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 Spirit GomjTTunion: 
 
 An immovable fact in the internal 
 conaciousneas and external history 
 
 of man « « 
 
 by 
 
 J. B. Ferguson «
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 SPIRIT COMMUNION: 
 
 AN IMMOVABLE FACT 
 
 IM THK 
 
 INTERNAL CONSCIOUSNESS 
 
 AND 
 
 lEXTERNAL HISTORY OF MAN, 
 
 BEING AN ADDKESS, 
 
 '^ DELIVERED IN TIIE REGULAR COURSE OF TUBLIC MINISTRATION, IN 
 
 NASHVILLE, TENN., APIUL 16, 1855. 
 
 BY J. B. FEROUSON 
 
 POBLIsnKD AKD CIIICCIATED GRATUITOUSLY BY M. W. WKTMOKE. 
 
 NASHVILLE: 
 
 M'KENNIE & BROWN, PRIXTKRS— TRUE WHIG OFFICE. 
 
 1855.
 
 >• 
 
 cc 
 
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 C\ 
 
 
 SPIRIT COMMUNION. 
 
 PRAYER. 
 
 Ai.L-irELPixG SpipvIt, aid me to think clearly and speak 
 impressively to these, Thy creatures. Our humble power 
 of Thought, with its immortal instincts, we would now turn 
 to Thee. Our knowledge is very limited; our judgment 
 imperfect; our love grows cold, and our hearts harden in 
 5 selhshness ; while our feet often wander in the thorny paths 
 oQ of wrong-doing and sorrow. Give us the wings of faith and 
 pure desire, that we may, for this hour at least, fly away 
 from the perplexities of weak and misguided judgment; the 
 "in '^Tpression of care, and the heart-stings of unworthy afiec- 
 ^ tions and fears. How wide, O, God ! the gulf between the 
 clear skies of Thy unfaili)ig love, and the low, dark, clouds 
 of our ignorance, and the benighted places of our gross 
 , indulgences ! But Thou dost pity and help us, as our souls 
 5 bear testimony ever}'- day. Thy beneficent smile, spread 
 ^ o'er the face of Nature, gives rays of light to our dark 
 2 pathway ; and the inspirations of Thy good Spirit warm our 
 uj liearts to love and adoration. Unreservedly would we com- 
 -\ mit ourselves and our interests to Thy guiding wisdom, 
 < hopefully trusting that we shall be taught that truth which 
 shall never die ; gain that treasure which shall never cor- 
 rupt; secure that faith that shall always deliver; and that 
 delight, angelic, that shall illumine the gateway of death 
 with hope eternal ! O, lit us for the heavenly light and life. 
 May we feel the impulses of immortal souls, and anticipate, 
 with satisfying foretastes, the -welcome and bliss of our future
 
 SPIRIT COMMUNION 
 
 homes. Bless us witli desire and power to bless others, in 
 both word and deed. May we feel poor with Thy poor, 
 lonely with thy orphans, sorrowful with Thy cast down and 
 disconsolate ones, that we may be elevated together. May 
 sickness, distress and misery find ns ever i;eady to minister, 
 both with our sympathy and substance. May our lives be 
 more consistent than our words can possibly be, and become 
 sermons of practical devotion to duty and praise. And in 
 the inner depths of our souls, may we feel Thy peace, so 
 pure, so full, that we may triumphantly pass, amid all con- 
 flict, to that glorious Heaven to which Thou hast lifted our 
 purest desires and holiest anticipations. And to Thee, ever- 
 blessed Father, be the glory eternal — Amen. 
 
 A D D E E S S . 
 
 And now, having prayed, we have scarcely faith enough 
 in ourselves, our fellows, or in our God, to proceed. The 
 chilly influences of the cold and selfish controversies of the 
 religious leaders of the people, incapacitate us to speak with 
 living power, and to hear with meditative and. inspiring 
 interest. They have suppressed Thought, and the suppress- 
 ion of Tliought is the most deadly infidelity possible to the 
 human mind ; it is the heresy of heresies, and the atheism 
 of the church. By Thought we are elevated above the 
 brute ; take our appointed rank in the scale of accountable 
 being ; gain the agencies by which to purif}'- our grossness 
 and ally ourselves to all Christ-like intelligences and God- 
 like purposes. It is the talisman of power to the human 
 soul, and only in its free exercise can it be loving and help- 
 ful amid the trials of a frail humanity. It alone can make 
 Truth our own conviction, duty our personal choice, holiness 
 and Heaven our desire and delight; for it is the medium 
 alike for all earthly and heavenly influences upon rational 
 intelligences ; for all earthly, as the negative basis upon 
 which, and in which, the pure positive power of God may 
 operate to secure our refinement and progress, and the
 
 8 P I R I T C M SI U N I O N . 5 
 
 iiJvancement of tlie world. Let us charitably hear, then, 
 that we may judge justly and act considerately toward 
 all the iniluences and persons with which we have our dis- 
 cipline. 
 
