, m 
 
TEN YEARS' EXPERIENCE 
 
 SPIRIT MANIFESTATIONS. 
 
taanom 
 
 PHIXTBD BI 8POTTISWOODF, AND CO 
 KEW-STBEBI SQCABB 
 
FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 THE RESULT OF 
 
 TEN YEARS' EXPERIENCE IN SPIEIT MANIFESTATIONS. 
 
 INTENDED AS A GUIDE TO ENQUIRERS. 
 
 BY C. D. 
 
 WITH A PREFACE BY A. B. 
 
 Tb Trvevfio. '6-rrov &e\ei wei, KaX rty <p<av)]V avrov anoveis, 
 oA\' ovk olSas ir69ev Kpxercu, Ka\ irov virdyei. 
 
 LONGMAN, GREEN, LONGMAN, ROBERTS, & GREEN. 
 1863. 
 
BF-U5 - / 
 
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 4cf4tfr£~~ 
 

 WVEESIT7, 
 PREFACE 
 
 IT is but now and then that a preface is contributed by one 
 who is not the author : and only now and not then, or 
 else then and not now, that the writer of the preface declares 
 he will not stand committed either for or against the con- 
 clusions of the book. But this happens in the present case. 
 I am satisfied, by the evidence of my own senses, of some of 
 the facts narrated : of some others I have evidence as good as 
 testimony can give. I am perfectly convinced that I have 
 both seen, and heard in a manner which should make un- 
 belief impossible, things called spiritual which cannot be 
 taken by a rational being to be capable of explanation by 
 imposture, coincidence, or mistake. So far I feel the ground 
 firm under me. But when it comes to what is the cause of 
 these phenomena, I find I cannot adopt any explanation 
 which has yet been suggested. If I were bound to choose 
 among things which I can conceive, I should say that there is 
 some sc^rt of action of some combination of will, intellect, 
 and physical power, which is not that of any of the human 
 beings present. But, thinking it very likely that the universe 
 may contain a few agencies — say half a million — about which 
 no man knows anything, I cannot but suspect that a small 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 proportion of these agencies — say five thousand — may b« 
 severally competent to the production of all the phenomena, 
 or may be quite up to the task among them. The physical 
 explanations which I have seen are easy, but miserably in- 
 sufficient : the spiritual hypothesis is sufficient, but ponder- 
 ously difficult. Time and thought will decide, the second 
 asking the first for more results of trial. 
 
 C We, respectable decemnovenarians as we are, have been so 
 nourished on theories, hypotheses, and other things to be 
 desired to make us wise, that most of us cannot live with an 
 unexplained fact in our heads. If we knew that omniscience 
 would reveal the secret in a quarter of an hour, we should in 
 one minute have contrived something on which to last 
 through the other fourteen. ^ The commonest of all questions 
 is, c How do you account for . . . ? ' and woe to him who, 
 not having an answer of his own, shall refuse to accept that of 
 the querist. So habitual is this propensity that even irony 
 fails to tell upon it : what is the use of quizzing the action of 
 the lungs or the circulation of the blood ? In one instance a 
 joke about explanations has been taken for fact, and ex- 
 planations given of it. Bacon, or Selden, or some such dry 
 humorist, put forth the sarcasm of the old man who took 
 Tenterden steeple to be the cause of the Goodwin sands, 
 because he never heard of the sands until after the steeple 
 was built. Those who should have been hit by this, but were 
 not, accepted the fact, and proceeded to account for it. They 
 put forth that some funds destined for fights or other 
 warnings were diverted to build the steeple ; whence of 
 course increase of wrecks. So it would seem that any sar- 
 casm aimed at universal expositors may be but a missionary to 
 the cannibals, one dinner more. 
 
 All who have studied the history of opinions will feel 
 
PREFACE. VU 
 
 satisfied that the matter is in a right train. Try to balance a 
 level on the palm of the hand with the bubble in the middle : 
 who can do it ? Not one in a hundred. The little air-drop 
 is always in extremes : it may stay in the interval for a few 
 seconds, and then comes a tiny unconscious motion which 
 sends it right up to one end or the other. This is a true 
 picture of the mode by which human intelligence deals with 
 conclusions : and this is the way in which we come by all we 
 know in most things. If, being in all other respects what we 
 now are, we had been a cautious, logical, self-knowing set of 
 improved gorillas, content to wait for a decision until we 
 had got what your way-feelers call ground enough, we should 
 have made what we knew four thousand years ago ground 
 enough to sleep upon. But, being what we are, we hunt our 
 arguments, not to arrive at opinions, but to support them. 
 Of the book of nature, and of the book of experience, may be 
 said * what was said long ago of another book, that we search 
 for what we want to find, and take good care to find it. This 
 is our character, and we must not quarrel with it : we have 
 got a great deal by allowing it to have its way, and we 
 may expect more ; one side or the other, or both together, 
 catch a truth and cut its wings ; a hundred years hence it will 
 matter little which. 
 
 Those who affirm that they have seen faith-staggering 
 occurrences, are of course supposed to be impostors or dupes. 
 
 * Hie fiber est in quo quaerit sua dogmata quisque, 
 Invenit et pariter dogmata quisque sua. 
 
 Which has been translated, and more, as follows : — 
 
 One day at least in every week, 
 
 The sects of every kind, 
 Their doctrines here are sure to seek. 
 
 And just as sure to find. 
 
Vlll PREFACE. 
 
 To this there can be no objection : a pretty world we should 
 live in if the arrangement did not demand moral courage from 
 those who offer evidence of wonders. For every truth which 
 cowardice has delayed, a thousand falsehoods have been pre- 
 vented from gaining existence. But there is one mode of 
 treatment which, though not of any ultimate harm as to the 
 matter in hand, is of bad example : the visionaries are re- 
 proached for not accommodating their narratives to the 
 swallow of their hearers. In many ways it is intimated to 
 them, in effect, that they ought to have come forward with 
 something less extraordinary, in order that they might have 
 been believed; as if the object of a story were assent and 
 nothing else. This is a principle of danger, when applied, as 
 it is every day, in our courts of law. The examining counsel 
 draws himself up, and — with that fearful moral elevation 
 which it is given to none but brief-holders to attain — thunders 
 out, ' Do you expect the jury to believe . . .' Honour to 
 the first judge who shall stop the volley with ' Brother Buzfuz ! 
 the witness is to mind his truth, the jury will take care of the 
 credibility. 1 In the courts of law, I say, this is a dangerous 
 principle : because good or evil, justice or injustice, will be 
 consummated before the court rises. But out of court, in 
 matters of asserted fact or theory, the harm is transient, the 
 ' good permanent. The man who demands credible story, 
 and makes onslaught upon all that is beyond his power to 
 receive, as certainly either falsehood or delusion, is far more 
 useful than he knows of, though not exactly in the way he 
 thinks of. He takes himself to be separating the wheat from 
 the tares : but God has been kinder to our race than to leave 
 that matter in his hands. He cuts everything to the ground : 
 buv the wheat of the moral universe has a durable root, which 
 gives growth after growth, each stronger than the last ; while 
 
PREFACE. IX 
 
 the tares, though their roots are also pretty tough, have 
 shoots which are weaker and weaker. Hack away then, say 
 we to him, and never stop to look what is before you ; your 
 work is judged by quantity, not by quality. 
 
 There are some who feel afraid of these gallant slashers, and 
 decline to encourage their laudable propensity by giving any- 
 thing marvellous in their presence. There is, to many, some- 
 thing unpleasant in the alternative of knave or fool, when 
 invited to select a character for themselves out of the pair. 
 Do those who quail before this option remember how high 
 a compliment they pay to the proposers of it? If they 
 do, and are willing to pay that compliment, there is nothing 
 to be said. But if they be really of opinion that the other 
 parties are little worth minding, and yet feel annoyed, it is 
 because, as very often happens, they do not understand what 
 in law is called the plea to the jurisdiction'. Nine-tenths of 
 the positive opinions which are given in conversation or writ- 
 ing are given judicially : that is, the proposer speaks to his 
 conclusion as -positively as if it were his office to know the 
 truth ; and implies that any opposition is a thing for him to 
 judge of. He is annihilated by being reduced, no matter in 
 how courteous a way, from judge to counsel : but this is what 
 must be done ; the jurisdiction must be denied. Some persons 
 pull him off the bench with little ceremony ; but this is hard 
 upon a poor fellow who really believes in his own right to 
 decide : the great art is to pull the bench from under him 
 without his seeing exactly how he comes to tumble, and with- 
 out proceeding to sit upon it yourself. (^There is but one of 
 the species I am discussing who deserves no consideration : it 
 is the one who passes from party to judge in the course of 
 the process. ^ He begins with confession of a mind not made 
 up ; he only wants to hear the evidence ; he is quite aware of 
 
X PREFACE. 
 
 the importance of dispassionate inquiry ; — all addressed to a 
 person who is not anxious to make proselytes, nor even to 
 enter on the subject. In this way a statement of testimony is 
 obtained, at the end — it may be in the middle — of which the 
 candid inquirer vaults on to the seat of judgment, and proceeds 
 to pass sentence. Such a judge is an awkward imitator 
 of Joshua the son of Nun ; awkward in the omission of 
 a most material point. My son, said Joshua, give glory, 
 and confess, and tell me, and hide not : and after he had 
 thus wormed out the acknowledgment of hidden treasure, 
 he thundered forth, Why hast thou troubled us ? But in the 
 interval — and the corresponding procedure is quite forgotten 
 by the judge I speak of — he had sent messengers, and verified 
 the statement. 
 
 I write, as will be guessed, for and to those who have been 
 staggered either by what they have seen, or by what they 
 have heard and cannot reject. They are very many in num- 
 ber, if we include those who think more than they like to con- 
 fess. And no wonder : for by one of those epidemic move- 
 ments which seem to be made for the advancement both of 
 truth and of falsehood, there has been a sudden and general 
 recognition of the existence of phenomena which historical 
 inquiry shows never to have been entirely unknown. When 
 I say phenomena, I mean certain appearances, which are 
 to be finally knit on either to some truth or to some 
 delusion. All at once, I say, the whole world is made 
 alive to the existence of these phenomena ; and two parties 
 are in conflict about their meaning. The opinions of our 
 race seem to have some affinity with the things which 
 learning calls Crustacea, and common life crabs, lobsters, 
 &c. The creature is bound in a hard* shell, which at cer- 
 tain periods it throws off, and manages to take a good 
 
PREFACE. XI 
 
 growth before the new shell is hardened. Our ghost-shell 
 has certainly cracked ; but what and how much of growth the 
 notion will get before the new integument is stiff enough for 
 a philosopher, is still to be seen. It adds not a little to the 
 wonder that the epidemic broke out among a people who have 
 the reputation of a dry, practical, unimaginative temperament ; 
 broke out, I say, for it came on them like the small-pox, and 
 the land was spotted with mediums before the wise and prudent 
 had had time to lodge the first half dozen in a madhouse. And 
 when the infection had crossed the sea, and London and Paris 
 were running after tables in a new sense, no very deep 
 research made it apparent that every one of the new pheno- 
 mena — I believe literally every one — was as old * as history. 
 This very remarkable point is to some an evidence of delusion 
 or imposture ; they argue that the old divinations were one or 
 the other, whence the modern phenomena, being of the same 
 character as phenomena, must be of similar source. But it 
 ought to be obvious that the proper way is to settle the 
 modern phenomena first, and to return from them to the old 
 ones; instead of founding a conclusion about the new upon 
 pure assumption as to the old. It would be a very curious 
 thing if in a country in which knowledge of antiquity does 
 not flourish, persons of no information should have hit upon 
 striking resemblances to old forms of delusion or fraud. There 
 
 * One of the Fathers, but I have mislaid the reference, speaks of 
 divination per tabulas et capras, by tables and goats ; an odd association. 
 The word crepa would be the legitimate companion substantive of 
 crepo, and would mean a crack or rap. But the word is only found in 
 Festus (teste Forcellini), who says that crepes are goats, quod cruribus 
 crepent. There is enough in this to raise a suspicion that crepa did 
 actually exist in what would have been its primitive sense, and that the 
 Father who is cited was speaking of divination by tables and raps. 
 There is also crepus, for which see any account of the Lupercalia. 
 
Xll PREFACE. 
 
 are some, of whom I avow myself one, whose minds cannot 
 refuse the belief that the quod semper quod ubique has a 
 foundation of reality, open to suspicion that the real fact may 
 have been distorted or misinterpreted. I look for the dis- 
 covery of the sea-something, which shall explain what won- 
 dering sailors have called the sea-serpent. Mr. Owen and his 
 brethren may be quite right when they announce that this or 
 that description is utterly at variance with all structures 
 hitherto examined : and I hold it most probable that when the 
 sea-something actually comes before them, they will find it 
 harmonising .with other animals in its anatomical features. 
 Or if, which may happen, it should turn out to be quite ex- 
 ceptional, what will it be but a water ornithorhyncus, or a 
 marine boomerang? Before the duck-bill, which now has the 
 first of the two names, was actually killed and given to the 
 zoologist, he — not the duck-bill, who knew better, but the 
 zoologist — is said to have supposed that some tricky wonder- 
 monger had stuck the bill of a duck upon the neck of a 
 quadruped. What a grand resource is belief in imposture ! 
 There are savages, we are told, who fill their stomachs with 
 clay when food is scarce ; which clay they vomit when they 
 get a meal. In like manner the civilised man of non-nescience — 
 a word I take the liberty of using for science, since two nega- 
 tives make an affirmative — distends his theory-bag with 
 belief in imposture until he can find something to satisfy his 
 appetite. Self-knowledge would do better ; this valuable 
 commodity would not only keep the wind out of the recep- 
 tacle, but it need not be displaced to make room when whole- 
 some aliment comes to hand. 
 
 Imposture may be called the Zadok of those whom I de- 
 scribe ; Coincidence is their Nathan : and this priest and this 
 prophet anoint Solomon Self-conceit king. It is all coinci- 
 
PREFACE. Xlll 
 
 dence from beginning to end. If a man see the image of a 
 friend of whom he was not thinking at the moment, and 
 knew nothing except that he was far away, and if at that 
 moment or close to it that friend should have died — I take a 
 phenomenon of which most non-nescients admit that some of 
 the thousands of seriously affirmed cases are true — it is a coinci- 
 dence. "What is coincidence ? The falling of two things to- 
 gether. And how did these two things fall together ? Why, 
 they arrived at the same time. And how came this about ? 
 Because one happened to happen at the same moment in which 
 the other happened to happen. And to what are we to 
 attribute this ? To coincidence. There seems something very 
 candid about this circular reasoning ; this making coincidence 
 to be its own explanation. The truth is that the last assertion 
 means unconnected coincidence: but the presence of the adjec- 
 tive strips the theory naked, while the omission hides the 
 tatters of coincidence, the explanation under the respectable 
 garments of coincidence the fact. Accordingly, those who 
 rely on coincidence are not in the habit of reminding their 
 hearers what sort of coincidence they mean. 
 
 One of the great pursuits of the world is the study of 
 evidence : we are all engaged upon it in one way or another. 
 But, as generally happens when a word goes much about, it 
 picks up more than one meaning in its travels. Accordingly, 
 evidence passes for that which is given and intended to produce 
 an effect, and also for that which does produce it : there is the 
 quod debet monstrari, that which may properly be tendered 
 in aid of a conclusion, and the quod facit videre, that which 
 gives perception of truth or falsehood. The difference, and 
 the fallacies of confusion, are strikingly illustrated in the 
 courts of law. While the case is preparing for trial it is the 
 lawyer's business to collect what he then calls the evidence 1 
 
XIV PREFACE. 
 
 the matter which is to be offered to the jury. It is his duty 
 to see that his ' evidence ' is quod debet monstrari y not 
 only addressed to the points raised by the pleadings, but in 
 conformity to certain rational rules which are laid down. 
 And thus it comes before the jury, who are sworn to give a 
 true verdict according to the ' evidence,' which is now * the 
 quod facit videre. So far good ; the law nmst decide what is 
 and what is not fit to be offered as material for evidence. 
 But it may happen that matter slips in which the court would 
 have prevented if it could, but could not, or at least did not 
 prevent. And now comes one of those collisions in which the 
 jury mind rules contrary to the legal mind. If the ghost of 
 the murdered man were to make his appearance in court in a 
 form which no one could possibly attribute either to impos- 
 ture, optics, or chemistry, and were solemnly to declare that 
 the prisoner was not the murderer, and then to vanish through 
 the roof, the judge would, no doubt, instruct the jury that 
 they must dismiss the respectable apparition from their minds 
 altogether ; that even if the spirit had offered to be sworn and 
 to stand cross-examination, there would be very grave doubt 
 whether his evidence could have been received, from his 
 probable want of belief in a future state ; but that, as matters 
 stood, it was clearly their duty to take the vision pro non viso. 
 To which the jury would reply, if they believed the ghost, by a 
 verdict of not guilty. No honest men would ever make be- 
 lieve that they do not believe what they have in any way 
 
 * An exquisite proof of .the need of the distinction occurred a few 
 months ago. The jury asked the judge whether they were bound to find 
 according to the evidence whether they believed it or not. The judge 
 kept his countenance, and told them they were not bound ; but he 
 ought to have told them that, in the jury-meaning of the word, 
 evidence is not evidence until it is believed. 
 
PREFACE. XV 
 
 been made to believe, if they clearly understand what they 
 are doing. This case is only an extreme illustration : I will 
 now state what happened a few years ago. A sued B on a 
 bill of exchange : B's defence was I forget what insufficiency ; 
 that he had accepted a bill was admitted. Now the truth 
 was that B had taken up his bill, released himself from all 
 liability, and had the paper in his own hands to prove it. 
 But, strange as it may seem, this circumstance was not pleaded 
 in defence to the action ; why, did not appear. Accordingly, 
 there can be no doubt that payment could not either legally or 
 reasonably be put forward on the defendant's behalf. By 
 accident, or as an incident of the defence that was made, the 
 bill was actually produced, in a manner which showed that 
 the defendant had taken it up, and was the legal possessor of 
 the piece of paper. The jury were instructed to find for the 
 plaintiff; they evidently demurred, and the judge pressed the 
 matter, telling them in effect that they were to pretend to 
 believe they did not know that the bill had been taken up. 
 The jury were not to be persuaded, and found for the de- 
 fendant ; the judge warning them that the parties would be 
 put to the expense of a new trial ; which I think did not 
 happen. 
 
 I hold, of course, that the jury were as fully justified in 
 their verdict as the judge would have been, if he could 
 have done it, in keeping the unpleaded fact out of their way. 
 Though the preceding anecdote is only introduced in illus- 
 tration of the two meanings of the word evidence, the ap- 
 proval which will be generally given to the verdict turns 
 upon a point which receives very little attention, though all 
 are concerned with it, both in and out of court. What is 
 belief? A state of the mind. What is it often taken to be? 
 An act of the mind. The imperative future tense — I will 
 
XVI PREFACE. 
 
 believe, thou shalt believe, &c, which has no existence ex- 
 cept in the grammar-book, represents a futile attempt which 
 people make upon themselves and upon others. We all 
 know what a horrible chapter of human history has the 
 second person for its heading : the only thing to be said for the 
 actors is that they believed in the first person, which, besides 
 making them think the means they used were competent, 
 gave the honest among them a tendency to suppose that pro- 
 fession might be taken for belief; the dishonest wanted only 
 profession. The judge thought the jury could believe or not, 
 as they liked : that is, he thought they could, by an act of 
 the will, put their own minds into the state in which they 
 would have been if they had not known of the payment. 
 This they could not have done : all that was in their power 
 was to encourage that puzzle-headed — but doubtless, very 
 honest — confusion between belief and acknowledgement 
 which is usually in the heads of those who say, ' I never will 
 believe . . . .' 
 
 The attempt to induce others to will a belief or an un- 
 belief is exceedingly common among all sides of all questions. 
 There is no arguing against it : for it is a lurking attempt, 
 unsuspected by those who make it. I go on to something 
 in which those who have thought and read about belief as 
 belief may not be quite hopeless of exciting useful reflection. 
 Let the evidence tendered be what it may, it is an error to 
 suppose it ought to produce the same effect on different 
 persons. It is nonsense to say, Strip your mind of all bias, 
 and make it equally ready for all impressions : you might as 
 well tell a wrongly bent twig to please to put itself straight, 
 that you may then give it another bend in the proper way. 
 It is evidence which must both unbend and bend : it is not in 
 the power of anyone to alter his state by will. A person who 
 
PREFACE. XV11 
 
 finds another easier to convince than himself calls the other 
 credulous ; but when the other is the harder, the first calls 
 him unreasonable. Every one is just at the right point ; and 
 all the initial difference between himself and others is pre- 
 disposition. What right then has anybody to talk to any- 
 body else about matters of opinion ? It would seem that we 
 are to say — -that is, if we may coin a new word merely to 
 imitate an old pun — that orthorhopy is my allowance of 
 rope and heterorhopy another person's : that right bias and 
 wrong bias are purely relative terms. An astronomer knows 
 it has been found that people have different knacks of 
 observing : that with the same thing to note, and the same 
 clock to note it by, one person will nearly always be a little 
 in advance of another, and a little behind a third. Nothing 
 can bring them to a habit of agreement ; it is their nature : 
 and they call these differences persona I equations, though to the 
 unlearned non-equations w r ould have been nearer the mark. 
 But what if all the world be too quick or all too slow ; 
 surely then there is no such thing as correct astronomy : 
 what if the disagreements be in all cases only different 
 versions of too soon, or different versions of too late. It must 
 be answered that first, there is good presumption that all 
 kinds of human errors take opposite directions : and next that, 
 if not, it would be of no more consequence than if all the 
 clocks in the world were too fast, or all too slow, so long as 
 they keep as close to one another as now. This last may be 
 true enough, but the hopes of humanity must lie in the first : 
 a nice mess we are in if it should happen that all bias is one 
 way, and that what we call opposite tendencies lie only in the 
 differences of one kind of tendency. Suppose, to put a case, 
 that all mankind have a bias of credulity which is, one man 
 with another, as 1000 ; while the most strong-minded, the 
 
 ■ 
 
XV111 PREFACE. 
 
 pinks and tulips of philosophy, have as much as 999, and 
 poor blind spiritualists only 1001. Think of this as certainly 
 not impossible, and then read the slashing review which 999 
 wrote against 1001, beginning l After all the diffusion of 
 education, after all the triumphs of science, in the middle of 
 our enlightened century. . . . .' Or take it the other way, 
 let our bias be that of incredulity, in which case 1001 writes 
 as above against 999. Put all these things together and stir 
 them up ; the result will be a gradual perception of the 
 meaning and force of difference of opinion, and perhaps a 
 suspicion that the rational point for the time being is some- 
 where between the two extremes, and that the people who 
 * don't know what to make of it,' are nearer the true result 
 of the present state of materials than either negative philo- 
 sophers or positive spiritualists. But, as already hinted, these 
 intermediaries will not settle the question ; the disputants 
 must do that : all that the undecided can attempt is inducing 
 both parties to keep the peace, to suspect the existence of 
 their several biases, and to acknowledge that they are sup- 
 porting their theories, ready made by help of prepossessions, 
 not dispassionately constructing them. 
 
 The spiritualists, beyond a doubt, are in the track that has 
 led to all advancement in physical science: their opponents 
 are the representatives of those who have striven against 
 progress. I take for granted that there is a large body of 
 unexplained phenomena. Imposture men and coincidence 
 men I leave to see their king anointed, and to rejoice and say, 
 •Long live the king. "When navigators first began to make 
 observations with instruments on deck, the self- sufficient 
 called them star-shoote?*s, and when a star's altitude was taken 
 would ask if they had hit it. When the pendulum was first 
 employed in this country to measure time, the incredulous 
 were more than usually happy in their jests upon the swing- 
 
PREFACE. XIX 
 
 swangs, as they called them. It is likely enough that the 
 first set really believed that the navigators were pretending to 
 hold communication with the heavenly bodies ; and that the 
 second set took the regularity of the movements of the 
 pendulum for a succession of coincidences. But there is a 
 higher class of obstructives who, without jest or sarcasm, bring 
 up principles, possibilities, and the nature of things. These 
 most worthy and respectable opponents are, if wrong, to be 
 reckoned the lineal descendants of those who proved the earth 
 could not be round, because the people on the under side 
 would then tumble off. This sect is useful in raising doubts 
 and difficulties, but absurd when it pronounces decisions upon 
 them. It was proper to suspect that the locomotives would, 
 with a flat wheel on a flat rail, refuse to go on for want 
 of friction, the wheels doing what by military analogy might 
 be called goose-roll : but it was absurd to affirm this incapacity 
 as existing. When the great engineer said before the parlia- 
 mentary committee that he expected more than ten miles an 
 hour, the greater barrister — greater for the moment — turned 
 away and said, ' I will not ask this witness another question.' 
 The barrister's* moment is gone : the engineer's moment is a 
 long future. Any one who chose might collect such a list as 
 would powerfully edify those who can do without, and would 
 not do a bit of good to those who want the warning. 
 
 I have said that the deluded spirit-rappers are on the 
 right track : they have the spirit and the method of the grand 
 time when those paths were cut through the uncleared forest 
 in which it is now the daily routine to walk. What was 
 
 * When I say the barrister, I mean the clients who instructed him. 
 The hint is -worth giving, for people who know that Garrick would have 
 been one of the last men to give a kingdom for a horse, are apt to think 
 that learned counsel are the fools they are paid to be taken for. Are 
 the bar better actors than Garrick ? 
 
 a 2 
 
XX PREFACE. 
 
 that spirit? It was the spirit of universal examination, 
 wholly unchecked by fear of being detected in the investi- 
 gation of nonsense. When the Eoyal Society was founded, 
 the fellows set to work to prove all things, that they might 
 hold fast that which was good. They bent themselves to the 
 question whether sprats were young herrings. They made a 
 circle of the powder of a unicorn's horn, and set a spider in 
 the middle of it ; ' but it immediately ran out : ' they tried 
 several times, and the spider i once made some stay in the 
 powder.' They inquired into Kenelm Digby's sympathetic 
 powder — ' Magnetical cures being discoursed of, Sir Gilbert 
 Talbot promised to communicate what he knew of sym- 
 pathetical cures ; and those members whc had any of the 
 powder of sympathy, were desired to bring some of it at the 
 next meeting.' June 21, 1661, certain gentlemen were ap- 
 pointed ' curators of the proposal of tormenting a man with 
 the sympathetic powder : ' I cannot find any record of the 
 result. And so they went on, until the time of Sir John Hill's 
 satire, in 1751. This once well-known work is, in my judg- 
 ment, the greatest compliment the Royal Society ever received. 
 It brought forward a number of what are now feeble and 
 childish researches in the ' Philosophical Transactions.' It 
 showed that the inquirers had actually been inquiring : and 
 that they did not pronounce decisions about ' natural know- 
 ledge ' by help of ' natural knowledge.' But for this, Hill 
 would neither have known what to assail, nor how. Matters 
 are now entirely changed. The scientific bodies are far too 
 well established to risk themselves. Ibit qui zonam perdidit — 
 
 Let him take castles who has ne'er a groat. 
 
 These great institutions are now without any collective pur- 
 pose, except that of promoting individual energy : they print 
 
PREFACE. XXI 
 
 for their contributors, and guard themselves by a general 
 declaration that they will not be answerable for the things 
 they print. Of course they will not put forward anything for 
 everybody : but a writer of a certain reputation, or matter of 
 a certain look of plausibility and safety, will find admission. 
 This is as it should be : the pasturers of flocks and herds and 
 the hunters of wild beasts are two very different bodies with 
 very different policies. The scientific academies are what a 
 spiritualist might call ' publishing mediums ; ' and their spirits 
 fall occasionally into writing which looks as if minds in the 
 higher state were not always impervious to nonsense. 
 
 Again, the spiritualists have taken the method of the old 
 time. There was a strong head, one Bacon, who laid down a 
 scheme of philosophising which, in England,* is supposed to 
 have been the guiding star of all subsequent successes. But 
 Bacon was great as a destroyer, feeble as a constructor : he 
 could upset, but he could not set up. His plan was to collect 
 all the facts ; after which, to use his own expression, sciences 
 would be made as easily as a circle is drawn with a pair of 
 compasses. But no answer has ever been given to the question, 
 What science owed its birth or growth to Bacon's directions 
 how to make a science ? Many have profited much by the 
 descriptions which Bacon (Beacon?) has given of error: a 
 few may have profited a little by his expositions of the way 
 to truth. Those who are acquainted with the build of the 
 successful sciences can onty bring themselves within the pale 
 of the established worship by making induction mean other 
 things besides itself. It is universally acknowledged that 
 Bacon's attempt at a discussion of heat, on his own plan of 
 
 * The Bacon-worship of the continent was much less than that of 
 England, though not small. The reaction is now so strong that it is 
 protested against as excessive by the French translator of Aristotle, 
 Barthelemy St.-Hilaire. This was written before I saw Liebig's assault. 
 
XX11 PREFACE. 
 
 setting up, does not come near enough to deserve even the 
 name of a failure. There was another strong head, called 
 Newton, whose opinion of Bacon may be gathered from the 
 fact that he does not, in any one of his works, make any 
 allusion* whatever to Bacon's name, system, or writings. To 
 this Newton we owe, inter multa alia, the foundation of 
 our present knowledge of the moon's motion. How did he 
 proceed ? By collecting facts ? No ! by vigorous and 
 rigorous — I had written one of these words, and afterwards 
 could not tell which ; but both are true — developement of 
 one of the most outrageous ideas that ever was conceived, and 
 trying how its consequences worked. His predecessors had 
 started the notion that dead matter pulls other dead matter ; 
 they had an idea that the pull of the earth kept the moon at 
 proper satellite distance. Newton trumped their trick with a 
 vengeance : for he made it his hypothesis that every atom of 
 matter pulls every other atom. I purposely avoid the grand 
 words gravitate towards and attract : they mean pull without 
 volition, or they mean nothing. There are stars in the milky 
 way of which it is now pretty clear that their light takes at 
 least scores, probably hundreds of years to reach us, at the 
 express speed of 190,000 miles odd in a second and no stop- 
 pages. Newton laid down as his theory that there is not a 
 particle in the salt-cellar in any one of these stars but is 
 always pull, pull, pulling, at every particle in the salt-cellar 
 on our earth ; aye, and in the pepper-box too : our pepper 
 and salt, of course, using retaliatory measures. And he had 
 the impudence to say, Hypotheses non jingo ! But for all 
 
 * Newton, in some cf his early optical writings, uses the phrase 
 experimentum cntcis, which raises a presumption, though by no means a 
 proof, that he had looked into Bacon's writings. If he had really done 
 so, his silence must be intentional. 
 
PREFACE. XX111 
 
 that, to Newton we owe it, and by aid of this supposition too, 
 that the moon is of use in finding longitude. He himself 
 clearly shows that when he talks about matter pulling matter, 
 he means that matter, no matter how, does move and change 
 place as it would do if it had all these pulls upon it. Gravity, 
 says he — the cause of these motions — exists and acts, but I 
 have not yet found out the cause of it. Many of his followers 
 believe in the very pull ; and all the early opponents of course 
 took the theory in this sense. 
 
 Suppose Newton had merely collected his facts; where 
 should we have been now ? A person who knows the lunar 
 theory would smile at the idea of a speculator of 1660 presented 
 with two hundred years of accurate meridian* observations of 
 the sun, moon, and planets, at two remote observatories, and 
 requested to make an inductive astronomy out of them which 
 should give equally accurate predictions for time to come. 
 He would smile again when he remembers the state of 
 meteorology. For many a year have observations been made 
 with all that ends in ometer ; thermometer, barometer, hygro- 
 meter, eudiometer, anemometer, &c. And good has been 
 done by it : but where is our science ? Who can make the 
 weather of the last three months predict that of to-morrow ? 
 
 * James II. has had great notoriety as an actual administrator of naval 
 affairs : but few can remember how much is due to Charles II., when 
 they think of the progress of navigation. I hardly know whether this 
 may not be the first place in which the three royal foundations are 
 pointedly mentioned together : and of these the second and third were 
 not merely promoted by the king, but called into existence by the man. 
 First, the Royal Society, which by strong pressure induced Newton not 
 merely to print but to write the Principia. Secondly, the Royal Obser- 
 vatory, from which came the few lunar observations which were essential 
 to Newton's work : and no such observations had ever been made before. 
 Thirdly, the Royal Mathematical School, attached to Christ's Hospital, 
 for the education of navigators. 
 
XXIV PREFACE. 
 
 He will not have to wait for fame until he can acknowledge it 
 only per tabulas et crepas. When Murphy's almanac foretold 
 the coldest day of the winter, the public, as soon as they saw 
 that the day named was colder than any that had gone before, 
 did not wait to try the future, but thronged to buy in such 
 crowds that the police were called in to keep order. The 
 time may come when some weather Newton, with an atrocious 
 theory, and access to one year's observations of some observa- 
 tory, may point out the direction of progress. Never has any 
 way been made by observation alone. Facts have sometimes 
 started a theory ; but until sagacity had conjectured, divined, 
 guessed, surmised — for more choices, see Roget, § 514 — what 
 they pointed to, the facts were a mob, and not an army. 
 
 Some theory, then, is essential : a bad one may lead to dis- 
 covery. The Ptolemaic hypotheses improved astronomy. Of 
 the two great theories of light, emanation and undulation, one 
 must be wrong, if not both : but both have added largely to 
 knowledge. The time may come when a step * nearer to the 
 
 * At present it seems more likely that attraction will drive out 
 matter, by and with the aid of repulsion, The current of physical philo- 
 sophy sets towards Priestley's notion that an atom is but a centre of 
 attraction and repulsion, a terminus ad quern for a pull, a terminus a 
 quo for a push. Well ! but surely there is something to be pushed and 
 pulled, to push and pull. Here will arise in due season a dispute 
 parallel to that which is attached to the names of Collier and Berkeley. 
 What a comfort it should be to think that this source never can run dry. 
 Go as far as we may, we shall always be able to raise the question 
 whether we have arrived at the direct action of Deity, or whether we 
 are still in second causes. I speak of this life : of the future state we 
 are informed by some theologians, but quite out of their own heads, that 
 all wants will be supplied without effort, and all doubts resolved with- 
 out thought. This a state ! not a bit of it : a mere phase of non- 
 existence ; annihilation with a consciousness of it, such as I shall pre- 
 sently allude to. The rapping spirits know better than that ; their 
 views, should they really be human impostures, are very, very singular. 
 
PREFACE. XXV 
 
 first cause shall raise a smile whenever gravitation is men- 
 tioned : the time may come when attraction shall be saddled 
 with some contemptuous nickname, say the pully-hauhj 
 crankum. But this will only be done by the pseudosophs : 
 those who add wisdom to knowledge will be able to remember 
 what this — then to be called — >pure theory has added to the 
 stock of power. The number 999 of the day, when he writes 
 against number 1001, will twit him with being one .who 
 ' ought rather to have lived in the days of our well-meaning, 
 but blinded, ancestors, who were duped by the notion of 
 matter attracting (!) matter.' 
 
 The followers of a theory are of two kinds ; both equally 
 apt to use it with effect. There are those who hold it tenta- 
 tively, as consolidating existing knowledge, and suggesting the 
 direction of inquiry : there are those who believe in it as re- 
 presenting the true cause. The first may be the wiser ; but 
 the second are likely to be the more energetic. Now the 
 spi?*itualists, so called, meaning all who receive the facts, or 
 some of them, as facts, may be divided into those who believe 
 that the communications are spiritual, those who do not see 
 what else they can be, and those who do not see what they 
 can be. All who inquire further, let them think what they 
 may, will, if they shape their inquiries upon the spiritual 
 hypothesis, be sound imitators of those who led the way in 
 
 In spite of the inconsistencies, the eccentricities, and the puerilities 
 which some of them have exhibited, there is a uniform vein of descrip- 
 tion running through their accounts which, supposing it to be laid down 
 by a combination of impostors, is more than remarkable, even mar- 
 vellous. The agreement is one part of the wonder, it being remembered 
 that the ' mediums ' are scattered through the world ; but the other and 
 greater part of it is that the impostors, if impostors they be, have com- 
 bined to oppose all the current ideas of a future state, in order to gain 
 belief in the genuineness of their pretensions. 
 
XXVI PREFACE. 
 
 physical science, in the old time. I do not speak of those who 
 suspect imposture : to them it belongs to invent catch-tests. 
 I do not speak of those who think they can set out with a 
 view of the naturally possible and impossible ; they can arrive 
 at their conclusions by pure logic : let them learn Barbara, 
 Celarent, &c. with all speed, and set about imitating those of 
 the schoolmen who have made the name of their whole order 
 a by- word. But to those who know the truth of facts, and 
 who do not know what can and cannot be — at least out of the 
 exact sciences — it will appear on reflexion that the most pro- 
 bable direction of inquiry, the best chance of eliciting a satis- 
 factory result, is that which is suggested by the spirit hypo- 
 thesis. I mean the hypothesis that some intelligence, which is 
 not that of any human beings clothed in flesh and blood, has 
 a direct share in the phenomena. 
 
 Take this hypothesis on its own a priori probability, and 
 compare it with that of attraction. Suppose a person wholly 
 new to both subjects, wholly undrilled both in theology and 
 in physics. He is to choose between two assertions, one true 
 and one false, and to lose his life if he choose the false one. 
 The first assertion is that there are incorporeal intelligences 
 in the universe, and that they sometimes communicate with 
 men : the second is that the particles of the stars in the milky 
 way give infinitesimal permanent pulls to the particles on our 
 earth. I suspect that most, even among those who have all exist- 
 ing prepossessions, would feel rather piizzled to know which they 
 would have chosen, had they been situated as above described. 
 
 The simple form of the hypothesis, namely, the cooperation 
 of an intelligence which is not that of living human beings, is 
 far too elementary to be the pabulum of most persons : they 
 could as soon make pure nitrogen do the work of nitrogenised 
 food. We must have something more positive than this. 
 
PEEFACE. XXV11 
 
 Accordingly, some will have the phenomena to be, as the 
 phenomena themselves declare, caused by departed spirits ; 
 some have recourse to infernal agency. Angels, and such in- 
 termediate spirits as fairies, &c, have not, I believe, been 
 called in. I have been told of a hardy speculator who is pre- 
 paring to give the world the theory that all matter thinks, and 
 that the atmosphere is competent to be the cause of the as- 
 serted communications. All this is quite in the spirit of phi- 
 losophy, as times go. My state of mind, which refers the 
 whole either to unseen intelligence, or something which man 
 has never had any conception of, proves me to be out of the 
 pale * of the "Royal Society. I could bring a very long list of 
 names, including some of the most celebrated of our own day, 
 who have made it, some their principle and all their practice, 
 to take all the imaginable causes of a known effect, and to de- 
 clare, or to act as if they declared, that one of them must be. 
 They can no more keep a set of facts uninvested in a theory, 
 than a person of the usual prudence can hold back his money 
 when a mania for speculation is in the market. ' For 
 Heaven's sake,' said the people at the time when the South Sea 
 
 * The letters F.E.S., of which everybody knows the English meaning, 
 have two esoteric significations. My more learned reader knows the old 
 distinction between in re and in ratione. Looking at the homo trium 
 literarum, the thief of the secrets of nature, as a follower of natural know- 
 ledge, a promoter of man's power over matter, and an augmenter of the 
 conveniences of life, he well deserves the honourable title of Fautor Realis 
 Scientia. But when I turn to the mental side of the question, and 
 consider the action of his physics, as presented by himself, upon the 
 mind and thought of man, I see what induces me to think the time 
 must come when one of his predicates will be Falsa Bationis Sacerdos. 
 No blame upon him. To every system its proper time and place. The old 
 schoolmen manured the ground ; he has raised a plentiful crop ; and 
 the time will come when there will be bread, leavened bread, and plenty 
 for all. 
 
XXV111 PREFACE. 
 
 bubble gave birth to offspring like itself, ' let us but subscribe 
 to something; anything is better than nothing at all.' 
 
 I hold those persons to be incautious who give in at once to 
 the spirit doctrine, and never stop to imagine the possibility of 
 unknown power other than disembodied intelligence. But I 
 am sure that this calling in of the departed spirit, because 
 they do not know what else to fix it upon, may be justified by 
 those who do it, upon the example of the philosophers of our 
 own day. Some flints are found in what they call the drift, 
 curiously cut, and, for various reasons believed to owe their 
 shape to agents different from those which give other flints 
 their multitudinous configurations. These queer-shaped 
 things are tolerably like the tools of savages. The geologists 
 do not hesitate a moment: these are the works of men, and 
 the whole history of the human race must shift its basis. And 
 why are these flints the works of men ? I can learn nothing 
 but what amounts to this, that the geologist does not see 
 what else they can he. He calls in his higher power the mo- 
 ment he wants to steady his mind upon an explanation : as to 
 waiting a while for further knowledge, that would not suit the 
 hunger of the theory-bag. At last human remains are 
 found, in positions which favour the supposition that we have 
 got the bones of those who owned the axes, as well as the 
 axes themselves. Does this provoke new inquiiy into the 
 epoch of these remains ? With a few it may, but not with 
 the many. The rapid arrival at conclusions is as conspicuous 
 among the geologists as among the spiritualists. For reasons 
 above given, both are in the right track. 
 
 So soon as any matter excites warm discussion and lively 
 curiosity, attempts at imposition commence. Some forged 
 flints — perhaps also bones — have certainly been put into the 
 drift; and some forged spirits have made their communi- 
 
PREFACE. XXIX 
 
 cations. The philosophical world is of easy belief in fraud : 
 they can credit any amount of skill and ingenuity, provided 
 only that what they cannot otherwise explain, except un- 
 palatably, may be thereby shown to be trick. If it were meted 
 to them in their own measure it would go hard with their 
 characters : but the outer world is not so unreasonable as 
 they are ; and of this they get the benefit. I do not wish to 
 be understood as discouraging suspicion ; my own admissions 
 show that I ought to stand up for the keenest scrutiny. 
 What I reprobate is, not the wariness which widens and 
 lengthens inquiry, but the assumption which prevents or 
 narrows it; the imposture theory, which frequently infers 
 imposture from the assumed impossibility of the phenomena 
 asserted, and then alleges imposture against the examination 
 of the evidence. And further, when I speak of the 
 * philosophical world,' I make a reference which needs 
 special explanation, and a good deal of it. 
 
 There are four courts of the mind, if the phrase may be used. 
 First, for the strict reasoning of the exact sciences, purely 
 mathematical or purely logical, resting on those universally 
 acknowledged laws for which consciousness has only to 
 examine itself. I speak not merely of conclusions which 
 require thought and learning, but also of the assents which 
 all persons give to maxims of common life ; whether syn- 
 thetical, as that a straight line is the shortest distance between 
 two points ; or analytical, as that none are left when all are 
 gone. Secondly, for the evidence of the senses to things 
 which are. Thirdly, for the authority of others, as to 
 principles which can be made certain, if true ; or the 
 testimony of others, as to things or events which can be 
 known, if they really exist or actually happened. Fourthly, 
 for principles which are presented as more or less obvious, 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 but not capable of the absolute demonstration of logic or 
 mathematics. The first three courts are peaceable and 
 quiet places of business : the fourth is half the battle ground of 
 the greatest human differences, ambiguity in meaning of 
 words being the other half. I do not include experience, 
 •which is a compound usually of perception and testimony. 
 
 Absolute demonstration, perception by the senses, and the 
 testimony of others (a word which may include authority, 
 when properly used), are the three things by which conclu- 
 sions may be obtained from without. But in each of the 
 three we may be deceived, now and then : and in each of the 
 three we seek the protection of the plural number. A ma- 
 thematician knows that, when his demonstration is complicated 
 and lengthy, he is glad to fortify himself by another, con- 
 ducted on a different principle. In matters of sense, there 
 are many cases in which touch, smell, or hearing, are called 
 in to confirm the sight, or vice versa. We all know the over- 
 powering effect of the second witness. And yet in all three 
 cases there may be collusion. The second demonstration may 
 contain the faulty point of the first in a different form ; the 
 two senses may — in mania it would seem they sometimes 
 do — back each other in deceiving the mind ; and two 
 witnesses may be speaking in fraudulent concert. Neverthe- 
 less, all deductions made, demonstration, perception, and tes- 
 timony, are our three supports ; and, in at least ninety-nine 
 cases out of a hundred, neither of them leaves reasonable 
 doubt, when applied to matters within its scope, and when 
 not opposed by one of the same kind, or by one of the others. 
 
 It is far otherwise with the fourth court of human know- 
 ledge, the principle, the thing which must be, the dictum of 
 common sense, what nobody can deny, the impress of nature 
 on our minds, &c. &c. &c. Out of this court comes all phi- 
 
PREFACE. XXXI 
 
 losophy except exact science ; all morals except what is 
 founded on belief in human testimony, bearing witness to 
 actual revelation ; and no mean portion of all other conclu- 
 sions. And from this court comes all denial of what I have 
 said about this court. I am speaking of what cannot be es- 
 tablished either by demonstration, sense, or testimony : and 
 the fourth court, name it by what name you will, is the 
 giver of law to what I call the 'philosophical world.' I may 
 be supposed to define * philosophy ' as being the handling of 
 all that cannot be proved either by pure logic applied to un- 
 controverted * postulates, by the senses, or by testimony : there 
 is much to be said for this definition, but here I am only con- 
 cerned with it as being the best way of describing a world 
 which delights to call itself ' philosophical,' and to which I 
 am ready to concede the name on my own terms. This 
 world must be distinguished, on the one hand, from the very 
 small world which cultivates true philosophy in a manner 
 which leads them towards that acquired ignorance, that clocta 
 ignorantia, of which Nicolas of Cusa — to whom I suppose we 
 owe the phrase — says ' quanto in hac ignorantia profundius 
 docti fuerimus : tanto magis ad ipsam accedemus veritatem.' 
 It must be distinguished, on the other hand, from that very 
 large world, nearly all the rest of society, which the school I 
 speak of is sometimes falsely accused of corrupting. Falsely : 
 for the truth is that my philosophers — those of whom I speak — 
 are guilty of no more than methodical cultivation of a propen- 
 sity of our nature : and we must not describe as part of their 
 crop the weeds which would have grown if they had never 
 handled a spade. They are those who have reduced human 
 
 * Uncontroverted, not incontrovertible. The undenied is one thing ; 
 the undeniable is another. People pass oyer the first, and fight about 
 the second. 
 
XXX11 PKEFACE. 
 
 infirmity to a system. They are of every kind of pursuit, and 
 of every kind of temperament : they are not to be judged as a 
 body by those who stand out offensively, and who are a trifle 
 more respectable than the others. Conspicuous among the mass, 
 a minority very considerable in number, and unreproved by 
 the rest, are the set who do the looking down from a higher 
 sphere, with smiles of contempt and eyes of pity, when they 
 meet with a man or woman who sets their trite saws at 
 naught ; the supernal part of whose mission it is to be useful 
 to reasonable persons by accustoming them to the practice of 
 courtesy * under difficulties. These are the brighter lights of 
 the system ; the others are more reserved : they hide their 
 candle under a bushel in the company of those who are not 
 afraid of the craft, and remove the covering when they get 
 among their own set, where they back the bites of their 
 bolder comrades, and bite the backs of their opponents. The 
 difference, such as it is, is a distinction : but a Mussulman is a 
 Mussulman, whether sunny or shy. 
 
 I should be very loath to say that the whole of this ■ philo- 
 sophy ' is ignorance : there is a part of it which is always 
 craving a hearing, and comes recommended by the attribute 
 quod semper, quod ubique. We have for instance — to take 
 
 * Why do not these people take to writing doctrinal novels ? There 
 is a satirist who would be an odious prig if he were to come forward in 
 person, with nothing but his infallible judgments, and his sneers at 
 public men who differ from them. But he joins his own better nature 
 to what would otherwise be insufferable insolence, by putting his opinions 
 into the mouth of a genial parson of the old school, who lubricates dog- 
 matism with port wine, and hates Lord Brougham and a supper of 
 nothing but sandwiches on a common principle. And so he produces 
 what is exquisite reading. His method has the advantage of allowing what 
 philosophy seldom allows, the influence of years upon stiffness of opinion 
 and roughness of manner. Dr. Folliot and Dr. Opimian, as from one 
 hand at different times, are worth comparing together. 
 
PREFACE. XXXlll 
 
 the two feelings which the philosophy man takes least note 
 of — the moral sense, as we call it, and the aspiration after 
 a future state, anterior to all discussion about either reason 
 or revelation. Take the notion of a future state : it will 
 bear question whether human beings are capable of conceiving 
 themselves annihilated. With many, at least, of those who 
 profess to have no hope, there is a dread of non-existence 
 which, when closely examined, shows that it is imagined 
 a consciousness of it remains. An American spiritualist 
 relates that a friend, of very ' sceptical principles,' observed to 
 him, ' I guess I should not like to be annihilated.' When 
 asked why not, he replied, ' I am afraid that perhaps I should 
 regret it afterwards.' If it be a practical impossibility for a 
 human being to think himself out of existence, this point of 
 structure is matter for very grave thought. But to assert, 
 as even theologians have done before now, that immortality 
 is brought to light by it, without other help, is very grave 
 nonsense. 
 
 The positive part of our natural 'philosophy' is en- 
 titled to examination, as likely to lend strength to conclusions. 
 The negative part is to the full as difficult as the spirit the- 
 ory. Here we have our possibilities and our impossibilities ; 
 our knowledge of what would be the necessary connexion, if 
 only they did exist, of things which we thereupon declare do 
 not exist ; and all that comes of filtering the consequences of 
 this philosophy into the ordinary action of life. When ex- 
 amples are asked for, there is a kind of difficulty which de- 
 mands extreme cases. Take an ordinary instance, and the 
 thing is so common, and done by so many at once, and with 
 such an air of every-day habit, that we hardly see what is 
 done, even when we look, if unpractised in the kind of exami- 
 nation necessary. A person not used to military sights, watch- 
 
 b 
 
XXXIV PREFACE. 
 
 ing a whole company at drill, cannot follow the easy and 
 simultaneous movement of the muskets ; it is next to impossible 
 to keep the eye fixed on one. But let there be in front what 
 they used to call a fugleman, who directs the rest by exagge- 
 rating the requisite actions, or — as I once saw — a grotesque 
 urchin who places himself as near as he may, and imitates 
 with a stick ; the unaccustomed spectator will soon have light 
 thrown upon the whole business. Now I shall place a fugle- 
 man in front of some of the companies, not meaning of course 
 that the cases I point out are anything but exaggerations of 
 what usually happens. 
 
 1. A philosopher, far too respectable to be named with the 
 companions I mean to give him, once contended that, on any 
 theory of consciousness except the one he favoured, man would 
 be the ' dupe and victim of a perfidious Creator.' According to 
 this announcement God had a duty towards man before * his 
 creation, the violation of which would have been perfidy, that 
 is, treacherous breach of faith. The reader will be surprised 
 to learn that the philosopher quoted was a Genevan, who also 
 believed that God had foreordained — i. e. determined before 
 their creation — that millions upon millions of human beings, 
 designated beforehand, should be punished to all eternity, M to 
 the praise of his glorious justice," as the Westminster confes- 
 sion has it. This instance well illustrates the inconsistency 
 which prevails far and wide among those who find first princi- 
 ples in the fourth source. 
 
 * The point of my remark may be illustrated by a very short dialogue 
 which is reported to have taken place between a hero of our literature 
 and a person who desired to be thought of his acquaintance as they 
 came out of church : — ' A good sermon to-day, Dr. Johnson.' — ' That 
 may be, sir, but I 'm not sure that you can know it.' 
 
PREFACE. XXXV 
 
 2. Jean Meslier, a French parish priest, who died in 1733, 
 aged 55, was a man who performed his functions without re- 
 proach or suspicion, and was benevolent to the utmost far- 
 thing he could spare from the wants of life. He left a bulky- 
 manuscript which he called his Testament, all or part of which 
 was printed under the title of Bon Sens : it was translated into 
 English in 1826. The doctrine of the work is that there 
 is no God, which is in fact its sole argument. Among the 
 supports of this doctrine is the assertion that ' a universal God 
 would have instituted a universal religion,' that is, would have 
 made all men of one religion. This worthy priest, to whom 
 there was no God, knew how the universe would have been 
 fashioned if there had been one : he looked at the first cause 
 from an earlier point of view. 
 
 3. Many years ago, a miserable pot-boy fired a pistol at the 
 Queen. When questioned * about his motive he answered, ' I 
 don't think a woman ought to rule over such a country as 
 this.' The case is extreme, no doubt : but it fugles admirably 
 for a very large class of the philosophical principles. Politics 
 and social economy are derived from the fourth court, and 
 morals to match from — Heaven doesn't know where. 
 
 4. There was an insurrection of colonies against the mother 
 country which had enough of defensible grounds, but the 
 craving for philosophy based it upon a principle — ' We hold 
 this maxim to be self-evident, that all men are born free and 
 equal.' No doubt the fact is true ; the slightest experience 
 of new-born infants verifies it. But the erection of the fact 
 into a maxim is a good instance of the way in which bias 
 
 * Privately, of course, for our law, though it gives such an object the 
 honours of a trial for high treason, does not condescend to solicit an 
 explanation of ' the principles on which he acted.' 
 
 b 2 
 
XXXVI PKEFACE. 
 
 assumes more than is wanted, and does not know what to do 
 with the rest : for philosophy does not allow any part of a 
 1 self-evident ' notion to be returned upon her hands. If the 
 sturdy patriots had contented themselves with declaring it self- 
 evident that they must have their own way, they would have 
 given an answer, not only to the claims of Great Britain, but 
 to that awkward question, ' How about the Negro ? ' 
 
 5. Though we have 3een something of 'What else can 
 it be ? ' I add an instance which came to my knowledge many 
 years ago. A certain accusation was contemplated, which 
 turned upon whether goods were or were not, for a time, de- 
 posited at . ' How can we prove this on oath ? ' asked 
 
 one accuser. ' Oh ! I'll swear to it,' said another. 'How do 
 you know ? ' asked the first. ' Why ! where else could they 
 have been ? ' said the second. 
 
 Absurd extremes of these and other kinds may enable some, 
 on both sides of the spirit question and others, at least to sepa- 
 rate the knowledge of the fourth court, — which takes in all 
 that is neither demonstration, sense, nor testimony — and to 
 take it at a more reasonable valuation than is usual. Our age 
 of the world presumes itself free from reliance on what I 
 have separated from the rest, because it has long known that 
 the preceding age had that very defect. But those who have 
 been much in contact with both see that both have the same 
 features. The development of reasons for this assertion would 
 lead me too far : and the time for it is not come ; but it is 
 coming. Other revivals are in progress, besides that of the 
 possibility of communication with higher worlds of thought : 
 among them is the study of those minds which have been on 
 the shelves for a century and a half, covered with dust and 
 nicknames. As this study goes on, it will be accompanied by 
 a comparison which will show that many of the tunes of new 
 
PREFACE. XXXV11 
 
 philosophy, though played on another instrument, are the old 
 tunes over again. 
 
 I should have been well pleased to have borne equally hard 
 upon both sides of the spirit controversy, but circumstances 
 make this impracticable.- The spiritualist appeals to evidence : 
 he may have enough, or he may not ; but he relies on what 
 has been seen and heard. When he assumes that there is a 
 world of spirits, it is no more than all nations and ages have 
 assumed, and many on alleged record of actual communica- 
 tion, which all who think him a fool ought to laugh at. If 
 he should take the concurrent feeling of mankind as pre- 
 sumption in favour of such a world — a thing which may 
 be known — he is on more reasonable ground than the oppo- 
 nent, who draws its impossibility — a thing which cannot be 
 known— out of the minds of a very small minority. He may 
 be wrong, then, and I hold him too hasty : but his error 
 is one which cannot be ascertained except by further use 
 of his own method ; he may work his own cure, if cure be 
 needed. But the opponent philosopher, if he be wrong, is 
 obnoxious to all that can be said against wrong reason. He 
 takes a mode in which he can only be right by accident, and 
 in which he can only guard against error by also guarding 
 against truth. Very many may be suspected of the wish to 
 be counted wise by receiving nothing : they know that there 
 are Candides in plenty. ' Oh ! ' said that simple youth, ' le 
 grand homme que ce Poco-curante : rien ne peut lui plaire.' 
 Those who are inclined to watch anyone of the class, whatever 
 his guiding instincts, will observe the wonderful fertility of 
 his brain ; he produces maxim after maxim, mostly negations, 
 and can make them as long as anyone will listen. In many 
 cases his principles have so close a fit that it may be sus- 
 pected the things they were to apply to were measured for 
 
XXXV111 PREFACE. 
 
 them. This rate of production is suspicious: as the very old* 
 English song against the clergy says — 
 
 Ther beth so manye prestes, hii ne muwe noht alle be gode. 
 
 And when a satirist says l not all' we may be sure he means 
 'very few.' If the fourth-court reasoner be wrong, his 
 own maxims can never extricate him. Accordingly, his 
 methods of proceeding have a score of weak points for one 
 which is incident to the plan of looking at evidence, and de- 
 ciding upon it. I will not call him the modern schoolman, 
 because there is one point of difference in his favour, or at 
 least in favour of his deductions. The old schoolman kept 
 close to the meaning of his words, and kept strictly to logic : 
 usually, that is ; no rule without exception. Hence a false 
 principle would lead to false deductions. The modern philo- 
 sopher — I mean the man of the fourth court — is lax in 
 phraseology and illogical in inference; consequently, a false 
 principle may end in a true deduction, either by shift of 
 meaning, or error of reasoning. It may be said that he is just 
 as likely to produce false conclusions out of true principles : 
 this diminishes his advantage, but does not exhaust it, if, as 
 may be suspected, his false maxims far outnumber his true 
 ones. 
 
 The full comparison of the two ages of the world, the old 
 
 * The song, which I casually turned up while this page was in pro- 
 gress, has been the means of extruding a line which I intended for the 
 place. When I have noticed philosophical minds, such as we meet with 
 every day, strong in our ignorance as in triple mail, dealing out a pro- 
 fusion of undeniable principles, and sneering away like omninescience 
 at everyone who ' can 't see that,' my admiration of the facility with 
 which they supply the power their Creator forgot to give them often 
 brings into my head — but never off my tongue ; manners before every- 
 thing — a slang line which I suppose is part of a more modern song: — 
 Go it, ye cripples ! crutches are cheap ! 
 
PREFACE. XXXIX 
 
 and new mediaeval — as they may one day be called — is too 
 large an undertaking for a preface. The dispensation which 
 is perhaps at the beginning of its end has selected the weaker 
 points of the old day, and has attached them to the word 
 schoolman, which has been made a term of contempt. An age 
 to come may possibly repeat this process ; and if it should get 
 hold of schoolboy, as the word by which to make the smaller 
 man of the second mediaeval period the representative of his 
 time, I think equal justice will be done. Should I have life 
 and opportunity, I contemplate a sketch of the affinities and 
 consanguinities of the two periods : and the handling of the 
 spirit-hypothesis, whether in the hands of advocates or oppo- 
 nents, will furnish striking instances. 
 
 I began this preface by stating that certain phenomena, 
 which I myself witnessed, had satisfied me of the existence of 
 a real somewhat in the things called spiritual manifestations. 
 My reader may desire to hear something about my own expe- 
 rience of these phenomena; and the more, as neither they, nor 
 hundreds of others of the same force but different kinds, have 
 produced either acceptance or rejection of the spirit-hypothe- 
 sis. With the following preliminary explanation, I will state 
 some things which have happened to myself in general terms. 
 
 When a person relates a wonder which he has seen to 
 another person whom he desires to convince, but whose mind 
 is well barricaded by fourth-court principles against the recep- 
 tion of the explanation which the narrator — perhaps on prin- 
 ciples of the same kind — desires to advocate, both parties very 
 often proceed in a way which may be well illustrated by diffi- 
 culties of frequent occurrence in money transactions. The 
 narrator forgets that the things which he has seen and heard 
 are not made visible to the sight and hearing of the receiver of 
 his testimony ; the evidence he offers is of a secondary cha- 
 
xl PREFACE. 
 
 racter, though the evidence he received was primary. He 
 tenders a cheque upon a most respectable firm, Messrs. Fact & 
 Co., to an immense amount : and might properly be answered 
 by, — ' My dear friend, I know that your credit is good, as 
 things in general go, but I really must make inquiry before I 
 take so large a cheque as this for value.' On the other hand, 
 the receiver of the testimony brings a few positions out of his 
 stock of laws of nature, notions of possibility and impossibility, 
 dictates of common sense, &c. &c, on which he desires the giver 
 to conclude that the evidence of his own senses is good for 
 nothing, because it would prove that what cannot be can be, 
 which is absurd, Q. E. D. He tenders a cheque upon his 
 house, Messrs. First Principles & Co., and might, with equal 
 propriety, be answered by, — ' My good fellow, I know your 
 credit in that quarter is unlimited ; but the truth is, they give 
 unlimited credit to so many, that I doubt their lasting through 
 any twenty-four hours in the year.' Each of these parties 
 deals unreasonably with the other. Now my reader will 
 understand that I do not make any demand upon him : he will 
 give me credit, if not himself a goose, for seeing that the 
 tender of an anonymous cheque would be of equal effect, 
 whether drawn on the Bank of England or on Aldgate Pump. 
 My thesis is that he has asked of me a specimen of what 
 makes me believe in the reality of some of the things called 
 spirit-manifestations. Whether or no he shall allow me to 
 have had the ground I say I had, is to me indifferent, and to 
 the question irrelevant. I confess that for a little while I 
 thought I had thrown salt on the tail of an impossibility. I 
 felt what the French call desoriente', but fortunately not au bout 
 de mon Latin, though the phrases are of the same family. So 
 I went back to the old quiddity-mongers, and fortified myself 
 with ab actu ad posse valet consequentia. My state required 
 
PREFACE. Xli 
 
 so much relief that I had recourse to Aristotle, who says — my 
 reader must excuse translation, it is really too deep — Tct t)e 
 yevofieva (pavepor on cvvara ' ov yap eyivero el i\v advvara. I, 
 it will be observed, had my own senses to preserve from utter 
 confutation : my reader will not require the strong medicines 
 which I prescribed for myself; he has but to set me down for 
 a liar, a dupe, or a hoaxer, and he gets off cheaper than I did. 
 Ten years ago, Mrs. Hayden, the well known American 
 medium, came to my house alone. The sitting began imme- 
 diately after her arrival. Eight or nine persons were present, 
 of all ages, and of all degrees of belief and unbelief in the whole 
 thing being imposture. The raps began in the usual way. 
 They were to my ear clean, clear, faint sounds, such as would 
 be said to ring, had they lasted. I likened them at the time 
 to the noise which the ends of knitting-needles would niake, 
 if dropped from a small distance upon a marble slab, and 
 instantly checked by a damper of some kind : and subsequent 
 trial showed that my description was tolerably accurate. I 
 never had the good luck to hear those exploits of Latin muscles, 
 and small kicking done on the leg of a table by machinery, 
 which have been proposed as the causes of these raps : but 
 the noises I did hear were such as I feel quite unable to im- 
 pute to either source, even on the supposition of imposture. 
 Mrs. Hayden was seated at some distance from the table, and 
 her feet were watched by their believers until faith in pe- 
 dalism slowly evaporated. At a late period in the evening, 
 after nearly three hours of experiment, Mrs. Hayden having 
 risen, and talking at another table while taking refreshment, 
 a child suddenly called out, ' Will all the spirits who have 
 been here this evening rap together ? ' The words were no 
 sooner uttered than a hailstorm of knitting needles was heard, 
 crowded into certainly less than two seconds ; the big needle 
 
Xlii PEEFACE. 
 
 sounds of the men, and the little ones of the women and chil- 
 dren, being clearly distinguishable, but perfectly disorderly 
 in their arrival. 
 
 For convenience I shall speak of these raps as proceeding 
 from spirits — the reader may say that the spirit was Mrs. 
 Hayden ; the party addressed, a departed friend, the devil, or 
 what not. Though satisfied that the sounds were made 
 amosgepotically* I prefer the word spirit , as briefer than 
 c amosgepotic influence.' 
 
 On being asked to put a question to the first spirit, I 
 begged that I might be allowed to put my question mentally 
 — that is, without speaking it, or writing it, or pointing it out 
 to myself on an alphabet, — and that Mrs. Hayden might hold 
 both arms extended while the answer was in progress. Both 
 demands were instantly granted by a couple of raps. I put the 
 question and desired the answer might be in one word, which 
 I assigned; all mentally. I then took the printed alphabet, 
 put a book upright before it, and, bending my eyes upon it, 
 proceeded to point to the letters in the usual way. The word 
 chess was given, by a rap at each letter. I had now a 
 reasonable certainty of the following alternative : either some 
 thought-reading of a character wholly inexplicable, or such 
 superhuman acuteness on the part of Mrs. Hayden that she 
 could detect the letter I wanted by my bearing, though she 
 (seated six feet from the book which hid my alphabet) could 
 
 * I present this word as one which will be found very convenient : 
 it may frequently effect a compromise. For example, I have lately 
 heard of some one who declared in an elaborate article that he would not 
 believe the evidence of his senses unless the facts presented were capable 
 of explanation on some (by him) received hypothesis. I could go with 
 him as far as this, that I would not trust my own eyes and ears for 
 anything except what could safely be attributed to an amosgepotic 
 source. 
 
pueface. xliii 
 
 see neither my hand nor my eye, nor at what rate I was 
 going through the letters. I was fated to be driven out of 
 the second alternative before the sitting was done. 
 
 At a later period of the evening, when another spirit was 
 under examination, I asked him whether he remembered a 
 certain review which was published soon after his death, and 
 whether he could give me the initials of an epithet (which 
 happened to be in five words) therein applied to himself. 
 Consent having been given, I began my way through the 
 alphabet, as above : the only difference of circumstances being 
 that a bright table-lamp was now between me and the 
 medium. I expected to be brought up at, say the letter f ; 
 and when my pencil passed that letter without any signal, I 
 was surprised, and by the time I came to k, or thereabouts, I 
 paused, intending to announce a failure. But some one called 
 out, ' You have passed it ; I heard a rap long ago.' I began 
 again ; and distinct raps came, first at c, then at d. I was now 
 satisfied that the spirit had failed ; and I thought to myself 
 that it was rather hard to expect him to remember a passage 
 in a review published in 1817, or thereabouts. But, stopping 
 to consider a little more, it flashed into my mind that c. d. 
 were his own initials, and that he had chosen to commence 
 the clause which contained the epithet. I then said nothing 
 but ' I see what you are at : pray go on, ? and I then got t 
 (for The) , then the f I wanted — of which not one word had 
 been said, — and then the remaining four initials. I was now 
 satisfied that contents of my mind had been read which could 
 not have been detected by my method of pointing to the 
 alphabet, even supposing that could have been seen. 
 
 I gave an account of all this to a friend who was then alive, 
 a man of ologies and ometers both, who was not at all disposed 
 to think it anything but a clever imposture. ' But,' said he, 
 
xliv PREFACE. 
 
 * what you tell me is very singular : I shall go myself to Mrs. 
 Hay den : I shall go alone and not give my name : I don't 
 think I shall hear anything from anybody : but if I do I shall 
 find out the trick ; depend upon it I shall find it out.' He went 
 accordingly : and came to me to report progress. He told 
 me that he had gone a step beyond me, for he had insisted on 
 taking his alphabet behind a large folding screen, and asking 
 his questions by the alphabet and a pencil, as well as re- 
 ceiving the answers. No persons except himself and Mrs. 
 Hayden were in the room. The ' spirit ' who came to him 
 was one whose unfortunate death was fully detailed in the 
 usual way. My friend told me that he was ' awe-struck,' and 
 had nearly forgotten all his precautions. 
 
 The things which I have narrated were the beginning of a 
 long series of experiences, many as remarkable as what I have 
 given ; many of a minor character, separately worth little, but 
 jointly of weight when considered in connexion with the more 
 decisive proofs of reality; many of a confirmatory tendency as 
 mere facts, but of a character not sustentive of the gravity 
 and dignity of the spiritual world. The celebrated apparition 
 of Giles Scroggins is a serious personage compared to some 
 which have fallen in my way, and a logical one too. If these 
 things be spirits, they show that pretenders, coxcombs, and 
 liars are to be found on the other side of the grave as well as 
 on this ; and what for no ? as Meg Dods said. 
 
 The whole question may receive such persevering attention 
 as shall worm out the real truth : or it may die away, obtain- 
 ing only casual notice, until a new outburst of phenomena 
 recalls its history of this day. But this subsidence does not 
 seem to begin. It is now twelve or thirteen years since the 
 matter began to be everywhere talked about : during which 
 time there have been many announcements of the total ex- 
 
PREFACE. xlv 
 
 tinction of the ' spirit-mania.' But in several cases, as in Tom 
 Moore's fable, the extinguishers have caught fire. Were it 
 the absurdity it is often said to be, it would do much good by 
 calling attention to the ' manifestations ' of another absurdity, 
 the philosophy of possibilities and impossibilities, the philoso- 
 phy of the fourth court. Extremes meet : but the ' meeting ' 
 is often for the purpose of mutual exposure, like that of silly 
 gentlemen in the day of pop-and- paragraph duels. This on 
 the supposition that spiritualism is all either imposture or 
 delusion : it cannot be more certainly one or the other than is 
 the philosophy opposed to it. I have no aquaintanee either 
 with P or Q ; but I feel sure that the decided conviction of 
 all who can see both sides of the shield must be that it is more 
 likely that P has seen a ghost than that Q knows he cannot 
 have seen one. I know that Q says he knows it : on which 
 supra, passim. 
 
