HALL 
 The Use of .Spiritualism,
 
 THE USE OF SPIRITUALISM? 
 
 (PRINTED FOR PRIVATE CIRCULATION.) 
 
 " For thou bringest certain strange things to our ears : we would know, 
 therefore, what those things mean. " THE ACTS. 
 
 ' ' He that answereth a matter before he heareth it, it is folly and shame 
 unto him." SOLOMON. 
 
 "The true mission of Spiritualism, and it is a great and magnificent 
 mission, is to recall to the knowledge, and restore to the consciousness of 
 mankind, the Christian faith, with all its Divine and supernatural power. 
 Its business is to exhibit the reality of its connection with God, and His angels, 
 with the life and spirit of the Divine Word, and to open our earth-dimmed 
 eyes to perceive all the wealth of celestial wisdom in the Christian Revela- 
 tion." WILLIAM HOWITT. 
 
 BY S. C. JL A L L, F.S.A. 
 
 BARRISTER-AT-LAW, ETC. 
 
 
 GLASGOW: 
 HAY NISBET, PRINTER, 219 GEORGE STREET. 
 
 -
 
 
 
 
 
 I PRINTED this letter in 1863 ; in 1871 I reprinted it, with many additions. 
 In 1876 I print it again; and I again add to it. My motive in referring 
 to previous editions is to show that my belief in Spiritualism has undergone 
 no change. I have as entire conviction of its truth as I had thirteen years ago. 
 But I have far less joy in it now than I had then. It is, at this time, not 
 only enveloped in mystery, not only confused, and conflicting, and contra- 
 dictory ; but many of its public professors subject it to the vilest influences, 
 while some of the spiritual publications uphold the filthiest doctrines : taught 
 to them, as they say and probably say truly by SPIRITS who have lived in 
 earth-life. 
 
 Spiritualism is none the less a fact a solemn, impressive, and instructive 
 fact. I attribute the decadence in spirit, while the number of "believers" is 
 largely increasing, to this: Those who might guide it, and ought to guide it, 
 keep aloof from it, and leave the workers for its propagation to their own 
 often wicked devices. They are not encountered, or are insufficiently 
 encountered, by the good and able men who are public advocates of the 
 Spiritualism that upholds the cause of God and promotes the welfare and 
 happiness of man. There are comparatively few ministers of the Gospel who 
 " take up" the cause : few who enquire, and the few who do lack the courage 
 to avow belief. Yet Spiritualism progresses, and will progress. There are 
 now millions where, twenty-five years ago, there were scores. To "stop" 
 it is impossible : as easy would it be to stay the inflow of Ocean by a wall of 
 shingles. Our pastors and teachers leave the mighty power for good or for 
 evil in the hands of those who will use, to abuse, it who do use, and do 
 abuse, it. I solemnly warn, therefore, such as are enquirers, neophytes, or 
 acolytes, to avoid, as they would contact with a plague-spot, fellowship and 
 communing with mediums who, under the sway, influence, and dictation of 
 spirits, low or base, or evil, inculcate principles repugnant to natures that are 
 good, and sometimes teach "Doctrines of Devils." 
 
 The purpose of this letter- is first to prove that Spiritualism is reasonably, 
 rationally, and scripturally TRUE ; and next, that it is intended to be, and 
 may be, a holy safeguard a "whole armour" a source of incalculable happi- 
 ness, a powerful means of strengthening and disseminating the teachings of the 
 New Testament that is to say, Christianity. 
 
 S. C. HALL. 
 
 50 HOLLAND ST., KENSINGTON, 1876.
 
 UCSB LIBF 
 
 REVEREND SIR, 
 
 I answer the question you have put to me, What is the "USE" of 
 SPIRITUALISM ? and your doubts as to whether it be good or evil in its origin and 
 purpose. 
 
 If it be of no "use," religious thinkers and men of science are bound to 
 enquiry .concerning it. It is only of late years we have discovered the " uses" of 
 a hundred things that our fathers considered either useless or obnoxious. The 
 lever that moves the world steam was useless until within a comparatively 
 recent period. Is it so long since an eminent Professor derided the idea of a ship, 
 propelled by steam, conveying a cargo across the Atlantic? In 1843, the House 
 of Representatives at Washington scorned Professor Morse and ridiculed his 
 suggestion as "a chimera." Yet, who now wonders when he receives a message 
 by the electric telegraph, although he knows the sender, three thousand miles 
 away, is waiting for his reply ! Dreams are " admitted facts," yet of what use are 
 they ? Not one in a thousand can be recalled at all ; not one in a million is of 
 any worth. Benjamin Franklin asked what was the use of an infant ? He must 
 have been strangely startled who first saw the magnet draw towards it a piece of 
 iron. When telescopes and microscopes were invented, they were decried as 
 " atheistical inventions." Although Mesmerism is not yet an " admitted fact," 
 it is " believed in '' by thousands who a few years ago treated its advocates with 
 hostility and obloquy. These are the comments of Archbishop Whateley on that 
 subject. They are as applicable to Spiritualism as they are to Mesmerism. 
 
 " I myself was for many years strongly reluctant to believe in Mesmerism ; but I was at 
 length overcome by facts. Any amount of detected mistake or imposture -will no more tfo to disprove 
 a well established fact than the detection of a number of pieces of counterfeit coins will prove a genuine 
 shilling and sovereign not to be genuine silver and gold." The learned Prelate adds: "To sup- 
 pose that we are all so mad as to believe that things are taking place before our eyes which did 
 not, and all mad in the same way, is utterly incredible. No one, I am convinced, who has seen 
 what I have seen, or the half of it, can remain unconvinced that Mesmerism is a real and powerful 
 agent. Those who profess complete disbelief, therefore, must belong, I conceive to one of two 
 classes : first, those who have made but a slight and scanty enquiry, or none at all, and shun full 
 investigation, lest they should be convinced which is what they do not wish ; and secondly, 
 those who have enquired more fully, and really are convinced, but are afraid to own it, for fear of 
 being laughed at, or of being sent ' to Coventry' by a kind of Trades' Union conspiracy." 
 
 How rapidly do scientific discoveries and inventions pass from the marvellous 
 to the familiar ! The miracle of yesterday becomes the natural law of to-day, 
 and may be the common fact of to-morrow. Thunder was a prodigy to our far- 
 off ancestors. There are people now to whom the ticking of a watch is the voice 
 of a god. Tell an enlightened native of Siam that you . can drive a laden cart 
 over the surface of a lake : will you expect him to believe you ? Tell him that 
 the water may be converted into vapour, and that the vapour may be made to 
 move the cart at the rate of fifty miles an hour : will you look for any comment 
 beyond an incredulous laugh ? He has never seen ice ! He has no conception 
 of the power of steam ! 
 
 Thus wrote the Christian poet, James Montgomery : " Let Science search
 
 TO DESTROY MATERIALISM. 
 
 
 
 out every secret of the Universe : she has nothing to fear except error : error in 
 the guise of truth, or truth adulterated with error: every pure truth she can dis- 
 cover must be a new revelation of God in His visible universe, and a new confir- 
 mation of the authenticity of that Word which reveals the things that are unseen 
 and eternal." 
 
 Truths universally admitted, have been ignored by nine-tenths of mankind. 
 
 I am fully aware that in its present immature state, Spiritualism is, at times, 
 not only unsatisfactory and inconclusive, but conflicting and contradictory : 
 
 " dark and intricate, 
 Puzzled in mazes, and perplexed with error "- 
 
 I believe that as it now exists, it has mainly but one purpose TO CONFUTE AND 
 DESTROY MATERIALISM, by supplying sure and certain and palpable evidence that 
 to every human being God gives a soul which he ordains shall not perish when 
 the body dies ; and that the soul, after removal from the earthly house of this 
 tabernacle is, in some cases, permitted to revisit earth, discharging such duties 
 as the Almighty Father ordains and directs. That is what I shall endeavour to 
 prove to you. If I succeed, you will believe that Spiritualism is doing the special 
 work of God, for the welfare and happiness of man, temporal and eternal. 
 
 I contend, then, that if there be no apparent or probable " use" in Spiritual- 
 ism, enquiry is still a duty : especially if it be shown that believers in Spiritualism 
 are very numerous, including many of the most intellectual men and women of 
 the age : some, whose temperament, education, and pursuits are the very opposites 
 of those that beget error or nourish enthusiasm persons whose business in life 
 is to deal withyar/j. 
 
 The mockers and sneerers at Spiritualism are almost exclusively those who 
 have seen nothing of it, know nothing about it, and will not enquire concerning 
 it As rational and respectful would it be for me to reprove Professor Owen for 
 saying that a certain mark on a stone was the mark of an antediluvian bird's claw 
 which to me appeared nothing more than an accidental impression as it would 
 be for one who has seen and known nothing of Spiritualism, to tell those who 
 have seen and studied it much, that they are deluded and deceived believing 
 they see, hear, and feel, that which they neither feel, hear, nor see. 
 
 Yet I for one am bound to receive these objections in a spirit of charity : 
 not only because charity is ever persuasive, but because for a long time I viewed 
 the subject with extreme and suspicious reluctance : and I can repel none who 
 consider it a delusion or a fraud ; for I repeatedly refused to accept, even to hear, 
 the testimony of those whose testimony was quite as unexceptionable as mine 
 can be. Conviction came at length, but it certainly was not invited. 
 
 It is unnecessary now to defend Spiritualism on the ground I must have 
 taken not long ago, when it was " cried down " as " a mischievous delusion," " a 
 shallow fraud," "consummate and disgusting quackery," "shameless duplicity 
 and fraud," "a puling prostration of intellt-ct," "invented by knaves for the 
 wonder of fools," received " only by persons on the confines of imbecility" (these 
 are extracts from newspapers published ten or twelve years ago). Nay, a Chief
 
 ACCUMULATED EVIDENCE. 
 
 5 
 
 Justice of Victoria spoke in public of the " blasphemous pretensions " of its up- 
 holders, describing them as "impostors" and their followers as "credulous dupes." 
 
 The. facts are now generally admitted ; such evidence, and so continuous, 
 has been adduced, the witnesses are so thoroughly above suspicion, so entirely 
 removed from all doubt, inferring either delusion or fraud, that its opponents 
 have taken their stand on other ground attributing it to demoniac agency. 
 
 It has been truly said of Spiritualism by one who is not only a learned man, 
 but a Christian clergyman, " Testimony has been so abundant and consen- 
 taneous that either the facts must be such as they are reported, or the possibility 
 of certifying facts by human testimony must be given up." 
 
 " Evidence has accumulated on all sides so continuous, so multiplied, 
 in every way so overwhelming that no doubt is any longer entertained on the 
 subject." That is the view of F. Perrone, an eminent Roman Catholic divine, 
 who decries Spiritualism as devil worship. A writer who quotes him in the 
 Dublin Review, a Roman Catholic journal, adds, " Here there is a question of 
 facts and of the testimony of the senses ; of facts sensible to the sight, the hear- 
 ing, the touch ; of facts and testimonies repeated over and over again, beyond 
 the possibility of calculation, in the greater part of Europe and America, and 
 recorded year after year down to .the present day. It is quite impossible that 
 about such facts a cloud of such witnesses should be all deceived. Abandoning 
 that ground, therefore, we proceed to show that it is diabolical agency, solely the 
 devil personating the souls of departed friends and others." 
 
 I am justified, therefore, in treating this subject under the assumption, that 
 of the reality of the phenomena the facts on which Spiritualism is based there 
 is now no doubt ; that, at least, such is the conviction of all who have inquired 
 concerning it.* As there are many who cannot and will not accept this asser- 
 tion, I shall endeavour to explain the grounds on which it is made. Yet it 
 requires much moral courage to defend Spiritualism, either as a mere fact, a use- 
 ful fact, or a means by which God works out His high and holy purpose. Its 
 advocates are, even now, often hailed with scorn and obloquy ridicule is the 
 least of their rewards for a bold avowal of their convictions : for a resolute 
 advocacy of truth ; they are met, not unfrequently, by a degree of hostility 
 indefensible nay, sometimes with a shudder of abhorrence. Many who 
 have as full faith as I have and on the same ground shrink from its avowal : 
 they dread the peril in which it may place them, the suspicion of mental 
 incapacity that may prejudice them in their social positions at best, they are 
 frightened by the contempt they have to endure when their opinions are expressed. 
 
 No such feelings affect or influence me ; they will not affect or influence 
 you if you are convinced that it is a gift of God to humanity. 
 
 It is asked why, if this be a blessing, it has been so long withheld from uni- 
 
 * The Dialectical Society a Society instituted to inquire " concerning all subjects with a 
 view to the discovery and elucidation of truth," but mainly to expose the fallacies of Spiritualism, 
 and concerning which the majority of its members had arrived at a foregone conclusion, answering 
 the matter before they heard it, proclaiming it to be fraud where it was not delusion, and delu- 
 sion where it was not fraud unanimously (I believe) abandoned that ground ; the evidence 
 submitted to them induced conviction that it was not fraud that it was not delusion. A 
 majority of its members ignore Spiritualism, although they concede the phenomena to be 
 unquestionable and inexplicable.
 
 WITNESSES TO THE FACTS. 
 
 versal knowledge ? I believe that Spiritualism is given us now, because it is now 
 more needed than it has been at any period of the earth's history now, when 
 Revolution and its close ally, Infidelity, are marching over civilisation : when 
 dogmas, repulsive to Scripture and reason, are preached from the pulpit ; and 
 books are issued, and treated with indulgence if not respect, that strike at the 
 roots of all beliefs ignoring all responsibility dissipating all hope of Hereafter 
 all trust in a superintending Providence. 
 