 There is a very current, and, in many circles of society, a 
 somewhat popular idea, that all light upon man's spiritual 
 • .r immortal relations, was made to shine in the past ages of 
 liumau history, and that it is alike irreverent and preposter- 
 ous to seek further knowledge or confirmation in the higher 
 developments of mind and triumphs of knowledge, that 
 have marked succeeding, and characterize the present geue- 
 i-ations. We esteem this idea as the oflspring of a false, not 
 to say idolatrous reverence of the past, tending to enslave 
 and degrade human nature, and corrupt the native birth- 
 right and holiest privilege of the soul: the birth-right of 
 'Hiought, and the privilege of forming our convictions 
 according to the light we enjoy from the ever-unfolding and 
 eternal sources of wisdom and help in God. Tlie idea is 
 predicated upon an absurdity. It is, that the nature of God 
 i^ changeable. For, if God be the same, and his purposes 
 without variation, then it cannot be possible that one mind 
 in one age can arrive at the knowledge of Truth, and an- 
 other mind be denied the privilege. In other words : what 
 is possible to one mind, under the same conditions, is possi- 
 ble to all. If, therefore, God is the same, and the human 
 mind the same, no discovery of Truth possible to one age, 
 can be rendered impossible to another. Every attainment, 
 therefore, gained by Prophet or Philosopher, is but a reve- 
 liition of a possibility to any mind ecpially true to its nature 
 and privileges. Beside, the opposite idea would make God 
 a respecter of persons and peoples, and thus give foundation 
 !l/r all the partial, passionate and revengeful character 
 ascribed to him by the childish systems of lleathenism, and 
 the sectarian controversies and creeds of Christendom, which 
 the enlightened votaries of each can never believe to be true, 
 HTid which the enslaved receive more with fear, than either 
 hope or faith. 
 
 Again : The idea that all religious truth is confined to a 
 past age, and that all we have to do is to memorize and
 
 SPIRIT COMMUNION 
 
 interpret, (or, if I might speak from tlie practical effects of 
 that interpretation, I would say,) or quarrel over tliat truth 
 and its application, is founded upon a mistaken view of Truth 
 itself. It supposes that Truth can be mapped and bounded, 
 can be limited if not exhausted. It is the common mistake 
 in childish life, when we imagine our home the universe, our 
 parents and friends the greatest of mankind, and our inter- 
 ests and pleasures the full measure of the purposes of God. 
 It is pardonable in a child — is evidently necessary for his 
 dangerous and disciplinary stages of progress ; but here, as 
 in all things, we should seek a state of Thought and Piety 
 in which to dispense with childish things. Truth never was 
 exhausted — never was made less. The spiritual relationships 
 of man are infinite, because they connect us with God, who 
 is connected with all. "VVe cannot embrace the idea of one 
 God, without being compelled to this thought ; and hence, 
 the knowledge of God is the eternal life of the soul, for it 
 connects it with all life, and its progress consists in finding, 
 using and enjoying that connection. Whoever made a truth 
 less by stating it, or applying it? The estimate of it may 
 have been made less, as in the vain attempts to circumscribe 
 all truth in a creed, but the exhaustless fountain flows on, 
 and as it flows forever will flow on ; for its source is in God, 
 the All of Truth, to whom we are connected as we are assimi- 
 lated more and more to His nature and perfections. "We 
 may discover truth, but we cannot create it. We may apply 
 it in exquisite and beautiful skill ; but we can never exhaust 
 it. And every man being born with an immortal nature as 
 a semblance of his God, is born with immortal instincts for 
 God's truth ; and only as he sees and uses it for himself, is 
 he happy, hopeful, or man-UJce. He, for himself, and not 
 for another, has his God to find and adore ; the Christ-like 
 spirit, or anointing of that God to enjoy and increase, and 
 the endless chain that binds him to the spiritual universe, to 
 discover and brighten. This I know, though once I knew it 
 not ; but the knowledge I cannot directly impart, for no one 
 could impart it to me, as my experience, however blissful it 
 may have been, as theirs ; but I can state it, after the man- 
 ner of the ancient Prophets and Apostles, or after what I am
 
 SPIRIT COMMUNION 
 
 permitted to call my own. Ilere is the place for the testi- 
 mony of experience, and this can never be surrendered. 
 We may become false to it, for Judas betrayed his Christ 
 when he betrayed his brother ; and every religious persecu- 
 tor does the same; whether consciously or unconsciously, 
 depends upon his degree of opened soul, or his attainment 
 in the stature of Truth. Truth is immortal — not as a tijcure 
 of speech, a beauty of poetry — but in its nature immortal. 
 It knows no diminution, no corruption, no perversion, no 
 death. We may diminish ourselves in its knowledore and 
 power ; we may pervert and enslave our faculties to dis- 
 cover, receive and enjoy truth ; we may corrupt our minds 
 and hearts so that they almost, or quite cease to reflect it. 
 In a" word, we may degenerate to the dull, sensual plane of 
 bruteism, and seek to hallow it by the holy name of Christ 
 and God, or Humanity and Heaven. But God and Truth 
 remain the same, and we never come to enjoy either until 
 we become true to ourselves and the Truth-like, God-like 
 impress of Divinity we bear. Sacred and inviolate, like the 
 pure sky above us, it lives ; and though clouds may hide it 
 from our eyes it hides it not from itself As men become 
 more true to themselves, to the nature they inherit, to the 
 universe of which they form a part, they ascend in harmony 
 with its eternal laws, and behold what men less true, idola- 
 trously worship, or distastefully blaspheme, or fight over. 
 
