UC-NRLF 702 GIFT OF i S 3 Proofs of Immortality ITS NATURALNESS AND POSSIBILITIES J. M. PEEBLES, M.A., M.D., PK.D., LLD. ot Smmortalttp ITS NATURALNESS, ITS POSSIBILITIES -ami. NOW-A-DAY EVIDENCES REFUSED A HEARING By Rev. Canon Girdlestone and other churchmen connected with the Victoria Institute and Philosophical Society of Great Britain. By J. M. PEEBLES, M. D., M. A., PH. D., LL D. 'The atone which the builders refused is become the head-stone of the corner." Psalm CXVIII-22. FIFTH 'EfDITION PEEBLES PUBLISHING CO. 5719 Fayette St. Los Angeles, California, U. S. A. Copyrighted in the Office of the Registrar at Washington, D. C. by J. M. PEEBLES, M. D. 1914 & Introduction The eminent John Wesley, and other noted men of the past, believed in the immortality of animals. Their existence is certainly dual. They have instinct, sensation, and they reason on a certain plane of con- sciousness. But whether immortal or not, they de- serve our tenderest care. Surgeons, intelligent, up-to-date men in psychology, are well aware that in amputating a limb they do not remove the invisible, the more substantial, spiritual limb. There is a peculiar worm the nais which, when cut into several sections, will reproduce itself from every section, showing conclusively that there was a vital entity in each section capable of reproducing this re-growth. Amputate the leg of a salamander, and it will be reproduced to the minutest details, joints, veins, nerves. And why? Because the real entity the invisible leg was not removed. The ma- terial at best is but a shadow. The vital leg re- mained, serving as the attractive force for the bio- plasmic cells to rebuild the exact form of the displaced leg, even to the muscles, tendons, arteries, bones, each and all in their proper relations. The dog has been known to attempt to lick the lost foot of his master. When the material arm or finger of a man is am- putated, or torn off by machinery, the vital, substan- tial arm remains and the person is often conscious intensely conscious, of the presence of this invisible arm and yet, not invisible to the clairvoyant. Man is a duality, and more, he is a trinity in unity, constituted of a physical body, a soul-body, and that 308395 divine, entity -the uncompounded conscious spirit God incarnated and finited. If the animals and insects of earth exist in the spirit world, which is plausible, it does not prove that they will so progress, or so exist consciously in the celestial or angelic world, destination being consid- ered the measure of aspiration. The ideal does not belong to the lower kingdoms. Materialists, and some materialistic spiritists, have endeavored to account for the origin of man by "matter and force/' or "matter and motion." Some writers jumble together motion and force. They are not equivalents. Motion is not substantial ; it is only the act of a body in changing its position from a state of rest, and necessarily ceases to exist when the body ceases to move. The persistent state- ment of "molecular motion" only provokes the in- quiry, "What caused the motion?" The substantial alone can cause motion, and the substantial is none the less substantial because of its inconceivable at- tenuation and ethereal intangibility. Steam, though invisible, is an acknowledged force a substance a substance that drives the piston in the steam engine. Force, though unseen, is indestructible. The soul- body, though unseen by the material eye, interper- meates the physical body. It is an intermediate ve- hicle between spirit and matter, and the force which penetrates and moves it is the spirit. And this spirit, ethereal, intangible and uncompounded, is substan- tial substance not gross matter, but divine sub- stance a vital spark from the infinite life a ger- minal entity, non-composite, non-compounded, and hence necessarily indestructible, for no thinker, no scientist, no inspired biblicist, would presume to predicate destruction of indestructible substance, which indestructible substance involves life, sensa- tion, thought, self-consciousness and progress in manifestation and so we scientifically and logically prove the immortality, not of the soul, but of the spirit, which spirit is the offspring of, and poten- tially and parentally related to the infinite Spirit of the universe God, Immanuel with us and Im- manuel in us. The following translation of the speech of Cato on the immortality of the human spirit can scarcely be sufficiently admired for its conciseness, purity and elegance of phraseology : "It must be so. Plato, thou reasonest well. Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire, This longing after immortality? Or whence this secret dread and inward horror Of falling into naught? Why shrinks the soul Back on herself, and startles at destruction? 'Tis the divinity that stirs within us: 'Tis heaven itself that points out a hereafter, And intimates eternity to man. Eternity! thou pleasing, dreadful thought! Through what variety of untried being, Through what new scenes and changes must we pass! The wide the unbounded prospect lies before me ; But shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it. Here will I hold : If there's a Power above us (And that there is all Nature cries aloud, Through all her works), He must delight in virtue; And that which He delights in must be happy; But when, or where? I'm weary of conjectures, this must end them. Thus am I doubly arm'd : my death and lif e My bane and antidote are both before me. This, in a moment, brings me to an end ; But this informs me I shall never die. The soul, secure in her existence, smiles At the drawn dagger, and defies its point. The stars shall fade away, the sun himself Grow dim with age, and Nature sink in years ; But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth, Unhurt amidst the war of elements, The wreck of matter, and the crush of worlds." EXPLANATORY The following letter, published in London Light, April 29th, 1906, mentions the circumstances and suggests some of the reasons why this paper was denied a reading by the council. "Mark well" (using the words of a Masonic de- gree). While a guest at the dining-club of the secre- tary, Rev. Dr. Hull, in London, some four years ago, he expressed the wish that I would "prepare a pa- per" to read, or to be read, before the Philosophical Society of Great Britain. I promised to do so at some future time. That time had now come. It was prepared and personally presented to the secretary, Rev. Dr. Hull, and, according to the custom of this scientific institute, constituted of some of the most distinguished scientists and Christian religionists of England and of other countries, my paper was pub- lished in pamphlet form by this Philosophical Soci- ety and sent out to the members for consideration and discussion, before the assembled body, after the reading. And these are the preliminary words, appearing at the commencement of their pamphlet publishing the address: "While it is the Institute's object to investigate, it must not be held to endorse the various views ex- pressed, either in the paper or discussions." But just how this body of learned men could "in- vestigate or discuss" a paper that the assembled council, manipulated by a Rev. Church Canon, would not permit to be read, is a mystery worthy of the thirteenth century eccjesiasticism. The Rev. Canon Girdlestone was substituted to give an address upon the "Resurrection" the resur- recton of Jesus' body in the place of my "paper." This address in proof of the resurrection of the material body of Jesus Christ, was tame, painfully musty with old theological platitudes, yet soundly orthodox. At the conclusion of this Canon's lecture, this Philosophical Society, in session, gave me a unanimous vote of thanks for my paper, which they had forbidden to be read. Is it strange that illus- trious scientists and liberalists the world over have called "Christian pulpits, cowards' castles"? Wisely did Milton write: "Let truth and false- hood grapple. Whoever knew truth put to the worse in a free and open encounter?" The president of this Victoria Institute and Philo- sophical Society of Great Britain is the Right Hon- orable, the Earl of Halsbury, Lord Chancellor D. C. L., F. R. S., etc., and these gentlemen constitute the council. English-speaking people in all lands have a right to know their names: Rev. Principal James H. Rigg, D. D. Rev. Dr. F. W. Tremlett, D. D., D. C. L., Ph. D. Very Rev. H. Wace, D. D., Wean of Canterbury (Trustee). Rev. Chancellor J. J. Lias, M. A. General G. S. Hallowes, f. c. Rev. F. A. Walker, D. D., F. L. S., F. R. G. S. Captain E. W. Creak, C. B., R. N., F. R. S. Thomas Chaplin, Esq., M. D. Rev. Canon R. B. Girdlestone, M. A. Theo. G. Pinches, Esq., LL. D., M. R. A. S. Ven. Archdeacon W. M. Sinclair, M. A., D. D. Gerard Smith, Esq., M. R. C. S. Commander G. P. Heath, R. N. Rev. Canon Tristram, M. A., D. D., LL. D., F. R. S. Rev. G. F. Whidborne, M. A., F. G. S., F. R. G. S. His Excellency Lieut.