, a paradigm that he uses for an investigation and articulation of a number of philosophical contemplations. In this paper, I discuss Eliot’s different configurations of the logos/flux paradigm in the poem, firstly to illuminate the relationship between temporality and eternity, secondly, to elaborate the relationship between God and humanity, and thirdly to express the relationship between structured art and chaotic experience. In each instance it is not only the opposition between the two elements that is important, but also the point of contact, the intersection. There is some evidence that Eliot’s depiction of this intersection as, for example, the “moment in and out of time”, is based on personal experience of a transcendent, mystical nature. His expression of this experience is also investigated by comparing it to similar experiences described by others, notably by a Canadian psychiatrist, Richard Maurice Bucke. A comparison of Bucke’s description in his evolutionist text of 1901 and Eliot’s poetic rendering reveals not only surprising similarities but also essential differences which highlights Eliot’s purely Christian interpretation in the face of Bucke’s more universalist approach. For T.S. Eliot, eternity or timelessness can only be accessed through the temporal experience of human consciousness, in fleeting moments of exaltation in daily life, in the charged, timeless configurations of art as an imitation of divine creation, and finally in Christ, who embodies the love of God and is for Eliot the ultimate transection of the temporal and eternal, the flux and the logos.
Comparable studies
Other theoretical and historical papers on mysticism, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| The mystical mind: probing the biology of religious experience | 2000 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Religious and Mystical Experiences as Artifacts of Temporal Lobe Function: A General Hypothesis | 1983 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| The Problem of Pure Consciousness: Mysticism and Philosophy | 1993 | Edited collection of essays | |
| Irreducible Mind: Toward a Psychology for the 21st Century | 2020 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Mysticism and schizophrenia: A phenomenological exploration of the structure of consciousness in the schizophrenia spectrum disorders. | 2016 | Theoretical or philosophical paper |