We are apt to forget the mystical side of Aquinas; who was poet and contemplative as well as scholastic philosopher.
And the third feature we notice about these men and women is, that this new power by which they lived was, as Ruysbroeck calls it, "a spreading light."[52] It poured out of them, invading and illuminating other men: so that, through them, whole groups or societies were re-born, if only for a time, on to fresh levels of reality, goodness and power.

Their own intense personal experience was valid not only for themselves.

They belonged to that class of natural, leaders who are capable,--of infecting the herd with their own ideals; leading it to new feeding grounds, improving the common level It is indeed the main social function of the man or woman of the Spirit to be such a crowd-compeller In the highest sense; and, as the artist reveals new beauty to his fellow-men, to stimulate in their neighbours the latent human capacity for God.

In every great surge forward to new life, we can trace back the radiance to such a single point of light; the transfiguration of an individual soul.

Thus Christ's communion with His Father was the life-centre, the point of contact with Eternity, whence radiated the joy and power of the primitive Christian flock: the classic example of a corporate spiritual life.