-General Sir H. L. Geary, K. C. B., R. A. Walter Kidd, Esq., M. D., F. Z. S. Edward Stanley M. Perowne, Esq. Martin Luther Rouse, Esq., B. L. Rev. R. Ashington Bullen, B. A., F. G. S. Rev. John Tuckwell, M. R. A. S. Major Kingsley O. Foster, J. P., F. R. A. S. Lieut.-Colonel George Mackinlay. General J. G. Halliday. Here is my explanatory letter of reproof, appear- ing in the columns of London Light, a very widely circulated Spiritualist journal, under the heading: "THE REJECTED ADDRESS BY DR. PEEBLES." It is with a modified yet righteous indignation that I wish to put on record a recent remarkable and unique experience. I have been for fifteen years a promptly paying member of the London Victoria Institute and Philo- sophical Society of Great Britain, of which body the Earl of Halsbury is president, but a paper upon "Immortality" that I had prepared to be read at a meeting of that society on Monday, the 17th inst., was, at the last moment, rejected by the council in session. Though yearly admiring many of the essays upon science and religion read and discussed by this dis- tinguished body, I felt that the temple of this con- servative Institute needed a "living stone," a pres- ent-day inspiration; and from the best and highest motives I prepared to furnish it under the name of "Immortality : Its Naturalness, Its Possibilities and Proofs." The thinking, progressive souls of the twentieth century do not care whether the old Moabites were polygamists or monogamists; whether Samson chased the foxes or was himself chased by foxes; but they do care and pray for the termination of this brutal war between pious Christian Russians and the more enlightened "Pagan" Japanese ; they do care about the unemployed in London and the street-cor- ner beggars in New York; they do care about the uneducated, half -clad orphan and the weeping moth- er mourning over the cold, dead form of a loved child. With no knowledge of a future life, many Rachels are mourning without consolation ! Seriously pondering upon these momentous sub- jects, I selected Immortality, with its legitimate corollaries, as a fit subject for my paper. It was duly prepared, and handed to the secretary, Pro- fessor Edward Hull, LL. D., F. R. S., on April 3d, and, according to the custom of the Victoria Insti- tute, it was printed in pamphlet form, and sent out to many of the members, that they might know its contents and be prepared for the reading and the discussion. The paper was in the hands of the of- ficials and members for two weeks. All seemed well. 10 In the meantime the secretary very courteously wrote to me, knowing the condition of my throat and lungs, and expressed the hope that I would be able to personally read the paper. The tickets of invita- tion had been printed and distributed. The hour had come. The people had assembled. The reporters were at the table then, and then only, was I summond into the council room and gravely informed that the council had decided that, "for good and sufficient reasons/' the paper was not considered appropriate to be read" before the mem- bers and invited guests. Using the Daily Mail's phrase, the "address was closured before it began," and the Rev. Canon R. B. Girdlestone, M. A., was substituted to deliver an address on the "Resurrec- tion." The most of my friends, city officials and journalists, indignantly left the lecture hall. The council having refused to accept my paper, treating of the evidences of the Divine existence, and proofs from ancient testimonies and present- day spiritual phenomena, in demonstration of a fu- ture conscious life, I withdrew it, and it is now my Eroperty. Spiritualism was the crux, and yet, at the ead of the printed pamphlet sent put by the Insti- tute was this passage : "The Institute's object be- ing to investigate, it must not be held to endorse the various views expressed either in the papers or dis- cussions." But, inasmuch as it is the professed pur- pose of this body to "investigate," the inquiry nat- urally arises here: Could the members of the In- stitute "investigate and discuss" a paper which was forbidden to be "read"? I need not dilate upon the shock, or the crushing, mortifying position in which this belated decision placed me. It is passing, and almost mirthfully strange that this council and the learned members had previously received, and had discussed, a paper on the "Venomous Snakes of India;" and another paper (see Vol. XXXIII) of twenty-seven pages was read by the Rev. F. A. Walker, D. D., upon "Hor- 11 nets/' particular stress being laid upon the point as to what "period of the year do queen hornets leave their nests." Think of it! A distinguished body of ministers, clergymen, and titled scientists permitting a paper to be read upon the characteristics of "Hornets" and "Wasps," yet rejecting a paper treating of the an- cient and present-day proofs of human immortality ! As I have said, Spiritualism was the crux, and yet these clergymen should not be frightened at Spirit- ualism, when many of the brainiest and most schol- arly men of the world are Spiritualists when the illustrious Dr. Jowett, Master of Balliol College, Ox- ford University, in a sermon upon "Faith, Doctrine, and Immortality" (p. 319), says: "The spirits and forms of the dead seem to hover around us and to be about our bed and about our path, sometimes for a shorter and sometimes for a longer period after they have been taken from us." Jesus asked (I quote from memory), "How much, then, is a man better than a sheep?" and I shall ever say, when thinking of the Victoria Institute and Philosophical Society of Great Britain, how much better is im- mortality, with its angel ministries and spirit mes- sages, than the "hornets and wasps" and the "snakes of India." the characteristics of which this Institute allowed to be described in a paper (of twenty-seven pages) by Sir Joseph Fayrer, M. D., LL. D. The extraordinary treatment I have received from the council of the Victoria Institute excites in me not the least anger, but rather the fraternal feeling of a most condescending pity. And yet, owing to my abiding and unbounded faith in God and the ful- filment of His mighty purpose in creation, I believe in the future enlightenment and final salvation of the members of this Institute's council; basing the beautiful belief in a degree upon this sacred scrip- tural passage: "The Lord preserveth the simple." J. M. PEEBLES, M. D. 12 The Rejected Address Upon IMMORTALITY: ITS NATURALNESS, ITS POSSIBILITIES AND PROOFS By J. M. PEEBLES, M. D., M. A., Ph. D., LL. D. THE PRELUDE. The poet, Leigh Hunt, when late in life was called the "immortal boy." Youth flushed with hope has its work in front of it; while old age, rich in experi- ences, calmly awaiting the summons, has a grand charm of its own a serene sanctity comparable to a moss-covered cathedral, within which are devotion, meditation and uplifting music. Old age does not hinge upon the number of years lived. The honorable and venerable who have lived in obedience to the divine laws of nature, and in continuous activity, have some noble purpose in view, have no sense of the phrase "outlived their usefulness. " These last are their best days. There is a desert palm in our American west-lands famous for a single flowering bud. The bud unfolds, sheds it fragrance and dies; but the palm tree itself, straight .and stately, continues to grow. Life and death are not only natural, but beautiful in their time and place. The falling and disappearance of the body is inci- dent to the birth of the spirit, which when passing into the many-mansioned house of the Father, often signals backward and whispers, "I still live." Having passed by a number of years the mile- stones that mark the octogenarian's life journey, and facing as I calmly do the fading sunset of mortality, it is only natural that I should very seri- ously ask, Does man conscientiously survive death? 