 I could give you a long list of persons eminent in literature, science, and 
 art, sound practical lawyers, methodic bankers, merchants, and stock-brokers ; 
 clergymen not only of the Established Church, but of "all denominations;" 
 physicians, surgeons, accountants, electricians, naturalists, astronomers, chemists 
 in a word, I repeat, men whose whole business in life is to deal with facts. I 
 quote but one authority, that of Judge Edmonds, an eminent Judge of New 
 York, who, being put on his defence, thus wrote : 
 
 "It is now over fifteen years since I made a public avowal of my belief in spiritual inter- 
 course. I was then so situated that the soundness of my intellect was a matter of public 
 interest. I had just retired from serving my term in our Court of Appeals the court of last 
 resort in this State. I was then the presiding Justice of the Supreme Court in this city, with 
 the power of wielding an immense and destructive influence over the lives, liberty, property, and 
 reputation of thousands of people. The soundness as well as the integrity of the administration 
 of public justice was involved, and all had an interest in watching it. The cry of insanity and 
 delusion was raised then as now. I remained on the Bench long enough after such avowal to 
 enable people to judge how well founded the clamour was ; and for the fifteen years that haye 
 since elapsed I have been somewhat before the world as a lawyer in full practice, as a politician, 
 active in the organisation of the Republican party, in a literary aspect as the author and 
 publisher of several works, professional and otherwise, and as a public speaker, thus affording 
 to all an abundant opportunity of detecting any mental aberration if there was any in me." 
 
 If you inquire as to the number who hold this faith you will be told they are 
 to be counted by millions that in every part of the world they are continually 
 increasing ; yet that little more than twenty-five years have passed since a small 
 room held all the men and women who thus believed ; encountering howls of 
 derision, sometimes personal assaults, losses of business, ejection from society, 
 separation from friends and often nearer ties, persecution in all the shapes it is 
 possible to assume in the igth century, which assuredly would have been the 
 gallows and the stake if they had avowed their convictions two centuries earlier. 
 
 Happily, we live in an age when persecution will not be tolerated ; it was 
 otherwise in old times and in times more recent. " For as concerning this sect 
 we know that everywhere it is spoken against," was applied to those who first 
 preached Christ the Redeemer. All who brought new lights to the world have 
 had to endure the fiery trial of Faith. From the time when Noah built the ark, 
 and was scorned for giving warning of a coming flood, persecution has been the 
 heritage of Truth. Luther, Huss, Fox, and Wesley, all reformers of religion, all 
 heralds of scientific truths, have been thus encountered. 
 
 There are few of the leading towns of England in which there is not a 
 " circle" of Spiritualists to be found. More than a hundred volumes record their 
 views in England, and upwards of a thousand in America. Here there are
 
 MINOR OBJECTIONS. 
 
 several periodical publications which represent them ; and there is hardly a city 
 or town in the United States that has not at least one. 
 
 The matter, therefore, cannot be passed over as insignificant. Though of 
 rapid it is of mighty growth either for good or evil. Let us see ! 
 
 Spiritualists, then, demand to be heard on the ground that their antecedents 
 are such as to justify confidence confidence in their integrity and in their 
 capacity for arriving at correct conclusions based on the evidence of their senses, 
 sustained by their intelligence ; because they have subjected Spiritualism to such 
 tests as the Almighty has given them by which to detect error and to discover 
 truth ; because these things are not done in a corner ; because alleged facts are 
 attested by tens nay, by hundreds of thousands, who have witnessed them at 
 various times, in several places, now in one company, now in another : testified 
 to, not by " ignorant and unlearned men," but by men and women of capacious 
 minds, and of great experience in all the affairs of life sound and practical 
 thinkers ; and they affirm that if their testimony on this subject is not to be 
 accepted by just and intelligent judges, it must be considered worthless for any 
 purpose by any public or private tribunal that they are unfitted for the discharge 
 of any of the duties of citizens, because of either cupidity, deliberate imposture, 
 mental incapacity, or continuous self-delusion. 
 
 " We speak what we do know, and testify what we have seen /" 
 
 Before I proceed to deal with the more important parts of my case, I will 
 make some reference to the minor objections urged against it. Spiritualists are 
 continually met by arguments based on the puerility of the messages they receive 
 and the uselessness of the marvels exhibited. I by no means admit that it is so. 
 I could tell you of wonderful cures effected by those who have " the gift of 
 healing ;" of communications out of which have arisen great temporal good : but 
 I confine myself to my main object that Spiritualism is a mighty helper to 
 destroy materialism, to strengthen Bible-teaching, and lead to belief in Christ. 
 
 Yet, if these miracles were all puerile, inquiry is imperative none the less. 
 The "raps" and "tilts" and "dancings of tables" upon which opponents are 
 perpetually harping are but the lowest rucks of the Spiritual_ ladder. They are, 
 perhaps, the most convincing to neophytes : they have their purpose, and that 
 purpose is answered by stimulating curiosity, and subsequent thought and study. 
 It may be that their very simplicity contains suggestions of truth. Naaman 
 objected to have his leprosy removed by so simple a process as dipping seven 
 times in the water of Jordan : nay, " he turned and went away in a rage " at 
 receiving counsel so undignified ; but when his servant argued " If the prophet 
 had bid thee do some great thing would'st thou not have done it?" he yielded, and 
 was made clean. The facility of the means by which manifestations are made, 
 supply to some the most " unanswerable" argument against their possibility. 
 Those who imagine that " table turnings " and " rappings " are the only " mani- 
 festations " of spiritual power are very greatly in error : there are manifestations, 
 of which these give no better idea than a single brick may do of the completed 
 building than the alphabet can do of the printed book. Often a little additional 
 light enables us to discover hidden beauty. Newton had seen many wonderful
 
 g PUERILITY OF MANIFESTATIONS. 
 
 things in nature before the fall of an apple from a tree became to him a volume 
 of Revelation. When Franklin was flying his kite, he seemed to lookers-on only 
 occupied with the plaything of a child. 
 
 The experience of life confirms the line of the poet . 
 
 "What great events from little causes spring ! " 
 
 Forty-five years ago, I saw Professor Wheatstone exhibit a doll which he made 
 dance about a drawing-room table : when he told us it was " done by lightning " 
 he was heard with a smile or a laugh ; yet it was the embryo of the electric 
 telegraph. Sir John Herschel said, " The history of all science establishes this 
 that speculations apparently the most unprofitable have almost invariably been 
 those from which the greatest practical applications have emanated." 
 
 The same spirit of unreasoning objection would condemn the Saviour for 
 His " policy " in selecting His apostles from the lower classes of the Jews 
 " unlearned and ignorant men " instead of the Gamaliels of the chosen people. 
 They were not " dignified " miracles that changed a rod into a serpent, made iron 
 float, and wetted a fleece with dew while a hot sun was shining. 
 
 Another objection is that mediumship is limited to a few, and these not of 
 the better order of mankind. " Have all the gifts of healing ? Do all speak 
 with tongues ? Do all interpret ?" Why mediums are necessary for these mani- 
 festations who can say ? I believe their power arises mainly, if not solely, from 
 some physical peculiarities not accorded to many : that mediums are to the spirits 
 who " use" them little more than the tables at which they sit The greater num- 
 ber of these " mediums " are not remarkable for either moral, social, or intellec- 
 tual.advantages some, indeed, are, in all ways, of a low type. I could, however, 
 adduce exceptions : men and women, as honest and intelligent and upright as 
 any of those who constitute themselves their judges. I must specially name one 
 Mr. Daniel D. Home the most prominent and the most "gifted" of those we 
 have yet had in England. I have known him, intimately, for upwards of fifteen 
 years : I am sure he is as incapable of fraud as any man living of saying, or 
 even thinking, a thing that is untrue. And I know that opinion would be 
 indorsed by a hundred witnesses who hold high positions in public esteem, and 
 are entitled to have their testimony respected and accepted. He has been the 
 object of much vituperative slander ; but so it has been with all who have " told 
 us some new thing." 
 
 But mediums are by no means needed in all cases. There is ample evidence 
 that mediumship is frequently encountered where it is least expected : in private 
 families where none of the marvels of Spiritualism have been seen ; sometimes 
 among those who are so alarmed as to shrink with terror from its display ; and 
 occasionally among such as have never heard the word Spiritualism at all. Those 
 who imagine there are only professed mediums are greatly in error. All persons 
 are mediums, more or less ; with different gifts. 
 
 I see no reason why " professional mediums " should not be sustained in 
 their work by payment for that work : for the most part, they have no other means 
 of living ; we have high authority for pronouncing the labourer to be worthy of his 
 hire. Mr. Home has indeed persistently continued his resolve to receive no
 
 DOUBTS AS TO MEDIUMS. 
 
 money for the exercise of his " gift," and so it is with several other mediums ; but 
 all are not so circumstanced as to be able to give of what they have received. 
 
 It is equally a mistake to suppose that sittings must be in the dark, some- 
 times they are so, and the most singular of the physical manifestations take place 
 when light is entirely excluded. I dislike dark sittings : Mr. Home very rarely 
 sits in the dark. The sittings of Mrs. Everitt are dark sittings that is to say, 
 alternating between light and dark. It is obvious that only in darkness we can 
 see the lights that almost invariably appear in many parts of a room. I believe 
 Mrs. Everitt and her husband to be as upright and incapable of wicked and 
 blasphemous deception as any two persons living on earth. To some of the 
 phenomena that occur in their presence I shall have to refer. 
 
 Neither have we any means of knowing why "manifestations" are at one time 
 varied and abundant, and at another time there are none although apparently 
 the conditions are exactly similar, the same persons being together, aided by the 
 same medium. Some "men of science" have agreed to "inquire," provided they 
 might previously arrange a "programme:" that is to say, lay down certain "rules" 
 that would, of a surety, prevent the possibility of manifestations. Sir Charles 
 Wheatstone told me he could make a piano play a tune when no hand was near 
 it, but he declined to permit me to examine its vicinage and cut away any wire 
 that was near the instrument. One of the most eminent of the men of science 
 can show wonderful effects in a room that must be perfectly dry and free from 
 damp : what would he say if I demanded his sanction to bring a boiling tea-kettle 
 into the chamber? 
 
 Sceptical " Philosophers" have been repeatedly tendered the power of suspi- 
 cious scrutiny the means of examination by any test, before and after. Some 
 have consented and been convinced; others "hold out," and refuse to inquire 
 unless permitted to dictate their own terms. Others, and these form by far the 
 greater number, concede the phenomena, and attribute them to some occult 
 power as yet unknown, but which in no degree interrupts their notions as to a 
 Creator and an hereafter. As one of them is reported to have said, " Spirits are 
 the last things I will give in to." 
 
 You could direct my attention to many such incidents and results recorded 
 in Scripture. When the apostles asked our Lord why they could not work a 
 certain miracle, they were answered, "because of your unbelief:" when our Lord 
 came into his own country "he could do there no mighty works." The Pool of 
 Bethesda was effectual only for him who was first dipped in after an angel had 
 troubled the waters. Many widows were in Israel, in the days of Elias, when 
 great famine was throughout all the land : but unto none of them was Elias sent, 
 save " to Sarepta, a city of Sidon, unto a woman that was a widow." 
 
 To me, it is certain that belief in Spiritualism is not only consistent with 
 reason, and sustained by experience, but is sanctioned by Revelation, upheld 
 by the Book of God : that it is "a glorious truth and a Heaven-born reality." 
 
 Belief in supernatural influences seems inseparable from humanity : a part of
 
 I0 BELIEFS IN SUPERNATURAL INFLUENCES. 
 
 our universal nature. It has been received and cherished among all nations, in 
 all ages : not only is it rife among refined and cultivated peoples, it is found alike 
 in "farthest Ind," and in the ultima thuleoi civilisation.* The Old Testament is 
 full of evidence. While, in the New Testament, I find frequent references to 
 spirits, to spiritual power and spiritual influence, I find nothing that infers 
 peril to mind or soul arising from such belief. " Come out from among them 
 and be ye separate," is one of many cautions against intercourse with dangerous 
 associates in this life : surely it applies with equal force to subtle adversaries un- 
 seen. We are warned against " seducing spirits, teaching doctrines of devils, 
 and bidden to "try the spirits, whether they are of God;" but while there 
 is much to warrant, nay, to encourage, the belief, there is nothing to pre- 
 vent such belief from being accepted as another proof of the Will of that 
 God who ever 
 
 " Moves in a mysterious way." 
 
 I know that " concerning spiritual gifts," the apostle Paul " would not have 
 you ignorant ;" and that the prayer of one of the most beautiful of the collects of 
 our Church is, that God will " mercifully grant, that as Thy holy angels always do 
 Thee service in heaven, so, by Thy appointment, they may succour and defend 
 us on earth." 
 
 Need I remind you, Rev. Sir, that not only the apostles and their immediate 
 successors, but good men in all ages and, probably, of all countries have be- 
 lieved in the direct intercourse and superintendence of angels and spirits of 
 their "jurisdiction," so to speak, in the affairs of earth and of the influence they 
 exercise over our thoughts, words, and acts. The annals of the Roman Catholic 
 Church are full of them ; yet, strange to say, the Roman Catholics are almost 
 universally opposed to Spiritualism ; they will acknowledge no miracles but such 
 as are sanctioned by " the Church ;" yet who will pronounce all their records to 
 be fictions " cunningly-devised fables "? 
 
 That remembrance and consciousness of deeds done in the flesh is with the 
 soul after it has quitted the body is not only sustained by Scripture and con- 
 sistent with reason, but without it, indeed, the Hereafter would be a blank, and 
 the soul assume a condition equivalent to extinction. 
 