 Truth is the same in nature, though infinite in the degree 
 of its reflections. Mathematics is the same in its nature, 
 but how wide the degrees of its reflections in the negro, who 
 cannot tell the number of his fingers, and La Place, who 
 calculates the lines of the stars ; and, yet, who would com- 
 pare either to the mathematics of God ? Music is the same 
 in the lonely murmuring of the forest brook and in the an- 
 them of Bethoven ; yet, who could ever rationally think of 
 music as exhausted in its sweet melodies and enrapturing 
 harmony. Poetry is the same in the rude ballad of the 
 Druid bard and the lofty conceptions that flow through 
 Harris ; but eternity will never exhaust its power to move 
 and elevate. Philosophy is the same in the Mexican, who 
 lubricates the wheels of his cart from the bark of the elm.
 
 SPIRIT COMMUNION. 
 
 and in the sublime reasoning of Davis ; but its field is the 
 universe, and its lessons are for all time. So, Jesus, and 
 every spiritually illuminated soul, declares truth, but does 
 not exhaust it — performs many wonderful and loving works, 
 but ever promises, in that very performance, that his disci- 
 ples shall do greater. 
 
 We reverence the past, then, because it reveals the links 
 in the chain of an eternal Providence; but we use the pres- 
 ent as our day, that the chain be neither buried nor broken; 
 for we too, live, move and have our being in God, as well as 
 they who have passed through the earthly life, and our day 
 will answer for us as well as it will for them, according to 
 our fidelity and devotion. 
 
 Now, these truths are so simple, so self-evident, that we 
 wonder that they should ever be questioned ; but we do not 
 wonder at the terrible results that inevitably follow wher- 
 ever they are disregarded. Dark and fearful despotism in 
 government ; furious and bitter scorning and persecution in 
 churches ; frowning and hideous superstitions in religion : 
 families separated ; knowledge despised ; science neglected, 
 and the earth mourning beneath the inhabitants thereof, 
 who deliver the assassin and crucify the Saviour, are the 
 dread issues of a prostration of reason, and a disregard of 
 the eternal privileges it secures. But, perhaps, it would be 
 well to note some of the common appeals by which it is 
 justified. 
 
 Because the Bible contains many divine disclosures, and 
 is made the foundation of much that is good and indis- 
 pensable in human society, therefore, a very plausible appeal 
 is made to popular prejudice in opposition to every disclo- 
 sure upon man's moral and spiritual relations, as if it would 
 subvert the morality and religion man instinctively regards. 
 But this appeal presumes upon an unwarrantable ignorance, 
 and thus shows itself more fatal to the good order of society 
 and the elevation of man, than any perversion of a real 
 privilege can possibly be. We have need only to ask : Has 
 not every discovery in science and skill in the arts been con- 
 demned by the very men who were enjoying their advanta- 
 ges, under the influence of the blind bigotry and slavish
 
 s I' I R I T c o M ar U N I O N . U 
 
 reverence of those who were the professed and consecrated 
 expounders of Bibles and Records? Is tlie Bible, then, 
 opposed to knowledge ? Does it fear the light ? Can a 
 communication from God be endangered by spreading it 
 before the world? Is man capable of judging for himself^ 
 and if not, who are they who presume to judge for him^ 
 What lineage do they bear tluit gives the right to lord it 
 over the consciences of their fellows? Are they not men of 
 like passions and frailties with their kind ? Let their his- 
 tory and present position answer. 
 
 But, iu answering this last question, we probe this diffi- 
 culty to its core. We extend the question, and ask, from 
 whence came this Biblical record ? What favored ages in 
 human history does it cover? AVhat are the sublime and 
 heavenly practices that characterized its heroes? Were 
 they men or gods? Or, if more under the influence of Truth 
 than others, was it not because they were more true? — more 
 true to themselves and their God? — that is, more true to the 
 same minds we bear, the same miiverse we live in, the same 
 God over and in us all. 
 