13 And if so, what awaits him beyond that cold, grim portal? In this essay, involving some of the testimonies of the past and some present evidences of a future con- scious existence, looking to immortality in the sense of endlessness of being, I dp not appear in the role of the teacher. Far from it. Nor do I profess in the least to have exhausted a subject that has occu- pied the attention of eminent minds in all ages ; but I appear rather in the nature of one thinking aloud one talking confidentially to himself upon a great, upon an all-important subject; or as one openly ex- posing his thought-out conception and matured con- victions with some of the more potent reasons for entertaining them as shields and supports, as helps to faith and knowledge, while nearing day by day the boundary of mortality. THE ADDRESS The greatest and most all-incisive word that ever fell from human lips in English-speaking countries is God ! The Christ did not say, "God is a spirit," but "Pneuma Ho Theos" God is spirit; and spirit, embodying consciousness, life, purpose, wisdom and will, lies at the foundation of and is the original gen- erating cause of all things from the amoeba up to man, who stands upon the very apex of earth's or- ganic pyramid, the crowning glory of nature. Belief in the existence of God is intuitive, and in some form and under some name is as universal as the races and tribes of humanity. Circumnavigating this planet several times and meeting some of the lowest specimens of the human species, such as the Bushmen of Australia, the natives of New Zealand, the black tribes of Central Africa and the wood- fiber-clad natives of the Pacific Islands, I have no hesitation in stating emphatically that these bar- barous and semi-barbarous tribes have some con- 14 ception of gods, or of an overruling, Supreme Being, to whom they rear rude altars and have some unique forms of worship. It may be further stated that the God-idea springs up in human nature spontaneously, and belongs to the moral necessity of things. It is deeply rooted in the conscious minds of all reasoning human intel- ligences. It is intuitional if not axiomatic, and re- quires in support of faith therein, no more labored and logical proofs than does the existence of space in which minor objects move and planets revolve. True, there are arches with imperfect keystones; there are temples illconstructed to architectural ad- justment ; there are art failures from color-blindness. These, though misfortunes, are not irremediable. And then, there are quite intelligent men born with such coronal brain-depressed organizations as to put them in the category of postponed possibilities of full-orbed men. These doubt God, deny the historic Jesus, question a future life, antagonize religion, and strive to find a moral sustenance in the leprosy of a dreary, atheistic materialism. The much-exploited phrase in the vocabulary of agnosticism, "The Unknowable" rooted in the rela- tivity of knowledge, has few charms for the erudite thinker or religious philosopher. Gravitation, the omega of our knowledge in physics, is unknowable. We only know something of its effects. Neither scientists nor psycho-physicists can, with the most delicate instruments, verify the presence of ether, yet they say it must exist, because light and heat cannot pierce and pass through perfect emptiness. But whether ether be homogeneous world-stuff, or whether it consists of Leibnitz's monads or of dis- crete units filling all space, no one knows. It is un- knowable. And yet the most advanced philosophers and astronomers believe in it as a frictionless pres- ence, permeating space, believe in it not only as a possibility, but as an indispensable necessity. "God," exclaimed the enthused Neo-Platonian 15 Proclus, "is Causation." Causation implies intelli- gence and energy. And conscious intelligence towards a given end implies purpose, wisdom and power. These are everywhere manifest in this measureless and orderly universe. And unquestion- ably, finite order could no more plan and constitute itself than books could print themselves, or than chaos could plan and constitute Kosmos. Neither could order and chance exist together at the same time in a universe of unconditioned Causation. They are direct contraries. Nor could there be order and immutable law without an all-energizing and over- ruling Author which Author, God, makes life, evol- ution, order, harmony and morality possible. Fur- ther, the fixed motions of the universe, in all their intermingling, tortuous varieties (yet of inherent unity in origin), are strictly mathematical strictly governed by law, else no eclipse could be astronom- ically calculated decades of years before its appear- ance. Furthermore, God is not a heartless absentee from this pulsing, mind-thrilled universe of life. He is imminent in the opening bud, in the planetary spaces and in the hearts of all reasoning men as the highest ideal, the Final Perfection. Indeed, the Divine Ex- istence, as the self-conscious Reality, is self-evident, and that which is self-evident to sane minds and savants does not depend upon or require a multi-. plicity of evidences for verification. It was Descartes who, founding positive know- ledge upon self -consciousness, affirmed this : "Cogito Ergo Sum' 1 (I think, therefore I am). This was not a petitio principii a begging of the question, as ultra materialists have repeatedly stated, because in thinking, something is done, which something (the reyerse of nothing) implies a conscious actor, the existing Ego. I think I cognize and cognition, related to intuition, knows knows something of Causation, for it is ever existing and ever manifest- ing as cause and effect. Intuition (I purposely avoid 16 the phrase, "First Cause") being the immediate per- ception of fundamental and essential truth, ^ ante- cedent to and independent of reason, education or experience, knows satisfactorily knows that un- caused Causation must be a finality. Had the philosophizing Proclus said, "God is con- scious Causation," he would nearly have reached the exalted moral altitude of the Christ, who declared, "God is Spirit." Evidently God, while pure in spirit, is both personal and impersonal, center and circumference measureless infinite. His oneness, his inscrutable individuality, plus personality with its attributes, is predicated of consciousness, pur- pose and will, and his Divine Personality implies energy, life, design, determination, power, wisdom and love. These are the major attributes of person- ality, and are manifest from seashore sands to the stars and suns that dot the mighty immensities above us. Be sure, we can never comprehend the incompre- hensible; we may never know God in his absolute totality, but we may know and do know enough of him enough of this great, good, Almighty Spirit- Presence, through revelation and intuition and through the stupendous works of nature, to call forth our unbounded confidence and profoundest reverence. Encircled in the Divine embrace and leaning upon the loving bosom of this infinite Ten- derness this Divine Reality is my spirit's abiding trust and rest. Though "He slay me, yet will I trust in Him." The great, the mightiest phrase of all, however, is as aforesaid, "God is Spirit," pure, e immutable, absolute and omnipresent; and man, being made in the image of God, is necessarily a spiritual being. We are all his offspring, according to both Grecian poesy and apostolic inspiration. And it is the spirit that is immortal, and not the soul. Mark well this point: not the soul. It is no more astronomically incorrect to speak of the "sun rising in the morn- 17 ing," than it is to religiously speak of the "immor- tality of the soul." No such phrases as the "im- mortal soul" or the "immortality of the soul" occur in either the Old or New Testament. Philo Judaeas, as did several Grecian and Roman writers of the first centuries of Christianity, differentiated "soul" and "spirit;" so also did Paul when speaking of "the quick and powerful word of God," that "divided asunder soul and spirit." And again, in writing to certain Thessalonians, he exclaimed: "I pray God that your whole spirit, soul and body be pre- served blameless until the coming of Jesus Christ." This triune manifestation of expression relating to man in his essential wholeness is not especially peculiar to Biblical psychology, for several Greek philosophers are reported to have taught, though in different phraseology, the same rational truth. The Roman Marcus Aurelius, while urging that life was a unit that the sensations were subjective taught also that the "soul (the soul-body) was a re- fined, corporeal organism." Alford, in his Greek Testament, declares that Pneuma is the highest and distinctive part of man, while the Psuche, the lower or animal soul, contains the desires and passions which we have in common with the brutes. Auberlin, a Tubingen graduate and Bassel pro- fessor of theology, states that "the spirit is the spir- itual nature of man as directed upward, and is capa- ble of a living intercommunion with God, while the soul is the diffused, quickening power of the body, as in animals, and pertaining to, is excitable through the senses." Porter, on "The Human Intellect," declares that the word "soul" differs from spirit as the species from the genus; souls being limited to a spirit that either is or has been connected with a body or ma- terial organization, while a spirit may be applied to a being which has not at present, or is believed never to have had, such physical connection. 