 The highest authorities in the Church of England, and the oracles of the 
 Dissenters from that Church, contend that such " miracles " have not ceased, but 
 that they continue to be wrought, not only by good angels, but by evil spirits. 
 Thus wrote Bishop Hall " So sure as we see men, so sure we are that holy men 
 have seen angels." And thus Archbishop Tillotson " The angels are no more 
 dead or idle than they were in Jacob's time or in our Saviour's, and both good 
 
 * One of the most eloquent writers of our age, Lord Lytton, affirms that while " the grandest 
 thinkers have sanctioned the hope of the humblest Christian the man who has no faith in 
 religion, is often the man who has faith in a nightmare," and he quotes the instances of Julius 
 Caesar, and that type of the elegant sceptic, Lord Herbert of Cherbury : Julius Caesar, who 
 publicly denounced a belief in hereafter, and rejected the idea of a soul and a Deity, yet muttered 
 a charm when he entered a chariot, and did not cross the Rubicon until he had consulted the 
 o;nens: Lord Herbert, "writing a book against revelation, asking a sign from heaven to tell 
 him if his book is approved by his Maker; the man who cannot believe in the miracles performed 
 by his Saviour, gravely tells us of a miracle vouchsafed to himself!"
 
 EVIDENCES OF CHURCH AUTHORITIES. 
 
 and bad spirits are each in their way busy about us." Bishop Beveridge con- 
 tends that " though we cannot see spirits with our bodily eyes, we may do so 
 when they assume, as they sometimes do, a bodily shape." 
 
 [It has been explained to us by spirits that they assume such bodily shape 
 " for our eyes " that we may recognise them : " when our souls are predisposed 
 by sympathy or tendency to see them."] 
 
 Among the Dissenters there are many authorities equally convincing and 
 conclusive. Baxter, in reference to apparitions, says " I have received un- 
 doubted testimony of the truth of such." Who can doubt that John Bunyan was 
 a thorough Spiritualist? Isaac Watts reasons that " the appearance of apparitions 
 is a strong proof of an intermediate state, whence they can return for special 
 divine purposes." "I know," says good Mrs. Fletcher of Madeley, " our friends 
 are not really divided from us; they are only invisible, and are hidden from our 
 sight lest we should put too much trust in them." The story of John Wesley's 
 father is well known ; in the supernatural noises, of which he gives a detailed 
 history, John Wesley fully believed ; he could not resist belief, on such testimony. 
 His sermons on " Good Angels " and " Evil Angels " contain nearly all on which 
 the modern Spiritualist insists. The former is preached from the text " Are 
 they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs 
 of salvation?" the latter from the text "For we wrestle not against flesh and 
 blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the dark- 
 ness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places." The venerable 
 founder of Methodism contends not only that good and evil spirits worked 
 in the apostolic times, but that they are as busy now as they were then, to 
 lead and to mislead, to enlist soldiers under the banner of Christ, and to augment 
 the armies of Satan ! And he establishes that doctrine by reasoning unan- 
 swerable, arguing that " whenever evil spirits assail us in soul or in body, the 
 good are at least equally strong, equally wise, and equally vigilant," that " God 
 has in all ages used the ministry not alone of men, but of angels," defeating the 
 rage, the malice, the subtlety, of evil spirits, and although he does not in that 
 sermon affirm his belief that they appear in visible shape which he does else- 
 where he contends that evidence of their actual presence is none the less 
 palpable, concluding his most beautiful and eloquent discourse thus of Good 
 Angels : 
 
 ' ' They may assist us in our search after truth, remove many doubts and difficulties, throw 
 light on what was before dark and obscure, and confirm us in the truth that is after godliness. 
 They may warn us of evil in disguise, and place what is good in a clear strong light. They may 
 gently move our will to embrace what is good, and fly from that which is evil. They may many 
 times quicken our dull affections, increase our holy hope or filial fear, assist us more ardently to 
 love Him who has first loved us. Yea, they may be sent of God to answer that whole prayer 
 put into our mouths by pious Bishop Ken : 
 
 ' ' O may thy angels, while I sleep, 
 Around my bed their vigils keep ; 
 Their love angelical instil, 
 Stop every avenue of ill ! 
 May they celestial joys rehearse, 
 And thought to thought with me converse ! " 
 
 Dr. Isaac Watts considered that the soul after its removal from earth " reflects 
 upon its own temper and actions in this life ; it is conscious of its virtues and its
 
 12 
 
 EVIDENCES OF NONCONFORMISTS. 
 
 vices," " and," adds Dr. Southey (vide" The Doctor"), " it has an endless spring of 
 peace and joy within, or is tormented with the anguish of self-condemnation." 
 
 " For, in truth, 
 
 Man's spirit knows not death, but sets aside 
 The interlinear boundaries of the flesh, 
 And in its thoughts, which are its proper self, 
 Holds intercourse with those which are unseen, 
 As if they were still with us." * 
 
 Dr. Johnson thus writes: "That the dead are seen no more, I will not 
 undertake to maintain against the concurrent and unvaried testimony of all ages 
 and of all nations." Addison speaks of such belief as "confirmed by the general 
 testimony of mankind." Isaac Watts, in allusion to the text, " If a spirit or an 
 angel had spoken to this man," &c., affirms that a " spirit here is plainly distinct 
 from an angel;'' and asks, " What can it mean but an apparition of a human soul 
 that has left the body?" 
 
 (" But may ye not, unseen, around us hover, 
 
 With gentle prompting and sweet influence yet?") 
 
 And thus wrote Adam Clarke, in his " Commentaries" " I believe there is a 
 supernatural and spiritual world, in which human spirits, both good and bad, live 
 in a state of consciousness. I believe that any of these spirits may, according 
 to the order of God, in the laws of their place of residence, have intercourse with 
 this world, and become visible to mortals." 
 
 "This is certain, angels descend from the choirs of the blessed, and minister to the comfort 
 of the suffering ; those angels return from their ministry to the choirs of the happy ; and can we 
 suppose they will be silent on what they have seen, and to whom they have ministered below? " 
 
 I quote the passage from one of the eloquent discourses of the Rev. Dr. 
 Gumming ; he is not only no Spiritualist, but a strong and somewhat irrational 
 opponent of Spiritualism. Yet, in the following passage from another of his 
 discourses, he preaches and teaches almost all for which Spiritualists contend : 
 
 " Those who are gone before us recollect this world and those they have left behind them. 
 It seems to me an irrelragable conclusion that those who have gone before us must recollect those 
 they have left behind. The life that now is shapes the life that is to be ; the impressions we 
 receive in time we never can forget in the realms of eternity. Separate our growth here from our 
 recollections there, and you separate the individual from himself. Were the past blotted out, 
 for instance, from the memory of some one admitted into heaven, he could not believe himself to 
 IK: the same person. As long as I am placed anywhere, so long the /must recollect what it was, 
 what it has gone through, what influences it has felt, what motives have inspired it, and what 
 process it has made. Separate in my memory my past from my present, and you annihilate me, 
 you create a totally distinct and different being. We cannot conceive memory to be expunged 
 in Heaven, because we cannot conceive the individual to be annihilated there." 
 
 Perhaps I am needlessly urging an argument, the weight of which you would 
 readily concede. Others, however, may not do so, and to them I address 
 myself through you. 
 
 If we admit a God All-mighty we must admit the possibility of miracles, 
 that He can change the conditions which seem to govern, and do generally 
 govern, natural laws ; for we only mean by the 4< supernatural," occurrences 
 
 *The Rev. John Keble.
 
 OTHER TESTIMONIES. 
 
 that cannot be accounted for by the operation of such natural laws. But we 
 have to contend against those who admit nothing of the. kind, nothing they cannot 
 test by their reason and their senses ; they limit the Omnipotent to acts that 
 science calls "the possible;" they affirm that what they have not seen God do, 
 He cannot do ; and that He does not depart from the laws of what they term 
 " Nature." They are far from conceding that there are no laws before God but 
 His will. Yet what does science know of any laws ? The laws they accept as 
 guides now were not the laws that guided them yesterday; and some of them 
 may be utterly abrogated to-morrow. Yet their perpetual reasoning is, in accord- 
 ance with the line of the poet 
 
 " What can we argue but from what we know?" 
 
 They contend that all nature is comprehended in the visible, that the same 
 things must happen under the same circumstances ; " they doubt everything in 
 the Maker's plan of Creation that cannot be mathematically proved, contending 
 that our experience is all experience, and will not permit God to depart from the 
 ordinary rules by which He governs Earth;" "substituting for a benignant 
 Deity a relentless Fate." 
 
 "Can science gauge the influence that draws 
 
 The needle to the magnet ? Can it see 
 The perfume of the rose ? or measure laws 
 By which the flower gives honey to the bee ?" 
 
 Happily all the men of science are not in this state of mind. There is no advo- 
 cate of Spiritualism more resolute than Mr. Cromwell Varley; but he has some- 
 what recently obtained a powerful ally in another eminent man of science Mr. 
 William Crookes. I must content myself with merely naming him ; for to go at 
 sufficient length into his statements, derived from often repeated scrupulous 
 and suspicious examinations, chiefly in his own house, would be to extend this 
 paper far beyond the limits to which I confine myself. 
 
 But what sort of philosophy is that which makes no effort to discover truth, 
 if the attempt infers a departure from old ways and generally conceded facts ? It 
 is the philosophy, not of Galileo but of the monks who would have burned him. 
 It is not the philosophy of Jenner, but of the College of Physicians who laboured 
 to prove him an imposter. It is' not the philosophy of that unhappy man who 
 first promulgated the notion that steam was a power, but of those who placed 
 him in the Lunatic Asylum of the Bicetre. It is not the philosophy of our Lord, 
 but of the Jews who crucified Him ! It is the philosophy of Lot's wife to look 
 only behind ! 
 
 " I believe," says the latest among these philosophers, " that water will wet, 
 that iron will sink in it, that fire will burn;" and it would be utterly impossible 
 to convince this philosopher by any reasoning that the're exists a Being who ever 
 did, or could, prevent fire from burning to death men enveloped in it, cause 
 water to divide and let men pass through it with dry garments, or prevent iron 
 from sinking beneath the surface of a lake. 
 
 The miracle of Spiritualism may yet do for Professor Tyndall what the 
 written Word and the Teachings of Holy Men have failed to do. He may credit 
 the miracles of yesterday by witnessing those of to-day. 
 
 I need not allude to the theory called " Darwinian," which traces man to his
 
 DECISIONS OF SCEPTICS. 
 
 origin in the monkey, and the monkey to his source in mud ; but I may refer to 
 one of the authors of " Essays and Reviews " the Rev. Baden Powell. This is 
 his view of miracles" All facts may be brought under the dominion of some 
 physical law, and thereby become credible ; ' and he necessarily treats as mere 
 inventions all the recorded miracles of Christ those that preceded and those that 
 succeeded His mission, as well as those that are affirmed by Spiritualists in 
 modern times. Yet the Rev. Baden Powell was an ordained clergyman of the 
 Church of England. For my own part, I believe there are many ordained or 
 appointed ministers of religion who ascend the pulpit weekly and do not 
 believe in the Gospel they teach. I may quote to you the latest case that of 
 the author of " A Sling and a Stone "the Rev. Mr. Voysey. It is patent to 
 the world. He is no longer a clergyman authorised to preach and teach; but he 
 is preaching and teaching ; and no doubt finds many to follow in his wake. 
 
 This is the reasoning of Ernest Renan, in his book " The Apostles," in refer- 
 ence to miracles : " The first twelve chapters of the Acts are a tissue of miracles ; 
 such facts have never been proved ; all the pretended miracles, near enough to 
 be examined, are referable to illusion or imposture ; discussion and examination 
 are fatal to miracles." He admits, indeed, that "a miracle before experienced 
 savans at Paris would put an end to all doubt ;" but affirms that, " alas ! such a 
 thing never happens." I have hope that Ernest Renan will see the miracles I 
 have seen in the presence of experienced savans as sound as any that Paris can 
 supply. If he does, of a surety he will repent him of the book he has written, 
 and admit that miracles may have occurred 1 800 years ago. 
 
 Yes, to those who will accept Truth only on the evidence of their senses 
 who altogether ignore faith unsustained by tangible proof is this new light of 
 Spiritualism sent 
 
 Miracles were the credentials of the Jewish prophets; and they were adopted 
 by our Saviour and His apostles to prove the authenticity of His mission. " If 
 I do not the works of my Father, believe me not. But if I do, though ye 
 believe not me, believe the works." " They were wrought," said our Lord on 
 another occasion, "to the intent ye may believe.'" That His miracles did what 
 they were designed to do, we have the clearest and most conclusive evidence ; 
 not only after the raising of Lazarus, but on many other occasions, thousands, 
 who having seen the works, and exclaimed " Surely never man did what He 
 doeth," believed in Him, in consequence of what they saw, who would not have 
 believed if oral testimony had been all their proof. It is clearly stated, indeed, 
 that when one did rise from the dead many believed in Christ as a direct result of 
 that miracle. There are other cases notably that of Tabitha, in which the same 
 effect followed the same cause. 
 
 Yet there are many who contend that miracles have ceased ; who, while they 
 admit that miracles were wrought to induce conviction of .Christ's mission and as 
 means of conversion to Truth, deny that they are in operation now, when there 
 are on earth hundreds of millions more than there were in the apostolic times, 
 and though they know that Materialism is widely spread and extending through- 
 out the world. But I respectfully say I do not consider them sustained by the 
 teachings of our Church of any Church. I do not see that the Fathers, at any
 
 THE POSSIBILITY OF MIRACLES DENIED. 
 
 period, have impressed such belief. Certainly, the Roman Catholics believe, 
 universally, that miracles have not ceased. 
 