 Let us open the Book and see, for we have studied it from 
 (nir childhood. It tells us that man was created perfect ; 
 that lie fell, and the vast majority of its devotees say so fell 
 as to involve himself and all his descendants in a depravity 
 of nature that exposes him to all the ills of the present life, 
 and to the pains of endless torture in the life to come. 
 Kere, we ask, can nature be depraved ? Character may be, 
 but how can God's own nature, which man is represented 
 to have received by Divine inbreathing, be depraved? Can 
 you corrupt the Deity ? This is like corrupting or exhaust- 
 ing Truth? But farther: the world degenerates; God grieves 
 that he created it ; destroys it with a flood, only to make its 
 condition hopelessly worse in the hell beyond, and saves one 
 man and his family. We would expect that this man would 
 be pure, and better fulfill the ends of creation, that seem, 
 upon a first experiment, to have failed. But what does th(? 
 sequel prove? He worships, it is true ; but lies down in 
 drunkenness and obscenity, and rises up to curse the child 
 that laughs at his folly !
 
 10 SPIEIT COMMUNION. 
 
 But you will tell me that lie is not a good example ? I 
 answer, is Abraham, denying the wife of his bosom, and 
 repeating the denial? Is Jacob, wrenching the paternal 
 blessing from a tender and starving brother by deceiving a 
 blind father? Are Judah and his brethren, in their envy of 
 Joseph and his sale to the traffickers in human flesh of those 
 days ? 
 
 Or, is Moses the object of your admiration; for he, as the 
 others, is worthy on many accounts. Behold him, like a 
 thief in the night, casting his eyes before and behind, and 
 then slaying the Egyptian. Perliaps David, whom the 
 record says, "was a man after God's own heart," is free 
 from the mortal taint. Read the 109th Psalm, and answer 
 to your own consciences and to your God. He prays that 
 his enemy may be condemned when judged; that the 
 iniquity of his father and the sin of his mother may not be 
 forgotten ; that his innocent wife may be a widow, and his 
 unoffending children beggars ; that an executioner may 
 catch his goods ; that his posterity may be blotted out, and 
 that God may never forgive him ! ISTow contrast this with 
 a descendant of his, who lived a God among such men, 
 who, in the agonies of a shameless crucifixion, prays to hu 
 God to forgive the vilest of enemies ; for, says he, " they 
 know not what they do." "Would Noah, or Abraham, or 
 Moses, or David, have desired their enemies with them in 
 Paradise, as Jesus promised one of the vilest of mankind % 
 
 But why refer to these facts ? It is to show that the mor- 
 tal frailty to which you and your kind are subject, belonged 
 to the men who wrote, and who are biographically sketched 
 in your Bible. Divine truth is in it, we do not deny, but 
 rejoice to believe and prove upon all fitting occasions. But 
 human error is equally manifest, and its shadow is cast in 
 the selfishness, bigotry, and cruelty of the present age. The 
 Bible Patriarchs, Prophets and Apostles, delivered truths 
 in exact proportion as they were true. You do the same. 
 Where they failed, we should not fail ; where the}'- attained 
 to spiritual knowledge, peace and joy, we may attain, and 
 glorify the same exhaustless Providence that made John 
 the Baptist superior to Moses and the Prophets, and which,
 
 SPIRIT COMMUNION. 11 
 
 through Jesus, in word mid deed, reveals the truth, " that 
 the least in the kingdom of Heaven may he greater than 
 John." 
 
 Are we true to our nature, discipline, opportunities and 
 privileges? If so, what is our hope? Is it built upon a 
 record that covers a period of some five thousand years, 
 and fragmentary at that — that has been handed down from 
 generation to generation without the facilities for printing 
 and preserving that you possess — that has been collected, 
 altered, added to and subtracted from, according as ambi- 
 tious monarchs and corrupted priesthoods have felt inclined 
 or believed would best subserve their interests ? — a record 
 appealed to, to substantiate the claims of every conflicting 
 sect, from the Romanist to the Mormon ? Or do you build 
 your hopes upon the cultivation of your own nature by its 
 aid and all other aid ; and if so, do you not commune with 
 the immortal friends that have gone before, as did Abra- 
 ham, Moses, John, and all the prophets, whose authority 
 you have so blindly reverenced ? This is the question. If 
 with all their faults and frailties they communed with the 
 spiritual world, how claim you to be their disciples, while I 
 would hope, with less impurity, you know not the end of 
 your earthly pilgrimage, and deny the possibility of know- 
 in o;? If God is the same — if the human mind is the same — 
 if the ancients, who, with their fjiults recorded, enjoyed this 
 privilege, why do you not enjoy it? 
 
 I testify, then, in common with hundreds and thousands 
 of this age, that the privilege still exists, and its advantages, 
 like the advantages of every privilege in nature, dei^ends 
 upon our faithfulness to ourselves, to our nature and to God. 
 Its purposes and ends need not be stated, for they would not 
 be believed, except as we come to appreciate and enjoy this 
 natural birth-right and indestructible prerogative of every 
 human being. 
 