18 Professor Schubert, a follower of Schelling, states that "the soul is the inferior part of every intellec- tual nature, the interior organism, while the Spirit is that part of our nature which tends to the purely rational, the lofty and the divine." Delitzsch, in his Biblical Psychology, assures us that the "psychical functions of the soul are types of the spiritual functions, the broken rays of their colors. But the soul is no Ego. It is to be distin- guished from the spirit. The inner self-conscious- ness, which forms the background of the spirit- copied functions, is that of the spirit, and is related to the Infinite Spirit from which it has its origin." Man, in his completeness, it must be remembered, is a trinity in unity, and this idea of the trinity runs like a continuous golden cord through all things, vis- ible and invisible Father, Logos, Holy Spirit cause, means, effects the root, the trunk, the fruit- age the self-conscious spirit, the particled soul- body, the physical human organism Man ! How true the Biblical teaching: God breathed into man the spirit (ruach) of life, and he became a living human being. When the disciples saw Jesus walking upon the sea, they said, "It is a spir- it." In this phrase they expressed the common be- lief of those times in the conscious presence of the spirits of the dead. Says the French academician, Renan: "The group that pressed around Jesus on the banks of the lake Tiberias believed in appari- tions and spirits. Great spiritual manifestations were present. . . . All believed themselves to be inspired in different ways ; some were prophets, some teachers, and others spake in tongues." These won- derful works were wrought in the very face of ag- nostic Sadduceeism and sacredotal Phariseeism. The cries of "Beelzebub! and of Magic!" were of no avail. "Judge ye of yourselves," were the fervid words of the Christ. Soul (Nephesh, in the He- brew) has been a sort of a verbal vehicle for many ambiguous ideas. In Biblical language, souls are 19 born and souls die. "The soul that sinneth, it shall die;" and the New Testament speaks of "Him who was able to destroy both soul and body in hell;" but the destruction of the spirit, inbreathed by God, was never taught (if memory serves me) by any classical scholar or any of the early Christian writers. The ruach (Hebrew), pneuma (Greek) is not an accumulation of aggregates not a bundle of thoughts, emotions and warring attributes; but is noncomposite, uncompounded and indestructible an involutional influx from God, the One the All who alone hath underived immortality. The apostolic writers considered men in their fleshly and soul-bodies as dominated by the spirit, and this analysis into the somatic, the psychic and the pneumatic is clearly maintained in their writ- ings. Jesus, in soul-agony, cried out, "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit." God is not pro- nounced the Father of the bodies nor of the souls of men, but he is called the "God of the spirits of all flesh." When the first martyr, Stephen, fell be- neath the stones of murderers, he exclaimed, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit;" and dying, he joined "the spirits of just men made perfect." "There is a spirit (conscious force) in man," exclaimed the prophet, "and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth it un- derstanding." Just what the inherent essence of this spirit this Ego is, besides being conscious, finite, limited in power, and uncompounded, we may as well say, with the old Roman Ovid: "Causa Latet; vis est notissima (fontis)" "The cause is hidden ; the effect is visible to all." And this "visible effect" of the spirit is consciousness, purpose and will, manifesting through the soul, or rather the soul-body, and called by Paul the "spiritual body;" by theosophists, the "astral body;" by psychic re- searchers, the "etheric body;" and by cultured ideal- ists, the "subjective body." This soul-body, or subjective body, as believed by 20 Spiritualists (I have here used the word "Spiritual- ists" as the direct antithesis of materialists), is a substantial, organized entity, an aggregate of sub- limated elements, and the counterpart in form of the physical body. Every permanent form neces- sarily has a germinal attracting center, and the ger- minal magnetic center of the soul-body is the con- scious, intelligent spirit, inbreathed from God at the beginning of this planet's cycle of human exist- ence. Further, this soul-body, the intermediary be- tween the physical body and the abiding spirit, is particled and constituted, in part at least, of the emanations from the infinitesimally minute atoms, electrons, unseen aromas, imponderable elements, and the subtle essences eliminated from the earthly body in its varied attitudes and activities. This particled, fluidic soul, or soul-body, is the vehicle, the etheric clothing of the immortal spirit. It is this body that is resurrected out of the physical, perish- ing body at death. The resurrection from mortality into immortality is perpetual. "Now that the dead are raised," said Jesus, "Moses showed at the bush." There never was a more irrational, illogical the- ory put forward, or a greater mental failure exhib- ited relating to immortality, than that of a few necromancy practitioners who have attempted to ac- count for the existence of spirit, or of spiritual beings, from the conjunction and molecular interaction of two unknowables, matter and force; both, so far as we know, non-conscious. Nothing is absolutely known of the ultimate nature of matter. Much is said and written of its properties and qual- ities; but these, known only in terms of mind, point to a primordial, unexplored substratum nothing more. The primordial foundation of immortality, then, can be logically predicated and substantiated only of the two factors, self-conscious Spirit and ten- uous, invisible substance the One in two expres- sions. The structural plan of nature, through intermedi- 21 ate, physical forms, each and all afire with the Di- vine purpose, was undoubtedly from the animalcule up to man man, with his feet fast upon the earth, and his head, in inspiration and thought, among the blazing stars, symbolizing his destiny. Students of nature, physiology, psychology, psy- chometry and phrenology especially the latter in their varied experimental demonstrations, such as applying the galvanic current to certain brain areas in both men and animals, witnessed, through this stimulation, the production of muscular movement, and later determined the location of organ and func- tion. They were at first almost amazed at the emo- tions and faculties aroused, evolved, and so located in particular cranial centers. None acquainted with the investigations of Gall, Spurzheim, Combe, Fowler, the late Dr. John Elliot- son (president of a medical society and professor at the University of London), Professor Hidjig of Baden, Dr. Hollander, Professor Ferrier, Alfred R. Wallace, naturalist and scientist, and others can doubt that the brain is the home, the center-station of the conscious spirit. Exciting definite portions of the cranial areas in monkeys, there were produced effects corresponding to the located organs claimed by phrenologists as manifesting certain aptitudes relating to the mental characteristics of mankind, the cerebellum, relating to the physical nature and animal activities, the front brain to the intellect, and the top-brain, or coronal region, to hope, faith, conscience, reverence and spirituality. And these, the highest organs of the head, are located directly over the great central seat of the self-conscious spirit. True, Dr. Carpenter contended that the back- head was the seat of the intellect, but the Doctor years ago was himself a conservative back-chapter in the revelations of psychological and phrenological research. It is admitted that the most of the ex- periments by Ferrier were with monkeys and other animals, but monkeys think, have intellects, and they at reason upon their plane of instinctive development; and yet, unquestionably, they lack the top-brain parlors, the moral and spiritual nature. They never transmit their knowledge; never show remorse of conscience; never pray, nor "chatter," so far as we know, of the hope and joyousness of a fadeless im- mortality. It must be evident, not only to psychologists, phrenologists and psycho-physicists, but to every