 If they have ceased when and why ? If they occurred, as you know they 
 did, " to the intent ye may believe," are they ineffectual now that were effectual 
 eighteen hundred years ago ? They remained in operation at the latest period of 
 Scripture record. Was such power withheld from the disciples of the disciples ? 
 Was the mandate, " Go ye unto all nations," and the means to induce belief 
 by miracles, given only to the few, the twelve or the seventy ? 
 
 " Except ye see signs and wonders ye will not believe " may be addressed 
 to congregations to-day with as much necessary force as they were when our Lord 
 spoke the words, " Believe me for the very works' sake." " We know that thou 
 art a teacher come from God, for no man can do the miracles that thou doest 
 except God be with him " the passage is as applicable to-day as it was ages 
 ago. The words of our Lord " He that believeth in Me, the works that I do 
 shall ye do also, and greater works than these shall ye do," were limited to no 
 period and to no place. Such works were done at Ephesus fifty years after His 
 ascension, and by men who had not only never acknowledged the Lord while 
 on earth, but were of those who persecuted his disciples : such at least had been 
 St. Paul. 
 
 What is there irrational in this faith the faith that the departed from earth 
 can and do communicate with those who remain on earth ? Scripture so abounds 
 with evidence in proof, that he cannot be a Christian who doubts it. That angels 
 have appeared in the outer guise of men is clear : Jacob wrestled with an angel : 
 Lot gave entertainment to angels. Even our Lord was mistaken for the gardener 
 by the holy women at the Tomb. 
 
 Was it an evil spirit that Cornelius heard and saw that bade him seek St. 
 Peter at Joppa? Was it an evil spirit that said to Peter, "Go: nothing doubting : 
 I am with thee"? Was it an angel or an evil spirit who, when Peter was in 
 prison, asleep, said to him, "Cast thy garment about thee and follow me," led him 
 through an iron-gate, that "opened to them of its own accord," and having set him 
 free "departed from him"? Was the power evil that met St. Paul on the way 
 to Damascus when " they that were with me saw indeed the light, but heard not 
 the voice of him that spake to me." We are warned often not only of false 
 prophets but of false Christs, who " shall show great signs and wonders." But 
 of what use would the warning be, if the true prophets and true Christ withheld 
 the power to distinguish one from the other. The seed of the parable fell upon 
 good ground as well as upon barren rocks and among thorns. 
 
 Is it difficult to believe in an innumerable company of angels : that 
 
 "Millions of spiritual beings walk the earth, 
 Unseen, both when we wake and when we sleep"? 
 
 That there may be as njany gradations from man up to the Creator as there are 
 from man down to the smallest insect so small that the human eye cannot see 
 it though aided by the telescope that magnifies ten thousand fold? 
 
 I address myself only to those be their creed what it may who believe in 
 an HEREAFTER in an immortality distinct from present life in a spiritual as 
 well as a natural body and of them I ask what is there irrational in this faith ? On
 
 HAVE MIRACLES EVER CEASED? 
 
 what ground do they question it? The soul when it has left the body is somewhere. 
 As a good man has said, " Heaven cannot be a state of glorified indolence." 
 
 There are not only those who affirm that " the age of miracles is past" that 
 "the days of supernatural enlightenment are over:" but some who describe 
 miracles as periodical impulses of God : believing that they happen now and then : 
 forgetting the emphatic declaration of our Lord, " I AM WITH YOU ALWAYS ! " and, 
 " I am the same, yesterday, to-day, and for ever ! " 
 
 Rev. Sir, our combat as Spiritualists, has principally been with those who 
 have faith in no hereafter. It has happened to me, more than once in my life, to 
 be told, " I would give all I have in the world to believe fully and entirely, and 
 without a shadow of doubt, in a future state." In the Christian, as in the Jewish, 
 Church, there are Sadducees who do not believe in a Resurrection " for the 
 Sadducces say there is no resurrection, neither angel nor spirit.'' 1 They were not 
 only rulers but learned men, of whom St. Paul asked, " Why should it be thought 
 a thing incredible with you that God should raise the dead ?" Of the Corinthians 
 he enquired, " How say some among you that there is no resurrection of the 
 dead? 1 ' On one memorable occasion he said, "Touching the resurrection of the 
 dead I am called in question." Rev. Sir, may there not be in your own congre- 
 gation some who do not believe in any future beyond this life ? Nay, may not the 
 pulpit be occasionally occupied by preachers who have no faith in an Hereafter? 
 
 Yes, there are many who, rejecting miracles of the present, hold fast to faith 
 in miracles of the past. They irrationally strive, indeed, to uphold the miracles 
 of Scripture by denying the possibility of any not recorded in Holy Writ ! 
 
 They refuse to believe that Mr. Home and others have been raised without 
 hands or any visible power and floated about a room ; but they say they believe that 
 Philip was " taken up" and conveyed from Gaza to Azotus ; and they credit 
 Daniel when he says, " He put forth the form of a hand and took me by the back 
 of my head, and the spirit lifted me up between the earth and the heaven." They 
 will not believe that a simple uneducated peasant girl has written Greek sentences, 
 and a man from the plough delivered a Latin oration ; but they say they believe that 
 on the day of Pentecost, apostles and disciples "spoke with other tongues as the 
 spirit gave them utterance." They will not credit the healing powers of the 
 Zouave Jacob, Dr. Newton, and others; but they say they believe that at the gate of 
 the Temple called Beautiful a man was made to walk who was impotent from his 
 mother's womb. They will not believe that a heavy table has been raised from 
 the floor to the ceiling without touch of human hand ; but they say they believe that 
 the stone was rolled back from the door of the sepulchre. They will not believe 
 that voice-music has been heard continuously when no living lips were moved ; 
 but they say they believe that shepherds heard voices praising God in the highest. 
 They will not believe in modern trance-mediumship ; but they say they believe 
 Ezekiel when he wrote, "And the spirit entered into me, when he spake unto me, and 
 set me on my feet, that I heard him that spake unto me." They will not believe in 
 the cold breezes and violent shakings of rooms that usually precede communica- 
 tions when Spiritualists are " with one accord in one place ; " but they say they 
 believe in " the rushing mighty wind" that shook the house in which the apostles
 
 THE MIRACLES OF TO-DAY. 
 
 17 
 
 were assembled. They will not believe in the audible voices heard by Spiritualists, 
 though they say they believe in the voice heard bySt. Paul on the way to Damascus, 
 which some of the attendants " heard not ; " and in the voice that hailed our 
 Lord, heard by some although " others said it thundered." They will not believe 
 in " direct spirit-writing," although they say they believe that Jehoram received a 
 written communication from Elijah four years after he had been taken from 
 earth. They will not believe that writings and drawings are now produced with- 
 out thought, design, or will ; but they say they believe that David thus received 
 instructions how to build the temple "All this the Lord made me understand in 
 writing by His hand upon me, even all the works of this pattern." They will not 
 believe that, in our day, seen or unseen hands have been known to write what was 
 afterwards read ; but they say they believe in the handwriting on the wall at the 
 feast of King Belshazzar, and that Ezekiel spoke truly when he said, " When I 
 looked, behold an hand was sent unto me ; and lo ! a roll of a book was therein." 
 They will not believe that a coal of fire has been placed on the head of a white- 
 haired man without singeing a hair ; but they say they believe that three men were 
 thrown into a fiery furnace, from which they issued unscathed. In short, that 
 angels and spirits do now communicate with men and women, earth-living, they 
 will not believe, although they say they believe that angels announced to shepherds 
 good tidings of great joy ; that a multitude of the heavenly host heralded them to 
 the manger at Bethlehem ; that Moses and Elias talked with our Lord on the 
 Mount ; that it was a spirit who reproved John when seeking to worship him, 
 " See that thou do it not, for I am thy fellow-servant, and of thy brethren the pro- 
 phets." You can multiply such cases ; and I can show that the miracles recorded 
 in Holy Writ are almost identical with those of recent experience. Why they are 
 now more palpable than they have been during centuries past we can no more 
 tell than we can why God in His wisdom has delayed for development in our 
 day many things of which He kept us in ignorance in times past. But I by no 
 means concede that Spiritualism is the birth and growth of recent years ; that all 
 the good deeds for which Saints have been canonised, are inventions. 
 
 That the " gifts " were given as signs of God's approval is certain. Is it not 
 equally certain that their withdrawal were marks of His displeasure ? When He 
 threatened, through the Prophet Amos, to " to send a famine on the land," it was 
 " not a famine of bread nor a thirst for water, but a hearing of the words of the 
 Lord/^A warning was conveyed through Micah "Then shall the seers be 
 asTTamed and the diviners confounded : yea they shall all cover up their lips ; for 
 there is no answer of God." And, surely, if Spiritualism can illustrate the manner 
 in which Saul prophesied when influenced by an evil spirit, they aid to make 
 intelligible that by which " the spirit of God came upon him : and he prophesied." 
 Who will suppose it was alone from the Witch of Endor he sought counsel, or 
 doubt that he applied to her only because the oracles of God were dumb ? 
 
 And now, Rev. Sir, I approach another branch of my subject, and address 
 myself to those who, fully believing in the outer manifestations of Spiritualism, 
 attribute them to Satanic influence : resisting it upon that unnatural and un- 
 christian ground : contending that while God does allow evil spirits to be with us, 
 communicating with us, influencing us, teaching us, He absolutely forbids just 
 and good spirits from counterbalancing the effects that evil spirits are continually 
 
 c 
 
 \
 
 DEMONIAC INFLUENCE? 
 
 striving to produce. Surely, so to assert, is to arraign not only the mercy, but 
 the justice, of God ! 
 
 Those who " wrestle not against flesh and blood," but against " spiritual dark- 
 ness," may contemplate the struggle with dread, for it cannot be without danger. 
 Ordinary means of opposing enemies are not at their command : they do not see 
 the foe they have to encounter : they are without the power of estimating peril, 
 such as reason, the senses, and it may be instinct, supplies to guard against 
 dangers they can foresee or apprehend. Against " flesh and blood " they may 
 wrestle fearlessly ; but against " spiritual darkness" they can prevail only by help 
 from God, and His protecting and ministering angels. 
 
 Who will dare to say that God will refuse to send them in answer to fervent 
 and faithful prayer? Surely, it is precisely to such the impressive words are 
 addressed, " Fear not, for /am with thee : be not dismayed, for /am thy God." 
 Who can doubt their being also perpetually present with us : reminding us of the 
 penalties of sin and the rewards of righteousness, of the wisdom of virtue and the 
 terrible malady of remorse : impressing the awful truth that while the influence of 
 evil spirits engenders misery on earth, it prepares a future from which even hope 
 may be excluded and repentance " quite shut out." 
 
 To believe that God does permit the evil to act and forbids the good to aid 
 is to induce not only despondency but despair. Who could tolerate life if he 
 believed himself given over exclusively to the influence of evil : evil which good 
 had no power to counterbalance : nay, that by the decree of the Omnipotent, 
 good was absolutely withheld from any interference with the operations of evil ! 
 
 These are truisms, you will say : they are so ; but they are needed none the 
 less as answers to those who, while they admit the existence of Spiritualism, con- 
 tend that it is only and exclusively demoniac. " He shall give His angels charge 
 over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways ! " Especially will that charge be impera- 
 tive when evil is present with us. " If we could see," exclaimed Luther, " for 
 how many angels one devil makes work, we should despair ! " But despair we 
 should not, if we could see also the good angels by whom the devil and his 
 helpers are controlled and fettered. 
 
 Yes, well we know that evil spirits are perpetually about us : Spiritualism brings 
 only closer and more conclusive evidence that they are ever ready and eager to 
 instil poison into heart and mind, to induce corrupt thoughts, to excite impure 
 desires, to suggest wrongful acts, to palliate sin, and to supply excuses for iniquity. 
 Is peril that is seen more perilous than that which is unseen ? Is the whole 
 armour of God more or less efficacious for defence when we know it is needed 
 and are warned to be ready for the inevitable encounter ? 
 
 " Shall we admit," writes Dr. Gumming, " that fallen angels may reach the 
 heart, irrespective of the volition of its possessor, and that good angels may not 
 do so ?" and he adds, " Now I cannot believe that an evil spirit would speak the 
 truth or attest the inspiration of the Bible : for if a kingdom be divided against 
 itself how can it stand ?" 
 
 Spiritualists believe in PROGRESS, after the soul has left this life. The sub- 
 ject is too large a one to enter upon here. The " many mansions " are prepared 
 for many souls : and inasmuch as while on earth there is no standing still, and
 
 CONVERTS TO CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 those who do not advance must retrograde, so it is in the "places" prepared for 
 us. Southey, writing to one of his friends, alludes to a state " where there shall 
 be no separation and no mutability except that which results from ' continual pro- 
 gression? " That is a point on which you can better instruct me than I can 
 enlighten you. 
 