 I now give place to the author, with the statement that, 
 though generally cognizant of each other's vieAvs, both the 
 author and myself had substantially finished before either set 
 eyes on what the other had written. Between us we have, in a 
 certain way, cleared the dish ; like that celebrated couple of 
 whom one could eat no fat and the other no lean. 
 
 A. B. 
 
 July 1863. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 I. 
 
 II. 
 III. 
 IV. 
 
 V. 
 VI. 
 
 VII. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 IX. 
 
 X. 
 
 XI. 
 
 XII. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 XV. 
 
 PAGE 
 PREFACE ....... V-Xlv 
 
 INTRODUCTORY METHOD OF EXPERIMENTING . . 1 
 
 RAPPING AND TABLE-MOVING REALITY OF PHENOMENA 11 
 
 WRITING: FIRST EXPERIMENTS . . . .29 
 
 MESMERISM . 
 
 MEDIUMSHIP : MODES OF INFLUENCE 
 
 mediumship {continued) : writing — vision — 
 
 DRAWING 
 
 mediumship (continued): the voice and hearing 77 
 
 mediumship : NATURE of influence 
 process of death and formation of the 
 
 BODY . . . 
 
 DAYBREAK ..... 
 
 THE HOME OF THE SPIRIT 
 APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH . 
 CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT 
 INFLUX AND INSPIRATION 
 THE WORD OF GOD 
 
 NOTES TO CHAPTER XV. . 
 
 42 
 52 
 
 92 
 
 SPIRITUAL 
 
 . 119 
 . 176 
 . 192 
 . 216 
 . 267 
 . 319 
 . 344 
 . 381 
 
VkS* Of THP. 
 
 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 Errata. 
 
 Page xiii, line 1, for his read his' 
 „ ,, 17, omit the comma 
 26 > „ 6, for and was read and I was 
 109, „ 3, „ phenomena „ phenomenon 
 152, „ 9, after appeared insert substantial 
 175, „ 3, „ happiness „ a comma 
 224 to 234, insert marks of quotation throughout 
 270, line 8, for then read their 
 
 300, 
 326, 
 329, 
 330, 
 330, 
 331, 
 346, 
 
 15, 
 18, 
 25, 
 
 6, 
 15, 
 
 4, 
 16, 
 
 World „ Word 
 at „ as at 
 
 conclude read 
 under-growth „ 
 brains 
 
 include 
 undue growth 
 nerves 
 
 classes. Life, if this is, read classes, life 
 
 earth, read earth, 
 
 lousness might seem to be lessened, .bor the truth 
 and accuracy of all incidents given without names or 
 with initials, I hold myself responsible. Where names 
 or authorities are given at length, the evidence must be 
 taken for what it is worth. 
 
 When a strange tale reached us, twelve years ago, 
 of noises which had been heard in America, and attri- 
 buted to spirits, everybody laughed. As the stories 
 
ftp* OF THK 
 
 'tjsivtsrsitt; 
 
 FROM MATTEE TO SPIRIT. 
 
 CHAPTEK I. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY — METHOD OF EXPERIMENTING. 
 
 fTlHE following narrative of experiences has been for 
 -*■ the most part taken from notes made at the time 
 of the occurrences. For obvious reasons names are 
 suppressed and initials changed, but I have neither 
 exaggerated the marvellous features of any case, nor 
 omitted to mention circumstances by which its marvel- 
 lousness might seem to be lessened. For the truth 
 and accuracy of all incidents given without names or 
 with initials, I hold myself responsible. Where names 
 or authorities are given at length, the evidence must be 
 taken for what it is worth. 
 
 When a strange tale reached us, twelve years ago, 
 of noises which had been heard in America, and attri- 
 buted to spirits, everybody laughed. As the stories 
 
2 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 multiplied, a few persons in England began to think 
 they must have some origin at least, and to wonder why, 
 if spirits could rap in the United States, they did not 
 do so in our own country. Then we began to hear of 
 ' mediums,' people only in whose presence these seem- 
 ingly fastidious spirits would make their appearance ; 
 and at length curiosity was still further excited by the 
 appearance of a medium in London. Mrs. Hayden 
 became the wonder of a day ; but people fancied that 
 they could detect imposture, and, though none was ever 
 fairly proved, the interest flagged and the i medium ' 
 returned to America, having sown the seed of a tree 
 the extent of whose growth has yet to be measured. 
 Since that time the experiments have been laughed at, 
 talked of, and tried, with more or less of intelligence 
 and belief; and, though the subject has not yet lived 
 through the ridicule bestowed on every fact new to the 
 world's experience, enough of interest prevails to justify 
 a narrative of experiences, and some conjectures on the 
 truths to be thence deduced.* One thing is certain ; if 
 these phenomena are not the result of imposture and 
 delusion, the study of them involves questions worthy the 
 deepest consideration of the theologian and the man of 
 science. Whether they have any claim to be considered 
 
 * Since this was written Mr. Home's book has appeared. The 
 narratives it contains are far more wonderful than any I can offer here, 
 but they are given with a different object, and are, I believe, perfectly . 
 trustworthy. 
 
METHOD OF EXPERIMENTING. 3 
 
 in the higher point of view, it is the object of the follow- 
 ing pages to show. 
 
 Some readers may like, while mentally following the 
 course described, to experiment for themselves, and thus, 
 if successful, verify my statements as they go on. To 
 such readers a few directions how to proceed may be 
 acceptable, and with this view I prefix them to my own 
 narrative and conclusions. 
 
 There is a general and not unreasonable dislike to 
 
 o 
 
 paid mediums among those who cannot find out how far 
 such mediums could impose upon credulity ; hence the 
 question is often asked, • What can be done to enable us 
 to see these things for ourselves ? ' To this there is only 
 one answer, 6 You must earnestly and patiently try for 
 yourselves.' If any number of persons can be found 
 who will do so, let them, having first secured perfect 
 confidence in each other's good faith and a determina- 
 tion to avoid all tricks or trifling, begin their experi- 
 ments. 
 
 I suppose six or seven men and women — fewer would 
 be enough, more than seven are too many — sitting round 
 a table. If any one of the party is highly nervous or 
 hysterical, that one should not join the circle, at least 
 in the commencement of operations ; for though it is 
 likely that the physical condition on which the power of 
 ' mediumship ' depends may exist in him or her in a very 
 high degree, yet the consequences might be injurious 
 to health. Children, in my opinion, should rarely be 
 
 B 2 
 
4 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 allowed to join. The causes of this injurious ten- 
 dency may be guessed at when we arrive at some con- 
 clusion as to the agency at work in producing the 
 phenomena. 
 
 Among the party of healthy persons ready to form a 
 circle, it is hardly likely that one or more should not 
 possess the organisation necessary for a medium. As 
 far as I have seen, the faculty often accompanies the 
 sparkling dark eyes and hair of what phrenologists call 
 the nervous-bilious temperament. Blue eyes and fair 
 hair are also generally favourable, but great exercise of 
 mediumship is likely to exhaust the more delicate con- 
 stitution of the nervous sanguine. But though these 
 two temperaments, as well as that having blue eyes 
 and brown hair, are very often found in the strongest 
 mediums, it does not appear that the power depends on 
 any complexion or temperament. 
 
 The length of time during which the party sitting 
 round the table should remain with their hands placed 
 on it before abandoning any hope of success, depends 
 on conditions not yet known. In general, the question 
 is settled in about twenty minutes. Then, if any effects 
 are produced, the table will appear to throb or vibrate 
 under the hands as if charged with a kind of electricity. 
 Do not attend to the supposition that this arises only 
 from pulsation at the finger-ends produced by pressure. 
 Let it be so. Further experiment will give rise to 
 further conjecture. Then the table will crack or creak, 
 
METHOD OF EXPERIMENTING. O 
 
 and some one will have a theory about the wood getting 
 warm. But if there be more than an average amount 
 of e medium ' power in the circle, the table (which ought 
 not to be a large one) will show symptoms not referable 
 to heat. It will begin to move, and unless the party 
 keep to their resolution to take all that comes without 
 argument, much time and power will be lost in such 
 observations as * You pushed it then ; ' ' No, indeed, the 
 impulse came from the opposite side,' &c. 
 
 The table perhaps will move in a circuitous di- 
 rection, or perhaps will at once ' tip ' down to one 
 side. If it goes round, one of the party will save 
 time by asking the invisible influence* to tip it, and 
 the request is almost sure to be followed by the move- 
 ment required. 
 
 To avoid confusion, one person only should speak. 
 
 Let a request then be made to tip so many times, 
 and, if you find that the desired number of movements 
 occur, agree how many shall stand for 'Yes,' how many 
 for ' No,' and how many for ' Doubtful.' When these 
 preliminaries are settled, ask, 'Can the name be given 
 if the alphabet is repeated ? ' Suppose the reply to be 
 in the affirmative, it will be better to find out who is to 
 repeat it, as an uncertainty on this head sometimes 
 causes difficulty. It can be ascertained by mentioning 
 
 * In using this and similar expressions, I do not intend here to 
 indicate the nature of the influence, nor to imply that it is external or 
 internal to ourselves. That question must be considered hereafter. 
 
FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 the names of those present, and begging that the table 
 may be tipped at the right name. Then if the person 
 indicated repeats the alphabet slowly, not dwelling 
 longer on one letter than another, but giving time after 
 each for the movement to be made, the table will be 
 found to tip at some letter. Note that, and repeat the 
 alphabet again, and so on till a name is spelled, 
 beginning again after each letter is obtained. The 
 name will in all probability be at once recognised. 
 Then ask for a sentence or communication from the 
 unseen power, which will be given at once by the 
 alphabet and the tipping. Those who really desire to 
 try the nature of the phenomenon will do wisely not to 
 put test or leading questions, but to take what comes, 
 and wait with patience for an explanation of all inco- 
 herencies. I would also say, Let the questions of 
 will-power, and unconscious muscular action, &c, which 
 will naturally arise in the mind, be deferred for the 
 present. 
 
 It is certain that great activity in the brains of those 
 concerned interferes with the experiment. The sentence 
 received will perhaps contain a special message to the 
 person chosen to repeat the alphabet, or it may be a 
 general greeting or piece of advice, or possibly a 
 direction how to improve the circle by changing places 
 or otherwise. The person to whom the message is 
 given may perhaps say, ' If this is from a spirit at all, 
 
 1 am sure it is not from , the phraseology is so 
 
METHOD OF EXPERIMENTING. 7 
 
 unlike his. Take all you can get. If the examination 
 is pursued in a good and serious spirit you have a 
 better chance of receiving communications of the same 
 character, and these are far less puzzling and misleading 
 than the merry but foolish sentences which are some- 
 times given when the party only assembles for fun. 
 And at this stage of the enquiry all discrepancies must 
 be left for future consideration. 
 
 Perhaps, instead of the table tipping or moving, raps 
 or sounds will be heard, like slight discharges of 
 electricity, in or on the wood of the table. With these 
 proceed exactly as with the tipping, first securing a 
 perfect understanding between the source of the sounds 
 and the circle around the table, and then repeating the 
 alphabet as directed. It sometimes happens that 
 instead of the occurrence of sounds or movements, the 
 hand of one of the party may be agitated perhaps with 
 some violence. If this person takes a pencil, the hand 
 will be moved backwards and forwards, round and round, 
 sometimes in irregular forms, sometimes in long lines 
 of consecutive curves and waves, till at length it settles 
 itself into a steady movement, tracing letters and at 
 length legible words and sentences. The rapidity or 
 slowness of the writing will depend on the character of 
 medium power, and possibly on the temperament of 
 the writer. Additional power is sometimes gained by 
 another person placing a hand on the writer's wrist. 
 
 The writing should not be allowed to continue if 
 
8 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 flippant or irreligious sentences are given, nor if the 
 writer feels exhausted. I do not pretend to account 
 for the fact, at all events not in this place, but I believe 
 that when the communications are foolish or malignant 
 in their meaning, the persons through whose agency 
 they are given will be likely to suffer more or less 
 exhaustion. 
 
 The movement of the hand may perhaps resolve itself 
 into drawing instead of writing, though it is, I think, 
 generally found that drawing is a later developement. 
 This is often more enigmatical, but unless objects of a 
 frightful or very grotesque character are drawn, is most 
 likely of no hurtful tendency. More will be said of the 
 writing and drawing hereafter. 
 
 If, instead of any of the above-mentioned results 
 taking place, one of the party becomes drowsy as if 
 mesmerised, and then falls either into a trance or a 
 series of strange contortions and movements, there is 
 no cause for fear. This very seldom occurs ; when it 
 does, it is a proof of great susceptibility in the ( medium ' 
 and of power in the circle, and in this case means are 
 generally afforded, either by the writing of the indivi- 
 dual affected or by means of one of the others, to obtain 
 directions either to demesmerise the person, which is 
 done by making transverse passes across the face, or as 
 is more commonly the case, to ' let him alone, he will 
 not be hurt.' It is well on first trying the experiment 
 
METHOD OF EXPERIMENTING. V 
 
 to have one person in the party who is accustomed to all 
 the various phases of the phenomenon. I cannot too 
 strongly impress on those who wish to give the whole a 
 fair trial, the absolute necessity of unanimity, and the 
 great advantage of serious, even religious feeling among 
 the members of the circle. 
 
 To persons well accustomed to witness these mani- 
 festations the foregoing directions may seem unduly 
 minute. The details could not be avoided if the in- 
 structions are to be at all useful, and a conviction that 
 they are really needed has led many friends to urge 
 their insertion. 
 
 When parties form circles without the presence of a 
 practised ( medium,' great wonders must not be expected 
 at once. There is a process of developement required for 
 even the lowest manifestations, by which I mean those 
 having reference to the external senses of touch, sight, 
 and hearing. Those who mistrust the mediumship of 
 strangers must take the longer but more satisfactory 
 course of gradual developement. 
 
 I believe that the amount of imposture among paid 
 mediums has been greatly overrated. If they were such 
 well-practised jugglers as is sometimes supposed, how 
 does it happen that hours sometimes pass without any 
 manifestation at all taking place ? But, even after a 
 large deduction is made for imposture on the part of 
 the i medium,' and for credulity and self-deception on 
 
10 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 tha,t of the enquirer, a sufficient number of genuine 
 cases of apparent spiritual communication remain to 
 set aside the idea of coincidence, and to challenge 
 enquiry into their nature and origin. 
 
 A few of these instances, for the truth of which I can 
 vouch, will be given in the next chapter. 
 
11 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 RAPPING AND TABLE-MOVING — REALITY OF PHENOMENA. 
 
 TT is now ten years since I began attentively to 
 -*- observe the phenomena of ' Spiritualism.' My 
 first experience occurred in the presence of Mrs. Hayden 
 from New York. I never heard a word which could 
 shake my strong conviction of Mrs. Hayden's honesty ; 
 indeed, the result of our first interview, when my name 
 was quite unknown to her, was sufficient to prove that 
 I was not on that occasion the victim of her imposture, 
 or my own credulity. 
 
 A party of friends, many of them known in the 
 literary world, permitted me to join them, and another 
 literary friend, Mr. James,* a man of unimpeachable 
 truthfulness, undertook to arrange a meeting with 
 Mrs. Hayden, whom we were to visit at her lodging 
 near Cavendish Square. At the appointed time we 
 went, and were shown into a scantily furnished drawing- 
 room. We had ample opportunity, of which we availed 
 
 * All names are changed or suppressed through every experience 
 narrated. 
 
12 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 ourselves, for examining the old Pembroke table and 
 the other furniture before Mrs. Hayden and our friend 
 Mr. James made their appearance. She was introduced 
 to us, but was evidently a stranger to any of our names, 
 which were never mentioned. As my own experience 
 is to be narrated, I may premise, that I had deter- 
 mined not to ask for nor to dwell in thought on the 
 name of any departed friend, and when the rest sat down 
 I begged leave to sit out of the circle. This per- 
 mission was not given, Mrs. Hayden saying, as we have 
 since proved, that perfect unanimity was a necessary 
 condition of success. I then took my place at the 
 table with my friends. We sat for at least a quarter 
 of an hour, and were beginning to apprehend a failure, 
 when a very small throbbing or patting sound was heard, 
 apparently in the centre of the table. Great was our 
 pleasure when Mrs. Hayden, who had before seemed 
 rather anxious, said ' They are coming.' ( Who were 
 corning f ' Neither she nor we could tell. As the sounds 
 gathered strength, which they seemed to do with our 
 necessary conviction of their genuineness, whatever 
 might be their origin, Mrs. Hayden said, ' There is a 
 spirit who wishes to speak with some one here, but as 
 I do not know the names of the gentlemen and ladies, 
 I must point to each in turn, and ivhen I come to the 
 right one, beg that the spirit will rap.'' This was agreed 
 to by our invisible companion, who rapped in assent. 
 Mrs. Hayden then pointed to each of the party in turn. 
 
RAPPING AND TABLE-MOVING. 13 
 
 To my surprise, and even annoyance, (for I did not wish 
 this, and many of my friends did,) no sounds were heard 
 until she indicated myself, the last in the circle. I was 
 seated at her right hand ; she had gone round from the 
 left. I was then directed to point to the letters of a large 
 type alphabet, and I may add, that, having no wish to 
 obtain the name of any dear friend or relation, I certainly 
 did not rest, as it has been surmised is often done, on 
 any letter. However, to my astonishment, the not 
 common name of a dear relation who had left this 
 world seventeen years before, and whose surname was 
 that of my father's, not my husband's family, was spelt. 
 Then this sentence — ( I am happy, and with F. and 
 6r.' (names at length). I then received a promise of 
 future communication with all three spirits ; the two 
 last had left the world twenty and twelve years before. 
 Other persons present then received communications by 
 rapping ; of these some were as singularly truthful 
 and satisfactory as that to myself, while others were 
 false and even mischievous. One, if I remember rightly, 
 contained an accusation of murder against a living 
 person ; another professed to come from a ( spirit ' which 
 was quite unknown to the lady thus visited, and who 
 was then, and I believe remains to this time, quite 
 incredulous on the subject. 
 
 The occurrences of this first sitting are narrated in 
 this detailed manner because the experiment was tried 
 under very favourable circumstances, and because the 
 
14 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 various successes and failures on that occasion served 
 afterwards to indicate the simpler laws regulating the 
 appearance of the phenomenon. After this meeting our 
 names were made known to Mrs. Hay 6! en. 
 
 We agreed next to meet at the house of one of those 
 who had been present on the first evening. As before, 
 I narrate my own share in the proceedings. 
 
 We had not sat for many minutes when the same 
 sound was heard as on the previous occasion, and again 
 it was for me. The presence of the other two friends 
 was announced by the first ( spirit,' and each rapped at 
 my request, a very decided difference being perceptible 
 in the sounds, such as might be expected between the 
 influence of a man of firm and energetic will, and that 
 of one much younger, less powerful, and more imagi- 
 native. The first heard sound was different from both. 
 Each of the two who had not hitherto spoken was to 
 give some sentence by which I might recognise him. The 
 older ( spirit,' which gave the name of one who during 
 his stay on earth was constantly occupied in religious 
 thought, and in anticipations of the fulfilments of the 
 
 promises of Scripture, gave this sentence : ' My , 
 
 why do you doubt the holy attributes of God, ivhen 
 this is in perfect accordance with His teaching ? ' 
 
 This was certainly the sort of sentiment, but not the 
 phraseology, likely to have been used by the person, 
 whose name, I ought to have said, had been correctly 
 given by the raps. 
 
HAPPING AND TABLE-MOVING. 15 
 
 The name of the younger spirit was very peculiar, 
 and very unlikely to have been heard by anyone 
 present, with all of whom I had become acquainted 
 many years subsequently to my relation's death, and I 
 had never been in the habit of speaking of him. With 
 Mrs. Hayden's permission I took a writing portfolio, and 
 set it upright between her eyes and the alphabet so as 
 completely to prevent her seeing the letters. The 
 singular name was given with perfect accuracy. I 
 asked then for a proof of identity, and received this : — 
 'D, e, a, r, e, s, V Every one wrote and expected 
 
 'Dearest ,' and all but myself were puzzled and 
 
 annoyed when, instead of my name, the three letters 
 1 h, e, r,' were given. This completed the name of an 
 attached friend of my communicant, from whom he had 
 received much kindness, and who did not long survive 
 him. The sentence was : — 
 
 ' Dear Esther is ivith me, and we long to clasp you 
 in our arms in this bright world of glory,'' 
 
 Here , again a mixture and an incongruity. The 
 identification of the two c spirits,' both by name and 
 the meaning of the sentences, was complete ; but then, 
 c clasp you in our arms,^ &c, was so wholly unlike any 
 language used by my relations when with us, that it 
 puzzled me. I afterwards found that this was a phrase 
 of Mrs. Hayden's ; and it occurred more than once in 
 communications given by raps in her presence. Some 
 of my friends thought this improbable phraseology a 
 
16 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 proof of imposture; I preferred waiting, and hoped 
 that further experiment would help me to discover the 
 cause of these discrepancies. 
 
 On the occasion of a third sitting with Mrs. Hayden, 
 a person Was present who, if not absolutely disbeliev- 
 ing, was at least very doubtful of the possibility of 
 ' raps ' without imposture. For a long time nothing 
 happened. I then begged the person in question to 
 leave the room ; immediately the raps were heard, and 
 
 Mrs. Hayden said, ' They do not like A .' I asked 
 
 why they did not rap before, and the reply was, ( A 
 
 unconsciously repels us.' In answer to our questions, 
 however, we found that the current once established 
 
 would not be interrupted, and on the return of A 
 
 to the table the rapping continued, and many very 
 curious communications were given to several of the 
 party. 
 
 The promises made at Mrs. Hayden's were kept. 
 Many experiments were tried in private, and it was 
 found that a number of persons, both in and out of my 
 own family, possessed the faculty of ' mediumship ' in a 
 greater or less degree. I found, however, what I had 
 noticed at first, that the communications were always 
 given in the spelling and phraseology of the person 
 through whose agency they come.* 
 
 A little incident at this time gave me some idea of 
 
 * This statement is more easily verified when the ' medium ' is very- 
 young, or uneducated. 
 
RAPHNG AND TABLE-MOVING. 17 
 
 the process of rapping, and of the share which the 
 organisation of the medium is made to take in it. A 
 little girl in the house had been moving a saucer, and 
 through the tipping of this a name was spelt, with the 
 words, ( lean rap through you (meaning myself) to-day? 
 This was not expected but it was worth trying, and I 
 therefore went into an uncarpeted room barely furnished, 
 and sat down by the table, on which I laid my arm. 
 Very soon loud raps, which I called some of the family 
 to hear, resounded on the table. There seemed to be 
 power enough to rap the number of times desired, but 
 not to indicate letters so as to spell anything. The 
 sounds soon ceased and never returned. As each rap 
 seemed to be shot through my arm it was accompanied 
 by a feeling like a slight blow or shock of electricity and 
 an aching pain extending from the shoulder to the hand, 
 which remained for more than an hour after they had 
 entirely ceased. This experiment seemed to prove that 
 the nerves of the human body were necessary, if not for 
 the production, at least for the propagation of the sounds. 
 Many strange vagaries of table-moving have been 
 witnessed which must be very slightly noticed here. A 
 medium would lay one hand on a small table, and with 
 the other play a waltz or lively tune on the piano. 
 The quick jerks and movements of the table kept 
 perfect time to the music. Another time a gentleman 
 at one end of a room placed his fingers on a little table 
 desiring audibly that it should move to the other end, 
 
 c 
 
18 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 making three, four, or more turns as the case might 
 be, before reaching the end of its journey. This was 
 obeyed punctually, to the satisfaction of a roomful of 
 friends, to all of whom it was evident that the medium 
 could not, if he would, have produced the movements 
 by voluntary action of the muscles. These things are 
 only referred to in passing. They are curious, but hardly 
 furnish sufficient presumptive evidence of an agency 
 distinct from that of the medium to be used in illustra- 
 tion of an argument. 
 
 At this time much writing and drawing was going on 
 among a few friends. Of these more will be said here- 
 after. This chapter being devoted to rapping and 
 tipping, the first form in which ' spirit knowledge ' 
 reached me, I give a few more instances of success and 
 failure in communications received in this way. 
 
 A friend who is mentioned here as Mrs. J went 
 
 in company with six persons to visit Mrs. Hayden, to 
 whom they were all unknown. In the account first 
 
 written to me by Mrs. J , no names were given, but 
 
 I was told that they were all persons chosen for high 
 intelligence, good judgment, and integrity. The party 
 sat for nearly an hour, and then, perceiving no sign of 
 sound or movement, left Mrs. Hayden, who appeared 
 to all of them troubled and annoyed by the failure. 
 
 Another friend, quite unacquainted with Mrs. J at 
 
 this time, found that she had the power of ( medium- 
 ship,' and that the names of deceased persons whom she 
 
RAPPING AND TABLE-MOVING. 19 
 
 did not know were often given to her. The form in 
 which her mediumship appeared was that of tipping. 
 One evening some weeks after the failure of Mrs. 
 
 J 's experiment, which I had never mentioned to 
 
 my i medium ' friend, I was sitting with the latter at a 
 small table, when very unexpectedly the name of a near 
 
 relation of Mrs. J , whom I had known well during 
 
 life, was given. Something was to be said to me, and 
 it appeared that there was a great wish on the part of 
 the ( spirit ' to communicate with her relation. In 
 answer to my question why her name was not given to 
 
 Mrs. J at Mrs. Hayden's, she said (by tipping) : 
 
 ( I could not. There were two persons in the circle 
 whose presence prevented iV 
 6 Were they men, or women ? ' 
 Ans. ( A man and a woman.'' 
 ' Can you give their initials ? ' 
 « Yes ; X. F, and Y. Z: 
 A verbatim report, as above, of this conversation was 
 
 sent to Mrs. J , from whom I received a list of the 
 
 six persons who had been present at the sitting. Among 
 them were Mr. X. Y. and Mrs. Y. Z. All the party 
 were of that class of mind which is more deeply im- 
 pressed with the impossibility than with the possibi- 
 lity of any occurrence contrary to the usual apparent 
 ' order of nature.' 
 
 About a year or more after my first acquaintance 
 with Mrs. Hayden, a person came into my house who 
 
 c 2 
 
20 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 was found to be endowed with the ' medium ' faculty 
 in a high degree. She lived with us more than six 
 years, and of her perfect good faith (for indeed she 
 had not skill to deceive) in the matter of spirit mani- 
 festations, neither I nor any of my friends who watched 
 her narrowly could have any doubt. When she first 
 came into the family I noticed in her the dark spark- 
 ling eye which has so often been found to accompany 
 magnetic sensitiveness and great mesmeric power, what 
 one might imagine a quality of rapid conduction. She 
 began, too, before any mention was made of c spiritual ' 
 phenomena, to talk of curious dreams and visions 
 which she had had. Of these some had been literally 
 fulfilled ; others, and those the most interesting, appeared 
 to me to convey a splendid symbolism, the application 
 of which she did not understand, bat was able to 
 appreciate when it was explained to her. These seem- 
 ing indications of medium power deserve notice, in 
 order that persons who have had similar experience 
 may be led to try whether their faculty may be made 
 useful in the present enquiry. Jane also talked of 
 sounds attributed to kauntings having been heard in 
 several houses in which she had lived. That all these 
 peculiar experiences were not to be attributed to fancy 
 or superstition was amply proved in the sequel. Sus- 
 pecting from her temperament that she was one with 
 whom a table or other article might move readily, I 
 begged her to sit down with me and one or two others. 
 
TUPPING AND TABLE-MOYING. 21 
 
 She had heard of table-turning, but never of rapping ; 
 nor did any one of us expect a manifestation which we 
 had often tried in vain to obtain. The sounds came 
 almost immediately, first a throbbing, then a creaking, 
 then a full well-formed sound like a concussion of air, 
 which she said passed through her arms like an electric 
 shock. She was not at all hurt by these experiments, 
 and though a delicate person, seemed to gain strength 
 and spirits during the two years and half in which they 
 continued ; for they ceased entirely after that time, and 
 though many friends would have given her money if 
 she could have ' got the raps,' she never could gratify 
 their wish. 
 
 It soon appeared that no surname could be given 
 through Jane's mediumship. Occasionally a christian 
 name, if not an uncommon one, was rapped out ; but 
 notwithstanding this difficulty, the professed 'spirit' 
 always found a way of making its identity known, and 
 the relationship between -it and the enquirer in the 
 circle was always truly particularised. 
 
 As a curious instance of identification by raps, I 
 will mention here, although it has appeared in another 
 place, a fact which occurred during the period of Jane's 
 mediumship. I had been brought into communication 
 with a person in a state of frenzied excitement owing 
 to the suicide of her brother, who killed himself in a fit 
 of intoxication. This brother and sister were unknown 
 both to Jane and myself, and she had never seen the 
 
22 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 survivor. But some days after my interview with trie 
 sister, as a party was sitting round the table expecting 
 'manifestations' from their friends, loud sounds were 
 heard which interfered with and disturbed everything 
 else. After much questioning and cross-examining it 
 was discovered that the disturber was a man whom I 
 had not known in his earthly life, that he had de- 
 stroyed himself, and wished to speak to me. I guessed 
 the name of the unhappy suicide, begging him if possible 
 to prove his identity. A series of sounds then pro- 
 ceeded apparently from the pedestal of the table, which 
 were recognised as the noises produced by sawing, 
 planing, screwing, hammering, filing, &c, all per- 
 fectly distinct. We asked whether this was meant to 
 show us that the spirit had been a carpenter and joiner, 
 and found that such was the intention. I had no idea 
 of this at the time, but found on inquiring that it was 
 quite true. 
 
 Although the medium, Jane, had the organisation 
 necessary for the transmission of raps when in the 
 presence of some persons, she could not obtain them 
 when alone, or when in company with most of those 
 with whom she came in contact. I found that, when 
 absent from my house, she had tried among her own 
 friends, but never with any decided success. She was 
 always most successful when sitting beside me, and as I 
 judged from that circumstance that some share of the 
 power of transmission belonged to myself, the cause of 
 
RAPPING AND TABLE-MOVING. 23 
 
 my very remarkable experience at Mrs. Hayden's met 
 with a possible explanation. 
 
 The spelling of those sentences which were given 
 through Jane was, as I before observed, always hers. 
 e Beautiful ' was ' butiful, i writing ' ' riting? &c, 
 except on some rare occasions when educated persons 
 were present whose strong medium power, as I con- 
 jecture, overcame hers. This fact relating to spelling 
 and forms of expression applies to every phase of 
 mediumship I have hitherto seen; whether the ex- 
 planation to be given will be as satisfactory to the 
 reader as to myself, must be determined hereafter. I 
 may here mention that Jane had very little perception 
 of, or memory for, the surnames of individuals, and 
 could rarely give me correctly the name of any friend 
 who called in my absence, or any message in which a 
 surname was required. The organ called 'individuality' 
 was small in her, while in Mrs. Hayden's forehead I 
 noticed that all the perceptions were large and full. I 
 do not mean to attach much importance to this ob- 
 servation, till a greater number of facts have been 
 recorded, connecting the character of communications 
 given through the agency of any medium with his or 
 her cerebral developement. 
 
 Jane was extremely fond of flowers, and the messages 
 given by rapping, as well as those when her mediumship 
 had taken another form, almost always contained descrip- 
 tions of gardens, and references to wreaths and nosegays 
 
24 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 of flowers. When we come to the symbolism which is 
 almost invariably used through all mediums by the 
 unseen influences, some explanation of this also will be 
 attempted. 
 
 Poor Jane died two years ago of rapid consumption. 
 Lest it should be supposed that the exercise of her 
 medium power injured her, I ought to say that for 
 three years, during which time her health was good, the 
 manifestations had ceased. Her last illness was brought 
 on by cold, and imprudent treatment of a constitution 
 always delicate. A few days before her death she gave 
 me a solemn assurance that she had never deceived me 
 in the slightest degree in any particular connected with 
 spiritual manifestations ; ' but,' she said, ' I have from 
 my infancy seen and heard far more curious things than 
 I have ever talked of to anyone.' 
 
 Jane's mediumship was never successful in the 
 presence of persons who allowed their unbelief to 
 appear. She even said that she could feel an opposition, 
 whether it were open or concealed. I believe that the 
 uncertainty and inconclusiveness of evidence on many 
 ghost stories may be accounted for by ignorance of the 
 conditions of mediumship and the different degrees of 
 power in different persons. Of this the 'Cock Lane 
 Grhost ' was in all probability an example. For a long 
 time the cause of the sounds defied all attempts at 
 discovery; at length it was found that they were heard 
 only in the presence of an ignorant young girl, who 
 
EAPPING AND TABLE-MOVING. 25 
 
 could only declare that she did not make them. Dr. 
 Johnson was not a little proud of his sagacity in con- 
 cluding that as the sounds were only heard in the 
 presence of this young girl, she must have made them, 
 consciously, and was therefore an impostor. The 
 means taken to prove imposture were wonderfully sci- 
 entific, and more to be admired than imitated. When 
 the poor girl had been frightened by the sight of so 
 many fine people, it would have been strange indeed if 
 the nerves which were to serve as telegraphic wires had 
 not been deranged in their action. After the savans 
 of that time had found out how the raps could be 
 stopped, they discovered how they were made. The 
 girl was laid down with a board placed by her, and she 
 was then told that, if she did not make the ghost come, 
 she would be severely punished. Accordingly she took 
 the best means she could of producing the effect of his 
 ghostly presence by tapping on the board with her 
 finger, and so the matter was settled. 
 
 The rappings in the house of the father of John 
 Wesley may be better understood now, than at the time 
 of their occurrence. Accounts of these have appeared 
 in the Spiritual Magazine, but the whole story will be 
 remembered by all readers of Southey's Life of Wesley. 
 
 The most remarkable instance of table-moving with 
 a purpose which ever came under my notice occurred 
 at the house of a friend, whose family like my own 
 were staying at the sea-side. An account of this has 
 
26 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 appeared in print before, but it is so much to the 
 purpose here that I cannot resist adding it to the 
 collection of experiences. 
 
 My friend's family consisted of six persons, and a 
 gentleman, now the husband of one of the daughters, 
 joined them, and was accompanied by a young member 
 of my own family. No paid person was present. A 
 gentleman, who had been expressing himself in a very 
 sceptical manner, not only with reference to spirit 
 manifestations, but on the subject of spiritual existence 
 generally, sat on a sofa two or three feet from the dining- 
 room table, round which we were placed. After sitting 
 some time we were directed by the rapping to join 
 hands and stand up round the table without touching 
 it All did so for a quarter of an hour, wondering 
 whether anything would happen, or whether we were 
 hoaxed by the unseen power. Just as one or two of the 
 party talked of sitting down, the old table, which was 
 large enough for eight or ten persons after the manner 
 of a lodging-house, moved entirely by itself as we 
 surrounded and followed it with our hands joined, went 
 towards the gentleman out of the circle, and literally 
 pushed him up to the back of the sofa, till he called out 
 6 Hold, enough ! ' 
 
 Of the marvels in the way of table-moving, &c, 
 occurring in Mr. Home's presence, his own account, 
 corroborated by so many witnesses, speaks with suffi- 
 cient detail. In referring to his very powerful me- 
 
KAPPING AND TABLE-MOVING. 27 
 
 diumship, I only add one to the number of persons by 
 whom the facts are attested. It is only in Mr. Home's 
 presence that I have witnessed that very curious ap- 
 pearance, or process, the thrilling of the table. This 
 takes place for some seconds, perhaps more, before it 
 rises from the floor. The last time I witnessed this 
 phenomenon, an acute surgeon present said that this 
 thrilling, the genuineness of which was unmistakable, 
 was exactly like what takes place in that affection of 
 the muscles called subsultus tendinum. When it 
 ceased, the table rose more than two feet from the 
 floor. 
 
 The i tipping ' appears to be the easiest method of 
 communication for the unseen influences, as it is the 
 most readily obtained by the circle of experimenters. 
 By it, as indeed by all methods, very strange and 
 absurd communications are sometimes given. I have 
 seen instances, and been told of others, in which long 
 incongruous strings of names and titles have been spelt 
 out; such as, Kichard Cceur de Lion, Pythagoras, 
 Byron, Cheops, and Mr. Fauntleroy, the list perhaps 
 ending with T. Browne or J. Smith. The givers of 
 these names seem to delight only in buffoonery or 
 abuse, and perhaps, after playing absurd and mis- 
 chievous tricks for days or even weeks, will seem to 
 come in a body, giving all their names with the in- 
 formation that they are come to say ( Good-by for 
 ever,'' After this their names or sobriquets do not 
 
28 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 appear again. Of course it would not be to the pur- 
 pose to try, in the present state of the inquiry, to account 
 fully for these strange proceedings. Even on the 
 supposition that names thus given proceed from real 
 existences, we must imagine either that the names are 
 assumed for fun, or that some unknown law connect- 
 ing the name with the character or nature is involved. 
 Of this law, of which we seem to have a little glimmer- 
 ing, I shall speak further on. Whatever may be the 
 cause of the foolish and mischievous visitations referred 
 to, their very frequent occurrence is a sufficient reason 
 for the repetition of a caution already given ; namely, 
 that those who wish to try experiments must, if they 
 do not desire to be repelled in the outset, preserve a 
 really religious, earnest, and truth -loving spirit. The 
 absence of this temper of mind in the party will soon 
 be followed by such manifestations as those last de- 
 scribed, which are really hurtful to mediums, and from 
 their reckless and untruthful character very unlikely 
 to lead to just conclusions on the whole subject. 
 
29 
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 WRITING — FIRST EXPERIMENTS. 
 
 DURING- the two first years of our experience in 
 spirit manifestations, the power of mediumship 
 was found to exist in a greater or less degree, and in 
 different forms, in about thirty persons. Among these 
 were men, women, young persons, and children, persons 
 of all ages, of all stations in society, and all degrees 
 of education and varieties of disposition and intellect. 
 Experiments tried with such extensive means of obser- 
 vation can scarcely fail to be useful in assisting conjec- 
 ture on the subject ; and in the hope that they may be 
 interesting, I extract some of the most remarkable 
 instances from a record kept at the time. 
 
 When the involuntary writing is first seen in imper- 
 fect mediums, unaccompanied by its more striking 
 allied forms of manifestation, rapping, moving furni- 
 ture, &c, it is generally thought to be the result either 
 of an uncontrolled self-delusive imagination, or of 
 some undeveloped faculty in the mental nature of the 
 writer akin to that described by some physiologists 
 
30 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 as unconscious cerebration, or an action carried on in 
 the brain without the knowledge of the mind. The last 
 view is often taken by thoughtful persons on the first 
 appearance of the phenomenon in themselves or others. 
 Less scientific observers are apt to attribute the whole 
 to fancy. Uneducated people say the medium 6 gives 
 way,' and are confirmed in this luminous view of the 
 matter by the fact that the movement of the hand can 
 be generally, though not always, prevented with ease. 
 But when it is found that the rapping or moving stops 
 
 after the spelling of some such sentence as c Let 
 
 hold the pencil, I can write by his hand,' and that no 
 effort of will can reproduce the raps, or gain communi- 
 cation in any other way than that promised, it is 
 impossible to avoid the conclusion that the same agency 
 is at work in both forms of mediumship. But the re- 
 spective parts taken by the medium and by the unseen 
 power, if the latter exist, remain to be seen. 
 
 A great deal of nonsense, as has been said, is often 
 written at first by mediums. This is reverted to here 
 by way of caution, for excepting the proof that, if the 
 unseen influences emanate from beings in another 
 state, they are if anything in a lower mental and moral 
 condition than ourselves, I know of nothing to be 
 learnt by it. The verses written by the unseen power 
 are often curious and quaint, sometimes ridiculous. 
 But verses not of a low and mischievous character have 
 been given to us as to many other experimenters. The 
 
writing: first experiments. 31 
 
 best of these contained beautiful ideas connected with 
 the happiness of a life among the blessed and good 
 in the world of good spirits and angels, very lovely 
 descriptions of the scenery of that world or worlds, and 
 much affectionate anticipation of reunion among friends 
 and future progress in happiness together. These were 
 the elementary thoughts only. The language and 
 forms of imagery might be traced in every instance 
 which I have seen to the brain of the medium. This, 
 I think, will be found true throughout all the mani- 
 festations, and in none is it more apparent than in the 
 writing, from T. L. Harris's always remarkable and 
 frequently poetical productions, down to verses written 
 with excessive rapidity by the hand of a child eight 
 years old. I would say then, even at the risk of 
 repetition, the elementary idea or truth sought to be 
 conveyed does not originate with the medium ; the lan- 
 guage, spelling, and form of expression is his or hers. 
 It is true that mediums like Mr. Harris and others 
 whom we have known produce both prose and verse in 
 a variety of styles, so as to favour the idea of a variety 
 of influences, according to the names of poets or others 
 given as the inspirers of the composition : but it will be 
 found that the latter never exceeds the ability of the 
 writer to attain and comprehend, though its meaning 
 and characters may be beyond or outside of what he 
 would have himself originated. 
 
 The name of a great poet was once given to me by 
 
32 FE05I MATTER TO SriRIT. 
 
 the hand of a very young medium, and I, who was then 
 inexperienced in the whole proceeding, asked for a 
 complete little poem in three verses for a friend. The 
 child, of course, could have no idea of what was coming, 
 as my request was a sudden thought, but in about five 
 minutes three verses were written with very great 
 rapidity, describing the approach of an army, a battle 
 on the bank of a river, which ran red with the blood of 
 the combatants, another battle on hills whose greenness 
 was especially noticed, and a third when the flowers 
 were in bloom, and when the chief was dead. The metre 
 was uncommon, and though the lines were grotesque, 
 they were not inharmonious. One of our greatest 
 living authors, himself a fine poet, pronounced these 
 three stanzas to contain a poetical element which could 
 not have proceeded from the mind of a young child. 
 In the following spring, several months after the 
 writing, the applicability of this rhythmical production 
 to the three battles of Alma, Inker mann, and Bala- 
 clava was apparent. But they were written long 
 before the Crimean War broke out. 
 
 In what follows, as indeed in all that has been said, 
 I know not how to secure anything like a belief in the 
 trustworthiness of a narrator who is not at liberty to 
 authenticate the truth of any one narrative by the 
 names of those concerned. Perhaps some honesty of 
 purpose may appear in the method both of experi- 
 menting and of recording results ; this, however, will 
 
WRITING I FIRST EXPERIMENTS. 33 
 
 only be sufficient to stimulate enquiry, and so I leave 
 my statements, even if ridiculed in the first instance, 
 to receive a larger amount of consideration when the 
 experience of each individual shall have enabled him to 
 verify them for himself. 
 
 Many considerations yet remained, and many expe- 
 riments were still to be tried, before we could have full 
 reason for believing that another intelligence was 
 concerned, or, in other words, that an invisible being 
 directed the operations of the telegraphic wire whose 
 mechanism was in our own organisation. 
 
 From the beginning of my experience in these mani- 
 festations, two circumstances had struck me forcibly as 
 forming an element of the question as to their nature. 
 The first of these was the invariable assertion that they 
 were caused by 'spirits,' and that these spirits had 
 once lived in the body on earth. The other circum- 
 stance was that, whatever the name given, and through 
 whatever means or mediumship it came, the phrase- 
 ology always agreed with the relationship claimed. To 
 make my meaning more intelligible: Suppose that 
 writings are given purporting to come from the sister 
 or brother of a person present, and that a family party, 
 in which all kinds of relationships are found, compose 
 the circle. The writing, in mentioning members of the 
 family to each other, will always specify them correctly 
 by the relationship subsisting among them. For 
 example; — A supposed brother writing to his sister 
 
34 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 about her son by the hand of a stranger medium, will 
 speak of the son as ( my nephew,' and to the son, of 
 4 my sister,' ' your mother,' &c. I never saw this fail. 
 It seems difficult to believe that any unconscious 
 action of the brain can, without the least premeditation, 
 produce expressions which fall into such coherence of 
 meaning. 
 
 Here is a curious and perfect illustration of what I 
 mean, obtained in an experiment which was tried in 
 order to ascertain, whether a ( spirit,' having written 
 something by one medium, can repeat the same word, 
 or convey the same idea, by another who is unac- 
 quainted with it. In answer to this general question, 
 we were told that this could sometimes be done, but that 
 it depended on the mental harmony subsisting between 
 the medium and the spirit. 
 
 Two young mediums were present ; I placed a paper 
 before one of them, begging that some word might be 
 written which might be either literally or substantially 
 repeated by the hand of the other, who was reading 
 quietly at a distance. The writing was — 
 
 'Yes I can. " Fou."' 
 
 * That is what you mean to write ? ' (pointing to the 
 word you, but not repeating it.) 
 
 Ans. < Yes: 
 
 The name given of the spirit was that of one of my 
 nieces. I laid another paper before the other medium, 
 begging him to hold the pencil for a moment. His 
 
WRITINGS FIRST EXPERIMENTS. 35 
 
 hand wrote, ' My aunV We then told him the object 
 of the experiment, and showed him the word * You ' 
 written by the first medium. 
 
 Here the idea, and not the word, was conveyed by 
 the medium's writing. 
 
 Another time I asked this question : — 
 
 6 If I were to write down the name of a flower, and 
 Emily (a very young medium) were to write another, 
 each keeping the idea of that flower in our minds, but 
 not mentioning the names to each other, could you 
 (the spirit) write a third and different name, by our 
 joined hands ? ' 
 
 Ans. 'Yes, with Emily and you, but not with all 
 mediums.' 
 
 I then wrote Rose, and Emily wrote Sweetpea. 
 Neither mentioned these names aloud. But Emily's 
 hand with mine on the wrist wrote Lily. Again, 
 Emily wrote Jessamine; I, Mignonette; and our joined 
 hands wrote Larkspur. This was done four times 
 in all, the three names each time being clear and 
 distinct from each other. Then our hands wrote, 
 ' Leave off ; the power is gone.' It seemed to me that 
 if either Emily or I had influenced the writing by 
 muscular or mental power, the result would not have 
 been a clearly written name, but a mixture of our 
 thoughts. 
 
 While the opportunity for making experiments 
 lasted, we obtained stronger presumptive evidence 
 
 D 2 
 
36 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 than any yet given of the existence of another will 
 and intelligence in the source of the writing, quite 
 independent of the will of the medium or mediums. 
 
 Three writers were present, Edward, John, and my- 
 self. I, however* could not write alone, and could only 
 strengthen the power of others by laying my hand on 
 the wrist. After preliminaries were settled, and the 
 name of a spirit given who declared himself able to 
 draw a figure or mark by one, and to repeat it by the 
 others, what follows took place. 
 
 By Edward's hand with mine on it, this figure was 
 ■ t , ,,. drawn. This was hidden immediately, 
 1 and John, who had been at too great a 
 
 * ■ distance from us to see anything if he 
 
 had tried, took the pencil. I did not go near him. 
 Edward, who cared little about the experiment, was 
 
 reading. John's hand made several attempts. I give 
 a tracing of the last four. 
 
 When No. 3 was drawn, I, thinking the spirit had 
 succeeded, said, ( Is it not done ? ' John's hand then 
 
WRITING : FIRST EXPERIMENTS. 
 
 37 
 
 made another quadrangular figure, with the horizontal 
 lines fine, and the perpendicular ones thick (No. 4). 
 This characteristic of the figure drawn by Edward's and 
 my hand I had not noticed before. 
 
 I now felt that it would be more satisfactory if we, 
 who really did feel an interest in the result, did not know 
 the pattern figure. It was therefore drawn by the 
 hand of John, who put it away at once. Then Edward 
 held the pencil, which, with my hand upon it, drew 
 No. 2. 
 
 Pattern figure, drawn by John. No. 2. 
 
 No. 2, drawn by Edward's and my hands. The 
 pencil was moved so as to double the lines. This 
 appeared like an effort to alter the position of the 
 figure, which is less upright than the pattern. When 
 the pencil stopped I asked, ' Is that it ? ' Ans. * Yes.' 
 E. ( Most likely it is all wrong.' 
 Myself. < I expect this is a failure, John.' 
 
38 
 
 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 John then took his drawing from his pocket, and 
 we found that the two differed only in size, and in the 
 inclination of the lines. 
 
 The next was less successful : as before, it was by- 
 John's hand alone, hidden immediately. 
 
 After four attempts had been made by Edward's 
 hand and mine, I asked whether it was done. 
 
 Ans. 'NO.' 
 
 ( Which is the nearest of the four figures ? ' 
 
 This figure (No 2) was pointed out; we found it the 
 
 Pattern figure. No. 2. 
 
 most like of the four. The double line appeared like 
 an intention to form the inner angle. 
 
 The next had the pattern figure by John's hand. 
 
 This time the con- 
 trol over Edward's 
 hand and mine 
 seemed to be almost 
 lost. Eight figures 
 Pattern figure. were drawn, all cir- 
 
 cles, with some other lines. Then we were told that 
 the spirit could not do it, but that this was the nearest. 
 
WRITING: FIRST EXPERIMENTS. 39 
 
 A day or two after trying this experiment, we learned 
 more through writing, by John's hand, of the difficulty 
 found by spirits* in transmitting what they wish to 
 say through mediums. We were told that unless the 
 directing power had complete control, the thought 
 uppermost in the medium's mind would be given, and 
 this made it extremely difficult, when anything was 
 written by one medium, to repeat it by another ; ( for,' 
 it was said, ' the medium always begins to guess and 
 think whether it is right. When marks or figures are 
 drawn there is less difficulty, because the medium is 
 not so likely to imagine a figure.' This, if it be true, 
 shows that the positive action of the brain is exactly 
 opposed to the passive state required by the unseen 
 power for impression. It is also one cause, among 
 many others, of the great difficulty of obtaining tests 
 when tests are sought for. Perhaps, also, it may serve 
 to throw light over the admitted fact that so large a 
 proportion of powerful mediums are at present among 
 the uninformed and uncultivated classes. If spiritual- 
 ism, as such, is ever generally received and thoroughly 
 understood, this will cease to be the case. 
 
 We had sometimes asked questions and received for 
 
 answers, ' I cannot tell you this by E 's ha,nd, let 
 
 D hold the pencil? The explanation sought for 
 
 * I need hardly say that I am compelled to use these expressions in 
 narrating incidents or mentioning communications. 
 
40 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 has then been given by D , who nevertheless might 
 
 be unable to write many things which were given with 
 
 great clearness by the hand of E . Some mediums 
 
 appeared more completely under the control of some 
 spirits than others, and I soon thought that in the 
 characters of those who wrote, even under the supposed 
 influence of spirits whom they had never known, a 
 resemblance might be seen between the mind or dis- 
 position of the spirit and that of the medium. The 
 following little incidents well illustrate this, and help 
 to indicate the conditions necessary for full communi- 
 cation. 
 
 A young lady (whose mediumship has not been 
 referred to before, and whom I call Charlotte) was 
 trying experiments in a room the windows of which 
 opened on a garden, in which her sister, also a writing 
 medium, was walking. The name of my relation who 
 is represented as having first communicated with me 
 at Mrs. Hayden's was given. I write the initials as 
 
 M . I then asked, ' Could you, M , write by 
 
 the hand of Amelia ? ' (the young lady in the garden). 
 
 The reply was, ' I cannot write by her hand, but 
 my (relation specified) can.' 
 
 We then called from the window begging Amelia to 
 come in, for that a spirit who had never written by her 
 before, had promised to write by her hand. She took 
 the pencil and, after some preliminary practice of 
 scrawls and flourishes as described, wrote the promised 
 
WRITING : FIRST EXPERIMENTS. 41 
 
 name at length, with a characteristic sentiment refer- 
 ring to the progress of spiritual enlightenment. This 
 spirit was the second who had communicated with me 
 at Mrs. Hayden's. We then asked ' Why could not 
 
 M ivrite by Amelia's hand? 9 The answer was, 
 
 ( Dispositions do not harmonise? 
 
 A gentleman whose literary works had always been 
 characterised, after the manner of Fuseli's paintings, 
 by a tendency to the sanguinary and terrific, once asked 
 me to place my hand on his wrist, in order to ( set his 
 hand going.' The two hands soon moved, and the 
 usual scrawling 'practice was made, but my arm felt 
 stiff and painful even to the shoulder and neck. After 
 one or .two efforts the names of Catherine de Medicis 
 and Maria Manning were written. We left off im- 
 mediately. Had I not felt uneasiness in the arm 
 before the two names appeared, the sensation might 
 have been fairly ascribed to fancy. Certainly the pain 
 lasted for more than an hour after the pencil was 
 dropped. 
 
 In the next chapter I will give the explanations we 
 received of the agency by which, as is asserted, spirits 
 act through mediums. 
 
42 
 
 CHAPTER IV, 
 
 MESMEKISM, 
 
 BEFORE entering on an explanation of the manner 
 in which, as asserted by themselves, the c unseen 
 powers' influence the mediums, it is necessary to say a 
 few words on that which preceded f Spiritualism' in 
 the world, namely, 'Mesmerism.' Those who are 
 acquainted with the processes and phenomena of mes- 
 merism will at once understand the description of this 
 mode of operating ; but to many persons mesmerism is 
 only another word for some mysterious and fearful, 
 perhaps dangerous operation, which puts people into 
 strange unnatural states, or throws them into an end- 
 less sleep. For readers in this vague and imaginative 
 state of mind, -some further explanation is wanted, 
 especially as my object will be to show the connection 
 between spiritualism and mesmerism — whatever may 
 be the physical agencies at work in and the ultimate 
 cause of both. 
 
 Long before the rappings, &c, were heard of, I had 
 made many experiments in mesmerism, all of which 
 
MESMERISM. 43 
 
 had the cure of disease for their object; and though 
 phenomena were never sought after, several very re- 
 markable cases occurred, with a very few of which I 
 will trouble the reader* They will help to throw light 
 on the more mysterious occurrences which afterwards 
 took place. 
 
 1. The following will show the power of mesmerism 
 over the muscles of the body. I leave to physiologists 
 to describe the manner of its action through the 
 nerves. A baby, ten weeks old, which from its birth 
 had been unable to hold up the feet in their natural 
 position, at right angles to the legs, was brought to me 
 by its mother, who wished to be taught how to bandage 
 the legs, according to the directions of an eminent 
 surgeon. The feet hung quite powerless, in a line with 
 the legs. While I was considering the best way of 
 bandaging such very small limbs, it occurred to me 
 to show the mother how to mesmerise them, as that, 
 I thought, could do no harm, and, from what I had 
 seen, would be likely to strengthen the joints. I had, 
 however, no expectation of what actually occurred. A 
 few passes were made — perhaps twelve, at most twenty 
 in all — from the knees to the end of the little feet. 
 After about six passes the feet began to rise, and 
 immediately gained their natural position. I went on ; 
 the muscles gained a power which they never had 
 before; the bandages were returned to the hospital; 
 and the cure was complete, having been accomplished 
 
44 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 in about five minutes. In due time the baby ran 
 alone, as if nothing had ever been the matter with his 
 legs. 
 
 2. A child who was mesmerised for the cure of 
 severe headaches afforded me an opportunity of ob- 
 serving that remarkable state which has been called 
 e community of sensation.' This state, according to the 
 assertions made by the involuntary writing, affords a 
 key to some of the mysteries of spiritual action, as the 
 happy occurrence of a Greek inscription with its two 
 Egyptian counterparts on the Rosetta stone afforded the 
 means of interpreting the unknown hieroglyphic. The 
 phenomenon of community of sensation deserves espe- 
 cial notice ; and the experience afforded by it may be 
 applied, although the internal cause of its appearance 
 is still hidden from our knowledge. 
 
 The boy, in a sleep-waking state, was talking to me 
 of his headache, when a slight blow was accidentally 
 given me by a person passing. It was scarcely worth 
 notice, but the child called out, 'Who knocked my 
 arm ?' Perceiving that he was then in the state which 
 I had often heard of, but never seen before, I tried the 
 effect of other sensations. I tasted sugar, and he liked 
 the sweetness; I took mustard, and he complained 
 grievously of the pungency ; a pin's point touching my 
 hand seemed to give him great pain, and for a short 
 time he appeared to reciprocate all my physical feelings. 
 This susceptibility was, however, soon lost. After a 
 
MESMERISM. 45 
 
 few experiments his sensations became confused; and 
 though when my arm, for instance, was pinched, he 
 felt something, he could not tell where the sensation 
 arose, and talked of his back being hurt. When he 
 returned to his normal state his head ached, and I 
 therefore never made more than one or two trials of 
 this again. On one occasion the little boy was placed 
 as the last of a chain of eight or nine persons, holding 
 each other's hands. The first in the chain took a pinch 
 of snuff, and the child sneezed, and talked of our 
 putting snuff in his nose. I need hardly say that, 
 unlike the action of an electric shock under similar 
 circumstances, the sensation of snuff-taking was not 
 felt by any other of the party. 
 
 3. Many patients have spoken of light which they said 
 they saw streaming from my fingers. The description 
 of this appearance varied with the subjects. It has 
 been observed by as many as eight persons during 
 a few weeks, some of these being magnetised, some 
 in a normal state. The boy of whom I have spoken, 
 and also the mother of the baby, herself unmesmerised, 
 saw this very plainly. The mother saw a cloud of 
 light resting on the baby's leg as the foot received 
 the mesmerism. One of the most remarkable instances 
 of this perception occurred in a person holding a very 
 respectable place in a public charitable institution. 
 This person looking steadily at the fingers of a strong 
 mesmeriser saw streams of light ; and when the fingers 
 
46 FEOM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 were directed downwards on some water in a tumbler, 
 observed the rays, each of which appeared like a little 
 sunbeam with a line of silver in the centre, fall into 
 the water, gradually filling it, and then rising in the 
 glass till the latter was full of mist. Then she said 
 the water seemed to move or boil, gradually surging 
 up like the waves of a tiny sea, till it reached its 
 greatest degree of agitation or ' boiling point.' The 
 subsidence, which took place gradually, always occupied 
 the same number of minutes as the 'boiling.' Of 
 course those who had no power of vision saw nothing 
 of this occult action. Among mesmerised persons 
 some perceived a movement among the particles of 
 water, while to some it appeared brighter than before. 
 One mesmerised girl who saw this said that the small 
 insects in the water fell down as if struck by electricity ; 
 but this could not be confirmed, as no one but herself 
 could discern insects so minute. An account of this 
 phenomenon appeared in * The Zoist,' at that time the 
 organ of magnetic experiments. Its truth was after- 
 wards attested in the same periodical by two respectable 
 clergymen, each of whom had repeated and verified 
 the experiments for themselves. 
 
 4. I once tried a few passes over the spine of a poor 
 little deformed child, asking her whether she felt them. 
 Her answer was, ( No, I can't feel anything but ivarmth; 
 but I don't like it, because I am afraid of lightning, 
 and now there is lightning coming on me,' The 
 
MESMERISM. 47 
 
 action of the water, and the sight of luminous rays 
 issuing from the hand, are brought forward here in 
 proof of the assertion, that a fluid influence or force 
 emanates from the hand of a powerful magnetiser, and 
 to persons in some states is sensibly perceptible. 
 
 5. Two instances of clairvoyance will be adduced, 
 because they will be found of use in illustrating laws 
 which we were afterwards told by the unseen influences 
 pervade the whole universe of spiritual life; and 
 which must therefore be interpreted before a knowledge 
 of spiritual language or operations can be attained. 
 
 A young and ignorant girl while under mesmeric 
 treatment for fits, from which she quite recovered, fell 
 into the state called clairvoyance. In one of her 
 liveliest moods she proposed to go and find one of my 
 family, who was visiting at a house with which I was un- 
 acquainted. It was more than a mile distant from my 
 own home, and I knew nothing of it but the street in 
 which it stood. As soon as I had agreed to 6 go with 
 her,' which was done by merely holding her hand, 
 she asked me to direct her. I did so as far as the 
 street, listening to her remarks as we mentally went 
 on, as if we had been walking together in London. 
 When we reached the corner of the street I told her 
 I did not know the number, and she must ask the 
 
 first person she met to show her 's house. She 
 
 answered that she would do so, and in a minute said, 
 i We are there ; this is the house.' ( Knock at the door,' 
 
48 FKOM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 I said. < I can't yet ; 1 am only just in at the garden 
 gate? 
 
 She then talked of ringing at the bell, saying there 
 was no knocker ; spoke (apparently) to some person who 
 had come to her spiritually-found door, and asked if B. 
 was there. 
 
 • He says, Yes. We may go up-stairs.' 
 
 She described the staircase and its decorations, 
 talked of many shut doors on the landing, and of 
 hearing voices within. Then she said she had got into 
 the room where B. was. The furniture of this room 
 was described, and her description, which included some 
 rather minute and unusual details, proved accurate. 
 Everything about chairs, curtains, glasses, &c, was 
 verified afterwards. And one part of her account 
 was this : — 
 
 e I see a gentleman (describing age and appearance) 
 sitting beside B. They are talking together. I can't 
 hear what they say. B. is pointing with his finger at 
 you, and the other is looking at me. Now the other 
 gentleman has fetched a lady, and the lady has joined 
 them, and they are all three talking together.' 9 
 
 The exact time when she said this was noted, B. 
 soon after came in and confirmed all she said. But that 
 which puzzled me then, and has since served as an 
 illustrative fact, was the girl's statement, that B. was 
 ' pointing,' and his friend * looking,' at her and myself. 
 B. was at that moment telling his friend some of the 
 
MESMERISM. 49 
 
 most curious things that had taken place during the 
 mesmerising, and the gentleman had called to his wife 
 to come and hear what was said. 
 
 On another occasion this girl, making a mental (or 
 rather spiritual) journey through some streets in the 
 neighbourhood, described a chapel on fire, the flames of 
 which had broken out after she was put to sleep, and 
 the fire had not been mentioned in her hearing. She 
 spoke of the number of engines successively arriving, 
 the difficulty of getting water, the shouting and bad 
 language of the mob, which she said she heard, and, 
 what I thought the strangest of all, of the diffi- 
 culty of getting into the chapel through the locked 
 iron gates. This difficulty was surmounted, as she said, 
 after some men in the crowd had climbed the railings ; 
 and she was then able to get in at the chapel door, 
 when she traced the origin of the fire, and gave me a 
 full description of the inside of the building in its burnt 
 and dismantled state. Two messengers were sent out 
 separately to ascertain what was going on at the fire 
 (half a mile from the house), and from these, in turn, 
 we received a full confirmation of all her statements. 
 
 This girl, like some of the others, saw the light from 
 her mesmeriser's hand, and once when the hands were 
 rubbed together she exclaimed that they were on fire. 
 
 Every wonderful effect produced by mesmerism has 
 since found its explanation or its counterpart in the 
 spiritual phenomena, so that, had unseen powers been 
 
 E 
 
50 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 truly working for our instruction, they could not have 
 taken a better method of giving the needful elementary 
 knowledge than by making us acquainted with the 
 processes and results of mesmerism. As all the infor- 
 mation that can be obtained on the subject of mes- 
 merism is valuable, for its power in healing disease 
 when properly applied is unquestionable, I would 
 recommend those interested in the subject to read 
 Barth's 'Manual of Mesmerism,' in which everything 
 connected with the practice of magnetism is included ; 
 and for many very interesting details connected with the 
 subject, a little collection of cases entitled ( Clairvoyance 
 in Hygienic Medicine,' by Jacob Dixon. An extract 
 from this interesting little work will be found farther on. 
 Persons in some of the highest mesmeric states do 
 indeed appear to have passed the boundaries of material 
 life, and to have gained an insight into the world of 
 spirit. Of this I had one striking experience long 
 before the time of the raps, seeing-mediums, and 
 mysteries of the present day. It is certain that when 
 this happened, though too many instances of earthly 
 clairvoyance had come to my notice to allow of my 
 remaining sceptical in that direction, yet I held all 
 belief in real intercourse with spirits to be a delusion, 
 caused by some unknown action of the brain. This 
 scepticism was shaken by the following occurrence. 
 Being invited by a friend to see a young lady in a state 
 which he called spiritual clairvoyance, in which she 
 
MESMERISM. 5 1 
 
 professed to see and converse with spiritual beings, I 
 entered the room after she was mesmerised, and my 
 name was not mentioned aloud. I took my seat un- 
 noticed by her side, and listened to her exquisite 
 description of the scenes in which she believed herself 
 to be. Although the great beauty of the imagery, and 
 its wonderful coherence with her theory of symbolism, 
 puzzled and surprised me, I set the whole down in my 
 own mind as the working of a highly excited poetical 
 fancy. At length my friends asked her whether she 
 could look for any spirit for the lady sitting beside her. 
 She would try. I mentioned two, only naming their 
 relationship to myself, giving neither the age nor sex 
 of either. She then said, ' I am noiv in a garden 
 quite full of flowers. There is a group of chil- 
 dren hanging garlands over a lamb. Hoiv they have 
 covered that lamb with flowers ! Two children come 
 out from the group. The girl is the oldest. They are 
 ten and eight years old.'' She then described perfectly 
 every feature of the two children I had asked for, 
 dwelling with animation on their beautiful appearance 
 and surroundings. The age she mentioned was, how- 
 ever, much in advance of the reality. When I remarked 
 this, she was silent a minute, then said, c They say that 
 I see them as they are now ; you must remember that 
 they have been here some time.'' It then appeared that 
 the ages she mentioned were exactly what they would 
 have been had the two remained on earth. 
 
 £ 2 
 
52 
 
 CHAPTER Y. 
 
 MEDIUMSHIP— MODES OF INFLUENCE. 
 
 THOUGH a kind of resemblance between the mes- 
 meric and spiritual phenomena could not escape 
 notice when our experiments were first made, I had no 
 idea whatever of the real connection between the two 
 processes, nor of the nearness to identity of the agencies 
 employed. 
 
 But as soon as it appeared that several of our friends 
 were sufficiently under the control of the invisible 
 power to give answers apparently independent of our 
 thoughts, I began to make enquiries as to the nature 
 of the influence and the manner of using it. 
 
 A young man, sitting in a circle, had his arm shaken 
 with irresistible violence, making innumerable curves 
 and lines. When this had gone on some time, a very 
 intelligent person in the party, who had been observing 
 all that passed, said, ( I am sure that all this is some 
 action of electricity.' Instantly the hand wrote, with 
 exceeding rapidity, and no spaces between the words, 
 
MEDIUMSHIP MODES OP INFLUENCE. 53 
 
 *. Youarerightitiselectricitythatmovesthehandb uttheve isa 
 spiritthatguidestheelectricity? 
 
 Another time, I asked a young writing-medium, quite 
 unconnected with the one above mentioned — 
 
 * Hoiv do spirits write through mediums ? ' 
 
 Ans. ' The spirit mesmerises the medium.' 
 
 Another statement through a medium still younger : 
 
 4 Spirits take hold of the wrist.' 
 
 Q. ' If you take hold of the wrist, and so produce a 
 mechanical movement of the hand, how is it that the 
 answers come in the language of the medium ? ' 
 
 Ans. 'Because we do not take hold of it in your 
 way.'' 
 
 Q. 'How, thenV 
 
 Ans. ( It is done by the spiritual fluid, which comes 
 from the brain to the hand.' 
 
 At this point of the dialogue, it appeared as if our 
 informant could not tell us all we wanted to know by 
 writing, and a sketch was drawn (Fig. 1), which, 
 strange and grotesque as it is, by the hand of a child 
 who could not draw, conveys the idea required. The 
 good spirit above is throwing the influence through the 
 higher portions of the brain, namely, the organs of 
 veneration, benevolence, ideality, and the intellectual 
 portion. The evil spirit, nearer to earth, is trying to 
 mesmerise the base of the brain. I cannot help con- 
 necting this illustration through a quite uninformed 
 medium with some experiments in writing made 
 
54 
 
 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 through my friend Miss L , who has sometimes 
 
 been obliged to leave off, from the character of the 
 writing, the pain in the nape of the neck, and a chill 
 which she frequently feels, and which always gives her 
 the idea of an earthly or evil influence. 
 
 Fig. I. 
 
 The illustration in the diagram was afterwards con- 
 firmed by the hand of another medium, with the 
 additional intelligence that ' Spirits often influence 
 through each other.' 
 
 I asked for a drawing of the process, when two 
 
MEDIUMSiriP 
 
 MODES OF INFLUENCE. 
 