studious and profound investigator of the brain, that while it is a congeries of organs, every organ implies a function, and every function indicates a present purpose being fulfilled, or a prophetic purpose to be actualized and fulfilled in a future state of ex- istence. It may be further stated that the cortex of the brain, the instrument of the spirit, develops from the interior outward, the lower, deeper stratum be- ing the first to unfold and that there are embryonic cells in the process of formation representing the higher nature, suggesting moral and spiritual possi- bilities not yet achieved possibilities which demand a future realm of existence for their unfoldment and realization. Summarizing the foregoing, as relating to immor- tality, we see that God is Spirit ; and, human beings being made in the image of God, are necessarily moral and spiritual beings, and spiritual beings (not originating in matter) naturally survive death. The universality of the belief in immortality in- dicates that it has a natural basic foundation in the human constitution, the central force of which is spirit. This life does not give sufficient time for the ad- justment of errors and malicious-planned wrongs in the social and moral channels of sowing and reap- ing. Remorse, with the lowest classes, often merges into a sort of personal Utopia. They smile while they murder; hence a disciplinary life hereafter is 23 necessary to adjust the character-equilibriums be- tween cause and effect, retribution and reformation, justice and mercy. The deep, fervid desire for knowledge, progress and perfect felicity, cannot under any circum- stances, be attained in this brief life; therefore the necessity for a future life, for the consummation of whatever is noblest and purest in this preliminary and checkered state of existence. Human bodies, like trees in a forest, grow, attain their limits and fall, while the conscious spirit of the thinker, the idealist, the moralist, the philos- opher, though reaching a ripening old age, has barely touched the life-limits of capacities and mighty pos- sibilities. Therefore, the demand for a future life, with its superior opportunities and its attending heavenly helpers. Today's highest delights are found in the widen- ing fields of knowledge, in solving the mysteries of nature, in conquering intruding environments, in the projection of good thoughts, in the reaching up- ward for loftier ideals ; but these ideals are never at- tained in this life ; therefore the moral necessity for a future life where ideals are attained and faith ripens out into fruition. The life-principle, centered in the simple cell of the amoeba, prophesied of higher forms. And these, in connection with the upward trend of things, from the less to the more complex, prophesied of man. And the ordained and immutable law of unfoldment being interminable, rational man today, afire with hope, aspiration, possibility and spiritually tethered to and affiliated with the Infinite Cause, prophesies of immortality, without which^this life is a painful blunder a meaningless failure a tantalizing dream, and morality, madness itself. Said the great Grecian : "When, therefore, death approaches a man, the mortal part of him, as it ap- pears, dies, but the immortal part departs, safe and 24 uncorrupted, having withdrawn itself from death." Plato. "As they who run a race are not crowned till they have conquered, so good men believe that the reward of virtue is not fully given till after death. . . . Not by lamentations and mournful chants ought we to celebrate the funerals of the good, but by hymns ; for in ceasing to be numbered with mor- tals, they enter upon a diviner life." Plutarch. "If my body be overpressed, it must descend to the destined place; nevertheless my spirit shall not descend, but, after being a thing immortal, shall fly upward to high heaven." Heraclitus. "A man ought to have confidence then about his spirit, if during this life he has made it beautiful with temperance, justice, fortitude, freedom and truth he waits for his entrance into the world of spirits as one who is ready to depart when destiny calls. I shall not remain, I shall depart. Do not say then that Socrates is buried ; say that you bury my body." Socrates. "The origin of spirits cannot be found upon earth, for there is nothing earthly in them. They have faculties which claim to be called divine, and which can never be shown to have come to man from any source but God. The nature in us which thinks, which knows, which lives, is celestial, and for that reason necessarily eternal. ... It cannot be de- stroyed." Further, Cicero represents the aged Cato as exclaiming, "0 happy day when I shall remove from this crowd of mortals, to go and join the divine assembly of the gods. Not only shall I meet again there the men who have lived godlike on earth; I shall find again my son, to whom these aged hands have performed the duties which in the order of nature he should have rendered to me. His spirit has never quitted me. He departed, turning his eyes upon me and calling on me, for that place where he knew I should soon come. If I have borne his loss with courage, it is not that my heart was un- 25 feeling, but I consoled myself with the thought that our separation would not be long." Cicero. The foregoing thoughts, in connection with sci- ence and scientific demonstrations, such as wireless telegraphy, wireless telephony, optical instruments enabling one to see the lips of persons in conversa- tion several miles distant; sympathetic suggestion, subjective intelligence, telepathy, permitting the transmission of thought-force through ethereal vi- brations, connecting under supranormal conditions the fleshed with the unfleshed and psychic lucidity, of which the X-ray is a fine physical symbol these, all these, reaching to the very verge of materialistic mortality, impinge upon, take hold of and prophesy of a future, never-ending existence. The recorded phenomena of remotest antiquity, the revelations of the Oriental races, the historic rec- ords of Brahmins, Buddhists, Jews, Christians, as well as the oracles of Greece and Rome, all abound in abundant testimonies of a conscious existence be- yond the silence of the tomb. In a special and most marvelous manner Christ "brought life and immortality to light," to the proud, ceremonial Pharisee and to the agnostic Sadducee. Long and often had the Judean Hebrew asked, "If a man die, shall he live again?" Long had the Jew- ish people sat in the shadow of darkness. "All our fathers were under the cloud," wrote Paul to the Corinthians. Therefore when Christ took the dead maid by the hand and said, "Arise, her spirit came back to her again;" and when they heard the com- manding voice, "Lazarus, come forth," they were not only startled, but convinced that the dead live again. After the resurrection of the Christ in his sub- jective or soul-body, being seen of Cephas, then of the twelve, then "about five hundred brethren at once," and then, exclaims Paul, "Last of all he was seen by me also." And further, when on his way to Damascus, commissioned by the Chief Priests, he saw at midday (as did the others journeying with 26 him) a light from heaven, above the brightness of the sun, shining about him, and out of the silence he heard a voice saying in the Hebrew tongue, "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? And I said, Who art thou, Lord?" He replied, "I am Jesus whom thou persecutest. Rise, stand upon thy feet. I have appeared unto thee for the purpose of making thee a minister and a witness." Having been a witness of such astounding spir- itual manifestations, the apostle could well say: "For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." Again he says: "Coming to visions and revela- tions," he knew a man "caught up to the third heaven" into paradise, hearing there "unspeakable words." And while praying in the temple he de- clares that "he was in a trance." Similar phenomena confirming the future life antedate and succeed Christianity. God is no re- specter of either persons or nations. Epimenides, contemporary of Solon, received, so he stated, divine revelations from the overshadow- ing spiritual heavens. Zeno affirmed that tutelary gods or guardian spirits inspired his speech and at times influenced his actions. Ulysses, in the eleventh book of the Odyssey, is declared to have visited the underworld region, con-; versing with the spirit of Tyresius Elpenon and his own mother, receiving great consolation. Minucius Felix, a Roman author (about 189 A. D.), in the "Octavius," Chap, xxix, writes thus: "There are some sincere and vagrant spirits, de- graded from their heavenly vigor by their earthly stains