 Now, Rev. Sir, notwithstanding the much I have already written and my 
 "letter" has grown into a pamphlet it is possible you may still ask, "What is 
 the use of Spiritualism ?" I do not think you will ask it of me, at all events 
 when you have read a little farther. I could give you the names of many who 
 have been by this means converted to belief from unbelief of some to perfect 
 faith from total infidelity ; I can, indeed, give you abundant proof that Spiritualism 
 is doing God's work, and may be an all-powerful assistant to His ministers, I may, 
 without hesitation, name Dr. Elliotson (a name well known throughout Europe) 
 who, in a letter to an esteemed and venerated clergyman of the Church of Eng- 
 land (an earnest advocate of Spiritualism), thus wrote : " You ask me if I am a 
 believer in Christianity ? I believe all that you, as a Christian minister, believe 
 and perhaps more." The opinions of Dr. Elliotson, as they are recorded in 
 his writings, do not demand comment;* they approached atheism. He expressed 
 his deep gratitude to Almighty God for the blessed change that had been wrought 
 in his heart and mind by Spiritualism. As noteworthy a case is that of Pro- 
 fessor Hare a very celebrated chemist and physicist of Philadelphia an avowed 
 unbeliever, who, according to his own statement to Judge Edmonds, had been 
 " all his life long an enemy to the Christian religion, a denier of the possibility of 
 revelation, and a disbeliever in God and in our immortality." He had, indeed, 
 published extracts from the Bible with a view to negative its testimony. Not 
 long before his removal from earth, he said to the Judge, to the intense happiness 
 of that most excellent man " I believe in revelation, and in a revelation through 
 Jesus of Nazareth. I am a Christian." He had been taught by a Christian sister, 
 years previously removed from earth. Spiritualism and Spiritualism only had 
 done that work. 
 
 I may be permitted reference to another remarkable man, although I have no 
 right to infer that he was at any time " a sceptic," in the ordinary sense of the 
 term ; but he was not a believer in miracles until he had seen miracles. I allude 
 to Robert Chambers, one of the most estimable, as well as the most enlightened, 
 men I have ever known. He was a thorough Spiritualist, although he lacked the 
 courage to avow his opinions publicly. In a letter from him to me, dated 
 September i, 1866, he writes, "What a rich thing Spiritualism is, if men of the 
 world could only be induced to take a candid view of it." And he once said to 
 me, " If I did not believe that the spirits of those who have gone from earth can 
 and do communicate with those who remain on earth I could believe nothing." 
 He also told me that after he became convinced by Spiritualism, he destroyed a 
 MS. for which he had been many years collecting materials a History of Supersti- 
 
 * Dr. Elliotson has left earth since this was written: he had read it, however, and authorised 
 me to print it, in a letter now before me. I am acquainted with a clergyman who, sitting with 
 him, saw him take the Bible in his hand and say, "This is now my comfort, and hence is my 
 hope." The same clergyman, who knew him at two periods of his life, described to me the 
 expression of his countenance as more angelic than human at its later period.
 
 20 MY OWN CASE. 
 
 tion. I do not know if he were or were not the author of " Vestiges of Creation :" 
 but if he did write that book, I am very sure he would not have published it after 
 he became a Spiritualist. I may surely include in this list the name of George 
 Sexton, A.M., LL.D., the editor of "The Spiritual Magazine," and "The Chris- 
 tian Spiritualist " a frequent, able, eloquent, scholastic, and scientific lecturer on 
 Spiritualism. Before the truth was revealed to him he was an open advocate of 
 Scepticism I will not say infidelity, although his views and his public writings 
 bordered upon the frightful malady of total unbelief in a Supreme Being. 
 
 I do not wish strongly to describe my own state of mind all my life until I 
 became convinced by Spiritualism convinced, that is to say, that the dead die 
 not : that there is an eternity of which, what we call life is the beginning and the 
 preparation : that earth is but the first of " many mansions'," to which man is in 
 progress : that, in a word, God creates in each of us a spirit (which we call 
 " soul,") that He ordains shall never perish. 
 
 [Honoured and revered be the memory of the good woman (her life in this 
 sphere was continual preparation for life in another) who, after she left earth, was 
 mercifully permitted to continue her influence, to give me counsel, to bring me 
 " messages," to humble my heart, and lead me to a knowledge of my Saviour a 
 work she had laboured, while jn the flesh, to accomplish, in vain. We had 
 evidence of her presence with us, after her "removal," as clear, certain, and con- 
 clusive, as we had when she was sitting " in the body," by our side. It was 
 scarcely less palpable than it was when she was only an inhabitant of earth.] 
 
 You will not, Rev. Sir, ask me if Spiritualism has been to me of any use ? I 
 humbly and fervently thank God it has removed all my doubts ! I can, and do 
 believe all the Bible teaches me : in the efficacy and indescribable happiness of 
 Prayer : in the power of Faith to save : in the perpetual superintendence of Pro- 
 vidence : in salvation by the sacrifice of the Saviour : in the mediation of the 
 Redeemer in a word, I am A CHRISTIAN. 
 
 It is no doubt right that you and other clergymen should tell us we have the 
 Bible, and that the Book is all-sufficient for salvation : although they thus, in some 
 measure, ignore the fact that ministers are appointed to be its interpreters. 
 " Understandest thou what thou readest?" was the question put by Philip. " How 
 can I except some man should guide me ?'' was the answer of the Eunuch. I 
 deny, however much I may deplore, that they not the one, but both in combina- 
 tion suffice always to induce conviction of the mysterious truths in Christianity. 
 They certainly did not suffice in my case ; for I did not, and could not, believe 
 in miracles, although, from my youth upwards, I had been taught to study the 
 Scriptures, and had been " guided " by Christian men of the Established Church. 
 It is needless to say, that while I did not believe in miracles I was not a Christian. 
 Rev. Sir, is it not something like seeking a quarrel with God to question His 
 judgment if He has seen fit to give the guidance of another light in addition to 
 the lights He had given, when they did not suffice ? and who will dare to com- 
 plain if he send it to some and not to all ? Jonah was angry with God for saving 
 the Ninevites, whose destruction the prophet had foretold as nigh at hand. Some 
 persons decry Spiritualism on just such grounds, and imply blame to the Almighty 
 for sending a new light to those who had found the lights of Scripture and Teach- 
 ing insufficient, but who, guided by that new light, have found them sufficient for 
 salvation. There are some who question my right to walk in this way, although
 
 DIFFICULTIES IN THE WAY OF FAITH. 21 
 
 it has led to Christ because it is not their way. " Blessed are they who have 
 not seen and yet have believed !" yet surely they are blessed also who believe 
 because they have seen. 
 
 I am far from asserting that Spiritualism has been to all Spiritualists what it 
 has been to me. On the contrary, I believe that to many it is a teacher of Evil : 
 utterly un-Christian : but I am sure that none have been led from Christianity, 
 though thousands have been brought to it, by Spiritualism. On earth, like seeks 
 like : so it is with those who, having passed from earth, seek intercourse with 
 those who remain of earth. But alt who believe in Spiritualism are nearer to 
 Christianity than they have been are in a state or preparation for receiving it, 
 because at least ready to hear, and not eager to reject, the truths of the Gospel. 
 
 All who saw the miracles that Jesus did were not believers in him : some 
 mocked him : others called them delusions and frauds : others exclaimed, " He 
 casteth out devils through Beelzebub, the chief of the devils :" others cried out, 
 " Crucify him, crucify him !" 
 
 Think you that a man will be less inclined to faith in the " diversities of 
 gifts," of which holy Paul speaks, after he has himself witnessed them ? Will he 
 be doubtful that some apostles had the power to work miracles after he has seen 
 miracles ? Will he be more than ever disposed to deny the gift of " discerning 
 of spirits " after spirits have appeared to his visual organs ? " To them which sat 
 in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up !" 
 
 We can but take the advice and caution when we accept the testimony of St. 
 John : " Try the spirits whether they be of God !" try them by earnest and 
 fervent prayer : try them by the words they utter : try them by the counsel they 
 give : a house divided against itself falleth : and Satan will not cast out Satan ! 
 
 Rev. Sir, Faith based on Scripture is to you easy : you have probably never 
 had any doubts. But do you wonder that it has not been so easy to others ? Re- 
 member the case of one of the associate-apostles of Christ St. Thomas. There 
 were ten witnesses, all agreeing in evidence : yet Thomas did not believe their 
 words that they had " seen the Lord !" He directly accused the ten of fraud and 
 imposture : for it is not easy to understand how he could have supposed them all 
 deluded, that they did not see what they affirmed they had seen. Yet Thomas 
 had witnessed the miracles that Jesus did, had read the prophecies, and knew 
 that the body of his Lord had disappeared from the tomb in which he had been 
 laid : no doubt they brought reasoning and argument to convince him : yet {hey 
 failed : he insisted on evidence of a certain kind, dictating to the Almighty one 
 specific proof by which alone he would be satisfied " Except I shall see in his 
 hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and 
 thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe/' And it pleased God to give 
 him that specific proof : he was convinced, and exclaimed in a burst of repentant 
 agony " My Lord and my God !" 
 
 Yet such conclusive means of proof were rarely given by our Lord. There 
 was no response when the mocking unbelievers on Mount Calvary exclaimed 
 " Save thyself, and come down from the cross !" It is for God and not for man 
 to determine by what evidence He will communicate His will. Testimony 
 depends for its value on the trustworthiness of those who give it. God permits
 
 32 THE BETTER PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 us no certainties : our lives are entirely guided by probabilities : if we had the 
 former, who would toil for the harvest he knew he should never reap. 
 
 I have alluded to publications that strive to propagate and extend the evil in- 
 fluence of Spiritualism. Happily all Spiritual works are not of that class. There 
 are some though not many that are pure, holy, and Christian. It would occupy 
 more space than I can spare even to name them. There is one, however (a recent 
 publication), that I may not pass over without brief description and comment. 
 It is published by Nisbet, the printer of this pamphlet. It professes at least 
 the major part of it to be the Revelations of a Persian Prince, who lived 
 on earth during the youthhood of our Lord: when the Gospels describe Him 
 as commencing His mission, at the age of thirty. It is a wonderful book 
 beautiful in style ; but that is comparatively nothing : it is entirely HOLY : fully 
 bearing out the testimony of Scripture : and sustaining the Christian in his belief 
 of the Divine birth of our Lord. I cannot give even an idea of the contents 
 of this Marvellous Book.* The revelations were transmitted at more than a 
 hundred " sittings," there being present several reputable and respected citizens 
 of Glasgow, the Medium, David Duguid, being a carpenter a man of irreproach- 
 able life, educated only in so far as a Scottish mechanic is usually educated. 
 I have not witnessed his mediumship. I must take the statements of well- 
 known and trustworthy citizens whose positions and characters preserve them 
 from the suspicions of fraud, and who are as justly safe from the supposition of 
 delusion. They have seen Duguid paint pictures in the light and in the dark : 
 landscapes some of them very good ; producing in a few minutes a picture 
 that, under ordinary circumstances, it would take any artist a day to paint. 
 Imposition is utterly impossible. There may be there are, indeed two opinions 
 as to the authenticity and integrity of the source. There will, no doubt, be 
 some who pronounce Hafed an imposter. I cannot conceive him to be so. 
 No evil influence and if it be not a true, it must be a very evil influence 
 could so emphatically uphold the teachings, and exhibit the purity of the example 
 of Christ. Satan will not cast out Satan. It is utterly repugnant to belief that a 
 Devil could have prompted a spirit to the utterance of truths so holy not once, 
 but a hundred times. For my part, I see no reason to doubt that a spirit may 
 be permitted to revisit earth who had lived on earth at the time of our Saviour's 
 earth life. None can doubt that who have had a tithe of the experience I 
 have had. I am sure that Duguid could not of himself have written the book, 
 any more than I could have written it, than any one of the party assembled day 
 
 * " Hafed " is introduced to us as a Prince of Persia who lived at the commencement of the 
 Christian era. His own life story is deeply interesting. Much professedly authentic information 
 is given regarding the state of the nations of the East as they were in his day ; but the grand 
 feature of the Communications is what he has to tell about the middle life of Jesus Christ. Hafed 
 claims to have been one of the wise men who came from the East to Judea guided by the star. 
 Jesus is said to have spent years with him in Persia when growing up a young man, to have 
 studied in Persia, and travelled in India, Egypt, Greece, and Rome. The history embraces 
 most of the time between the Saviour's boyhood and the period when his public ministry com- 
 menced A considerable part of the book is occupied with an account of the 
 
 labours and sufferings of Hafed and others in the service of Christ, after he had given com- 
 mandment to go unto the world and preach the gospel to every creature. The Christian 
 News (Glasgow).
 
 PERSONAL EXPERIENCES. 
 
 after day at Mr. Nisbet's could have written it. It is infinitely above their 
 capacity and mine. Indeed, I should find it difficult to name any writer who 
 could have produced it as a result of thought, labour, time, reading, and 
 frequent revision : yet if we are to credit these witnesses and there are none 
 who question their probity the words were taken down as they came from the 
 lips of a comparatively illiterate carpenter. 
 
 It is necessary that I should detail to you some of the marvels (" miracles ") I 
 have witnessed. Most of them if not all have occurred in my own house, in 
 presence of persons invited by me : with lights always burning : with " all condi- 
 tions" as perfect as they could be made, for scrupulous and even suspicious exam- 
 ination. On such occasions the medium has, generally, been Mr Daniel Home : 
 and some of the most remarkable of them are fully described (with at least a 
 hundred others in various places, with ditferent persons, often " sceptics," in so 
 far as Spiritualism is concerned,) in a book, printed for private circulation, by Mr 
 Home's friend, Lord Dunraven, entitled " Experiences of Spiritualism," with 
 introductory remarks by his Lordship's father, and " certified " by above fifty 
 ladies and gentlemen present on such occasions, whose names are given with 
 their sanction first obtained. 
 
 I have held an accordion (my own property) in my hand, when delicious 
 music was played upon it, lasting several minutes. It has been taken from 
 me and carried to the end of a large room, playing there : I saw the stops 
 moving and heard the music I could only not see the power that produced 
 the sounds. I have seen a man taken from his seat by some power invisible, 
 conveyed about the room ; and he has marked on the ceiling, with a pencil, a 
 mark that is still there. 
 