 I'.ut, am I told we have never seen ministering spirits, 
 and our ears are never saluted by their heavenly voices? 1 
 answer : Have you ever seen God, or Christ, or the Pro- 
 phets? And is sight the measure of human knowledge and 
 blisb ? Do you deny the existence of an ocean, because you
 
 12 SPIRIT COMMUNION. 
 
 cannot see it? Does the reality of blindness, or limited 
 vision, destroy tL.e liglit of heaven and the glory of God ? 
 And so every objection you urge — and you ought to urge 
 them to yourselves, at least — will but reveal the solemnity 
 and power of that greatest of all truths, that in the exact 
 proportion in which we are faithful to ourselves and the 
 god-like faculties we possess, God, and Heaven, and heav- 
 enly influences find tlieir reflection in us. 
 
 But some will say within themselves, would that we could 
 believe Spiritual Communion possible to us as well as to the 
 ancients. It would give new hope, new life and vigor to 
 our souls ; it would span with new prospects, the troubled 
 ocean of our thought, and reveal the truly sublime purj^oses 
 of our being and earthly discipline ; and we, too, would 
 come to feel those sacred afiinities that unite all in one kin- 
 dred in God. It appears as an indispensable nutriment to 
 our souls, and yet overburdens our thought. We should no 
 longer live in doubt, nor die in fear, but stand as men in 
 God, to relieve, and not to increase the misfortunes of our 
 kind. Tlie roots of our thought would go down beneath 
 encumbering forms that oppress the soul, and with new 
 prospects we could seek the elevation of all our race. This 
 power, we admit, belonged to Christ and the Apostles, but 
 did it not die with them ? 
 
 We would say, in reply : no truth can die ; no true privi- 
 lege can be finally lost. This privilege did belong to Christ 
 and the Apostles, for they lived true to the Divinity within 
 them, and the powers it granted to that truthfulness. They 
 lived near the departed, conversed with them in their holi- 
 est hours, and by their aid healed the sick and comforted 
 the distressed. Why, then, if we were equally true, equally 
 hopeful, equally pure', equally reliant upon God in all, could 
 we not come as near our departed? Our grosser nature 
 alone, hinders our approach. All that can be necessary for 
 the benefit of man is within our grasp ; but skepticism, 
 intolerance, priestly rule, and wrong in ourselves, with over- 
 whelming force, condemn us to that devotion to self that 
 absorbs the life of the dead and the purity of the living, to 
 mourn over wrecked hopes and prostrated powers. We
 
 8PIEIT COMMUNION. 13 
 
 luive seen tlie sick bealed, the lame walk, and the decrepit 
 strengthened, wrongs corrected, errors overcome, servitude 
 supplanted by freedom, and doubt removed, by positive 
 intercourse with the spirits of those who were bone of our 
 bone and flesh of our flesh ; and all in witness to the truth 
 of the light now breaking everywhere upon the nineteenth 
 century, and in promise of the glory of God to cover the 
 earth with a new-born race, to be immersed in a spirit of 
 truth and love that will sweeten tlie souls of all, wipe the 
 tear of sorrow, and sow the seed of hope in the most deso- 
 late hearts. And we know that if our minds could be en- 
 tirely harmonious with the benevolent purposes of our God, 
 agencies exist to carry forward this work to an extent and 
 to ends that never entered into the imagination of the most 
 hopeful. 
 
 But, in the face of these undeniable facts, what are we 
 told ; how are we met ? " K the good spirits come to 
 administer to our good, may not the evil come to tempt us 
 and lead us astray?" I ask this objector, where is your 
 faith in God? He never permitted this ; by which I mean, 
 he so constructed the mind, and the universe of visible and 
 invisible ministrations to its development and power, that 
 like will seek like, "with unerring aim." It is true, man 
 may deceive himself He may degrade himself so low that 
 nothing but the low can gratify him. He may mistake the 
 answers of his own mind for the responses of spirits. But 
 he knows and feels his self deception whenever true to him- 
 self. No undeveloped spirit ever intrudes upon those who 
 seek Light and Hope. This is the message we have from 
 all, and we have never met with an exception. Prattling 
 innocence, and hoary experience testify at our hearthstones, 
 every day, and under every variety of circumstances, that, 
 as we, arc and as we hecomc^ in purity, in fiiithfulness, in 
 hope, so are our kindred in God drawn to us, to still further 
 elevate and increase our powers, both to bear and to do, to 
 behold and to testify. "While all bring the inspiring assu- 
 rance that this Light is now dawning upon the hilltops of 
 every land, and to use their own language, "but a few silent 
 watches of the night, and the distant dawn will proclaim the
 
 14 SPIEITCOMMIJNION. 
 
 epoch, of a brighter day, to fill the heart with joy and illume 
 the soul with a resplendent orb, whose penetrating rays 
 shall give life and vigor to the parched earth, from whence 
 shall spring a joyous birth of gladness that shall bind 
 together all men in unison to their great end in God. Its 
 epoch is already here." From ten thousand seeing, hearing 
 and impressible minds, in every quarter of the globe, and 
 without reference to any partizan views of religion, govern- 
 ment or selfish interest, this announcement is being made, 
 attended with a weight of evidence such as was never given 
 to any fact of your belief. 
 