and lusts. Now, these spirits, after having lost the simplicity of their nature by being weighed down and immersed in vices for a solace for their calamities, cease not, now that they are ruined 27 themselves, to ruin others ; and being depraved them- selves, to infuse into others the error of their deprav- ity. The poets know that these spirits are demons, and the philosophers discourse of them." Origen, the erudite Christian Father, writing against his atheistic antagonist, Celsus (200 A. D.), says: "Celsus has compared the miracles (spiritual manifestations) of Jesus to the tricks of jugglers and the magic of Egyptians, and there would in- deed be a resemblance between them if Jesus, like the practitioners of magic arts, had performed his works only for show or worldly gain." Tertulian, in his celebrated work, "De Anima," says : "We had a right to anticipate prophecies and the continuance of spiritual gifts, and we are now permitted to enjoy the gift of a prophetess. There is a sister among us who possesses the faculty of revelation. Commonly, during religious services, she falls into a trance, holding then communion with angels, beholding Jesus himself, hearing divine mys- teries explained, reading the hearts of some persons, .and administering to such as require it." For three hundred years after the apostles' time, visions, trances, apparitions, healing gifts and spir- itual marvels abounded in all Christian societies and countries. And why should they not, since Jesus expressly said : "These signs shall follow them that believe"? And again, "Greater works than these shall ye do, for I go unto my Father." And still again : "Lo ! I am with you alway unto the end of the world." Do these signs, these demonstrations, these mani- festations, visions and trances and gift of tongues, among which also was "the discerning of spirits" (see 1 Cor. xii) abound in churches or in the Chris- tian nations today? Far from it. As prophesied, they have "fallen away," fallen into divided sects, of which there are 157 in our own United States, including Christian Scientists; fallen into the whirl- pool of competition for pelf and power, into the 28 maelstrom of selfish worldliness, causing caste wranglings, blood-crimsoned battle-fields murders on a massive and merciless scale ! Christ's promised gifts, be it said in sorrow, no longer abound in the churches. Atheistic material- ists, agnostics and honest, cultured doubters are ask- ing, why? since God and his laws are unchangeable. They are asking for clear, now-a-day evidences, for terse, positive, present-time proofs of a life here- after. Do they get them from popes, priests and parsons? Furthest from it possible. These can only point inquirers to the oracles of old, or remind them of the New Testament miracles and records. Then comes the prompt response : Those are not now-a-day evidences. They are ancient, long ago testimonies testimonies by unknown authors tes- timonies collected and 'booked long after their re- ported occurrences. And, further, they were "voted upon" by interested priests and bishops in Roman Catholic councils, and have during the warring cen- turies been manipulated, revised and re-revised. Medieval theology is today in a state of complete bankruptcy. Continuing, these free-thinking agnostics sardon- ically ask : "Are sincere prayers answered? Is God alive and present in the universe? Is Christ still mediatorially in the heavens? Are angels still min- istering to mortals? Are spirits appearing and talk- ing as did Moses and Elias on the Mount of Trans- figuration?" No ! is the chilling, reluctant reply of the church- es; inspiration has ceased; the heavens are brass, the angels are voiceless. Spirit communications and revelations were booked and sealed upon Patmos and the present this stirring, investigating pres- ent is left to feed upon the bony skeletons and am- biguous records of the grim, dust-buried past. Read- ing about the manna that fell and fed the wander- ing Israelites does not feed us today. None can live on the history of a thousand-year-old bread. Noah's 29 ark would not serve our modern commerce. The Biblical records of the fig and pomegranate that once ripened around Olive's mountains do not sat- isfy our normal wants today. As well strive to fill our arteries with the blood of those old Jewish patriarchs as our minds with their dull, formal, sacrificial ceremonies and dry religious experiences. It is morally impossible to import religion, or direct evidences of a future immortal life from the cylin- der libraries of Babylonia and Mesopotamia, or from the sepulchred dust of Asia Minor. And how vain the attempt to do so, when we are taught to pray, "Give us this day (mark the phrase, 'this day 9 ) our daily bread," the bread of life which cometh down each day out of heaven in the form of impressions, premonitions, inspirations, visions, and entrancing manifestations, giving light and "life to the world." "Where there is no vision," said the prophet, "the people perish." (Prov. xvi, 19.) Thankfully it may be said, God has never left the world without living witnesses, and among the wit- nesses today of a true Christianity and heavenly manifestations relating to immortality, are the American Shakers, a quiet, unassuming, humble people, keeping the commandments in the Christ spirit of love and truth. This body of real, Pente- costal Christians hold all things in common. They are noted for industry, cleanliness and hospitality. They are religious seven days in the week. Practic- ing the laws of hygiene, they live to be very aged. Thy have added to faith, knowledge. They oppose all wars, and follow peace ; and they retain the gos- pel-promised spiritual gifts. They are not very nu- merous, for, as foretold, "Strait is the gate and narrow is the way, and few there be that find it." But, once more, where are the dead? Momentous question! Where are the demonstrations, the irre- fragible evidences in this morning time of the twen- tieth century, proving beyond question the fact of a 30 future conscious life, in which identity is maintained and where we shall meet, recognize our loved ones, and know as we are known? After half a century and more of candid, conscientious research in the fields of the finer forces and among the higher psy- chic sciences, in both English-speaking and Oriental lands, my reply may be expressed in one word "Spiritualism" using the word first as the direct antithesis of materialism, and secondly as the npu- menon underlying the phenomena of personal spirit presences, and demonstrating under proper condi- tions a converse with them. The investigating, advancing nineteenth century bequeathed to this twentieth century the newly dis- covered key the mighty force that unlocked the door of the dreary tomb, rolled away the stone from the sepulchre, cabled the ocean of doubt and bridged the river of death, enabling mortals and immortals, standing face to face, to affirm in the living now, the truth of life eternal beyond death, and withal, widening the seemingly limitless horizons of prog- ress out into measureless eternities. In its broadest, all-comprehensive sense, Spiritual- ism is a fact a truth a philosophy; and more, it is religion religion itself, binding and rebinding the finite closer to the Infinite, and humanity to the very heart of Divinity. Thus considered in its high- est estate, it is the complement of the Christianity of the Christ, and relates to the long-delayed dis- pensation of the "second coming" a continuous coming in the glory and in the power of angel min- istrants the manifestations of which are natural to the plane of their producing causes. The miracles in the Catholic Church from the first Christian centuries to St. Francis of Assisi, and later, were supported by the most incontrovertible evidence, by judicial depositions, and by authentic records; and these miracles, so-called ; were plainly- spiritual manifestations, and were in perfect ac- 31 cord, psychically considered, with those occurring in the present. The scholarly Dr. T. J. Hudson, in his work, "The Law of Psychic Phenomena/' remarks: "The man who denies these facts is simply ignorant. " They are the links in the chain of continuity that, uniting the past with the present, harmonize religion and science the right and left hand angels of progress. The most eminent preacher of New York, Dr. Minpt J. Savage, thus testifies: "After years of in- vestigation, a large number of the leading thinkers, students, authors, scientists, physical scientists, chemists, mathematicians great minds have come to believe that there is no possible way of explaining the phenomena which have been over and over again proven to be facts, without supposing that the per- sonalities had been in communication with the in- telligences of the invisible world." Only Sunday, March 5th, Bishop Fallows of Chi- cago, in an eloquent sermon, delivered in St. Paul's Episcopal Church, said: "There are undoubtedly genuine Spiritualistic phenomena. Otherwise the Bible itself would be untrue. They occurred in the past, and why not now, since so many materially inclined doubt a future life?" The late Bishop T. M. Clark of Providence, R. I., attended the seances of D. D. Home, and later years he informed both Robert Dale Owen and myself that the "phenomena were real and wonderful, destroy- ing the fear of death and reviving the gifts of the spirit." The Rt. Rev. W. H. Moreland, Bishop of Sacra- mento, CaL, stated, as reported in the press, that "as a Christian and a spiritual being, I believe the com- munications with the spiritual world are reasonable, and to be expected; indeed, that our whole religion reveals it and requires it, and that, as a matter of fact, we practice intercourse, consciously or uncon- sciously, with the spiritual world every day of our lives." 