 Robert Chambers in my drawing-room, once held my accordion in his hand. 
 His father's spirit came to him : Robert said, " If it is you, play an air that you 
 specially loved." Immediately an old Scottish air was played. " Yes," said 
 Robert, " That is it." 
 
 I have seen nearly a hundred flowers among them two large bunches of apple- 
 blossom thrown on my table : the medium, a lady, having been previously 
 examined by two ladies on entering my house. I have repeatedly grasped " a 
 spirit hand " I can compare it only to a glove inflated with air ; and have fre- 
 quently recognised a hand by a peculiar mark on one of the nails : I have seen 
 lights that seemed phosphoric, to the number of it may be twenty at once, floating 
 in all parts of a room : I have seen a heavy table floated to the ceiling, carried 
 round a chandelier, and brought to its place as gently as a leaf falling from a tree. 
 A grand piano has been raised from the floor and moved backwards and for- 
 wards, no visible person being within two yards of it : I have seen a hand-bell 
 taken from my table and rung over the head of each person in the circle : I saw, 
 and all the others present saw, a shadowy hand raise it and replace it. (At that 
 sitting the late Lord Lytton was present.) 
 
 I might greatly augment this list of marvels ; but the wonders I have seen are 
 insignificant, and inconclusive, compared with those that may be related to you 
 by others. With reverence I borrow the words, " Ye cannot bear them yet." 
 
 I will describe briefly an evening I passed at the house of Mr.' and Mrs. Everitt. 
 He is a respectable and respected tradesman of Pentonville : they are both
 
 PERSONAL EXPERIENCES. 
 
 teachers at a Sunday school, and estimable in all the relations of life as parents, 
 friends, and neighbours. They are Christians, members of a non-conformist 
 church ; and they never sit without prayer, singing a hymn, and a chapter read 
 from the New Testament always I believe suggested to them by some unseen 
 spirit present. To suppose fraud under such circumstances would be to infer an 
 amount of wickedness almost incredible : that they could blasphemously implore 
 God's aid and blessing, with the deliberate intention to perpetrate a cheat ! They 
 are in no way paid mediums ; and I am sure they believe in the reality of these 
 manifestations, as truly as Mary and Martha believed in the restoration to life 
 from death of Lazarus their brother. 
 
 At that " sitting " (it was " a dark sitting ") I held a conversation, continuing 
 for more than half-an-hour, with a spirit who called himself " John Watt," who 
 told us much of his earth-life's history, of his present condition and state, and of 
 his hope and faith in progress to a higher and better. The voice was low ; at 
 parting he said this prayer : " May God and our Lord Jesus Christ bless you, 
 comfort you, help you, and give you happiness in this world and in that to 
 which, in due course, you will come. May his light guide you, and his help be 
 with you here and hereafter. Amen." 
 
 It would occupy too much space to give you full details. 
 
 There was a cottage piano in the room : it was closed and locked. I removed 
 from the table, the books, a large inkstand, and other things, and placed them on 
 the top of the piano. The medium, Mrs. Everitt, was seated, in a trance, at the 
 end of the table farthest from the piano. The room is a small room, with barely 
 space enough for the ten persons assembled. Suddenly we heard a faint sweet 
 melody, not played on .the keys, but on the wires : it was as if a harp was played 
 just such as I have heard from a player on a Welsh harp, where all the strings 
 are wires. The melody continued for full five minutes : those present who are 
 musical, describe it as of great beauty and great originality : it was sometimes 
 louder and sometimes softer : dying away into a murmur of sound, and having an 
 echo, so to speak, of surpassing delicacy and sweetness.* 
 
 On another evening a still more marvellous incident occurred at the Everitt's, 
 Mr. Sergeant Cox, Mr. William Crookes, the eminent chemist, and others being 
 present with me. A sheet of blank paper, marked so as to be recognised, was laid 
 upon the table with a pencil : the light was extinguished : we heard a scratching 
 on the paper : in seven seconds there were raps to indicate that the candle was 
 to be relit, and we found the paper half covered with writing, to have written 
 which would have taken me seven minutes. It contained the name of a Greek 
 philosopher, and a Latin quotation of four lines. Imposture was out of the 
 question : if the medium had been a Greek and Latin scholar, to have written so 
 much in seven seconds was a sheer impossibility, by any "living" human hand. 
 
 This " miracle " occurred in my own drawing-room. I copy the follow- 
 ing details from a letter written by Mrs. Hall to the Earl of Dunraven, and 
 printed by him in his book : " . . . Mr. Home rose from his chair, walked 
 slowly to the fire-place, held his hands over the fire, and then drew out of the 
 fire with his fingers a large lump of red and blazing coal not from the top but 
 
 * I published a somewhat lengthened account of this sitting in the Spiritual Magazine, Oct. , 
 1869, and previously obtained the signatures testifying to its accuracy of all the persons who 
 were present, three of whom were our personal friends taken there by us.
 
 EVIDENCES OF IDENTITY. 
 
 from the middle of the fire ; he held it in both hands, advanced to the table at 
 which we were seated, and placed the coal, red and blazing as it was, on Mr 
 Hall's head, ruffling his white hair about it. When it had remained there more 
 than a minute he removed it, and offered it to a lady, the wife of a clergyman 
 who was present. She drew back : Home murmured, little faith.' He then 
 tendered it to me (Mrs. Hall), and placed it on my open hand : I felt it to be 
 warm, but not hot : he did the same by one of our guests. Before he took 
 it back to the fire-place, he put it on a sheet of paper on the table : the paper 
 was singed through. There was not a hair of Mr. Hall's head singed ; but when 
 he combed it in the morning, he combed out about fifty specks of cinder dust the 
 blazing coal had flung off. Two candles were lighted on the chimney piece, and 
 gas was burning in the next room, separated by folding doors that were open." 
 
 I am sure that all the eight who were present would testify to the accuracy of 
 this statement : that fraud was impossible : delusion impossible : and I do not 
 dread that a single person who reads it will hesitate to believe that collusion 
 was impossible. Lord Dunraven was not then present : Lord Lindsay was. 
 Lord Dunraven gives in his book details of three occasions to which he was 
 witness, when facts similar, or nearly similar, occurred at three different places ; 
 and once it took place at my house, when Mr. Sergeant Cox and Mr. Crookes 
 were of my guests. The coal was not then placed on the head of any one, but 
 there were the other phenomena. 
 
 I must detail to you one other experience. Early in May, 1869, I had a 
 sitting in my own house, with seven of our friends, including the medium, Mr. 
 Home : nine in all. My venerable and truly Christian sister, who had passed 
 from earth two years previously, was permitted to be visible to me, and those 
 who sat with me. She was not only not a Spiritualist, but strongly and sternly 
 objected to the principle, as anti-Christian or demoniac. She had never been 
 present at any manifestation, never would be. But not long before her departure, 
 I said to her, " I am sure God will permit you to visit me after you leave earth. 
 You will be permitted to do so for my comfort, and as a helper on my way to 
 Christ. I wish you to promise that you will do so, if God gives you the power." 
 She did not absolutely make the promise ; but she did say, " My dear brother, 
 if it be for your good, and God permits it and He may do so I will be with 
 you after He has called me from earth." 
 
 When she appeared to us in my drawing-room, her face was so healthy so 
 full of the red and white that betoken health that at the moment I did not 
 recognise her, for she had been two years confined to bed, "died" of cancer, 
 was a great sufferer, and was naturally reduced to a skeleton so to speak. 
 Suddenly I said, with an exclamation, " It is my sister." Three blows (indicating 
 the affirmative) were struck on the table : the head was distinctly turned round 
 towards me, and a smile moved the features. The eyes were closed she had 
 been blind during the last ten years of her earth-life possibly but for that I 
 should not have recognised her; there was so marvellous' a contrast between the 
 face, as I saw it on her "death" bed, and the face as I saw it then; so healthful, 
 so beautiful, so happy; but the likeness was exact, for I recognised every feature 
 after my exclamation; the hair, precisely as she wore it, plaited back, and the 
 cap precisely as she wore it also, which the Master of Lindsay (now Lord Lindsay, 
 who was seated next to me), called a "mutch," i.e., the cap of the old Scottish 
 
 D
 
 2 6 EXPERIENCES WITHOUT PROFESSED MEDIUMS. 
 
 model. She remained before us, thus palpably, for about two minutes certainly 
 more than one. Long enough for any photographer to have made a photograph 
 of her ; and I am very sure there would have been no difficulty whatsoever in 
 making such photograph, if the apparatus had been ready; that it would have 
 been at once recognised by any person who had known her during her " life " 
 here, and that it would have been as distinct as any photograph of any (so- 
 called) living person.* This statement would be confirmed by all the persons 
 present excepting one ; that one (a lady and a Spiritualist) could see nothing, 
 although the appearance was repeatedly pointed out to her. One of the ladies 
 present subsequently made a drawing of the " appearance" which she gave to me. 
 
 I could give you many evidences of identity within my own knowledge and 
 experience ; 1 confine myself to these : but if you desire further, you may have 
 them in abundance, and greatly more striking and conclusive, by consulting some 
 of the numbers of the Spiritual Magazine. I could, indeed, detail to you marvels 
 witnessed by others persons as fully entitled to credit as I claim to be 
 compared with which those I have related from my own experience would be, I 
 repeat, insignificant. 
 
 Facts by which to identify the spirit with the "person" are so numerous and 
 so conclusive, that I consider it hardly necessary to detail any. Of the many I 
 could give, I will, however, relate one. I passed an evening with the artist, Mr. 
 Hannah ; the medium was a Mr. Colchester since passed from earth. He had 
 never before seen and did not know me. Before I went to the meeting, in my 
 own house I wrote a name in pencil on a small slip of paper, which I enclosed 
 in seven envelopes crossing and recrossing them. When I entered, I addressed 
 Mr. Colchester and said, " I desire, if it be possible, to receive a communication 
 from the spirit whose earthly names I have written in this paper." He took it 
 between his hands and threw it into the fire-place. I took it up and burned it, 
 following him into the next room a room with folding doors. We had not been 
 seated two minutes before Colchester addressed me : " Sir," he said, " that is a 
 spirit by your side." " What was the earthly name of that spirit?" " Hamilton 
 Hall." "Yes," I said, " that is the name I had written. Now, if you are the 
 spirit of my brother Hamilton, tell me what I mean by this.:" placing my hand 
 on my thigh. The answer written by Colchester was this : " I did it with a 
 knife." When we were young children I was teasing him at the dinner-table ; he 
 flung the carving knife at me : and the mark of the wound is still on my thigh. 
 I had not thought of putting any such test until the moment before I asked the 
 question. 
 
 A few months ago, a clergyman a dignitary of the church formed one 
 of a circle in my house ; the spirit of his mother came to him. He said " it 
 
 * I wrote this statement to Judge Edmonds, apropos of the trial of Mumler in New York, 
 charged with fraudulently pretending to make photographs of spirits long departed a charge 
 which he refuted by evidence, which the presiding magistrate (not a Spiritualist) deemed sufficient 
 to justify his discharge. Since then there have been manifest frauds in photography; so as 
 greatly to weaken, if not to destroy, faith in the process ; but if spirits can be seen and recognised 
 there is no reason why they may not be photographed, nay, though we cannot see them, that 
 they may be photographed, although not palpable to our sight.
 
 EXPERIENCES WITH THE PLANCHETTE. 
 
 would go far to convince me of your presence if you would write your maiden 
 name on that paper." Two minutes afterwards, it was written. 
 
 I am strongly tempted to enlarge on this subject. My father once came to 
 me : I asked him for a test, and he gave me one that no other person present 
 could by any possibility have recognised. So it was with an aged woman who 
 had been our servant more than forty years ; and not long ago my life was saved 
 by a very dear friend, the late Master of the Rolls in Ireland, who gave to Mrs. 
 Hall and to me his earth-name at a sitting the day after. 
 
 Who will say how often, what we thoughtlessly call " chance," is in reality 
 the act of some spirit permitted to be our guardian and protector. 
 
 " It chanced Eternal God that chance did guide! " 
 
 There can seldom be evidence that it is so, but no proof is required by believers 
 in Spiritualism. The very beggar whose needs we have relieved may have been 
 our preserver in dangers we marvel to have escaped : " Inasmuch as ye did it 
 unto one of these ye did it unto me." The bread we cast upon the waters may 
 be returned to us " after many days." 
 
 What a stimulus is this belief to "do good and to distribute" to "lay up 
 for ourselves treasures in heaven :" to sow plenteously that we may reap 
 plenteously : to "gather a good reward in the day of necessity:" to know, as 
 indeed we do know, that those we help may be our help there, although here they 
 can give us only prayers and blessings. It is fact, and not fancy, that we some- 
 times " entertain angels unawares." 
 
 The occurrences I have above related (excepting the last), all took place 
 when "mediums" were present. I have said that manifestations frequently 
 happen when no medium is near. I will detail some of those that we (my wife 
 and myself) receive, when we "sit" with a view to obtain them: they are by 
 comparison limited in length, but that they are sources of intense happiness to 
 us you will not doubt, when you have read some of the "messages" thus con- 
 veyed to us. 
 
 Our communications are obtained through the planchette, a piece of wood 
 with a pencil attached to one end, which moves and writes when our hands are 
 upon it. When the hands of either are alone there, no movement is made ; 
 when the hands of both are there, it rarely fails to write. We are utterly ignorant 
 as to what is written until the sentence is finished (indicated by two raps of the 
 planchette)* and we have read it. 
 
 * Communications made by writing are very frequent. 
 