 We tell you this calmly — we pass by all outside state- 
 ments that we are crazed, are fanatics, or selfish schemers. 
 We leave you and all to judge of the justice of such reflec- 
 tions. We live, and labor, and move among you, and you 
 know w^hether it be true or false ; and we assure you, that 
 such charges excite us not, not because we are not as other 
 men, but because we know whereof we aflirm, and feel that 
 Truth is the birth-right of man from his God, and will yet 
 prevail over our follies and yours, and that it is our mutual 
 duty to prepare to receive and apply it. We ask of you no 
 compensation for our testimony, whether Spoken or printed. 
 Gratuitously we print and circulate what we receive to the 
 extent of our means, and in some instances beyond them. 
 Not one cent of profit has any Spiritualist in ISTashville, 
 either directly or indirectly, received for his labor or ex- 
 pense, in speaking or publishing in this cause. Of many 
 in other places, this is equally true, and if of any it be oth- 
 erwise, we know it not, the current representations to the 
 contrary notwithstanding. And we ask nothing. Though 
 poor in this world we have been made rich in the evidences 
 of an immortal estate, and expect to sustain ourselves in 
 temporal matters as others, esteeming it a privilege that 
 amply compensates for all apparent sacrifices, (for they are 
 but apparent,) to spend and be spent in elevating the hope 
 of a common brotherhood. 
 
 'Nor, can we promise ourselves any exclusive honor or 
 personal elevation. We have no privilege that is not open 
 to all, for all have departed ones making a kindred in God.
 
 8 P I R I T C O M M U N 1 O N . 15 
 
 We have no attainment that greater faitlil'uhiess upon your 
 part will not make greater to you than ours is to us. And 
 surely to be feared by our friends whom we liave loved and 
 served with uninterrupted devotion; to be held in doubt 
 by thousands who hear of us as demented or woi-se ; to bo 
 watched in our every word and act; surely, surely, this 
 could ofler no inducement to our testimony. And yet, we 
 esteem it the highest honor to say, that a Blessed Light, 
 which shall be to all people, is now dawning, and it^ evi- 
 dences are open to all, while not made necessarily depend- 
 ant upon any. Already, consciously or unconsciously to 
 the people, it influences all the movements of the age ; con- 
 trolling some — directing others— affecting all, from the war 
 in the Crimea, to the humblest efforts of the lowliest crea- 
 ture of God, seeking spiritual light and help. 
 
 Nor do we abandon any honorable avocation for thi:* 
 privilege. It comes from the God who made us to eat, 
 drink and sleep, and provide for our natural wants. jS'ay, 
 it gives us holier views of tlie humblest calling; and assigns 
 our natural wants and duties their proper place, neither en- 
 grossing our souls nor dwarfing our bodies. Less demands 
 but little, and our animal are sure to be our lesser wants. 
 "As nature needs, so nature feeds;" and through our spi- 
 ritual being, our higher nature, it gives admonition of all we 
 need for ourselves and others. Is there a Spiritualist of your 
 acquaintance, I mean one who claims to have daily spiritual 
 privileges, whose business, family, or citizen duties show the 
 least neglect? Think and answer for yourselves, before you 
 believe the false tales of insanity, etc., huckstered to the 
 rabble. Your wise men predicted we would all be insane ; 
 proposed enlarging your asylum for our benefit, and your 
 foolish men believed the prediction, and are astonished that 
 it is not fulfilled. Now, tell me, did you ever see a i)erson 
 made insane by Spiritualism? Are any of your S])iritualist 
 neighbors in any sense injured by this privilege. You can- 
 not point to one either here or elsewhere. 
 
 Sj)iritual life reveals the sacredness of our identity. AVe 
 are taught that " the spirit of the prophets is subject to the 
 jjrophets.*' AVe too, have fears for the sanity of any medium
 
 16 SPIRITCOMMUNION. 
 
 developed through inharmonious relationships, and permit- 
 ted to attempt to gratify the unbounded curiosity of idle 
 and superstitious visitors. We have seen such, and feel that 
 we have prevented most terrible results, by showing them 
 the folly of attempting to gratify, what never was and never 
 can be gratified. "We must say, by the prerogative granted 
 to every man, to Spiritualism as to every other great fact, 
 depart, when other duties and responsibilities claim our 
 attention. We cannot control the rain or the winds, but we 
 can build our shelters and adjust our sails. No man will be 
 injured by spiritual privileges if he preserve his individu- 
 ality ; any man may be ruined by it who yields it even to 
 spirits. It is the wise adaptation and application of any 
 great truth that leads to good results. Steam is not respon- 
 sible for explosions, but engineers are. So Spiritualism is not 
 responsible for lunacy, but men who ignorantly or wilfully 
 abuse it are ; and for one, I desire to be held to the most 
 strict responsibility for any evil that may occur under my 
 application of it, but not for any other man's. 
 