32 Bishop John P. Newman of the Methodist Church is a Spiritualist. This was shown in unmistakable language in a funeral sermon of an aged lady at No. 561 Madison Avenue, New York. "Belief in spirit communication in some form/' he declared, "is all but universal." He further said that "the spirits of the departed have all along returned to earth. The best of the Greeks and the Romans, and those eminent in the church for learning and piety, have cherished this common faith. It is reasonable and Biblical. . . . Celestial visions were given to Isaiah and the prophets, to Paul and the apostles, to Stephen and the martyrs, while Samuel and Moses and Elias were returned to earth. And why should we suppose that there is less interest in heaven for earth now than then? But do the communications between the two worlds continue to this day? Let us not be deterred in answering this question affirm- atively because a great Bible fact has been perverted for lust and lucre. ... It was the opinion of Wesley that Swedenborg was visited by the spirits of his departed friends, and Dr. Adam Clark be- lieved the same." The Rev. Adin Ballou, of Massachusetts, whom Count Tolstoi pronounced "one of the greatest and noblest men of America," both preached Spiritualism and wrote a book in defense of it. Professor Robert Hare, of the Pennsylvania Uni- versity, author of several discoveries in the physical sciences, among which was the caliomotor, praised by Professor Faraday, wrote a large volume entitled, "Spiritualism Scientifically Demonstrated." Alfred R. Wallace, the scientist and naturalist, pensioned by the Queen for his great attainments, says : "My position, therefore, is that the phenom- ena of Spiritualism in their entirety, do not require further confirmation. They are proved quite as well as any facts are proved in other sciences." Sir William Crookes, F. R. S., in his book, "Re- searches in the Phenomena of Spiritualism," states 33 at length his investigations of the fact of an inter- communion between the dwellers in the visible and the invisible worlds. The illustrious Victor Hugo was an outspoken Spiritualist. I once had the combined pleasure and honor of attending a seance in Paris where he was one of the personages present. When receiving a beautiful communication from his departed son, he wept in joy and gratitude. Well and wisely did he say : "When I go down to the grave I can say, like many others, 'I have finished my day's work;' but I cannot say that I have finished my life. My day will begin again the next morning. The tomb is not a blind alley ; it is a thoroughfare. It closes on the twi- light to open on the dawn." The distinguished F. W. H. Myers wrote, in his "Phantasms of the Living:" "not, then, with tears and lamentations should we think of the blessed dead. Rather, we should rejoice with them in their enfran- chisement, and know that they are still with us and minded to keep us as sharers in their joy. It is they, not we, who are working now. They are more ready to hear than we to pray; they guide us as with a cloudy pillar, but it is kindling into a steadfast fire." Professor Henry Kiddle, writer, author and super- intendent of the New York City schools for years, thus wrote : "Spiritualism not only demonstrates in a most positive manner the fact of a future conscious existence, but it is an encouraging help to all religious truth. . . . I have witnessed marvelous manifesta- tions through my son's organization, which I could not account for only upon the hypothesis that the agencies were spirits." Dr. Richard Hodgson, M. A., a prominent member of the British Society for Psychical Research, writes : "I believe I am in possession of incontrovertible facts which demonstrate immortality. I have witnessed some genuine supernormal phenomena, not explain- able by either fraud, illusion or suggestion, and whose 34 significance will have to be reckoned with by all men of science." The late S. C. Hall, writer, book reviewer, and founder of the London Art Journal, writes in his pamphlet: "As to the use of Spiritualism, it has made me a Christian. I humbly and fervently thank God that it has removed all my doubts." Hundreds of testimonies similar to the foregoing from those illustrations in science, or devoted to relig- ion, might be named, who would testify to the tre- mendous fact that the dead can and do consciously converse through sensitive intermediaries with the living. And what the moral trend what the primary pur- pose of this spiritual dispensation? Whatever it may have been, it certainly is not destructive, only so far as light displaces or disintegrates darkness. It was and is emphatically constructive and confirmatory of all the past revelations that have streamed down in golden radiance from the Christ-heavens of beatific blessedness. These cheering, uplifting messages from the high- er, invisible world are especially intended to impress upon men's minds that they are spirits now; that they are moral actors now; responsible beings now; that they are building now for eternity ; that they con- sciously survive death; that they take with them to the next stage of existence their deeply-imbedded characteristics, attainments, memories, in a word identities, and can, under proper psychic environ- ments, converse with those still vestured in material bodies ; and, by so doing, mortals along the way may measurably learn of the conditions and employments of those existing in different states of consciousness and dwelling in different spheres, from the arch- angels and angels down the moral decline to those peopling the dark Tartarian realms of remorse, an- guish and intensest mental suffering. The philosophy of Spiritualism puts character be- fore creed, and reaffirms the apostolic doctrine that 35 "whatsoever men sow, that they must also reap ;" that there is no escape from just and deserved punish- ment; that repentance and prayer are indispensable duties and it seeks to instill and thrill into men's minds the principles of co-operation, of equal oppor- tunities for all and it, moreover, inculcates the sub- lime ideal of universal harmony by establishing bet- ter and higher social conditions here and now con- ditions that must ultimate in a practical and Christ- like altruism a present spiritual realization. Heav- en's rest is not idleness; the soul's activities are in- tensified by the transition termed "Death." The fu- ture life is a social life, a constructive life, a retri- butive life, and a progressive life, where the spirit sweeps onward and upward in glory transcending glory. In that hour of death, Spiritualism does not say, "Good-night," but rather gives the glad assurance of a most welcome "Good-morning" just across the crystal river. It does not drape the mourner's home in gloom, but lifts the grim curtain, allowing the sor- rowing to hear responsive words of undying affection from those who have gone one step higher into some one of the Father's heavenly mansions. When Christ's Christianity prevails when nominal Chris- tians become more Christlike, and nominal Spiritual- ists more spiritual, the chasm of Shibboleths and medieval dogmatisms will be bridged, estranged hands will be clasped, unsympathizing hearts will be warmed by the Pentecostal flames of divine love, and angels will daily walk and talk with mortals as pres- ent-day proofs of immortality. This restless, pushing twentieth century, largely immersed in materialism and a conscienceless com- mercialism, needs a new Christ in its temple; or, rather, a nearer, purer-purposed approach to the old Christ-spirit, which inspires and