 Others draw most beautiful flowers, which are stated to be "from nature" in the other 
 sphere ; and I have seen drawings of angel groups by a young girl who, in her normal state, 
 cannot draw at all, so good that Flaxman might have produced them. I know a lady and gentle- 
 man who cannot write a verse of poetry, but who have thus written a poem in blank verse of 400 
 lines, some passages of which are of great power and beauty. I am acquainted with three young 
 ladies, sisters, who in my presence have had their hands guided to answer questions in lofty 
 science, of which they are utterly ignorant. I have seen a French lady write a long extract 
 from an English poem which she had never read indeed, she could not speak ten words of the
 
 2 3 "SHE IS NOT DEAD." 
 
 From the messages so received, I extract the following, selecting them from 
 more than a hundred of the like, premising that the spirit who thus communi- 
 cates with us has never been of earth, and can answer no mundane question. 
 More than once I have had this reply, " That is purely a mundane question, and 
 I cannot answer it." The spirit, however, can and does prescribe for bodily 
 ailment, and has more than once anticipated the prescription of our doctor. 
 These are a few of the messages we receive : they are written in a broad, bold 
 hand, very different from the handwriting of either of us; sometimes a word is 
 illegible, which, at our request, is written again : 
 
 " May God give us what we need, not what we ask." 
 
 " It is right, meet, and your bounden duty to encompass yourselves and those you love with 
 an atmosphere of praise and prayer. " 
 
 "The silent unbeliever is an object of pity ; the public unbeliever is a pestilence." 
 
 " The Lord's influence will be with you when you pray for it, and even when you do not. 
 He causeth the sun to shine on the just and on the unjust ; but its greatest light, its warmest sun- 
 shine are for the household of faith. Pray that when the Lord cometh he may find your lamp 
 bright and burning in that household." 
 
 " God's lamp is fed by the oil of gladness." 
 
 " Never mourn the departure of time, unless you have neglected its improvement." 
 
 "Keep away all gloom, for gloom insults God." 
 
 " Neglect no means of grace, neither in the closet nor in the church ; and though zeal leads 
 you on to instruct, yet remember you have two ears and but one tongue. " 
 
 " Prayer is to the growth of faith what water is to dry land. May the love and peace and 
 joy of Christ dwell with you, now and for ever. Amen ! " 
 
 " It is well to study and think over all words, but especially written words; they live after 
 you have left life, and in them your life continues. Weigh and consider your written words." 
 
 " The land that asks a day's rain should be grateful even for a shower." 
 
 " The wayside gutter cannot have the purity of the mountain stream, though the sun and the 
 stars shine on it, and at times it catches their beauty and light, and is purified." 
 
 "You will be harmonized by this evening (i.e., an evening at church), for even if it is not 
 given to the preacher to illumine your mind, the Divine Spirit is in the prayers, and the sacred 
 singing is the voice-incense to heaven, and the atmosphere is more refreshing to the wearied and 
 worn than the perfume of a garden of roses to the fainting senses. Remember how He honoured 
 the Temple made with hands." 
 
 We have had but one " living " child. Its earth-life was but for a few days. 
 I know she has been often with us that she is our child still that she will be 
 restored to us ; as surely as that when one of us two husband and wife has 
 "gone before," that one will again meet that other. "They sin who tell us love 
 can die!" My belief is, as you are now aware, that though the child has been 
 taken from our sight, she is with us continually ; 
 
 " She is not dead the child of our affection. 
 
 Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution, 
 She lives, whom we call dead. 
 
 Not as a child shall we again behold her ; 
 
 But a fair maiden, in her Father's mansion, 
 Clothed with celestial grace. " 
 
 language. These writings are by no means always with the planchette; often the pencil is held 
 in the hand, and the hand is guided. What is called "direct spirit writing" is when the pencil 
 and paper are laid together, and no human hand is near them. Well authenticated cases of this 
 kind are numerous. I have seen several.
 
 DANGER OF SPIRITUALISM. 
 
 Sitting with a clergyman lately, the spirit of a child he had " lost " came to 
 him. The child had been born deaf and dumb. The message given was, " You 
 will hear his little echo soon." The clergyman clasped his hands and exclaimed, 
 that was the only word the child ever spoke ; it continually moved about the 
 house saying "e-co!" I received once a message to Robert Chambers from a 
 child he had "lost," and I asked for a test to prove the verity of the communica- 
 tion. This was the answer, " Tell him pa love ! " I have before me the letter 
 of Robert Chambers, in which he writes to me, " These were the last words the 
 child said when she was dying in my arms." 
 
 "Ah!" said the Quaker, to a lady he saw in grief that reason and 
 religion had not lessened for the loss of her child, " Ah ! friend, I see thou hast 
 not yet forgiven God Almighty !" She was mourning without hope. What hope 
 might she not have derived from Spiritualism? Believing, and receiving comfort 
 and consolation from the belief knowing that the child 
 
 " Takes the vacant seat beside me, 
 Lays her gentle hand in mine." 
 
 I have confined myself almost entirely to the marvels of which I have been 
 myself a witness ; but, as I have intimated, there are those who will testify to 
 marvels infinitely more wonderful ; such as the " bodily " appearance of spirits 
 having all the outer characters of beings of flesh and blood. I leave this matter 
 in the hands of Mr. W. Crookes, F.R.S., who has deposed to many facts compared 
 with which the facts now related are very small, to say the least. 
 
 Albeit, to such facts he has printed the certificates of several ladies and 
 gentlemen, who were on such occasions present; some of them have high social 
 rank; and 'all of them are far above the suspicion of delusion to no other 
 charge could any one of them be for a moment subjected.* 
 
 Rev. Sir, I have now a less pleasant duty to discharge. That evil spirits as 
 well as good spirits are actively at work among Spiritualists is abundantly proved. 
 It was always so. The apostle emphatically warns us to " try the spirits whether 
 they are of God." There were active anti-Christian spirits then as there are now: 
 then as now there was mediumship for evil as well as for good. It was so during 
 the earlier periods of the Jewish history : so it was during our Lord's sojourn on 
 earth and the times that followed- so far as we know concerning them from 
 Holy Writ. Can we doubt that so it was with the immediate successors of the 
 Apostles the primitive Christians that it has been so, indeed, in all ages ? 
 Spiritualists are terribly and fatally broken up into sects : one sect maintains that 
 Christ is a saviour only in the sense that any good man is a saviour to those 
 who follow him. Another (it largely prevails in France) teaches the loathsome 
 
 * "If, as is claimed, there be a 'preternatural element' involved in the manifestations, what 
 fact more important could be established? The question of a death-defying principle in man, an 
 invisible body, the continent of his individuality, of his entire self, unimpaired by the wreck of 
 matter or by the transition to another stage of being? Were it a question of the discovery of a 
 beetle, distinguishable from all other known varieties by an additional spot, what respectful heed 
 would be given to it by specialists like yourself, and how patient would they be of all details ! "- 
 Epes Sargent addressing Professor Tyndall.
 
 APPEAL FOR HELP. 
 
 doctrine of re-incarnation: that the Supreme transmits the soul from one 
 body into another made to receive it; hence all earthly ties are abrogated: 
 a future is nil as associated with a past: reformation is begun, and will be ended, 
 here : memory becomes a dim and utterly clouded retrospect if there be any 
 retrospect at all. Such a creed is infinitely worse than that of total annihilation 
 far more repulsive than that which recognises no hereafter. Thus William 
 Howitt writes concerning such Spiritualists as those to whom I refer: "By the 
 extravagance of their doctrines and the wild immorality of some of their social 
 innovations, they have struck a deadly blow at their own glorious dispensation. 
 By their licentious free-loverism : by citing the teaching of spirits to violate the 
 sanctity of marriage: to declare the non-existence of evil, though its desolation 
 and ruins lie awfully around us : and by their attacks on all established faiths : 
 by the loathsome dogma of re-incarnation and the advocacy of heathenism : they 
 have caused sober and reflective people to start back and stand aloof." 
 
 I am told and I do not doubt that those who hold the frightful belief 
 in reincarnation, derive it from instructions of spirits, some of whom have been, 
 and some of whom have not been, in the flesh. And I know many en- 
 lightened and good persons who, most unhappily, profess it. " Horrible, 
 hateful idea," as William Howitt terms it impossible to God, and intolerable 
 to man " " destroying," to quote from another writer, " the principle of personal 
 identity, and the hope of future recognition of mutually attached souls." 
 
 These are perhaps the most objectionable of the theories which Spiritualists 
 profess and teach, and broadly proclaim as tending to the social good, moral 
 progress, and ultimate happiness of man ! 
 
 Unhappily, as I have said, some of the periodical works that represent 
 Spiritualists as well as published volumes, uphold and strive to extend these 
 doctrines of devils. Still more unhappily, there are lecturers going about from 
 town to town labouring to inculcate such pernicious teachings in some cases 
 forming what they term "children's classes," and holding "seances" of which 
 blasphemy is the foundation and the end. Many follow these "pernicious ways," 
 "bringing upon themselves swift destruction," as they did when false prophets 
 were denounced by the Apostle Peter. "He that biddeth him 'God speed' is 
 partaker in his evil deeds.'' The warnings against spirits of devils "working 
 miracles," "seducing spirits" and "doctrines of devils," "spiritual wickedness in 
 high places," are as applicable to-day as they were when they were uttered. It is 
 as needful now as it was then to believe not every spirit, but to " try the spirits 
 whether they be of God." 
 
 But, Rev. Sir, I have shown you that the working of Spiritualism is not all 
 evil ; if it were so, I should yet intreat you to " stand between the dead and the 
 living, that the plague may be stayed." Hundreds of thousands have been 
 converted by Spiritualism from utter unbelief; and if their creed be now confused, 
 or worse, it is at least better than that which excluded all faith in Hereafter. 
 They have not gone from good to bad ; they had no belief in any future, any 
 responsibility, any God : and their last state is certainly not worse than their first. 
 
 And now, Rev. Sir, to my main purpose in addressing you, and, through you, 
 other clergymen, ministers, pastors, and teachers, of any Christian Church. You 
 may be sure I have not written this pamphlet without earnest prayer to God for
 
 THE DUTY OF GOD'S MINISTERS. 
 
 guidance : that He would send His angels and the spirits of just men made 
 perfect to aid me as I wrote ! My prayer has been answered. 
 
 I say again, you cannot arrest the progress of Spiritualism; but you can 
 guide it. You can make it a helper to Christianity. It is, as I have shown 
 you, spreading largely over earth this "new revelation of an old power:" of 
 a surety, it will increase.* 
 
 It is in the hope that you, and men like you, whose solemn and bounded 
 duty it is not only to pray, but to give practical effect to the prayer " that it 
 may please Thee to bring into the way of truth all such as have erred and are 
 deceived" that you, and men like you, will stand by the side of Christian 
 Spiritualists in their combat with "spiritual wickedness" in places high and low 
 to sustain in fighting the good fight of faith those Spiritualists who are empha- 
 tically Christians as hostile as you can be to the propagators of infidelity. 
 
 You, and men like you, who have made a solemn contract with God and man 
 to impress and extend and interpret the holy, and comforting, and happy truths 
 of the Gospel, must come to the van and no longer loiter in the rear, or rather 
 by keeping altogether aloof, be indirectly, yet certainly, aiding and abetting those 
 who are our foes as much as yours. Will you see us warring with the powers of 
 darkness and render no help to those who bear the banner of light ? 
 
 And now, Rev. Sir, I draw this Letter to a close. I have told you of my entire 
 faith without the shadow of a doubt that not only does God send to earth His 
 holy angels, ministers of His will, but that He permits to visit earth and to hold 
 intercourse with those who are yet of earth, those who have been "in the flesh :" 
 I have told you I have had such clear, ample, continual, and conclusive proof of 
 this, that, if I did not believe it, I could believe nothing for which I have the 
 evidence of my senses sustained by reason, analogy, and reflection : I have 
 presumed to tell you also, that my faith is supported by testimony in all ages 
 by God himself in the inspired writings of His prophets by the testimony of 
 our Lord and Saviour, and by the repeated and emphatic declarations of His 
 apostles. I have shown that hundreds of thousands, nay millions, receive and 
 cherish this faith : believing it to be sent of God, and that we are, more or less, 
 the means He adopts for its propagation ; that " the dead die not" that there is 
 another state of being, and that we step into it at the instant of our leaving what 
 we call life ; that permission for the departed to communicate with the living is 
 a part of God's merciful dispensation to humanity that he permits us evidence 
 
 * " Spiritualism can now take care of itself. For the last quarter of a century those who 
 hate and fear it have been comforted almost daily with the assurance that it was at last dead 
 and buried; that some great exposure had taken place which explained its tricks and proved it 
 to be all a fraud. Yet here it is, more irrepressible than ever, though its 'exposers' multiply, 
 and its calumniators call it bad names. It goes on, not at all affected, it would seem, by all 
 these assaults of anger, malevolence, charlatanry, and pseudo-science. It has survived not only 
 the frauds and misdemeanors of real or spurious mediums not only the dislike and denunciation 
 of its critical classes, the religious and the cultivated but what is harder to endure, the help 
 that is harmful, the imprudences of its own friends, and the heresies, credulities, and stupidities 
 that would seek a shelter under its name." Epes Sargent.
 
 O BLESSED FAITH ! 
 
 that it is so that His ways are inscrutable and past finding out, and that in 
 seeking to fathom them we only betray our infirmities : 
 
 " Blind unbelief is sure to err, 
 
 And scan His work in vain ; 
 God is His own interpreter, 
 And He will make it plain." 
 
 Rev. Sir, you will not tell me there is no meaning in this passage from the 
 prayer we of the Church of England offer up at the grave-side of one whose 
 earthly tabernacle we bury out of sight : sown a natural body : to be raised a 
 spiritual body: <: Almighty God, with whom do live the spirits of those that 
 depart hence in the Lord, and with whom the souls of the faithful, after they 
 are delivered from the burden of the flesh, are in joy and felicity." 
 