 55 
 
 persons' hands were joined, and the drawing No. 2 was 
 made. These two sketches, strange as they are, are 
 nearly fac-similes of the original, which was, however, 
 
 Fig. 2. 
 
 too large for this page. According to the law of 
 symbolism always in operation, by which it appears 
 that the character of the representative imagery used 
 
56 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 always depends on the brain of the medium, the appear- 
 ance depicted may not be exactly what we should see 
 if we had the power of vision. It is certain that, in 
 circles, when a hand has been moved to write, a person 
 having the gift of spirit-sight has declared that the 
 form of a hand was visible immediately over the hand 
 of the writer. Perhaps both this appearance and the 
 illustrative drawing are meant to convey the same idea, 
 of an influence emanating from the spirit and directing 
 the muscles of the medium; and the extended arms 
 and active position of the superincumbent figure may 
 possibly be the only forms in which the directing 
 influent could convey the idea by a child of twelve 
 years old. I was told at the time, but have not now a 
 record of the words, that the agency employed in 
 rapping and moving substances was of an electrical 
 character, but rather more material and less refined 
 (proceeding from a source nearer earth) than that by 
 which the hand is moved to write or draw : that the 
 processes of rapping and moving involve two actions, the 
 charging of the table, &c, and a current of spiritual fluid 
 passed through the medium, to produce raps thrown 
 off in successive shocks or blows instead, like the draw- 
 ing or writing, of flowing in one continuous stream. 
 
 I asked the question, ' When a spirit writes through 
 a medium directing the spiritual fluid through the 
 brain to the hand, how is the thought conveyed V 
 
 Ans. * Whatever the spirit thinks, the medium 
 writes.' 
 
MEDIUMSHir MODES OF INFLUENCE. 57 
 
 Thus was given in part the information sought for. 
 We had something like a coherent theory, and could 
 compare the action of human mesmerism, when the 
 mesmerised person shares the sensations or feelings of 
 the mesmeriser, or imitates his movements, with the 
 presumed spiritual influence. We were also furnished 
 with a key to the mystery of the difficulty found in 
 communicating by some mediums, and the impossibility 
 of doing so by others, while in some cases writing and 
 drawings are executed with great ease and rapidity. 
 This part of the subject being one of the most com- 
 plicated of the whole, will be entered on at greater 
 length hereafter. 
 
 As to the order in which the phenomena are deve- 
 loped in a medium, I believe that the table-moving is 
 generally one of the first to appear; the writing 
 precedes the drawing; vision is a later and more in- 
 ternal process, and hearing later still. But the earlier 
 and most material forms of mediumship, such as rap- 
 ping and table-mpving, do not seem to be susceptible 
 of any great change or refinement ; the communications 
 given after a year's practice being no more exalted than 
 those first received ; while all the more internal forms, 
 such as writing, drawing, seeing, and hearing, are 
 capable of being unfolded and refined to an indefinite 
 degree. 
 
 So much comes under the head of * Vision,' in 
 connection with other modes of mediumship, that I 
 proceed to give some instances of spiritual sight. 
 
58 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 mediumship (continued) : writing — vision — drawing. 
 
 AS an answer to the question 6 How is vision pro- 
 duced ? ' a drawing had been made in which the 
 seer is represented as lying back with the eyes shut 
 and receiving a current of ' spiritual fluid ' from the 
 two hands of a spirit. The current from the left hand 
 enters the right eye, and reissuing from the left eye of 
 the seer, joins the right hand fingers of the spirit again. 
 Quite unexpectedly to me, the words ' InJ and ' Out? 
 were written by the eyes, thus indicating a kind of circle. 
 These first explanatory notes and illustrations will here- 
 after, doubtless, appear as rude and imperfect as the 
 first guesses of the alchemists at the simple elements are 
 seen to be by the analytical chemists of our own time. 
 
 I next asked how the character of the vision was 
 determined, and was told, ' Whatever the spirit thinks, 
 the medium sees.'' 
 
 The following instances of vision are transcribed 
 nearly verbatim from notes taken during their occur- 
 rence. They were as little expected or understood by 
 
MEDIUMSHIP : VISION. 59 
 
 the mediums as by myself, and the seers being either 
 intimate friends or members of my own family, were of 
 course unpaid. 
 
 On one of those occasions on which a circle of friends 
 had assembled for experiments, a vision was seen, which 
 is well worthy of notice, both because it was preceded 
 by the sensible mesmerising of the seer, and on account 
 of its own beautiful imagery and meaning. 
 
 There had been a slight movement of the table, 
 which soon however became steady, and the hand of a 
 young man present was moved to write ' Join hands 
 
 round the table? After a time, Mrs. T> , a lady of 
 
 high intellectual power, declared that she could not 
 keep her eyes open. We begged her not to combat the 
 influence. Her hands were then drawn away from 
 those of the rest of the party, who sat quietly watching 
 her. She did not sleep, but could not open her eyes, 
 and she said she felt a sensation like cool fanning over 
 her face and brow. This lasted some minutes, and 
 from its distinctness seemed to surprise her very much. 
 She said that it was a most delightful feeling, but she 
 could not guess whence it was, nor what it was for, 
 though she felt as if some one were very near her. At 
 length she exclaimed, s Now I see ! ' and described the 
 vision, which was written from her own words. 
 
 * I see a church of emeralds. An altar, over which 
 is a beautiful bright light, and a steeple, illuminated. 
 The pavement is inlaid and of the richest colours. A 
 
60 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 great deal of purple, but no black. The deepest colour, 
 that which would have been black, is blue. The ends 
 of the pews are arched, and all of precious stones. 
 
 6 Now I see a number of people coming. There is 
 so much purple about them. They have loose robes of 
 purple. They appear to have formed ranks on each 
 side, and a number of beautiful children are come, all 
 in white, with wreaths held up over their heads. They 
 pass up the church and are kneeling before the illu- 
 minated part, which is a tower rather than an altar. 
 
 ' Now I see a beautiful altar, not a crescent. The 
 top is inlaid with marble of beautiful colours, highly 
 polished. The windows are purple and gold. In the 
 centre of each window is a large precious stone ; it is as 
 large as a dinner-plate. The first is bright gold, the 
 second is ruby or carbuncle, the third is bright blue. 
 Now I see them (the people) all going up the immense 
 tower. What a height ! It makes me giddy to look at 
 it ! Now they have wings, and I see them all in the 
 air. There is a bright circle, and they have passed 
 through it. They are all gone into heaven. 
 
 ' Everything is dissolving, and a bright light coming 
 
 again. Where the illuminated tower stood, I see the 
 
 cross of Christ, and beside it stands our Saviour. Oh ! 
 
 how beautiful He looks ! pointing upwards towards His 
 
 cross ! ' 
 
 The seer said that the church appeared to be more 
 
 than a mile in length. She was impressed to believe 
 
MEDIUMSHIP : VISION. 61 
 
 that the figures in purple were those who had suffered 
 for the faith of Christ, and the young ones in white, the 
 purified spirits of those who went to heaven by His means. 
 
 We then asked for a fuller explanation, and obtained 
 the following in writing, by the hand of the young man 
 who had first written : — 
 
 Q. ' What do the emeralds mean ? ' 
 
 Ans. 'New. It is the New Church that is fast 
 coming. Watch the course of events throughout the 
 world.' 
 
 Q. What is meant by the wreaths that the young 
 ones held ? ' 
 
 Ans. e Innocence. Never cease watching the course 
 of (rod's providence.' 
 
 Q. ' Who are you who give us this information ? ' 
 
 Ans. * F ■ .' The name of the older spirit who 
 
 had spoken to me at Mrs. Hayden's, and who has been 
 described as delighting, in his life on earth, in antici- 
 pations of the fulfilment of prophecy, and the establish- 
 ment of the Saviour's kingdom. 
 
 After this, Mrs. D 's eyes continuing tightly shut, 
 
 we asked for directions how to open them. It was 
 written, ' Just touch her forehead between the eyes, and 
 they will open.' I did so, and the lids began to rise. 
 Then it was written, ' Touch her eyelids.' They opened 
 immediately. 
 
 1 The scenes of the vision,' Mrs. D said, ( came 
 
 one after another like dissolving views/ 
 
62 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 Both she and the young man by whose hand the 
 explanation was written were of a character, and 
 possessed of a cerebral organisation, which well fitted 
 them to receive and appreciate such communications. 
 
 Mrs. D soon had experience of a different cha- 
 racter from that described. One instance of this 
 afforded a means of recognising the spirit seen. The 
 lady had become partially entranced, having her eyes 
 close shut, but in no other way showing that she was 
 under influence, when she began to describe scenes 
 through which she seeuied to be passing. I give 
 as nearly as I can her own words ; ■ — 
 
 i These green slopes are very lovely, with their 
 patches of flowers, and ferns, and brushwood. This 
 young girl is Ellen; quite herself, so fresh, and fair 
 and young. She is looking at me with her bright 
 smile from behind a rosebush ; she seems to be just 
 pushing aside the branches to let me see her face. 
 Now I see that with the other hand she holds the hand 
 of a noble-looking old man whom she calls ,' (men- 
 tioning the relation and describing the face, features, 
 
 and manner of the older spirit whom Mrs. D had 
 
 never seen in life, but who was the one mentioned 
 as having given her the vision of the church, and as 
 having a mind much in harmony with her own). 
 
 6 Ask him,' I said, ( to take some means of identifying 
 himself for me, if possible ? ' She waited a minute, then 
 said ; 
 
MEDIUMSHir : VISION. 63 
 
 *I see him kneeling in prayer; a book lies open 
 before him in a character which I do not know.' 
 
 * Perhaps it is Greek,' I suggested. ' If it is the 
 spirit named, he used to read the Greek Testament 
 habitually.' 
 
 ' No, I know the Greek letters well ; this is a black 
 square character, which looks very ancient. The volume 
 itself has a black cover.' 
 
 When in another minute her eyes opened, I laid 
 before her a Hebrew Bible which had been constantly 
 read in this life by the spirit, 
 
 ' That,' said the seer, ' is the book itself ! ' 
 Mrs. D — — , on seeing afterwards a bust of the same 
 person, immediately and without any word from me, 
 recognised it as a likeness of the reader of the Hebrew 
 Bible. 
 
 The seer of the next vision, Miss L , has been 
 
 already slightly referred to. Of middle age, quiet, 
 practical and unimaginative in her habits, and truly but 
 not ostentatiously christian in conduct, she readily wins, 
 and never to my knowledge has lost, the confidence 
 of those who know her. My own acquaintance with 
 her has lasted thirteen years, and during that time 
 many of the most internal spiritual phenomena have 
 occurred. 
 
 Very soon after the discovery of Miss L 's power 
 
 in writing, her hand with mine on it (it would not move 
 
64 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 without) * was guided to write, ' i" could show myself 
 to you, if you would look in the crystal? 
 
 This crystal, the action of which on the eye will be 
 explained farther on, is simply an egg-shaped piece of 
 clear glass giveu to me by a friend who had seen 
 similar glasses used in Lancashire by fortune tellers, or, 
 as they used to be called, peepers. 
 
 The assertion of Miss L 's capability of seeing 
 
 in the crystal proved true. The manner of its first 
 occurrence was, in few words, as follows. Having 
 placed the glass on the table, covering it so closely as 
 to shut out from it and from her own eyes every 
 vestige of light, or reflection of the articles in the room, 
 she sat down in perfect quietness gazing on the glass. 
 After about ten minutes she said that it appeared to 
 have become cloudy, then dark, then an opaque black. 
 After this some light appeared, apparently from with- 
 in the crystal, and the latter cleared. Then followed a 
 succession of scenes gradually becoming more and more 
 beautiful, each one appearing for a minute or so, then 
 melting aivay like a dissolving view, and after a little 
 clouding of the crystal, giving way to its successor. 
 For the most part each of the earlier scenes was charac- 
 terised either by a gate, an arch, a bridge, or some 
 other image typical of a passage from one state into 
 
 * Experimenters will find this need of two hands a good test of the 
 writing not being their own origination. See p. 35. 
 
MEDIUMSHIP : VISION. 65 
 
 ■+ 
 
 another. I have seen this in all instances of well- 
 developed crystal vision. 
 
 Miss L generally seemed to pass through two 
 
 doors or gates, before she saw any persons whom she 
 could recognise as her earthly friends. 
 
 After the last arch had been passed through, and 
 the crystal had become clear, the same spirit who had 
 desired her to look was plainly recognised by Miss 
 L . Every portion of her dress, which was ex- 
 tremely beautiful, was minutely described by the seer^ 
 and the precision with which other spirits, friends and 
 relations of the one first seen, were described, enabled 
 me to recognise them at once. In an instance 
 which I am about to narrate particularly, this recog- 
 nition did not take place at the time, and the whole 
 occurrence deserves attention as a proof that the vision 
 could not be the effect of any occult action,, either oi 
 the mediums or my own brain. 
 
 All the earlier portions of the vision had been passed 
 
 through, and Miss L described herself as ' seeing/ 
 
 or ' being in,' a very lovely park, in which were trees 
 loaded with blossoms, and grass gemmed with bright 
 flowers. Children were playing on the grass in groups, 
 making wreaths of the flowers, and all seemed a picture 
 of beauty and happiness. * Among the children,' she 
 said, 6 1 see some young people and some who are old, 
 
 or elderly. There is Ellen, and M , and F 
 
 (the two who had rapped at Mrs. Hayden's), and with 
 
 F 
 
66 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 them is a stranger, one whom I have never seen before. 
 He is a new spirit, and they are bringing him here, and 
 seem to wish to introduce him to us. He is dressed 
 like a clergyman.' She then described very minutely 
 the features and expression, including a peculiar mode 
 of shutting the eyes* of the person she saw. Strange to 
 say, I had no idea who the spirit was, and puzzled 
 myself for some time with vain attempts to conjecture. 
 We asked him to show us something by which I should 
 be enabled to guess ; something that would remind me 
 of his tastes or pursuits when with us. She said, ' He 
 is holding a picture.' This ought to have been a guide, 
 but I had identified the living man so completely in 
 my own mind with other studies of a more learned 
 character, that the description of his image in the 
 crystal was not recognised. 
 
 The next morning, being with a writing-medium by 
 whom the name of one of those seen in the crystal had 
 been given, I asked who was the old gentleman whom 
 
 Miss L had seen with the spirits on the previous 
 
 evening. The name of one who had left this world 
 three or four months before was written. The cor- 
 rectness of Miss L— — 's description was now apparent, 
 and I wondered that I had not recognised the spirit, 
 nor remembered that soon after his departure a promise 
 had been given through a writing-medium that he 
 would show himself to the first person who could see 
 and describe him. In thinking how I should be able 
 
mediumship: vision. 67 
 
 to prove the identity of this spirit, or at least the 
 agreement of the appearance with the written name, I 
 remembered a good photograph of him which had 
 been carefully locked up as a treasure, and which Miss 
 
 L , who since I received it had only visited me on 
 
 the one occasion when she looked in the crystal, had 
 never seen. There was no name attached to the 
 photograph. 
 
 One evening when I expected a visit from Miss 
 
 L , I laid this framed photograph, and another of 
 
 a friend of hers which is in a case, on the table. They 
 were in the midst of a quantity of books, papers, and 
 work, and looked as if they had been placed there 
 
 accidentally. Miss L sat down by the table, and 
 
 after a very few sentences had passed between us, her 
 attention was drawn to the likeness in the frame. 
 * Will you excuse me?' she said, taking it up; 'but I 
 think I know this face. I must have seen this gentle- 
 man here.' 
 
 6 No, you have not. He has not been here for many 
 years. You did not know him, I think. Look at this 
 other photograph of .' 
 
 She looked, said it was like, but could not forget the 
 first. 
 
 ( I am certain I have seen that face somewhere. 
 
 Did he belong to the ? ' (an institution in which 
 
 she had been interested). 
 
 6 No, indeed.' 
 
 F 2 
 
68 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 She was evidently unconvinced, and though appa- 
 rently trying to turn her attention to other things, 
 could not keep it from the photograph. After some 
 time she exclaimed — 
 
 * Now I know that picture ! That is the new spirit 
 whom I saw in the crystal ! Did not I tell you his 
 eyes and hair were,' &c. &c, pointing out the charac- 
 teristic trait she had remarked. 
 
 The power of seeing and reoognising is not, of course, 
 confined to crystal-seers. Jane, the medium before men- 
 tioned, through whose faculty of transmitting raps we 
 were enabled to make so many observations on the 
 phenomena, had occasionally the power of seeing the 
 spirits after their presence had been announced in a 
 circle. Eight or nine persons were on one occasion 
 sitting round a table. In the party was a lady till that 
 evening a stranger to all present, but whose own 
 medium powers it afterwards appeared were consider- 
 able.* The name of this lady's Jmsband, with a long and 
 suitable message to his wife and children, had been 
 rapped out, when suddenly the sounds ceased, and all 
 felt disappointed by the early termination of the sitting. 
 
 Jane, however, said, e I seem to be in a cloud; I shall 
 see something.' She looked towards the new member 
 of the circle, and declared that she saw standing beside 
 
 * This, as in my own first experience at Mrs. Hayden's, was no doubt 
 an element of success. The wife was the medium through whom, though 
 unconsciously, the husband was able to transmit familiar thoughts to 
 Jane. 
 
mediumship: vision. 69 
 
 the lady a gentleman, whose appearance, both as to 
 dress (which was a uniform) and person, she described 
 with the utmost, minuteness, mentioning the form and 
 position of two scars on the face. She said that he held 
 out his hand, on the fourth finger of which was a 
 curious ancient-looking gold ring, to which he seemed 
 to invite her notice. The lady, though evidently sur- 
 prised and affected, said nothing till Jane had described 
 the exact form of the ring. Then we were told that 
 this antique ring, the valued gift of a dear friend, had 
 been worn till the last hour of his life by her husband. 
 After Jane had left the room the lady showed us the 
 ring, which had been on her finger unnoticed among 
 many others before the circle commenced, but had been 
 put with her bracelets into her bag as Jane came in, for 
 we were not sure how metals or jewellery might affect 
 the influence. The next morning Jane, who had not 
 seen the gold ring, cut out its form in paper. It was 
 exactly like. It may be thought that some kind of 
 clairvoyance enabled the medium to see the ring in the 
 lady ; s possession; but, on that supposition, how did 
 she know that it had been worn and valued by the hus- 
 band sufficiently to serve as a test of identity almost as 
 good as the scars, which, it must be remembered, were 
 seen at the same time ? 
 
 In exploring such an untrodden region, the asser- 
 tion of one seer alone cannot be held of value, unless, as 
 in the foregoing instances, it affords conclusive evidence 
 
70 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 of the apparent presence and identity of some spirit, 
 which evidence, to be satisfactory, should be quite 
 independent of any information received from others. 
 
 Mrs. D 's perception of the Hebrew Bible, of which 
 
 I had not thought for years; Miss L 's description 
 
 of the ' new spirit,' whose name I did not conjecture 
 till the next day, when it was written by the other 
 medium, and afterwards confirmed by the recognition 
 of the parties ; and Jane's account of the antique ring, 
 were all of this class. In none of these instances can 
 the action of one brain upon another be traced as the 
 supposed cause of vision without resorting to a mode of 
 explanation not coherent with the other phenomena, 
 and far more complicated and obscure than that which 
 admits the influence of another intelligence in their 
 production. 
 
 Whether the next case of vision will be thought to 
 involve the necessity of other presences I am not sure. 
 It was my own experience, the only time when I ever 
 saw what appeared to be an external and objective 
 reality not apparent to all others. 
 
 I was at a church with a little girl. It is needless 
 to give an assurance of the truthfulness of my young 
 companion, as her trustworthiness is not a necessary 
 element in the question. But my own credibility as a 
 narrator is requisite to give my experience value in the 
 judgment of those who would draw inferences from it 
 and other similar facts. 
 
:mediumship: vision. 71 
 
 While listening with extreme pleasure and deep 
 attention to the preacher's beautiful illustrations of our 
 Lord's discourse to the Samaritan woman, of the foun- 
 tains of living water springing up unto everlasting life, 
 I suddenly saw over the shoulders of the preacher what 
 appeared like the outlines of three bright heads, so 
 brilliant as to cast the light-coloured wall behind into 
 shadow. I touched my young companion, asking her 
 (she had much power of vision) whether she had seen 
 anything ; I was beginning to add, ( I saw three,' when 
 she stopped me, saying, 'I will tell you afterwards.' 
 When we left the church she told me that just before 
 I spoke she had seen three heads — only the head and 
 neck — beside the preacher. She could not discern the 
 faces. When we reached home she drew the sizes, 
 which differed from each other a little, and the relative 
 position of these heads, with perfect accuracy. I cannot 
 believe that the words ' I saw three,' even if she heard 
 them, could have suggested to her mind precisely the 
 same vision as had appeared to myself. 
 
 The last instance is of external vision shared by two 
 persons. The next one of what is called inner vision. 
 It also occurred to myself. A young servant, Hannah, 
 also having the sparkling black eyes so often seen in 
 mediums, had during her stay in my house obtained 
 the gift of hearing, a manifestation of which more will 
 be said in the next chapter. Not only the sentiments, 
 but often the phrases she used, resembled those of the 
 
12 
 
 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 person whose voice she professed to hear, and when 
 a communication, perhaps a medicine or mode of treat- 
 ment in illness, could not be given in any other way, it 
 has frequently been whispered to this young girl. She 
 could also see sometimes, and though this faculty 
 diminished as the hearing: strengthened, she was able to 
 describe very perfectly the personal appearance of the 
 departed friend who usually spoke to her, and whom 
 she resembled in quality of mind and character, though 
 she had never seen him in life. 
 
 One evening, while talking to a friend of another 
 who was gone, I became, without apparent cause, very 
 sleepy. The feeling of an influence like mesmerism 
 remained with me after I had gone with my children 
 to their nursery, and became so strong that I could not 
 open my eyes. Suddenly I had, not the sight, but — so 
 vivid that I could have described every feature with 
 perfect accuracy — an impression of the face of the friend 
 of whom we had been talking down stairs. He looked 
 smiling and more happy than in life, the complexion 
 far clearer and fairer, and the countenance brighter 
 than I had ever known it. The glad expression made 
 me feel happy. I asked the young girl if any spirits 
 were present. She listened, then said — 
 
 ( Mr. R.' (the spirit whose voice she always professed 
 to hear) 'says that a newly come spirit is here with 
 them ; Mr. R. thinks you can see him.' 
 
 6 1 have seen a face,' I answered ; 6 tell me his name.' 
 
MEDIUMSHIP : VISION. 73 
 
 She replied, < Mr. James.' This was the right name, 
 but as we had often expected and hoped to see or 
 hear from this spirit, her giving the name would not 
 have been any evidence at all. So far it might all 
 have been guess-work or coincidence. This possibility, 
 however, was soon put out of the question. Next day, 
 I got accidentally into an omnibus, in which was a per- 
 son of strong medium power also acquainted with the 
 departed Mr. James, and who was then returning from 
 a visit to some friends* interested like myself in the 
 investigation of these phenonema. He accosted me 
 with — 
 
 ' There appears to be a reason for my meeting you. 
 
 Last night at the 's Mr. James announced himself. 
 
 We asked him whether he had been to see you, and he 
 said that he would go at once. We then concluded that 
 he was absent, by his not answering our questions ; but 
 he soon returned, and said that he had seen you, but was 
 not sure of your recognising him. He said you did not 
 shake hands w 7 ith him as usual. In fact, he seemed 
 disappointed.' 
 
 I then asked at what time in the evening this had 
 taken place, and w r as told at half-past eight, being just 
 the time at which I believed that the face of my friend 
 had appeared to me. 
 
 In the chapter on writing an instance is recorded in 
 which the two fearful names of Catherine de Medicis and 
 Maria Manning w r ere written by the hand of a gentle- 
 
74 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 man with my own placed on the wrist: the painful feeling 
 left in the arm and shoulder on that occasion were 
 noticed. The reader will remember too that when an 
 illustrative sketch was made of the method of influencing, 
 the evil influence was represented as coming from a 
 figure on the ground, and being directed towards the lower 
 portion, what is called the basilar region, of the brain, 
 while the higher organs are subjected to a stream or ray 
 emanating from a figure above. When the little drawing 
 was made I had not even a guess, much less a theory, 
 
 on the subject; and Miss L , when she saw the 
 
 following crystal vision, was not only as little informed 
 on the method of influence as I had been, but was 
 quite unacquainted with phrenology. 
 
 ( Here is a park, or at least green grass, with oars 
 lying down. They are painted red and blue : I suppose 
 I am to go over the water. JSTo ; down a lane, and 
 into a kind of hall or theatre with benches rising one 
 above another all around. The seats are empty. 
 In the centre, below, is an altar, and upon it a crucifix 
 with our Saviour. In front of the crucifix there stands 
 a vase of beautiful fresh flowers. I see behind the 
 altar a marble tomb. What a bright light comes from 
 the tomb and the cross ! Over the altar there is a board 
 like a sign-board. I hope I shall be able to read that 
 inscription ! But the letters do n't come out clear yet. 
 It is getting cloudy — now clear again, and the benches 
 are quite full of people. A man is here in a soldier's 
 
mediumship : vision. 75 
 
 uniform with a wand in his hand pointing to the letters. 
 Still they are misty, I can't read them. I don't like the 
 look of that man, and none of the people seem to 
 like him.' 
 
 ' I wish,' I said, ' that we could have some sign 
 whether they like his presence.' 
 
 * They have all bent their heads down sadly. They 
 do not like it. Oh, how my neck aches ! ' 
 
 She put her hand to her neck just at the base of the 
 brain. Without saying a word to her I demesmerised 
 the spot by a few horizontal passes, while she continued 
 looking earnestly at the crystal, the shelter for which, 
 built up of large books, quite hid her face. 
 
 ( How is the pain now ? ' 
 
 ' Gone. That man is gone, and they are all looking 
 up joyfully.' 
 
 ' Tell me ivhen or how the man went away.' 
 
 6 1 don't know ; just as you asked me about the pain 
 'ae had disappeared. Oh ! the light from the tomb and 
 the cross is glorious! It is a church, and I think it 
 must be something about death they are going to show 
 us. Here is a sweet-looking lady in a white dress, with 
 a crimson border. She is pointing to the letters. Now 
 I shall be able to make it out (reads) — 
 
 1 " 7, a, m, t 3 h t e, I, i, g, h } t. H, e, t, h, a, t, b, e, — " 
 I can't read the next : at the end it is — " have lifer ' 
 
 ' Perhaps it is, u I am the Light. He that believeth 
 on Me shall have life." ' 
 
76 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 * Yes. That is it. Now I see what the cross and the 
 tomb meant. In the lane again. Coming back. Now 
 it is all gone ! ' 
 
 Here it will be seen that the words presented to the 
 seer were not precisely those of our Lord. They seem 
 to be a compound of the two sentences, ' / am the 
 Resurrection and the Life: He that believeth on Me 
 shall never die.'' ' i" am the light of the world,' &c. I 
 presume that the manner in which the words were 
 
 collocated and shown to Miss L were those best 
 
 adapted to convey to her mind, imperfectly impressed 
 with the Scripture phraseology, the beautiful teaching 
 of the vision. 
 
 Within a month from this time, the departure of a 
 near and dear friend was witnessed by the seeress and 
 myself. 
 
 Cases of vision might be multiplied to a very great 
 extent, and I shall hereafter have to recur to several 
 modifications. But enough have been here given for 
 specimens of the different kinds of spiritual sight. It 
 will soon, I think, be found that the different varieties in 
 each mode of manifestation are produced by different 
 degrees rather than by dissimilarity in kind of influence. 
 These varieties, too, seem in a great measure to depend 
 on the varying susceptibility of the human frame to the 
 reception of the unseen power. 
 
77 
 
 CHAPTER VII, 
 
 mediumship (continued) — the yoice and hearing. 
 
 THE first conjectures as to the cause of writing, 
 drawing, hearing, &c„ are, naturally enough, that 
 the medium is the subject of some irregular action of 
 the nerves and muscles, perhaps also of the brain, which 
 may be traced by physiologists, but whose cause lies quite 
 beyond the penetration of the uninitiated : a process 
 like that which goes on in dreams, which, though held 
 by the ignorant to have something awful and mysterious 
 in their natures, are easily enough placed by the 
 scientific to the score of late suppers, sour wines, and 
 other similar causes. In mentioning our first experiences 
 of writing, drawing, and vision, I have tried to choose 
 those instances which are best calculated to place the 
 phenomenon beyond the region of subjectivity* Perhaps 
 the following instance of hearing will have the effect 
 of producing similar conclusions as to that mode of 
 manifestation. A sick person, who was in the habit of 
 receiving visits from a kind friend whose mesmerism 
 had sometimes been useful, having means of com- 
 
78 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 munication with the unseen influences through mediums, 
 received some instructions through the last-named 
 channel on the nature and beneficial action of mes- 
 merism. At one time, when a slight increase of illness 
 had taken place, a writing-medium, who may be called 
 Mary, wrote one day, giving the name of a spirit — 
 
 6 1 have been just now to Mrs. R to tell her to 
 
 come and see you. She will come to-day or to-morrow 
 evening.' 
 
 The time at which the spirit said she had been to 
 
 Mrs. E was noted down. Neither Mrs. N , the 
 
 sick person, nor the medium, expected a verification of 
 the spirit's writing, but the note of time was kept, 
 because some coincidences had occurred before of im- 
 pressions given to Mrs. R exactly at the time when 
 
 her presence was desired. On that evening the 
 invalid was sufficiently better to sit in a room on a 
 ground floor from which everything that passed in the 
 entrance-hall could be heard. Only the medium knew 
 of the communication. That day passed, and no Mrs. 
 
 R . came. Next day, when the idea of the visit had 
 
 been given up, the medium's hand again wrote, 'She 
 could not come last night, but will this evening.' Mrs. 
 N begged another friend to make a note of the com- 
 munication, namely, that the spirit had spoken audibly 
 
 to Mrs. R at nine o'clock the day before, to desire 
 
 her to go to Street. The note was made. Mrs. 
 
 R lived at a distance of three miles from the house. 
 
MEMUMSHIP — THE VOICE AND HEARING. 79 
 
 That evening Mrs. N , hearing the bell and the 
 
 entrance of some visitor into the hall, went directly out 
 
 of her sitting-room and found that Mrs. K had 
 
 just entered. The only words that had passed between 
 her and the servant contained an enquiry as to Mrs. 
 
 N 's health, to which the servant replied, ( She is 
 
 down-stairs.' Mrs. E looked relieved on seeing 
 
 Mrs. N , saying, ' I feared you were ill, for I was 
 
 sent here by , naming the spirit.' * Then,' said 
 
 Mrs. N , 'you must come up-stairs and tell as 
 
 well as myself how the direction was given.' 
 
 Mrs. K had no idea why this request was made 
 
 of her, but complied^ and when the three were together, 
 said — 
 
 ( I was sitting at table yesterday with my family, when 
 
 whispered to me, "Gro to Street to Mrs. 
 
 N ." I said, "Is she ill? It is inconvenient for me 
 
 to visit her to-day or to-morrow, as I am going into the 
 country the day after." He said again: "She is not 
 very ill, but you could do her good." So," said Mrs. 
 
 R , e as I could not come to see you yesterday, I came 
 
 this evening, though it was inconvenient, as all our 
 preparations are made for going into the country early 
 to-morrow.' 
 
 ' What time did this happen ? ' asked. 
 
 1 At five minutes before nine in the morning.' 
 
 This agreed to within a minute or two with the time 
 of the medium's writing. 
 
80 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 The young servant (mentioned p. 71), who sometimes 
 heard whispers, was one night called up on account of 
 the sudden illness of one of the family. She had 
 asserted from the first that the spirit speaking to her 
 gave the name of a departed medical friend of her 
 master's whom she had never seen in life, though she 
 described his voice and appearance correctly, and the 
 expressions she used were very like his. I attributed 
 this resemblance and her power of conveying his forms 
 of thought and expression to a similarity in the two 
 characters, and to this probably the completeness of the 
 mediumship was due. 
 
 When the young girl saw the sick person in great 
 pain, she listened for a minute, then said : — 
 
 ' Mr. says you must have two medicines ' 
 
 (naming them), ' in turn, every five minutes.' She pro- 
 cured and mixed the medicines. At the end of about 
 five minutes she said: 
 
 ( Now, Mr. says the first medicine has done its 
 
 work, I am to give you the second.' She gave it, and 
 in less than ten minutes from the time when she 
 entered the room the sufferer was quite relieved. 
 
 No communications are more interesting than those 
 which, coming in one form through one medium, are 
 confirmed through another by a different mode of 
 mediumship. 
 
 Of this kind was the following instance of the writing 
 of one medium, the vision of another, and the hearing of 
 
MEDIUMSHIP — THE VOICE AND HEAKING. 81 
 
 a third, all independently of each other, agreeing in the 
 same statement. By it also we were taught that in the 
 spiritual heavens there are seasons, or, as we might 
 call them, waves of influx from the first fountain of life. 
 And that the returns of these seasons, in which spiritual 
 gifts are plenteously distributed through angels and 
 spirits to us on earth, are the realities whence the 
 churches of Christendom, deriving through the Jews, 
 have their periodic festivals. This last very beautiful 
 fact has been conveyed to us in many forms, and 
 demands earnest and careful study from the professors 
 of religion. 
 
 (From my note-book) : — 
 
 Last Monday Mrs. K described to me a very 
 
 lovely vision she had had of Mrs. A (a very 
 
 amiable young woman who had died not long before 
 
 in her first confinement). Mrs. K saw her beneath 
 
 some beautiful branches and wreaths of flowers of 
 soft and brilliant colours, chiefly green. I thought 
 but little of this ; in truth, we are in the habit 
 of hearing so many things of the kind, that many are 
 overlooked; but this evening it was whispered to 
 
 Mrs. K as she sat by me, ' The flowers you saw are 
 
 in our arbour. It is finished, and we shall have a 
 feast there? 
 
 Still I did not pay much attention to the subject, 
 though I was pleased to see Mrs. R 's great interest 
 
 G 
 
82 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 in and delight at her vision of her friend. This morn- 
 ing (dated the following day) Jane's hand wrote : — 
 
 ' ' Our garden is so beautiful, I wish you could see it, 
 and our arbour is finished. (The medium had not heard 
 
 of Mrs. E 's vision.) 
 
 * Who has seen your arbour ? ' 
 
 6 A and Mrs. E .' 
 
 ' We have a mother and a baby with us, who have 
 been helping to make the arbour. They are just come 
 here from another sphere, and are staying in our house 
 till theirs is ready.' 
 
 6 Were there any other children left in this world by 
 the mother ? ' 
 
 c No, there were no others. She came from London. 
 I think you will find out who she is.' 
 
 16th. This evening it was whispered again to Mrs. 
 
 E , that they (the spirits) could not stay long, 
 
 they were so busy preparing for the feast. 
 
 19th. Yesterday evening I saw Mrs. E again. 
 
 She told me of another beautiful vision of ' the arbour,' 
 which was prepared for the feast. Grapes, peaches, 
 apricots, and many other fruits wore placed on long 
 tables covered with white satin and gold, in a kind of 
 raised embroidery. The most lovely flowers hung in 
 all directions, and the branches interlaced overhead. 
 Birds were flying about within the arbour. 
 
 During the evening a lady, whom I had not seen for 
 several weeks, came in. We did not speak of the arbour 
 
MEDIUMSHIP THE VOICE AND HEARING. 83 
 
 or anything connected with it, but our last visitor told 
 us that she had acquired a kind of internal vision. She 
 can see with her eyes shut, and her fingers pressed on 
 them (this pressure of the eyes is not uncommon in 
 clairvoyance). We begged her to try then if she could 
 see anything, believing that the presence of mediums 
 would ensure magnetic power. She shut her eyes, and 
 pressing her fingers on them, soon exclaimed : 
 
 6 I am in a large and beautiful garden, like 
 a park. Little lambs are playing about, and there 
 are horses here too. Oh ! this is not lighted by our 
 sun, but what a lovely light! 
 
 * I am to go farther. Here are high trees with their 
 branches interlaced above ! How very lovely it is ! It 
 forms an immense green arbour, nearly a mile long. It 
 is full of flowers hanging in wreaths around ; and 
 bouquets of lovely flowers, geraniums and roses. It is 
 all set out with splendid fruits, grapes, peaches, every- 
 thing ; and birds are flying about. 
 
 ' It is all gone. I have never seen anything so lovely 
 before ! ' 
 
 Then we told her of the preceding visions and 
 communications, and that we were waiting to hear the 
 name of the feast. Mrs. E especially was de- 
 lighted by the description, which, in every respect but 
 the little lambs and horses, agreed so entirely with her 
 vision of the night before. 
 
 By the writing next day we were told that another 
 
 c 2 
 
84 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 friend of ours would see the feast (this was verified, 
 but the vision was a very slight one, and though 
 there were some curious and rather different particulars, 
 I have not kept a memorandum of it). That they * call 
 
 it the feast of ,' a very illegible word, which the 
 
 medium could not read, but which, guessing letter by 
 letter, and asking the spirit to confirm my guesses when 
 right, I found to be e Tabernacles.' The writing-medium 
 had a good deal of acquaintance with Jewish customs, 
 and knew, when thus reminded of the fact, that at this 
 feast a tent or place open to the sky is decorated for 
 reception, its covering being evergreens ; but she had 
 not been thinking of her Jewish friends, nor recall- 
 ing the feast, till I deciphered and guessed the word 
 1 Tabernacles.' 
 
 It will be said that this agreement of the three 
 mediums in their description, proves nothing but sym- 
 pathy of brain. This has been said to me on similar 
 occasions by scientific men. I can imagine the 
 brains of three persons being impressed with a simi- 
 lar thought at one time. But in ■ this case the 
 first was vision, in which the mother and baby were 
 seen. The next writing, by a person who had not 
 heard of the vision — in fact, she was away from the 
 
 house during the whole of Mrs. E 's visit ; and the 
 
 third, the impromptu vision of my unexpected visitor, 
 who came in when we were not speaking of the arbour, 
 and who saw, in addition to the other things, lambs 
 
MEDIUMSHIP THE VOICE AND HEARING. 85 
 
 and horses. These two last images will give more 
 significance to the vision in the minds of those who 
 are acquainted with the doctrine of correspondence. 
 Then, the two last ladies knew nothing of Jewish 
 customs, yet that which was said by the writing-medium 
 to be the ' Feast of Tabernacles ' was described by both. 
 
 Here is another instance of the spiritual perception 
 of two persons at once. I do not deny that the brain 
 may sympathise in these cases — though, as in this 
 instance, the different external form of perception 
 would rather contradict that idea — but the sympathy I 
 believe to lie deeper than the material brain, even in 
 the spirit of the seer or writer ; and when the spirits of 
 two persons act in unison, those persons are together in 
 the spiritual world. 
 
 I was once sitting by Mrs. K , when she suddenly 
 
 said she heard the sound of music at a distance. I felt 
 
 then externally the fanning which has been before 
 
 described, and internally a strange chaos or confusion 
 
 of thought, which at length settled itself, and I seemed 
 
 to hear the words of a little Christmas hymn, ending 
 
 with — 
 
 Christmas gifts for all, 
 By the Spirit poured, 
 Hallelujah ! Hallelujah ! 
 Praise the Lord. 
 
 As the impression strengthened, I said, ' I seem to hear 
 internally a little Christmas hymn.' * I hear,' she said, 
 
86 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 6 no words, but real music, like a pealing organ, and 
 many voices singing hymns of praise.' 
 
 The spiritual hearing seems generally to be a later 
 developement than the gifts of writing, drawing, or 
 seeing. All have their place in the order of spirit life, 
 and that order would of itself form a study. The more 
 external developements are first; the internal ones 
 later; as in life, come, first perceptions, then intel- 
 lect, then matured earthly, and, finally, heavenly 
 affections. We shall find that this is the process of the 
 heavenly training — first, that which is natural or ex- 
 ternal, afterwards that which is spiritual. Again, there 
 are degrees above and beyond this : for the intellectual 
 of the brain corresponds to the perception of the spirit ; 
 and the love of the heart, as it is commonly said with 
 more truth than is suspected, corresponds with a higher 
 and more heavenly opening — that which Swedenborg 
 calls the celestial degree. To apply this to the order of 
 developement, sight or vision corresponds with intellect, 
 or the first degree of spirit life ; sound or hearing with 
 love in the highest sense, or the celestial degree. Be- 
 sides this order, each gift has its own degrees of 
 developement, becoming more and more internal as 
 the inner life expands into the outer. 
 
 I have heard those friends to whom the inner voice 
 has come speak of it as seeming to be formed into 
 sound, with mental confusion, as if numerous ideas and 
 sounds were thronging together in the mind, quite 
 
MEDIUMSHIP THE VOICE AND HEARING. 87 
 
 beyond the thinker's power to arrange. In this state 
 all that can be done is to wait. It is the action of 
 spiritual influx, and we shall have further examples of 
 its work. Impression, which may never get beyond the 
 most internal degree of consciousness, is sometimes 
 projected into sight, sometimes into audible sound and 
 its other forms. But here we find another proof of 
 correspondential action : for that which seems, according 
 to the spirit's description, to be thrown in through the 
 external organs to the spiritual sensorium, where it 
 forms impression, is also, when the power is strong 
 enough, carried out again to the external sense ; 
 exactly as the perceptions are carried from external 
 objects through the nerves to the brain, and again back 
 to obey the dictates of the will, through another series 
 of channels, to the bodily organs. Of the very impor- 
 tant part which the ganglionic system takes in all these 
 processes, I am not qualified to speak with anything 
 like distinctness. It is supposed by some to be the 
 apparatus through which the actions of the soul itself 
 are carried on. It is quite certain that many clair- 
 voyants refer their power of seeing with the eyes shut 
 to the solar plexus, which is the centre of this 
 sympathetic system of nerves. Then, in other cases 
 again, the power of seeing is referred to the forehead, 
 or brain. But in the matter of hearing, in the most 
 marked instances that I have ever known of an internal 
 voice audible only to the subject or medium, the 
 
88 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 process of formation of sound seems to originate near 
 the pit of the stomach, namely, in the great solar plexus ; 
 and this may justify the assertion of Swedenborg, that 
 the deepest and most internal degree, corresponding 
 to celestial love, has its seat not in the brain, but more 
 near the heart. 
 
 The following extract from Dr. Dickson's little work 
 contains an instance of spiritual hearing : — 
 
 ' I have some notes which point at the introduction 
 of a spiritual element into the circuit. The clairvoyante 
 was behind her usual hour one morning. She said 
 that when about half way, a voice sounded, " Gro back." 
 She thought it was some distant exclamation, and 
 proceeded. She heard the voice again, and felt her- 
 self stopped by some invisible agency, still hearing 
 " Go back." She returned home. Her little boy had 
 fallen and was considerably hurt. She said that the 
 same voice said what she should do in her perplexity, 
 namely, "Magnetise, and arnica lotion." When she 
 was in the sleep, she said that she found it was her 
 mother and another spirit who had turned her back. 
 
 'She drew her hand wavingly from mine one day 
 on her passing into the sleep, and said, "What a 
 beautiful red and blue ray came from your hand ! " 
 " And yet I don't feel well," I said. " It came from 
 Dr. Ley," she answered. " We are on these occasions 
 surrounded by invisible friends, who sometimes mag- 
 netise through you, and who make use of my tongue. 
 
MEDIUMSHIP — THE VOICE AND HEARING. 89 
 
 I have to express what they would say, which I do vet y 
 imperfectly'' * 
 
 6 The same day she was, while in the sleep, locally 
 magnetising a patient. He said, " That does me good." 
 " We should do much more good, " she replied, " if all 
 were believers like you." He asked, * How is it you 
 know so well what to do in this state ? " She pointed 
 upwards. "Is the mind," he went on, "in this state 
 among spirits ? " "I see them about us." " Are you 
 in spirit as you will be after death ? " " Indeed I 
 hope to 'be better and happier. You may awake me 
 now.'" 
 
 Some years ago, Miss Emma Jay, now I believe 
 married and in America, came to England. The 
 manifestation of the voice in Miss Jay's case was very 
 remarkable. During the impression she appeared like 
 a person under very powerful mesmerism, with gasping, 
 twitching of the muscles, and other very perceptible 
 effects of the unseen magnetic influence. When the 
 system was quite brought under the controlling power, 
 the eyes were shut; or if the lids were in the least 
 degree open, the eyeballs were turned up, and the 
 subject was, with very little variation, apparently in a 
 state like that of some clairvoyantes. A question was 
 put to her ; she waited for a minute, and then gave an 
 answer, in expression, range of thought, and beauty 
 
 * This is a confirmation of former statements respecting language. 
 
90 FKOM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 6f imagery, far surpassing anything she could achieve 
 in her normal state. When out of the trance, she 
 described herself as being quite passive, listening to 
 her own words, and learning from the spirit, who had 
 control over her organs, exactly as she would have done 
 to the teaching of another person. She said that 
 explanations given through her were often quite un- 
 expected, and contrary to her previous notions. With 
 a very finely developed brain, and a nervous system 
 calculated to receive and transmit the influence, the 
 medium's education had not been at all proportionate 
 to her natural abilities. Yet few persons, especially 
 women, could have entered at all on questions which 
 she, or the spirit controlling her, discussed and answered 
 with great ability and clearness. Miss Jay's voice 
 and manner differed much when under different in- 
 fluences, but the phraseology was always, with vari- 
 ations, her own, and the chains of argument such as 
 her well-organised brain was able to convey. 
 
 Mr. T. L. Harris, who has in a high degree the internal 
 voice, dwells much on the phenomenon of internal 
 respiration. This breathing, deeper in the system than 
 that of the lungs, seems to be a usual accompaniment 
 of all states of impression and clairvoyance. It may be 
 observed in the deep mesmeric sleep or trance, and the 
 change from it to the external process of inspiration 
 and expiration of the lungs is very curious indeed. 
 I have seen persons just waking from a trance, cough 
 
MEDIUMSHIP — THE VOICE AND HEARING. 91 
 
 and breathe with difficulty, often declaring that the 
 entrance of the coarse outer air is painful to them, 
 after the pure atmosphere of the spirit world in which 
 they have been breathing. It is said, and I believe 
 with truth, that no real influx can take place till the 
 medium is susceptible of this state. It seems to be an 
 ebb and flow of the spirit within, agreeing with the 
 waves of influx from the spirit without, whose action, 
 as has been said, is so often perceptible as fanning, or 
 a current of fresh, pure air. When our pulmonary 
 breathing and spiritual breathing are brought into 
 harmony of action, or 'polarised together, we shall all 
 be receptive, as a natural condition of every-day life, of 
 the streams of influx from higher beings. 
 
92 
 
 CHAPTEK VIII. 
 
 MEDIUMSHIP — NATURE OF INFLUENCE. 
 
 WHEN an enquirer ventures into a new region of 
 knowledge, he has not only to establish, but 
 to systematise facts; and in the first arrangement, 
 these will probably not hold the same rank as they 
 will take when the now unrecognised territory has 
 been measured, observed, and cultivated. The order, 
 too, in which facts present themselves to such an en- 
 quirer, is not always that in which the whole is most 
 easily communicated, and the earliest information 
 must be rather a history of discovery than a well- 
 digested essay on the subject. 
 
 I do not forget that the theme of spirit life and 
 impression has been far more fully discussed by 
 Swedenborg and a few others than it can be in such 
 a slight account as this. But the seers do not assume 
 that every step is to be established. They speak with 
 the authority of teachers ; as a dweller in the land can 
 give descriptions of every part from his own know- 
 ledge ; while one who undertakes to gather from the 
 
MEDIUMSHIP — NATURE OF INFLUENCE. 93 
 
 accounts of travellers, must needs have a very undi- 
 gested mass of material to work upon. This may 
 explain the seeming repetitions and returns to the 
 same subject in its different forms, which could not 
 be avoided in framing an explanation like the present 
 from many and various experiences. 
 
 Supposing the explanations as to the cause of drawing, 
 writing, &c, generally offered to the scientific world 
 to be received, and these processes with the more inter- 
 nal ones to be attributed to irregular cerebral action, 
 self-delusion, &c, we must then fall back upon that 
 portion of the phenomena which has been declared to 
 be of the most material kind ; namely, the raps and 
 movements. And we shall find their use, for no ex- 
 planation involving subjectivity can apply to experi- 
 ments whose results can be seen, heard, and felt by a 
 number of persons in a quiet waking state, and which 
 can be repeated whenever the trial is made under 
 favourable conditions. After the subjective theory, 
 the next in order is imposture, and when this is dis- 
 posed of, we have to deal with 'the Devil,' whose 
 name I really did not wish to have introduced here. 
 Now, having shown ample reason to believe that all the 
 manifestations emanate from one source, we must 
 settle which of the three is the moving power. Un- 
 conscious cerebration, self-delusion, or any other mental 
 vagary, can produce writing and drawing ; it cannot 
 make intelligent sounds audible to eight or nine people 
 
94 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 at one time, nor can it cause the movement of furni- 
 ture either with or without an intelligent aim. The 
 instances of tables rising from the floor to the height 
 of three or four feet are so well attested that I hardly 
 feel it necessary to refer to them. I have myself 
 often witnessed this marvel under circumstances which 
 put delusion or visual deception quite out of the 
 question. Neither could it be any hallucination of the 
 kind which made the sceptical gentleman against 
 whom the table rushed call out to beg that it would 
 stop.* And there was neither hand nor foot on that 
 table, nor any professional medium in the room. The 
 heaviest weight which I have ever seen rise by means of 
 invisible agency, was a mahogany dining-table. It rose 
 evenly a few inches from the floor, remaining raised while 
 the friend who accompanied me placed his hand under 
 one castor, and I had mine under that which stood 
 diagonally opposite. Two other friends had their 
 hands under the other castors, but it is evident that 
 if my companion and I could be certain that the 
 cross castors rested on our hands, the table, if level, 
 must have been entirely off the ground, and the pos- 
 sibility of ocular delusion vanishes. 
 
 With respect to raps and movements, then, the ocular 
 delusion or general delusion theory must be aban- 
 doned ; so must the unconscious cerebration. As to the 
 
 * See p. 26. 
 
MEDIUMSHIP NATURE OF INFLUENCE. 95 
 
 Origin of Evil, who has been flattered by being sup- 
 posed to be the chief actor in all the manifestations ; 
 of his and all other agencies I need only say, on the 
 highest authority, ( By their fruits ye shall know them.' 
 
 But it is to the nature of the agency used, and then 
 to the intelligent but unseen being directing it, that 
 our next enquiry must be directed. In Chapter IV. 
 several cases of mesmerism have been detailed. I 
 have chosen these from among many others, not for 
 their novel or striking character, but because they 
 will furnish a key to the knowledge of the agency 
 employed in producing the spirit manifestations. 
 
 The different forms of mediumship, as has been seen, 
 are often accompanied or preceded by feelings such 
 as are produced by mesmerism. Fanning, a warm or 
 cool current of air, chilliness or drowsiness, with some- 
 times a tingling like that produced by the wires of a 
 galvanic battery, and, during the raps, slight shocks 
 like electricity passing through the arm of the medium, 
 are among the commonest of the sensations. It is 
 indisputable that the medium is under mesmeric in- 
 fluence, but what is that influence ? and in these cases 
 whence does it proceed ? 
 
 The instances already given, and which might be 
 supported by hundreds beside, prove that their source 
 is not to be found in the medium or in any other 
 member of the circle. The communications are coherent 
 and intelligible ; often, too, quite new to every person 
 
96 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 present. It seems then not a hasty assumption that 
 they are the work of an intelligent unseen being, 
 acting by means of a force similar to mesmerism 
 upon the system of the medium. 
 
 I may here allude, but very slightly, to the experi- 
 ments of physiologists, showing the relation between 
 the electric, magnetic, and nervous forces. All that I 
 can venture to say is, that their effects prove them to 
 be analogous but not identical in their nature. Elec- 
 tricity in the form of galvanism shares with the nervous 
 forces the power of circulating along the nerves, and, 
 like mesmerism,* contracting the muscles. A strong 
 current of electricity also evolves magnetism. We 
 know, too, how effects, very like those of electricity and 
 magnetism, appear in mesmerism, and its other form 
 electro-biology. The action of the positive and nega- 
 tive wires of a voltaic battery produces chemical 
 composition and decomposition, and a stream from the 
 fingers of a powerful magnetiser causes immediate and 
 perceptible granulation in scalds and wounds. But, as 
 far as I have seen, water is the only material element 
 affected by the mesmeric force in such a way as to 
 change (to susceptible persons) its taste and appearance, 
 while, as is well known, the galvanic current can be made 
 to act upon matter much more extensively.! 
 
 * See p. 43. 
 
 f I have heard of a trial made by a powerful mesmeriser, showing 
 that paper'prepared for photography is acted on by the emanation from 
 
MEDIUMSHIP NATURE OF INFLUENCE. 97 
 
 It may be a question whether all the ' imponderables,' 
 as they have been called, are the effects of vibrating 
 currents whose differences and resemblances depend on 
 the number and direction of their undulations. As it 
 is only the one which I believe to be the most intense 
 and most refined with which I have to do, I do not pursue 
 the comparison with related agencies. But I am not the 
 first to believe in a connection between all the forces in 
 creation (such a belief is involved in a perception of 
 the harmony of nature), and the probability of our 
 finding a scale advancing in purity and intensity as we 
 t^ce them up from their action in forming the matter 
 of the coarsest mineral, to their work in the most 
 delicate forms of animal life. 
 
 There is no doubt, I believe, in the minds of physio- 
 logists that the nerve force, whatever may be its nature, 
 is that which, passing along the nerves, conveys im- 
 pressions from the organs of sense to the brain, and 
 again, through another series of nerves, the dictates of 
 the will from the brain to the muscles. That it also, 
 possibly in a more refined form, permeates the brain, 
 
 the fingers in the same manner as by the rays of the sun. This ex- 
 periment should be repeated. It might help us to find what are the 
 properties in common between light and the nervous or mesmeric 
 current, which also, as has been said, excites the sensation of light on the 
 eye, in a state, the physical conditions of which are not yet known. And 
 this knowledge may throw some light on the doubtful question of 
 spirit-photography, a question into which I am not qualified to enter. 
 
 HTT WTTTWTI f» V m **! 
 
98 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 and is, so to speak, the circulating medium of thought 
 and feeling, is unquestioned. 
 
 The nerves themselves, which, branching off in pairs 
 from the brain and spinal marrow, form channels for the 
 6 nerve force] or < nerve fluid] consist each of a bundle 
 of fibres encased in a sheath. Each fibre, when sub- 
 jected to microscopic examination, is seen to be formed 
 of a transparent enveloping membrane, enclosing the 
 white medullary substance of the nerve which serves 
 as the medium for the transmission of the force. 
 Through the centre of this white substance runs a small 
 flattened, fibre ; the whole forming a perfect apparatus — 
 a telegraphic cable for the transmission of the refined 
 electricity which conveys the messages between the 
 spirit and body. , 
 
 Sir Benjamin Brodie, in some wise and excellent 
 strictures* on the -mental and bodily ruin produced by 
 the forcing education of this time, says : ' The nervous 
 force is consumed equally in bodily and mental exer- 
 tion, and if over much of it is expended in one way, 
 there must be proportionally less in another.' A recent 
 writer on psychology, J. D. Morel, has, with the later 
 .German physiological writers, very properly assigned 
 its due importance to the nerve force in all enquiries 
 relating to mind. Mr. Morel speaks of three forces, 
 differing from each other according to their different 
 
 * 'Psychological Enquiries. 
 
MEDIUMSIIIP — NATURE OF INFLUENCE. 99 
 
 functions and operations. If, as well as three kinds, he had 
 said three hundred thousand degrees of force, the writer 
 might have been nearer the truth, though still far 
 away from perfect accuracy. But we can form a very 
 imperfect conjecture as to the limits of these degrees ; 
 for when, leaving the observation of that which we are 
 used to call wholly material, because perceptible to our 
 outward senses, we approach the more delicate parts of 
 our organisms, whose existence can only be known by 
 their results, the study becomes more difficult and com- 
 plicated. This difficulty arises, in a great measure, 
 from the fact that few persons besides those in a 
 seemingly abnormal state, magnetic or somnambule, 
 can make observations on the forces in question. 
 These persons, too, differ in their powers of perception, 
 so that emanations quite unseen by one are very 
 visible to another, and perhaps vary so much in the 
 appearance they present to a third and still deeper seer, 
 that his accounts of what he sees are supposed to 
 contradict the statements of the two first. In confir- 
 mation of this I have only to refer to the notes made 
 by Eeichenbach of the visions of his i sensitives,' and to 
 my own experiments with mesmerised water. These 
 differences in vision, however, point to the boundary 
 lines of the different degrees both of internal percep- 
 tion and refinement of nervous influence. The finer 
 the degree of nervous circulating medium in action, the 
 deeper will be the internal opening, and vice versa. 
 
 H 2 
 
100 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 In leaving the outer senses of sight, hearing, &c, with 
 their appropriate nerve force, we come to the first 
 degree of internal sight and hearing, with their appro- 
 priate magnetic agency. And as I suppose the dis- 
 tinction between electricity and the nervous force to be, 
 that the first exists in that degree of refinement calcu- 
 lated to act on inanimate matter, and the last in that 
 higher form by which the functions of animal life are 
 carried on, so, when leaving the outer senses, we come 
 again into the region of internal sense, we find the far 
 more refined emanations only perceptible to those 
 whose state corresponds with their nature and use. 
 
 Whatever may be the essential nature of this vital 
 influence, it can hardly be doubted that it is in 
 operation in different degrees of refinement and in- 
 tensity in every human being. Neither will it be 
 questioned, certainly not by those who have seen much 
 of mesmerism, that an influence passing from the mes- 
 meriser to the patient, and akin to the nerve force, is 
 the active medium of mesmeric operations. 
 
 This force or fluid, then, or one whose effects on the 
 system are precisely similar, but perhaps more refined, 
 is that by which all the operations of mediumship are 
 carried on, and the source from whence it immediately 
 flows is an unseen and intelligent being, asserting 
 itself to be a spirit, which has quitted the material 
 earthly form. 
 
 The names of Swedenborg and Jung Stilling will 
 
MEDIUMSHIP NATURE OF INFLUENCE. 101 
 
 have little authority for persons who have hitherto been 
 accustomed to consider the ' Mystics ' as dreaming 
 speculators, having no foundation but fancy for their 
 theories, and no proof to offer of the truth of their 
 assertions. When we know practically, however, the 
 results of mesmerism and the sensation always described 
 by persons under its influence, we can better form a 
 judgment on what is said by the professed believers in 
 spiritual influence, whose teachings were given before 
 the modern manifestations were thought of. Long after 
 I had heard of and felt the sensation of fanning, a cool 
 breeze, a cold chill draught, or an electric current, of 
 which mention is made as among the commonest 
 experiences of mediums, I read the following in 
 Swedenborg's Spiritual Diary. The italics are not 
 Swedenborg's : — 
 
 C A spirit is compared to the wind (John iii. 8); 
 hence it is that spirits have come to me both now, 
 and very frequently before, ivith wind, which I felt in 
 the face; yea, it also moved the flame of the candle, 
 and likewise papers ; the wind was cold, and in- 
 deed most frequently when I raised my right arm, 
 which I wondered at, the cause of which I do not yet 
 know.' 
 
 On one occasion, when in the company of two or 
 three mediums I paid a visit to a house believed to be 
 haunted, a most perceptible wind arose in the basement 
 rooms, accompanied by a kind of vapour or steam. 
 
102 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 This took place when the house was quite empty, and 
 all the windows and doors were shut. Jane, the 
 medium, often felt such a chill breeze in the circle, and 
 has always declared her conviction that it emanated 
 from a bad influence. 
 
 From Mr. Howitt's i History of the Supernatural ' I 
 extract the following, which occurs in the chapter on 
 Jung Stilling: — 
 
 'At Marburg one of the students who attended 
 Stilling's class, and whom he continued to know in 
 after-life as a most excellent man, brought him a 
 printed account of a strange occurrence which hap- 
 pened to his father when a young man, and to his 
 grandfather. The latter had written down the whole 
 narration, and printed it for circulation only amongst his 
 friends. It is very large, being given in complete de- 
 tail, with the conversation betwixt the grandfather and 
 the spirit. The spirit described himself to have been 
 one of their ancestors one hundred and twenty years 
 before, and identified himself by their genealogical 
 table. He appeared sometimes three or four times a day 
 as a little man, dressed in a blue coat and brown waistcoat, 
 with a whip hanging at his girdle, and knocked audibly 
 at the door before entering. He was extremely im- 
 portunate that the son should go to a certain tree in a 
 certain meadow, under which, by digging, he would find 
 a deposit of money. This money seemed to have 
 chained him to the spot all these years, during which 
 
MEDIUMSHIP NATURE OF INFLUENCE. 103 
 
 he had not found a medium in the family to whom he 
 could make himself apparent. But he appeared also to 
 have a deed of blood on his soul, for he " took down 
 the son's Bible from a shelf, to which was attached a 
 small hymn book, and pointed out with his finger the 
 hymn beginning ( Have mercy, gracious Grod,' and the 
 third verse of which had the words ( From guilt of 
 blood deliver me,' " &c. The spirit continued its im- 
 portunities from January 1 to April 30, 1755. 
 
 * Neither father nor son would listen to him, con- 
 sidering him as a tempter ; but this the spirit denied, 
 and to convince them, joined with them in singing 
 hymns, calling on the name of Jesus, and declared that 
 he was always glad to hear the Word of Grod. He 
 joined them in the reading of the Scriptures, and, on 
 coming to the words in the 8th chapter of the Epistle to 
 the Eomans, " We are saved by hope," &c, he clapped 
 his hands, and exclaimed, * yes, yes, saved by hope ! " 
 He declared that he was going through a course of 
 purification sent from Grod. 
 
 6 Yet there were circumstances which made the 
 father and son believe that he was far from this puri- 
 fication, for fire streamed from every finger when he 
 became angry at their resistance to his wishes. Still 
 more, when he touched the Bible it smoked, and the 
 marks of his thumb and finger shrivelled up the 
 leather of the binding where he held it, and also the 
 paper where he pointed out the place in the hymn, 
 
104 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 "From guilt of blood deliver me," was black and singed. 
 The Bible with these marks is " preserved in the family, 
 and many creditable persons have seen it, and may still 
 see it." Still further, on one occasion wishing the 
 son to shake hands with him, he recommended him 
 first to lay his handkerchief over his hand. This 
 was done, and the handkerchief was found with the 
 five fingers of a hand burnt in, so that the first and 
 middle fingers were, in part, burnt entirely through, 
 but the thumb and two other fingers were burnt black 
 and singed. This handkerchief was sent round amongst 
 friends and acquaintances, who assured Stilling of the 
 truth of the whole, and then these singular relics were 
 laid up for the inspection of all respectable visitors, 
 and for posterity. The whole account was signed and 
 attested by father and son, the clerk of the peace, the 
 Imperial Commissioner of Liquidation, and the school- 
 master of the place, on May 16, 1755. 
 
 'The fiery touch of the spirit which induced the 
 father and son to believe it a bad one, modern spirit- 
 ualists can testify to belong to many spirits. How 
 often have we seen fire streaming even from the finger 
 of a medium? How often have spirits, before 
 shaking hands with you, desired you, at Mr. Home's, 
 to lay your handkerchief over your hand first ? How 
 often have you felt the touch of spirit fingers prick as 
 from the sparks of electricity ? 
 
 * And Stilling,' Mr. Howitt continues, ' soon came to 
 
MEDIUHSHIP NATUEE OF INFLUENCE. 105 
 
 understand this. He says,* "Light, electricity, mag- 
 netism, galvanic matter, and ether, appear to be all 
 one and the same body under different modifications. 
 This light or ether is the element which connects soul 
 and body, and the spiritual and material world to- 
 gether." 
 
 6 In these words Stilling, above half a century before 
 Reichenbach's experiments on the Odyle force, an- 
 nounced that force as a modification of electricity, 
 magnetism, &c. ; which Eeichenbach confirms. The 
 spirit eventually, notwithstanding its fire, was accom- 
 panied by another radiant little spirit, and finally 
 appeared white and radiant itself, full of joy, announcing 
 its deliverance from the. probationary state ; knelt with 
 the son, and uttered a beautiful prayer and thanks- 
 giving to God, which Stilling gives ; and then took his 
 leave, saying they would see him no more, which proved 
 true. 
 
 ' As regards the touch of spirits, it yet appears true, 
 that according to the state, the sensation they occasion 
 is more or less agreeable. Stilling says : — " When a 
 departed spirit is tranquil in its mind, its touch is felt 
 to be like the softness of a cool air, exactly as when 
 the electric fluid is poured upon any part of the 
 body." And how fully can this be confirmed by spirit- 
 ualists. How frequently is the approach of spirits at 
 
 * The italics are mine. 
 
106 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 seances perceived by the cool atmosphere which pre- 
 cedes them.' * 
 
 As far as I have had experience in this matter of 
 touch and atmosphere, it has seemed to me that the 
 temperature depended chiefly on the nearness of the 
 spirit to earth, and this nearness might arise either 
 from recent departure or from earth-clinging tendency. 
 The lady who saw the vision of the church spoke of the 
 exceeding pleasantness, ' delightful sensation,' of the 
 fanning. When I was once at one of Mr. Home's 
 circles, my hand, lying quietly on my knee, was touched 
 and held for a moment by something which I tried to 
 hold, but which vanished from my grasp. The feeling 
 of this touch was warm, soft, and delightful. There 
 was more of meaning and reality in it — it was more 
 like the loving pressure of a hand in a higher sort of 
 life, more vital than this, than I can describe ; and I 
 believed I recognised the spirit whose hand it was. In 
 the account given by 6 Verax ' of a seance with Mr. 
 Home, the same sensation is described. 
 
 I once mesmerised a little child for weakness of 
 sight. During the process he became in some degree 
 clairvoyant, but never quite forgot what had passed 
 during: the mesmerism. He sometimes asserted the 
 presence of a lady dressed in white, who, he said, could 
 tell him little things in answer to questions. One day 
 
 * Howitt's History of the Supernatural, vol. i. pp. 34-37. 
 
MEDIUMSHIP NATURE OF INFLUENCE. 107 
 
 when some reference had been made to the presence of 
 the lady, I was called away from my patient, who, how- 
 ever, called me qnickly back, saying that he did not want 
 the lad} 7 to touch him. I hurried to him again, and was 
 told that the lady had taken hold of his hand, but 
 quitted it on my return. I of course believed that the 
 white lady was a result of imagination, or of some 
 cerebral delusion, and was rather surprised when he 
 said, ' I showed you where she touched my hand ; it 
 does hurt me so.' I looked at the spot he pointed out 
 at first, and there saw a little round mark presenting 
 the appearance of having been touched with a hot iron. 
 This must have been freshly made, from its appearance 
 and the pain it gave, yet there had been neither burn 
 nor hurt of any kind since the mesmerising began. 
 
 It will be remembered that the mesmerised girl 
 whose clairvoyance was so remarkable saw my hands 
 'as if they were on fire,' when they were rubbed 
 together. The coincidence of all these testimonies 
 cannot be overlooked. 
 
 So we come back to the explanation given at the 
 outset by the writing, • It is electricity that moves the 
 arm, but there is a spirit that guides the electricity.' 
 And again, as to the modes of manifestation. For 
 vision — 
 
 'The spirit mesmerises the eye, then whatever 
 image is in the mind of the spirit is seen by the 
 medium.' 
 
108 FKOM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 As we go on, we shall find that an image in the mind 
 of a spirit constitutes the state or surroundings of that 
 spirit; consequently, whatever is in the mind of the 
 mesmerising power becomes objective when the mes- 
 merised or the medium is, so far, let into a spiritual 
 state. Whether the external eye of the medium is by 
 the process brought into uniformity of action with the 
 internal perception, I do not pretend to say; all that 
 is asserted is, that vision arising from the opening of 
 the inner sense is produced by the direction of a 
 mesmeric force through the eye by an invisible agent. 
 
 When the force is directed through the brain to the 
 muscles of the arm, the medium is made to write or draw 
 according to the feeling or thought of the spirit. 
 Here the very important law of symbolism or cor- 
 respondence plays an important part in giving form 
 to the writings and representations. But as it is not 
 the place to enter on this at present, the accounts already 
 given of writing and drawing, with their moving cause, 
 have been short and elementary. They are to be 
 spoken of more fully when all their conditions can be 
 considered. 
 
 The raps and movements seem to be produced by a 
 stream of mesmeric force directed through the brain 
 and given off through the muscles of the medium. It 
 seems that great power and great control are required 
 to produce sounds which are of rarer occurrence than 
 the other so-called physical manifestations, requiring as 
 
MEDIUMSHIP NATURE OF INFLUENCE. 109 
 
 they do a sudden influx and interruption of the current 
 at the precise moment when the letter is repeated. 
 
 The phenomena of crystal-seeing has always appeared 
 so weird and mysterious that among educated persons 
 its possibility has been utterly denied; while among 
 untaught believers it is looked upon as magical. 
 Crystal vision is a well-attested fact, having its laws 
 and conditions like other phenomena in this world of 
 known and hidden causes, and a little careful observa- 
 tion may clear away some of that obscurity which has 
 kept it as the property of witches and sorcerers. 
 