 But you will tell me that the light of Spiritualism is so 
 obscure — so much mystery connected with it — so vague — so 
 unsatisfactory. Is this your fault, or ours ? Or, rather, is 
 this our fault, or that of spirit monitors? A block of wood 
 will cast its shadow. Should human minds be expected to 
 do less ? Every truth, upon every subject, shows its con- 
 tacts with the channels through which it flows. To us, the 
 teaching is pure, uniform, and opens, as our minds open and 
 our practices tally in virtuous conduct and benevolent aims. 
 We were made to learn / not to pry into mysteries to boast 
 of our attainments, and lord it over some less favored 
 brother. Hence, we must seek in the Sjnrit, if we would 
 gain of the Spirit ; and how few there are who do this I 
 " Whatsoever is of the Spii'it is Spii-it." 
 
 If Spiritualism were what many foolishly suppose it to be 
 — did it take the place of our reason, our power of thought, 
 or judgment, it would, indeed, curse us with insanity, and 
 doom us to the hopeless ignorance that ever fears a Devil, 
 where, a higher illumination, would worship a Grod. Spirit- 
 ualism is a revelation of a law of God in man, inscribed by
 
 6 I' I It I T O O M M U N I O N . 1 ' 
 
 an angel host, and its disclosures come to us to invio-orate, 
 and not destroy the souls we hoar. Purity of mirrd and 
 honesty of purpose are its indispensable conditions, as thev 
 are the only incentives to virtue. Spiritualism reveals God 
 in all things— the Beginning, Life, End of all. If in all, iu 
 ^ us by the Spirit he has given us ; and as we open, purify 
 • and elevate that Spirit, it finds its kindred in all that sur- 
 rounds it, and its infinite relationship to those cherished 
 ones that are ever near it. We may behold diversity, then, 
 but no contradiction. Wg may have endless variety, for 
 the life and destiny of man is various, but all tends to the 
 same end — viz : the good of man ! 
 
 The light of Heaven is not less pure because variously 
 reflected by the objects of sight around. Tiie inscriptions of 
 Divine wisdom and goodness upon the Heavens that over- 
 arch our every horizon, are not less perfect because man 
 fails to see the glory of his God, imprinted there. Difterent 
 degrees of capacity and circumstances, reflect from the same 
 light, different impressions. The Temple of Freedom may 
 be erected in the brotherly and sisterly regard of those who 
 have passed from our sight, but wc may fail to come near 
 enough to share its pure light and undimmed glory. Wo 
 should rejoice that we have, iu spiritual approach, a light, 
 which, in its apparent divergences, adapts itself to difleronr 
 conditions and occupations. Tliis fact may reprove our sel- 
 fishness, but it will improve our spiritual sympat]i3'. ^'^i- 
 pacity, however, will not always measure immortality; "for 
 the day is not distant when the evidence of Spiritual Com- 
 munion will be as plain as these heavens, and jis firm as this 
 earth, and radiate man in God ! " 
 
 But, saj'S another, "what you claim is miraculous, and 
 we cannot believe in miracles." Nor do we believe i!i 
 miracles in the ordinary and philosophical moaning of that 
 word. That is, we do not believe that God violates his own 
 laws. Nature, in its principles and results, is of God. J'ut 
 spirit, with us, is nature also, only a higher form than the 
 external manifestations usually called by that name. Nature 
 is of God, and therefore perfect for all the ends he contem- 
 plates. Its laws are his laws, and therefore, whenever 
 2 
 
 460037
 
 18 SPIRITCOMMrsriON. 
 
 we define miracle to be a violation of any law of i!:^ature. 
 our definition makes it a violation of the law of God — an 
 absurdity. For if God be perfect in working as in purpose, 
 the whole of Xature, as his work, must be perfect. Conse- 
 quently, any violation implies imperfection, either in the 
 one or the other ; and our minds revolt at the idea, in the 
 exact proportion in which they are true to the law of God 
 written within us. 
 
 But the lack of faith in a miracle as a violation of the law 
 of God, does not, necessaril}'^, imply or produce a denial of 
 the event, or fact, called miraculous. It depends upon its 
 own evidence, and our faith upon the knowledge of, and 
 faithfulness to that evidence. Which, simply stated, is, 
 that we do not make our own capacity, or that of others^ 
 the standard of Divine operation — another absurdity. 
 
 What are called miracles, therefore, may have been per- 
 formed — mav have disclosed a law of Nature higher than 
 those previously recognized, and even so much higher as to 
 overbear, or take the place of some inferior method, and 
 yet there is no violation. 
 
 Thus, what is wonderful to one degree of culture, or point 
 of observation, may be miraculous to another; and what 
 strikes one mind as a disclosure of a higher law, may strike 
 another as a violation of a lower one. The true or false con- 
 ception is the result or lack of cultivation. 
 
