According to this Neoplatonic reading of Novalis, his religious language can be understood using the "magic wand of analogy", a phrase Novalis used in "Europe and Christianity" to clarify how he meant to use history in that essay. This use of analogy was partly inspired by Schiller, who argued that analogy allows facts to be connected into a harmonious whole, and by his relationship with Friedrich Schlegel, who sought to explore the revelations of religion through the union of philosophy and poetry. The "magic wand of analogy" allowed Novalis to use metaphor, analogy and symbolism to bring together the arts, science, and philosophy in his search for truth. This view of Novalis's writing suggests that his literary language must be read carefully. His metaphors and images- even in works like "Hymns to the Night"- are not only mystical utterances, they also express philosophical arguments. Read in this perspective, a work like Novalis's "Christianity or Europe" is not a call to return to a lost golden age. Rather, it is an argument in poetic language, phrased in the mode of a myth, for a cosmopolitan vision of a unity that brings together past and future, ideal and real, to engage the listener in an unfinished historical process.