 The crystal, which is a clear spherical or egg-shaped 
 piece of glass or rock crystal, seems to produce on the 
 eye of the seer an effect exactly like what would ensue 
 under the fingers of a powerful mesmeriser. The 
 person who looks at it often becomes sleepy. Some- 
 times the eyes close. At other times tears flow. These 
 effects are like those produced by the fingers of a 
 mesmeriser. Then a cloudiness or mist comes over the 
 sight ; and lastly, where before, the glass with its re- 
 flection of surrounding objects had been clearly seen, 
 a perfect black, opaque sphere appears to the gazer. 
 This is a sign that the outer eye is acted on in such a 
 way as to allow of other impressions than those from 
 without to be presented to the seer's view. I dare not 
 say to the sensorium of the seer, for that word is 
 commonly used for the centre of all impression from the 
 natural world. Although spiritual sight is now induced, 
 
110 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 material vision is not necessarily interrupted. I have 
 known cases in which the seer has looked off, talked 
 about subjects in the room, even left the room for a 
 time, and then returning to the crystal, has exclaimed, 
 6 Here it is, all just as I left it.' The only difference 
 noticed has been some change in the position or 
 appearance of ( the people in the crystal.' 
 
 As an explanation of crystal-seeing, a spiritual drawing 
 was once made representing a spirit directing on the 
 crystal a stream of influence, the rays of which seemed 
 to be refracted, and then to converge again on the side 
 of the glass sphere before they met the eye of the seer. 
 An enquirer, better acquainted than myself with polar- 
 isation, refraction, &c, of light, would perhaps have 
 been able to trace the analogy between the laws of 
 external or natural, and those of internal or spiritual 
 vision. 
 
 The material brain of the medium seems to be the 
 apparatus used for the transmission of thought. It has 
 been said that the kind of sentiment and phraseology 
 are always modified by the mental and moral peculiarities 
 of the medium. This naturally gives rise, in the first 
 instance, to mistrust in the persons present. And when 
 we have such sentences spelt out as ' We have seek 
 butiful flowers here/ we cannot wonder that new 
 enquirers form a very low idea either of the honesty of the 
 medium or the orthography of the spirits. All kinds of 
 explanations of this have been attempted by persons who 
 
MEDIUMSHIP NATURE OF INFLUENCE. Ill 
 
 thought that the communications thus strangely spelt 
 or expressed approved themselves in other respects as 
 from their departed friends. It has been supposed they 
 adopted a kind of phonetic writing, and even carried 
 their old habits of contracting their words into the next 
 state. I do not deny that this last may be the case 
 sometimes, or rather that when spirits are able they may 
 repeat their old customs in order to be recognised ; but 
 I believe that the sentences, whether written, rapped, 
 heard, or spoken, are always such as could find expression 
 in the mind of the medium or mediums, and are inva- 
 riably transmitted in language with which those minds 
 are familiar. It will, however, be modified by the 
 kind of influence or the character of the impressing 
 spirit. Although many cases are on record of the 
 speaking of languages unknown to the medium, I do 
 not find any reason to alter my conclusion. In every 
 instance of which I have heard, the person to whom 
 the foreign language has been addressed, and who is of 
 course present, has had, perhaps unconsciously, strong 
 medium power. Even in the direct writing, where the 
 work seems to be done by the spirit quite independent 
 of the medium, we shall find the interference of his 
 brain, or perhaps of the atmosphere emanating from it, 
 proved by the spelling and expression. For instance, 
 had Baron Gruldenstubbe been unacquainted with 
 Greek or German, the direct writings obtained in his 
 presence could not have been in those languages. 
 
112 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 From this last circumstance and many experiences I 
 was led to perceive that a certain resemblance of 
 character between the spirit and the medium must 
 form a necessary condition of any kind of spirit message. 
 This is illustrated in the case of the two young ladies 
 called in the foregoing pages Charlotte and Amelia.* 
 Another may be found in that of a lady of my acquaint- 
 ance who has had her hand impelled to write. The 
 medium's characteristics are intellectual power, bene- 
 volence, and truthfulness, with a quick sense of humour. 
 In all these qualities but the last mentioned the spirit 
 who gives his name was deficient, and the result is such 
 as the very narrow channel allowed by the affinity 
 of the two minds affords. A series of very meagre 
 attempts at humour are made, promises to ' make 
 merry' which are fulfilled by drawing such objects as 
 children woulcniardly laugh at, and assertions which are 
 afterwards contradicted, being the production of the 
 spirit by the hand of this medium, who naturally 
 wonders at the appearance of writing and drawing so 
 little in harmony with her own cultivated taste. It is 
 possible, however, that other causes may determine the 
 direction of this her first stage of mediumship, for all 
 who have been practised declare that the acquisition 
 of the power is a gradual and well-marked process, 
 beginning with what may be called low and external 
 
 * See page 40. 
 
MEDIUMSHIP — NATURE OP INFLUENCE. 113 
 
 communications, and proceeding step by step, until the 
 highest inspirations with which the brain can be 
 impressed are transmitted and received. 
 
 As to the varying powers of transmission by different 
 brains. Phrenology, though not an admitted fact in 
 all its details, is generally received in its principles by 
 mental philosophers. By this I mean that the de- 
 pendence of character generally on the form and size of 
 the brain, and its modification according to tempera- 
 ment, are admitted by those who deny the classing and 
 division of organs made by Gall. It is enough for 
 my purpose now, that the principle is admitted to the 
 extent of taking for granted, as by Alexander Bain in 
 his late work on phrenology, that the form and size of 
 the brain are indications of the mental and moral 
 character. This is almost implied in th^^ry objection 
 raised. Mr. Bain says of the classification of functions, 
 c the whole system wants revision,' appearing to forget 
 that the ( system ' is the result of observations on heads 
 and the corresponding developements in character, and 
 not an arbitrary arrangement of qualities made with- 
 out any reference at all to the brain or its external 
 measurements. Those who criticise the arrangement of 
 phrenology, while they accept it in its general prin- 
 ciples, will do well to remember that before the form of 
 brain was observed in connection with diversity of 
 character, the study of mental science was carried on in 
 
 I 
 
114 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 the same way as navigation would be in a ship without 
 charts, compass, or rudder. 
 
 Some very good phrenologists believe, and most con- 
 sistently, that not only every convolution, but every fibre 
 of the brain has its own especial function, each one form- 
 ing a telegraphic wire for the conveyance of impression, 
 and each kind of impression differing in the least possible 
 degree from that transmitted by the fibre nearest. Thus 
 every convolution or group of fibres in the brain will 
 form a whole, of which the portions farthest from the 
 centre have a function which approximates to that of the 
 outer fibres of the neighbouring group. And this inter- 
 blending, this shading together among the ( organs,' is in 
 wonderful harmony with our observations on mind, and 
 affords a beautiful explanation of the shades and diver- 
 sities of character. And the brain itself has been sup- 
 posed to consist of many different degrees, each 
 corresponding to the nerve fluid, or life force, circu- 
 lating in it. This thought was first given to me by a 
 friend, to whom many mental communications are 
 made by the i inner voice ' and by ' impression.' She 
 had been told by a very acute phrenologist, whose 
 judgments of character have been wonderfully true, 
 that she was fond of guessing riddles. This lady 
 is not accomplished in riddles, and cares little for 
 them, but she is a highly developed spiritualist, having 
 internal perceptions of correspondence and symbolism 
 in many degrees. Hence she judged, and was con- 
 
MEDIUMSHIP NATURE OF INFLUENCE. 115 
 
 firmed in the thought by the spiritual influences around 
 her, that that portion of her brain whose function 
 might have enabled her to guess riddles, had a higher 
 internal developement, and in its more spiritual action 
 had given her a mental faculty like that of the Sphinx 
 of Egypt, the expounder of riddles. 
 
 I am quite aware of the very great imperfection of 
 the thoughts now offered for consideration on this very 
 wonderful and complicated subject. I have tried not to 
 assume as established truth more than is generally 
 known; the rest is matter of suggestion, and to that 
 portion much of what follows must be allotted. I sup- 
 pose that impressions from external objects pass from 
 the organs of sense through the nerves of sight, hearing, 
 &c, to the brain, where they are then received among 
 the sets of fibres or convolutions adapted to receive 
 these impressions — as by the optic nerves of sense 
 come the perceptions of form, size, colours, &c; and 
 again from these, the series adapted to convey the 
 still more complex perceptions which form data for 
 comparing an reflecting, and so on; while from the 
 brain, another series of nerves conveys the dictates of 
 the will to the muscles of the body. This rough 
 statement may show what is meant by the following 
 analogy between one of the best attested facts in 
 mesmerism and the transmission of thought through 
 mediums, as seen in the spiritual phenomena. 
 
 In that very curious mesmeric state called ( commu- 
 I 2 
 
116 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 nity of sensations,' we find that impressions are trans- 
 mitted from the brain and nervous system of the 
 mesmeriser to that of the mesmerised, and this when 
 the senses of the patient seem to be closed to all 
 external objects. And a current of power or influence 
 is established by some mysterious union between the 
 two systems, so that it appears, and probably is the 
 fact, that one nervous force acts equally through both. 
 
 If I am right in extending the functions of reception 
 and transmission even into the fibres of the brain itself, 
 and supposing that each fibre is a channel for the 
 conveyance of a specific feeling or mental impression, 
 it will be easy to see that in order for one brain to 
 obtain mesmeric control over another, the two brains 
 must contain many fibres having similar functions, or, in 
 other words, tbat the two characters must be alike in 
 many points. The various degrees of power possessed 
 by mesmerisers over different patients may be partly ac- 
 counted for in this way, and may also depend on some 
 unknown conditions in the temperaments of each by 
 which the quality of the nerve force is affected. 
 
 In the spiritual manifestations it is asserted by 
 the unseen power that the effects are produced by 
 spirits taking the place of an earthly mesmeriser. And 
 the conditions already laid down being kept in mind, 
 we see how the communications made through any 
 medium will be modified by his character ; for a spirit 
 wishing only to convey mischievous or destructive ideas 
 
MEDIUMSHIP NATURE OP INFLUENCE. 117 
 
 cannot find means to transmit them through a brain 
 whose fibres are found only to receive the highest 
 feelings, while a brain in which only the lowest elements 
 predominate cannot furnish a channel for the beneficent 
 influence of a good spirit. 
 
 In this part of the enquiry, though the interior action 
 of the brain has been hinted at, I have not spoken of 
 the action on the soul ; because that portion of our being 
 has yet to be considered. 
 
 But how do spirits become mesmerisers ? This, the 
 most puzzling portion of a difficult question, can only be 
 answered, as other portions have been, hypothetically, 
 but for the conjecture I am about to offer there is a 
 strong though indirect evidence arising partly from 
 observation, partly from the coherence of the statements 
 made by the unseen powers, and partly from the 
 beliefs and legends of all times, and, to crown all, that 
 which all Christians venerate as revelation. 
 
 These presumptive arguments may receive con- 
 firmation from the accumulating mass of testimony 
 now coming from all quarters, and the coherence of the 
 whole may recommend it to the notice of those who 
 would not think any separate portion of the subject 
 worthy of attention if taken apart from the rest. 
 
 The nerve force, with all its related invisible and 
 more refined agencies, constitutes the life of the body, 
 inasmuch as it forms the instrument without which 
 sensation, thought, and motion could not go on. Closely 
 
118 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 connected, if not one form of this, is the agency- 
 employ ed in mesmerism. According to the common 
 definition, the life force, even in its least refined degree, 
 is immaterial, because imperceptible to the senses in 
 their usual state. When the life of the body ceases, all 
 we know is that the material, which is in fact a 
 residuum or deposit, whose formation has been the 
 work of the spirit, decays and returns to its original 
 elements, like the withered husk when its contained 
 fruit is ripe. But this immaterial vital portion of our 
 frame is no less a reality than its outer covering, and, 
 unlike it, has never been seen to fall to dust. 
 
 What, then, becomes of that which permeates and 
 animates the body ? Let us not seek the living among 
 the dead. In the next chapter I will bring together 
 some experiences which may help us to follow the 
 released spirit, and, by connecting the visions of clear- 
 seers with some of the reasonings of physiologists, to 
 find whether the spiritual body possesses powers of the 
 same kind, though intensified and exalted in degree, as 
 those which it wielded when in its now forsaken shell. 
 
119 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 PROCESS OF DEATH AND FORMATION OF THE SPIRITUAL 
 BODY. 
 
 6 1TOW are the dead raised, and with what body do 
 J-J- they come ? ' 
 
 Analogy, though a bad master, is often a very good 
 assistant in difficult enquiries. I intend to call in its 
 aid as a pioneer to reasoning in this untrodden ground, 
 to strengthen a theory which has more than mere con- 
 jecture in its favour. Following the analogy afforded 
 by all the successive formations of nature, we find 
 simple elements reproduced in a more refined compli- 
 cated form in the grade of being next above that in 
 which they first appear. Thus, the vegetable has in 
 itself the same elements as the mineral combined under 
 the new conditions necessary to organic life. The 
 simplest animal has the elements of organic life in a 
 higher degree and in the conditions necessary to the 
 developement of its organisation ; the next above has 
 again the elements of the first under new and more 
 refined relations. The higher the animal, the more 
 
120 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 complicated and refined is the combination. And at 
 the top of the scale we find Man, who, in the most 
 perfect organisation apparent to our bodily senses, 
 combines with all the elements of organic also the 
 highest animal life, and, as might be expected, a some- 
 thing^ possibly the result in some part of the more 
 refined combination, superadded. 
 
 This is well said by the physiologist Bichat : — 
 
 'La vie, examinee plus en detail, nous offre deux 
 modifications remarquables. L'une est commune au 
 vegetal et a l'animal ; l'autre est le partage special de ce 
 dernier. Jetez, en effet, les yeux sur deux individus dans 
 chacun de ces regnes vivans, vous verrez l'un n'exister 
 qu'au dedans de lui, n'avoir avec ce qui l'environne des 
 rapports de nutrition, naitre, croitre et perir fixe au sol 
 qui en recut le germe; l'autre, allier a cette vie interieure, 
 dont il jouit a plus haut degre, une vie exterieure qui 
 etablit des relations nombreuses entre lui et les objets 
 voisins, marie son existence a celles de tous les au- 
 tres etres, Ten eloigne ou Fen rapproche suivant ses 
 craintes et ses besoins, et semble ainsi, en lui appro- 
 priant tout dans la nature, rapporter tout a son ex- 
 istence isolee. 
 
 4 On dirait que le vegetal est l'ebauche, le canevas de 
 l'animal, et que pour former ce dernier il n'a fallu que 
 revetir ce canevas d'un appareil d'organes exterieures 
 propres a etablir des relations.' 
 
 Reasoning thus from analogy, we may naturally 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 121 
 
 expect an uninterrupted rising scale in the order of 
 creation. Bat that which is in the next degree above 
 cannot be observed, as that below ourselves, by the 
 means of our senses. We have to rise from things which 
 are seen to those which are unseen; and in gaining a 
 glimpse of the something beyond the apparent life of man 
 in less well-explored pathways than those of natural 
 science, we must avail ourselves of help from whatever 
 source or direction it may come. As all that I have 
 hitherto said, both in the way of fact and reasoning, has 
 been first suggested by my own experience, gathered in 
 different forms, it seems the most natural course, at 
 this stage of the enquiry, to give, in the order in 
 which I have received them, explanations and illus- 
 trations of the process of death and the formation of 
 the spiritual body. As before, I only ask for belief 
 in the narrators' honesty : whether any, and how much 
 value will be attached to the facts narrated, will 
 depend entirely on the mental state of the reader, 
 and his ability to receive and appreciate evidence of 
 the nature adduced. 
 
 When we found that so many unexpected explana- 
 tions came by the hand of the young medium who 
 drew the sketches of spiritual impression, I begged for 
 as clear a description as could be given of the process 
 of death. Having myself read some American accounts 
 of visions, dreams, &c, referring to this subject, I had a 
 rather vague notion of the spirit breaking away full 
 
122 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 formed from its earthly covering, and floating at once 
 on high in a body prepared to enter into the happy 
 spheres.* Eeports of visions which had reached me 
 confirmed this belief. I was, therefore, pleased and 
 surprised when, by the drawing, a wonderful and 
 systematic process, coherent in all its parts, and making 
 no extravagant demand on our powers of belief, was 
 unfolded. The person by whom the drawing was made 
 was too young to have thought on the subject, and his 
 hand moved without, as in some cases, being touched 
 by that of another person. 
 
 The pencil traced a recumbent figure, evidently 
 meant to represent a dying person. From many points 
 of this figure, the hand of the medium formed long 
 lines which met in a point placed carefully at a short 
 distance above the figure. As the lines were multiplied, 
 the point was also increased in size till it became a 
 small globe or circle, and from that circle other lines 
 were drawn out to represent the body and limbs of 
 another and smaller figure. The larger figure below, 
 and the smaller one above, were then numbered, and 
 notes, to correspond with the numbers, written below. 
 From this diagram it appeared that the process of 
 death, and the entrance into another state, is as natural 
 (in the sense of orderly) an event as the birth of a 
 child. f No more real mystery, nothing more super- 
 
 * I had not at that time read Swedenborg's description of death. 
 
 t The unborn child lives only an organic life. The processes of animal 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 123 
 
 natural (in the sense of miraculous), accompanies a 
 departure from, than an entrance into, this world ; for 
 that which passes the ken of mortal eyes is not 
 necessarily outside the order of creation. 
 
 The lines drawn from the recumbent figure, and 
 meeting above, represent the ( spiritual fluid.' This 
 will be recognised as that invisible element of the body 
 which, drawing nourishment from its surroundings, is 
 the essential agent of vital force, of will — power, and 
 even of thought and feeling. That it quits the body at 
 death is certain, for it is not, like the material part, 
 left to decay. It becomes a question whether, having 
 been only elaborated in the animal frame, this, the 
 most delicate and vital portion, ceases to exist when its 
 source is destroyed ; or whether, having its source in a 
 power above and beyond the body which it has animated 
 and inhabited, it passes away, prepared by its sojourn 
 here for another dwelling, when its earthly one is 
 capable of containing it no longer. I have digressed in 
 order to identify the ' spiritual fluid ' of the invisible 
 writer with a part or the whole of the magnetic or 
 vital forces spoken of before. It will afterwards be 
 seen that these vital forces are what constitute the soul, 
 in its most material and most refined elements. 
 
 The 6 spiritual fluid,' then, was represented as coming 
 from every portion of the frame, its streams meeting 
 
 life come into action when it enters this world. See Bichat, Sur la Vie 
 ct la Mort. 
 
124 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 near the heart — I think at the great solar plexus- -and, 
 having passed away through the brain, uniting again 
 above the body, there to form the new body which is 
 destined to be the future dwelling of the spirit. These 
 streams appeared by the drawing to carry from the 
 material body each its own type of life, by which I mean 
 that each minute current is adapted to fill one place 
 and form one specific portion only, in the new combina- 
 tion. Thus the spiritual fluid, leaving the hand of the 
 material body, will enter the nucleus of the spiritual 
 organism, to be again projected, and to form the hand 
 of the risen being. As the butterfly's folded wing can 
 be traced under the shell of the chrysalis, and may even, 
 in its rudimentary state, be seen in the caterpillar before 
 its first change, so every portion of the resurrection 
 body is contained and wrapped up during life in the 
 material form. This is the teaching given by our 
 invisible companions, by means of the involuntary 
 writing. The clearest explanation came by the hand 
 of a young person who had no preconceived ideas on 
 the subject ; but similar descriptions have been given 
 by many seers and mediums, each one ignorant of what 
 has been said by others. I speak now of modern days, 
 the days of spirit mediumship ; but let anyone look 
 through the* records of old times, the teaching of 
 
 * For most copious details on the spiritualism of early times, see 
 W. Howitt's ' History of the Supernatural,' &e., just published; a work 
 so full of information in every branch of Spirit History, that, had not 
 
THE Sri RITUAL BODY. 125 
 
 ancient uninspired philosophers, and the mythologies 
 of early religion, and he will find that what is brought 
 forward with the expectation of ridicule in these 
 Christian days, and this vaunted ( nineteenth century,' 
 has been a universal belief, held with more or less of 
 modification, according to the seer's mind, and waiting 
 for the fulness of time for its clearer revelation, yet 
 as the truth that the future state is a continuation of 
 the earth life, and the heavenly body an outbirth from 
 the material form. 
 
 Having given the spirit's account of the passing over 
 the boundary, I will bring together a few records of 
 appearances, drawn from the statements made by 
 persons who profess to have a more than ordinary 
 faculty of vision. At the risk of censure for repeating 
 what has appeared elsewhere, I first give every 
 trustworthy account which has come to my own 
 knowledge. 
 
 First, appearances to those present at the time of 
 
 death. Many years ago, Mrs. D , a person in 
 
 humble life, but of tried and proved truthfulness, and 
 rather matter of fact in her mental habits, said to me, 
 
 this little book been completed before it came into the hands of the 
 present writer, the appearance of a smaller work on the subject would 
 have seemed superfluous. A few questions, however, are touched in 
 this volume which have not come within the scope of Mr. Howitt's 
 book ; but it is quite impossible to avoid repeating a very few of his 
 amply detailed statements in illustration and proof of the spirit's 
 assertions. 
 
126 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 in a conversation about ghosts and ghost-seeing, { I 
 never saw a ghost, but I have seen a spirit rise.' 
 
 ' If you will tell me exactly what you saw,' I said, ' I 
 will write it as you speak, and will beg you to sign 
 your name.' 
 
 This she did, and the present account is copied from 
 her own words as I wrote them, and she put her 
 signature : — 
 
 ( When I was sixteen years old, I was nursing a child 
 of seven who had been ill since his birth with disease of 
 the head. He had been for some days expected to die, 
 but was quite sensible. About noon I left him in a 
 little back parlour on the ground floor. His mother 
 and a friend were with him. I was returning from the 
 kitchen to the child, and had just reached the top of the 
 staircase, when I saw, coming from the door of the 
 room, the form of a little child. It did not step on the 
 ground, but immediately went up over the staircase and 
 disappeared from me. The bed on which the sick child 
 had been lying was close to the door of the room, and 
 that door was not more than about a foot from the top 
 of the staircase which I came up. As I entered the 
 room, his mother said, " He is just gone." The figure 
 that I saw was a little child, fair and fresh-looking, and 
 perfectly healthy. It looked fatter and younger than 
 the little sick boy, and had a very animated, happy 
 expression. It was like a living child, only so light.' 
 
 Compare the above account of a vision by a girl of 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 127 
 
 sixteen with the following narration of an imperfect 
 perception of the same kind, which occurred, later in 
 life, to the same person. 
 
 ( More than twenty years after that, I was sitting up 
 with the mother of a child who had been ill three or 
 four days with fits. It was more than two years old. 
 The mother had one arm under the child's head. I 
 was on the other side of the bed, lying by the baby, and 
 the fire was burning brightly on the same side of the 
 room as that on which the mother sat. Suddenly I 
 saw the fire darkened by something that seemed to 
 flutter or move backwards and forwards before it. I 
 noticed this to the mother, who was between the bed 
 and the fire ; but she did not see it, and declared that 
 the fire was bright. The fits left the child about six 
 o'clock, and it lay perfectly still till it had ceased to 
 breathe about half-past ten. I saw the darkening of the 
 fire for an hour before the child died, and the instant it 
 expired the fire was distinctly visible. J. D.' 
 
 The seer of the above was an uneducated woman who 
 could not account for the variation in her two visions, 
 and who had certainly never heard of the different 
 degrees of opening of the spirit sight. To me, therefore, 
 the account of the second vision confirmed the truth of 
 the first. Had she invented both stories, she would 
 most likely have made the second instance appear the 
 most striking and wonderful. But she was not given to 
 invention. 
 
128 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 I was myself once standing with a person who had 
 sometimes the gift of spiritual vision, beside a bed on 
 which lay one whose life was departing. The breathing 
 was ceasing slowly when I noticed a thin white mist 
 which seemed to rise two or three inches above the 
 bed. My companion appeared also to be looking at 
 something. Her eyes, which always had a strange 
 glitter when they encountered any object unseen by 
 others, were raised gradually from the recumbent form 
 to the top of the bed ; then, returning, seemed to rest 
 half-way between, gazing, as far as I could see, on 
 vacancy. This earnest gaze lasted more than a minute. 
 I looked at her enquiringly, but she did not speak. 
 She told me a few minutes after what she had seen, 
 thus : — 
 
 ' I was looking at a mist which seemed to be rising 
 from the bed, and which I have noticed some time, when 
 my attention was drawn upwards, and I saw a pillar of 
 light, between sunshine and moonlight, rising three or 
 four feet. Within this was a still brighter light, 
 becoming more brilliant at the centre ; and from the 
 centre to the circumference, from within outwards, it 
 was all working together with intense rapidity. I saw 
 it once again, but slightly afterwards, just as the last 
 breath was drawn. It seemed then to pass off by the 
 top of the bed.' The seer has been a trusted friend of 
 my own for many years ; her character for truthfulness 
 is quite above suspicion. 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 129 
 
 On giving an account of this appearance to a friend, 
 he told me that a similar statement had been made by 
 a sfirl in whose character for truth he had entire conn- 
 dence. The incident occurred in Eubcea, where my 
 informant has an estate on which he has lived many 
 years. 
 
 The young woman had nursed her mother, who 
 was confined to her bed by long and wasting illness. 
 The poor invalid died gradually ; the feet first, then the 
 legs, becoming numb and powerless. At length life 
 seemed to be confined to the head and upper part of 
 the body. One night, or rather towards morning, the 
 poor girl awoke suddenly and saw a strong light rising 
 to some height above the sick woman, from whom it 
 seemed to emanate. It passed away in an upward 
 direction, and disappeared. The girl in great terror 
 called out to her mother, but received no answer. She 
 then ran to a friend (a confidential servant of my infor- 
 mant), and told her what she had seen. Her friend 
 returned to the cottage, where they found the mother 
 quite dead. 
 
 The late Miss W , well known at one time in the 
 
 mesmerising world, told me that she once nursed an 
 uncle through his last illness. As he died, a very small 
 bright cloud, appearing to come from the nostrils, 
 passed away, and rising while she watched it, disap- 
 peared by the ceiling. This is another instance of a 
 difference in the poiver of vision. 
 
130 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 My readers who are old enough to remember some 
 of the early observations on magnetised girls, may 
 recall the assertion made by one of the Okeys, who, being 
 taken by her mesmeriser into one of the hospital wards, 
 declared that she always saw a cloudy figure, to which 
 she gave some slang name, rising from the beds of cer- 
 tain patients. It was asserted by her mesmeriser, that 
 in all those cases where she had represented the form 
 as tall, the patient died ; but there was a chance of re- 
 covery for those from whom it only seemed to emanate 
 to a lesser height. This statement is not held of great 
 importance in the present enquiry, for the experiments 
 seem not to have been made in a very careful manner, 
 but they serve as corroboration of a fact otherwise 
 well attested. The shorter figure was probably an 
 efflux of the most external spiritual fluid of the sick 
 person. 
 
 In like manner, Mr. A. J. Davis's account of his 
 clairvoyant vision of a death may be referred to. Not 
 having his f Great Harmonia,' in which the narrative 
 may be found, I cannot give an extract, and I only write 
 from memory. The history is a very interesting one, 
 and its close agreement in many points with the visions 
 of other seers places it beyond the pale of fiction. The 
 writer, who is said to be a genuine clairvoyant and 
 medium, describes the gathering of the life-force or 
 nerve-spirit from every part of the body in the head, 
 whence it again reissues, forming a cloud of beautiful 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 131 
 
 mellow light above the figure. Within this atmosphere 
 the new head, then the body and limbs of the spirit 
 appear. Mr. Davis, like J. D , dwells on the fresh- 
 ness and bloom of the newly-formed spiritual body. 
 Until the completion of the form, a stream of electric 
 light is seen passing from the head of the dying person 
 to the beautiful figure above, and when the work is 
 done, and the life, having quitted its old tabernacle, 
 has found and animated its new house, this last link 
 with earth is broken, and the freshly-formed being passes 
 upwards to its new home. The cord of electric light 
 carrying the nourishment from the old envelope to the 
 new form, makes the analogy between the earthly and 
 spiritual births complete. Two friends who have the 
 gift of vision declare, that they know when a spirit 
 appearing to them has not permanently entered its 
 next state by the line of electric light which it seems to 
 draw after it. 
 
 Accounts of the process of death have been given by 
 various seers. These narrators, it must be remembered, 
 are all quite independent of each other, and their 
 descriptions were given, with one exception, long before 
 spiritualism, in the modern sense, was known. I do 
 not class the following with the foregoing visions, 
 because the first statements were made by observers of 
 the process itself, who described as much as was visible 
 to them on different occasions of death. The more 
 detailed accounts which follow come from persons who 
 
 K 2 
 
132 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 profess to have gained a general insight by clairvoyance 
 into the whole subject. 
 
 The following is from ' Guardian Spirits,' A Case of 
 Vision into the Spiritual World, from the German of 
 H. Werner, New York, 1847. The author, Werner, 
 was pastor of Beckelsberg, Stulz, on the Ehine. The 
 translator, A. E. Ford, appears, by his preface, to have 
 been a Swedenborgian, but the absence of a definite 
 Swedenborgian doctrine from the theology of the 
 seeress is a guarantee for the translator's general fidelity. 
 The revelations are in a series of dialogues between the 
 author and his patient K . 
 
 ' Author. You said that the magnetic sleep was simi- 
 lar to death. Explain this to me if you can. 
 
 e R. Yes, certainly ; the magnetic state is similar to 
 death. The way in which the soul leaves the body I 
 cannot now explain to you ; I can only give you an 
 image of it as I feel it. It seems to me now as if in 
 the waking state the body were the house of the soul, 
 and it might look out now at this window, now at that. 
 In the somnambulic state, however, the soul has gone 
 out and shut the door of its dwelling. For this reason I 
 now see you and myself as a third person does a group. I 
 am at your left, and am looking at you and at my own 
 body. 
 
 'Author. Will this be the case in dying ? 
 
 S R. Yes; only with this difference — that return to 
 the body is no longer possible. In dying, the spirit 
 
THE SPIEITUAL BODY. 133 
 
 leaves its residence exactly as in the magnetic sleep. 
 But as it cannot be without the soul (because they are 
 there united as body and soul), for this reason it cannot 
 rise without it. The latter does not part with the body 
 so easily as the spirit, which is divine in its quality ; only 
 with hard struggles does the soul leave the body, with 
 which it has much affinity, and which it greatly loves. 
 For this reason, it also for the most part takes with it 
 its corporeal appendages, which often are not the best ; 
 because they have grown, as it were, into its very 
 nature. 
 
 ' Author. What distinction is there between spirit and 
 soul? 
 
 ' R. The spirit is the life of the soul, the eternally 
 divine, begotten from God. The latter (the soul) be- 
 longs to its personal essence and completes its whole. 
 In its essence it is a spirit body, and hence can put on 
 altogether the nature of the spirit and supernaturalise 
 itself; and on the other hand, can overcome the spirit, 
 and more and more corporealise and debase itself. It 
 is the countenance of the spirit, its characteristic form 
 or clothing, as you will. Neither can subsist without 
 the other ; they are as closely united as soul and body ; 
 how, I cannot tell. These are connections that exceed 
 the power of my eye. 
 
 1 Author. But perhaps you can tell me how both are 
 united with the body ? 
 
 ' R. Yes, I can. The soul is the internal sense of 
 
134 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 the man, by which the spirit expresses its essential 
 activity. The latter gives to the soul power for its 
 vital expressions. But that these may be manifested, 
 there is required still a third, which is superadded, and 
 which, at the same time, moves and animates the body. 
 This is an exceedingly fine substance, of which the soul 
 itself seems almost entirely to consist, and with which 
 it pervades the body in all its parts. 
 
 ( Author. Is this the so-called nerve-spirit? 
 
 ( R. You have the right idea. It is what gives to the 
 body eternal life, nobility, and power, but the name does 
 not please me. 
 
 s Author. Do you know any which describes it 
 better ? 
 
 * R. No, I know no word for it. 
 
 ( Author. What becomes of this nerve-spirit in 
 death ? 
 
 * R. It is indeed taken out of the essence of the soul, 
 but by its operations in the body has more of its nature 
 than the soul ; in itself considered, it is> ahvays its in- 
 strument for operating in the external world. And 
 when the soul parts from the body, this fine substance 
 accompanies it ; for it is as well a part of the soul as of 
 the body. Should it stay in the body, this would live 
 on although the soul had left it. This is in some 
 measure the case in my present state. ... In death, 
 the soul is the body of the spirit, and is destined, if the 
 spirit is not to miss the high end of its creation, to be- 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 135 
 
 come one with it, to be spiritualised. This presents 
 itself to me as another dying ; the nerve-spirit is des- 
 tined at last, as what is more gross and corporeal, to be 
 entirely removed, and the soul to assume the nature of 
 the eternal light of the spirit. 
 
 'Author. To what purpose does the nerve-spirit serve 
 after death ? 
 
 ' R. It does not renounce its nature, although in- 
 visible to the bodily eye ; it is very gross and corporeal 
 in comparison with the essence which spirit and soul 
 make together. The soul cannot free itself immediately 
 after death ; each, it may be said, takes something of 
 lower desire with it into the other state, and this is 
 what attracts and weighs the nerve-spirit downward to 
 the earth. Souls quite earthly wrap themselves 
 gladly in it, and give thereby the characteristic form 
 to their spirit. By the aid of this substance, they 
 can make themselves seen, heard, and felt by men. 
 They can excite sounds in the atmosphere of the earth.' 
 
 I now extract from the ' Seeress of Prevorst : ' — 
 
 * She, the seeress, was frequently in that state in which 
 persons who have the faculty of ghost-seeing perceive 
 their own spirit out of their body, which only enfolds it 
 as a thin gauze. She often saw herself out of her body, 
 and sometimes double. She said, "It often appears 
 to me that I am out of my body, and then I hover 
 over it, and think of it, but this is not a pleasant 
 feeling, because I recognise my body ; but if my soul 
 
136 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 were bound more closely to my nerve-spirit, then 
 
 would this be in closer union with my nerves, but the 
 
 bonds of my nerve-spirit are daily becoming weaker." 
 ****** 
 
 'The seeress said that the separation of the spirit 
 from soul and body in sleep-waking bore a great 
 resemblance to death, but was not the same. "When the 
 spirit quits the body, in the last moments, it becomes 
 weak and helpless ; it cannot draw the soul after it, 
 and can only wait. The dying person is then uncon- 
 scious of all that happens ; the future is hidden from 
 him, and he can no longer express himself. When, 
 previously to this moment, a dying person declares 
 that he is now certain of the existence of a future state, 
 &c, it is because the soul, being no longer under the 
 direction of the brain, recovers its natural power of 
 clear-seeing and hope of the future, which had been 
 before obscured. When the spirit has quitted the body, 
 the soul knows it can no longer stay, but struggles to 
 be free. This is the moment of the death-agony, and 
 at this moment, instead of the now powerless spirit, 
 the spirits of the blest stand by to aid the soul ; and the 
 struggle is longer or shorter, in cases of natural death, 
 in proportion to the ease or difficulty with which the 
 soul can separate itself from earthly things. 
 
 ( With respect to the nerve-spirit, or nervous prin- 
 ciple of vitality, she said that through it the soul was 
 united to the body, and the body with the world. . . . 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 137 
 
 ' The nerve-spirit is immortal, and accompanies the 
 soul after death, unless when the soul is perfectly pure, 
 and enters at once among the blessed.* By its means 
 the soul constructs an airy form around the spirit. 
 It is incapable of increase or growth after death, and by 
 its means the spirits who are in the mid region are 
 brought into connection with a material in the at- 
 mosphere which enables them to make themselves heard 
 and felt by man, and also to suspend the property of 
 gravity, and more heavy articles. When a person dies 
 in a perfectly pure state, he does not take this nerve- 
 spirit with him. Though indestructible, it remains with 
 the body, and at the general resurrection is united 
 to the soul, and constructs it an aerial form. Blessed 
 spirits, to whom this nerve-spirit is no longer attached, 
 cannot make themselves heard or felt ; they appear no 
 more. The purer the spirit is, the higher grade it 
 holds in the mid region, or intermediate state, and 
 the more entirely it is separated from the nerve-spirit.' 
 
 There is some discrepancy in the account of the 
 final destination of the nerve-spirit. The seeress says 
 that the purer it is, the more completely it is thrown 
 off. It appears to be the connecting link between 
 the electricity in the atmosphere and the soul. It is 
 the magnetic fluid in its animal degree, which I have 
 tried to indicate in the preceding pages as the vital 
 
 * 1 Cor. xv. 48. 
 
138 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 instrument in our bodies, and the element which we 
 have in common with those who have left the earth 
 and are invested with a new form ; but it seems 
 questionable that this most earthly portion of the 
 spiritual should ever be reunited with it again ( at the 
 general resurrection,' after the pure spirit has disen- 
 cumbered itself of its most earthward-tending vestment. 
 That, in this particular, the mind of Friderica 
 Haufife was influenced by the opinions of Justinus 
 Kerner, her physician, is quite possible ; but it seems 
 more likely, as all her teaching seems to have been 
 new to him, that either he or the English translator 
 (I have not the original to refer to) have mistaken the 
 speaker's meaning. 
 
 Next to these German seeresses, and on account of 
 their many points of resemblance, I will place a far 
 older description — that of Socrates, or, more properly, 
 of Plato in the words ascribed by him to Socrates. 
 We cannot expect that these Greek sages and seers,* 
 living 400 years before that full revelation of im- 
 mortality which was made by the Saviour, should 
 give as perfect a description as St. Paul of the entrance 
 into the next state. Every seer clothes the truth he 
 imparts in the thoughts familiar to his mind, and this 
 description of Socrates is, as might be expected, full 
 of the imagery drawn from the religion of his country ; 
 
 * Socrates at least was spiritually gifted. "Witness his demon, or 
 guardian spirit, and his dreams. 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 139 
 
 but making all allowance for Greek mythology, we 
 have a statement nearly resembling that of the seeresses 
 quoted. The latter part, concerning the manner in 
 which the good are received in the next state, is like 
 some of the descriptions which follow this extract from 
 the < Pha?do :' *— 
 
 'The soul, then, the part without form, imma- 
 terial,! is that w T hich goes to inhabit another place, 
 invisible like itself, noble and pure in nature ; namely, 
 to Hades, the true world of spirits, near the good and 
 wise God. And there, if God wills, my soul must im- 
 mediately go. For can the soul, being of a nature so in- 
 finitely superior — can it, when separated from the body, 
 at once be dispersed into nothing, and utterly destroyed, 
 as some people think? Far otherwise, dear Cebes 
 and Simmias ! Much more must it follow that the 
 part which has taken its departure in purity, not 
 encumbered by any of the bad impure passions of 
 human nature, because it had endeavoured through life 
 to remain uninfluenced by them, and to fly from all 
 that was bad — devoting itself to true philosophy, and 
 aiming to die happily, for this is right and true phi- 
 losophy, is it not ? — how much more likely must it be 
 
 * I prefer Lady Chatterton's translation to Dr. WhewelTs, because it 
 is a trifle clearer, and is quite as faithful to the original. Either version 
 would serve my purpose. 
 
 t Socrates seems to believe that what is generally invisible must be 
 without form. 
 
140 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 that the soul so prepared will depart to its kindred 
 spirits — to the region of the Divine, the Immortal, the 
 Wise, where it must attain true happiness and be freed 
 from all errors and ignorance, and fears and wild de- 
 sires, and all other human influences — and dwell hence- 
 forth with the gods, as those are taught to expect who 
 are consecrated in the holy mysteries?' 
 
 To this Cebes assents. 
 
 ( But I think that if the soul departs from the body 
 polluted and impure, because it has always been in- 
 fluenced by the body, and has served it, and delighted 
 in its evil passions, and allowed itself to be deceitfully 
 charmed by its desires and pleasures, so that it believes 
 in nothing that is not material and corporeal, and can 
 put faith in nothing except what can be touched and 
 seen, or drunk, or used for enjoyment, because it 
 darkened its eyes, and deafened its ears, and hated and 
 dreaded the invisible and intellectual objects which 
 are the aim of philosophy — dost thou think that 
 such can be pure in itself, or fitted for a region of 
 purity ? ' 
 
 ( Not in the least,' said he. ( No, for it must be drawn 
 away by the corporeal encumbrance * which this 
 
 * In the ■ Timseus ' of Plato the philosopher speaks of what he calls 
 oxwa — the vehicle of the soul. The description of this, which con- 
 stitutes the connecting link between soul and body, identifies it with 
 the ' nerve-spirit ' of the seers and the ' spiritual fluid ' of my young 
 medium. 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 141 
 
 habit of living in, and being influenced by, the body 
 must create.' 
 
 1 Certainly.' 
 
 c And in this case, the soul (which survives the body) 
 must be wrapped up in a helpless and earthy covering, 
 which makes it heavy and visible, and drags it down to 
 the visible region, away from the invisible region of 
 spirit world, Hades — which it fears. And thus these 
 wandering souls haunt, as we. call it, the tombs and 
 monuments of the dead, where such phantoms are 
 sometimes seen. These are apparitions of souls which 
 departed from the body in a state of impurity, and 
 still partake of corruption and the visible world, and 
 
 therefore are liable to be still seen And these 
 
 are not the souls of good men, but of bad, who are thus 
 obliged to wander about suffering punishment for their 
 former manner of life which was evil. And thus they 
 waader, until, by the longing which clings to them 
 for«earthly things, they are again enclosed in a body, 
 chained to one most probably with habits resembling 
 those which they had acquired during their former 
 
 lives Those who had indulged in gluttony and 
 
 contemptuous pride, who had been brutalised by 
 drunkenness, devoid of any feeling of shame or self- 
 restraint, would naturally pass into such bodies as asses 
 
 and other beasts And therefore it is probable 
 
 also of the rest, that each will go into the state which 
 most resembles the condition they had striven to attain 
 
142 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 either by indulging in bad propensities or by omitting 
 to cultivate the better instincts of their nature.' 
 
 We shall perhaps return to Socrates, in a comparison 
 of ancient and modern speculations concerning the 
 destination of souls. 
 
 Some particulars of a case of lucid vision induced by 
 magnetism are given in a little work, c Somnolism and 
 Psych eism,' by J. Haddock, M.D., London, 1851. 
 
 'The patient, Emma, while in a state of ecstasy, made 
 some revelations in which man is represented as a 
 spiritual being, rising from what she calls " the shell " 
 of the dead material body, immediately after death ; or 
 as soon as the connection between the soul and its mate- 
 rial covering is completely severed, which, she sa} 7 s, does 
 not occur sometimes until a day or two after what 
 appears as death. The risen and emancipated spirit 
 is a perfectly organised existence, preserving the human 
 form, and having a complete sensational perception of his 
 fellow-spiritual beings, and the beautiful scenery of the 
 spiritual spheres, that is, provided he was, during life, 
 in a moral state in harmony with those spheres. . . . 
 
 6 It seems (said the clairvoyante) as if the idea of 
 what you should say comes into the mind, and they 
 (the angels) tell you what you want to know. When 
 I got with the angels, I seemed like one who had gone 
 a long journey and got home; but I could not tell how 
 I went the journey. When I was seated near the 
 fountain, I asked how people got there, meaning, how 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 143 
 
 they left the world by death. It was told me, they were 
 not always dead when their friends thought so, for all 
 the actions of the body stop by degrees.* It was some- 
 times two or three days after what is called death, but 
 was not always alike; some were a longer, others a 
 shorter time. During this time they were like a 
 person asleep, and in a state between this world and the 
 next. As soon as people rise into the spirit-world, 
 angels talk to them, and tell them where they are, and 
 try to lead them upwards.' 
 
 I once asked, by the hand of a boy, some questions 
 relating to the same subject, of a spirit, or rather an 
 unseen intelligence. The medium's style of speaking 
 was very laconic, and accordingly the spirit information 
 was given in few words. 
 
 Q. 'Is going into a trance the same process as 
 dying?' 
 
 A. ' Not exactly.' 
 
 Q. ■ How does it differ ? ' 
 
 A. ( The spirit returns.' 
 
 Q. ' Can you describe to me the sensation of dying. 
 Do people suffer pain ? ' 
 
 A. * Sometimes they do.' 
 
 Q. ' Had you any pain in dying ? ' 
 A. None.' 
 
 Q. ' Do you remember the last time you spoke ? ' 
 
 * See Bichat, Sur la Vie et la Mort, 
 
144 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 A. 'Yes.' 
 
 Q. 'What did you feel after that ? ' 
 A. e As if I was going to sleep.' 
 Q. ' What was the next sensation ? ' 
 A. ' As if I was shut up in my body.' 
 Q. ( W T hat was the next thing? ' 
 A. ( I came out.' 
 Q. < And then?' 
 
 A. 
 
 ' < Collect 
 
 The line was drawn round the words as if to illustrate 
 the collecting or embodiment. About the same time 
 a very young child wrote, 'It is not death, only the 
 spirit breaking loose.'' 
 
 By the hand of another child was written, purporting 
 to be from a spirit — 
 
 c We are never tired, because we have in us the 
 strength that comes from the body when we leave it. 
 When we were on earth, the strength of our spirits was 
 locked up ; but now we have the everlasting * and 
 beautiful strength of the spirit, and the strength we 
 take from the body, which mingles with the spirit 
 strength.' 
 
 (It was here observed that at death the body decays.) 
 
 * Imperishable. 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 145 
 
 6 I know, but when we go, the strength that was in 
 our body goes with us.' 
 
 The idea of the ' sleep,' and the state between this 
 world and the next, was conveyed, in the drawing of 
 the process of death, by the spirit's passing through a 
 state represented by a plain. It must cross a river 
 before it gets into a state in which it can recognise friends. 
 
 ' The Birth into Spirit Life,' is the title of one of 
 the most interesting articles in the * Spiritual Magazine.' 
 The writing is anonymous, but the name of the medium 
 is known to me, and is a sufficient guarantee for its 
 genuineness. 
 
 ' I lived alone on the earth at the time of my de- 
 parture from it, and was attended by two faithful 
 servants. I had left them suddenly, and they had 
 stretched my body on the couch where in my last 
 illness I had been carefully attended by their hands. 
 I closed my eyes on nature and opened them on 
 spirit life. I saw my two attendants busy with a corpse 
 and also occupied in ministering to my spirit form 
 that stood upright before them. They were anxious to 
 perform aright the new and mournful duties that now 
 devolved upon them in the natural sphere, and that 
 desire caused them to fulfil the use that now pertained 
 to them,* that of tending an immortal spirit, on his 
 
 * This seems probable, as the liberated spirit would be able to see 
 the spirits of his attendants, and, as will be explained in the chapter 
 
146 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 first entrance upon that life which is but one step re- 
 moved above nature. 
 
 • I have just said that I did not know I had left the 
 world, and yet I beheld my corpse stretched on the bed 
 I had lain and suffered on. I have not made that state- 
 ment without a purpose, being desirous to show that 
 the one condition is not incompatible with the other. 
 It is so to the spirit in the flesh, but not to the spirit 
 out of it, for both the one and the other are in a per- 
 fectly normal condition for the time being, and there- 
 fore that which would be abnormal to the one is 
 perfectly normal to the other, and a normal or usual 
 state of mind will not surprise or cause extraordinary 
 emotion to the person experiencing it. Thus it would 
 cause a spirit very great astonishment, should he be 
 suddenly brought back into nature ; he would not com- 
 prehend many things that he saw, and he would wonder 
 why he did not behold those objects that are purely 
 spiritual which he had been accustomed to in the world 
 of spirit. He would find himself in a totally abnormal 
 condition. And so if a person in the flesh be elevated 
 into the spiritual regions, he is much astonished at the 
 objects he there beholds ; he also is in an abnormal, or 
 extraordinary state of mental perception. But, when a 
 spirit has left the natural frame, then is spirit life with 
 
 on Correspondence, their wish to do all they could for him would place 
 their spirits in the attitude of doing kind offices for his spiritual form. 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 147 
 
 all its concomitants a perfectly homogeneous existence, 
 and he is not aware that he has ever dwelt in any other 
 sphere. So when I beheld my natural frame delicately 
 tended, I found that I myself — my spirit — was provided 
 for as to all my requirements, and by the same persons 
 with whom I had been accustomed to associate during 
 my life in the world. And it being according to divine 
 appointment that both good offices should be simul- 
 taneously performed, all appeared to my new-born spirit 
 perceptions to be perfectly harmonious and congenial. 
 .... Spirit life dawns upon the senses of mankind, not 
 with surprise, nor necessarily with pleasure to the good, 
 nor pain to the unheavenly, but it does so to every grade 
 of human beings with a perfectly normal perception 
 of all its realities and in all its varieties of aspect ; 
 for it is the life we have all along been recipient of, and 
 it is just as natural for us to become suddenly conscious 
 of it as it is for the infant to be ushered into the 
 material world without consciously experiencing any 
 unusual degree of excitement from the occurrence. 
 The outward consciousness of both the one and the 
 other is gradually de^loped, the experience of each in- 
 dividual varying, just as at the birth of the soul into 
 its first garb or covering.' 
 
 The next experience is slightly different. 
 
 l2 
 
148 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 THE PROCESS OF DEATH. 
 
 ' The first lesson, I think, every spirit learns, is one in 
 reference to death. The general impression is, that 
 persons suffer intensely in their last moments, and we 
 hear much of "the agonies of death." These how- 
 ever are generally imaginary, and in most cases there 
 is little or no consciousness of suffering; even when 
 there is a struggle, it is only an effort, painless in its 
 character, of the spirit to burst the bonds that have 
 bound it to the physical body : this struggle may 
 create contortions of the body, but in most cases all 
 consciousness of pain has passed away. This was my 
 own experience, and I have been told by many others 
 that it was theirs. I experienced but very little suffer- 
 ing during the last few days of my life, though at first 
 there were struggles, and my features were distorted ; 
 but I learned, after my spirit had burst its barriers 
 and was freed from its connection with the external 
 body, that these were produced by it in its attempt to 
 sever this connection, which in all^ cases is more or less 
 difficult; the vital points of contact being suddenly 
 broken by disease, the union in other portions of the 
 system is necessarily severed with violence, but, as far 
 as I have learned, without consciousness of pain. 
 Like many others, I found that I was unable to 
 leave the form at once. I could feel myself gradually 
 
TIIE SPIRITUAL BODY. 149 
 
 raised from my body, and in a dreamy, half-conscious 
 state. It seemed as though I was not a united being 
 — that I was separated into parts, and yet despite 
 of this there seemed to be an indissoluble connect- 
 ing link. My spirit was freed a short time, after 
 the organs of my physical body had entirely ceased 
 to perform their functions. My spiritual form was 
 then united into one, and I was raised a short 
 distance above the body, standing over it by what 
 power I was unable to tell. I could see those who 
 were in the room around me, and knew by what was 
 going on that a considerable time must have elapsed 
 since dissolution had taken place, and I presume I 
 must have been for a time unconscious ; and this I find 
 is a common experience, not, however, universal. As 
 consciousness returned to me, the scenes of my whole 
 life seemed to move before me like a panorama ; every 
 act seemed as though it were drawn in life size and was 
 really present : it was all there, down to the closing 
 scenes. So rapidly did it pass, that I had little time 
 for reflection. I seemed to be in a whirlpool of ex- 
 citement ; and then, just as suddenly as this panorama 
 had been presented, it was withdrawn, and I was left 
 without a thought of the past or future to contemplate 
 my present condition. I looked around me, and I 
 thought, if there is a possibility of spirits (for I seemed 
 half-conscious now that I was a spirit) manifesting 
 themselves to those still in the form, how gladly would 
 
150 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 I now do so, and thereby inform my friends and others 
 of my condition, at least as far as I understood it 
 myself, which I confess was not very far. Everything 
 seemed to be in a whirl of motion ; scarcely had one 
 desire come, before another was presented. I said to 
 myself, "Death is not so bad a thing after all, and I 
 should like to see what that country is that I am going 
 to, if I am a spirit." 
 
 ' I had heard the spiritualists say that the newly-born 
 spirits were always received in the arms, and wel- 
 comed by kind and loving guardian spirits; finding 
 none around me, for I had seen no spirit out of form 
 yet, I concluded this was not true. Scarcely had this 
 thought passed through my mind, when two, with 
 whom I was unacquainted, but toward whom I was 
 attracted, appeared before me. They were men of 
 intelligence, but like myself, had given no special 
 attention to the higher principles of spirituality; they 
 knew my name, although I did not reveal it, and they 
 shook hands with me in a hail-fellow-well-met sort of 
 way, that was very pleasant to me. They then con- 
 ducted me from the room where I had died, and in 
 which I had remained until this time. Everything 
 around me seemed shadowy, yet through these shadows 
 they conducted me to a place where there were a 
 number of spirits assembled ; these had been in spirit- 
 life a longer time than I had. I might mention the 
 names of some of these, but I prefer not to do so now. 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 151 
 
 * I remained in conversation with these spirits for some 
 time, and then, without knowing why or how, I was 
 attracted back to the place in which my spirit had 
 separated itself from the form. I then found that I 
 must have been in their company much longer than I 
 supposed, as, contrary to the experience of many whom 
 I have since met, I did not attend my own funeral ; and 
 I would here remark, that it is generally gratifying to a 
 spirit to do this, and where the body can be kept for 
 some time, they gladly embrace the opportunity of at- 
 tending on this ceremony, and listening to and aiding 
 those who officiate on such occasions.' * 
 
 As to show the common truth pervading all these 
 descriptions, with the variety of imagery according to 
 the character of both spirit and medium, a genuine 
 collection of statements made either through clairvoy- 
 ants or mediums is valuable, I add one more account by 
 a spirit, through the writing of a child, of the f entrance 
 into life.' 
 
 * When a mortal dies, some friendly spirit enters the 
 room and strews rose-leaves over the floor and the 
 body. They then take a tiny silver bell, and ring it, 
 which is the signal for the spirit to come out of the 
 
 body. When I came away, rang one of these tiny 
 
 bells. It was so gentle that I came directly to sense. 
 
 * A Narrative of the Experience of Horace Abraham Ackley, M.D., 
 late of Cleveland, Ohio, since his entrance into Spirit-life. 
 
152 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 I rose up and stood by the window. The smell of rose- 
 buds made the room like paradise. The golden light 
 was shining on the wall, and something seemed to call 
 me. I turned, and it seemed as if a gulf were opening 
 at my feet, and then I saw before me a dark thing like 
 a shadow. Something told me it had been myself, and 
 then came and took me away.' 
 
 Mr. Haddock's seeress often saw persons in the body 
 as shadows, while those in the spirit-form appeared 
 to her. With respect to the bell and the rose-leaves, 
 the reason of their being used in the description will 
 appear in the chapter on correspondence. I have often 
 seen bells drawn or written of by mediums, and have 
 always found a bell to be a symbol of spiritual com- 
 munication, or revelation. Rose-leaves and buds typify 
 affectionate feelings. The spirit who wrote had a loving 
 welcome to its new home. 
 
 A young friend of my own, while in a clairvoyante 
 state, was questioned on the process of death. The 
 following vision was presented to her. It must be 
 remembered that this was not a description of any 
 departure taking place at the time. It was rather an 
 illustrative picture, imaged forth in the forms familiar 
 to the seer's mind. 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 153 
 
 VISION, SEEN JANUARY 11, 1859. 
 
 6 1 said I saw a glorious sunset. It is wonderful 
 indeed ! This sunset is shown me as a type of earthly 
 life. 
 
 ( Across the glowing sky hastens a group of angels. 
 What are they bearing along with them ? Ah, I see 
 now. They carry a golden cross, a golden cup, and a 
 lily crown. How beautiful are those angels ! but they 
 hasten rapidly away. I am going with them. I see 
 where they are going. It is towards the earth, where it 
 is cold and twilight. They are gone to comfort a little 
 child — a little pale, very pale child. The child is 
 about to die. Yes, it is for this child that the angels 
 have brought these glorious gifts of the cross, the cup. 
 and the lily crown. Ah, how pale is the little child ! 
 Now it is dying ! But how can I describe the wonder- 
 ful process of death ? It is too interior to be described, 
 and should be witnessed. An angel has taken the 
 child, and is drawing forth the internal of the child into 
 the external. The old external child will die, but the 
 new child will be drawn forth, and becomes the ex- 
 ternal. The mode of this is more wonderful than can 
 be conceived. The angel draws forth, as with a magnet, 
 the various particles of the child, and attracts them into 
 a new form. First of all, as by a wonderful music, all 
 the particles of hearing are drawn forth. Later on, the 
 
154 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 particles of vision, and then the child will behold as 
 well as hear. It is most wonderful ! ' 
 
 All accounts of death-beds are full of interest, but it 
 is very seldom that the different stages of the process 
 are so well marked as to render them apparent to 
 bystanders ; and the sorrow of friends, whose eyes are 
 bent on the mortal coil and blind to the beautiful work 
 which is going on as the case of clay is deserted, only 
 throws a gloomy horror over the scene. In the next 
 chapter I shall try to gather a few out of the numberless 
 records of * last words ' and looks which strength eD the 
 conjecture, that the spirit often has a glimpse of the 
 promised land before it is free to pass the barrier. 
 A good collection of well-authenticated death -bed 
 memoirs, with notes of the nature of the disease; its 
 duration, and the mental and physical state of the dying- 
 person, would be a valuable contribution to psychical 
 knowledge. 
 
 The last testimony, before we refer to the authority 
 of Scripture, will be furnished by Swedenborg, whose 
 writings I quote as I would those of Socrates, not 
 putting implicit faith in the revelations of either. 
 Both were philosophers, though in different lines of 
 wisdom, and both, Swedenborg preeminently, gifted 
 seers. Like other seers, they received spiritual truths 
 under the imagery with which their brains were familiar, 
 and thus were liable to fall into what to other minds 
 might seem partial error. For every human being has 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 155 
 
 his own sphere of spiritual perception, which is to him 
 the spiritual world. Into this sphere he comes when- 
 ever, by the shutting of the outer material sense, the 
 internal life is entered. And spirits sympathising 
 with the seer can communicate their thoughts through 
 his brain, so the ideas and images presented in his 
 spiritual state are what he will describe and possibly 
 believe to be absolute truths. 
 
 This remark should be kept in mind, and applied to 
 each of the seers quoted, in explanation of their 
 resemblances and differences. The more highly in- 
 formed the seer, the nobler and truer will be the 
 symbolism his mind can offer to the spirits' teaching. 
 And a philosopher who only ceased his scientific enquiries 
 when his perceptions were turned inwards on a world 
 above and beyond that explored by the senses, could 
 not fail of bringing to the new region a rich apparatus 
 of acquired facts and well-observed objects. As much 
 of literal truth, therefore, as can come from the 
 spiritual into the material world may be looked for 
 in the visions and narrations of Swedenborg, who gives 
 as follows : — 
 
 THE PROCESS OF DYING RESURRECTION. 
 
 'When the body is no longer able to perform its 
 functions in the natural world, corresponding to the 
 thoughts and affections of its spirit which it has from 
 
156 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 the spiritual world, then man is said to die. This takes 
 place when the respiratory motions of the lungs and 
 the systolic motions of the heart cease ; but still man 
 does not die, but is only separated from the corporeal 
 part which was of use to him in the world: for man 
 himself lives. It is said man himself lives, because 
 man is not man from the body, but from the spirit, 
 since the spirit thinks in man, and thought with affec- 
 tion makes man. Hence, it is evident that man when he 
 dies, only passes from one world into another. Hence 
 it is that death,* in the word in its internal sense, 
 signifies resurrection and continuation of life. The 
 inmost communication of the spirit is with the respira- 
 tion and the motion of the heart; its thought with 
 the respiration and the affection, which is of love, with 
 the heart ; wherefore, when these two motions cease in 
 the body, there is immediately a separation. Those 
 two motions, namely, the respiratory motion of the 
 lungs, and the systolic motion of the heart, are the 
 very bonds, which being broken the spirit is left to it- 
 self, and the body being thus left without the life of its 
 spirit, grows cold and putrefies. That the inmost 
 communication of the spirit of man is with the respira- 
 tion and with the heart, is because all the vital motions 
 thence depend, not only in general, but also in every 
 part. The spirit of man after the separation remains a 
 
 * A confirmation of this will be found further on, in the frequent 
 spiritual predictions of death. 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 157 
 
 little while in the body, but not longer than till the 
 total cessation of the heart's action, which takes place 
 with variety, according to the state of the disease of 
 which man dies ; for the motion of the heart with 
 some continues a long while, and with some not long. 
 As soon as this motion ceases, the man is resuscitated, 
 but this is done by the Lord alone. By resuscitation 
 is meant the drawing forth of the spirit of man from 
 the body, and its introduction into the spiritual world, 
 which is commonly called resurrection. The reason 
 why the spirit of man is not separated from the body 
 before the motion of the heart has ceased, is, because 
 the heart corresponds to affection, which is of love, 
 which is the very life of man, for from love everyone 
 has vital heat ; wherefore, as long as this conjunction 
 continues, so long there is correspondence, and thence 
 the life of the spirit in the body. How resuscitation 
 is effected has not only been told me, but also shown 
 by living experience. The experiment itself was made 
 with me, in order that I might fully know how it was 
 done. I was brought into a state of insensibility as to 
 the bodily senses, thus almost into the state of the dying; 
 yet the interior life, with thought, remaining entire, so 
 that I perceived and retained in memory the things which 
 occurred, and which occur to those who are resuscitated 
 from the dead. I perceived that the respiration of the 
 body was almost taken away ; the interior respiration, 
 which is of the spirit, remaining, conjoined with a slight 
 
158 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 and tacit respiration of the body. Then there was first 
 given communication as to the pulse of the heart with 
 the celestial kingdom, since that kingdom corresponds 
 to the heart with man. Angels thence were also seen, 
 some at a distance, and two near the head, at which they 
 were seated. Thence all proper affection was taken, 
 but still there remained thought and perception. I was 
 in this state for some hours. The spirits then who were 
 around me removed themselves, supposing that I was 
 dead. There was also perceived an aromatic odour,* as 
 of an embalmed corpse, for when the celestial angels 
 are present, then what is cadaverous is perceived as 
 aromatic; and spirits perceive this; they cannot approach. 
 Thus also evil spirits are kept away from the spirit of 
 man, when he is first introduced into eternal life. The 
 angels who were seated at the head were silent, only 
 communicating their thoughts with mine; and when 
 these are received, the angels know that the spirit of 
 man is in such a state that it can be drawn forth from 
 the body. The communication of their thoughts was 
 made by looking into my face, for thus communication 
 of the thoughts is made in heaven. Because thought 
 and perception remained with me, in order that I might 
 know and remember how resuscitation is effected, I per- 
 ceived that those angels first enquired what my thought 
 was, whether it was like the thought of those who die, 
 
 * This seems to justify many stories of sweet odours near the death 
 beds of the good. 
 
TIIE SPIRITUAL BODY. 159 
 
 which is usually about eternal life ; and that they wished 
 to keep my mind in that thought. It was afterwards 
 said that the spirit of man is held in its last thought 
 when the body expires, until it returns to the thoughts 
 which are from its general or ruling affection in this 
 world. Especially it was given to perceive, and also to 
 feel, that there was a drawing, and, as it were, a pulling 
 out of the interiors of my mind, thus of my spirit, from 
 the body ; and it was said that this was from the Lord, 
 and that hence is resurrection. When the celestial 
 angels are with a resuscitated person, they do not leave 
 him, because they love everyone ; but when the spirit 
 is such that he can no longer be in company with the 
 celestial angels, he desires to depart from them; and 
 when this is the case, angels come from the Lord's spi- 
 ritual kingdom, by whom is given to him the use of 
 light ; for before he saw nothing, he only thought. It 
 was also shown how this is done : those angels seem, as 
 it were, to roll off the coat of the left eye towards the 
 septum of the nose, that the eye might be opened and 
 be enabled to see. The spirit does not perceive other- 
 wise than that it is so done, but it is an appearance. 
 When the coat seems to have been rolled off, there 
 appears something lucid but obscure, as when a man, 
 on first awakening, looks through the eye- lashes. This 
 obscure lucidity appeared to me of a heavenly colour, 
 but afterwards it was said that this takes place with 
 variety. Afterwards something is felt to be rolled off 
 
160 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 softly from the face, and when this is done, spiritual 
 thought is induced. That rolling off from the face is 
 likewise an appearance, for by it is represented that he 
 comes from natural thought into spiritual thought. 
 The angels are extremely cautious lest any idea should 
 come from the resuscitated person but what savours of 
 love. They then tell him that he is a spirit.'* 
 
 The 'appearances' spoken of by Swedenborg are 
 correspondential : of this more will be said presently. 
 The 'bell' and the 'rose-leaves' are also symbols. 
 And by comparing the imagery in these visions and 
 descriptions we shall find a common idea in all, 
 underlying the symbolisation, which receives its form 
 according to the mind of the recipient. In the vision 
 (p. 153), the angel draws forth, as by a wonderful 
 music, the interior of the child, and the sense of hearing 
 is first developed. Hearing and sound, all the mediums 
 tell us, correspond to the affection of love, which is 
 characteristic of the celestial kingdom ; light and sight, 
 to knowledge, and to the lower or spiritual degree. 
 Thus the clairvoyant's vision and Swedenborg's de- 
 scription are accordant as to the order in which 
 spiritual perceptions are opened. And the spirit who 
 smelt the rose-leaves and heard the silver bell of the 
 welcoming angel was born into a loving region before 
 his spiritual sight was opened. 
 
 * Heaven and Hell, pp. 445-450. 
 
TIIE SPIRITUAL BODY. 161 
 
 Turning to the natural aspect of the subject. The 
 two seeresses whose descriptions of body, soul, and spirit 
 agree so entirely, teach us 'that the spirit, which is 
 divine in its nature, goes first, and the soul and nerve- 
 spirit — by the combination of which (if they are not 
 different degrees of the same) animal and organic life 
 is sustained — follow. In the order indicated, that 
 which is less material, the spirit, is first disengaged. 
 This is in accordance with Swedenborg's celestial 
 degree. Then comes the soul with its atmosphere of 
 4 nerve-spirit.' This, we are told, being intimately 
 united with the body, does not quit it till after appa- 
 rent death, being gradually drawn away. Bichat says 
 that animal life ceases first, organic life afterwards. 
 All agree that the elements leave in the order of their 
 independence of the material substance : and thus the 
 symbolic statements of the spirit through a medium, 
 the description of the clairvoyants, and the observations 
 of the physiologist, confirm each other. After all, we 
 are led back to the old exploded idea of spirit, soul, 
 and body. How firmly this division was believed in by 
 early writers may be seen in a well-compiled little 
 volume, by Greorge Bush, Professor of Hebrew in New 
 York University. The book is entitled : The Soul, or 
 an Enquiry into Scriptural Psychology, as developed 
 by the use of the terms Soul, Spirit, Life, &c, viewed 
 in its bearing on the doctrine of the Resurrection. 
 The following extract is to the purpose : — 
 
162 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 'This distinction (into spirit, soul, and body) was 
 clearly recognised in the ancient philosophies. The 
 three-parted hypostases of body, spirit, and soul, was 
 familiar even among the fathers of the Christian 
 Church, of whom no one is more explicit than 
 Irenseus : " There are three, of which the perfect man 
 consists, flesh, soul, spirit; the one, the spirit, giving 
 figure; the other, flesh, being formed. That, indeed, 
 which is between these two is the soul, which some- 
 times following the spirit is raised by it; and some- 
 times consenting to the flesh, falls into earthly lusts." * 
 
 6 Origen speaks with equal distinctness to the same 
 effect : — 
 
 c " There is a three-fold partition of man, the body or 
 flesh, the lowest part of our nature, on which the old 
 serpent by original sin inscribed the law of sin, and by 
 which we are tempted to vile things, and as oft as we 
 are overcome by temptation are joined fast to the devil. 
 The spirit, by which we express the likeness of the 
 divine nature, in which the Creator, from the archetype 
 of His own mind, engraved the eternal law of the 
 honest by his own fingers, and by which we are firmly 
 conjoined to Him, and made one with Him ; and then 
 the soul, intermediate between these two, and which, as 
 in a factious commonwealth, cannot but join with one or 
 
 * Irenseus, lib. v. c. i. I give a translation rather more literal than 
 that of Professor Bush. 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 163 
 
 other of the former parties, being solicited this way and 
 that, and having liberty as to which it will adhere. If 
 it renounce the flesh and join with the spirit, it will 
 itself become spiritual : but if it cast itself down to the 
 desires of the flesh, it will itself degenerate into the body." 
 
 6 .... In the Alexandrian philosophy in particular, 
 which favoured the Pythagorean and Platonic, the 
 distinction above mentioned is very plainly recognised, 
 as they denominated the ttvsv/jlo, as the rational soul 
 (vous, to \oyucov mind, and the yvxrj, sensitive soul, to 
 s7ri,0v/jLr)TLK6v, that which desires or lusts). Josephus 
 also gives us intimations to the same effect. Thus, 
 in his account of the creation he says (lib. i. c. i.), " Grod 
 took the dust from the ground and formed man, and 
 inserted in him a spirit and a soul." Thus, too, in the 
 apocryphal book of Wisdom (chap. xv. 11), "Foras- 
 much as he knew not his Maker, and Him that inspired 
 into him an active soul, and that breathed into him a 
 living spirit." 
 
