The Piper at the Gates of Dawn: Mapping the spiritual experiences of Mole and Ratty onto a scientific analysis of mysticism

Kenneth Grahame’s masterpiece, The wind in the willows, contains a classic description of a religious experience as Ratty and Mole come face-to-face with the Piper at the Gates of Dawn. This chapter draws on Happold’s identification of seven characteristics of mystical experience, as amplified by the Francis-Louden Mystical Orientation Scale, to test whether Ratty and Mole’s experience can be properly classified as a mystical experience. It is argued that Ratty and Mole’s experience passes the test of exemplifying all seven characteristics: ineffability, noesis, transiency, passivity, consciousness of the oneness of everything, sense of timelessness, and true ego.