 I have shown you that the belief I cherish I share with some of the most 
 enlightened men and women of the age of intelligence unimpeachable upright, 
 conscientious, and good utterly incapable of fraud, and, as far as humanity can 
 be, not liable to self-delusion or exposed to the influence of deception. 
 
 We believe I repeat that Spiritualism, the foe of Materialism, may lead 
 to inconceivable, immeasurable, good. And we pray God that, having enlight- 
 ened us, we may be made His instruments for distributing that light to our 
 fellows on earth that, BEING CONVERTED, WE MAY STRENGTHEN OUR BRETHREN. 
 
 I am aware that in the earnestness of my desire to impress your mind I 
 have occasionally " repeated myself." I risk that charge again by printing, with 
 additions, a short paper I recently contributed to the " Spiritualists' Calendar," 
 edited by the Rev. F. R. Monck. 
 
 To me it seems marvellous that people who believe in a Creator GOD and 
 in the existence of a soul, linked with every body, that .does not perish when the 
 body perishes, that such persons should refuse to believe, or find any difficulty 
 in believing, that the soul after separation from the body can and does visit and 
 communicate with the souls that yet continue " in the flesh," awaiting their own 
 removal to that other sphere which they are to inhabit when the bonds that 
 bound them to earth in the ordinary sense of the term earth-life are in force 
 no longer. 
 
 The soul when gone from the body is somewhere. Probably, there are now 
 very few who accept the old theory that the soul remained not dead but 
 torpid, like a stone until a final award of happiness or punishment at " the day 
 of judgment." Those who have that faith are consistent and rational in answering 
 that there can be no communication between the " living " and the " dead :" but, 
 surely, it is far otherwise with those who hold that the soul does not lose 
 consciousness when its earth-life ceases. Such consciousness to be retained 
 makes the Heaven or the Hell of hereafter. " The deeds done in the flesh," 
 when they become retrospect, must be sources of joy or misery, or the soul 
 would be, to all intents and purposes, a new creation, and the promises of 
 Scripture signify nothing : while all inducements to act righteously, to fear and 
 love God, and do His work for "neighbour," would be utterly nil, except
 
 IS CONSCIOUSNESS RETAINED? 
 
 inasmuch as they might influence us for evil or for good in the life, brief or 
 prolonged, the united soul and body is commissioned, or permitted, to pass on 
 earth. I ask you to read again the passage I have quoted from Dr. Gumming 
 at page 12 of this Letter. 
 
 If the soul, on its departure from the body, its sometime tabernacle the 
 house in which it has dwelt loses all consciousness of a past, what can be its 
 future ? If it cease to take any interest in things of earth, if the affections are to 
 die when the body dies, and although parents, children, friends while " living " 
 enjoy the bliss that memory brings, the souls removed are denied all such sources 
 of happiness, surely, to maintain such a doctrine would go very far to destroy 
 all honour and glory to God, all faith and trust in Him, in His justice and His 
 mercy, and all the hope that sustains more or less every human being born into 
 the world, and what is, so especially, the inexpressible blessing of the Christian. 
 
 I am limited to a brief space : yet upon this fertile theme I could fill many 
 pages : and may do so if my life is sufficiently prolonged here: if not, my faith is 
 that I shall be directed to do that work hereafter. 
 
 I am as sure that the " dead " wrongly so-called, for there is no death, 
 "what seems so is transition" can and do communicate with the "living" as I 
 am that my right hand holds the pen with which I write. I could give a hundred 
 proofs in evidence. I have given some in this Letter; but they are to be had by 
 thousands in the hundreds of volumes that Spiritualists have written : and those 
 who desire or require conviction may obtain it from "authorities" at least as 
 unquestionable as I can be. 
 
 That souls " departed " that is to say, removed from positive " contact " 
 with our senses (though I by no means admit that it is so, for, as I have stated, 
 I have seen, heard, and touched "spirits" I knew to be the spirits of those I had 
 known when I and they were living on earth), are continually about us, as 
 "vital" intelligences, comforting, consoling, helping, advising, protecting, teach- 
 ing, I no more doubt than I do the power of the Creator. 
 
 He or she who seeks to deprive me of this source of incalculable happiness 
 is a cruel and needless enemy : but a worse enemy to the soul that is freed from 
 the flesh than to the soul that continues encumbered by flesh. 
 
 Such an enemy would take from us all responsibility all stimulants to good, 
 all faith, all hope in this life : but that is comparatively little of the evil he or she 
 who so teaches us would do. 
 
 Picture a soul departed a mother taken from her child, a husband from 
 his wife, a child from its parent, a friend from a friend and imagine its condition 
 //it is permitted to retain consciousness and has still the power of memory and 
 the gift of reason, shut out from all intercourse with the objects of affection, 
 anxiety, hope, with only the horrors of suspense, despondency, fear I add one 
 word despair ! and ask yourself, if there can be Heaven for a soul so circum- 
 stanced ! 
 
 Surely, if the soul, after its departure from earth, retained no remembrance 
 of "deeds done in the flesh," no consciousness of a past with its light or heavy 
 records of good or evil, it would be, to all intents and purposes, a new creation : 
 in no sense the soul that made happiness or misery to many or few, during its 
 habitation of the body for minutes or a century, as it may be in this sphere. 
 It would be, in short, tantamount to extinction, for we know the body is
 
 34 
 
 MEMORIES OF A PAST. 
 
 destroyed, and if the mind be obliterated also there could be no hereafter of 
 rewards or punishments. This life would be all in all : the " be-all and the end 
 all " would be of earth and on earth. 
 
 God keep us from a faith so utterly miserable so entirely opposed to 
 revelation and to reason : a faith that would extinguish hope as a delusion : that 
 would make the Christian of " all men most wretched," render the sensual enjoy- 
 ments of life the duties of a season, and justify men who say "let us eat and 
 drink for to-morrow we die." 
 
 Possibly I am fighting with a shadow ; there may be none who believe in 
 God and in the soul's immortality, who hold and cherish so foul a doctrine. 
 
 But my purpose is to show that if there be not such an annihilation of all we 
 associate with the soul, there must outlive this life, affection, memory, reflection, 
 comparison, intelligence to use a familiar word, REASON : that these faculties are 
 not lost or lessened, but vastly strengthened in the soul after its removal from the 
 body. They must be exercised : there must be a continual recurrence to the events 
 of this life: there must be meaning in the words " well done good and faithful 
 servant," and in these "depart from me ye wicked." Only by the unlimited 
 exercise of these powers could there be reward and punishment : without them 
 " Hereafter" would be a sound " signifying nothing !" 
 
 " But MEMORY lives of what thou wert and art 
 
 In 'many mansions' where the Soul may dwell: 
 For to REMEMBER is of Heaven a part, 
 As to REMEMBER is a part of Hell."* 
 
 Let imagination then follow a departed soul into the sphere it occupies in 
 progress after leaving life in the flesh, and ask whether it is possible for a soul 
 to be happy with memory strong, and love stronger, as regards those who 
 continue yet on earth : fancy the perpetual anxiety to know something of the 
 beloved ones : the yearning desire to help them : the continual conviction that 
 when they go wrong they might, if helped, go right : that danger, physical and 
 moral, might be effectually averted if God would permit the advanced soul to 
 give aid to souls that are in peril. And ask yourself, if Heaven could be a place 
 of bliss, if you, believing you could help, were debarred from efforts to help 
 notwithstanding your deep longings and your earnest prayers ! 
 
 Is it hard, then, to believe that a God of love and mercy will permit to the 
 spirits for whom He designs happiness hereafter to whom His promises have 
 been emphatically given and to whom He has sent THE BOOK that " they might 
 have hope converted into certainty," that " by patience and comfort of His holy 
 word," they may have reliance and faith, that can by no possibility infer dis- 
 appointment is it hard to believe that God does permit such souls to revisit 
 earth as the guardian angels of those they have loved when clothed in "humanity," 
 and whom they love still more dearly when dwellers in Celestial spheres ? 
 
 I have said I know that the spirits of those who have gone from earth can 
 and do communicate with those who remain on earth : that such belief is not 
 
 * "Butter argues expressly that there is no ground for supposing that the exercise of our 
 present powers of reflection is even suspended by the act of dying. See Analogy, ch. i., ad 
 fin." " Unless the act of dying is to effect some magical change which there is nothing in 
 Reason or Revelation to suggest such as the sinner was when he passed from Earth, he must 
 
 wake in the World Unseen " The Rev. H. N. Oxenham in the Contemporary 
 
 Review.
 
 THE WORK HEREAFTER. 
 
 35 
 
 only borne out by Scripture, " written for our learning," but sustained by Reason : 
 that, in a word, spirits departed, " gone before." could not be happy unless such 
 was the Will of God. 
 
 When our Lord said, " I have finished the work Thou gavest me to do," He 
 did not mean it to be inferred that there would be no more " work " for Him. 
 After the crucifixion He preached to the souls in prison, and taught disciples on 
 the way to Emmaus ; it was after He had " risen from the dead," " when the 
 doors were shut," He appeared to the eleven, breathed on them, and said, 
 " Receive ye the Holy Ghost !" 
 
 There are a hundred passages of Scripture (if they are needed) to show 
 that the Divine Master is still working. So it will ever be while man needs a 
 comforter, a helper, a mediator. Christianity is based on the belief that God 
 permits no idleness to any of the works of His creation. 
 
 The most beautiful of the Church Collects prays that " As Thy holy angels 
 always do Thy appointments, they may succour and defend us on earth," in- 
 ferring that they may work for us and with us ; and surely the prayer would 
 apply quite as strongly to the "just made perfect" as to "holy angels." Can 
 we conceive a state of existence where there are thousands of millions of souls 
 with " nothing to do "? Surely some of them will " walk the earth " 
 
 " Both when we wake and when we sleep." 
 
 Can we suppose that God has no occupation for them ? Can they see the 
 beloved ones, and render them no help ? Hear them, and give no response ? 
 Are they less capable in their state of beatitude than they were when clogged by 
 human infirmities 
 
 " Puzzled in mazes and perplexed with error ? " 
 
 Always assuming that consciousness of the past is not obliterated, will they 
 be useless when mortal has put on immortality, and nothing but the earthly 
 tabernacle is dissolved ? The WILL is strong stronger than ever. Is the power 
 weaker weaker than ever to guide, to counsel, to comfort, to console, often to 
 protect and preserve from perils seen or unseen ? " God is not the God of the 
 dead, but of the living ;" surely as much the God of Moses and Elias, when com- 
 muning with our Lord on the Mount, as when they were doing the earth-work 
 He had given them to do. 
 
 O blessed faith that keeps us ever watchful, knowing ourselves to be per- 
 petually watched : that gives us conclusive and continual evidence how very thin 
 are the partitions that separate this world from " the next " the next where in- 
 gratitude is a crime, and " sins of omission " exact penalties as do " sins of com- 
 mission :" where those who, having neglected their "talent," are guilty as those 
 who misused it. " Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of these ye did it not unto 
 me," implies condemnation for opportunities neglected, as well as abused. 
 
 " For what we will, yet lack the power to do, 
 Be it for good or ill, God counts as done." 
 
 O blessed faith ! that brings closer and nearer those whom death has, not
 
 THE BLESSING OF FAITH. 
 
 even for a time, separated from us : that makes certain sure the actual presence 
 of those we love : sharing our daily walks, our hourly talks : watching us with 
 hopeful love : participating in all our anxieties : in all our joys : guiding us, help- 
 ing us, averting from us evil and the influence of evil : bringing around and about 
 us the holy and the good : giving us a foretaste of that " overpowering of 
 delight '' of which the poet speaks as the recompense of death : bringing pal- 
 pably to our hearts and minds " the substance of things hoped for ; the evidence 
 of things not seen : " and prompting to continual prayer, that when our Lord 
 cometh He may find our lamps bright and burning in the Household of Faith. 
 
 O blessed Faith ! that enhances a thousand-fold the joy that is given by the 
 Christian dispensation ; that removes all doubts of Hereafter teaching us that 
 angels who do the will of our Father which is in heaven, " may by his appoint- 
 ment succour and defend us on earth," and that the perfected spirits of the 
 just are not only permitted, but directed, so to aid us that we also may inherit 
 the " mansions " prepared for us ! 
 
 That is the faith of all Christians. But it is not the happy privilege of all to 
 have palpable and convincing evidence of their companionship on earth ; the 
 absolute and positive knowledge of their continual presence, hearing all we say, 
 seeing all we do nay, cognisant of our most secret thoughts : " to us invisible or 
 dimly seen," yet sometimes seen and heard and felt by us while we dwell in 
 our habitations of clay. It is not belief, it is certainty ! 
 
 Is not death thus deprived of its sting? are we not thus taught to dread 
 
 " The grave as little as our bed ! " 
 
 Shall we not, therefore, strive so to live that we may be the associates of the 
 good and the happy when we leave earth when the loving and beloved will 
 meet us " the souls of the perfected just released and relieved from the burthen 
 of dust" not with the ailments and weaknesses that clog mortality, the 
 draperies of Earth that entangle the soul but freed of them all ! 
 
 And we, hoping in faith that God will, in our turn, make us His messengers 
 it may be His missionaries to those we have left behind, amid troubles, griefs, 
 and temptations, to be their consolers, their comforters, thdr counsellors, during 
 the remainder of their journey through this life to another life, where there as 
 well as here the soul is 
 
 " tried and purified, 
 To have in heaven its perfect rest." 
 
 S. C. HALL
 
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