 ■ In the book of Enoch, likewise apocryphal, we 
 find mention made of ra irvsvfiaja twv ^rv^wv tcov 
 airoOavopTwv avQpammv, the spirits of the souls of 
 dead men; and again, tcl irvsv^iara ra i/ciropevofjLsva 
 curb rfjs tyvyfis clvt&v q)9 sk rrjs aapK09, spirits going 
 forth from their soul as from the flesh. For ourselves 
 (says Dr. Bush), we read in these extracts intimations of 
 a great psychological fact, viz. that the irvsvpa is to 
 the ^uxVi the spirit to the soul, what the soul is to the 
 
 M 2 
 
164 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 body. The soul is a kind of involucrum to the spirit, 
 what Plato calls the siBcoXov, image, of the spirit. The 
 yjrvxv is the spiritual body or body of the spirit, so- 
 called, however, not as denoting its true ontological 
 nature, which is psychical (?), but rather its uses as 
 constituting the form through which the affections of 
 the spirit manifest themselves. .... As it is through 
 the gross material body that the soul manifests itself in 
 the present world, so we are warranted in believing that 
 it is through the soul that the spirit manifests itself in 
 the other world ; in other words, it performs for the 
 spirit the office of a body, and is consequently so 
 termed.' * 
 
 The last authority I shall bring forward is that of 
 the Apostle Paul. To professing literal Christians his 
 assertion may be held sufficient even without all the 
 confirmation brought from other sources, while that- 
 living confirmation will show to learned readers that 
 the Apostle taught a real doctrine, an absolute fact, 
 unadulterated by any Greek philosophy or popular 
 superstition. Unbelievers, too, may learn from real 
 occurrences leading up to those spiritual truths which 
 are the beginning and end of Scripture teaching, that 
 the simple and grand assertions of Holy "Writ are all in 
 harmony with the order of creation. 
 
 St. Paul (1 Cor. xv.) gives a clearer and more 
 
 * Bush, The Sold, pp. 91-93. 
 
THE SPIEITUAL BODY. 165 
 
 concise description of the process of death than has 
 been received from any seer or philosopher; but a 
 literal translation from the Greek is needed to make 
 this apparent. The words of our received translation 
 are not quite so specific as those of the original, and 
 the introduction of italics, to supply the supposed 
 sense in the common version, leads to a less defined 
 meaning than that of the writer. The following is slightly 
 varied from the authorised version. We must read it 
 with the idea of the natural resurrection that has 
 been described : — 
 
 Corinthians xv. 35-57. 
 
 35 But some will say, How are the dead raised, 
 and with what body do they come ? 
 
 36 Oh foolish one! That which thou sowest is not 
 quickened, except it die. 
 
 37 And what thou sowest, thou dost not sow the 
 body that is to come, but bare grain, perhaps wheat, or 
 any other grain. 
 
 38 But God gives it a body according as He will, 
 and to each of the seeds its own body. 
 
 39 All flesh is not the same : but one flesh of men, 
 another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, another of 
 birds. 
 
 40 And heavenly bodies, and earthly bodies; but 
 the glory of the heavenly is one, and the glory of the 
 earthly is another. 
 
166 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 41 One glory of the sun, and another glory of the 
 moon, and another glory of stars, for star differeth 
 from star in glory. 
 
 42 #o also the resurrection (avdorao-is, standing up) 
 of the dead. It is sown in corruption ; it is raised in 
 incorruption. 
 
 43 It is sown in dishonour ; it is raised in glory. 
 It is sown in weakness ; it is raised in power, 
 
 44 It is sown a soul body, it is raised a spiritual 
 body. There is a soul body, and there is a spiritual 
 body. 
 
 4:5 So it is written, The first human Adam became 
 a living soul, the last Adam a vivifying spirit. 
 
 46 But not the spiritual first, but the soulish; then 
 the spiritual. 
 
 47 The first man from earth, earthy (clayey) : the 
 second man the heavenly. 
 
 48 Like to earthly material are the earthly, and 
 like to that which is heavenly (in its nature) are the 
 heavenly. 
 
 49 And as we have borne the image of the earthly, 
 we shall bear also the image of the heavenly. 
 
 50 But I say this brethren, that flesh and blood are 
 not able to inherit the kingdom of God, nor does decay 
 inherit incorruption. 
 
 51 Behold, I explain to you a mystery. All indeed 
 will not sleep, but all voill be changed. 
 
 52 In an instant, in the twinkling of an eye, at 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 167 
 
 the last trumpet: for the trumpet will sound, and 
 the dead will rise incorruptible, and we shall be 
 changed, 
 
 53 For it must be that this corruptible clothe itself 
 in incorruption, and this mortal clothe itself in that 
 which cannot die. 
 
 54 But when this corruptible has put on incorrup- 
 tion, and this mortal has put on immortality, then is 
 fulfilled the written word, Death is absorbed (or ended) 
 
 n victory. 
 
 55 WJiere is thy sting, Death f Where is thy vic- 
 tory, Hades ? 
 
 56 The sting of Death is sin, and the power of sin 
 the law (the Jewish law). 
 
 57 But thank God, who giveth us victory through 
 our Lord Jesus Christ. 
 
 Some words in the above have been slightly altered, 
 only because the ear, accustomed to attach a definite 
 meaning to a series of phrases, receives the same with 
 difficulty in a new and partly different sense. Some 
 have been changed in order to give what seems to me 
 a more faithful rendering of St. Paul's meaning. Of 
 these last, the most important is the word psychical or 
 soulish, used instead of natural. It would be tedious 
 if I were to attempt to go into details as to which 
 versions favoured this or the other reading. I will 
 only say that the word translated animal is an adjective 
 
168 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 formed from Psyche, which word bears the meaning 
 soul, and no other, in every Greek writing. The 
 rendering of this word by natural does not convey 
 its full meaning. It has sometimes been translated 
 ' animal/ but that gives rather its lower than its higher 
 import. A Grerman translator of the Vulgate has re- 
 ceived this idea in full, and has given for it the word 
 ' thierische ' (like the beast). 
 
 Verse 44, ' It is sown,' &c, implies that a process 
 goes on something like that with seed which is not put 
 into the ground to grow up at some uncertain and far 
 distant future, but as having its life continued and 
 developed from the parent plant. It does not appear 
 that, by the analogy of sowing, Paul meant the burial 
 of our bodies, though their being laid in the ground 
 has favoured this notion. The seed of which he speaks 
 in his comparison is the living spirit given, the ' breath 
 of life ' breathed into the psychical body for its uses in 
 the world. The psychical, or soul body, is our present 
 body, which is animated by a soul : this is man as he is 
 here. The spiritual is the next body, animated by a 
 spirit, so, the Apostle says, 'there are (in man) the 
 soul body and the spirit body' — verse 45. In the 
 quotation which follows, 'The first human {avdpayrros) 
 Adam was made/ &c, the word translated * was made ' 
 should be ' became,' or 'passed into,' a living soul — the 
 Greek word always implying transition, whereas ' was 
 made ' conveys a vague idea of original formation, the 
 
TIIE SPIRITUAL BODY. 169 
 
 carrying on of which application to the second Adam 
 falsifies the whole meaning. St. Paul completes his 
 answer to the question, ' How are the dead raised, and 
 with what body do they come?' by saying (verse 46) 
 that the soul life is first developed, the spiritual after- 
 wards, as the soul takes that place in the spirit man 
 which the material body had held in the mortal being 
 before death. 
 
 In verse 47, the different natures of the two bodies 
 are recognised : the first, the man in this world, formed 
 of the same elements as the material creation; the 
 second, the spiritual man, being of heavenly elements. 
 I have here omitted ' the Lord from heaven,' because it 
 is not found in the most authentic manuscripts. It is 
 omitted by Lachmann, the German editor, whose 
 edition includes every careful emendation; and the 
 supposed reference to the Saviour is not required in this 
 place — for the work of the Lord, in the risen and 
 rising man, is fully treated of in other parts of the 
 chapter. The verses, from 35 to 53 inclusive, relate 
 entirely to the process of putting off the perishing 
 material, and being clothed in that inner body whose 
 heavenward developement during our earthly existence 
 depends on purity of aim and obedience to the will of 
 God. One who has low, sensual, earthly desires, has 
 for his new body that soul which has been materialised 
 and rendered akin to earth, while one who by prayer 
 and love of the Highest has united his spirit with 
 
170 FEOM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 the Holy Spirit of the Lord, has the refined and 
 spiritualised soul for his new investiture. 
 
 The Apostle winds up by saying that the ' hidden 
 thing,' or ' secret,' which he has told them is, that at the 
 end of this earthly life we do not go into a long sleep, 
 but are changed, and that the change takes place at 
 once ; i. e. at the time when the body dies. 
 
 The destination of the spirit and the work of the 
 Lord is described earlier, and at the end of the chapter. 
 1 Christ is risen from the dead, and become the first-fruits 
 of them that slept.' By the word translated 'first- 
 fruits,' is not meant the earliest fruit or produce, but 
 an offering set apart as especially belonging to God, as 
 were the first-fruits among the Jews. Those who 
 'slept' had not risen from 'Hades,' their first state 
 after death, for the victory over Hades was not gained. 
 It needed the Word * made flesh to re-open the channel 
 for the descent of the Holy Spirit ; in other words, to 
 open the kingdom of heaven. 
 
 * For as in Adam, or in the natural man (the body), 
 all die, so in Christ (the spirit") shall all be made alive. 
 But Christ the first-fruits (first returned to the Source 
 of Life), afterwards they that belong to Christ at His 
 coming, or in His presence.' 
 
 * Then cometh the end, when He shall have delivered 
 up the kingdom to Grod, even the Father, when He 
 
 * The Word, or Logos, will be spoken of hereafter, in the chapter on 
 Scripture. 
 
TITE SPIRITUAL BODY. 171 
 
 shall have put down all rule, and authority, and power. 
 For He must rule till He have put all enemies under 
 His feet.' 
 
 1 The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.' 
 
 This last death refers to death in its largest sense, 
 the death of the soul. ( Fear not,' our Saviour says, ' him 
 that can kill the body.' As a necessary consequence of 
 the continued rejgn of Christ, sin will disappear, and 
 the soul, freed from its impurities, will no longer be 
 drawn downward towards its material covering, but 
 rise, at once spiritualised and gaining more and more 
 vitality as it ascends to the Pure Fountain and 
 Source of Life. 
 
 If before writing the foregoing paraphrase I had seen 
 1 Stanley's Commentary on the Epistles of St. Paul to 
 the Corinthians,' the chapter would have been given 
 in Dr. Stanley's words. I have however let it remain, 
 being in substance the same as the version of that 
 excellent writer, to whose whole work I refer my 
 readers. 
 
 Of verse 40, Dr. Stanley says of heavenly bodies : 
 1 In the first instance, he (Paul) means the angels.' 
 Dr. Stanley omits the word ' Lord ' in verse 47, follow- 
 ing, as I have done here, the Greek of Lachmann. His 
 note on verse 48 is : — 
 
 ( The earthy, ol ypl KO h men i n their mortal state ; 
 the heavenly, ol eirovpavioi, Christians after the resur- 
 rection.' 
 
172 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 Verse 52, ( Behold I show you a mystery/ is thus 
 paraphrased : — e Behold, look my words full in the 
 face, they contain a truth which we are slow to recognise, 
 but which is true notwithstanding.' Of all the various 
 readings of this perplexed passage (Stanley says), that 
 of the received text, as contained in the five MSS. 
 he enumerates, is the best. ' We shall all of us not die 
 but be changed.' . . . ' Although it is by no means 
 certain that all of us, (i. e. myself and the Corin- 
 thians) shall die, yet it is certain that we shall all 
 be changed. The passage is personal to himself and 
 his readers, and is written in the same expectation 
 as that expressed in the parallel passages . . . that 
 the end of all things would take place in that gene- 
 ration.'* 
 
 I believe that St. Paul's meaning was much more 
 simple. He wrote to those who believed death to be 
 an endless sleep ; he tells them that he will make 
 clear to them what has been a mystery, namely, that 
 the common lot and apparent end of humanity is not 
 extinction, but change of state. 
 
 I have now brought together evidence from many 
 sources, of the fact that the end of earth life is also the 
 entrance into the spiritual state, or the resurrection. 
 And I think it will be found on examination that every 
 Scripture expression which seems to imply an in- 
 
 * Stanley's Commentary, p. 333. 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 173 
 
 tervening state of unconsciousness or sleep of the souls 
 is really figurative. When the day of judgment is 
 described, the inhabitants of the world are spoken of 
 as sheep and goats. We know that the souls passing 
 through the judgment are not sheep and goats, therefore 
 the same allegorical or figurative form which cannot be 
 denied to one part of our Lord's parable must be ex- 
 tended to the rest. Indeed, St. Paul's expressions of c in 
 a moment, in the twinkling of an eye,' seem meant 
 to convey the idea that the change is not to be de- 
 ferred for an indefinite time after death, but takes 
 place at once. The f trumpet ' of the angel probably 
 conveys the same truth as the ' bell ' of the receiving 
 spirit. 
 
 If further proof is wanted that the change is effected 
 at once and at the time of death, we shall find it in the 
 words of Christ, when He speaks of ' the Grod of 
 Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who is not the Grod of the 
 dead, but of the living,' implying that the Patriarchs 
 so often quoted by the Jews are living and conscious 
 beings. 
 
 It has also been my aim to show that the spiritual 
 body, or the soul, being an organisation embodying all 
 those forces whose deposit is the material form, issues 
 from its shell carrying with it into the next state all 
 the energies it possessed in this, unincumbered by 
 the trammels of the flesh. That among the vital 
 elements which in ever}^ shade and degree of refinement 
 
174 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 exist in every human being, is the nervous force, or the 
 agency used in mesmerism, and that all the spiritual 
 manifestations are thereby produced ; the spirits most 
 nearly allied to matter acting most easily on matter and 
 on gross outward natures, while those of a higher degree 
 impress the finer and more internal portions of the 
 brain, and through them the soul. In the chapter on 
 Inspiration we must consider the highest action of the 
 highest influence, that on the most internal spirit, by 
 the Holy Spirit of Grod. 
 
 The power of imparting vital or magnetic influence 
 possessed by spirits seems to be referred to by St. Paul, 
 when he says, * The second heavenly man is a life- 
 giving spirit.' 
 
 Many instances might have been brought together, 
 showing how a healing influence like that of an earthly 
 mesmerism has been often felt in illness, procuring rest 
 and relieving pain. I have drawn so largely on my 
 readers' capacity for belief even while confining myself 
 to facts in illustration of the usual spiritual pheno- 
 mena, that I will not go further ; but if ancient tra- 
 dition and modern spiritual communications are to be 
 trusted, every spirit, in or out of the flesh, exercises an 
 influence for good or evil, for health or disease, on those 
 spirits whose qualities fit them to imbibe that in- 
 fluence. From the beings whose wretched lives and 
 mischievous statements evince the depravity of their 
 nature comes a hurtful and weakening magnetism, 
 
THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 175 
 
 while from the loving friend who, passed away, 
 tries to pour gladness into the sorrowing soul by an 
 assurance of his presence and happiness from higher 
 and still higher sources, through angels and archangels, 
 streams the heavenly life, even from the Sun of 
 Eighteousness about to rise with healing on His wings. 
 
176 
 
 CHAPTEE X. 
 
 DAYBREAK. 
 
 fTlHE apparent recognition by the dying of those who 
 -■- have gone before, is a common and notorious fact. 
 So very numerous, indeed, are instances of this kind, 
 that each reader will probably be able to recall to 
 his own mind incidents more convincing and better 
 adapted to support my other assertions than a large 
 collection of accounts received from strangers. I will, 
 therefore, only mention a very few instances in illus- 
 tration of all that has been, and remains to be, said 
 on the process of death and the entrance into another 
 state. 
 
 A very complete description of the feelings of a 
 dying person is given in a letter from Admiral (then 
 Captain) Beaufort, to Dr. Wollaston. This may be 
 found, extracted from the autobiography of Sir John 
 Barrow, in Haddock's Somnolism and Psycheism, to 
 which work I have before referred, and to which I 
 am indebted for more than one interesting extract. 
 
 ' Many years ago, when I was a youngster on board 
 
DAYBKEAK. 177 
 
 one of His Majesty's ships in Portsmouth harbour, 
 after sculling about in a very small boat, I was en- 
 deavouring to fasten her alongside the ship to one of 
 the scuttlings ; in foolish eagerness I stepped upon the 
 gunwale ; the boat of course upset, and I fell into the 
 water, and, not knowing how to swim, all my efforts 
 to lay hold either of the boat or the floating sculls 
 were fruitless. The transaction had not been observed 
 by the sentinel on the gangway, and, therefore, it was 
 not till the tide had drifted me some distance astern of 
 the ship that a man in the foretop saw me splashing in 
 the water," and gave the alarm. The first lieutenant 
 instantly and gallantly jumped overboard, the carpenter 
 followed his example, and the gunner hastened into a 
 boat and pulled after them. 
 
 4 With the violent but vain attempts to make myself 
 heard, I had swallowed much water. I was soon ex^ 
 nausted by my struggles ; and, before any relief reached 
 me, I had sunk below the surface — all hope had fled, 
 all exertion ceased, and I felt that I was drowning. So 
 far these facts were either partially remembered after 
 my recovery, or supplied by those who had latterly 
 witnessed the scene; for during an interval of such 
 agitation a drowning person is too much occupied in 
 catching at every passing straw, or too much absorbed 
 by alternate hope and despair, to mark the succession 
 of events very accurately. Not so, however, with the 
 fact which immediately ensued. My mind had then 
 
 N 
 
178 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 undergone the sudden revolution which appeared to 
 you so remarkable, and all the circumstances of which 
 are now as vividly fresh in my memory as if they had 
 occurred but yesterday. 
 
 'From the moment that all exertion had ceased — 
 which I imagine was the immediate consequence of 
 complete suffocation — a calm feeling of the most 
 perfect tranquillity succeeded the most tumultuous 
 sensation. It might be called apathy, certainly not 
 resignation ; for drowning no longer appeared an evil : 
 I no longer thought of being rescued, nor was I in any 
 bodily pain. On the contrary, my sensations were now 
 of rather a pleasurable cast, partaking of that dull but 
 contented sort of feeling which precedes the sleep 
 produced by fatigue. Though the senses were thus 
 deadened, not so the mind ; its activity seemed to be 
 invigorated in a ratio which defies all description; 
 for thought rose after thought with a rapidity of 
 succession that is not only indescribable, but probably 
 inconceivable, by anyone who has not been himself 
 in a similar situation. The course of these thoughts I 
 can even now in a great measure retrace: the event 
 that had just taken place, the awkwardness which 
 produced it — -the bustle it must have occasioned, for 
 I had observed two persons jump from the chains — 
 the effect it would have on a most affectionate father, 
 the manner in which he would disclose it to the rest 
 
DAYBREAK. 179 
 
 of the family, and a thousand other circumstances 
 minutely associated with home, were the first series of 
 reflections that occurred. They took, then, a wider 
 range: our last cruise — a former voyage and ship- 
 wreck — my school, the progress I had made there, the 
 time I had misspent, and even all my boyish pursuits 
 and adventures. Thus, travelling backwards, every 
 incident of my past life seemed to me to glance across 
 my recollection in retrograde procession ; not, however, 
 in mere outline as here stated, but the picture filled 
 up, with every minute and collateral feature ; in short, 
 the whole period of my existence seemed to be placed 
 before me in a kind of panoramic review, and each 
 act of it seemed to be accompanied by a consciousness 
 of right or wrong, or by some reflection on its cause or 
 consequences — indeed, many trifling events, which had 
 been long forgotten, then crowded into my imagination, 
 and with the character of recent familiarity. 
 
 May not all this be some indication of the almost 
 infinite power of memory with which we may awaken 
 in another world, and be compelled to contemplate our 
 past lives ? Or might it not, in some degree, warrant 
 the inference that death is only a change or modifica- 
 tion of our existence, in which there is no real pause or 
 interruption? But however that may be, one circum- 
 stance was highly remarkable, that the innumerable 
 ideas which floated into my mind were all retrospective; 
 
 N 2 
 
180 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 yet I had been religiously brought up ; my hopes and 
 fears of the next world had lost nothing of their early 
 strength, and at any other period intense interest and 
 awful anxiety would have been excited by the mere 
 idea that I was floating on the threshold of eternity; 
 yet at that inexplicable moment, when I had a full 
 consciousness that I had already crossed that threshold, 
 not a single thought wandered into the future ; I was 
 wrapt entirely in the past. The length of time that 
 was occupied by this deluge of ideas, or rather the 
 shortness of time into which they were condensed, I 
 cannot now state with precision; yet, certainly, two 
 minutes could not have elapsed from the moment of 
 suffocation to the time of my being hauled up.' 
 
 The rest of Captain Beaufort's letter contains the 
 account of his physical sensations on being restored to 
 the consciousness of this world. 
 
 Sir William Hamilton, in his lecture on ' The Con- 
 servative Faculty? says : — 
 
 ' On this theory [of attention, &c], the proposition 
 with which I started,— that all mental activities, all acts 
 of knowledge, which have been once excited, persist, — 
 becomes intelligible; we never wholly lose them, but 
 they become obscure. This obscuration can be con- 
 ceived in every infinite degree, between incipient lates- 
 cence and irrecoverable latency. The obscure cognition 
 may exist simply out of consciousness, so that it can be 
 recalled by a common act of reminiscence. Again, it 
 
DAYBREAK. 181 
 
 may be impossible to recover it by an act of voluntary 
 recollection; but some association may revivify it enough 
 to make it flash after a long oblivion into conscious- 
 ness. Further, it may be obscured so far that it can 
 only be resuscitated by some morbid affection of the 
 system ; or, finally, it may be absolutely lost for us in 
 this life, and destined only for our reminiscence in the 
 life to come? * (The italics are mine.) 
 
 Admiral Beaufort's sensations were those of a person 
 about to leave this world by a sudden and violent, 
 though happily incomplete, severance of the bond be- 
 tween body and soul. These instances of revival of 
 memory do not occur so frequently just before death 
 (as far as we know) as during the last illness, when, in 
 dreams and so-called delirium, the soul often returns to 
 the scenes of childhood, and seems to wander with its 
 first friends in its earliest home. But a few hours 
 before death not only is the presence of already gone 
 friends discerned, but perceptions of beautiful scenery, 
 sounds of exquisite music, and sometimes even the 
 objects required for a long journey, seem to be present 
 to the mind of the departing traveller. 
 
 It would be strange indeed if this were not the case, 
 and if, in all the varieties and combinations of disease by 
 which death is caused, the last perceptions of earth, 
 and first of Heaven, should not vary greatly in the 
 
 * Hamilton's ' Lectures on Metaphysics,' vol. ii. p. 215. 
 
182 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 order of their occurrence. It is as if the walls of 
 the prison giving way, the captive before his escape 
 looks sometimes through one, and sometimes another 
 opening, into the region beyond, whence the friendly 
 inhabitants come to guide him on his way. 
 
 It was not long since a daughter was describing to me 
 her mother's last hours. c The night before her death,' 
 she said ' we heard her name her sister, who had been 
 dead for years.' She said that her sister stood beside 
 the bed, and she lay and talked with her for two hours. 
 We could not distinguish what she said, but when I 
 heard that her sister was there, I felt sure that my 
 mother was going. 
 
 In these conversations between the parting and 
 departed spirits it seldom happens that words are 
 articulated, while yet audible sounds issue from the 
 lips. It may be that the spirit, held by a slender 
 bond to the body, still moves those nerves and muscles 
 which it had been accustomed to control, but from 
 their incomplete and inharmonious action, the tele- 
 graphic wires only give sign of a power at their inner 
 end, by an incoherent vibration in place of a regular 
 movement. Many times the loveliest scenes are spoken 
 of, though the failing strength is insufficient to describe 
 them. Very often the traveller seems to recognise 
 water, and sometimes this is spoken of as a sea, or 
 a river, which he has to cross. This fact of frequent 
 occurrence is used by Mr. Dickens in his touching scene 
 
DAYBREAK. 183 
 
 of the death of little Paul Dombey. The novelist is a 
 close observer of nature, and it is likely that he here 
 describes what has come under his own notice. 
 
 Within the last ten years an authoress died whose 
 works are the outpourings of a mind full of graceful 
 and lovely images. As her last moments approached, 
 she looked up with an expression of quiet delight, 
 repeating thrice, very softly, the words 'How beau- 
 tiful!' 
 
 It is difficult in the great wealth of illustrations 
 which abound in this part of the subject, to make a 
 selection. I wish if possible to bring those to notice 
 which I know to be strictly true, and which may 
 afterwards be referred to as instances of spiritual corre- 
 spondence. 
 
 One, dying young and pure, told her nurse a few 
 hours before her spirit was released, that there was 
 water to be crossed, and beyond that she saw an 
 Oriental scene. The nurse did not know that the 
 opening vision had disclosed the imagery of the spiritual 
 East, the morning land of those who love the Lord. 
 
 A description of the last hours of a most lovely and 
 heavenly-minded child, was given to me by a friend. I 
 repeat it as it came to her from the mother, whose 
 expressions of yearning love for her child, and con- 
 sciousness of his spiritual presence, led the narrator to 
 enquire about the circumstances under which the young 
 traveller was released. 
 
184 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 Q. c How was it with your poor little boy at the 
 last?' 
 
 Mother. ' After many months' suffering, at length the 
 morning came when God called him from us. He had 
 frequently spoken about his approaching death, and 
 sought to realise the change before him. Our minister 
 was very kind and often came to pray and talk with 
 him, but for a very long time he could not get rid of 
 the idea that when he came to Jordan he should be 
 unable to pass over. The morning on which he died 
 having bade all the family farewell, he lay for some 
 time quite quiet, when at length he said to his father, 
 who was sitting at his bedside, " Father, do pray take 
 out the window. Don't you see that the glass prevents 
 my getting away, you must see how I am trying to get 
 out, and cannot get aivay!" His father opened 
 the window, but still the poor little fellow did not seem 
 quite satisfied. Again he spoke in the great stillness of 
 the room, his voice sounding strong and clear ; he was 
 evidently replying to some question which he had 
 heard asked. 
 
 * " Yes" he said, " my name is John L , and I 
 
 come from M . Yes, I have told lies, but I pro- 
 mise to do so no more ! " 
 
 * We were astonished and awestruck. We felt that he 
 saw and heard an angel invisible to us. Again he 
 said : — 
 
 * " Mother, here is grandmother come ! you must see 
 
DAYBREAK. 185 
 
 her ! And she is ivith such a great company, and they 
 say that they are come to take rne away with them? 
 Soon after that he gently breathed his last.' 
 
 * Such,' says the narrator, ' was my conversation with 
 
 Mrs. L . Doubtless, dear friend, you will agree 
 
 with me that the " great company " was a holy assembly 
 of ministering spirits sent by Grod to conduct the poor 
 child's soul safely across the mystery of " Jordan," so 
 much dreaded by him, and you will rejoice, as I did, on 
 hearing of the comfort vouchsafed to the sorrowing 
 mother through a " vision of angels." ' 
 
 The next account does not bear quite the same force 
 of evidence which I should wish to belong to my own 
 or intimate friend's experience. While trying to choose 
 among various descriptions one or two calculated to 
 illustrate the fact of the spiritual opening before de- 
 parture, I received the following in the words of an 
 eye-witness. My informant has only been a few weeks 
 in my family. As far as I can judge her character 
 is decidedly truthful, and her powers of invention not 
 great. She always keeps to a story which she has once 
 told, without deviation from the original version, and 
 though when I heard this account I tried to test her 
 by suggesting additions she rejected all these, and 
 adhered literally to her first statement. It would 
 however not have been thought worthy of a place here, 
 but for the recognition of her departed sister and the 
 description of the corresponding light. The subject 
 
186 FKOM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 was suggested by some questions I put to her, she having 
 told me of a fright occasioned by the reappearance of 
 a worldly wealth-loving spirit which was seen by three 
 persons, and which made her so uncomfortable that she 
 left the house at which it occurred. I asked her 
 whether she had been present at the departure of this 
 spirit, to which she answered that she had, but that the 
 
 death was very unlike that of , a near relation, 
 
 6 which was so happy ! Oh ! that was beautiful ! I 
 shall never forget that scene as long as I live.' 
 
 I begged for a description, and she went on : — 
 
 ' He was a real good man, he had led a good life, 
 and done much for the poor. His illness was terrible, 
 but he said he did not suffer. " Whatever Grod," he said, 
 " pleases to inflict on me, that I can bear contentedly." 
 Just before he died he looked round the bed and saw 
 
 us all round him, and he said, " Oh dear J , and 
 
 A , and D , do all of you try to come to our 
 
 Father ! " And then he looked up and called three 
 
 times " C (the name of a relation who had gone 
 
 before), I am coming to you, to be with Jesus Christ ! " 
 "And there," he said, pointing to the right-hand corner 
 of the room, where there was a bright light which we 
 all saw 
 
 6 1 interrupted her — "You mean a candle or moon- 
 light?" 
 
 'No. I don't know what it came from. It was 
 like a bright twinkling star, with rays all coming out 
 
DAYBREAK. 187 
 
 quickly from the middle to the outside, and the centre 
 was very bright indeed. Well, he pointed to it, " And 
 there," he said, " is Jesus Christ, who died to save the 
 world ; I am going to Him." Those were the last 
 words he spoke. We all saw the light — everyone in 
 the room — and it moved from where it was when we 
 first saw it, and came and rested on the bed just as he 
 died.' 
 
 This vision of Christ given to the dying man is only 
 one in addition to an infinite number of similar occur- 
 rences. A near connection of my own asserted the 
 continual visible presence of the Saviour, some time 
 before she was released. The seeming mystery of the 
 appearance in so many different aspects of the Word 
 made flesh, will become clear as we learn more of the 
 laws of spirit manifestation. 
 
 In the last chapter I have brought forward many 
 concurrent testimonies of seers to the fact that spiritual 
 hearing is developed in the process of change, before 
 spiritual sight. Swedenborg gives as a reason, that in 
 the next state the spiritual developement is in a different 
 order to that in which it takes place while we are in 
 the body. In the last process we are penetrated, in the 
 first instance, as it were from without, and so the more 
 external vision is generally developed before hearing. 
 After the change the developement takes place from 
 within, and the heavenly or higher angels are first 
 associated with the parting spirit. The accounts are 
 
188 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 very numerous of heavenly music being heard around 
 the beds of the young and pure, and if the sounds have 
 not been audible to others, which is occasionally the 
 case, the glow on the countenance of the listening 
 traveller about to wend his way hence shows the 
 delight inspired by the angels' welcome. 
 
 The last moments of the little captive in the Temple, 
 Louis XVII.,as described by Beauchesne, are an instance 
 of this, when hearing in a preeminent degree was the 
 spirit sense awakened to bring joy to one whose cup on 
 earth was so full of woe. 
 
 Gromin, seeing the child calm, motionless, and mute, 
 said to him, ' I hope j-ou are not in pain just now ? ' 
 
 f Oh yes ! I am still in pain, but not nearly so much. 
 The music is so beautiful ! ' 
 
 Now there was no music to be heard, either in the 
 tower or anywhere near. No sound from without could 
 reach the room where the young martyr lay expiring. 
 Gromin, astonished, said to him 'From what direction 
 do you hear this music ? ' 
 
 6 From above.' 
 
 ' Is it long that you have heard it ? ' 
 
 6 Since you knelt down. Do you not hear it ? Listen ! 
 Listen ! ' And the child, with a nervous motion, raised 
 his faltering hand, as he opened his large eyes, illumi- 
 nated by ecstatic delight. His keeper, unwilling to 
 destroy this last sweet illusion, listened also, with the 
 pious desire of hearing what could not possibly be 
 
DAYBREAK. 189 
 
 heard. After a few moments of attention, the child 
 again started, his eyes sparkled, and he cried out, in 
 intense rapture, ( From amongst all the voices I have 
 distinguished that of my mother.' 
 
 That word, as it left the orphan's lips, seemed to re- 
 lieve him of all suffering ; his knitted brow relaxed, and 
 his look lighted up with that calm brightness given by 
 the certainty of deliverance or victory. His eye fixed on 
 an invisible object, his ear attentive to the far distant 
 sound of one of those concerts that human ear hath 
 never heard. A new existence seemed to break in upon 
 his young soul. 
 
 A moment after, the brightness of that gleam was 
 gone. His arms were crossed upon his breast, and an 
 expression of sad discouragement was visible in his 
 countenance. Gomin looked close at him, and followed 
 all his motions with a troubled eye. The child's breath- 
 ing was not more powerful, but his eye was wandering 
 slowly and confusedly, and from time to time it turned 
 to the window. Gomin asked him what so interested 
 him in that direction. The child looked at his keeper 
 a few moments, and then, as if he had not understood 
 the question, though it was asked him again, made no 
 reply. 
 
 Lasne came upstairs again, to relieve Gomin, and 
 the latter went out of the room, his heart very heavy, 
 but not more uneasy than he had been the day before, 
 for he did not even yet anticipate so sudden a close. 
 
190 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 Lasne sate down near the bed, and the prince looked at 
 him long with a fixed and dreamy eye. On his making 
 a slight movement, Lasne asked him how he felt, and 
 what he would like. ( Do you think my sister could 
 have heard the music ? ' said the child. ( How much 
 good it would have done her ! ' Lasne could not 
 answer. The anguished glance of the dying boy turned 
 eagerly and suddenly towards the window. An excla- 
 mation of joy escaped his lips ; then he said, looking at 
 his keeper, * I have something to tell you ! ' Lasne 
 came close to him and took his hand. The prisoner's 
 little head leaned on the keeper's breast, who listened, 
 but in vain. All was said. God had spared the young 
 martyr his last mortal convulsion of anguish. Grod had 
 kept to himself the knowledge of the last thought. 
 Lasne put his hand on the child's heart ; the heart of 
 Louis XVII. had ceased to beat ! 
 
 By following out the ideas suggested, and comparing 
 the results with the spirit manifestations, we may find 
 the law by which each soul's future home is determined 
 not quite beyond our ken. 
 
 Many stories have been told of hideous forms and 
 dark shadows, terrifying bad men and women during 
 their last hours. As I only have these accounts at 
 second hand, they are not brought forward as affording 
 material for reasoning. Nevertheless, if we believe that 
 the laws of affinity prevail throughout the universe, ex- 
 tending from the world of spirit to the world of matter, 
 
DAYBREAK 191 
 
 and equally affecting spirits in and out of the flesh, so 
 that ' we may know a man (in either world) by the 
 company he keeps,' it is not more unlikely that dark 
 and evil beings should throng round their associate as 
 he approaches their state than that the bright and 
 good should welcome their dearly loved ones to their 
 happy home. ' Like to like,' is one of the first laws of 
 the spirit world. It is in the spiritual universe what 
 the laws of attraction and affinity are in the chemistry 
 of matter. And not the only analogous law, as we shall 
 see when we enter on the subject of correspondence. 
 By it the destination of the freed spirit is determined, 
 and the e ashes to ashes, and dust to dust,' of the burial 
 service equally expresses a truth when applied to the 
 perishing remains, as to the destination of a soul which 
 has yielded to earthly attractions, Ought we not, in 
 that same burial service, to follow with a greater joy 
 than is expressed the heaven-aspiring being, as it is 
 led by spirits and angels, among whom are its best-loved 
 earthly friends, on its upward path. 
 
 ' Then shall the dust return to earth as it ivas, and 
 the spirit shall return to God who gave iV 
 
192 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 THE HOME OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 fTlHE universal law of dev elopement from within out- 
 ■-*- wards had been very partially applied to our 
 future state, as indeed it had only been dimly appre- 
 hended, when we received the first descriptions of the 
 6 Spirit homes.' This fact should be remembered to 
 prevent the supposition that a hypothetical explanation 
 preceded or accompanied the experiments. So far was 
 this from being the case, that the first accounts of 
 spiritual scenery, varying in character, but seeming 
 always to be in harmony with the tastes and tendencies 
 of the spirit when on earth, were very puzzling. Some- 
 times the whole appeared to be allegorical in the sense 
 in which the word allegory is commonly used. Then 
 the assertions of literal truth and absolute objectivity 
 threw the whole again into confusion. 
 
 The first glimmering of light which broke up the 
 darkness arose from the observation that, by whatever 
 means of communication accounts came, the various 
 images by which they were conveyed always consisted 
 
THE HOME OF THE SPIRIT. 193 
 
 of objects familiar to the writer's mind, and were also, 
 as far as I could judge, in accordance with the feelings 
 and pursuits of the spirit. I also perceived, that if 
 through one medium a supposed spirit described him- 
 self as having passed through certain states, something 
 bearing the same construction would be given through 
 quite a different mind and hand. I will try to illustrate 
 my meaning. A kind-hearted high-spirited young lad 
 died. Soon after his departure his name was written 
 by the hand of a boy resembling himself. In answer to 
 a question relating to his new state and his entrance 
 into it, the medium's hand drew a river, on one bank of 
 which was a scene evidently meant to be rather gloomy 
 and uninviting, while on the opposite side was first a 
 plain, then ranges of hills rising one beyond the other, 
 and just over the top of the last and highest, a sun. 
 The medium's hand drew ships and boats crossing the 
 stream, and a bridge. By the writing then it was told 
 that some people went by the ships, some by boats, and 
 some walked, or rode over the bridge. I asked, ( How 
 did you go ? ' the answer was ( jumped over.' Another 
 medium, describing the entrance into the spirit world, 
 drew gates, railway trains, bath chairs and carriages, and 
 wrote of these methods as suited to the different degrees 
 of velocity with which spirits entered their new state. 
 Now in narrating these statements I do not mean of 
 course to imply that the descriptions are literally true, 
 neither do I mean to say that the ideas fixed by memory 
 
194 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 in the spirit's mind may not make them bear to him an 
 appearance of absolute truth. It is certain that these 
 and many statements which at first sight seem absurd 
 and unaccountable have been made, and our present 
 work is to find in what sense or manner they are to be 
 understood. Every mode described is found to be 
 familiar to the mind of both medium and spirit, as in 
 the case of the boy, when the writing described the 
 readiest way the spirit could imagine of effecting a 
 sudden and unobstructed change of state. 
 
 The accounts given by the same professing spirit 
 through different mediums were also at first very puzzling 
 in their dissimilarity, but it soon became evident that 
 the same fact was conveyed under different images. 
 For instance, by one medium the spirit said, ' I have 
 crossed two rivers since I came here, and am now rest- 
 ing.'' By another; — ( I walked through a gate into a 
 beautiful field and gathered flowers — then passed 
 through another gate and am here, where there is more 
 beautiful fruit than any you have in your world? 
 Each of these descriptions implies two changes in an 
 advancing state, and a rest in which something is 
 gathered or appropriated. This appropriation was 
 afterwards described by a more matter-of-fact medium 
 as ( learning more of God? The last expression, which 
 barely conveys the truth, may seem to some minds a 
 very poor description of the happiness of heaven, but 
 the poverty will be in their own inadequate conception. 
 
THE HOME OF THE SPIRIT. 195 
 
 ' Eye has not seen, and ear has not heard,' the smallest 
 fraction of the rich imagery with which such ' learning,' 
 must be invested, as all the mysterious realities of 
 creation unfold themselves to the soul of man in an 
 approach to the source whence it has its origin. 
 
 The first particular description of a spirit's home which 
 we ever received was declared to be from one who, 
 when on earth, was pure, innocent, and self-sacrificing ; 
 and in whose name assertions had been often made 
 of the objective reality of his abode, and of the con- 
 stantly increasing glories and beauties springing up 
 around him, with the developement of his internal 
 thoughts and feelings and the increase of his knowledge. 
 
 A picture of the house had been asked for, and by the 
 hand of a very young medium an outline was drawn, 
 which in touch and style was very like the drawing of 
 the spirit when on earth. It was of the interior of a 
 house, on the ground-floor. There was a spacious room 
 with doors opening into a vestibule, thence into a garden. 
 On one side of the room a sofa was placed, and on each 
 side of the open door were vases of flowers. A large 
 table stood in the centre of the room, and on it were 
 many articles. The most conspicuous of these was a 
 double vase or pair of vases, in the form of cornucopias, 
 full of flowers. The shape of this, which is very pretty, 
 is now common, but had certainly never been in any of 
 the shops at the tioie of the drawing. It was recognised 
 as a new shape when it appeared several months after- 
 
 o 2 
 
196 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 wards. All round the walls were portraits of the family 
 of the spirit. 
 
 The outside of the house was then drawn. It consisted 
 of three stories, and round the outside of the ground- 
 floor was a colonnade covered with glass, and having 
 creeping plants twined around each pillar. Through 
 the opened wooden doors could be seen the table, &c, 
 which had been represented in the interior. The second 
 floor had one window, and appeared to be covered within 
 with vines and festooning plants. The third consisted 
 of two little rooms, each having one window, and each 
 being surmounted with a dome and cross. 
 
 We were told, by the writing of the same medium, 
 that in the lower room all the friends of the spirit could 
 assemble ; in the second only the dearest of all, those 
 who were friends in spirit ; and into the top little rooms 
 the spirit went to be quite alone, to pray and think. 
 After this time, by another and a very young medium it 
 was written, c A fountain has sprung up in my house.' 
 
 Now, though it was very evident that this house in 
 some way typified the soul, with its external, its spiritual, 
 and its innermost or heavenly affections (of which all 
 centred in the cross), still the drawing of the house was 
 an enigma. The positive assertion of objective reality 
 on one side, and the equally positive contradictions by 
 other spirits who professed to have means of knowing, 
 threw the whole into confusion. At the end of some 
 months after the explanation of the drawing had been 
 
THE HOME OF THE SPIRIT. 197 
 
 abandoned as hopeless, it was seen by a person whose 
 finely developed brain, in which little but the faculty of 
 language had been cultivated by education, admirably 
 qualified her to receive neiv truths. By the hand of 
 this person an explanation was written, by which both 
 the present drawing and all the former contradictory 
 statements were harmonised and accounted for. It 
 came in answer to questions, and was as follows : — 
 
 Q. ' Are the house, and the fountain, and the other 
 beautiful objects real and palpable to you, as the 
 objects on earth are to us?' 
 
 Ans. ' Yes, yes' 
 
 Q. ' Are there really pictures of your family in 
 your house ? ' 
 
 Ans. f They are pictures on the walls of memory.' 
 
 Q. ' Is the whole symbolical, and drawn in this way 
 merely from the impossibility of expressing it other- 
 wise through the medium ? ' 
 
 Ans. ( All in my soul, that is the house. And they 
 are external as they project themselves from the inner. 
 As I gain knowledge, one representative after another 
 takes the form of the beautiful things I draw.' 
 
 Q. ' Do you mean that things in your degree are as 
 real to you, as the outward objects in our state are to 
 us?' 
 
 Ans. ' Can you not see that as soon as the life 
 principle in trees and flowers becomes external it is 
 real to you, but is in fact no new creation? The 
 
198 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 painter, sculptor, and poet, as rapidly as they embody 
 
 their ideal on canvass or in marble / cannot 
 
 express all I would, but the fact of their embodying any 
 existing ideal, however high or low, awakens a more 
 perfect life of conception deeper in the soul ; thus here 
 as well as there (in the spirit state as on the earth) 
 the arts are living and eternal progressive realities.'' C. 
 
 Before commenting on this, I will finish my detail of 
 communications on this subject. 
 
 An interesting communication connected with the 
 home of the spirit was made among the circle of friends 
 whom I have spoken of as taking part in the experiments. 
 I can vouch for its truth. The following was received 
 in a letter : — 
 
 ' A , J , B , and F , were with E 
 
 (a clairvoyante, not professional) May 19, 185-. E 
 
 had for some time been asleep, and describing heavenly 
 scenes ; she became silent for a little while, when she 
 was asked, " Where are you now ? " She immediately 
 answered, " C is with me. He looks very beauti- 
 ful. He has a mansion in which he lives. There is a 
 marble table in it. The Word is on the table open at 
 St. John. He has a great many flowers all around him, 
 and some in his hand and on the table. There is a 
 bookcase too in the room, with the Word in the centre 
 and a star above it. He has a small garden which 
 he cultivates, and which is full of red and white roses. 
 He has pictures in his house of all his family." 
 
THE HOME OF THE SPIRIT. 199 
 
 E was asked how C — — looked. She answered, 
 
 " Very beautiful, nothing dark about him. (The fea- 
 tures of the spirit, whom the medium had never seen in 
 life, were then described, and the age mentioned.) He 
 says he has not been studying much lately, as he has 
 been so anxious to watch and prevent other spirits from 
 writing in his family. He is sorry, too, to see his 
 mother fret about his leaving her, and he has also been 
 much occupied in drawing their thoughts to the Lord.'''' 
 
 Twice this last was mentioned. We then asked E 
 
 the meaning of buds and flowers. She replied, " Buds 
 are the beginning of spiritual ideas. As the buds gra- 
 dually open, there is an increase of faith ; as they be- 
 come full-blown on earth, they are ready for heaven. 
 It takes a long time to be full-blown." ' 
 
 This account was contained in a letter to one of the 
 relations of the spirit. This person went immediately 
 to a medium through whom what purported to be the 
 
 spirit of C ■ had written before. The question was 
 
 asked, ' Did you speak to E on such a night ? ; 
 
 Ans. (By the medium's hand) ' Yes.' 
 
 Q. i Did she see your house and garden ? ' 
 
 A. 'Yes.' 
 
 Q. * What flowers were there in the garden ? ' 
 
 A. ' Koses, red and white.' 
 
 Q. * And in your room ? ' 
 
 A. 'A table.' 
 
 Q. ' What was the table made of? ' 
 
200 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 The hand wrote ' Ivory ' and scratched it out, then 
 wrote 'Marble.' 
 
 Q. < What was on the table ? ' 
 
 A. ' Bible.' 
 
 Q. ' What was it open at ? ' 
 
 A. (With some difficulty) ' Isaiah.' 
 
 Now either the J. written by the medium's hand as 
 the beginning of John had suggested Isaiah, and the 
 spirit losing control could not guide the hand, or by 
 some deeper law, Isaiah took the place of St. John in 
 the mind of the medium. A guess may be formed on 
 this subject further on. 
 
 We once had much communication with a spirit who 
 had lately left the world, and in whom the family affection 
 seemed to overpower every other feeling. The survivors 
 were doubtful as to the future life, or at least did not 
 realise its immediate occurrence or its glorious happi- 
 ness for souls in a prepared state. The writing, which 
 gave the name of the departed one, conveyed earnest 
 entreaties that her family might be told that ( she was 
 still alive, and could speak to them.' 
 
 When I asked what sort of place she was in, the 
 answer was, * It is my home, b ut they are not there.'' 
 
 Then she wished that they might learn of the realities 
 of the Gospel, as, she said, she was now receiving it. 
 
 Not only happy, but unhappy, desponding, and even 
 wicked spirits have sometimes asserted their presence. 
 In answer to our enquiries about their state and sur- 
 
THE nOME OF THE SPIRIT. 201 
 
 roundings, we have been told of places with which they 
 were familiar, and which they did not seem to distinguish 
 from their old earthly haunts, afterwards of either 
 ( going into a place whence they would rise higher,' or of 
 ' being very miserable.' We will hope that even from 
 this misery they might rise in time, for none who have 
 come to us have seemed absolutely without good feeling. 
 
 At p. 21 I have told of rapping which was meant to 
 imitate the sounds in a carpenter's workshop. The 
 sounds professed to come from a poor drunkard who 
 had hung himself in the workhouse. After I had found 
 that the description of his occupation was a true one, 
 his presence was again announced by the same means 
 (raps) when . only three persons were present, one of 
 whom had the gift of seeing and sometimes even hear- 
 ing the spirits. The poor suicide said that ' he was very 
 miserable; that he had been taught about God and 
 Christ when on earth, but had never thought it was 
 real, or that he should be alive after his death? He 
 wished his sister (who had intemperate habits) to be 
 told about him, and urged to reform, and he said * he 
 did not know how to rise? 
 
 Foolish as it may appear, I must say that I talked to 
 the unseen as I would have done to an apparent pre- 
 sence. I found that we (who were nearer his former 
 condition) seemed more real and authoritative to him 
 than any of those higher beings who could have led him 
 upwards, but whose presence he seemed to think an 
 
202 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 illusion. This fact, which I have met with more than 
 once, was evidently unexpected by the medium, and 
 struck me very much. 
 
 While the dialogue with the invisible went on, the raps 
 which had come in assent to my entreaties that he 
 would try to pray for help, &c, suddenly ceased, and 
 the medium, who felt a cloud coming over her sight, 
 said she should soon see him. In a minute or two she 
 declared that she saw a man looking very sad and dark. 
 6 He seems,'' she said, ( to be in a cave with others — all 
 are ivretched-looking ; he is the best, but he is dressed 
 in dark grey rags,'' 
 
 6 Does he hear me ? ' I asked. 
 
 * He bows his head.' 
 
 Then I went on talking as one would do to an em- 
 bodied soul in a similar state. 
 
 ( Now,' she said, ' he looks more cheerful. He will 
 mind what you say. And now I see a little hole at the 
 end of the cave, and light is coming in.'' 
 
 I should hardly have ventured to recount the above, 
 if it had not been so perfectly in harmony with the 
 assertions of Swedenborg, who describes caves — gloomy 
 workhouses, and dull miserable stone-yards, with many 
 disgusting accompaniments — as the environments cor- 
 responding to the state of those who leave this world in 
 the guilty or degraded position of the suicide spirit. 
 
 As the person who saw them i in the cave ' was 
 certainly quite ignorant of Swedenborg's writings, the 
 
TIIE HOME OF THE SPIRIT. 203 
 
 agreement of her vision with the great seer's description 
 was the more remarkable. 
 
 It is only right that apparently conflicting statements 
 should be given. Many descriptions of i houses ' were 
 gathered at the same time from different sources and 
 through different mediums, and to one of these, if not to 
 the first drawing of the house, the following refers. It 
 was written by the hand of a person quite unconnected 
 with any of the spirits whose homes had been described, 
 and the asserted name of the unseen writer was that of 
 one who on earth had made little advance in Christian 
 purity or self-denial, and who, by his own account, was 
 still in a very undeveloped state indeed. 
 
 Though the last spirit almost charges the first with mis- 
 take and consequent misrepresentation, yet the accounts 
 agree in principle, both showing that the condition of 
 the soul is what lends it imagery. This had been 
 realised in an intense degree by the first loving and un- 
 selfish spirit, while the perceptions of the less advanced 
 being were only dim and cloudy. The mind of the 
 medium through whom the last was written was, how- 
 ever, in a more mature state than that of the young 
 person who drew the house. 
 
 In answer to a question from the medium as to the 
 description given of spirit life it was written — 
 
 ' / say that what such spirits write and reveal is 
 what can only be compared to looking through glasses 
 which distort They think they see, and when they are 
 
204 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 unable to find suitable words , they use what they think 
 most analogous,* Even on the lower regions of heaven 
 there is no distress to the bodies of spirits. All their 
 wants are spiritually supplied; but there are no 
 chairs, no sofas, no temples, no canopies, nothing, in 
 short, your limited language can describe ; and it is 
 only a vain attempt to comfort the left behind relations 
 to write such things. I can give you no better idea of 
 the state of the part of heaven where I am staying, 
 than by asking you to shut your eyes, and think of the 
 glowing colours of some sunset, which have remained 
 in your recollection. There was red, blue, rather 
 purple, perhaps almost green, where the gold tinged 
 the blue to the greenish tint. All these things have 
 names on earth as colours ; but the colonics themselves, 
 where wilt thou find them f Not in your tin boxes, or 
 tubes, or onthe canvasses of the most celebrated painters. 
 Thus heaven has its couches, its rests, its coverings, its 
 comforts ; none need mourn for those of earth ; but 
 attempt to name them with the equivalent on earth, the 
 resemblance dies away, as dies away the gold, and the 
 many hues of an autumn sunset even whilst seen 
 most vivid. How cold the reality of the sky no longer 
 thus illumined, I need not say ; but so are the attempts 
 to raise the thoughts of mortals to the realities of 
 
 * This is not inconsistent with my statement, that spirits having no 
 language impress the thought, and it finds expression in the medium's 
 words. 
 
THE HOME OF THE SPIRIT. 205 
 
 heaven; never to be fulfilled, for the words fail as 
 well as the ideas, A belief in the power of writing by 
 spirits will increase as the world grows older; and 
 when once that has become more general, the spirits 
 will be less afraid to say the truth, that of all heavenly 
 things granted to spirit life, none can be revealed. 
 They are kept — why not ? — to entrance life on heaven, 
 which to many sorrowing hearts needs as much of the 
 creature comforts as ever sorrow on earth required to 
 keep up the failing strength for life; for there are 
 sorrows which cease not tvhen this earth vanishes, and 
 as prison diet must needs be a generous one, so the 
 spiritual body unhinged in its dearest feelings re- 
 quires that strengthening which belongs to spirit life, 
 all wonderful to man as he awakens into iV 
 
 As any descriptions professing to come from spirits 
 through the hand of a perfectly honest writer are 
 curious and interesting, I add the following from the 
 same source as the above : — 
 
 ' I said that spirits far advanced on heaven were 
 shy of beginning relations ivith those of earth, and 
 that numbers were waiting on the confines of the land 
 they had left with regret, ready to communicate under 
 any name they could take to insure them attention. I 
 also said that numbers were occupied in watching the 
 entrance on to heaven of spirits released from earthly 
 bodies. You are right in believing the spirits have 
 their bodies, and they spend ages, according to earthly 
 
206 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 calculation, in this frivolous although to a certain 
 extent interesting occupation before they attempt their 
 own road upwards. For I must compare the ascent 
 into the higher heaven to the ascent of a hill, or rather 
 succession of hills, each summit revealing a higher 
 grade of ascent This so far as I Jcnoiv, for I have 
 only overlooked the beginning of the ascent myself. I 
 see others pass up and down ; there is no difficulty in 
 returning a second time. If once the road has been 
 
 traversed, a spirit is free of the part traversed 
 
 A wish is often felt to communicate, to relieve the 
 tedium of eternity ; for tedium there is in many cases, 
 and discontent — oh, how much ! Only those who learn 
 content on earth amidst life's hardest lessons, or are 
 constitutionally contented, begin spirit life with any 
 amount of life happiness on heaven : not idle content, 
 however.' 
 
 I have said that this spirit's own account of his state 
 and doings was not very favourable. What he calls 
 heaven, other spirits call the spirit-world. The distinc- 
 tion is not very important as long as we remember that 
 all communications recognise an intermediate or first 
 state, which seems to be a continuation of the earthly 
 condition, before the upward or downward course is 
 taken. The following, which describes his own state 
 and confirms some of my former assertions, is worth 
 notice : — 
 
 'I am glad that spirits are always sure of being 
 
THE HOME OF THE SPIRIT. 207 
 
 together when love has united them on earth ; and when 
 spirits are awfully distant from each other, it is the 
 fault of one or other of them. God permits union, and 
 He does not compel it ; and the good or the better — for 
 many are better who cannot justly be called good — 
 are able to go to the less good, and the less good may 
 
 never trouble the better There are occupations 
 
 and amusements in heaven suited to every spirit for 
 their recreation, and a great many spirits do nothing 
 at all for a long time after they come through death 
 to heaven ; and if you wonder at this, I think you will 
 be still more surprised to learn that one of the most 
 idle spirits of heaven is the spirit who writes by your 
 hand ; and the cause is, that the dissatisfaction of 
 spirit life is so great, that there is a feeling of utter 
 despair at the impossibility of working into better life. 
 But this diminishes slowly, very slowly ; at first by de- 
 grees, but not for years of earthly measurement. Then 
 cometh the wish* to be better; it comes quicker to 
 some than to others, and in a great many the wish 
 does not awaken till after a ivhole generation has' 
 come through death to life ; and the companionship of 
 others is instrumental in awakening the wish, with- 
 out which heaven is as the slumber of the grave. 
 And there is not so much inaccuracy as some think 
 in talking of the sleep of death; but it is not a 
 
 * This spirit is only describing those of his own acquaintance, who 
 seem neither to have high aims, nor absolute criminal dispositions. 
 
208 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 necessary condition of spirit life, and there are some 
 who pass at once into enjoyment ; for it is not enjoyment 
 to be doing nothing, while the better are at once em- 
 ployed, and progressing into higher states of spiritual 
 happiness.' 
 
 Let us see how the above conflicting statements can 
 be reconciled. 
 
 In travelling into the region of ' houses not made 
 with hands,' a region where the only experience which 
 we have for guide is in itself a mysterious study — ' such 
 stuff as dreams are made of — we can still find a little 
 guidance in analogy which will lead us from the known 
 and seen to the hidden and unknown. 
 
 We have seen that the mysterious germ of life said by 
 the seeress to be ' begotten from God ' is placed at its 
 origin in circumstances to attract to itself those particles 
 which are necessary to form a soul-body, or a body 
 whose whole organisation is animated and pervaded by 
 the soul. At birth, the enclosure which serves to 
 nourish it is thrown off. In like manner, by means 
 of what has been called the nerve-spirit, impressions 
 are gathered from the external creation to the soul, 
 which thus, through means expressly provided by the 
 body, is nourished and matured by the impressions 
 it receives during its life on earth from external 
 nature. The body then, having in its wondrous che- 
 mistry supplied those fluids or imponderable forces 
 which have acted as channels to transmit the required 
 
THE HOME OF THE SPIRIT. 209 
 
 sustenance "through the nerves and brain to the soul, 
 has done its work. It declines and dies, as in the earlier 
 period the sustaining envelope is left, or as the withered 
 husk falls from the perfected fruit. Then the soul, 
 with all the memories and impressions of which it has 
 become the storehouse, takes its place, and the more 
 internal spirit developed and advanced animates the 
 6 spiritual body.' But, according to the belief of most 
 thoughtful men,* we are, even in this earthly life, the 
 architects of our own surroundings ; external nature 
 supplies the cause whose effect is produced through the 
 senses and brain, according to a type or idea in the 
 mind, and the susceptibility to impressions from out- 
 ward objects varies in quantity and in relative propor- 
 tion, and forms the distinctive character of each 
 individual. 
 
 Let us apply the last thought to the appearances and 
 realities of the next state into which the spirit enters 
 
 * Mental philosophers are of three classes : the Idealists, who believe, 
 with Berkeley and others, that ideas are communicated without any real 
 substratum; the Realists, who hold that we perceive outer things as 
 they really are ; and a third, who may be called Intermediate Idealists 
 — of this class are the great majority of philosophers, who believe that 
 matter is a something external to ourselves which produces its appro- 
 priate impression or idea on the senses and mind, but which requires its 
 appropriate receptivity in the mind to give it form and character. 
 The ideas of Plato show that he belongs to this third class, and the 
 observations of phrenologists, which prove a variety of susceptibilities to 
 impressions, are strongly in favour of the doctrine. 
 
 P 
 
210 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 in a purer form, the gross corporeal particles of earth 
 having been replaced by the inner soul-body, and 
 having within itself those essential types or ideas 
 whose developement is to be the work of its everlasting 
 life. Of these, the most external — the framework, so to 
 speak — are what have been nourished by its earthly 
 surroundings into the memory of persons, things, 
 events, or feelings. As in this world memory is called 
 by mental philosophers the consciousness of the past, 
 so in the next, where the relations of time are changed, 
 the memory in all cases where the affections are con- 
 cerned will probably appear only a continuation of the 
 feeling. In Admiral Beaufort's narrative, and other 
 similar descriptions, the recollections of a life are spoken 
 of as presenting themselves at once in the shortest 
 possible time to the mind. According to the process 
 of developement from within outwards, those most ex- 
 ternal recollections which have been appropriated or 
 drawn into its life by the spirit become perfected ideas, 
 and only require the influx of vitality from within 
 to throw them off, as the bark of a tree is driven to the 
 surface with the rise of the vital sap. According to all 
 the descriptions I have received this is what really 
 takes place ; and all the feelings and impressions on 
 earth remain in the soul, and find their appropriate 
 nourishment and external objectivity in the next sphere, 
 where they thus become the seeming realities of the 
 heavenly sceoery. But these are not the only realities, 
 
THE HOME OF THE SPIRIT. 211 
 
 for the rapid spiritual developement multiplies and 
 magnifies every perception, so that the forms and hues 
 and sounds by which a single idea is conditioned are 
 immeasurably more numerous than those which charac- 
 terise the corresponding ideas of the soul in its earthly 
 embryo state. 
 
 We must remember that the first spirit, whose house 
 was described, spoke of the embodiment of an exist- 
 ing ideal, as awakening a more perfect life of conception 
 deeper in the soul ; by which was meant that, as a 
 natural consequence of the developement outward, a 
 corresponding increase of life will take place in the 
 innermost spirit or germ of vitality, which, according to 
 the two seeresses before quoted, receives its essence 
 from the Divine Source. This is entirely in harmony 
 with all the laws of natural growth, and receiving it as 
 not only fair conjecture, but one supported by the 
 assertions of spirits, as well as the analogies of nature, 
 we may trace its consequences on the whole circle of 
 our spirit life. Surely the internal influx will be of 
 the same character as the outer developement, or the 
 nature of the man would have changed. If our 
 thoughts, prayers, and aspirations rise to the great 
 Father of our spirits, we draw a large amount of 
 heavenly life into the soul; tbe second man from 
 heaven is nourished and strengthened, and we con- 
 stantly rise, as the spirits write, into a higher and more 
 internal state. If, on the contrary, the thoughts and 
 
 P 2 
 
212 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 inclinations tend downwards, in an earthward instead 
 of a spiritual direction, the stream of vital influx must 
 of necessity dwindle and diminish : ' The soul that 
 sinneth, it shall die.' 
 
 Can we not trace the process ? 
 
 The next state will be only a continuation of thoughts 
 and feelings spent on earthly and sensual objects, 
 a turning back to the world which is left behind, 
 instead of a pressing on to the things which are before. 
 And so a gradual inversion of the usual spiritual progress, 
 or, in other words, a decline from, higher to lower forms 
 of life. The seers and Socrates speak of this degrada- 
 tion of the soul that clings to earth, when, becoming an 
 impoverished essence, seeking earthly enjoyments of 
 which it has only the recollection, it falls in turn into 
 the states of the lower animals, according to the 
 character of its propensities, and finally even loses the 
 degree of the animal, and sinks through lower and 
 lower degrees of the less organised creation till the 
 lowest is reached. 
 
 Socrates says : ' Those who had indulged in gluttony 
 and contemptuous pride — who had been brutalised by 
 drunkenness, devoid of any shame or self-restraint, 
 would naturally pass into such bodies as asses and other 
 
 beasts While those who have had a propensity 
 
 to injustice, to tyrannise over others and rob them, 
 pass into the bodies of such animals as wolves, hawks, 
 and vultures ; for where else could such go ? ' 
 
THE HOME OF THE SPIRIT. 213 
 
 ' Without doubt,' said Cebes. 
 
 e And therefore it is probable also of the rest, that each 
 will go into the state which most resembles the condition 
 they had striven to attain, either by indulging in bad 
 propensities, or by omitting to cultivate the better 
 instincts of their nature.' (Phcedo.) This gradual but 
 certain declension issues in the final extinction of the 
 soul. 
 
 This agrees with St. Paul's doctrine. ' Fear not him 
 who can kill the body, and after that hath no more that 
 he can do,' &c. The ' eternal punishment' of the wicked 
 is truly spiritual punishment, as eternal * life should 
 be spiritual life. The second spirit, who combated 
 the idea of objective reality in heaven, though he ad- 
 mitted the reality of appearances, also writes : — 
 
 * There is no hell for the wicked, only more or less 
 happy places for the just, according to their virtuous 
 avoidance of the wickedness of this world, and a place 
 of improvement and instruction for all. 9 
 
 This may be and probably is true as the influencing 
 spirit perceives it. His own state is not very unlike 
 what it was here. Many, by his description (p. 205), 
 
 * I may not here enter into all the reasons for rejecting the usual 
 translation of aldvios, but my statement is not new. The word has always 
 been obscure to scholars, and I can only beg that its application by 
 ancient writers in the sense I have assigned to it should be examined. 
 Plato's alwves, or iEons, were breathings of spirit power from God, thus 
 Ages in one sense. 
 
214 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 are in the same condition and continue so for a long 
 time; but it follows as a necessary consequence of 
 the universal law of spiritual attraction and sympathy, 
 which must operate more strongly when the bonds 
 of the body are cast aside, that the ill-disposed will 
 congregate together, as in this world, in lower and 
 yet lower depths of sin. During the life on earth, 
 the direction of the will may be more easily changed, 
 and through that influence described in Scripture 
 as the work of God's Holy Spirit in the souls of 
 men, higher aspirations may and do take the place of 
 the lower propensities. But in a state where all affinities 
 will impel with greater force, like will consort with 
 like, good or even a desire for good will rise to God, 
 and hopeless evil will sink to evil. 
 
 When we examine into the universal law of symbolism, 
 or the correspondence of the internal of one state with 
 the external of those above, we shall find how this 
 massing together of wickedness will be inevitably 
 accompanied by a loss of all the beautiful perceptions 
 and sensations which make an advance in the heaven- 
 ward course so glorious ; how darkness and chill or a 
 smouldering fire will be substituted for the light and 
 warmth of the Sun of righteousness ; how discord and 
 strife, instead of love and harmony, will pervade the 
 whole, and form the lamentable surroundings of the 
 descending spirit. That this is the fact is asserted 
 by all mediums, as the foregoing accounts show. 
 
THE HOME OF THE SPIKIT. 215 
 
 c Hell '* is the Scripture name given to this condition. 
 We need not try to change it. 
 
 Thus are built for us those many spiritual mansions 
 of which our Lord tells us, and to which His ascent into 
 heaven opened the way. 
 
 But it is evident that we are ourselves the architects 
 of our houses, not so much by our own acts, as by our 
 own state, and that state depends on our reception of 
 the higher life from above, the influx of the Comforter, 
 the Spirit of Truth. 
 
 It is agreeable to all the analogy of nature that there 
 will be a kind of order in the developement after death ; 
 but when state perceptibly determines what we call 
 time and place here, this order will follow the degree of 
 strength of impressions. Thus, as in Admiral Beaufort's 
 description, those nearest the time of death will form 
 the first on awakening, so the next state will appear to 
 be only a continuation of this, without the suffering 
 which has preceded the change. Then, a gradual un- 
 folding of the storehouse. All the memories of this 
 world, with their treasured loves, their hoarded know- 
 ledge, and their innumerable scenes and pictures, will 
 be as an opened roll, forming what in the grand but real 
 symbolism of Scripture is called the book of judgement : 
 ' And the judgement was set, and the books were 
 opened.' 
 
 * The word Hell is not always used in the Greek when it is found in 
 the English Testament. In most places the original word is Hades, o 
 the spirit-world. 
 
216 
 
 CHAPTEE XII. 
 
 APPEAKANCES AFTER DEATH. 
 
 TF this chapter were meant to be merely a collection 
 -■- of ghost stories, chosen without regard to any- 
 thing but careful authentication, it would soon swell 
 into a volume ; for almost every friend 'can give a well 
 attested tale of a ghost, either direct or traditionary : 
 but my intention is more definite, and every instance 
 is chosen either for the purpose of illustrating what has 
 preceded, or of furnishing data for further reasoning. 
 
 It seems needless, at this stage of our inquiry, to go 
 over all the arguments for or against appearances after 
 death ; the simple fact, that in all ages and nations such 
 appearances have been believed in, is enough to 
 establish a foundation for the conjecture that, under 
 certain unknown but not very uncommon conditions, 
 the spirits of the departed are able to show themselves 
 to the living. For a great variety of facts connected 
 with this subject I refer to Mr. Dale Owen's ' Footfalls 
 on the Boundaries of another World,' Mr. Howitt's ' Su- 
 pernatural in all Ages and Nations,' and a large number 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 217 
 
 of well-attested statements in the Spiritual Magazine 
 and other publications, all showing that, if evidence is 
 insufficient to establish their truth, it cannot be held to 
 confirm that of any single occurrence. Much of the 
 mystery in which this subject is veiled is due in part 
 to the manner in which it has been treated by so- 
 called sensible persons and scientific men; by those 
 who, when other subjects are in question, boast of their 
 earnestness in collecting facts before trying to form 
 conclusions. In the matter of spiritual appearances, 
 it is certain that wherever their occurrence is asserted 
 a very uniform series of phenomena has been described. 
 The sudden terror, not always fear, but often rather due 
 to physical than mental action on the nerves, the 
 electric thrill or shudder, the faintness, sometimes 
 sleepiness, sometimes a sudden wakening from sleep, 
 occasionally an appearance of lambent flame or blue 
 mist, and sometimes even a phosphorescent or sulphu- 
 reous smell, are among the commonest of the facts 
 attested. We may say that these are all the produce 
 of ignorance and superstition; but why should igno- 
 rance and superstition always agree so well in their 
 fictions ? There must be some good reason for this 
 agreement ; but as it is not for one who has hazarded 
 conjectures as to the causes of rapping, writing, and 
 crystal -seeing, to enter into any train of reasoning 
 which supposes only hallucination or subjective mental 
 action in the asserted appearance of ghosts, I will only 
 
218 FROM MATTER TO SriRIT. 
 
 give a few well attested instances of different kinds of 
 apparitions, and then try to explain and classify them 
 according to the theories of spiritual and material 
 existence already given. 
 
