experience of god

A useful idea from William James:
is
"I speak not, now, of
your ordinary religious believer, who follows the conventional observances of his
country, whether it be Buddhist, Christian, or Mohammedan. His religion has
been made for him by others, communicated to him by tradition, determined to
fixed forms by imitation, and retained by habit. It would profit us little to study
this second-hand religious life. We must make search rather for the original experiences
which were the pattern-setters to all this mass of suggested feeling and
imitated conduct".