 If, therefore, Moses, the Prophets and Apostles of Israel, 
 performed miraculous works, or were made the instruments 
 of disclosures and powers never before recognized, it was 
 by a knowledge of, or a connection with, powers of God, 
 ( or ligature, if we prefer an inferior name,) higher and supe- 
 rior to those previously known. Miracles, then, as the result 
 of a higher law of K'ature, we believe ; but miracles, as a 
 violation of Xature, we deny, and do so with a confidence, 
 which is, to us, the highest form of faith in God, or Divine 
 perfection, possible to our minds. And we would modestly 
 suo;ofest that this distinction meets alike the difficulties of 
 the honest skeptic and the conscientious dogmatist. 
 
 Allow us to illustrate : It was a miracle of wisdom and 
 power to a North American Indian, to see a ship moving
 
 p r* I r. T T r o M ^r T X T o N . 1 •♦ 
 
 over the waves of the oceiiii in s;ilety, ueiirin^ men and arji- 
 mals comfortably, from some mikiiown region, to his native 
 shores. It was a miracle of kindness from God, and of skill 
 in man, to protluce a fiehl «»f waving grain — to reduce it to 
 an inviting meal, and find in it a means of sustenance and 
 pleasure. It was a miracle of Propliecy to foretell an 
 eclipse, and the fall of his nations, and the rise of another 
 so essentially different in population, arts and social charac- 
 teristics. But were these miracles to a cultivated European? 
 Were they not the result of a knowledge of higher powers 
 of the same Nature, and of the same Divinit}^ in Nature; 
 and especially in man, as its noblest external manifestation? 
 Unquestionably so. Just so the wonders of the Bible record, 
 so far as they are accurately recorded, are disclosures of a 
 hiirher law than that known or used bv those who called 
 them, or still call them, miracles in the sense of a violatioTi 
 of law. To deny a prophecy because we cannot make one, 
 would be as rational as it would have been in the Indian to 
 «leny a ship because he could not constnict one, or to deny 
 the golden harvest because ho knew not the laws of Nature 
 or mind by which it was produced. All religionists, of 
 every dogmatic creed, will agree with us here. Can they 
 be true to themselves and deny what follows? To worshij* 
 the man who performs the miracle of instantly healing tlie 
 sick, or who delivers a clear and unmistakable prophecy, or 
 discloses a new axiom of wisdom, or a new application of 
 an old one, or to worship the miracle, would be equally 
 absurd, and would, in nothing, essentially differ from the 
 Indian's worship of the ship or the husbandman. 
 
 God is in all things, and as his Divinity opens in us we 
 see his power, and are prepared to use it in all that sur- 
 rounds us. In the plant that grows, and the star that bums: 
 in the food that sustains and the medicine that relieves life ; 
 and we find the one and ap]troi>riato the other, as our minds 
 open to that Spirit of all AVisdom, whose dwelling is every- 
 where ; whose confinement is nowht,ro. 
 
 If a miracle be true, and I believe it not, it is easy to see 
 where the difficulty lies. If the report of it be false, and I 
 believe it, does not the mistake still lie in me ?
 
 20 SPIRITCOMMUNION. 
 
 To be true to myself, therefore, is to be true to all tilings, 
 as I come in contact with them, and they with me — is to be 
 true to my fellow and my God. 
 
 Let me not say, then, I believe in Christ unless I do, and 
 let me not hesitate to affirm it when I do, and to what extent, 
 and upon what evidence, whenever and wherever it is made 
 my clear duty to avow my faith. Now, then, at this moment, 
 from as careful an examination of all the evidence without 
 me, and in all the exercise of the powers within me, I sol- 
 emnly affirm that I believe in the Christ that dwelt in Jesus 
 of Nazareth, as the brightest and purest manifestation of 
 Spirit in Humanity — that it was of God, and in this sense, 
 was God; and that to the extent, however limited, in whicli 
 the spirit of any human being opens in wisdom and love, it 
 is also of God, and is God — the wisdom is God ; and its pow- 
 ers are his powers, and will secure as great and greater works, 
 as time and Providence may require ; and that when his spi- 
 rit shall be unfolded in all, God will be Christ in all, and 
 every human soul feel and know and forever rejoice in the 
 ties of that kindred in all, which is God manifest in human- 
 ity — the fullness of his Spirit filling all things. And so may 
 it be; and may we grow daily to receive our measure in the 
 Divine fullness ! Amen ! and Amen ! ! 
 
 If we believe, then, let us speak — if we believe not, our 
 own darkness condemns us, and in every serious hour, the 
 immortal instincts of our nature will seek for Light ! Be- 
 neath the radiations of Spiritual Light, we will yet see the 
 broad streamer of Life Lnmortal, waved as by angel hands, 
 high over all the clouds of ignorance and injury. 
 
 " Aad so our life "will flow 
 From its mysterious urn, a sacred stream, 
 In whose calm depth the beautiful and pure 
 Shall yet be mirrored ; then when shapes of ill 
 Shall hover round its surface, it shall glide in Light, 
 And take no shadow from them ! " 
 
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