 From all the information which we have been able to 
 gain from professedly spiritual sources, as well as by 
 inferences drawn from the facts themselves, it appears 
 that these apparitions are of different kinds, or rather 
 degrees; varying from that of the low material ghost 
 — who enters with a loud rap at the door, passes with a 
 heavy footstep round the room, pulls the curtains or 
 bedclothes, and behaves in an obtrusive unmannerly 
 way, and who seems plainly visible to the bodily eye, 
 audible to the ear, and even palpable to the touch, — 
 to the beautiful angelic vision of the lost parent or 
 child, whose glorious appearance, though perhaps only 
 seen in a dream, gives comfort and gladness to the 
 mourner. The first kind are of the earth, earthy ; and 
 with these lowest I begin. Such are described as seen 
 by the Seeress of Prevorst and by the seeress in 
 rdicm Spirits. These ghostly forms were often 
 seen by others beside the seeresses themselves, though 
 it is most probable that the condition of mediumship of 
 both these women rendered it more easy for the spirits 
 to clothe themselves in an atmosphere by which they 
 were rendered visible. On the subject of these low 
 earthly souls, I have 'already quoted Socrates, who speaks 
 of them as retaining enough of earthly material to 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 219 
 
 make themselves seen and heard, and who haunt 
 about graveyards, and other places where the heavy 
 damp state of the air is suitable for their appearance. 
 
 In answer to questions as to the means by which 
 apparitions of this kind are produced, an assertion is 
 constantly made by the spiritual writing that spirits 
 near to earth, even if not evil, are able to gather from 
 the atmosphere the finer elements nearest in affinity 
 with their own external. The growth of the body 
 during earthly life by the developement of the spirit 
 elements within is thus described ; the spirit and its 
 surroundings possess an attractive power, which gathers 
 according to its quality corresponding substances from 
 the enveloping body. Before birth the formation takes 
 place in this way, and during the earth-life we subsist 
 by taking into and assimilating with our systems 
 particles from the air, and from the solid substances 
 around us. But in the future state only that most 
 external portion of the soul which forms the new body 
 can have any affinity with earth, and, as in the case of 
 those spirits whose aspirations and affections are directed 
 upwards the outer material is thrown more and more 
 off, so with the downward-tending spirit there is a con- 
 stant yearning for association and assimilation with 
 earth. Hence the magnetic power which these last 
 possess of gathering around their spiritual forms a 
 covering of matter, which, though delicate and refined 
 to us, is coarse and heavy to them. It does not appear 
 
220 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 that the spirits making themselves visible by this pro- 
 cess are all, without exception, of an earth-tending 
 nature. Those recently departed may occasionally 
 become apparent as a necessary consequence of the new- 
 ness of their entry into life ; but it is probable that 
 those haunting spirits which are said to return year after 
 year, or at longer or shorter periods, in some places, and 
 to appear in the dress they used to wear in life, are of 
 this character. 
 
 Of this kind of manifestation, too, are said to be the 
 famous 'hands,' visible to many persons through Mr. 
 Home's wonderful mediumship. They are not neces- 
 sarily those of earth-clinging beings, but I am not 
 aware of any instance in which a heavenward-tending 
 spirit has after a long period of time made a hand 
 visible and palpable to the touch. What electric or 
 magnetic state of the medium enables the spirit to clothe 
 itself in this material covering has yet to be discovered, 
 as well as the physical part of the other conditions 
 of mediumship. I have been assured, by three persons 
 of unquestionable truth, of the sight and touch of hands 
 without the presence of any known medium, and in a 
 waking state. In one case it was the hand of a baby 
 seen by its little brother on the father's pillow, and soon 
 after felt by the mother to touch her own hand. An- 
 other time a child saw and described to me a beautiful 
 rosy dimpled hand, which she recognised as that of one 
 who had left her. In these cases the seer was the 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 221 
 
 medium of manifestation. When we consider the 
 doctrine of cortvspondence, in its relation to manifesta- 
 tion, we shall see why the hand, which is always used 
 as a type of power, should be so often seen. I have 
 known mediums and clairvoyants of a common-place 
 and rather ungifted nature able to see only the feet 
 of very refined heaven-tending spirits, while the whole 
 form of others, who in life had been nearer to their own 
 nature, was plainly seen and described. In the case of 
 the hands, seen in Mr. Home's presence, we may gather 
 from the letter of Verax, himself a spiritual medium,* 
 that they were not all equally visible to all the party. 
 The sight of each person was in proportion to the affinity 
 with the spirits, and the degree of spirit vision thence 
 acquired ; for, as I have already said, spirits can only 
 find channels for manifestation in any form through 
 that mental organisation which they have in common 
 with the medium : and this does not imply that a low 
 spirit cannot make itself heard or seen, or otherwise 
 communicate, in any degree at all, through a person 
 with noble qualities and high aspirations ; because there 
 is a mixture of elements in the highest as well as in the 
 lowest human being. It is the difference of proportions 
 and combinations that causes varieties of character. 
 But in the instances of assuming a visible form, it 
 follows as a necessary consequence of what I have said, 
 
 * See Incidents in my Life, by D. D. Home. 
 
222 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 that the more earthly the spirit, the greater will be the 
 number of persons to whom it can show itself. In the case 
 of hauntings, it has been surmised that even the place 
 itself furnishes odylic or magnetic conditions which en- 
 able the spirits to clothe themselves in a visible form. 
 This is in some measure confirmed by the fact that dis- 
 turbances cease when the house or room is rebuilt. 
 
 In order to begin at the very lowest step of the scale, 
 I will narrate some circumstances which came under 
 my own observation, in which all the phenomena of 
 6 haunting ' occurred. Every incident of the story was 
 known to me as it took place, and if the sounds and 
 appearances described, with the large amount of con- 
 firmation they received from facts afterwards made 
 known to us, can be attributed to imagination in the 
 first place, or coincidence in the second, I do not see 
 how any amount of evidence short of actual sight can 
 determine the cause of any occurrence whatever. The 
 narrative is given in the words of an eye and ear- witness 
 who was quite unprepared for any such disturbances in 
 the house, as she was ignorant of its former history and 
 character, and never felt a sensation like fear until the 
 last visit, when the sound of a voice was heard from the 
 keyhole of the door. As in former narrations, names 
 are suppressed and initials changed. 
 
 ' In the summer of 18 — we went for a few weeks to 
 
 House, in the village of D . Its damp and 
 
 dilapidated condition rather repelled me, but for a short 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 223 
 
 time in a dry hot summer this seemed of little importance. 
 We knew nothing of any former occupant. The house 
 consisted of three stories above the basement: namely, 
 ground floor, containing dining-room, &c. ; first floor, 
 drawingroom and three bedrooms ; second floor, bed- 
 room to the front over the drawingroom, and three 
 small chambers to the back, the second and third open- 
 ing from the first ; and the third, a very small room, or 
 rather closet, having for window only the glass panes of 
 a door which faced the fireplace, and opened on the 
 landing of a little ladder staircase under a cover, and 
 outside the house. The lower steps of this little flight 
 adjoined the door of the small bedroom below. The 
 windows of all the bedrooms at the back of the house 
 are sheltered from the road, and, considering that the 
 house is in a village and surrounded by other houses, 
 nothing can be more secluded than the two rooms at the 
 top and the bottom of the staircase. 
 
 ' On the basement is a kitchen having a dark larder, 
 entered by a door on the one side, and scullery on the 
 other. In the scullery is a sink, and on the left of this 
 sink a doorway leading through a dark stone passage to 
 a deep well, from which pipes were once placed to 
 supply water to the house above. 
 
 6 On the first night of our stay I heard at midnight three 
 loud knocks at the door of my room. A servant had 
 been left in the house by the person from whom I hired it, 
 and I concluded that it was she who wanted to speak to 
 
224 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 me, as all my family were in bed. I called to the 
 person to enter, but no one came in. The knocks were 
 twice repeated and twice answered. At length I got up, 
 opened the door, and found nobody. 
 
 The next morning my servant, who had slept in the 
 little back room, begged that she might not be required 
 to occupy it again, as she had not closed her eyes all 
 night. She did not give any reason for her wakefulness 
 or her request, but I concluded that she felt the oppres- 
 siveness of the air (the weather was very hot), and com- 
 plied with her wish. She was a sensible Scotch girl, 
 quite incredulous on the subject of ghosts, and rather 
 priding herself on her superior understanding. After 
 some time a young woman from the country, who had 
 once lived in the family, came to see us, and, the rest of 
 the house being full, occupied the little back room. 
 Just before midnight I went to all the rooms to see all 
 my family settled, and found that the new comer was in 
 my servant's room, which was very small even for one 
 person. She declared that nothing should induce her 
 to sleep in that ( dreadful hole ;' that as soon as she was 
 laid down she heard a sort of sobbing or sighing close 
 to the head of the bed, near the fireplace, with a strange 
 noise, as if some one were sweeping a broom or duster 
 all round the paper of the room. My own servant then 
 told me that on the night when she had slept in that 
 room, though she did not hear the sighing, she was con- 
 scious of a presence which prevented her resting, as if 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 225 
 
 some one were standing close to her pillow. She also 
 heard the sweeping round the paper. Both women 
 declared positively that there had been no previous 
 communication between them, and I knew well that 
 both were thoroughly truthful. Indeed, it would have 
 been very foolish in my servant to frighten her visitor 
 heedlessly, for it was very inconvenient to her to have a 
 companion in a bed little larger than a child's crib. 
 
 Another person, a well-known sensitive, slept one 
 night in the little back room. She afterwards said that 
 she had not rested at all. She had a sensation through 
 the night as of a tight bandage across her forehead, a 
 cold perspiration, and a feeling of horror, connected 
 with the door opening into the little room. A young 
 man of 20, a complete unbeliever, afterwards occupied 
 the same room (that adjoining the back room), and 
 described a similar feeling. To get rid of the oppres- 
 sion he rose at daybreak, and went out into the open 
 air. After this no one slept in the back room. Two 
 days before we left the house, a young lady, who had 
 lived for three years in a remote part of the country, 
 came, with two other friends, to visit us. The three 
 had found the house with difficulty, and the young lady, 
 who is a remarkable clairvoyante, noticed the small 
 oddly shaped rooms, and the antiquated look of the 
 whole place (for the premises did not consist only of the 
 house, but included a yard, and a wooden bridge across 
 it to stabling on the other side), and expressed a wish 
 
 Q 
 
226 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 to go over the whole. I gladly assented. I told her 
 that I fancied the house was haunted, but no one room 
 was specified. Nothing passed which could induce her 
 to look for ghosts in one part more than in another. 
 
 My three friends then went through the first floor 
 bedroom to the bottom of the little ladder staircase, and, 
 
 Miss desiring it, they went up. I, being lame, did 
 
 not follow them, but went up inside the house to meet 
 them as they entered the little back room. When I 
 reached the door-step I found that they had just got 
 
 into the room. Miss was standing looking at the 
 
 fireplace, which, it must be remembered, was opposite 
 the glass door through which they entered, close to the 
 bed's head. Her friends held each a hand, and spoke 
 to her anxiously, as well they might, for she looked 
 frightfully pale and horror-stricken. At first she seemed 
 unable to speak, then only said, ' Take me away.' We 
 all hurried down stairs, and she told us that while going 
 up the little flight of steps, she had not thought of 
 seeing anything, and when she got to the door, though 
 there was something white by the fireplace, she took it 
 for a towel or some shavings. She was, however, 
 made to look at this, and she then saw the figure of a 
 small woman kneeling, in a white night-dress. She did 
 not see the head. The dress was stained with blood ; 
 and there was a pool of blood on the floor. On the 
 stairs a man passed her, dragging up a small woman 
 
 against her will. Miss seemed in a great hurry to 
 
 get away. 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 227 
 
 We left the place two days after this; and in the 
 course of three or four weeks, removed to a new house. 
 
 A person from D was recommended to me to fit 
 
 carpets, &c, whose exceeding deafness was a great draw- 
 back to her in her work, though, as it made conversa- 
 tion impossible, it gave me security that she could not 
 have heard of these disturbances from any of my ser- 
 vants. I had been with her for some hours giving' 
 directions, &c, when I thought of asking ( If she knew 
 
 the house at D ?' She looked mysterious, and said 
 
 she did n't know much of it. f What do you know ? ' 
 ' No further than that they say it 's haunted.' 
 c Will you tell me all you have heard about it ? ' 
 She then told me that ( it belonged, years ago, to Mr. 
 
 L , but he went to live in another house. He had 
 
 a daughter very small in her figure, and gentle, but 
 
 u silly like," not crazy. Mr. T married her for her 
 
 money, for she inherited a good deal from her father, 
 and the house came into her possession. He ill-used 
 his poor little wife terribty, and dragged her about. 
 And he took her to that house and shut her up there* 
 When she died she was out of her mind, but there was 
 some mystery about her death. Some gentlemen and 
 ladies tried to find it out, but nothing was known satis- 
 factory, only they say the house has been troubled at 
 times ever since, and nobody stays long in it.' 
 
 'Do you know in what part of the house he kept her ?' 
 ' A little back room at the top of the house ; but I 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 never was there, myself, so I only speak as I Ve been 
 told.' 
 
 Soon after this time, being in the village, and finding 
 the outer gate open, I went in for the ostensible purpose 
 of asking about the rent, &c, the house being to let. 
 The landlord, who was in the house, told me that all 
 noises could be accounted for by the falling in of a 
 chimney, which had been shaking for some time. I 
 went up stairs with him, and found that the chimney 
 and fireplace of the little back room had sunk so com- 
 pletely that the fireplace was lodged on that of the room 
 below. I told the landlord of the various occurrences 
 that had come to my knowledge, observing that though 
 the falling of brick and mortar might be heard, it could 
 
 not produce an apparition as seen by Miss , nor 
 
 the feeling of horror described by persons who had no 
 idea of any catastrophe having taken place in the house. 
 The landlord said that anyone might have it for the rest 
 of his term for a mere trifle, for he could not dispose of 
 it, and that he should leave it in thorough repair. Soon 
 after this, I found a broker's wife, who was left in charge, 
 standing at the outer gate. She said she was afraid of 
 remaining within the house ; for that one day, as she 
 stood at the sink in the scullery, a woman, whose face 
 was bound up like a dead person's, came out of the well- 
 passages, touched her shoulder in passing, and, crossing 
 the scullery, disappeared in a little low closet opposite 
 the sink. I enquired about the character of this woman, 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATIT. 229 
 
 and found that I was not the only person to whom her 
 story had been told, though the hearers were generally 
 incredulous, and ready to condemn her. 
 
 The house stood empty for some time after the 
 repairs, which, however had not been very complete. 
 In the course of a few months some friends, one of 
 whom had the faculty of spirit vision, went with me to 
 pay a visit to it. As no one came to answer the bell 
 we supposed the house was empty, and went to the 
 agent for the key. We then unlocked both garden 
 gate, and house door, and found all the lower rooms 
 shuttered up and empty. The lady, who is a seeress, 
 went up the little ladder followed by her husband, 
 and on reaching the glass door said, ( There are people 
 inside, they have got a fire here ; but the door is locked, 
 so we must go up inside the house.' The other lady 
 said that 'of course the people could not hear the bell if 
 they shut themselves up in that room.' We went up 
 stairs inside, and when we reached the door between 
 the two little rooms, my friend looked strange and dis- 
 mayed. The room was quite empty. ( I am sure,' she 
 said, ( I saw them both, the man stood here ! ' pointing to 
 the place, ' and left the room as we came to the glass 
 door. The woman sate crouched down there,' pointing 
 to the spot by the fireplace where the figure had been 
 
 seen by Miss , and whence the sounds had issued. 
 
 c She is very small and looks imbecile; she had on a 
 lilac dress. They had quite a bright fire when I saw 
 
230 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 them from outside.' We stood looking for a minute or 
 two, nothing of course being visible to anyone except 
 this lady, who seemed, after a time, to see the little 
 woman again, for she said, ( I can't bear the look of those 
 dull grey eyes.' Then she said that both had gone 
 down stairs, and ran off quickly to follow them, not 
 stopping till she got to the side of the well, from which 
 it must be remembered the broker's wife had declared 
 the apparition had come. When beside the well, 
 
 Mrs. appeared to be under a kind of spiritual 
 
 impression, and told us that the cruelty practised by 
 the man on the poor woman was beyond description. 
 6 They,' she said, meaning the spirits, ( say that they 
 need not show me all. I think she was drowned in 
 this well ; she was kept upstairs in that little room ; one 
 night she got out of bed, fell on the fender, and cut 
 her forehead open. Another time she escaped, and ran 
 down stairs, he pursuing her ; then she threw herself into 
 the well ; he did not drown her. I do not think she was 
 here more than a fortnight, and he brought her late one 
 night in a little fly ; not one of those flies or cabs that 
 are used now, but a little narrow fly, in which the 
 people sit opposite each other. He is an ill-looking 
 man, with shaggy hair, and thick eyebrows, and a low 
 forehead, he is what they call beetle-browed. His 
 complexion is coarse, but not red.' 
 
 Soon after this time another party visited the house, 
 getting the keys as before from the agent. The visitors 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 231 
 
 were Mrs. , the seeress, two sisters, who had more 
 
 or less of medium power, two ladies of middle age and 
 unquestionable good sense and truthfulness, and myself. 
 All went down stairs, as the little room at the top was 
 quite empty, and felt free from any presence. As we 
 all stood round the kitchen table (the only piece of 
 furniture in the house), I mentioned a visit which had 
 been paid to the place since our last, by some other 
 friends, one of whom saw a spirit disappear near a 
 large flag-stone in the larder. As I mentioned this 
 circumstance a great crash was heard, apparently from 
 those stones; I examined the larder immediately and 
 found it quite empty. The hand of the younger lady 
 was moved to write, ' The stone is spiritually fixed, you 
 cannot move if From it all sorts of noises were heard, 
 differently perceptible however to the different mem- 
 bers of the party, one of whom heard nothing at all. 
 To some of us they appeared like footsteps, flutterings, 
 and little tappings. Two or three cloudy forms were 
 said by the two medium ladies to be visible to them, 
 and to pass about in the kitchen and scullery. This 
 time the first seeress saw another woman, with the 
 woman and man. At length a wind, sensible to most of 
 us, and strongly so to myself, arose in the kitchen, 
 which also seemed filled with a kind of cloud or steam. 
 One lady felt herself pulled and pushed more than 
 once, and she as well as myself had an oppressive pain 
 in the head, like that which is sometimes felt in 
 
232 FROM MATTER TO SPIEIT. ' 
 
 thundery weather. The turmoil and wind in the 
 
 kitchen increasing, Mrs. 9 the first seeress, thought 
 
 that we had better leave the house. We ascended the 
 kitchen stairs, the lady who had been pushed and pulled 
 leaving with some reluctance, for she wanted to see 
 more. Before leaving the house, we saw that all the 
 windows were safely barred, and the doors of the rooms 
 shut. All were satisfied that we left the house empty 
 as we found it. I then locked the house door with the 
 key which I had carried the whole time, and all six 
 stood outside the door listening to the confused noise 
 within. These sounds were like the mingling of a 
 thousand discordant voices at a distance, as if from a 
 disturbed noisy crowd. As we listened, the lady who 
 had been pushed before asked why I was pulling her 
 dress — I had not touched her. Just then the noise 
 seemed to condense into one horrid hissing sound, which 
 uttered an imprecation on our eyes in four words, the 
 first of which was indistinct. Some people thought 
 that the wicked spirit could not utter the holy name 
 which he was trying to profane. I had never felt any- 
 thing like fear till that moment, but a horror seized me, 
 and I felt as if nothing could induce me to enter 
 
 that house again. Mrs. , the seeress, and her 
 
 little boy, who had joined us from the outside, both 
 heard it as well as myself. Miss L. heard a hissing. 
 In order to make sure that my ears had not deceived 
 me, I took Mrs. aside and begged her to repeat the 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 233 
 
 words she had heard if she did not mind doing so. 
 She told me the three last as I had heard them. The 
 little boy, when asked, said he had heard ' bad words,' 
 but we did not wish him to specify more particularly. 
 Neither of the other three ladies heard anything. 
 
 Soon after this time I learnt that between thirty and 
 forty years ago, at the time indicated by the date on 
 the family grave, two little flies exactly answering to 
 the description given by the seeress were kept in the 
 village. I found an old lady, the wife of the person who 
 had owned these carriages, and learned from her that 
 all the books had been destroyed when her husband 
 gave up business. So no further information could be 
 obtained. Guided by my first information from the old 
 deaf woman, I tried to learn more of the character of 
 the man. One lady, with whom I accidentally met, 
 gave me some particulars, among others, that he was a 
 coarse, ill-looking, beetle-browed man, who never looked 
 anyone in the face ; that his wife was small in person, 
 and deficient in intellect, but that his ill-usage made 
 her worse. From another person who gave information 
 with reluctance, I heard that she died raving mad from 
 ill-treatment, and that an unsuccessful suit had been 
 instituted to get a divorce by some of her family, on the 
 ground of cruelty. After this time I met with a person 
 who knew the man well, and who spoke of his having 
 appeared since his death in other places in which he 
 had lived on earth. This person said that his conduct 
 
234 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 to his wife was horrible, but that to all he was a bad 
 avaricious man. When I asked if he ever swore, she 
 said ( he seldom spoke without an oath, and his tone 
 was always a snarl.' His usual imprecation, one which 
 he had used in speaking to her, was the one I had heard. 
 All this information was given me before I mentioned 
 anything connected with my former enquiries. To this 
 day, I have not ascertained with certainty where or how 
 the poor woman died, for there are conflicting statements 
 on this subject, among those who profess to know, some 
 asserting that her death occurred in the village of 
 
 D , and some that she died at a greater distance 
 
 from London. 
 
 It is now some years since I met with a gentleman 
 who had had some strange experiences in the matter of 
 c hauntings,' which the communications between a 
 clairvoyante in his house and the spirits rendered still 
 more remarkable. This gentleman told me that from 
 the revelations of the clairvoyante he had been enabled 
 to discover much of the former history of his house, 
 which history he had been able to verify. One day the 
 clairvoyante told him that the spirit would appear to 
 her in her waking state, on a certain day and hour, and 
 my informant, to defeat the intention, for he feared the 
 effect on the young woman's nerves, sent her out. She, 
 however, for some reason or other, unexpectedly returned 
 before the appointed time, and the meeting took place. 
 The clairvoyante, who never, in her waking state, re- 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 235 
 
 membered what she had said when mesmerised, met the 
 spirit, and the description she gave agreed entirely 
 with her account when in her lucid state. She was, 
 however, much frightened by the encounter. A very 
 respectable man living in the same house gave me an 
 account of his seeing this spirit. He had been utterly 
 unbelieving, and had laughed at my informant and the 
 clairvoyante on account of their belief. But he said, 
 that one day on entering an upper room he saw the 
 spirit. She was in a white dress. It seemed as if an 
 electric shock came from her eyes, and fixed him to the 
 spot on which he stood. He saw her for a few seconds, 
 then she disappeared. The above was taken from the 
 accounts of the parties themselves, and finds a place 
 here on account of the electrical effect described by the 
 last person. 
 
 In i Guardian Spirits ' we find an account of a 
 spirit by the sight of which the seeress was greatly 
 terrified. 
 
 ' He,' she says in answer to her magnetiser's questions, 
 ' is a frightful object.' . . . . ' The form of a man, 
 dressed in a dirty countryman's frock, not very tall. 
 His face, like his whole figure, is dark gray, inclining to 
 black, it has no proper features, but is all rough and 
 ragged. The eyes are like those of a bear ; he appears 
 to be bent and grown together in a shocking strange 
 manner, a true monster ; he has crooked club-feet, and 
 a form crippled all over, with shockingly long fingers. 
 
236 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 This spirit, it appeared, had been a monk in this life ; 
 he murdered and buried five of his own children in the 
 monastery. He also committed crimes of other kinds.' 
 
 This is very much like the Afreet of Egypt and the 
 East, and the dark spirits mentioned by the Seeress of 
 Prevorst. The Afreet is thus described in the i Bahar 
 Danush ' quoted by Southey : 
 
 ' He beheld a black demon heaped on the ground like 
 a mountain, with two large horns upon his head, and a 
 long proboscis, fast asleep. In his head the Divine 
 Creator had joined the likenesses of the elephant and the 
 wild bull. His teeth grew out as the tusks of a boar, 
 and all over his monstrous carcase hung long shaggy 
 hairs, like those of the bear. The eye of mortal form 
 was dimmed at his appearance, and the mind at his 
 horrible form and frightful figure was confounded. He 
 was an Afreet created from mouth to foot by the wrath 
 of God. His hair like a boar's, his teeth like a bear's. 
 No one ever beheld such a monster — crook-backed and 
 crabbed-faced, he might be seen at the distance of a 
 thousand furlongs.' 
 
 My object in making the extract is only to show the 
 resemblance between descriptions of wicked spirits of 
 the same class, and the continuance of a belief in Afreets 
 in the East. 
 
 Mrs. Poole's account, which may be found in her 
 6 English Woman in Egypt,' is given in part in Mr. 
 Howitt's ( Supernatural in all Ages ' &c. 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 237 
 
 'Mrs. Poole and her brother, Mr. Lane, took an 
 eligible house in Cairo, but in a few days were greatly- 
 disturbed by continued knockings; and the servants 
 began to quit them. Two maids left them almost 
 directly. They said that the house was haunted by 
 Afreets. They themselves were greatly disturbed by 
 these knockings; and one morning hearing a noisy 
 dispute between their servants, they demanded the 
 cause of it, and were informed that there was a devil 
 in the bath, that nobody had been able to live in the 
 house for a long time on account of this devil ; only one 
 person, who had soldiers and slaves, had been able to 
 hold out nine months ; for the rest a month at most was 
 enough. 
 
 ( This was agreeable intelligence, and it now came out 
 that a former tenant of the house had murdered a poor 
 tradesman who had entered the court, and two slaves, 
 one of these, a black girl, in the bath. The Afreet con- 
 tinued among them by marching round and round the 
 gallery leading to the different rooms as if in clogs, 
 striking the doors as he passed as if with a brick. 
 They hunted after him, but could detect nobody. One 
 night a servant shot at the Afreet, and for some time they 
 were quiet, but it soon began again. The loud knockings 
 went on ; heavy weights seemed to fall under the 
 window of the room in which they sat ; there were loud 
 tramplings as in clogs, and blows on the doors and 
 water-jars placed in recesses in the gallery. These 
 
238 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 noises continued the greater part of the night, and one 
 servant left after another. At length they were com- 
 pelled to quit too ; and Mrs. Poole, at the time of her 
 writing, said that six other families had gone in, and 
 were driven out again, their windows and their china 
 being demolished even in the daytime.' 
 
 In the ghost-laying tradition to which I shall refer 
 again, which describes a little residuum of dust or earth 
 as the result of the process when successful, the effect 
 is not said to be permanent. I have been told in 
 Wales of spirits 'laid,' and their remains deposited 
 under earth or stone, but after a certain period they 
 re-appear and get worse than ever. This appears to be 
 the case with the Egyptian Afreet. The Arab servant 
 
 ( The Afreet passed me in the gallery and repassed 
 me ; when I thus addressed it. " Shall we quit this 
 house, or will you do so ? " " You shall quit it," he 
 answered, and passing me again he threw dust into my 
 right eye. This proved he was a devil, and I wrapped 
 my cloak around me, and watched the spectre as he 
 receded. I stopped in the corner, and observed atten- 
 tively his appearance. It was tall and perfectly white. 
 I stopped and before it moved again, discharged my 
 pistol which I had before concealed, and the accursed 
 was struck down before me, and here are the remains." 
 So saying, he picked up a small burnt mass, which my 
 brother showed me afterwards, more resembling the 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 239 
 
 sole of a shoe than anything else, perforated by fire 
 in several places, and literally burnt to a cinder. This 
 the man asserted, agreeably with popular opinion, was 
 always the relic when a devil was destroyed, and it lay 
 on the ground under a part of the wall where the 
 bullets had entered.' 
 
 The Afrit or Efreet, described in the note to Thalaba, 
 would not appear to have ever been a mortal; but 
 Mrs. Poole's statement, that the one shot at Cairo 
 was supposed to be the spirit of a murderer, makes it 
 probable that the Afreet is always the spirit of a wicked 
 man, and that the translation of the first extract has 
 been in some way erroneous. It is true that the 
 Afreet of the ' Bahar Danush ' resembles the frightful 
 spirit seen by the seeress in c Guardian Spirits,' and that 
 spirit again had been, like Mrs. Poole's Afreet, a 
 murderer during life. But there was a difference in 
 the appearance presented to the Egyptian servant, 
 who saw the form which he shot at, as a tall white 
 figure. These differences of appearance will be bet- 
 ter understood when we enter into the question of 
 correspondence, and consider the different degrees of 
 opening of inner vision in the seer. 
 
 There are many stories in Wales of haunting spirits 
 which, having been laid by the intense gaze of those 
 skilled in such matters, disappear, leaving behind them 
 a little dust, which is generally buried. It is said that 
 after this operation the spirit does not re-appear for 
 
240 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 some time. I do not treat this with ridicule, because 
 the same tales have come from so many different and 
 unconnected sources, and because both the shooting of 
 the Egyptian Afreet and the laying of the Welsh ghost 
 may possibly bear the same interpretation. This ' laying ' 
 of a spirit is almost always done by the eye, and only 
 some gifted individuals are able to perform the feat. 
 Now supposing an earth-tending spirit to have covered 
 itself in a partially material wrapping, the envelope, 
 according to the statements of the seers, is held over 
 its form by a kind of magnetic attraction possessed by 
 the spirit. To dissolve the union between the spirit 
 body and the semi-material particles polarised to it, as 
 steel filings to a magnet, a contrary magnetism is 
 required, and this is supplied by the mesmeric power 
 of some person in the body. The e shooting ' may act 
 as a decomposing power by changing all the atmospheric 
 conditions about the earth-covered spirit, by which 
 operation all the adhering particles are detached, and 
 precipitated. On the supposition that the laying of 
 these ghosts has consisted in detaching earthly particles 
 from the spiritual form, there is no reason why the 
 process of attraction and assimilation should not begin 
 again, and a visible husk be assumed as before. This 
 would account for the temporary disappearance of the 
 spirits, and their re-intrusion again after a time in their 
 old haunts. In the cases of 'laying' by religious 
 rites, which are very well attested, I imagine the 
 
ArPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 241 
 
 process to be moral rather than physical, and to consist 
 of an effect on the feelings of the spirit, by which it is 
 induced to direct its thoughts into higher regions, 
 and so to lay aside its earthly investiture. All persons 
 who believe in communication with spirits say that 
 one of the strongest motives that unhappy spirits have 
 for seeking the living, is to obtain the aid of their 
 prayers. Our own experience has strongly confirmed 
 this. A case of this kind was that of the poor carpenter 
 (p. 201), and I was then told that to him the higher 
 spirits who would lead him in an heavenward direction 
 were scarcely perceptible ; he had known nothing while 
 he was here of a state like theirs, and was unprepared 
 to enter into it when he left this world ; and as similarity 
 of state in the spirit constitutes nearness, he was far 
 removed from his guides, who were able to approach 
 him only through the intervention of one in the body, 
 with whom he was in a kind of rapport, and whose 
 assertions he believed. While on the subject of ( laying ' 
 ghosts I may notice the strange old fiction, as it is 
 considered, of laying them in the Red Sea. When we 
 enter into the doctrine of correspondence into which 
 spirit-language falls when it comes through a mortal 
 brain, we shall see how significant is this apparently 
 absurd idea. We shall find that Egypt typifies, both 
 in Scripture and in all spiritual communication, the 
 natural state, out of which every soul must be led before 
 it comes into Canaan, the higher or truly spiritual 
 
 R 
 
242 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 degree. These poor spirits are supposed, in their 
 hankering after the flesh-pots of Egypt or their desire 
 to return to the natural state, to have passed over the 
 boundary between the two conditions, and thus the 
 laying them in the Red Sea is only a correspondential 
 way of expressing their being sent back into the state 
 proper for them. 
 
 A very interesting account of haunting may be found 
 in the second volume of the ' Spiritual Magazine,' en- 
 titled ' Clamps in the Wood,' by Mr. Howitt. I have not 
 the number containing the article, but can give, from 
 recollection, a sufficiently correct account of the facts to 
 illustrate other statements. I have also more than 
 once heard them in Mr. Howitt's own words. The 
 house called ' Clamps in the Wood,' stands in a lonely 
 neighbourhood in Derbyshire, in a mining district. 
 The spirits by whom this house is haunted are believed 
 to be those of miners. According to the descriptions 
 received by Mr. Howitt on the spot, these spirits 
 present different appearances to different seers. To 
 the grandmother, who saw them first, they appeared as 
 lights issuing from the wall, moving about the room 
 and returning by the way whence they came. These 
 lights are about two feet high, and in the centre of each 
 is a brighter light, radiating and working outwards 
 as rapidly as possible. Compare this account with 
 that of the person who saw the departed spirit (p. 128), 
 and the instance (p. 257) in this chapter. After a time, 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH, 243 
 
 as the old woman's vision opened, she distinguished the 
 forms of men within the external luminous atmosphere, 
 and saw that they were black and shining. This is the 
 appearance of men working in the lead mines. The son 
 never saw more than the atmosphere of the figures, but 
 took great delight in watching them, and called them 
 his glorious lights. They were only visible in winter. 
 
 In many legends and histories of haunted houses, the 
 spirits are said to appear periodically, at longer or 
 shorter intervals of time. None of these haunting 
 spirits are of a high order, though some are very low 
 and wicked ; while some are, like those at e Clamps in 
 the Wood,' quite harmless, perhaps even kindly disposed. 
 But they are all more or less nearly allied to matter, and 
 in some material circumstance one condition at least 
 of their periodical visits may be sought for. It has 
 lately been found that there is a periodicity in certain 
 magnetic conditions of the atmosphere, under which also 
 the aurora borealis is most frequently observed. Admiral 
 Fitzroy gives the period of eleven years for a rise in the 
 magnetic state, at the end of which time it is at its 
 highest point, the same condition recurring at the end 
 of another eleven years. The appearance of spots in 
 the sun is said to be coincident with this highest degree. 
 It has occurred to me as possible, that the recurrence 
 of ghostly visitations may be traced to a similar cause 
 as that of the aurora borealis, namely, the increase or 
 diminution of certain magnetic conditions of the atmo 
 
 XHR^S 
 
244 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 sphere. Readers of Reich enbach may remember that 
 some of his sensitives, in whom the spiritual eye was 
 shown to be partially open by their perception of the mes- 
 meric stream from the hand, described a luminous ap- 
 pearance precisely resembling that of an aurora radiating 
 and scintillating from the poles of a spherical magnet. 
 
 Many spirits are said to appear like those at Clamps, 
 only at one season of the year, some every three, and 
 some every five years. It may be that the atmospheric 
 state which enables them to show themselves only 
 occurs at these periods, and it is also possible that a 
 certain time is needed for them to attract to themselves 
 those particles by which they are rendered visible. The 
 haunted house mentioned early in this chapter is said to 
 be visited periodically, and the year in which the sounds 
 and sights were witnessed was one of intense heat. 
 Very beautiful auroras were seen during the summer, 
 and thunder and lightning and various meteoric pheno- 
 mena also occurred. Since that time the house has been 
 quiet, but it is possible that the alterations and repairs 
 made by the last occupant may have put the spiritual 
 visitors to flight. This only time can show. 
 
 Among the lowest spirits are those whose mental 
 state has been imperfect, and whose character has on 
 earth assimilated them in some measure to the animals. 
 We know that the brain of man and its animating soul 
 contains portions similar to the brains of animals. 
 Every man or woman has in his or her brain all the 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 245 
 
 fibres through which the animal instincts come into 
 action — and something more. But the 'something 
 more' is that which assimilates him to the angels. 
 Now supposing the brain to be very deficient in all the 
 higher portions of organic fibre, but to have the lower 
 ones in fair develop ement, and of course in correspond- 
 ing activity, the result will be a character deficient in 
 the moral and intellectual qualities, but active in the 
 animal propensities and feelings. This is the case with 
 many idiots and imbeciles. They may be perfectly 
 harmless, and even affectionate, and we may suppose 
 that, when the spirit has thrown off its outer husk and 
 covering, a more exalted organisation will succeed to 
 the first, which indeed is like an imperfect machine, 
 unfitted for the work it has to do on earth. But the 
 first state of the soul after its change will be exactly 
 that in which it leaves this world ; and as every quality 
 has its corresponding form, the conclusion is unavoidable 
 that the unhappy beings in whom animal instincts and 
 propensities greatly predominate will bear in the ex- 
 ternal of the spirit body the impress of its inner life. 
 This, slightly modified, is the old Eastern doctrine. It 
 is found among the Grreeks, in Plato among the rest, and 
 in many nations at the present time. An account was 
 given to me, years ago, of an apparition illustrating 
 this. It was seen by many persons in the beautiful 
 region in which its appearance took place, and many 
 persons in the neighbourhood attested its frequent 
 
246 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 visits. But the one from whom the statement was 
 received was an eye-witness of the phenomenon, a man 
 who until that occasion had never seen anything of the 
 kind, and who had neither any belief in nor fear of ghosts. 
 He was a well-informed and educated man. From him I 
 learned that one evening, as it grew dusk, he was walking 
 
 along a country lane leading from grange to the 
 
 village. His road lay on the hill side. He was followed 
 closely for some paces by a large dog, white and reddish- 
 brown. At first he scarcely noticed his companion, 
 then, seeing that it was different from any of the dogs 
 belonging to the neighbouring farmers, he turned and 
 looked steadily at it. He saw that it was larger than a 
 common-sized Newfoundland dog, and that its face bore 
 some resemblance to a calf's, the reddish-brown being 
 mixed with white on the face. As he looked, the 
 creature disappeared, and my friend declared that a 
 fear such as he never- felt before, an intense horror, 
 seemed to take possession of him. He reached his 
 home with difficulty, and was ill from the nervous 
 shock for a day or two after. This apparition was 
 occasionally seen for some months ; then, some workmen 
 
 digging under the walls of grange, in order to 
 
 enlarge the building, came upon a skeleton which, by 
 the red hair, was taken for the remains of a poor im- 
 becile boy who had once lived in the house, and who had 
 disappeared in a suspicious manner, his removal being 
 attributed, as happens in country neighbourhoods, to 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 247 
 
 anyone and everyone who could be supposed to have 
 an interest in his absence. 
 
 I should not have ventured to repeat this story if it 
 had not been attested by many persons, whose evidence 
 was corroborated by my friend. 
 
 These earth-tending* spirits are in every way disagree- 
 able, as are spirits in the body of the same character. 
 But besides the fear and horror produced by the sight 
 of a supernatural object, there seems to be an effect 
 produced on the nerves like a shock of electricity or a 
 wrongly directed galvanic current. I pass from these 
 very low spirits to others who may be harmless or good, 
 and who are attracted to their friends by sympathy and 
 affection. 
 
 We need not look for an envelope of material particles 
 in these less earthly cases, for the conditions being 
 favourable, a person whose spiritual eye is opened will 
 always see those spirits with whom he is en rapport. 
 As I have made this assertion before, I give two instances 
 of it here, in which a spirit still in the body was seen 
 by one bound to it by magnetic rapport and affection. 
 The condition of being still in the body, and the short- 
 ness of time consumed in the whole occurrence, seem to 
 preclude the idea of the vision being quite of the same 
 class as those already described. I have the strongest 
 possible evidence of the truth of the next instances, 
 which are given without change of initials. 
 
 A lady, Miss F , was ill in a distant part of the 
 
248 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 country. A friend, Mrs. W , who is, owing to some 
 
 natural cause, in strong magnetic rapport with Miss 
 
 F , while visiting Mrs. N , expressed great 
 
 sympathy for the sick person and desire to give her 
 
 comfort. Both Mrs. W and Mrs. N are the 
 
 subjects of spiritual experiences. Mrs. N observed 
 
 that her friend while talking looked for a minute or two 
 abstracted and absent (Qy. — Was the word absent 
 first applied in this sense ?), after which she conversed 
 as before. The time was well marked : a few minutes 
 before four o'clock, the dinner hour. On the next 
 morning, or that following, a letter came from the 
 
 mother of Mrs. W , in whose house the invalid was 
 
 living. The writer said that on the day in question, 
 while lying down at about four o'clock in an upper 
 room, she heard her daughter's footsteps up the stairs, 
 and then saw her pass along the passage and enter 
 
 Miss F 's chamber. Although Mrs. W 's back 
 
 was towards her mother, the seer had a perception of 
 her face. Neither walls nor doors offered any obstacle 
 to the mother's vision ; and the dress, hat, and mantle 
 
 described in the letter, were those which Mrs. W 
 
 wore, and which had not been taken off during her 
 
 conversation with Mrs. N . 
 
 Another very remarkable example of the same kind, 
 proving the strong magnetic affinity between the same 
 
 two ladies, has lately been told me by Mrs. W . 
 
 Miss F earnestly longed to receive the communion 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATII. 249 
 
 in the little village church in the place at which she was 
 staying ; severe illness, however, prevented her leaving 
 the house, and a kind sympathising friend who was 
 with her suggested that, by turning her thoughts in the 
 right direction she might receive as much benefit in 
 the spirit as she would have done by being present in 
 the body to partake of the Lord's Supper. This Miss 
 
 F did, and such a calm and peaceful state ensued, 
 
 that she quite ceased to lament her inability to be pre- 
 sent. But on the very day on which the sacrament 
 
 was given, Mrs. W , between two and three hundred 
 
 miles off, had a vision of Miss F sitting quietly in 
 
 her place in the little village church (which was very 
 dusty), waiting to receive the rite. 
 
 These are confirmations of Swedenborg's assertion, 
 that sympathy with, or even thought of, a person 
 produces presence in the spirit-world, and the spiritual 
 state is subject to the same conditions. It thus becomes 
 easy to explain the many instances of appearance of 
 those just gone or going, to friends whom either they 
 love, or with whom they wish to communicate. The 
 state of a spirit immediately after quitting the body, 
 before it has undergone any of the future changes 
 for better or worse, is so like that of many spirits in the 
 flesh, which, like that of the lady mentioned last, are 
 easily detached from their earthly covering, that the 
 occurrence of similar phenomena in both states is quite 
 intelligible. I have heard it said by seers, to whom the 
 
250 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 appearance of spirit still in the body is not uncommon, 
 that they can always tell when one has entered its future 
 home, by the absence of a line of light which forms the 
 electric chain connecting the spirit with its tabernacle. 
 This agrees with the statement in p. 131. 
 
 When living persons are able thus to show them- 
 selves to those whose sight is opened, they appear to 
 those with whom they are present in the body in a more 
 or less abstracted state, the degrees of which vary from < 
 an apparent reverie to a deep magnetic trance. And if 
 the mother who saw the sympathising visitor pass to the 
 sick room had not had her spiritual vision opened, 
 nothing would ever have been known on the matter, 
 
 except Mrs. W 's expressed wish to give comfort to 
 
 the sufferer. 
 
 The following incident was well known at the time of 
 its occurrence to a large number of persons in India. It 
 is a striking instance of the presence of a departed 
 spirit caused by its last wish to see a near relative. 
 The story was given to me by an Indian officer, whose 
 father, the seer, was also a servant of the Company. 
 My informant received it from more than one of the 
 gentlemen present, who made notes of the circumstance 
 at the time. The initials are changed. 
 
 The regiment to which Mr. C belonged was 
 
 stationed near a little village up the country, and in the 
 hunting season parties were formed, who on returning 
 from the hunt breakfasted at each other's quarters. One 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 251 
 
 morning, when it was Mr C 's turn to receive his 
 
 friends, he awoke at daybreak, and saw the figure of a 
 woman standing beside his bed. Being quite without 
 
 fear or superstition, Mr. C concluded at once that 
 
 the appearance was produced by some ocular delusion. 
 He sat up in bed, rubbed his eyes, and expected his 
 visitor to depart. But she still stood there, and he, being 
 determined to settle the question, got up, crossed the 
 room to the washing-stand, washed his face, and, turning 
 again to the spot, saw the apparition still in its place. 
 He went up to the figure, recognised her as his sister, 
 and exclaiming, e Grood Grod ! — what brings you here ? ' 
 swooned away. 
 
 Mr. C was unable to join the hunting party that 
 
 morning, but made breakfast for his friends on their 
 return. While they talked of his inability to go with 
 them, he set down the teapot, and, with his hair literally 
 standing on end, pointed to a spot in the room where 
 no one present could see anything. ' Is it possible,' he 
 said, ' that none of you see the woman standing there? ' 
 His friends declared that the place was quite vacant, 
 
 but Mr. C went on, f I tell you all she stands there, 
 
 and she came to me early this morning. She is my 
 
 sister whom I left in England. I am confident we 
 
 shall hear of her death. Each of the gentlemen present 
 made a note of this assertion. As soon as news could 
 
 arrive by the mail, Mr. C heard of his sister's death, 
 
 and of the earnest wish expressed by her before she left 
 
252 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 this world, that her brother would take charge of her two 
 children. The two sons were brought up by the uncle. 
 
 In the recently published Memoirs of the Eev. J. 
 Leifchild is the following account of an apparition at 
 the time of death. It seems to have been caused by 
 the affection of the departing spirit for his own family, 
 to whom his thoughts reverted before his final departure 
 from this world. Mr. Leifchild, the writer of these 
 memoirs, says : — 
 
 ' I give an account of an occurrence which soon after 
 befell my aunt, for the truth of which as an event I can 
 vouch, but of which I can offer no solution. She was 
 standing in a little shop fronting the street, while a 
 customer was being served. On a sudden her absent son 
 passed in the street before her, and as he passed gave her 
 a look of recognition, which so surprised and overjoyed 
 her, that, forgetting everything else, she rushed into the 
 street after him. When there she could not see him, 
 and concluded that he had gone to the alley which 
 led to the Abbey (my father pointed this out to me, 
 and the place of apparition), and meant to hide himself 
 awhile. We all went in search of him, as soon as we 
 could assemble, but could not discover any trace of 
 her son. My aunt then concluded that she had seen 
 his spirit and fell seriously ill. I noted the circum- 
 stances in writing at the time and pondered over them. 
 
 * A few weeks afterwards my father came to see us, 
 and my aunt truly divined his errand. He had received 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 253 
 
 a letter from the captain of the ship in which her son 
 was sailing, stating that the unfortunate lad had fallen 
 from the mast and fractured his skull. While lying on 
 his deathbed he directed the captain to write to my 
 father, whose address he named. The dates of this mis- 
 fortune and of her hallucination corresponded precisely. 
 The deceased was a clever, amiable, and handsome youth, 
 and his mother never completely recovered her animation 
 after his death.' * 
 
 It is very desirable in this inquiry, to find instances of 
 reappearance in which the complete identification of 
 the spirit by one having the faculty of mediumship 
 may connect the spiritual manifestations with that 
 world into whose partially opened door we are trying 
 to get an insight. Such, given us by words, is the 
 experience of a friend whose interest in the phenomena 
 is well known to a large circle of inquirers, to whom 
 also his name, if it could be given, would be sufficient 
 guarantee for the truth of any narrative, however 
 extraordinary. The medium or seeress is a lady 
 whose gift consists in remarkably clear vision in every 
 degree. The bright letters in which the spirit appeared 
 to write his name will remind the reader of the inscrip- 
 tion read by Miss L in the crystal. 
 
 Another very interesting feature of this case is the 
 introduction of a new law, that which governs names 
 and associations, as an element in the question. 
 
 * Vol. ii. p. 21. 
 
254 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 'Some few years ago I was in frequent commu- 
 nication with a friend, a clergyman, who was much 
 interested in geology, and who had some original views 
 connected with the causes of the various changes 
 discovered in the earth's surface. After a month had 
 elapsed, during which no letter reached me from him, 
 I received an intimation from his family of his sudden 
 death. On the evening of the day on which this inti- 
 mation reached me I was engaged to meet a friend at 
 the house of a lady who had given some very con- 
 vincing proofs of her power to communicate with those 
 mysterious beings, or powers, commonly known as 
 "spirits." I was desirous of testing whether a spirit 
 lately entered upon the spirit-world col d or would 
 immediately communicate with a friend on earth. I 
 therefore adopted the following course. Having con- 
 versed for about an hour upon in different subjects, I at 
 length asked the lady if she saw near me any spirits 
 whom she had never seen before ? After waiting a few 
 seconds she replied that she did see two or three, all of 
 whom had only lately entered the next world. She then 
 described the appearance of one, whom she said called 
 
 himself B , and who intimated that he had died a 
 
 violent death. That this person was then dead I was 
 not aware, but some weeks afterwards I discovered that 
 this statement was true, he being supposed, at the time 
 of his appearance, to be a prisoner in the East. 
 
 6 The second spirit the same lady described as looking 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 255 
 
 older, rather tall, and with a clerical appearance about 
 him. But she remarked that he did not know how to 
 communicate with her, as he was evidently ignorant of 
 the very elements of the laws by which spirits in and 
 out of the body can exchange ideas and thought. After 
 a few minutes' disappearance the same spirit reappeared, 
 and with him the spirits of two eminent Geologists, 
 both of whom had before communicated with the lady 
 whose powers were being thus tested. By their evident 
 direction (according to the lady's description), my friend 
 then wrote letters and words, which were described as light 
 brilliant words, and said, "When on earth I was known 
 
 as the Eev. , of ," and then he added 
 
 that he had much now to tell in connection with a 
 scientific problem (in which we had been much and 
 mutually interested), and which problem his change of 
 state had enabled him, in a great measure, to solve. 
 
 e The principal points of interest in this investigation 
 appeared to me to be : first, that the young lady did 
 not personally know the clergyman in question, nor did 
 she know of his death ; secondly, the Christian name, 
 surname, place of residence, personal appearance, and 
 profession of the person, were correctly given ; thirdly, 
 the immediate reference to a scientific investigation 
 which we had ceased to write about only when he died ; 
 fourthly, the fact of his finding a difficulty in making 
 his thoughts palpable to the lady, or, in other words, in 
 communicating with her, until he was taught how to 
 
256 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 do so by those more experienced than himself. Thus 
 appearing to indicate that there is a law in these 
 matters and conditions which must be fulfilled, just 
 as certain laws must be obeyed in all sciences, in order 
 to obtain constant results.' 
 
 Within the last few years an incident involving some 
 amount of evidence occurred among the circle of friends 
 mentioned as having been deeply interested in the 
 manifestation. A member of one of the families was 
 taken away. Some little time after the name was 
 given, as in many other cases, with accounts of the 
 spirit's progress and state. One day the appearance of 
 a light which was said to be seen by two persons, and 
 which was asserted by the writing to be occasioned by 
 the presence of the spirit, excited some attention, and a 
 
 letter was written to Miss S , at that time in the 
 
 north of England, telling of the occurrence. The day 
 after this letter had been sent, the spirit told, through 
 the writing, of having been to see friends on earth, and 
 
 among others named Miss S , who was said to have 
 
 been visited on the Friday before at twenty minutes 
 after eleven in the evening. 
 
 Q. ' Was it in a dream f ' 
 
 A. c A r o, she ivas aivake, and I think she saw my 
 atmosphere? 
 
 It will be remembered that no part of this had been 
 
 communicated to Miss S , from whom, however, a 
 
 letter came in answer to the one sent, from which the 
 following is an extract : — , 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 257 
 
 c What you tell me of the sight seen by and 
 
 determines me to mention a little incident which 
 
 I hardly liked to name to you, thinking it too slight to 
 trouble you with. One evening last week, I was sitting 
 alone by the parlour fire rather late, about eleven I 
 
 think, thinking of and very earnestly wishing to 
 
 see her, or some indication of her, and wondering, as 
 Swedenborg says that <( thought is presence," whether 
 my musings would have brought us nearer each other. 
 I was conscious of a very strong desire to see her, and 
 
 exclaimed involuntarily, " Dear ! Can you give 
 
 me a sign? " or something to that effect, and looked up. 
 At that moment I saw a round golden light, silvery at 
 the edges, a sort of dazzle rather than a shape (the 
 writer afterwards described a rapid radiating or corrus- 
 cating appearance in the light, of which other instances 
 occur in the course of this narration). Having looked 
 up so suddenly, I fancied it might be the sudden move- 
 ment of the eyes that had created the appearance, 
 
 especially as I doubted whether cared enough for 
 
 me, to be likely to give me a thought. It was but of a 
 few seconds' duration, yet perfectly plain, and reminded 
 me of a magnificent golden rosy glow I had seen, but 
 then with my eyes shut (though wide awake), after my 
 father's death.' 
 
 In the ' Spiritual Magazine' for January 1863, is a 
 very interesting letter from the father of a young, 
 innocent, and happy spirit, whose affection for his 
 
 s 
 
258 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 earthly friends led him to give a farewell look to them 
 before he sought his new home. From long acquaint- 
 ance with the family I am certain of the good faith of 
 the narrator, and can have no doubt of the accuracy of 
 the statement. It will be seen that in this appearance 
 there was nothing painful or horrifying, but that the 
 idea of sunshine was connected with the visit of the 
 spirit on the seer's mind. Mr. Barth says : 
 
 4 On May 14, 1861, our son George, a most excellent 
 and religious youth of 19 years, was removed from this 
 to the spirit world. Perceiving that the time of his 
 departure was near, his mother and I alone watched by 
 his bedside. When the last breath had been taken in 
 and expired, I quietly remarked, " He is now- gone." 
 His mother inquired the time, and then, seeing the 
 rising sun shining over the blind of the room, which had 
 an aspect to the east, she said : et See, the natural sun is 
 just rising as our dear boy is rising to his heavenly home." 
 I have an object in noting the rising of the sun at the 
 moment of his departure. 
 
 6 Mr. Williams, a highly intelligent and worthy man, 
 is united to our eldest daughter. At this time he was 
 staying at his house in the city, his wife having been 
 only a few days previously confined. He was sleeping 
 in a room the windows of which faced the east. He 
 states that he was soundly asleep, his hands outside the 
 bedclothes, when he was suddenly aroused by feeling 
 each of his hands firmly grasped and pressed. He 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 259 
 
 instantly sat up, and by the bedside stood Greorge, hold- 
 ing his hands, and smiling in his face with a look of 
 peculiar sweetness and kindness. George was attired 
 (seemingly) in his night-dress. Mr. Williams was not 
 at all alarmed ; he knew it was Greorge in the spirit, and 
 his presence filled him with a calm feeling of peace 
 and happiness which remained for many hours. 
 
 6 They thus held hands and looked on one another for 
 a minute or longer, then the grasp relaxed, and Greorge's 
 spirit faded away. Mr. Williams noticed that the 
 rising sun was shining into his room over the blind. 
 His impression was and still is, that he saw Greorge by 
 this light and not by any other. At 8 o'clock, Mr. 
 Williams went to his wife's room and told her, in the 
 presence of his mother and the nurse, that Greorge was 
 dead. " Have you heard from my father ? " was the 
 natural query. " No, but I have seen Greorge, he came 
 for a minute this morning at sunrise." Mr. Williams, 
 finding that his wife was quite incredulous, for she did 
 not believe her brother so near the end of his earthly 
 life, only quietly repeated what he had said, and ex- 
 pressed his belief that a letter would be received from 
 Mr. Barth. In an hour later Mr. Williams received 
 the letter which he expected. 
 
 'Mr. Williams and Greorge were mutually much 
 attached, in all his boyhood anxieties his brother James 
 was Greorge's confidant and friend. Hence a parting 
 visit, and a parting smile, and a last friendly grasp of 
 
260 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 the hand was that which a departing spirit might be 
 glad to give to his friend and brother, but he could not 
 go in the body, nor give it while his body kept him.' 
 
 ' There is little, very little in this narration to those 
 who sneer " at the credulity of some people " who mistake 
 the coincidence of a dream with a death for a fact ; but 
 there is much, very much in it, much matter for thought 
 and speculation to those who can believe the apparition 
 to be a genuine reality. Was George seen ? Were his 
 hands felt? Why did he come in his night-dress? 
 Why could he not stay or speak ? These are all serious 
 queries, and many other serious questions might depend 
 on the replies, if we could ask and give them. If the 
 evidence be accepted, it proves that the spirit lives on 
 when the body is dead. The spirit was able to be vi- 
 sible and tangible, it had form and features spiritually 
 resembling those left on the bed. How did it pass 
 through the intervening space of three or four miles ? 
 Why did it go away, and where did it go to ? Answer 
 these queries, and next comes, Where is this spirit 
 now? 
 
 6 George appeared twice afterwards to a lady at High- 
 gate, walking into her dining-room at mid-day, and 
 bringing with him two of her spirit children, one in each 
 hand. He was grateful to her while in the world for 
 many kind attentions. The lady saw him quite dis- 
 tinctly floating a little above the floor with her two 
 dear departed children, and smiling on her. She knew 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 261 
 
 at the time they were all three spirits, but they gave 
 her no alarm. . . . George also appeared to our friend 
 and former servant Anne, who lived with us as cook for 
 twenty years, and now resides at Hounslow. He 
 appeared to her at her bedside in his night-dress, before 
 she heard of his decease. 
 
 1 A few nights after the funeral, a Mrs. H who was 
 
 an inmate of our house, and who was sleeping in the next 
 room to Greorge, often visited him at night if she heard 
 him coughing, and did many kind attentive acts, was 
 awakened by hearing most extraordinary and beautiful 
 music. (Greorge was a fine pianist and musical enthusiast ; 
 in fact his devotion to music hastened his removal from 
 this state.) She got out of bed and opened her bed- 
 room door to listen, wondering that my two girls should 
 be at music at that hour, but all was quiet. She went 
 back to bed, and presently the music recommenced, 
 wonderful music she says. She got up and opened her 
 window, and saw by the gaslight people walking about, 
 but the music was not in the street. Again she listened 
 in the house and out of the house, and the music ceased. 
 When she was quiet in bed it recommenced and she fell 
 asleep listening to it. Whence came this unearthly 
 music? * * * GrEORGE Barth.' 
 
 The last instance is in the words of a mother who 
 received comfort from the vision she describes, from 
 whose own writing it is here copied. 
 
 ' On the of it pleased the Almighty to 
 
262 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 remove from us our greatly beloved child Anne, after a 
 severe illness of about three weeks. For long after I 
 could not alas ! reconcile myself to the bitter thought 
 that I was never more in this life to behold her who for 
 nearly eight years had been the object of such tender 
 .are ; at length one strong desire took possession of my 
 mind, namely, that I might see her in a dream. Day 
 after day it seemed strange that she who was ever 
 present to my waking thoughts should never be present 
 to my imagination when asleep. At length I laid open 
 my heart before the Lord who commands us to make 
 known all our requests to Him in prayer. I made it a 
 subject of daily supplication that he would grant me 
 this consolation, but week after week passed, month 
 after month and my petition was still unanswered, and 
 I began to fear it was a presumptuous prayer and not 
 according to His will. Under this impression I cast 
 myself again before Him, declaring these my doubts, 
 imploring forgiveness if I sinned, and once more as if 
 for the last time offering up my petition. This was 
 nearly seven months after our sad bereavement. That 
 night I went to bed and to sleep, when towards morning 
 it appeared to me that I awakened, the room was quite 
 light, and on looking towards the doorway I beheld three 
 figures, the two outward ones were clothed in long loose 
 white dresses, and on their heads, completely covering 
 their faces, were white hoods. Between them stood my 
 blessed child, clothed also in white, but her head and 
 
APPEARANCES AFTER DEATH. 263 
 
 face were uncovered, and her fair hair long and in 
 waves upon her shoulders and sparkling with light, as 
 was also her face, where heavenly joy and happiness 
 were strongly marked. Her head was thrown back and 
 her eyes raised towards heaven ; nor did she cast one 
 look upon the earth. Her affections seemed placed on 
 things above ; where her treasure was, there her heart was 
 also ! It appeared as if she had unwillingly left her 
 heavenly abode, and anxiously longed to return to it. 
 She was raised a little above her companions ; her feet 
 were not visible, but seemed as if wrapped in a white 
 cloud. Her face and form were just what they had been 
 when she inhabited this earth, and yet there was this 
 remarkable difference that she was every way larger and 
 the countenance was expressive of a more matured 
 intelligence than could belong to one so young. There 
 was, l^sides, an indescribable something not belonging 
 to a world of sin and sorrow. I was in the act of 
 stooping forward in order to gaze more earnestly on this 
 lovely vision when all disappeared and I saw nothing 
 but the light of day shining into the room.' 
 
 In the lowest class of spirits we find the strange and 
 hideous forms. Among those who are not evil, though 
 held to earth by the recollection of earth-life, as also in 
 the recently departed, are the spirits who are recog- 
 nised by the dress they wore when in the body. These 
 last, the ' ghosts in costume,' have excited a great deal 
 of ridicule; but their appearance may be readily 
 
264 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 explained on the principle to which I have adverted in 
 the chapter on The Home of the Spirit. We have, in 
 speaking of the manifestations, said that ' Whatever the 
 impressing spirit thinks, the medium sees,' and the 
 same idea may be conveyed by saying, that, as every 
 thought or feeling in the earth-life leaves its impress 
 on the soul, that soul, when it becomes the body of the 
 spirit, has only to recall the memory of any particular 
 condition to produce the appearance desired. An 
 instance of this may be found in the officer's uniform 
 and the antique ring shown to the medium Jane, and 
 recognised by the wife of the spirit. 
 
 The lower the spirit, the more material are its con- 
 ditions, and the more easily and outwardly is its ap- 
 pearance impressed on the seer's eye. Sometimes 
 indeed, it seems as if little more than external sight is 
 required for the perception of the apparition. ^But as 
 we rise in the scale, we find that the internal sight or 
 vision of the soul must be opened. The spiritual eye 
 is needed to discern the objects of spirit-life, and every 
 ascending degree in the next state requires for its per- 
 ception, a corresponding increase of internal vision. 
 
 It is a noteworthy fact too, that in all these mani- 
 festations the sensation produced in the seer is one of 
 pain or pleasure corresponding to the state of the spirit 
 and its nearness to, or exaltation above, this earth. 
 The low, haunting spirits, produce headache and a 
 sensation of horror, of which an example was seen in 
 
APPEAPANCES AFTER DEATH. 265 
 
 the witnesses of the phenomena in the haunted house, 
 and in the statement of the gentleman who saw the 
 apparition like a calf, who was seized with a horror 
 such as he had never felt before. The sceptical man 
 
 J felt a painful electric shock. Mr. C fainted, 
 
 but, whether from surprise, or the earthly tendency of 
 the spirit, I have no means of knowing. 
 
 But Miss S derived nothing but pleasure from 
 
 the light that dazzled and scintillated before her 
 spiritual eye ; Mr. Williams, to whom the good and 
 pure young Greorge Barth paid his parting visit, e was 
 filled with a calm feeling of peace and happiness 
 which lasted many hours ; ' and though the mother, 
 whose lovely vision of her child is last in the series, 
 does not speak of happiness, her words express the 
 delight she felt in the answer given to her anxious 
 prayer. 
 
 Having already spoken of the magnetic state of the 
 atmosphere as a possible condition in the production of 
 these phenomena, we may indicate to future observers 
 the hour of day as an element in the question. It 
 may be that, as dark midnight, and the sun's absence 
 are favourable for the appearance of the earth-bound 
 spirit, the bright sunrise, as in the case of Greorge Barth 
 and the mother's vision, is both a favourable condition 
 and a natural correspondence for the appearance of the 
 rising angel. 
 
 Its full and specific meaning is seldom, if ever, given, 
 
266 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 to the Apostle's description of the kinds of bodies in 
 which spirits of contrary direction are clothed. e As is 
 the earthy (like earthy material) so are they which are 
 earthy. And as is the heavenly (spiritual essence) so 
 are they which are heavenly.' 
 
267 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 
 
 ALL the various communications which I have ever 
 seen, professing to come from spiritual sources of 
 a higher character, agree in stating that no true know- 
 ledge of the nature of spiritual impression can be 
 attained without a clear idea of the agreement by 
 correspondence between the natural and spiritual worlds. 
 That this truth involves a doctrine which at first sight 
 appears mystical and imaginary cannot be denied. It 
 is, however, intelligible enough, and as certain as any 
 branch of knowledge which can be deduced by well- 
 marked steps from indisputable principles. The very 
 clear explanation of correspondence given by Sweden- 
 borg has not received the attention it deserves, partly 
 perhaps from the positiveness and great copiousness of 
 his style, and partly from the difficulty found in appre- 
 hending the reality of the doctrine by those who have 
 had no conscious experience of spirit-life. But after 
 the inquirer has found, as we did, that this principle of 
 correspondence, and this only, furnishes a key to the 
 
268 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 difficulties of all spirit communication and inspired 
 writing, he cannot do better than turn to the pages of 
 the neglected Mystic, where he will find a coherent 
 explanation of a system of which only the very simplest 
 elements can be given here. 
 
 It has been partly the object of the foregoing pages 
 to show that every human being has within himself 
 different degrees of life to be developed and matured in 
 succession. Within the body is the soul, which, accord- 
 ing to the teaching of Scripture, passes away at the first 
 change, death, and, animated by the spirit, becomes the 
 body of the next life. And the spirit, by which name 
 we recognise the intensest life now known to us, is 
 to become external as we approach the higher states. 
 In this world, impressions made on the soul through 
 what is called memory remain, and pass with it into the 
 next life (for if this were not the case, our conscious 
 identity would be lost) ; and, being gradually radiated or 
 thrown off from the centre, they become the external of 
 the spiritual being. Thus we see that the internal of 
 the man, is the external of the spirit, and extending 
 the principle from individuals to the mass, we find that 
 the inner state of the material world forms the outer 
 or phenomenal form of the spiritual sphere. Every 
 feeling or thought hidden in the depths of the spirit, 
 passes with the swiftness of lightning into the soul, and 
 thence by the nerves into the body, where it is mani- 
 fested by its appropriate action. Between each of these 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 269 
 
 different degrees of feeling or thought a resemblance or 
 correspondence exists, so that, to a person in whom the 
 spiritual degree is opened, as in a state of clairvoyance 
 arising from mesmerism or accidental trance, that 
 which is felt in the material body shows itself in action 
 in the soul or spiritual body, because, in the internal 
 state, the soul is seen as the body of the man. 
 
 Clairvoyants always assert that their perceptions re- 
 semble those of persons immediately after death, when 
 the soul has become the body, and the entranced person 
 holds converse with those dwellers in the spirit spheres 
 with whom he is in harmony or affinity. 
 
 Thus the whole of the inner spiritual world, underlying 
 and pervading the world of matter in which, as in a 
 husk or shell, it is enveloped, must correspond to its 
 external in all its details, as soul to body and as spirit 
 to soul. A few instances from the visions and writings 
 already repeated here will illustrate this truth more 
 clearly than any explanation. The clairvoyante girl * 
 who mentally visited the house at which my friend was 
 dining saw one gentleman ( looking ' at her mesmeriser, 
 while the other was f pointing ' to herself. She had no 
 idea that the process of mesmerism and the curious 
 phenomena she exhibited were the subject of conversa- 
 tion between the gentlemen, nor could we, when after- 
 wards told of it, imagine the how or the why of what 
 
 * Page 48. 
 
270 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 she described, till a better knowledge of correspondence 
 furnished the key to her vision. 
 
 The symbolisation will undergo a greater change but 
 will be more complete in itself, as the lucidity of the 
 subject increases, or, in other words, as he rises to a 
 higher state. The young lady * who described the two 
 little children in a beautiful garden, wreathing a lamb 
 with flowers, saw then heavenly or spiritual bodies ; and 
 their surroundings corresponded to the state of happiness 
 and innocence in which she found them. Flowers are 
 always spoken of by the spirits as the correspondence of 
 the first natural truths of the spiritual world — the 
 wreathing them together is the combination of this 
 knowledge ; and the dressing of the lamb symbolises 
 their adding this wreath of spiritual growth to the inno- 
 cent purity of their own hearts. If this is thought fanciful 
 let it be remembered that she spoke it as she saw it, and 
 that similar imagery has been seen by all mediums and 
 seers, and explained in all instances as I have explained 
 this. 
 
 If the different degrees of spiritual and material per- 
 ception were not very distinct in life, we should be 
 always in danger of confusing the perceptions of the two 
 states, as is indeed sometimes done by imperfectly 
 developed clairvoyants, who cannot tell whether a scene 
 is presented to the bodily or the spiritual eye ; and who 
 
 * See page 51. 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 271 
 
 are often reproached for falsehood when they describe 
 truly what they see. 
 
 The seer to whom the fair young girl Ellen appeared 
 among green slopes and ferns, and by the rose bushes, 
 saw her in the abode which the feelings and memories 
 of a pure young soul had prepared, for each of these 
 objects of external nature correspond to some spiritual 
 state. I shall be able to make this clearer in speaking 
 of universal correspondences and representations. 
 