demands integrity, moral principle, brotherhood, reverence, obedience, tongues of fire, open vision, and a heavenly baptism of life a new life a higher life inflowed from those 36 seers and sages, whose presence make radiant the homes of the glorified gods. Life, springing into conscious existence from non- life, is as unthinkable as the derivation of something from nothing. Neither man nor his naturally en- nobling religious emotions, originated from the chance-force friction of atoms, nor from any blind, polarized interblendings of unreasoning molecules. These of themselves could never produce such desir- able fruitage as morality and religion that relig- ion, pure and undefiled, which makes for righteous- ness and heaven here and now, and for beatific blessedness hereafter. It is true that finite, limited man, seeing through a glass darkly, has never seen God ; and so no child ever saw the mother who cared for him. Neither the garments nor the material body constitute the mother; and yet the child feels, loves, trusts the mother. And so conscious, rational man believes in and trusts God. The invisible is ever the author of the visible. Tutelary divinities, supersensuous influences and conscious spiritual intelligences from angelic alti- tudes adown the scale of being to demons and de- moniac obsessions, are all about us ; and yet, if men as moral actors accept and strenuously appropriate the good and true and the beautiful they may make this life now an Eden of ecstasy a statelier garden of enchanting loveliness where industry is animated and sanctified by love, and where men under the dominant reign of love may and will, like Enoch of old, consciously walk with God. Transfiguration is just as possible now as in apostolic times. "Come up higher" is the voice of God within. Come up higher, is the trumpet call of thousands of Christ's who have lived, suffered, fought, conquered, received the white-stone seal, and are now crowned victors in the celestial realms of a paradisaic immortality. Be sure, a present intercommunion with the in- visible hosts of heaven does not prove immortality 37 in the sense of endlessness. This cannot, in the na- ture of things, be absolutely demonstrated. But if Moses and Elias, a thousand years more or less after their death, appeared on the Mount of Transfigura- tion, and "talked" with the disciples of Jesus; if one of the ancient prophets appeared to John on the Isle of Patmos, and conversed with him ; if many of the great, inspired personages of the long-ago past have reappeared, robed in spotless white, and spoken in tongues of fire to mortals now living, the proof seems almost absolute that immortality is the glori- ous destiny of humanity. When this glad hour comes, empires, kingdoms, republics will constitute one country, and the thought of that one country will not be "mine," "wme," for selfish ends but ours, and yours, to appropriate for holy uses. Our homes will then be the universe, and our rest wherever a human heart beats in sympathy with our own, and the highest happiness of each will consist in aiding and blessing others. The soil will be as free for all to cultivate as the air that we breathe. Gardens will blossom and bear fruit for the most humble. Fountains will spring up by the wayside, and orchards and fruit trees will invite passing wayfarers. Orphans will find homes of tenderest sympathies. The tanned brows of toiling millions will be wreathed with the roses of industry and peace, and the great, throb- bing family of humanity will be obedient to the law of love, equality and liberty, thus establishing the kingdom of God upon earth. THE REJECTION. So ends the "rejected" paper, the rejection, cler- ical-inspired, being the natural fruitage of priest- craft and theological creeds. It is but justice here to state that the secretary of 38 this British Philosophical Society, Professor E. Hull, LL. D., F. R. S., F. G. S., exemplified the gentlemen of culture and fairmindedness all through this ex- traordinary transaction. It should be further stated that the world-re- nowned microscopist and scientist, Professor Lionel S. Beale, F. R. C. P., F. R. S., F. R. M. S., etc., contributor to and member of this Institute, called upon me personally a few days after the official re- jection of this "paper" upon immortality, to express his "regrets that the paper was not read." Other members of this Philosophical Society very gra- ciously called upon me, or sent personal "notes" ex- pressing their regrets that the "paper" was not read and discussed. But as their notes were marked "Private," I am not at liberty to mention their names. Canon Girdlestone neither called upon me as a penitent, nor has he, so far as I know, expressed any regret at the decision of the council, of which at the time he was leader and potentate. Wisely did the old Hebrew prophet exclaim, "0 priests, ye have been a snare on Mizpah. ... Ye teach for hire, and your prophets (seers) divine for money." Persecution and the sword have ever accompanied this churchianic Christianity, which is more Pauline than Christlike, and more popelike than Pauline in a word,demoniac. This class of hidebound priests, steeped in bigotry, will be the obsessing, vexing spirits in the future world. Intermediary sensitives should look out for them. They are not to be trusted in matters concerning their craft. Guizot, the eminent French statesman and his- torian, writing of the superstition and bigotry of the church, used these telling words: "When any war arose between power and liberty, the Christian church always planted itself on the side of power against liberty." In the same line of wisdom, the public press termed "good gray poet, " Walt Whit- man, wrote: 39 "0 to struggle against great odds, to meet enemies undaunted, To be entirely alone with them, to find out how much one can stand! To look strife, torture, prison, popular odium face to face, To mount the scaffold, to advance to the muzzles of guns with perfect nonchalance! To be indeed a God!" Cherishing only the kindest and most fraternal feelings towards the members of the Victoria Insti- tute and Philosophical Society of Great Britain, and wishing them abundant success in whatever is just and good and true, and as a parting salute, I bid them farewell in these lines: "And when my fainting heart Desponds and murmurs at its adverse fate, Then quietly the angel's lips part, Whispering softly, Wait!' 'Patience!' she sweetly saith 'The Father's mercies never come too late; Gird thee with patient strength and trusting faith And firm endurance 'Wait!' Angel, behold, I wait! Wearing the thorny crown through all life's hours, Wait till the hand shall ope th' eternal gate, And change the thorns to flowers." 40 THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW W AN INITIAL FINE OF 25 CENTS JLES FIVE J( temples, nati of all lands. Magic and \ Turkey, Gre WILL. BE ASSESSED FOR FAILURE TO RETURN THIS BOOK ON THE DATE DUE. THE PENALTY WILL INCREASE TO SO CENTS ON THE FOURTH DAY AND TO $1.OO ON THE SEVENTH DAY OVERDUE. ith foreign views, nee and literature Australia, China, Assyria, Palestine, sophies compared. 1.75. Postage 25c| rms, their progress 1 MV& and impulses. 3 brought together. ences. Symposium fl 1.25. Postage . 15c I xalted, say of their 1 icked. How spirits! 1,1.00. Postage 15c 1 spirits may cause 1 void and cast out. 1 1.25. Postage lac 1 edium, martyr, or 1 orient, excavations I Gnostic and early 1 J1.25. Postage 15c 1 ion of Spiritualism 1 s, authors, philos- 1 ference book. An 1 $1.00; Postage 12c S ive a century and j marriage and right ; 51.00. Postage lOc j rit. Pre-exlstence. 1 1.00. Postage lOc j of inoculation and ,ained. The cause $1.00. Postage 15c irly ability. Lines .40. Postage 10 _ .35. Postage 5c ared in debate by .. .30. Postage 5c , 25 the good from evil orld 10 SPIRIT and pilgrima Are divorces OOT 23 1946 by 40 differe IMMOR influence anc DEMON How to attri THE CH the very Goi lB)n'60MH and explorat Christian wr WHAT 1 with extract; ophera, sciei encyclopedia. DEATH grow ol'd gr; living. Wha * ! ' ; ' ' PATHW Embodiments VACC1N calf-lymph i of eczema, i SPIRIT sharply di^ REINC/ gU PDH 18Nov'6CGM Buddhist pr . NINETY Yl unw - HOW TO ( spirits. Ho SPIRITUAL NOV 14 Wfi ORTHODO* and hell-fii SPI RITU Al- '. 20 31 15 15 10 05 .15 PROOFS SPIRITUAL SPIRITUAL FRAUDS U FIRST EPI 05 FIFTIETH HOURS Wl .1 15 10 DID JESUS THE GENE 1 .15 L _. .25 ! .25 CHRISTIAr* WAR TS 10 ... .10 SCATHING DR. PEEB LIFE-SIZE PEEBLES 5719 Los Ansreles isin 05 . .25 LD 21-100m-7,'40 (6936s) f g 25 PUBLISHING CO. Fayette St. California, U. S. A. Gaylord Bros. Makers Syracuse, N. Y. PAT. JAN. 21, 1908 YC 15558 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY