There are fundamental psychological reasons for the wide prevalence of asceticism and for the remarkable manner in which it involves self-mortification, even acute physical suffering. Such pain is an actual psychic stimulant, more especially in slightly neurotic persons. This is well illustrated by a young woman, a patient of Janet's, who suffered from mental depression and was accustomed to find relief by slightly burning her hands and feet. She herself clearly understood the nature of her actions. "I feel," she said, "that I make an effort when I hold my hands on the stove, or when I pour boiling water on my feet; it is a violent act and it awakens me: I feel that it is really done by myself and not by another.... To make a mental effort by itself is too difficult for me; I have to supplement it by physical efforts. I have not succeeded in any other way; that is all: when I brace myself up to burn myself I make my mind freer, lighter and more active for several days. Why do you speak of my desire for mortification? My parents believe that, but it is absurd. It would be a mortification if it brought any suffering, but I enjoy this suffering, it gives me back my mind; it prevents my thoughts from stopping: what would one not do to attain such happiness?" (P. Janet, "The Pathogenesis of Some Impulsions," _Journal of Abnormal Psychology_, April, 1906.) If we understand this psychological process we may realize how it is that even in the higher religions, however else they may differ, the practical value of asceticism and mortification as the necessary door to the most exalted religious state is almost universally recognized, and with complete cheerfulness. "Asceticism and ecstacy are inseparable," as Probst-Biraben remarks at the outset of an interesting paper on Mahommedan mysticism ("L'Extase dans le Mysticisme Musulman," _Revue Philosophique_, Nov., 1906). Asceticism is the necessary ante-chamber to spiritual perfection.
It thus happens that savage peoples largely base their often admirable enforcement of asceticism not on the practical grounds that would justify it, but on religious grounds that with the growth of intelligence fall into discredit.[71] Even, however, when the scrupulous observances of savages, whether in sexual or in non-sexual matters, are without any obviously sound basis it cannot be said that they are entirely useless if they tend to encourage self-control and the sense of reverence.[72] The would-be intelligent and practical peoples who cast aside primitive observances because they seem baseless or even ridiculous, need a still finer practical sense and still greater intelligence in order to realize that, though the reasons for the observances have been wrong, yet the observances themselves may have been necessary methods of attaining personal and social efficiency. It constantly happens in the course of civilization that we have to revive old observances and furnish them with new reasons.