 I have said how greatly we were at first puzzled by 
 the seemingly discordant statements given through 
 different mediums on the condition and progress of 
 spirits, and how it was gradually found that the same 
 fact was asserted by all, though clothed by each writer 
 or seer in the imagery peculiar to himself. How, in 
 short, the brain of the medium, or rather that of which it 
 is the organ, qualifies and lends its own type to the 
 elementary truth. We had also found that, to enable a 
 spirit to communicate through a 'friend on earth, a 
 certain amount of resemblance or agreement of character 
 was indispensable ; so, whether the imagery presented 
 by the medium's mind be simple or elaborate, the 
 impressing spirit must not only be able to enter into it 
 but to carry it out through all its adaptations and com- 
 binations. If the thought only were imparted, it can 
 hardly be supposed that, as in the case of rapping or 
 tilting, and even of writing, every letter should be given, 
 and corrected if not properly transmitted. But that any 
 
272 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 thought can exist in the mind, unclothed in some form, 
 has been doubted by many philosophers, and is positively 
 denied by all spiritual seers ; and this denial is supported 
 by every fact connected with clairvoyance and spirit 
 mediumship. A lady of great intelligence and truth- 
 fulness, who has carefully observed the working of her 
 own mind during spiritual impression, declares that 
 with every change of thought and words she is conscious 
 of a series of images or pictures passing through her 
 brain. Our word imagine has arisen from some dim 
 perception of this truth ; and the word ' idea • is derived 
 from the Greek to see, for spiritual sight corresponds 
 with earthly knowledge. I must not, however, venture 
 to advert to language in connection with spirit, for proofs 
 of the spiritual origin of words are endless, and not till 
 we ascend to the first divine stream whence all the rivers 
 of tongue have flowed over the earth's surface, shall we 
 be able to arrive at a true philosophy of language. 
 
 We have reason, 'then, to believe that the spirit or 
 communicating power is cognizant of all the different 
 forms in which truths may be conveyed through a variety 
 of mediums, but that each medium is chosen for a 
 special quality which enables him to transmit the senti- 
 ments required. In this world, ideas conveyed from one 
 person to another must always fall into language com- 
 prehended both by speaker and hearer, but the same 
 thought would be expressed in very different terms 
 to a child and to a philosopher, supposing the speaker 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 273 
 
 able to perceive and meet the requirements of both 
 minds. 
 
 If, therefore, we in this life thus adapt our speech to 
 the hearer, how much more must this adaptation be 
 required when the communicant is raised a degree 
 in existence above the recipient. For the language is 
 different. In the case of communication from spirit 
 to mortal, the imagery or ideas contained in the 
 medium's brain takes the place of words. And each 
 medium furnishes a different capacity for the transmis- 
 sion of feeling or thought, and a different vocabulary 
 or series of images, in which to embody it. But, by 
 what we have already seen, both elementary thoughts 
 and varieties of imagery must exist in the mind of the 
 higher being, and as we have seen that in the next 
 world the subjective becomes objective, both are real ex- 
 istences in that world, in which all thoughts and feel- 
 ings are realities more glorious and more abundant 
 than the external objects of the material state. 
 
 Swedenborg treats of the subject of correspondence 
 at length and with great clearness of illustration, but 
 even while he shows its value as a key to the difficulties 
 of all inspired writing, he is quite aware of its obscurity. 
 Mystical and obscure as it is, the notice could not be 
 omitted in a narrative of the manner in which spiritual 
 knowledge is believed to have been attained by gradual 
 steps from material manifestations. Every vision seen, 
 and every communication made, has been set forth in 
 
 T 
 
274 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 such imagery as could be explained on this principle of 
 correspondence and representation, and became intelligi- 
 ble and coherent on this principle only; and every expla- 
 nation given has declared that the place and condition 
 of every being in the world of spirits takes its form 
 according to the law by which the external of one state 
 agrees with the internal of that below it. Many persons 
 will be able to recall deep and vivid dreams, in which 
 they have felt themselves near to lost friends. Perhaps 
 a river has parted the dweller on earth from the 
 dweller in heaven, or perhaps the spirit in the body 
 has looked up at the liberated bright ones, who stood 
 above on an ascent which he could not climb. This 
 is a common experience illustrating the law. When- 
 ever a true correspondence can be traced in dreams, 
 the imagery will be found to be qualified by the state 
 and character of the dreamer. 
 
 The language of symbolism or correspondence, then, 
 is the language of spirit in its communication with 
 material beings ; and the character of the symbolisation, 
 besides being modified by the mind through which it 
 falls, is also subject to variations of form, as the more 
 and more internal degrees of spirit-life are opened in 
 the recipient, whether by writing, drawing, vision, or 
 any other form of communication. This process of 
 opening from the outer to the inner, or, if we choose, 
 ascending from the lower to the higher, takes place with 
 every kind of variety during the developement of 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 275 
 
 mediumship. But though there are varieties in the 
 developement of individuals, one orderly law of ascent, 
 which may be traced in each person's experience, 
 prevails. When raps or movements have been given 
 for months through a medium, they will sometimes cease 
 suddenly, and their place will be either taken at once 
 by another form, such as writing, or the whole influx 
 departs ; and when it returns again after a season, 
 which the medium feels to be a blank, will reappear 
 with great energy in a higher mode of manifestation. 
 After the medium Jane had been the channel for the 
 transmission of raps for many months, the sounds 
 ceased and her hand wrote, ' There will be no more 
 raps in this house : they have done their work and been 
 of great use ; but we must now turn to higher things.' 
 This could not be ascribed to Jane's own will, for while 
 the rapping mediumship lasted, she was taken notice of 
 by many of my friends, and more than one person, not 
 perfectly certain of her good faith, offered her money to 
 reproduce them. The experience of many mediums 
 will confirm this fact of cessation and reappearance. I 
 am not sure, however, that the disappearance of a lower 
 phase of mediumship on the appearance of the higher 
 is universal, for Mr. Home, besides his more wonderful 
 gifts of vision, hearing, &c, seems also to have the same 
 remarkable external manifestations as he had years ago. 
 Something of this may be due to his having been born 
 with all the conditions of a medium, while in most 
 
 T 2 
 
276 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 persons they are a gradual growth. It is the fact that 
 those whose spiritual education has begun on the most 
 material plane, are carried up higher and higher, till 
 the most internal state of which the subject is capable 
 is reached, and as each degree is opened, the manifesta- 
 tions in those below it usually disappear. The original 
 magnetic or physical condition necessary for impres- 
 sion of any kind, is one, perhaps the sole element 
 possessed in common by the inspired prophet and the 
 table-moving medium. It is of the upward process 
 that we have now to speak, and we will suppose it to 
 begin on the lowest plane. After it has been found 
 that a person is endued with medium power of an 
 external character, the form will sometimes change 
 suddenly and quickly. In such a case I have seen 
 every limb thrown into strong convulsive action, as if 
 the unseen influence must permeate every nerve and 
 fibre before the power w T ielding it could obtain full 
 control of the wires of the human electric telegraph. 
 A sleep or trance often ends the process, which is of 
 the same nature as the ecstasies and convulsions occur- 
 ring during revivals and in times of religious excite- 
 ment. After the spirit has thus taken possession, its 
 presence is manifest in all the different ways described. 
 This action on the nerves seems to be the physical part 
 of the unfolding, the operation by which the harmonious 
 action of spirit and body is established ; but much more 
 is yet to come. 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPMENT. 277 
 
 When the process of developement has begun in a 
 heaven-seeking soul, the road is far from being smooth 
 or strewn with roses, for the living spirit within, tending 
 outwards from its central stream, meets those channels 
 of impression from external nature whose images are the 
 types of its essential thought and feeling, and a struggle 
 often ensues, before spirit, soul, and body can be made 
 to act in unison. If we hesitate and ponder over this, 
 deeming it a mere fanciful metaphor, let us compare 
 the process of which I have spoken with those of which 
 indeed it is the higher counterpart, namely the two first 
 stages of earth-life. All are equally holy and wonderful, 
 and if I have called the spiritual developement the 
 higher, it is only in obedience to the recognised law of 
 gradation from matter to spirit. 
 
 In the first state of earth-life, the nine months of 
 organic existence, the vital germ draws from its sur- 
 roundings nourishment whereby the new being is formed 
 which, on entering this world at birth, casts off the enve- 
 lope through which the component particles had passed 
 into the frame. Then a fresh process of attraction and 
 assimilation begins, lasting through this life, till, on its 
 entrance into another state, the body, that material re- 
 siduum or envelope, which has served the same purpose 
 as the former, but for which there is now no farther use, 
 is thrown aside. The uniformity of these two processes 
 has been touched upon before in considering the birth 
 into spirit-life : I bring it forward again in illustration 
 
278 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 of the spiritual developement, by which each one ought 
 to be, and at some more advanced time will be, prepared 
 during this stage of existence for an entrance into the 
 next. 
 
 The internal attractive force corresponding to the 
 germ of animal life, then, is spirit, which, as the seeress 
 says, is 'begotten from God.' And the surroundings 
 which are to convey nourishment to this infant spirit 
 till it reaches the full stature of a son of God, are the 
 thoughts, knowledges, and feelings gathered by the at- 
 tractive mental powers from the whole Book of Nature. 
 The soul is as a mental and moral storehouse, sup- 
 plying material to the spirit from its garnered harvests ; 
 and by the quality of ideas, images, and feelings with 
 which we nourish and invest the heavenly germ, we 
 determine our future angel-rise in the world of light, 
 or descent and extinction in the Abyss of Darkness. 
 
 The conscious developement of spirit-life in a medium 
 differs only in degree from the less strongly marked 
 spiritual experience gone through by all souls upon 
 earth. The two ought to unite and run in one stream 
 as in the case of Swedenborg, who would have been held 
 in honour for Christian goodness and scientific acquire- 
 ment even if he had never risen beyond the material 
 plane, and seen the forms of all his earlier intuitions 
 in the spirit- world. It is of the conscious developement 
 of spiritual action that I have now to speak, and, having 
 slightly sketched the nature of developement as it has 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 279 
 
 been imparted by the unseen teachers, to give what ac- 
 count I can of the sensations accompanying the process, 
 from the descriptions of those who have experienced it. 
 
 A very interesting account of such an experiment is 
 given by a lady who signs herself i Comfort,' in a letter 
 to Mrs. Newton Crosland. It is so much to the 
 purpose, that its entire omission here would be Shake- 
 speare's grandest play without its chief character. 
 
 'It is just a year since my hand was first guided by 
 spirit-power to write. The discovery of this new 
 influence dwelling within one, and softly propelling the 
 hand to write words and sentences foreign to the ideas 
 existing within one's own mind, must certainly be one 
 of the most astounding moments in a human life. I 
 know that to myself the surprise was beyond descrip- 
 tion, especially as I had been very sceptical regarding 
 all that I had ever heard of " spirit-mediums." It is 
 true I had heard only of spiritualism and its manifes- 
 tations through table-tilting, rapping, and occasionally 
 of writing, but had never seen nor had communication 
 with any spirit-medium until this mysterious influence 
 showed itself in our family circle, first in a younger 
 brother, and then in myself. We had for years believed 
 in the phenomena of mesmerism, and I immediately 
 felt that this was a kindred phenomenon. The surprise 
 and interest excited by the discovery it is scarcely pos- 
 sible to describe. 
 
 * Of the true nature and of the sacred mysteries to 
 
280 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 which the writing, or, in fact, any branch of mediumship, 
 tends ; of its dangers, its trials, and of the laws which 
 guide the developement of spiritualism, we were all 
 then entirely ignorant, and to this utter ignorance must 
 be ascribed several months of the most painful be- 
 wilderment and extremest distress of mind. Had we 
 been enabled to profit by the experience of other 
 mediums, my early initiation would probably have been 
 of a far less painful character ; but there must be the 
 pioneers in all new discoveries of untrodden lands, and 
 happy indeed those who through suffering are enabled 
 to save others from suffering ! The first communica- 
 tions written thus mysteriously through my hand, and 
 with ever-increasing sensations as of a most powerful 
 mesmeric influence over my whole frame, were given, as 
 usual, in the names of beloved departed friends and 
 relatives, and were simple messages of affectionate 
 greeting. Believing that communications proceeding 
 from a higher state of spiritual developement than that 
 of our earth, must be heavenly, pure, and true, I of 
 course at first implicitly believed every word written by 
 the spirit-power, believing also every word literally, not 
 even symbolically. Little were we any of us aware 
 that the intensest antagonism between truth and false- 
 hood, between light and darkness, encounters the 
 astounded and unprepared pilgrim upon his first en- 
 trance into the realm of spirit. The very slightest veil 
 but separates man in the natural world from the 
 
C01OIESP0NDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 281 
 
 spiritual world, which encircles him; and when that 
 veil is raised, as it has been occasionally by the Divine 
 wisdom in many previous ages, even as now in our own 
 time, the soul discovers itself surrounded by a host of 
 new and terrible enemies, as well as by hosts of all- 
 powerful angelic friends. But the language at first 
 even of the angelic host is an incomprehensible mystery, 
 for it is a language of symbols, which the newly-born 
 child of spirit learns to construe only by slow and 
 painful degrees. 
 
 ( Within a fortnight of the day when spirit-medium- 
 ship first came through the writing to myself, a gradual 
 and marked change in the communications had set 
 in. Painful messages connected with the temporal 
 life were written, instead of those simple greetings of 
 love from departed friends, which had first arrived. 
 At the same time with these temporal communications 
 came also very lovely explanations of various passages 
 in the Gospels which had always been obscure to 
 myself, and the most earnest commands were given to 
 pray unceasingly to Christ as the Saviour and to trust 
 in the Almighty's "eternal love, mercy, and peace." 
 The darkness was to come. Angelic love, however, 
 hastened to place as guides in the hands of the igno- 
 rant traveller the staff of prayer and the lamp of faith. 
 By-and-by the messages became more and more painful, 
 more and more temporal and exciting in their nature, 
 because connected with my own family circle and 
 
282 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 dearest friends. At length, written in the beloved 
 name of a departed brother, came announcements of 
 the approaching deaths of those dearest to myself, 
 accompanied with the most painful details, and with 
 directions for all the various medicines which would be 
 
 required to ease their approaching change 
 
 The physical mesmerisms upon me at this time were 
 extraordinary ; I felt frequently as if enveloped in an 
 atmosphere which sent through my whole frame warm 
 streams of electricity in waving spirals from the crown 
 of my head to the soles of my feet ; and occasionally, 
 generally at midnight, I was seized with twitchings, and 
 convulsive movements of my whole body, which were 
 distressing beyond words. All these symptoms at 
 length came to a crisis in a frightful trance.' 
 
 The writer recovered from this trance, went into the 
 country, and regained a calmer state of mind, with a 
 return of physical strength. She continues : — 
 
 ( Being too much distressed at the issue of my first 
 experiment in spirit-writing, I was not inclined to 
 return to it, even had I not given my solemn promise 
 to avoid all relapses into the mysterious experience. 
 And thus several weeks passed on. Soon, however, I 
 discovered that the mesmeric life was, though latent, 
 still an ever-present guest within me, a guest who 
 would assert his presence. My hands, either the right 
 or left (for the influence affected both nearly equally), 
 if lying passive on my lap, or upon a table, or book, 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 283 
 
 would begin to be moved to write ; often half a word, 
 or a whole one, or a name, would be written before I 
 could stop them. I found that the tip of my finger 
 placed upon a flat hard surface, would convey ideas 
 and sentences to my brain, as though words were 
 written through the finger instantaneously upon the 
 hard surface. I hardly knew whether I felt the words 
 or read them. Also, strange knowledges regarding the 
 medical properties of plants and their spiritual signifi- 
 cations came to me if I held them or rubbed them upon 
 the palm of my hand. I felt as though my palms had 
 become clairvoyant, as in fact I had in an earlier stage 
 discovered that the region about my heart possessed the 
 same singular faculty when the point of my fingers was 
 pressed against it. 
 
 6 The strange idea thus began to dawn within me, that 
 revelation of the most sacred and spiritual knowledges 
 can come through many other portions of the body 
 than those usually employed to read printed books or 
 even the book of Nature. I began to perceive that the 
 fleshly tabernacle is of so wonderfully spiritual a con- 
 stitution that every portion of it can reflect the know- 
 ledge of the external world through its walls for the 
 edification of the indwelling soul, its guest, whilst the 
 soul can call forth from the invisible world knowledges 
 unrevealed to the ordinary senses, and pour them 
 through every portion of its tabernacle for their mani- 
 festation to the external world. This was a lovely 
 
284 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 belief, and came in the train of many other beauti- 
 ful ideas, clearing away much which had been always 
 stumbling-blocks in my entire belief in the Scripture, 
 and the possibility of immediate revelation. But pain, 
 darkness, and terror accompanied the light and the 
 beauty ; and I did not then, nor till long after, arrive at 
 the blessed assurance that antagonism is, under the 
 divine command, one great means of all progression, 
 especially in spiritual and mental things. These new 
 trials came in terrible words, referring once more to 
 those deaths so much dreaded by myself, being written 
 within my body, spite of my most earnest struggles 
 against the power, sometimes when my eyes were 
 closed. The words were written in white or grey lines 
 upon a dark ground. I felt them within my eyelids, or 
 upon my breast, or within the palms of my hands. I 
 found my physical organism become a mystic book upon 
 which an unknown most subtle and omnipotent power 
 could write His will. These words would often fill me 
 with the greatest horror, and, to prevent their being 
 inscribed, I have many and many a time started up and 
 walked rapidly out into the fresh air, using every power 
 of my mind to withdraw myself entirely from the inner 
 into the external life; but in vain: a power far mightier 
 than my own will had commenced its lovely mysterious 
 work within me, and was moulding my mind and body 
 into that mystic organism for which we at the present 
 day have no other term, or perhaps dare use no other, 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 285 
 
 than medium of spirit. So many of these organisms 
 are being developed at the present time, that it is the 
 bounden duty, especially of medical men, to calmly 
 
 and philosophically investigate the phenomena 
 
 But to return to the inward spiritual writing. The 
 writing developement, no longer permitted to find its 
 natural outlet through the hands, had now become 
 inward. But painful as this was, and produced by a 
 checked effort of nature, still a fresh spiritual manifesta- 
 tion developed out of it, the mediumship of drawing. 
 Together with the inward written words or sentences, 
 now came single figures and groups of figures, all in 
 outline of white or grey upon a dark ground; the 
 explanations of which were written above their heads, 
 beneath their feet, upon their robes, or on scrolls in 
 the heavens, or upon the earth, upon their hands, upon 
 their swords and shields, or even sometimes as if pro- 
 ceeding from their lips. I could not wake in the 
 morning without these figures instantly being drawn 
 within my brain, over and through my heart, or within 
 my hands. They were at once a torment and a delight 
 — they were such a wonderful experience, so new, so 
 awful, often of the most portentous nature, and had a 
 character about them very much akin to Michael 
 Angelo's Creation. Three groups I especially remember 
 — the "Descent of the New Jerusalem" (a majestic 
 woman clothed in wonderful draperies studded with 
 jewels, and wearing many crowns, and a singularly 
 
286 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 beautiful breastplate), the " End of the World," and the 
 " Last Judgement." Also a less majestic figure painfully 
 affected me at this time. Waking in the night, the 
 strange drawing process instantly commenced, and I 
 felt and saw within me the figure, whose countenance 
 greatly resembled that of Christ, descending from a 
 morning sky towards me, and bearing upon his shoul- 
 ders a large cross, whilst from his lips proceeded 
 these words, " Love, Mercy, Peace ; but not till after 
 death." Again my soul trembled with anguish* for that 
 strange portentous word Death was ever written within 
 
 me or without 
 
 ( About this time I took a pencil one day to make a 
 sketch; and whilst talking to a friend who came to 
 speak to me at the table where I was drawing, my 
 hand rested listlessly upon the paper before me for a 
 minute or two. To my surprise, my hand was moved 
 and began drawing, not the design that I had had in 
 my mind to make, but a little head, and then a very 
 curious initial letter, like, and yet not quite like, an 
 initial letter in some old missal. I was surprised 
 indeed, as I had never heard before of spiritual draw- 
 ing. This, surely, could not bring with it pain like the 
 writing, nor yet bewilderment. How little did I com- 
 prehend the new class of instruction which was now 
 awaiting me ! The first drawings were very rude indeed, 
 like the uncertain tottering lines of a child, and also 
 singularly resembling the designs of the very early 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 287 
 
 Italian painters — heads of Christ, angels, and curious 
 female figures seated within spheres and hearts; and 
 always these drawings were accompanied with strange 
 ornaments of spiral and shell forms, with dots and 
 scroll-like ciphers, which I thought odd at the time, 
 but only months afterwards, when accidentally referring 
 to them, discovered to be the first undeveloped attempts 
 at writing one of the " spirit languages," so frequently 
 I know to be referred to in your book. ... At times 
 the power was withdrawn, and some other branch of 
 spiritual developement would take its place. Often, too, 
 when I most earnestly desired to have a spiritual draw- 
 ing given me, nothing but the merest scribble came. 
 The fear also of the bewilderment of the spirit-writing 
 accompanied me for several months whenever I drew, 
 for at times my hand, while drawing an angel's robe, 
 would have written through it, in curious ornament or 
 pattern upon the drapery, words which made my soul 
 die within me. There was always that terrible word 
 Death. At length, through God's blessing, and in His 
 own time, the key came to me. What was this word 
 when translated into the language of heaven — not of 
 earth — of immortal, not mortal thought ? Change — 
 change of state — of life — a birth into another life ! And 
 then many words and sentences began to assume other 
 significances than those we generally assign them. And 
 ideas of most lovely new truths gradually unfolded 
 themselves, and old truths breathed upon by spirit were 
 
288 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 no longer dry bones, but clothed in the blooming fresh- 
 ness of immortal life. But all had to be learnt through 
 
 prayer, faith, love, and obedience Comfort.' 
 
 In this instance we find a narrative of the different 
 stages of the process in the order in which they were 
 developed in a graceful, sensitive, and highly educated 
 mind. But it retains its general features in every case 
 that I have seen; or rather, whenever the develope- 
 ment is to be complete, and the influence of the highest 
 character. Of this more in the chapter on Inspiration. 
 In the first instance come the names of dear friends 
 and relations, and even in their varieties a law of 
 affinity may be traced corresponding with some of the 
 higher and more hidden degrees of our relationship 
 to each other and to our Heavenly Father in the 
 spiritual church or mystical body of Christ. To this 
 wonderful affinity I will if possible return. And not 
 only are the names of those near and dear to the 
 medium given, but numbers of ancestry of whom the 
 writer has perhaps never heard and with whom there 
 has been no attraction of affection; the magnetic 
 rapport of family descent taking its place. When a 
 question was once put to the influences giving these 
 names, as to the reason of their visits, the reply was, 
 ( We shall meet you in that order in the next life.' 
 And do we not enter this life welcomed by the nearest ? 
 It is only a regular developement of the same law that 
 brings the dearest as the nearest — first the family 
 
 * See Light in the Valley, p. 114. 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 289 
 
 affections which are next to earth, then affinities 
 which have less of the material and more of the 
 spiritual element. With the near relations, or some- 
 times, when there are none, almost taking their place, 
 come a tribe of strangely mixed influences of the most 
 incongruous kind, and from these are received number- 
 less false and contradictory statements. I believe these 
 spirits to be of the class described by the spirit (p. 205) as 
 gossipping worthless beings who gladly take the oppor- 
 tunity of a return to earthly companionship. These are 
 the debris in the valley, which must be passed before 
 the mountain can be ascended ; and the only safeguard, 
 the staff on which the traveller must lean as he traverses 
 the rugged path, is unbounded faith in the Heavenly 
 Gruide and Saviour. After these seemingly purposeless 
 writings, come another series, of a class a degree higher. 
 Each of these is signed by some name which may be 
 considered a generic term for some species of intellectual 
 influence. Of these are the Byrons, Shelleys, Groethes, 
 Luthers, and others ; they bear some kind of mental re- 
 lation to the medium, and take that part in his spiritual 
 developement which is represented by his ruling mental 
 quality. Again, they have to give place to a higher 
 order of influences, emanating from beings whose per- 
 sonality is lost in the names of those holy societies to 
 which they are sympathetically bound, for the spiritual 
 as well as the material world is governed by the laws of 
 orderly affinity. Thus Love, Hope, Comfort, &c, are the 
 
290 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 names given in the more advanced stages of influx, and, 
 even as in the earlier times of the world's spirit-histor} T , 
 a Name higher and holier than all has sometimes been 
 attached to the counsels of Love and Purity. I hesitate 
 to mention this, from the apprehension that those from 
 whom the things of the spirit are as yet hidden may 
 think that I deal lightly with the holiest of subjects ; but 
 when we remember how often, in the last days of good 
 men and women on earth, the visible presence of the 
 Lord has been granted to the inner sense, we must be 
 content to receive the fact with reverence, and to trust to 
 time for its explanation. Whenever the name of Christ 
 is given in writing, or the form is represented in draw- 
 ing or vision, the description or picture is exactly that 
 image which the medium's mind has been accustomed 
 to contemplate as the likeness of the Saviour. 
 
 1 Comfort ' has spoken of the fact that most mediums 
 whose aspirations are high, and whose state and progress 
 is guarded by earnest prayer, are told of their own ap- 
 proaching death and that of their friends. But as all the 
 language used by the higher spirits is correspondential, 
 this is liable to great misunderstanding if interpreted 
 literally. Unless it be a real prediction, by a spirit 
 still very near earth, of the material change of the 
 medium, the death foretold is that withdrawal of the 
 soul from its earthly loves which must precede its 
 regeneration. The material death may be truly fore- 
 told by a low spirit whose clairvoyance resembles that 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 291 
 
 of a person in the body, but such a spirit never gives 
 any but an earthly name, and its character has been 
 already sufficiently dwelt on for recognition. But the 
 death foretold and insisted on by the higher and 
 purer influences is that * death unto sin,' of which the 
 Apostle Paul writes, and which is followed by a new 
 birth unto righteousness. The prediction of death, then, 
 is the announcement of the first step in a journey 
 whose every portion has its distinct phraseology in the 
 symbolical language of spirit. That soul, whose reli- 
 gion is of an intellectual and moral character, is said to 
 be still ' sojourning in Egypt.' All the trials, back- 
 slidings, and encouragements attending a rise into a 
 higher spiritual state, are marked, as the events of a 
 weary pilgrimage through the desert. I have known 
 many instances of this, and have heard a medium or 
 clairvoyante asked to describe the spiritual state of a 
 person, when, without any previous reference to the 
 language of Scripture, the answer, if a verbal one, has 
 been couched in words borrowed from the journey 
 of the Children of Israel to the Land of Promise. 
 Egyptian darkness, Egyptian bondage, and the Exodus 
 into the Heavenly Canaan, are not merely historical 
 facts of Scripture, or fanciful allegories thence derived 
 by Bunyan and by the early Methodists, but are true 
 symbols, having their deep internal sense in the very 
 heart of our spiritual life, which is life itself. 
 
 There is an element in the process of developement, 
 
 U 2 
 
292 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 which requires deep attention, for it will be found to 
 throw light on all questions connected with spiritual 
 influx. Each developement, in whatever form it takes 
 place, consists of stages or series, corresponding to the 
 flowing and ebbing waves of influx, of which the regu- 
 lar fanning already spoken of, is a miniature repre- 
 sentation. At the commencement of each series, or at 
 the beginning of the whole, come visions or writings, in 
 which are embodied, swathed up as it were, in simple 
 and perhaps grotesque form, the whole of the series of 
 revelations which are to follow. It is as if the teacher 
 should say in simple words, ' I am going to teach you on 
 such a subject.' Then the outline or epitome of that 
 subject is set forth; the chrysalis form is shown in 
 rough and bold but undeveloped state. Gradually, and 
 in its own order, each portion is drawn out, and a series 
 of pictures or writings, showing the forms and relations 
 of all the parts, is made ; and at length the most perfect 
 tracery, the most delicate shades of which every touch 
 has its meaning, form the whole into a symbolism as 
 wonderful in its perfection and coherence as the grandest 
 allegory ever composed. I do not mean to imply that 
 either the execution or the imagery is always beautiful or 
 perfect, but that, with reference to the medium's power, 
 the coherence of the symbolisation and the relation of 
 each part to the other is complete. 
 
 Mr. Wilkinson, in the course of a description of 
 drawings by the hand of his wife, says : — 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPMENT. 293 
 
 ' Since I commenced giving this narrative, a new 
 developement has shown itself in the nature of the 
 drawings. The flower forms have ceased, and churches, 
 temples, and buildings, have been drawn, and after being 
 sketched my wife has been impressed to begin to paint 
 them, which she has done already with some success, 
 being told in writing what colours to use, and feeling 
 the brush sensibly moved through her hand 
 
 'In all the drawings, from the commencement to this 
 time, there is markedly a series of progression or 
 developement, so that the whole of them are wanted to 
 tell the story they ivould convey to us? * 
 
 I may refer to the drawings of ' Comfort' and to those 
 of Mrs. William Wilkinson in full confidence that all 
 persons who have carefully examined both will see how 
 fully they confirm my words. 
 
 In its more outward bearing it is exceedingly in- 
 teresting to watch the progress of a spiritually drawn 
 picture. Its growth from the smallest original germ, 
 its gradual expansion, and enlargement at the extre- 
 mities or circumference, might suggest thoughts to a 
 physiologist on the production of perfect forms from a 
 simple cell. The first mark which appears under the 
 pencil is perhaps a dot. This is gradually increased till 
 it becomes a large circle, from which other circles are 
 expanded. The first becomes a head; the last, body, 
 arms, and legs ; and in every portion of the figure, when 
 * Spirit Drawings, p. 34. 
 
294 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 complete, may be traced its derivation from the original 
 germ in the first expansion of the circle. Often the 
 process is more complicated and curious, and the un- 
 suspecting artist is made to depict many forms, each 
 complete in its kind, before he arrives at the last. And 
 throughout the whole drawing every part, which has been 
 traced, shaded over, and erased, till it assumes the last 
 form given, contains within itself or has passed through 
 a whole series of correspondential figures, rising from 
 the lowest to the highest degree which is arrived at, or 
 which the medium's mind is capable of transmitting. 
 It seems that in spirit manifestation nothing stands alone 
 or without direct reference to its ' antecedents and se- 
 quents.' So we do not find any drawing or vision with- 
 out meaning, or without the characteristics which mark 
 its place in the scale. The different degrees must be 
 passed through before the guiding influence can arrive 
 at that one which is to be represented. 
 
 Hence many drawings (and every phase of medium- 
 ship partakes of the same character) are prophetic, 
 rising from the present to the future state of the subject. 
 Some are retrospective, having their subject and origin 
 earlier than this state and time, reaching it gradually, 
 and perhaps even passing beyond it. There is a pecu- 
 liar interference, if I may so call it, to which all medium 
 developements are subject. This arises from the in- 
 troduction of a fresh influence, which we must suppose 
 to be more powerful than that moving the hand or 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 295 
 
 impressing the vision, and which at once takes the 
 place of the controlling spirit. A hand may be moving 
 to draw part of a series of pictures, descriptive of some 
 spiritual truth. A stranger suddenly enters the room — 
 the images alter at once, and not until something is 
 drawn plainly intended for the new-comer, does it 
 become evident that his state is now the one illustrated. 
 The efflux from the more recent sphere has overpowered 
 the former guiding influence. This impression by 
 atmospheric efflux seems to be perceptible sometimes 
 in the natural degree in other spiritual gifts, and to 
 give the power of seeing the antecedents or the futures 
 of those with whom the seer is in magnetic relation. 
 The well-known story of Zschokke, who saw all the 
 former life of a young man whom he met with 
 accidentally, is a case in point. Zschokke says that it 
 often happened to him, while talking with a stranger, 
 to be so impressed in this way that the words and fea- 
 tures of his companion were hardly perceived, and he 
 seemed to himself as if contemplating, in a kind of 
 dream, the person's whole foregoing history. 
 
 I believe that this impressibility to atmospheres 
 which constitutes a medium is possessed by gypsies in 
 a great degree. The gypsy as often tells the past as 
 the future of the person consulting her. But she has 
 the clairvoyante perception usually in the natural 
 degree, like Zschokke, and this distinguishes her 
 'fortunes' from the visions or drawings of a spiritual 
 
296 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 medium, through whom they are given corresponden- 
 tially. I once asked a gypsy how she saw the fortune by 
 looking at the hand. She began to tell me a long 
 history about planets &c, which I cut short by talk- 
 ing of crystal visions. 'Ah, then,' she said, 'you 
 know as well as I do. We see it all in ghosV 
 6 All at once ? ' I asked. c No, as the things come, one 
 after another, in clouds ; but differently with different 
 people.' 
 
 It is more difficult to trace the developement of 
 spiritual hearing than of the other forms, because, except 
 to the medium himself, the progress cannot, as in the case 
 of the drawing or vision, be made apparent to others. 
 I have been told of strange sensations at or below the 
 pit of the stomach, and an extraordinary unformed 
 gurgling rising up till it reached the head of the 
 medium, when it seemed to form into a clear and 
 audible sound. The conflicts and struggles described 
 in all these processes are not absent in this form of deve- 
 lopement, and, as in the others, they are of two kinds, or 
 rather degrees ; one being produced by the antagonism, 
 in a physical sense, of the bodily organs to the spiritual 
 action, the other, the constant combat between good and 
 evil by which every step of the road must be conquered 
 and held, in the process of regeneration. Many per- 
 sons, when the rnediumship is established, hear often 
 a tempting insidious whisper prompting to evil, and, 
 following this, the voice which is recognised as coming 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEjUENT. 297 
 
 from the angel-giver of all good counsel. Literally the 
 8 two Voices.' 
 
 The observation of this fact ought to be turned to 
 practical use. It is not at all uncommon for confessed 
 murderers to declare that they were urged on by a 
 ivhispering voice to the commission of the deed. Such 
 assertions cannot palliate guilt, but they are numerous 
 enough to claim serious attention, with a view of 
 ascertaining both the nature of the phenomenon, and 
 the conditions which favour its occurrence. 
 
 In the instance of the hissing whisper heard by four 
 persons at the door of the haunted house, there was 
 every reason to believe the spirit of so very low and 
 earthly a character, that none of his most unpleasing 
 demonstrations required an internal opening for their 
 reception. His voice was like the whisper of a wicked 
 degraded being in the flesh, yet had enough of that 
 which was unearthly to show that it came from no 
 mortal being. The daemon of Socrates was an instance 
 of a guardian spirit, but its efforts seemed to be confined 
 to warnings, and the mediumship, as far as it is re- 
 corded, did not rise much above the commonest mani- 
 festations. 
 
 In the developement of hearing, the order in which 
 the names of impressing spirits appear is the same as 
 in the other forms of mediumship. 
 
 To give an idea of the immense variety in drawings, 
 visions, and hearing, is impossible, for their number is, 
 
298 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 as the varieties of feelings and perceptions in mediums, 
 modified by every degree of opening between the mate- 
 rial and spiritual states. 
 
 All this will sound absurd and fantastic enough — but 
 the chronicler who narrates experience trul} r , and tries 
 thence to deduce a theory according to which all the 
 phenomena may become intelligible, must not be afraid 
 of a few startling assertions. The announcement of 
 most useful discoveries has been as startling to minds 
 unsuspicious of their causes, and perhaps as opposed to 
 scientific conviction, as are these guesses at spiritual 
 laws to the advanced science of our time. But scien- 
 tific men must not forget that till the first facts in 
 any study have been ascertained, inquirers are not in a 
 position to judge of inferences. Let the first experi- 
 ments be tried ; we may then argue fairly about 
 conclusions. 
 
 A more complete view of this subject of correspon- 
 dence in its relation to mediumship, may be gained by 
 altering the light in which it was first looked at. I 
 have tried to show, that both by reasoning from the 
 phenomena, and by the assertions of the unseen 
 influences, we are led to conclude that the world of 
 spirit is as the vitalising and forming soul of which the 
 outer world is the material husk. If this be so, it 
 follows as a consequence that every object in creation 
 outlies and typifies its animating cause in the world of 
 spirit. And so every created thing represents some 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 299 
 
 spirit-power, each power being a modification of the 
 one great central force, whose origin is in the will of 
 the Most High. 
 
 Each mind has its own peculiar set of symbols, but 
 there are some representations common to all, for all 
 have perceptions of nature, and elementary spiritual 
 truths, in common ; and the correspondence of natu- 
 ral objects with universal spiritual truths cannot be 
 confined to individual perceptions. A few of these 
 universal symbols have often been used in the writings 
 and drawings, and by tracing them through all their 
 combinations, we shall find that the laws regulating the 
 spirit-world are, in their degree, the perfect counter- 
 parts of those governing the universe of matter. It 
 could not be otherwise, as a little thought will show, 
 but these truths are little suspected. When, for in- 
 stance, we hear the yearnings of friends for those who 
 are gone, and the painful anxiety with which they ask, 
 6 Shall we really be together, and recognise and love 
 each other, in the next life V it is plain that they have 
 not made their own the grand fact, that throughout all 
 creation sympathy and affinity are the only bonds 
 of union ; and dislike and unsympathy the powers that 
 repel and create distance. That which in matter is 
 chemical attraction and affinity, in spirit is love and 
 sympathy ; and when men's minds are in a condition to 
 compare the two, I believe it will be found that every 
 property of matter, ascertained in every direction of 
 
300 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 scientific inquiry, has its corresponding phenomenon in 
 the inner world. Not to multiply instances needlessly, 
 I will mention one or two universal symbols; the 
 thought can be traced out by each one for himself; but 
 to some minds, the combinations will occur readily, 
 while to others the idea will seem valueless. The 
 perception and appreciation of different truths appear 
 to depend on mental elements, whose proportions and 
 combinations are shown by the form of the brain. In 
 the next chapter I shall try to glance at the subject of 
 phrenology in connection with influx. 
 
 The most important, as it is the most universal spiri- 
 tual symbol, is the Sun, which is used as a representation 
 of the Divine power in its direct action on the spirit. 
 In other words, it typifies the Lord the Living World. 
 I once asked a spirit impelling the hand of a child, 
 1 Hoiv does Jesus Christ appear in your world f ' It 
 was written, 'He gives the life to our Sun. 11 At this 
 time the statements of Swedenborg, though known 
 verbally, were unintelligible to me. But I soon found 
 a wonderful agreement in all good spirit communications 
 on this subject. We are told in the Eevelations that in 
 the sphere to which the holy John was raised in his 
 glorious vision, ' The Lord was the light thereof.' 
 
 A very little girl who had the gift of vision was once 
 describing to a friend and myself what she saw. We 
 had listened with great interest to her description of 
 very beautiful imagery, wondering at the symbolisation, 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 301 
 
 of which the little seer never suspected the meaning, 
 when she said : — 
 
 'Now I see the Sun, and in it a most beautiful face? 
 6 Whose face? " we asked. She hid her own and replied, 
 that she must not say the name, but that she should 
 soon see something more which would tell us. She 
 was silent for a minute or two, then said : — 
 
 6 1 see a very kind-looking man sitting down with 
 some dear little children beside him. One is on his 
 knee, and he is kissing it.'' 
 
 No child could have invented this vision with its 
 gradual descent from the high internal degree in which 
 she saw the Word as the divine life-giver, to that in 
 which He was manifested to her spirit as the Saviour 
 who loved and blessed the little children. This child was 
 too young to have been taught any doctrine about the 
 divinity of Christ. She had been told to obey and trust 
 Him, but beyond the natural love which the gospel narra- 
 tive inspired, her belief was of the simplest possible kind. 
 
 The Sun of our system is conjectured to be one of the 
 many centres round each of which circle systems of 
 worlds. Inasmuch as from the sun of each system are 
 poured down the life-giving rays on surrounding worlds, 
 we trace in it the material of which our Father's love 
 and wisdom constitute the internal soul; and of that 
 love and wisdom in its action on our own spirits we find 
 the embodiment in the Son of Grod, the Word made flesh. 
 From this central type all others may be traced. As 
 
302 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 the sunbeam falling on different objects is divided into 
 its component rays, so that one thing reflects the red, 
 another the blue, and another the yellow light, with all 
 their varieties of combination, so is the action of the 
 divine light, the Word, upon all spiritual natures of every 
 degree, and their appearance in the world of spirit is 
 according to laws exactly parallel with our laws of optics. 
 The evil spirit who is always seen as black or grey, or 
 of a leaden colour, cannot reflect the light of heaven 
 which, being received according to every possible variety 
 by the heaven-tending spirits, gives every possible variety 
 to their appearance. The loving nature reflects the red 
 element, the intellectual the blue, with all their inter- 
 mediate shades and degrees. Let anyone listen to the 
 description of a clairvoyante in a high degree of spiritual 
 developement, and he will receive a fuller and more 
 convincing illustration of this law of correspondence 
 than any I can give. The young lady who 4 found ' the 
 two children often gave wonderful explanations of her 
 correspondential visions. But her knowledge was gained 
 from spiritual sight and not from education. She 
 always described herself as passing from one degree to 
 another in a series of ascents. In the first she went 
 through lanes, groves, and gardens, like those of earth, 
 ' only clearer and brighter and more reaV Then she 
 rose one degree and entered the gold and silver garden, 
 in which all the colouring of the vegetation was of the 
 brilliancy of metals. Her last and highest degree was 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPMENT. 303 
 
 the jewelled garden where all the plants and trees, glo- 
 riously clear and delicate, shone with the rich splen- 
 dour of diamonds and coloured gems. In all these 
 she told of the spirits who dwelt there, and the ex- 
 planation of this wondrous imagery formed one of the 
 most beautiful and coherent lectures I ever heard. 
 Every portion of the dress of these dwellers in the spirit- 
 spheres shone with the glow and colouring reflected from 
 the ' Light of the world ; ' and not only the robes, but 
 the crowns, clasps, and gems had each its own special 
 significance, whether in relation to the part of the 
 spiritual body which it adorned, or to the Sun whence all 
 the glory and splendour was derived. 
 
 Of the same character is the following vision of 
 Elizabeth Squirrell, published in the ' Spiritual Maga- 
 zine ' for May 1863. 
 
 6 The first time I saw a spirit, or into the spirit- world, 
 was on the afternoon of the third Sunday of my illness, 
 when I had a vision, but of such glorious beauty and 
 truth, that I can render but a faint reflection. I was 
 only twelve years old when this vision occurred. . . . 
 An hour before the vision I had as little conception of 
 what was awaiting me, as if I had never even heard of 
 existence beyond the natural one ; I had always, however, 
 considered intercourse with spiritual beings possible, 
 but this was wholly an intuitive conviction. I will de- 
 scribe, as well as I am able, my first vision, and you will 
 then have some idea of the nature of all my spirit-seeings. 
 
304 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 6 1 have always looked upon that first vision as the 
 truest and most beautiful of all the spiritual scenes I 
 have witnessed. It came to me when I was in an 
 agony of mind consequent on a dread of death which 
 lay on me continually for many days like a nightmare. 
 I thought I was a great sinner, and that because of it 
 Grod could not love me, and I imagined, whenever I 
 thought of dying, hell with all its horrors yawning at 
 my feet. On the afternoon of the day of my vision I 
 lay on my sick bed in unusual weariness and listlessness 
 of body, but with the fullest and deepest tranquillity of 
 mind. I was so peaceful that I could have fancied my- 
 self on the eve of an everlasting rest. There was no 
 gloom of doubt hanging over my soul, no fears brooding 
 within it, nothing came between it and its glorified 
 Eedeemer. Everything about me tended to enhance 
 this pure celestial joy. It was early evening, and 
 within my room the sun shone, not with his most vivid 
 glory, but with a gentle fervour. The part of the sky 
 visible to me where I lay was of a stainless blue, while 
 in strong relief to its thrilling clearness stood ranged, as 
 far as my eye could look, a long line of tall green 
 poplars. By my bedside were seated my father and my 
 brother. I had held a long conversation with my dear 
 relations which had exhausted me, anc^ I had lain quite 
 calm and still for many minutes in order to recover my- 
 self. As I lay thus unmoving with my eyes closed, my 
 friends, thinking me asleep, suspended their talking, 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 305 
 
 and throughout the apartment there was a dead silence. 
 I was, however, thoroughly awake. I was so far from 
 being in a dreamy unconsciousness, as to be almost pre- 
 ternaturally wakeful, and being painfully cognisant of 
 all surrounding objects and motions. 
 
 'While lying in this still and thoughtful position, my 
 attention was suddenly arrested by distant sounds as if 
 of human voices singing. These voices were indescrib- 
 ably sweet and mellifluous, but carried to such ethereal 
 heights as to induce in the listener a " tremulous 
 felicity of fear." I listened with my whole soul and 
 sense absorbed in what I heard. The singing ceased 
 not for many minutes ; and when it did cease, such an 
 excessive brightness of light so filled and illumined the 
 whole room, that my friends were hidden from me, and 
 I only saw one unspotted space of colourless brightness. 
 
 6 A moment it remained full and fixed, and then it 
 parted and dissolved on either side of me, while I felt 
 as if rapidly ascending upwards higher and higher. 
 I seemed to ascend with full consciousness about me, 
 until I felt as if finally leaving the earth and winging 
 my way to Grod, and with a mortal's fear I shook with 
 amazement and apprehension. As I faltered, my ascent 
 was stopped, and I stood in a small enclosed space with 
 nothing remarkable about it save one very large 
 window which fronted the place where I stood, and 
 through which was pouring a flood of brilliancy utterly 
 overwhelming. I seemed to wait here a long while, and 
 
 x 
 
306 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 feeling that I was in His hand, I prayed to Grod that 
 if it were His will to show me further of His mysteries, 
 He would enable me to endure their presence without 
 shrinking. Before I had ended praying, I was aware 
 of a presence beside my own in the place, and looking 
 up I beheld a person of majestic mien and stature, 
 gazing on me with looks of anxious and troubled tender- 
 ness. He did not speak until I asked him fearfully 
 and humbly, * Where am I ? Tell me, I beseech you, 
 Sir, to where am I brought ? " " Ah poor distrustful 
 child," replied the spirit, " can you not trust in Him 
 when your God is pleased for an instant to separate you 
 from your earthly friends and habitation ? But come 
 with me, for I have much to show you, but if you fear, 
 you cannot receive any truth aright" I answered that 
 I would have courage, and taking me by the hand he 
 led me up a long and narrow ascent, on the top of 
 which stood a large mansion. A house it certainly was, 
 though unlike those we inhabit here. It appeared 
 reared of the choicest and fairest marble, was vast but 
 most exquisitely proportioned, and altogether lovely and 
 pure in appearance. An extensive portico was supported 
 on either side by four colossal pillars, each of which 
 was thickly studded with what seemed diamonds ; the 
 entire top of the portico was wreathed about with white 
 blossoms. As we neared this lovely palace I grew too 
 happy for containment, and cried out with rapture to 
 my guide : — 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 307 
 
 ' " Surely this is the house called Beautiful ! it 
 must be angels alone who could dwell here ! " 
 
 6 On entering this lovely palace to which my spiritual 
 guide had brought me, a scene burst on my bewildered 
 gaze, which could not be depicted so as to be realisable 
 by any except with the pen and spiritual knowledge of 
 an angel. Of its solemn grandeur, mighty vastness, 
 and surpassing glory and beauty, I can give no adequate 
 description whatever ; did I make an attempt, I should 
 be only wasting words in vain speech. We were 
 ushered into what seemed a temple, for an immense 
 concourse of persons were assembled as if for worship. 
 I can give you no idea of the space occupied by this 
 assemblage, or of the number of the assembled. The 
 former appeared to be illimitable, and yet to be tra- 
 velled over at a glance, while the latter was so great 
 that the mind could not calculate it. The persons of 
 the assembled were all so perfect, pure, and beautiful, 
 that I felt assured that I was in the midst of a company 
 of that heavenly host we read of in Scripture as " en- 
 camping round those that fear the Lord." 
 
 ' Every individual of this vast congregation was arrayed 
 in a garment of purest white, while girdles of gold 
 encircled their waists, crowns of gold their heads, and 
 each held a book and a stringed instrument. On the 
 latter they with one accord performed, accompanying 
 the music with their voices. 
 
 6 1, a poor frail child of earth introduced into such 
 x 2 
 
308 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 hitherto imimagined glories and felicities, stood still, 
 speechless and afraid, not daring to utter a word. 
 My guide saw my amazement, and, taking me aside, 
 spoke unto me as follows. " You are afraid," said he 
 in tones of great severity. I dared not avoid a reply, 
 and said, " Forgive me ! You are a spirit, perhaps in- 
 deed an angel, and such scenes as these are your daily 
 meat and drink. With me it is otherwise." To this 
 my guide replied : * You ought as a Christian to possess 
 unlimited confidence in the good providence of Grod, 
 knowing that all things shall work together for good to 
 those that fear Him : not even a sparrow falls to the 
 ground without our Heavenly Father's notice ; He has 
 numbered the very hairs of our heads. But come," added 
 he, " come with me : we must give you spiritual instruc- 
 tion, and so help you to gain the necessary confidence 
 in our Lord." And again taking my hand, this spirit 
 led me into an apartment, small, but the perfection 
 of beauty and order. In this room a few persons 
 were convened, bearing a close resemblance to those 
 of the larger congregation. In the centre of this 
 group, and in the attitude of one who teaches, stood a 
 man of most solemn and heavenly bearing. Before him 
 lay an open book, apparently the word of God ; his 
 right hand reverently grasped its leaves, while at 
 intervals he stooped and touched it affectionately with 
 his lips. The preacher, for such he evidently was, was 
 descanting on the love and wisdom of Grod, as seen in the 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPMENT. 309 
 
 creation and preservation, and then in the redemption 
 and regeneration of man. I listened breathlessly, for 
 the words seemed as if spoken exclusively to me : 
 I listened, and presently my terror had fled, my assu- 
 rance was full and unbroken. Presently the preacher 
 ended his discourse, the assembly dispersed, and again 
 taking my hand, my guide led me forth into a place 
 or state even more glorious and grand than I had seen. 
 There were mingled young and old, all uniting in 
 perfect peace and harmony, although variously em- 
 ployed. Some were formed into groups, whence they 
 sang and read together from the word of God; some 
 were dictating spiritual exercises and lessons, while 
 others were instructing little children in the way and 
 work of (rod. Every individual was beautiful — not one 
 deformity of face or form was distinguishable of all the 
 myriads that were here convened together. Every face 
 was a sure index of its possessor, and reflected back 
 nothing but the light of a pure, holy, and loving soul : 
 none were unemployed, all were in happy joyous activity. 
 There were no bickerings, no angry contentions ; here 
 each acted towards the other with perfect charity and 
 love, and with all meekness, patience, and gentleness ; 
 wisdom and intelligence in their brightest array beamed 
 from every eye and sate upon every brow. There was 
 no subject of a moral, spiritual, or celestial interest, of 
 which they could not converse, and with the fullest un- 
 derstanding of what they uttered. I can still remember 
 
310 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 the substance of what they spoke ; but to reproduce 
 it in their own language, would be beyond a mortal's 
 power. Whilst I waited in this heavenly abode, a 
 company of spirits came round me, and, conversing 
 gently with me, gave me much spiritual counsel, and 
 even temporal advice. They told me the nature of my 
 illness, and what would be the best treatment for me to 
 receive. They assured me of many strange conditions 
 of body into which I should relapse, and of much per- 
 secution and contempt of which I should become the 
 subject. "But," added they, "be assured that every- 
 thing will ultimately tend to the glory of Grod, and to 
 the progress of your own regeneration." ' 
 
 In this last description of a vision, which seems to 
 have closely resembled an awakening after death, we 
 find the order of developement the same as that given 
 by Swedenborg and other seers — the hearing first, then 
 the vision. This is the opening from within outwards, 
 not, as in the growth of mediumship, the gradual pene- 
 tration from without to the inner sense. The window 
 opening on the second degree is an example of the kind 
 of symbolism so often mentioned. 
 
 Water is one of the symbols common to all mediums 
 and seers, and all agree in assigning the same meaning 
 to it. It is truth in every degree, whether forming a 
 stream or river to be crossed — which is a new truth or 
 degree of knowledge gained before another state can be 
 entered — or springing up as a fountain, such as the 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 311 
 
 young spirit described as having risen up in his 
 house. 
 
 The good spirit, whose face Miss L recognised in 
 
 the photograph, first announced his presence by drawing 
 a well, from which a man was winding up buckets of 
 water. He said that he had been 6 working hard, 
 drawing much water and drinking some? His ideas 
 of spiritual life while upon earth were possibly very 
 different from those which awaited his earnest, truth - 
 loving mind on his entrance into the next life. 
 
 I have spoken of the Exodus, and must recur to it, 
 as to other forms of symbolisation, in treating of the 
 correspondences in Scripture. But there is one other 
 image equally common, the fitness of which will be at 
 once recognised. Spiritual developement, as has been 
 said, is in its degree a process like birth in the material 
 plane. If, therefore, the law of symbolisation holds 
 good in all its relations, we must expect, by tracing 
 this correspondence into its different relations, to find 
 the material symbol answering to mediumship. And 
 no one type, through all the range of experiences, is used 
 so often as that of a child. I have known very many 
 persons, who, before the opening of any spiritual degree, 
 have wondered at the number of times they have 
 dreamed of young infants or little children. Every- 
 thing connected with the care and growth of infants 
 gradually appears in these dreams, and the appearance 
 and character of the little subjects of the dream corre- 
 
312 FKOM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 spond to the kind of mediumship about to appear. It 
 would require many pages to enter fully into this most 
 wonderful yet most coherent portion of the subject. 
 Let it be remembered that the promise of a child is the 
 prediction of a spiritual opening in an individual, and 
 then it will be seen how deep a signification is borne by 
 the prophecies of Scripture on the birth of Our Lord, 
 Himself the focus and embodiment of all spirit-life in its 
 descent on earth. In the language of correspondence, 
 the birth of a child typifies the growth and unfolding of 
 the spirit. Had the followers of Joanna Southcot been 
 able to interpret this inner tongue, they would not have 
 brought ridicule on themselves and their cause by con- 
 founding the symbol of spirit-life with the conditions of 
 the outer world. 
 
 Such visions as those of Elizabeth Squirrell partake 
 of the character of dreams, of which it seems the place 
 to speak here. I believe that it will be found that the 
 conditions under which dreaming takes place are very 
 like those of some other forms of mediumship. The 
 dream is an opening, in a greater or less degree, of the 
 inner sense during sleep, and to gain some idea of these 
 degrees of opening, we must consider the phenomena of 
 clairvoyance. It generally happens, when change of 
 state is complete, that the clairvoyante forgets on 
 awakening what has been said or seen in the trance. 
 But this must depend on the completeness of the open- 
 ing or closing ; I have heard a clairvoyante say, ( Be- 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPMENT. 313 
 
 mesmerise one thoroughly when you awake me : I do 
 not wish to remember what 1 have seen when I awake? 
 And impressions are often made, the effect of which 
 remains on awaking, though the clairvoyante has then 
 no idea whence they came. All mesmerists would con- 
 firm this. I have seen a girl who had an habitual nervous 
 catch when awake. In her lucid state she promised her 
 mesmeriser that she would not twitch her arm. When 
 awake, she found herself unable to do so, but did not 
 know what prevented her. In these cases the change of 
 state seemed to be complete. 
 
 I was once told by a patient who remembered every- 
 thing on awaking that in her case the streams of mes- 
 merism only went a very short way into the brain. Had 
 they penetrated to the top and back of the head — she 
 pointed to the organ called firmness — all would have 
 been forgotten. 
 
 All these degrees of penetration and opening of the 
 inner sense, with the remembrance or forgetfulness, may 
 be applied to dreams. I know many persons who, on 
 going to sleep, feel a sensation like fanning or mesmer- 
 ising. After this they are impressed in different degrees, 
 sometimes only having a kind of idea, sometimes a dim 
 vision of scenes and figures following each other and 
 melting away in turn like dissolving views, and some- 
 times falling into a sleep more or less deep, in which 
 all the scenes and pictures become more vivid and real. 
 In the deeper state resembling trance, the dreamer 
 
314 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 enters as a clairvoyante into the spiritual state, of which 
 the incidents are probably more often forgotten than re- 
 membered. 
 
 On the physiological conditions by which these 
 remembrances are regulated I will not presume to 
 give an opinion. They must be investigated by those 
 whose scientific knowledge of their brain and nerves 
 will give them an excellent foundation for experiments 
 in the higher branches of psychology, when attention is 
 systematically directed to the meeting-point of the two. 
 It is quite certain that deep spiritual dreams are some- 
 times recollected, but in this case they may perhaps be 
 called trance visions. Such, too, are those in which the 
 dreamer or seer seems, like E. Squirrell, to pass from 
 one state to another by well-marked degrees, each state 
 being a farther advance than the preceding, into the 
 spirit-world. Of this kind are those which are some- 
 times remembered as a ( dream within a dream,' and on 
 awaking the outer dream is remembered, but the inner 
 dream sometimes lost. e I once,' said a friend, e wished 
 much to understand some spiritual truth which seemed 
 to me to defy explanation. One morning the whole of 
 what I wished to know became quite intelligible ; the 
 difficulties had disappeared, and a clue unsuspected 
 before seemed to have been given. I could not help 
 connecting this enlightenment with my dream of the 
 previous night, or rather morning, in which, after going 
 through a gate, I found myself walking in a pleasant 
 
<JORRTSPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 315 
 
 field. Beside me was a much esteemed friend who had 
 lately left this world, and, as he walked along with a 
 bright countenance and elastic step, I wondered that he 
 whose death had so lately caused our sorrow, should be 
 so well and strong. My companion opened another 
 gate, telling me that he was going to take me to a house 
 hidden behind some trees, where some friends of his 
 would give me what I wanted. I was conscious of great 
 delight in the society to which I had been admitted, but 
 remembered nothing more, and the awakening was 
 sudden and complete. It hardly seemed as if I had slept 
 at all.' This last remark reminds one of the return 
 to outer life from clairvoyance, when the mesmerised 
 person will often feel quite certain he has never 
 been asleep. ■ The first gate in the dream implied 
 the change to a state like the spirit's most external 
 one; the other gate which he opened was a degree still 
 deeper. 
 
 Many really prophetic dreams arise from the opening 
 of a degree in which some spirit conditions, such as the 
 substitution of state for time and place, are attained, but 
 the dreamer, still among objects of this world, is in the 
 situation of an earthly clairvoyante. There are some 
 strange grotesque dreams having also something of the 
 prophetic character, which arises from the annihilation of 
 that perception of sequence which constitutes Time, and 
 which have a kind of symbolism of the very simplest 
 character. Of this class are the dreams spoken of in 
 
316 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 dream-books, and interpreted after a lawless fashion by 
 ignorant people, who however perceive, in their constant 
 recurrence in connection with some event of life, a co- 
 herence claiming a nobler origin than the pork chops 
 and other indigestibles which have been made answerable 
 for them by the learned. For example, we often hear 
 even educated persons say, 'Whenever I dream of such 
 an object or fact, a certain event happens.' The object 
 or fact symbolises the event, and the symbol, often a 
 strange or familiar one, is remembered but not understood. 
 Such is the dream of stale meat or decaying flesh, so 
 generally believed to precede a death. I am speaking 
 now of the belief gained from dream-books, and held by 
 the uneducated; but it is easy to see that this stale 
 meat is a universal symbol for the very lowest material 
 view of the change into another state. A person whom 
 I know to be truthful has many times announced to me 
 that a death would be heard of, for she had been dreaming 
 of being at church. At first I took little notice of this, 
 but found at last that her expectation was always con- 
 firmed by the reception of the news. In her case the 
 symbol of death was a degree higher than the meat, for 
 she was a religious but not an enlightened woman, and 
 her idea of death was connected with some indefinite 
 notions of religion. All dreams of every degree which 
 are not merely derived from confused action of the brain 
 as sleep is coming on (and which of course compose the 
 greater 'number) occur after the brain and nerves have 
 
CORRESPONDENCE AND DEVELOPEMENT. 317 
 
 been calmed by the first sleep. Hence the saying that 
 • morning dreams come true.' 
 
 There is one deeply interesting question allied to the 
 subject of dreams. When we seem, in sleep, to be with 
 friends who are gone, are they really with us, or do 
 their images only recur, in either a typical order or an 
 incoherent j amble, to our minds? If my attempt to 
 trace some of the simplest laws of spirit-life has not 
 been altogether a failure, this question is answered 
 already. I have endeavoured to show that (independent 
 of revelation) there is the strongest presumption of the 
 continued existence after death of all human beings ; 
 that we, during this life, under certain conditions, pass 
 into a state, something like that of those who are gone ; 
 that this occurs in clairvoyance, dreams, &c. ; that the 
 risen being passes from one state to another of glory 
 and happiness, or the reverse ; and that our ability to 
 perceive beings and objects in these different states 
 depends on the seer's capacity for entering into deeper 
 and deeper degrees of inner life. When to these we 
 add the fact, proved by so much experience, that affection 
 and sympathy are affinity and attraction, and thought, 
 presence in the spirit state, we find the strongest reason 
 for believing that dear friends are really present with 
 us in our dreams. Indeed, it is only strange that we 
 are not more often conscious of their presence : but this 
 unconsciousness is not a proof that they are not there, 
 for they may be with us, yet unable, from the failure of 
 
318 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 magnetic conditions, to make their presence apparent ; 
 or, the conditions being* favourable, we probably often 
 receive from them comfort and counsel, the memory of 
 which is lost. If our friends sometimes appear to us 
 in dreams under strange aspects and circumstances, this 
 is but an illustration and confirmation of those laws of 
 correspondence which I have tried to explain. We see 
 a dear sister, or brother, looking younger and brighter 
 than when on earth, but we cannot reach him, or 
 perhaps he cannot speak to us, though we speak to him. 
 Or perhaps he stands on a hill which we cannot climb, 
 and we wonder, if his love is like ours, that he does not 
 come nearer. All these varieties of perception are 
 caused by varieties of state, and the symbolical form 
 assumed by all communications from a spirit in the 
 next to one in this state. We began this chapter with 
 symbolism, and to that universal law we have returned. 
 Many and various are the hidden spiritual treasures 
 which will be brought to light when the knowledge 
 of Correspondence is gained. Only its simplest elements 
 can be attained in this life, but as the window f opens 
 wider between this state and the next, the objects of the 
 spirit-spheres will become more clearly visible. 
 
 The difference of perception in the two states is ex- 
 pressed by the apostle: ' Noiv we see as in a glass, 
 darkly (or in symbols — the Greek word is enigmas), but 
 then, face to face. 9 
 
 * Window, in Hebrew, * is a word formed from one expressing 
 spiritual vision. 
 
319 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 INFLUX AND INSPIRATION. 
 
 f HAVE already made large demands on my reader's 
 -"- power of belief, but for every inference hitherto 
 drawn there has been a foundation of some kind 
 in experience. If the theory of Inspiration in the 
 following chapter should seem more systematic and 
 complete than is justified by facts, I beg to be under- 
 stood as only offering thoughts suggested by much 
 fragmentary information gained from various sources on 
 an obscure subject. If I can thus give a new direction 
 to an inquiry, which must be completed by better and 
 more advanced thinkers than myself, some indulgence 
 may perhaps be extended to errors which will soon 
 become apparent, but which at this stage of knowledge 
 are unavoidable. 
 
 We have seen that all communication from the 
 spiritual sphere is couched in the language of Cor- 
 respondence (though in simple messages from spirits 
 near to earth this may not be at first apparent), and 
 that, in the developement of mediumship, the character 
 
320 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 of the impressing spirit rises with the gradual opening 
 of the inner sense. The symbolism also consists of 
 different degrees, rising from the representations of 
 objects near to earth — which express good or ill accord- 
 ing to their characters and the character of the spirit 
 whose surroundings they are — to the glorious imagery 
 of the highest angel world. Two conditions are neces- 
 sary — the character of the inspiring source, and that of 
 the medium or channel of communication ; for by both 
 these acting together the quality and form of the 
 message is determined. Not that the human vessel 
 alters the heavenly stream, but that each current has its 
 separate source and its appropriate channel, and the 
 most direct channels must be traversed by streams from 
 the purest fountain before the work of spiritual regene- 
 ration is complete. To attain this state of receptivity, 
 a purifying process is needed ; but the amount of puri- 
 fication required varies in different individuals, and 
 this explains the fact that to innocent loving children * 
 visions and communications of the highest character 
 are sometimes given, confirming the words of the 
 Psalmist, e Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings, 
 Thou hast revealed strength ; ' and the assurance of our 
 Lord, in speaking of little children, that e Of such is 
 the kingdom of Heaven.' 
 
 Before going farther into detail as to the elements of 
 character required for each degree of communication, 
 * See page 301. 
 
INFLUX AND INSPIRATION. 321 
 
 I must say a few words on the division of the brain by 
 phrenologists, involving a mental analysis so wonderful, 
 that had it been the result of thought and invention 
 only, its author would have been set on a pedestal as a 
 philosopher, instead of rather being held worthy of the 
 pillory as a quack. But Gall did not invent, probably 
 no human mind could invent the marvellous grouping 
 of mental elements which his system displays. He 
 simply observed patiently and carefully, what mental 
 and moral tendencies were found united with certain 
 forms and proportions of brain, and when his arrange- 
 ment of faculties was completed, the whole, barring 
 some imperfection inseparable from a first work, dis- 
 played such a harmonious system as no mental philo- 
 sopher has ever tried to frame without falling into a 
 hopeless confusion. 
 
 The lower range of organs in the head contain that 
 portion of the brain which is used in the reception of 
 impressions from earth. They form the animal elements 
 of character. Sensuality in every form, Combativeness, 
 Destructiveness, Secretiveness, Love of Grain, &c. These 
 are the organs ministering to self, needed in due pro- 
 portion in this life, but sadly overgrown through in- 
 dulgence, and requiring all the restraint that conscience 
 and religion can impose, until their power shall be 
 diminished, by that conquest of evil by good, which the 
 fuller developement of their superiors will effect. 
 These self-organs do not lie in the forehead. The 
 
 Y 
 
322 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 lowest range there consists of susceptibilities of the 
 very simplest impressions from the outer world. Form, 
 Size, Colour, Sound, Number, and Language, the last 
 being behind the eye, which itself corresponds * with 
 intellectual light. 
 
 These are the mental perceptions needed for carry- 
 ing on material life, and many of these as well as the 
 less exalted feelings, are shared with us by the animal 
 creation in their different degrees. Above the lowest, 
 at the back of the head, comes a range one degree 
 higher. They are the affections, binding us to our 
 kind ; Adhesiveness, Love of Children, Love of Home, 
 Caution, &c. In the front, the higher intellectual organs 
 are compounded of the lower and simpler ones. The 
 powers of observing events and individual things are 
 centred, as might be expected, between and above 
 those perceptions of which the knowledge of individuals 
 and events is formed. Ascending one step we find 
 Comparison immediately above the last named, and in 
 the middle of the forehead. The function of this organ 
 is analogy and classification, the perception of objects in 
 space, according to some metaphysical writers ; and its 
 situation directly above the perception of complete 
 objects, and slantingly above Locality, the perception of 
 relative place, shows how well it was so designated. 
 
 * I think it is Mr. J. D. Morell who remarks, that the nerve of sight 
 is nearer the intellectual region, and the nerve of hearing nearer the 
 affectional portion of the brain. 
 
INFLUX AND INSPIRATION. 323 
 
 Comparison, when fully developed in an intellectual 
 brain, gives a perception of analogies, and, united with 
 a neighbouring organ, the perception of differences,* a 
 power of classification. 
 
 Causality, on each side of Comparison, is always 
 denned to be the power of tracing cause and effect. 
 This power has been called by some of the best mental 
 philosophers, the knowledge of objects in time. I pre- 
 fer this last definition. It is situated above all the 
 simple perceptions and immediately over Time and 
 Order. It is a complex perception, uniting the func- 
 tions of all below it. Close above this is the Perception 
 of Differences already mentioned, and ascending a step 
 on each side, the portion of brain which has been called 
 Ideality, whose function, however, seems hardly to be 
 as yet understood, and to which I must return after the 
 examination of those in the top of the head. And here 
 on the vertex as a centre, to which all others should 
 converge, we find that organ whose work it is to convey 
 impressions to and from the Highest. Veneration is 
 the name given. I believe that just as the Philopro- 
 genitiveness conveys those impressions from parent to 
 child, and vice versa, of which the parental feeling is 
 composed, so does the high and central organ commu- 
 nicate with its Holy Object. It is the perception and 
 
 * No. 20 in Gall's numbering. This was named, Wit or Humour, be- 
 cause it gives that needful element of humour, a quick perception of 
 what is incongruous, but its elementary function is simpler and higher. 
 
 Y 2 
 
324 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 impression of our relation with our Heavenly Father. 
 But each organ has different degrees of action, and 
 though the highest impressing power of Veneration 
 is divine, yet that organ is, like the others, open to 
 action from lower sources.* On each side of Veneration 
 is Hope, the perception of the future ; in its proper and 
 highest function, the knowledge of our next state. In 
 front of Veneration and between it and the higher 
 intellectual organs lies Benevolence, whose function is 
 the conveyance of all kind and good feeling among 
 men. On each side of Benevolence is Sympathy, called 
 from its lowest form of action Imitation, and above this 
 and between Hope and Ideality lies the organ of Marvel- 
 lousness, giving in its higher action a relation with the 
 inhabitants of the spirit world ; as Hope which it imme- 
 diately adjoins gives the perception of our own future. 
 In its lowest form of action and poverty of combination, 
 Marvellousness degenerates into wonder-loving and 
 
 * Whenever it is possible I am glad to confirm a theoretical state- 
 ment by a fact, and facts illustrating this scale of influences may be 
 found in the phenomena of Phreno- Mesmerism, or excitement of the 
 different cerebral organs of a sensitive . person while under mesmeric 
 influence. I once asked leave of a patient to try some experiments of this 
 kind. The eyes were tightly shut, and I pointed to some of the organs : 
 when my finger was directed to Veneration, the patient said, ' I don't 
 know why, but I feel as if I must get up and bow to you,' and the action 
 would have followed the word if I had not desisted. This was one of 
 many such instances. The feeling induced by spiritual action on an 
 organ is that which necessarily follows from the relation of the recipient 
 with the giver of the influx. 
 
INFLUX AND INSPIRATION. .325 
 
 superstition. The poet's especial organ of Ideality, above 
 Construct! veness and adjoining Marvellousness, seems to 
 consist in a redundancy of imagery borrowed both from 
 below and above, for its power of adaptation and putting 
 together arises from Constructiveness, and its material 
 may be found both in the earthly perceptions and in the 
 spirit spheres.* Behind Veneration is an organ whose 
 name must I think at some time be changed. It is called 
 Firmness, and is supposed to give persistency of action 
 or feeling, which in truth it does, but only in its lower 
 form : and on each side is Justice, giving a perception of 
 the relative rights of our fellow beings. I have passed 
 
 * That combination of organs by which the poet's gift is secured 
 
 seems to give rather an intense perception of harmony between the 
 
 inner and outer worlds than any special redundancy of ideas, though 
 
 this last forms a mighty element of power. All the undefined charm of 
 
 real poetry arises from the correspondential element, which gives to the 
 
 simplest utterances the depth and beauty of their internal sense. 
 
 Wordsworth is an instance of a writer whose verse is less melodious 
 
 than that of many less impressive poets, but its soul-touching character 
 
 is due to this internal perception. The absence of the quality makes his 
 
 often quoted man who could look at every object only in its earthly 
 
 aspect : — 
 
 1 A primrose on the river's brim 
 
 A yellow primrose was to him, 
 
 And it was nothing more.' 
 
 And Dante, though with a more dramatic and less analysing eye, saw, 
 like Swedenborg, the visions of another state, is not only the seer 
 describing what he really perceived in the world of spirits, but the poet, 
 who, if his internal sense had not enabled him to recognise the realities 
 of that world, would still by his indwelling faculty have given a true 
 imagery to his grand Drama. — P. 12. 
 
326 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 these last organs over quickly, as my object in giving 
 the slight sketch has been to show the gradual ascent 
 from the lowest and most earthly feelings to those 
 which place us in relation with the highest spiritual 
 spheres. The lower form the animal, the higher the 
 angel. And their place in the head corresponds with 
 the work they have to do. 
 
 It will be said, what has all this to do with inspiration ? 
 Truly, I could not write of inspiration without having 
 secured an understanding on the part of my reader of 
 the degrees of receptivity in the brain corresponding 
 with the character of influx from a spirit source. 
 
 Appended to Mrs. Crosland's Light in the Valley, are 
 some little diagrams drawn by a spiritual medium illus- 
 trating the direction in which the influence comes from 
 the spirit to the medium at the different stages of de- 
 velopement. Such diagrams are probably not exact 
 representations, though at page 54 they may be the 
 best illustration that can be given of the subject. In 
 the earliest stage, the influence falls in a horizontal 
 direction ; the spirits, though not necessarily evil, are 
 near to earth. They give earthly names, and act on that 
 part of the soul of which the aflfectional portion of the 
 brain is the organ. Of these are all the near friends 
 and relations ; they generally convey their messages in 
 very simple imagery ; and with them, as if taking ad- 
 vantage of the opening of the inner sense, come the 
 worthless and mischievous beings, who, like the bad 
 
INFLUX AND INSPIRATION. 327 
 
 spirit in the diagram, mesmerise the basilar region of 
 the brain. 
 
 After this series, the direction of influences as given 
 in the diagram is diagonal, falling from above sideways 
 on the head. This comes from the second order of 
 spirits, described before, as giving the names of those 
 who when on earth were distinguished by some strongly 
 marked feature of intellectual or moral character. 
 These spirits are represented as acting on those portions 
 of the brain which are fitted to receive the higher order 
 of impressions from earth, and the names they give 
 correspond with their work. Sometimes these are of 
 poets, and sometimes philosophers or philanthropists, 
 each having some general affinity with the character 
 cf the medium, and showing by the name both the 
 spirit's own character and that of the society or order 
 to which it belongs. For we are told, that in the state 
 in which sympathy is as nearness or affinity on earth, 
 spirits fall as by natural attraction into those groups in 
 which they find companionship ; as we do here whenever 
 the conditions are favourable. By the hand of a 
 writing medium, who is an admirer of Moore or Camp- 
 bell, some kind of imitation of their lyrics may be 
 written, with the signature of either poet, and the 
 writer, till the matter is understood, glorifies himself ac- 
 cordingly. But the pleasure taken in any one phase of 
 mediumship short of the highest, is a halting on the 
 middle step of the ladder, and will hinder progress. 
 
328 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 So the direction of influence gradually rises, till at 
 length it falls vertically into the top of the head, and 
 then the highest and holiest names are given as the 
 sources of inspiration. 
 
 While all these different currents are at work, good and 
 evil contending for mastery, all sorts of cross-magnetisms 
 occur, and the spiritual growth is a struggle and a 
 process in which we may trace an order analogous to 
 that of the moral growth and intellectual developemant 
 of every human being. 
 
 It is this struggle of contending forces which is re- 
 presented as the exodus of the spirit, when it comes out 
 from the Egypt of intellectual labour into the wider land 
 of spiritual knowledge, and those ideas and perceptions 
 which had been the object of its striving: in the firsc 
 state have become the instruments for embodying the 
 more enlarged perceptions of the next. 
 
 The word Influx includes every degree of spiritual 
 impression : Inspiration should I think be limited to 
 the direct action of the Holy Spirit upon the spirit of 
 man ; and the inner breathing, which in different de- 
 grees accompanies every stage of developement, is most 
 silent and deep when coincident with impressions from 
 the Highest Source. It is the effect of Inspiration. 
 
 As the typical people could not have their ark of 
 the covenant, or their holy of holies before the exodus 
 from Egyptian bondage was complete, so must each 
 soul get beyond the bondage of ideas gained by its own 
 
INFLUX AND INSPIRATION. 329 
 
 intellectual effort before he can be enlightened by the 
 communion of the Holy Ghost. The process of libera- 
 tion which I have described as a struggle, includes both 
 the conquest of self in the most internal feelings, and 
 the perceptible action of spirit influence. Neither can 
 be well or safely accomplished without constant and 
 earnest prayer, which is as sending up a vessel to re- 
 ceive the heavenly current, whose gentle but irresistible 
 power will purify body, soul, and spirit, bringing all 
 into perfect harmony with the will of Grod. When the 
 soul has thus been made ready, swept and garnished, 
 the sunlight will fall direct from above as into a temple 
 whose roof is open towards heaven ; while into the earthly 
 tabernacle whose windows open towards the world, it 
 will enter through the mist and smoke of earth, re- 
 fracted and dimmed by every material object. 
 
 A young child has all the mental and moral elements 
 of character from the earliest period, but all are not 
 matured at the same time. The physical senses first 
 become receptive and are strengthened by impression 
 suited for their exercise. 
 
 The simplest mental perceptions come next, and 
 then, as needed by the increased requirements, all the 
 others in turn ; but the more complex the receptivity 
 (for I conclude those generally named reasoning powers 
 among receptivities, or perceptions) the longer does it 
 take in gaining strength and maturity ; and I believe it 
 will be found that the simpler mental perceptions grow 
 
330 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 faster than even the earliest affections. There seems to 
 be in each life a fixed period for the strengthening of 
 different elements of character, and the growth of the 
 portion of brain by which impressions forming that 
 element are conveyed. Wrong training and forcing, 
 as in the vegetable world, may give an under-growth 
 and prematurity to any organ, or set of organs, but it 
 should be the teacher's study to find out the heavenly 
 or natural order, and when his teaching is added to the 
 teaching of nature, to supply the growing soul with 
 those impressions only which can give it strength 
 and nourishment. When Grod's will is thus carefully 
 obeyed in education, we shall cease to see young brains 
 crammed to insanity, by an excess of indigestible food, 
 and young brains strained and worn out by the effort to 
 carry burdens beyond their strength, till the whole system, 
 if it survive the one grand triumph of a college honour 
 or a gold medal, falls prostrate on entering the threshold 
 of life, unfitted for that real labour, for which these 
 early triumphs ought only to have been the preparation. 
 It is not only the stronger brains of men that are thus 
 sacrificed. The institutions called Ladies' Colleges 
 might, but for this infraction of God's law, be a boon 
 to women, and an instrument of great good to the 
 world, but by the forcing system which is encouraged 
 by the directors and teachers, young girls whose brains, 
 like delicate quick growing plants, need warmth and 
 ease, and sunshine to strengthen the fibre for future 
 
INFLUX AND INSINUATION. 331 
 
 work, are urged to compete in examinations, till 
 ambition takes the place which more genial womanly 
 feelings should have filled, the time is fully occupied 
 by preparing for classes. Life, if this is, becomes a 
 burden, instead of a delight, and mind and body, both 
 of which should have been strengthened by a timely 
 alternation of nourishment and rest, become weak and 
 inefficient, through the undue demand made on 
 their powers. We may hope that our great-grand- 
 children will be wiser than ourselves. If they are so, 
 what idea will they form of their ancestors' wisdom, 
 when they hear that in 1863, young girls were in the 
 habit of attending as many as seven classes at a college, 
 and spending eight, ten, or even twelve hours out of 
 the twenty-four, in the brain and nerve-destroying 
 work of passing for examination ? 
 
 The passions are to the moral nature, what the per- 
 ceptions are to the mental. After them, the affections 
 strengthen, as the need for them arises, and friendly 
 affection and parental love are in full maturity, before 
 religious feeling has attained its growth. Each age has 
 its appointed work to do, and its capabilities prepared. 
 Were this not the case, that wonderful adaptation which 
 is seen throughout all God's creation would be wanting 
 in his most complete works. As we should expect, in 
 the natural order of developement, those feelings 
 which form the link between us and Heaven are the 
 last matured, and they must come into full exercise 
 
332 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 as we approach the change for which all earlier 
 developements are intended to prepare us. It is a 
 melancholy reversal of orderly growth, when the re- 
 ligious life is weak in the aged heart. 
 
 All periods of growth, whether in the natural world, 
 spoken of in the Hebrew as a day, in the spiritual dis- 
 pensations as they are sometimes called, in the periods 
 of a life's teaching, or in the flow and ebb of the life- 
 stream from heaven in the soul, arise from the action of 
 successive waves of influx from the First Fountain. The 
 subject is too complicated to be entered on in detail, 
 were I able to do more than give the merest outline of 
 the teaching that has come to us. But a question 
 arises at the outset, which must be met to avoid seeming 
 incoherence. In what does the wave of influx which 
 opens the perceptions to all external nature differ from 
 that by which glimpses are gained of the world of 
 spirit ? 
 
 ' That is not first (in its earthly developement) which 
 is spiritual, but that which is natural, and afterwards 
 that which is spiritual.' The outer sense is opened first. 
 The influx differs only in its degree of action. That 
 which gives life to the body and opens the external 
 perception is the tide of our every day life and growth, 
 and falls in with our natural habits and feelings, so we 
 find no unusual state induced by it, and hence receive 
 all from Grod unacknowledged. And as the wave of 
 influx falls into the material sphere, it gives birth to all 
 
INFLUX AND INSINUATION. 333 
 
 true discovery and real science, while the recipient who 
 knows not whence his power is derived, believes that 
 his own unaided genius is the cause of all his mental 
 achievements. 
 
 With two exceptions the spiritual communications in 
 the early part of this volume came through young or 
 uncultivated mediums. The following through an 
 educated mind is on the subject of influx in the natural 
 world. It is written through the hand of Wm. Howitt, 
 whose uninfluenced works need no eulogium from 
 me. 
 
 'He who bestows intelligence, who ever and anon 
 endows the earth with a new man or a new discovery, 
 breathing intimations of a new dawn, opening vistas 
 into new regions of capability, and thus for ever adding 
 to the mass of human achievement and scientific afflu- 
 ence, yet taking no credit for it, but allowing his 
 children to adorn themselves in his own splendours and 
 his own honours ; shall he stint his gifts according to 
 the laws of the world's wisdom ? Who has set bounds 
 to his power or his will, to his munificence, or the modes 
 of his operation ? Who has issued laws of reason, and 
 rules of logic which shall bind Him ? His paths are 
 still higher than the clouds, or the atmosphere of earth; 
 ay, far beyond the stretch of the subtlest wit's imagina- 
 tion ; and as he astonished, and even scandalised the 
 world of old by walking with the untaught, and abiding 
 with the little ones of the earth, so now, and in many a 
 
334 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 coming age, his footsteps will be seen amid the wilder- 
 ness of strange things, and his profoundest plans shall 
 appear but folly to the glow-worm greatness of proud 
 dust. 
 
 ' Throw thyself boldly on the broad sea of divine 
 bounty, and thou shalt swim in the unfailing billows of 
 life and spirit. The world is still before the hopeful 
 son of the infinite, fresh as when first trodden by the 
 first man. As God perpetually clothes anew the bosom 
 of the earth with verdure and flowers, and ripens ever 
 anew fruits as luxuriant as at first, so does he still pour 
 into the heart-soil of new generations the powers and 
 the glories of new thought. Neither knowledge, nor 
 invention, nor imagery, nor truth, nor imagination 
 shall grow old or threadbare : whilst new years return, 
 new flowers wave in the warm breeze, new harvests 
 ripen, and the soul of man, feeding on the soul of the 
 infinite, desires to grow more like its Maker, and finds 
 in the consciousness of his blessings, an ever-expanding 
 greatness in himself.' 
 
 { Man, awakening to his place and progress in eternity, 
 seems to exist in an isolated state, unseeing of more 
 ethereal natures, and apparently unseen of them. But 
 this isolation is only apparent ; around him swarm more 
 advanced beings, and from them he receives various and 
 incessant aids, influences and ministrations. Through 
 them all is diffused the infinite life and soul of the 
 universe; the ocean of oceans, the atmosphere of 
 
INFLUX AND INSPIRATION. 335 
 
 atmospheres, embracing, quickening and sustaining all 
 things within it ; the principle of all being, spirit, intelli- 
 gence, and power, the one great omnipresent soul, the 
 illimitable and incomprehensible God. 
 
 • Unseen, yet ever present, ever and ubiquitously 
 cognisant, God is perpetually felt in the forces and ten- 
 dencies of our nature. Whilst leaving us as it were 
 alone, that we may assume and possess freedom, he is 
 never absent in his vigilant and love-inspired providence, 
 and having, consistent with this necessary freedom, in 
 all ages made his presence more sensibly felt by pro- 
 phets and saints, by dreams and inspirations, in this 
 more advanced age, he steps, as it were more palpably 
 from his concealment, and by the spirit of his Son, 
 Christ the Word, and by a host of his divine messengers, 
 converses more openly with his creatures. 
 
 c So fail the proud in despising the treasure-chambers 
 of humility, forgetting that their own birth is from the 
 earth, the common matrix of the diamond, the ruby, 
 the gold widely worshipped, the lofty priest, the infinite 
 beauty and poetry of the flower-kingdom, and all the 
 mineral and chemic substances with which physical 
 science works proudly yet darkly, but on its useful way 
 by hands whose touch it feels not. Happier far are 
 those who are too humble for conceit — the dazzled 
 darkness of men erring at summer-noon — but feel the 
 guidance of angel-fingers, and fear no misleading in 
 the garden of God. 
 
336 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 f The children trust and play — the blind think they 
 see and drudge — the mill-horses of physical fixation. 
 Better the broad hemisphere of spirit than the narrow 
 workshop of artisan intellect.' 
 
 When the influx comes direct from a spiritual source 
 to the spirit of men, it demands for its reception a 
 more internal opening of the senses, and, to prevent 
 confusion, the outer or every day senses must be closed 
 during its entrance. Thus, inspiration in any degree 
 causes an unusual state in the receiver, while, as has 
 been said, the passage of the spirit through all 
 degrees till it results in the usual cerebral action, is 
 only the work of e very-day thought and life. That 
 which is known as genius results from receptivity of 
 brain and temperament. The gifted man of genius 
 may be inspired so as to become a glorious prophet, but 
 genius is not inspiration. 
 
 The whole human race is (rod's child, and, as the 
 little crystal teaches us the form and properties of the 
 massive rock, we may learn from the natural growth of 
 an infant mind, the order followed by our Heavenly 
 Father in His spiritual education of the world. This 
 thought has been treated before by religious writers, 
 who might, perhaps, have used it with fuller effect if 
 they had made a clear distinction between spiritual and 
 intellectual receptivity in education. 
 
 The young perceptions of the infant nation open, 
 like those of a child, on the outer world, from which 
 
INFLUX AND INSPIRATION. 337 
 
 impressions can only be taken in and assimilated by 
 degrees. The period of this reception is the earliest of 
 the world's history; all natural objects now become 
 familiar to the race, that they may serve as the material 
 for future knowledge ; and this is the time when Adam 
 names the creatures and the trees in Paradise. But 
 into such simple minds the spiritual stream pours 
 swiftly, and the rise may be rapid : and hence, perhaps, 
 the very general idea of a golden age, when men talked 
 with the powers of Heaven. In these early times, 
 when the knowledge of external nature has not reached 
 below the surface of things, the waves of influx find 
 but a simple alphabet to write with; but though the 
 imagery cannot go beyond the knowledge gained, it 
 is equally good for all the purposes of spiritual teach- 
 ing, and, in fact, the only form in which the Word of 
 Grod can descend into the souls of men. Thus, 
 though the early religions are expressed in the most 
 familiar symbols, those symbols are true, and the ex- 
 pression is the work of the Holy Spirit, representing 
 the internal state of the recipient. But as the age 
 passes on, and new generations take place of the old, 
 a deeper and better comprehension of material laws is 
 gained, and the old symbols are cast aside as childish 
 notions by the learned of the time, who know them 
 only in their outer sense. On the other hand, those 
 well-defined forms and positive expressions, which are 
 rejected by the uninspired philosopher, become objects 
 
338 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 of blind adoration to the uninspired devotee, who guards 
 them jealously, believing that, were his idols cast from 
 their altars, nothing would be left. This is the beginning 
 of the conflict between science and religion. In the full- 
 ness of time, a fresh supply of divine life (called reaction 
 in the world) gives light to the stored up knowledge ; 
 God breathes into man the breath of life, 'the dry 
 bones live,' and all the outer world is seen to be in 
 harmony with, and representative of, the spirit world 
 within. Such a wave entered the soul of Swedenborg, 
 and the so-called Mystics, all of whom agree in the 
 truth symbolised, but differ as to the form in which 
 it was made known to them. Again, the shell 
 strengthens and becomes incrusted around its germinal 
 idea, and the searcher into natural truth condemns it 
 altogether as a worn-out superstition. In this manner, 
 forms of worship grow up and decay : but throughout 
 all the changes which follow each other in an ascending 
 scale from the simplest idea of a higher spiritual power 
 to the teaching of the Son of God, the symbol used 
 wraps up and involves an eternal truth, to be gradually 
 evolved as the prophetic mind becomes furnished with 
 images for its expression, and as the nation is prepared 
 to receive it. 
 
 I have tried to trace the process of developement in 
 its different forms ; in the birth of a child, in the earthly 
 life of a man, in the growth of the soul, and in the 
 never-ending advancement of the future life. Growth 
 
INFLUX AND INSPIRATION. 339 
 
 from within, and rejection of the outer garment when 
 it has ceased to embody the vital force, is seen in all 
 processes and in every degree of creation. It is the 
 law of influx, which is the same as saying it is the law 
 of life. Compare the earlier with the later descriptions 
 given in this book. One of the first sensations men- 
 tioned was that of regular fanning accompanying 
 impression. This is produced by the spiritual influx in 
 its simplest form, falling in regular waves corresponding 
 to the waves of light or the breathing of the lungs, 
 each breath bearing in a fresh supply* of vitalising power. 
 Agreeing with this idea of growth, it is found that not 
 only is each vision (or other form of impression) a 
 series of scenes, but that the visions themselves follow 
 each other in regular order, every successive series form- 
 ing a necessary part of what the first vision or drawing 
 comprehended as if in rude outline, so that no one part 
 
 * There is, I think, reason to suspect that the Greek word al<bv in its 
 primary sense signified wave of influx. Its Latin equivalent csvum is 
 sometimes used without reference to time, and in the sense of growth ; 
 as by Horace, 
 
 ' Crescit occulto velut arbor csvo 
 
 Fama Marcelli.' — Ode xii. b. 1. 
 
 Here the gradually expanding growth of a tree, to which the increase 
 of Marcellus's fame is compared, conveys the exact idea. 
 
 Plato's well-known doctrine that God made the world by the Logos, 
 through the iEons (aiwves) which were supposed to be spiritual emana- 
 tions, becomes intelligible with my reading of the word alwv. This will 
 appear more plainly in the next chapter, in which the Logos will be 
 spoken of. It is to the purpose that the Welsh call the stream of inspi- 
 ration falling on the bard the divine Awen. 
 
 Z 2 
 
340 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 of the whole process could have been left out. And the 
 character of the instruction rises by successive waves 
 from the simplest influx to the highest and holiest 
 degree of inspiration. A similar process on a larger 
 scale is carried on in the spiritual teaching of nations 
 and of the world. 
 
 Prophecy, though in later times the word has acquired 
 a limited meaning, was not originally confined to pre- 
 diction. This will be more apparent in the next 
 chapter. The commonest forms in which coming events 
 are seen in these times are clairvoyance or dreams ; 
 for when the spiritual sense is opened in either state, 
 the conditions of time and place, which are measures of 
 our present life, disappear, and in whatever direction 
 the spirit is drawn by sympathy, events which have not 
 yet occurred will appear present. Persons too may be 
 seen in a spiritual state who are at the time strangers 
 to the bodily sense, but who are met and recognised 
 years after. Many prophecies given in all forms of 
 spirit mediumship are symbolical, and these are never 
 understood till fulfilment. Of this kind were many of 
 the prophecies of Scripture, and the predictions of the 
 heathen oracles ; but the first, being in a higher degree, 
 and given from a divine, not simply a spiritual source, 
 were far more comprehensive and universal than the 
 local or personal predictions of Delphi or Dodona. 
 
 We have always found spiritual predictions, if from a 
 worthy source, fulfilled, though the fulfilment has taken 
 place in a manner and at a time quite unexpected. 
 
INFLUX AND INSPIRATION. 341 
 
 Time seems to be an element which cannot be trans- 
 lated from the spirit language into ours, and if any spirit 
 seems to hazard an assurance that in one or two years, 
 or days, or hours an event will occur, it may be con- 
 cluded, either that the period indicated is not to be 
 understood as an earthly measure of time, or that the 
 influence, if a good one, has not complete control over 
 the medium. 
 
 In times when the action of spirit was more observed 
 and better understood, a prophet was the recipient of the 
 wave of influx, though the form it might take would be 
 according to his organisation and power of transmission, 
 and as the prophet has been the receiver and transmitter, 
 so the priest has been held to be the interpreter of 
 spiritual symbols ; hence there has always been a class 
 possessing a knowledge of their inner meaning, and by 
 this class the knowledge has been formed into an 
 esoteric system. The careful exclusion from the mys- 
 teries of all but those who had been initiated was 
 perhaps inevitable, for to most persons the inner sense 
 would be a sealed book, and the external a meaningless 
 or possibly dangerous rite. The Egyptian hieroglyphic 
 is an instance of symbolical writing intelligible only to 
 the priestly caste. And we shall find in the hiero- 
 glyphics an illustration of another statement, namely, 
 that some objects are found to bear the same corre- 
 spondential meaning in religious writing throughout 
 the world. Perhaps the sun which is always given in 
 
342 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 modern spiritual experience as the material outbirth 
 of the Highest Power, the first remove from pure spirit, 
 is the most universal of these symbols. In all heathen 
 worship, in the grotesque and mystical Egyptian, in the 
 graceful refined Greek, and the beautiful easily-inter- 
 preted Scandinavian mythology, every legend and fable 
 has made the sun and his power as, after the Unknown 
 Cause, first the type, and then the object of adoration. 
 And this could not be otherwise, for till the inner 
 essence is openly manifested the type will be generally 
 worshipped. The religion is according to the spiritual 
 degree of the worshipper, and there must be as great a 
 variety in the forms of mythology as there are pro- 
 cesses in nature and powers of spiritual reception in 
 the medium.* To the seer of any country, the pheno- 
 mena peculiar to his native land furnish the scenes and 
 actors in his spiritual drama; but there are also ele- 
 ments common to all religions, and these have been 
 thought to prove a derivation of their legends from 
 
 * Another illustration of my meaning. Each of the mythological 
 deities personifies some manifestation of spiritual power. Thus Hermes 
 or Mercury represents the spiritual influence in many of its well-known 
 forms of action. Both in the Greek and Latin mythologies he is a 
 healer ; his Caduceus had the power of gmng health, of inducing sleep 
 and of waking the sleeper. He is the messenger of the gods, and in the 
 Greek is called r)yf)Tap ovtipwv, the leader of dreams, because his office is 
 to conduct dreams from Zeus, by whom they are sent, to the sleeper. 
 In the ancient Arcadian religion Hermes is the fertilising god of the 
 earth. 
 
INFLUX AND INSPIRATION. 343 
 
 one another, or from a common origin. It is true that 
 all the religions of the world have a common origin, 
 but that lies deep in the inner spirit of mankind and 
 its receptivity of the divine light, and is not merely 
 the inherited legendary lore of a remoter age. 
 
 It is not doubted that even in the earliest Grentile 
 religions a very large amount of spiritual truth under- 
 lies the now worn-out human element ; when we have 
 learned to distinguish the two, and trace the boundary 
 line which separates them, the study of mythology will 
 become both more interesting and more philosophical. 
 The symbols will afford a key to the national character, 
 both moral and mental, and their inner sense will show 
 us to what degree the education of His children had 
 been carried at that time by our Heavenly Father. 
 
 In these days of scientific research, when matter 
 and its supposed inherent laws are dwelt upon to the 
 exclusion of all that cannot be seen and heard and felt, 
 unbelief must and will prevail for a season. But if we 
 are now near the culminating point of an intellectual 
 age, when some of the creeds and symbols which have 
 embodied spiritual truth in former times are rejected 
 as dry crusts, we are also entering upon an age of 
 influx, when that which is superfluous and material in 
 religious systems will fall away and perish, while all 
 that is true will remain, a pure channel for the life and 
 light of the Word of G-od. 
 
344 
 
 CHAPTEE XV. 
 
 THE WORD OF GOD. 
 
 TY7HAT is the meaning of the phrase, the Word 
 ' ' of GrOD ? Within the churches and without the 
 churches, applied vaguely by honest religionists, and 
 falsely by dishonest ones, the simple phrase, which in 
 old times conveyed the idea of the Messenger of Peace, 
 has become the watchword of strife. 
 
 The words have lost their first import as the know- 
 ledge of internal spiritual things has died away. It 
 is an instance of what has been already said, that with 
 the growth of time expressions and symbols, losing 
 their essential meaning, are ill-used by the theologian 
 and rejected by the philosopher. 
 
 We must look to the Bible, its acknowledged record, 
 for the meaning of the Word, and we may find, as 
 in other cases, that when its specific sense becomes 
 clear, all the learned rubbish which has accumulated 
 round the phrase will fall away, taking with it the 
 confusion and discord inseparable from argument un- 
 enlightened by spirit. 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 345 
 
 The Hebrew debar, translated Word, bears in its 
 root the idea of driving, or throwing off; that is, ema- 
 nation or efflux. I must beg the reader to follow me 
 patiently through a few texts, applying this thought 
 till the invariable use of it in the sense of spiritual 
 influx has made its original meaning apparent. And, 
 remembering that the Word is the holy influence of 
 God's Spirit on the spirit of man, we should also bear 
 in mind the description given in the last chapter, of 
 the action of successive waves of influx in creation. I 
 have spoken of its earliest creating action in the 
 mineral, then in the vegetable, then in the animal 
 world — higher still, its descent into the mind, where it 
 operates as intelligence; and, finally, its more direct 
 influx, giving spiritual life and impression to the soul 
 of man. Every wave forms an auov, an age, period, or 
 day, and each wave, acting on the conditions prepared 
 for it by its forerunner, leaves the world one degree 
 higher in developement and refinement, so that the last 
 age is always one degree in advance of the preceding.* 
 
 * Whether these effects are each respectively produced by successive 
 ' waves or by one period of efflux in its different degrees, I do not con- 
 jecture. The result is the same, nor does it affect the truth of the 
 doctrine that it was held 2,500 years ago. I have been assured by an 
 eminent naturalist that the successive formations in the geological and 
 zoological worlds bear evidence of having resulted from an order such 
 as I have described. A developement by successive outpourings of 
 creative power is very different from that by which our pedigree is traced 
 from apes and monkeys. 
 
346 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 In this first sense of creative energy, we find the 
 Word used in the Psalms : — ' By the Word of the Lord 
 were the heavens made, and all the host of them, by 
 the breath of His mouth.' 
 
 This is generally passed over as if meaning simply, 
 ' By command of the Lord,' &c. But, if the Psalmist 
 had a distinct meaning, he would not have said, in this 
 general half-figurative way, that the Lord made the 
 heavens by His command, and then breathed their 
 spiritual inhabitants into being. I take the meaning 
 to be — the heavens, or higher worlds, were the result 
 of the outpouring of (rod's vital power, their hosts, one 
 degree above, by a higher efflux. 
 
 In Psalm cxlvii. 15, is another instance of the applica- 
 tion of the Word to natural creation. ' He sendeth 
 forth His commandment upon earth. His Word run- 
 neth very swiftly.'' The context shows that a simple 
 dictate or ordinance could not be meant. 
 
 Again, verse 18 — ' He sendeth forth His word, and 
 melteth them (ice), He causeth His wind (or spirit) to 
 move, and the waters flow.' , 
 
 In its healing life-giving character, Psalm cvii. 20 — 
 ' He sent His Word, and healed them. In its action 
 on the spirit — e Quicken Thou me according to Thy 
 Word ; ' and again — ' Thy Word hath quickened me.' 
 
 In these, which are chosen from many instances, the 
 vital emanation from God, who is the Fountain of Life, 
 is spoken of as the Word. But when we examine the 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 347 
 
 number of cases in which the Word is spoken of as 
 coming to the prophets, we shall find but a small pro- 
 portion in which the full sense would be attained by 
 translating debar as a word in the sense of an audible 
 sound, or even a command. Like all spiritual influx it 
 takes different forms of manifestation. It comes some- 
 times as an audible voice, sometimes as an impelling 
 influence, sometimes by writing, and sometimes, indeed 
 most often, by vision. Whenever a prophet utters his 
 inspiration (and the different forms of utterance show 
 that by the same law which I have traced the phrases 
 and symbols are those of the recipient), the expression 
 is, ' The Word of the Lord ' came to that prophet. The 
 burthen of a prophet is the influx which presses him, 
 that which he must utter before he can speak from him- 
 self. In Malachi i. 1, we find, ' the burden of the Word 
 of the Lord,'' 
 
 1 Samuel iii. 6. ' The Word of the Lord was rare in 
 those days : visions were not frequenV * 
 
 This clearly expresses the fact that the influence from 
 Grod was at that time not often received. The history 
 goes on to tell of the voice heard by the child Samuel, 
 evidently not an alarming sound, for he supposed that 
 Eli had called him. In Genesis xv. 1, we find that the 
 Word of the Lord came to Abraham in a vision. 
 
 In 1 Kings xiii. 1. c And behold! there came a man 
 
 * This is De Wette's translation ; the English common version differs, 
 but is less coherent. Either translation would support my argument. 
 
348 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 of God out of Judah by the Word of the Lord'' (by 
 the impelling influence). Here the two words used to 
 express the divine power in Man of God and Word 
 of the Lord are different ; the prophet is a man of the 
 spiritual powers, Elohim ; the Word is from Jehovah, 
 the highest name. 
 
 When Jehoram and Jehoshaphat went together 
 against the king of Moab, and became uneasy as to the 
 success of their enterprise, Jehoshaphat asks, verse 11, 
 
 6 Ls there not here a prophet of the Lord, 
 that we may enquire of the Lord by him?' (One of 
 the king of Israel's servants tells him that Elisha is 
 there.) 
 
 12 And Jehoshaphat said, ' The Word of the Lord 
 is with him.'' 
 
 The kings then went to Elisha, who after some hesi- 
 tation allowed himself to be consulted, but the influx 
 was not on him constantly, for he required the power of 
 music to induce the prophetic state. He says, verse 15, 
 
 ' But now bring me a minstrel.'' And it came to 
 pass when the minstrel played, the hand of the Lord 
 came upon him. 
 
 In 2 Chron. xviii. 4, Jehoshaphat says t to Ahab king 
 of Israel, ' Enquire I pray thee at the Word of the 
 Lord to-day.' 
 
 Four hundred prophets were consulted, who de- 
 livered their oracles, but they were not trusted. Jeho- 
 shaphat asks for a prophet of the Lord ; and Micaiah is 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 349 
 
 brought to him. The messenger who brought Micaiah, 
 verse 1 2, begs him, ' Behold the words (oracles) of the 
 prophets are good to the king with one assent ; let thy 
 word I pray thee be like theirs, and speak thou 
 good? 
 
 13 And Micaiah said, ( As the Lord (Jehovah) liveth, 
 even what my God (El, spiriUpower) saith, that will 
 I speak? 
 
 Micaiah's 'Word' comes in the form of a fine sym- 
 bolic vision. 
 
 16 '/ did see all Israel scattered upon the moun- 
 tains as sheep that have no shepherd; and the Lord 
 said ; " These have no master, let them return every 
 man to his house in peace? ' 
 
 18 Again he said, 'Hear the word of the Lord? 
 And again the word comes to him in a vision higher in 
 degree and more internal than the first, for the 
 first is only earthly, the last spiritual symbolisation. 
 In Num. xii. 6, the Lord said, 6 Hear now my words. 
 If there be a prophet among you, I the Lord will make 
 myself known to him in a vision, and will speak with 
 him in a dream? 
 
 It would be tedious to enumerate all the instances in 
 which the Word of the Lord is said to have come in 
 one form of manifestation or other to the prophets. 
 And the same prophet who uttered the Word, or Words, 
 saw also visions. Isaiah i. begins — 
 
 1 The vision of Isaiah, &c. Ver. 10, Hear the Word 
 of the Lord, &c. 
 
350 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 Chapter ii. ver. 1, The Word that Isaiah the prophet 
 saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. 
 
 Isaiah ix. 8, The Lord sent a word unto Jacob, and 
 it lighted upon Israel. This last has great meaning, it 
 is a part of the prophecy of the Saviour. 
 
 Jeremiah v. 13, And the prophets shall become 
 wind, the Word is not in them. 
 
 I might multiply quotations, but these will be 
 sufficient to prove my assertion, that the expression 
 ' Word of God ' meant originally the Holy Influx by 
 which our Heavenly Father has in all time acted on 
 the spirits of His children for their instruction and 
 guidance. Plato, who seems to have risen to a spiritual 
 knowledge beyond all except the early prophets of 
 Judea, called this Word the Logos,* and taught that 
 by it the world was created through the aeons, alcoves. 
 
 We will now turn to the New Testament — the history 
 of the New Covenant, the higher dispensation and more 
 complete union of the Spirit of God with the spirits 
 of men than was possible during the earlier ages of 
 the world, but for which union the whole Jewish dis- 
 pensation had been the preparation. And here we find 
 the word in Greek, the Logos, John i. 1. But we must 
 remember, that the Hebrew debar and its Greek 
 synonym logos comprehend every degree of efflux from 
 the source of life, whether it result in the formation of 
 a world, in a prophetic dream, or in a healing miracle. 
 * See note 1. 
 
TIIE WORD OF GOD. 351 
 
 The Apostle John's description of the word is im- 
 measurably more perfect and more sublime than any 
 attempt at explanation ever made by scholars or 
 theologians. 
 
 John, Chapter i. 
 
 1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word 
 was with God, and the Word was God. 
 
 2 The same was in the beginning with God. 
 
 3 All things were made by Him* and without Kim 
 was not anything made that was made. 
 
 4 In Rim (or in it) was life ; and the life was the 
 light of men. 
 
 5 And the light shineth in darkness ; and the dark- 
 ness comprehended it not. 
 
 6 There was a man sent from God whose name was 
 John. 
 
 7 The same came for a witness, to bear witness of 
 that Light, that all through him might believe. 
 
 8 He was not that Light, but was to bear witness 
 of that Light. 
 
 9 The true Light was that which, coming into the 
 world, lighteth every man. 
 
 10 He was in the world, and the world ivas made 
 by Him, and the world knew Him not. 
 
 1 1 He came unto His own, and His own received 
 Him not. 
 
 * The Greek would bear ' by it,' and this translation might suit the 
 original meaning till after the birth of Christ. 
 
352 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 12 But as many as received Him, to them gave He 
 power to become children of God, and sons of God, 
 even to them that believe on His name, 
 
 13 Which were bom, not of blood, nor of the will of 
 the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. 
 
 14 And the Word became* flesh and dwelt with us, 
 and we beheld His glory, the glory as of an only 
 begotten of a Father, full of grace and truth. 
 
 Nothing can more literally agree with the explanation 
 given of the Word than the assertion that in it is life, 
 for the creating and vitalising influx is life itself, and 
 light, in every degree, from the sun's ray and its 
 appointed mental receptivity to the intellectual and 
 spiritual light with which, in their degrees, the ray 
 corresponds. John the Baptist, having the inner vision, 
 was to bear witness, and saw in the perfect symbolism 
 of heaven the dove alighting on the Word made flesh. 
 
 In early times the Word of Grod falling on the spirits 
 of holy men made them sons of Grod, regenerate through 
 the Word. But in the fullness of time, that the Spirit 
 of Grod might be more closely united with the spirit of 
 man, the divine efflux became flesh, and, having been 
 the bearer to earth of purification, redemption, and 
 forgiveness, ascended again to the former state, and 
 shed forth the Holy Spirit upon all believers. This 
 opening of the kingdom of heaven is the climax in the 
 
 * fy&ero, passed into, occurs 1 Corinthians xv. 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 353 
 
 history of the Word itself, but its work, in the form of 
 the Holy Spirit the Comforter, is still going on, and of 
 its triumphant progress a glorious vision was seen by 
 the aged John, in Patmos. 
 
 Eevelation, Chapter xix. 
 
 1 1 And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white 
 horse ; and he that sat upon him was called Faithful 
 and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and 
 make war. 
 
 12 His eyes were as aflame of fire, and on his head 
 were many crowns ; and he had a name written, that 
 no man knew, but he himself. 
 
 13 And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in 
 blood : and his name is called The Woed of God. 
 
 Every word of this splendid imagery has its sym- 
 bolical meaning. The Word is on a white horse, i.e. 
 supported and carried through by a pure intelligence. 
 Perfect truth is His essence ; His eyes, a flame of fire, 
 show the brightness of spiritual knowledge; and the 
 crowns, his manifold powers. We have still to consider 
 names, and we shall find the fullness of meaning con- 
 veyed by the expression, He had a name written, that 
 no man knew, but He Himself. He purifies the world, 
 * bearing the sword and treading the wine-press ' — and 
 this will be the work of the living Word till the 
 conquest of all evil is complete and His name is 
 known, King of kings, and Lord of lords. 
 
 A A 
 
354 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 The Word of God, then, is the phrase used in 
 Scripture to express the outpouring efflux from our 
 heavenly Father in its creating, life-giving, and in- 
 spiring energy, and in its redeeming and sanctifying 
 power; and the Bible is the history of the Word in 
 all its degrees of action and modes of manifestation, 
 from the simple processes of magnetic healing and 
 clairvoyance to its full and perfect manifestation in the 
 person of the Saviour, the Word made flesh. 
 
 If this is true, we may expect to find allusions to 
 various magnetic and spiritual processes in the Bible. 
 And we shall not be disappointed. I will first bring 
 together a few instances of spiritual action in its lowest 
 forms. 
 
 In 2 Kings v. 10, we find a reference to mesmerism 
 made in such words as to lead to the belief that it was 
 commonly practised by the prophets, who were also in 
 early times called healers. Naaman the Syrian having 
 been sent to the King of Israel in order to be cured of 
 his leprosy, Elisha shows him how much more power- 
 ful is the healing which he practises than the mesmerism 
 which was expected. The prophet desires Naaman to 
 wash seven times in Jordan. 
 
 Verse 11 But Naaman was wroth, and said, 
 Behold, I thought, He will surely come out to me, and 
 stand, and call on the name of the Lord his God, 
 and move up and down his hand [marginal reading] 
 over the part, and recover the leper. 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 355 
 
 We find another instance in the history of the 
 prophet Elisha, of whom Jehoshaphat says, The Word 
 of God is with him. Hearing of the death of the 
 widow's son, Elisha first sends his staff by Grehazi, 
 desiring him to lay it on the face of the child. (All 
 mesmerisers have seen similar processes.) But this is 
 ineffectual, and Grehazi returns, telling his master of 
 the failure. 
 
 2 Kings iv. 33. He {Elisha) went in therefore, and 
 shut the door upon them twain, and prayed unto the 
 Lord. 
 
 34 And he went up, and lay upon the child, and 
 put his mouth upon his mouth, and his eyes upon his 
 eyes, and his hands upon his hands : and he stretched 
 himself upon the child ; and the flesh of the child waxed 
 warm. 
 
 35 Then he returned, and walked in the house to 
 and fro ; and went up, and stretched himself upon him: 
 and the child sneezed seven times, and the child 
 opened his eyes. 
 
 I have not referred in the preceding pages to a form of 
 mesmerism known as Hypnotism, and practised by some 
 persons with success. In this process, sleep, or a per- 
 fectly passive state, is induced by making the patient 
 fix his eyes on some object held before him. During 
 this passive or receptive state a healing influence seems 
 to be imbibed ; but I have been told that the operator 
 is as much exhausted by the process as by regular mes- 
 
 A A 2 
 
356 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 merism. Any operation by which an internal state is 
 induced, or, which is the same thing, by which the 
 external perceptions are shut up, is beneficial, provided 
 the brain and nerves are not tried during the quiescent 
 state. 
 
 We find a striking instance of this mode of cure, 
 with many noteworthy circumstances, in Numbers xxi. 6. 
 The children of Israel having become discontented, on 
 account of the hardships they endured in the wilder- 
 ness — 
 
 Verse 6 The Lord sent fiery* serpents among the 
 people, and they bit the people ; and much people died. 
 Then Moses prayed for the people, and, after the Divine 
 direction — 
 
 Verse 9 Moses made a serpent of brass, and pat it 
 on a pole, and it came to pass, that if a serpent had 
 bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, 
 he lived. 
 
 Thus there was not only the operation of healing 
 in the way described as hypnotism, but the beautiful 
 symbol of the Great Healer, who was to be raised up 
 before He could draw all men to Him. The image is 
 very perfect, if we remember that the mode of healing 
 produces a more internal state in the subject. 
 
 I need hardly refer to the direct healing of our Lord 
 and His apostles. But a few words are necessary to 
 
 * See Note 2 at the end of the book. 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 357 
 
 show that even these effects of the vitalising power of 
 the Word were processes of which the immediate cause 
 and agency can be traced. If by miracle we understand 
 an act not coming under this definition, then assuredly 
 the cures, and even the raising of the dead by the living 
 Word, were not more miracles than the birth of a child 
 or the growth of a tree. But their cause, though real 
 and apparent, lay far beyond the reach of educated 
 or uneducated humanity, unassisted by spiritual power. 
 When the Saviour was among believers, the very effort 
 of His will, uttered in ' Damsel, I say unto thee, Arise ! ' 
 poured life into the lifeless girl; and in like manner, 
 His Word raised the widow's son and the entombed 
 Lazarus. When He restored the man blind from birth, 
 a process was used, and the clay which contained the 
 vital influence was to remain on the eyes till washed off 
 at the Pool of Siloam. But we learn in Mark vi. 5, 
 that He could there do no mighty work, save that He 
 laid His hands on a few sick folk and healed them. 
 The corresponding verse in Matthew says, He did not 
 many mighty works there, because of tlieir unbelief 
 (Matt. xiii. 58.) 
 
 We see, then, that even the Word itself needs some- 
 thing in the recipient to make it effective. That 
 something is faith, without which we can do nothing, 
 but with which we may by God's help move moun- 
 tains. 
 
 I have traced the Word of God from its lowest to its 
 
358 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 highest degree of healing. We find it also in earthly- 
 clairvoyance and in heavenly vision. For the first, when 
 Saul had lost his asses, he went to a prophet to find 
 6 where they were.' And this was called enquiring of 
 God equally with the most important consultations. 
 
 Saul, having his money ready for the prophet's gift 
 or fee, asks where a prophet may be found. 
 
 1 Samuel ix. 9. Beforetime in Israel, when a man 
 went to enquire of God, thus he spake, Come, and let 
 us go to the seer : he that is now called a prophet was 
 beforetime called a seer. 
 
 Samuel tells Saul that the asses about which he had 
 come to consult him will be found, and then follows 
 the history of Samuel's noble seership and ministry of 
 the Word. 
 
 Every part of the Bible is full of spiritual vision in 
 every degree, so that the enumeration of instances would 
 only cease when the greater part of Scripture had been 
 copied out. After earthly clairvoyance, which we find 
 in Samuel and Balaam, we may mention divining in a 
 cup or a crystal, for the process is the same. 
 
 Joseph's brethren had left the court of Pharaoh to 
 return to their father, and Joseph, to bring them back, 
 orders his steward to put money into all their sacks, 
 and his own cup into the sack of Benjamin. The 
 steward, who searches the sacks, is directed to say ; 
 
 Gren. xliv. 5. Is not this it in which my Lord 
 drinketh, and whereby indeed he divineth ? 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 359 
 
 Much has been said in the foregoing chapters on the 
 gradual opening of the spiritual sense. An illustration 
 of this part of the subject is found in the narrative of 
 Elisha's vision of Elijah's removal from earth. 
 
 2 Kings ii. 9. And it came to pass, when they were 
 gone over, that Elijah said unto Elisha, Ask what I 
 shall do for thee, before I be taken away from thee. 
 And Elisha said, I pray thee, let a double portion of 
 thy spirit be upon one. 
 
 10 And he said, Thou hast asked a hard thing : 
 nevertheless, if thou see me when I am taken from 
 thee, it shall be so unto thee; but if. not, it shall not 
 be so. 
 
 Elisha saw the chariot and horses of fire and the 
 whirlwind which formed the sublime symbolism of the 
 prophet's change of state. 
 
 We have seen (p. 193) that in any removal, a 
 symbolism immeasurably lower in degree, but the same in 
 its correspondential character, would be presented to the 
 vision of any seer whose spiritual sense was opened to a 
 degree in which spiritual take the place of earthly objects. 
 Elijah, it appears, was not certain whether his successor 
 was susceptible of as great a degree of spiritual sight 
 as he himself possessed, and this vision was mentioned 
 as a test by which the depth of Elisha's power could be 
 estimated. Elisha had not, until the time of his pre- 
 decessor's departure, equalled him in prophetic power, 
 and the greater opening took place on the occurrence 
 
360 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 of a spiritual process involving a large outpouring of 
 influence. 
 
 Of Ezekiel's glorious visions I am almost afraid to 
 speak. Such imagery is too high to receive a short or 
 simple interpretation, but the vision in the first chapter 
 is in one respect so like the developements of writing 
 and seeing which have been described, that I refer to it. 
 It seems to be the description of successive outpourings 
 of spiritual power, with all their characteristic circum- 
 stances, and, following one of the laws of spirit-mani- 
 festation, it is the introduction to and epitome of all 
 succeeding visions. The imagery is perfectly symbolical 
 of the action of spiritual power. 
 
 Ezek. i. 13. As for the likeness of the living creatures, 
 their appearance was like burning coals of fire : it 
 went up and down among the living creatures ; and 
 the fire was bright, and out of the fire went forth 
 lightning. 
 
 Compare the description, pp. 128 and 186, of the scin- 
 tillating appearance in the light* and of the luminous 
 rays, like flashes of fire and lightning, seen by sensitives. 
 
 The picture rises to the likeness of a throne, and of 
 Him who sat on it, and the imagery becomes grander, 
 till in the centre of a rainbow the prophet sees the 
 likeness of the glory of the Lord. 
 
 28 And when I saw it, I fell on my face, and I 
 heard the voice of Him that spake, 
 
 * Note 3. 
 
THE WOED OF GOD. 361 
 
 As before described, sight in this instance comes 
 first, then the deeper state, preceded by trance, or fall- 
 ing on the face, and then the opening of the spiritual 
 ear. The succeeding visions are continuations of this 
 introductory one, which exceeds in splendour of imagery 
 and intensity of correspondential meaning everything 
 but the spiritual scenes in the Apocalypse. 
 
 I must not remain too long in the consideration of 
 the Jewish Scriptures. Simple imagery, such as has 
 often been met with in dreams and visions in these days, 
 is found in the vision of Peter, by which he was directed 
 to instruct the family of the Gentile Cornelius, who was 
 himself also spiritually told where to find the welcome 
 teacher. The whole history, contained in Acts x. xi. 
 is too well known to be extracted, but it should be 
 read in connection with the thoughts suggested by 
 an examination into spiritual phenomena. 
 
 A very simple suggestive vision was given to the 
 Apostle Paul, Acts xvi. 9, There stood a man of 
 Macedonia : and prayed him, saying, Come over into 
 Macedonia, and help us. This vision had an earthly 
 sphere for its object, and the imagery was earthly and 
 simple accordingly. 
 
 The sudden conversion of the Apostle Paul was 
 brought about in a manner which is intelligible to 
 those who have witnessed many spiritual manifestations 
 in various forms and degrees. 
 
 The outpouring of influence was apparent to some of 
 
362 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 the company in one way, to others in another, while 
 Saul himself, its immediate object, received it as a 
 stroke of lightning by which he became for a time 
 unable to see. 
 
 Acts ix. 3 — 
 
 And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus : and 
 suddenly there shined, round about him a light from 
 heaven ; 
 
 4 And he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying 
 unto him, Saul, Saul, ivhy persecutest thou me? 
 
 5 And he said, Who art thou, Lord ? And the 
 Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest ; it is 
 hard for thee to kick against the pricks. 
 
 6 And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, 
 what ivilt thou have me to do ? And the Lord said 
 unto him, Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be 
 told thee what thou must do, 
 
 7 And the men which journeyed with him stood 
 speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man. 
 
 8 And Saul arose from the earth ; and when his 
 eyes were opened, he savj no man, but they led him by 
 the hand, and brought him into Damascus. 
 
 When Paul afterwards gives a narrative of these 
 occurrences, he says— r 
 
 Acts xxii. 9 And they that were with me saw indeed 
 the light, and were afraid; but they heard not the 
 voice of him that spake to me. 
 
 This seems like a contradiction, but I do not think it 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 363 
 
 is really so. Persons who have seen much of such 
 manifestations as even those lesser ones which I have 
 described, know how every degree and variety of sight 
 and hearing would be opened in an assembly of people 
 of different degrees of susceptibility on such an occasion. 
 The first history says, ' hearing a voice (perhaps only a 
 sound), but seeing no man,'' This does not imply that 
 none of the party saw the light, but that they did not 
 know whence it came. As in the history of Peter and 
 Cornelius, a second person, Ananias, was at the same 
 time called to participate in the work. 
 
 The outpouring on the day of Pentecost was at- 
 tended with the . usual concomitant phenomena — a 
 rushing mighty wind, an appearance of flame or fire in 
 the form of cloven tongues, and then the influx of the 
 spirit. 
 
 In the marginal reading, chap. ii. 6, we find, instead of 
 when this was noised abroad [Greek, when this voice 
 came~\, which last, referring to the spiritual voice of the 
 apostles, is no doubt the right translation. That the 
 multitude consisted of the devout Jews, from every 
 nation under heaven (ver. 5) is plain from the different 
 languages in which the Word came to the ear of each. 
 The faith of these devout men formed a fit condition 
 for such reception. The sound (this voice) was spiritual ; 
 but as in other manifestations, each hearer's inner sense 
 formed it into the words and phrases familiar to his 
 ear. 
 
364 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 The spiritual writing is mentioned in Scripture in 
 every degree, from that by the hand of a prophet to the 
 direct impress of the finger of Grod. 
 
 The highest instance occurs Exodus xxxii. 15 — 
 
 And Moses turned, and went down from the mount, 
 and the two tables of the testimony were in his hand : 
 the tables ivere written on both their sides ; on the one 
 side and on the other were they written. 
 
 16 And the tables were the work of God, and the 
 writing was the writing of God, graven upon the tables. 
 
 There can be no question that this was direct spirit- 
 ual writing in the very highest degree. Precisely the 
 same word (for writing*) occurs in 2 Chron. xxi. 12, 
 where we find that 
 
 There came a writing to him (Jehoram, king of 
 Judah) from Elijah the prophet, saying, Thus saith 
 the Lord, God of Israel, &c. 
 
 The margin gives, which was written before his 
 death, but this is mere conjecture of the translators, 
 who were naturally puzzled by the statement ; for 
 Elijah had been dead at the time of Jehoram's recep- 
 tion of the writing four years at least. 
 
 ■ In 1 Chron. xxviii. we have a notable instance of 
 spirit writing and drawing, on an occasion where sym- 
 bolism of the most perfect kind was necessary. While 
 instructing his son to build the temple, for which he 
 had received Divine direction — 
 * See note 4. 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 365 
 
 Verse 11 Then David gave to Solomon his son the 
 pattern of the porch, &c. &c. 
 
 12 And the pattern of all that he had by the spirit, 
 of the courts of the house of the Lord. 
 
 19 All this (*said David) the Lord made me under- 
 stand in writing by His hand upon me, even all the 
 works of this pattern. 
 
 The vision of writing, Daniel v., is another instance, 
 and which also in many respects resembles those which 
 have come under our notice. There is no reason to be- 
 lieve that the part of a hand which formed the first 
 part of the vision, was seen by any one but Belshazzar. 
 The king saw the part of the hand that wrote. The 
 Magi could not read the writing, and it is not certain that 
 they even saw it. But Daniel, by his inner vision, is 
 able to interpret, and before the writing is left complete, 
 the hand had disappeared. This is very like the way in 
 which one part is developed from another in all the 
 forms of manifestation. 
 
 The Temple built by Divine direction is generally 
 believed to have been symbolic and representative, every 
 part corresponding with some spiritual state or process. 
 The outer court, the Temple, and the Holy of Holies 
 typify the body, soul, and spirit of man, and the entrance 
 of the High Priest only on rare and important occasions, 
 denotes a periodical opening of the inner state, corre- 
 
 * These two words are interpolated, but seem to be needed for the 
 
366 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 sponding with those periods of influx from which the 
 Jewish festivals, and thence those of our Church took 
 their origin. Like all the other spiritual material 
 events narrated in Scripture, the rending of the veil 
 of the Temple, when the last breath was drawn by 
 the Saviour, was in glorious correspondence with that 
 which took place on the cross, when the veil which had 
 hidden the highest influence from the soul of man, was 
 rent apart, and the Holy Spirit was hereafter to descend 
 on the humblest follower of Christ, without intervention 
 of priest or ceremonial. Another beautiful material 
 image of a spiritual event was the rolling away the 
 stone from the sepulchre, to permit the egress of 
 Him whose rising was as the opening of the closed 
 tomb to all the dead, both in the body and in the 
 spirit. 
 
 In Exodus xxviii. we find long directions for the con- 
 struction of an ephod or priest's dress, but there is, I 
 believe, only one passage which can lead to a conjecture 
 of the manner in which it was used. This occurs 1 Sam. 
 xxx. 7, And David said to Abiathar the priest, Ahi- 
 melech's son, I pray thee, bring me hither the ephod. 
 And Abiathar brought the ephod to David. 
 
 8 And David enquired at the Lord, &c. 
 
 It appears by this that the ephod was not a ceremo- 
 nial robe, but a real instrument, and David could use it 
 as well as the high priest, for he enquired at the Lord, 
 or induced in himself a spiritual state, as we have seen 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 367 
 
 can be done, though in a lower degree, by gazing at a 
 crystal. Whether it was a like process may be conjec- 
 tured from the account given of the ephod, breastplate, 
 and Urim and Thummim, by Josephus. e In the void 
 space of the garment there was inserted a piece about 
 the bigness of a span, embroidered with gold and other 
 colours of the oracle, and called essen, which, in the 
 Greek language, signifies oracle.' — Josephus, Antiqui- 
 ties, Book III. ch. vii. 5. 
 
 And of the Urim and Thummim (by some translated 
 Lights and Perfections, by others Manifestations and 
 Truth)— 
 
 * For as to these stones, which, as we told you before, 
 the high priest bare on his shoulders, which were sar- 
 donyxes (and I think it useless to describe their nature, 
 they being so well known to everybody), the one of 
 them shined out when Grod was present at their sacrifices : 
 I mean that which was in the nature of a button on his 
 right shoulder, bright rays darting out thence and being 
 seen even by those who were most remote, which splen- 
 dour was not before natural to the stone. This has 
 appeared a most wonderful thing to such as have not 
 so far indulged themselves in philosophy as to despise 
 Divine revelation, yet I will mention what is still more 
 wonderful than this. Grod declared beforehand by 
 those twelve stones which the high priest bore on his 
 breast, and which were inserted into his breastplate, 
 when they should be victorious in battle, for so great a 
 
368 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 splendour shone forth from them before the army began 
 to march, that all the people were sensible of Grod's 
 being present for their assistance. Whence it came to 
 pass, that those Greeks who had a veneration for our laws, 
 because they could not possibly contradict them, called 
 this breastplate ** the oracle." Now this breastplate and 
 this oracle left off shining 200 years before I composed 
 this book, God having been displeased at the transgres- 
 sion of his laws.' — Antiquities, B. III. c, iii. 6.* 
 
 Prideaux says that the oracle was given by an audible 
 voice from the mercy-seat between the cherubim. We 
 may well imagine it given either by vision or voice, for, 
 as we have seen, any opening of the spiritual state may 
 result in any mode of manifestation. We know from 
 Diodorus, that the chief judge of Egypt carried on his 
 breast an image symbolic of Truth with its eyes shut, 
 formed of precious stones. iElian says that these stones 
 were sapphires. We have had much experience of the 
 property of the sapphire, of very quickly inducing spiri- 
 tual vision. It seems to be more powerful than a 
 common crystal. 
 
 The teraphim formed part of the apparatus in the early 
 times of the Jewish history. T, in Arabic, takes the 
 place of S. I imagine that the word may be the same as 
 
 * As Josephns wrote 200 years after the phenomenon had ceased to 
 appear, and had neither seen it himself nor had the report from eye- 
 witnesses, we may easily imagine the description to be imperfect. He 
 was perhaps mistaken in supposing that the brightness of the stones was 
 apparent to all present. 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 369 
 
 seraphim (see Note 2), and have seen conjectures that 
 the cherubim by the mercy-seat were of a like nature. 
 This requires much examination, with all the other 
 appliances and symbols of the Jewish worship, which 
 cannot be understood until viewed by the light of the 
 Spirit. 
 
 The laying on of hands should not be unnoticed in an 
 enumeration of the various forms in which we have 
 seen a resemblance between the incidents of Scripture 
 history and the modern phenomena. I have said that 
 the power is always strengthened, I should have said 
 that it is often apparently communicated, by the hand of 
 a medium laid on the wrist of another to produce 
 writing, or on the shoulder to produce vision. A finger 
 of a powerful medium will convey the current to another 
 person. How often this fact is mentioned, or how im- 
 portant a part it bears in the history of the Word, I 
 need not say. In Deut. xxxiv. 9, And Joshua the son 
 of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom ; for Moses had 
 laid his hands upon him. 
 
 It is almost needless to quote the New Testament, for 
 the instances are very numerous in which mention is 
 made of the communication of the spirit,either for healing 
 or sanctifying, in this way. In 2 Tim. i. Paul writes — 
 
 6 Wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou 
 stir up the gift of God, which is in thee by the putting 
 on of my hands. 
 
 When the spirit shall have returned, and brought 
 
 B B 
 
370 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 that living light into the churches by which all will be 
 seen to have some element of truth, and which, by 
 being common to all, will unite the members of every 
 sect into the true church of Christ, this laying on of 
 hands will be a powerful and holy process, not as now, 
 a powerless though significant form. The touch of the 
 archbishop, bishop, or priest, is effective just in pro- 
 portion as he has the spirit, and the other person the 
 receptive power ; and the degrees of both can only be 
 known by the result. 
 
 The gradual rise and developement of spiritual influ- 
 ence is one of the most marked characteristics of the 
 spiritual education of the Jews ; and for this there 
 is a parallel in the manifestations. In every deve- 
 lopement the names of earthly relations are first 
 given; then those of persons who, when on earth, 
 bore a moral or intellectual affinity with the medium ; 
 and afterwards, the designations of those heavenly 
 natures known as love, faith, hope, and their modifi- 
 cations. These three degrees correspond with body, 
 soul, and spirit, and the highest influx, which has 
 its receptivity in the highest portion of the brain and 
 the noblest part of the human soul, is the Holy Ghost, 
 direct from the Most High. But even the lower ema- 
 nations are of different degrees, as the spiritual powers 
 from which they proceed approach the Divine essence. 
 A long-continued communication with spirits of the 
 lower natures, to the exclusion of the higher influences, 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 371 
 
 is a lingering on the road to that heaven which can 
 only be attained by the communion of the Holy Grhost. 
 
 In the spirit world or state, where everything appears 
 as it is, and is as it appears, the nature or character of 
 any one is implied in the name — which is not given 
 arbitrarily as names are here, but falls, as it were, 
 naturally, on the hearer. Hence, with the ascending 
 series of names is the ascending series ' of spiritual 
 natures from which influences are received by the 
 medium. If this is so in the spiritual training of an 
 individual, how much more must it be traceable in the 
 education of a nation, in which all the states and 
 processes of individual teaching are exhibited on a 
 larger scale ! 
 
 The Jews are the type and example of all our 
 Father's spiritual teaching, and this passage from lower 
 to higher degrees of influence may be found in 
 their history. The first and most marked record of a 
 change is found in Gren. iv. 26. The preceding history 
 is part literal and part symbolical ; the second chapter 
 especially, narrating the origin of Eve, seems to have a 
 correspondential meaning which is more coherent than 
 its literal one; for it relates to the developement or 
 opening of the spiritual degree in the natural man, 
 which was before unaided. ' Adam had no help meet 
 for him.'* And the method by which this internal 
 opening took place was a trance — for deep sleep is not 
 the true interpretation. But I must not enter into 
 
 B B 2 
 
372 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 these difficult chapters here. The last verse of chapter 
 iv. is, * Then began men to call upon the name of the 
 Lord.'* Hitherto the spiritual powers to which man- 
 kind had looked were those near to them, the Elohim, 
 the Gods — or in their communications Jehovah Elohim, 
 the Lord God, or the highest spiritual power to which 
 their thoughts could rise, or by which their suscepti- 
 bilities of impression could be acted on. But after 
 a long series of events, detailed in familiar forms and 
 language, but all having reference to the spiritual 
 progress of men in those early times, men began to call 
 upon, or to be called by, the name of Jehovah, the 
 Highest Name. 
 
 The marginal reading, to be called by, seems more 
 correct than the text, if we understand the meaning 
 of call, though, from want of the knowledge that a 
 real spiritual process is involved, it has lost its original 
 force. To be 'called by,' means to be influenced by 
 the highest degree of spirit of which the soul is re- 
 ceptive. The word call is used both in the active and 
 passive sense — He ivill surely call on the name of the 
 Lord his God ; and, * Then began men to be called by 
 the name of Jehovah.'' The last expresses a change or 
 ascent in the receptivity of influence, a higher degree 
 of inspiration, and a better knowledge of the object of 
 worship. 
 
 There is even at this day much mystery surrounding 
 this holy name, which has been believed by learned 
 
THE WORD OP GOD. 373 
 
 Jews to contain in its letters a mystical representation 
 of the Divine essence. So sacred is the word held, that 
 since some centuries before Christ it has never been 
 pronounced on ordinary occasions in reading the Scrip- 
 tures. The word Adonai, or e Lord of the age,' or ( eternal 
 Lord,' is substituted for it. The tetragrammaton, or 
 four Hebrew letters forming the sacred word, having lost 
 their vowel-sounds, remain only mrp; but the vowel- 
 points used in the word Adonai were affixed, and hence 
 the name is spelt Jehovah ; but the Jews maintain that 
 this is not the correct sound : and there exists a beau- 
 tiful tradition, that whenever the holy name shall be 
 pronounced in the right manner the wanderers on the 
 face of the earth will be restored to their own land. 
 
 When Moses was called by the Lord to lead the 
 children of Israel out of captivity, Exodus vi. : 
 
 2 And God (Elohim) spake unto Moses, and said 
 unto him, I (am) Jehovah ; 
 
 3 And I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and 
 unto Jacob, as El Shaddai, and by my name Jehovah 
 I was not known to them. 
 
 El Shaddai, 'the powerful,' translated 'God Almighty,' 
 might perhaps be better rendered according to its 
 primary meaning ; El being always spiritual power in a 
 good and high sense, and Shaddai coming from a word 
 implying to shed, or pour out, El Shaddai is the pourer 
 forth of spirit-power, the spiritual shedder. Balaam, 
 when entranced, saw the vision of El Shaddai. 
 
374 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 This reminds us of the descriptions of spiritual 
 action given both by clairvoyantes and by the seers 
 to whom the bright radiating or scintillating appearance 
 was visible. Jehovah, the highest name, has a far 
 grander and more internal signification than El Shaddai ; 
 but we must understand far more of these heavenly 
 subjects than is known at present before we can com- 
 prehend the advance from the lower to the higher 
 name. All the Divine teaching through the prophets 
 was directed to keep the worship Of the Jews to the 
 Highest Name, or Jehovah. There is no doubt that by 
 Baalim spiritual powers of a lower order are meant, 
 and these being more accessible, the people were easily 
 drawn away to them. They are false gods in the sense 
 in which low earthly spirits are false, not in the sense 
 of unreal spiritual powers ; and all the prohibitions about 
 witchcraft, &c, arise from the readiness of the people 
 to trust to lower spirits. These injunctions can hardly 
 apply to our time, if communications are sought only for 
 instruction. 
 
 The applications of the word Name, in the sense 
 which I have assigned to it, are very numerous in the 
 Old Testament, not, however, to the exclusion of the 
 lower meaning. 
 
 As a beast goeth doivn into the valley, the Spirit of 
 the Lord caused him to rest ; so didst Thou lead thy 
 people to make thyself a glorious name. 
 
 1 Kings ix. 3. And the Lord said unto him (Solomon) 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 375 
 
 ... 7 have hallowed this house which thou hast built, 
 to put my name there for ever. 
 
 Psalm cxlviii. 13. His name alone is excellent. 
 All through the Jewish dispensation, the Name of 
 the Lord indicates the spiritual degree into which the 
 Hebrew nation have entered at the time. There is 
 something very significant in the belief that they are as 
 yet unable to pronounce the word Jehovah aright. In 
 the spiritual language of correspondence the voice 
 typifies the affection, as the name implies the character 
 or essence. When the Jews have a true feeling of and 
 towards the loving essence of our Father, they will 
 regain the state originally intended for them. Will 
 not this be when they receive His manifestation in the 
 person of the Saviour, beholding the glory of God in 
 the face of Christ ? 
 
 The name of Jesus is said to have been announced 
 by the angel to Mary — ' Thou shalt conceive in thy 
 womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name 
 Jesus? 
 
 And to Joseph (Matthew i. 21) — 'And she shall 
 bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus 
 (Saviour), for he shall save his people from their 
 sins.'* 
 
 This name is spiritually communicated in both in- 
 stances. Zacharias, when the infant John was brought 
 into the Temple, wrote, under the influence of the 
 Spirit, His name is John. Our Lord says to His 
 
376 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 disciples, I am come in my Father's name. And, 
 Whatsoever ye shall ask in my name that will I do, 
 that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 
 
 Peter's statement on the occasion of the healing of 
 the blind man, shows that he assigned the full import 
 to the word Name. 
 
 Acts iii. 16. And His Name through faith in His 
 Name hath made this man strong. 
 
 And the high priest's question, Acts iv. 7, By what 
 power, or by what name, have ye done this ? 
 
 Peter, having replied that it is by the name of Jesus 
 Christ, of Nazareth, says — 
 
 Neither is there salvation in any other ; for there is 
 none other name under heaven given among men 
 whereby we must be saved. 
 
 In Acts xv. 17, the Apostle James, in order to prove 
 that the Grentile converts were not bound by the law of 
 Moses, quotes the prophet Amos, That the residue 
 of men might seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles 
 upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, tvho 
 doeth all these things. 
 
 We rise to the highest Name in the Christian dis- 
 pensation. Paul writes (Philippians ii. 9) — 
 
 Wherefore God hath highly exalted Him, and hath 
 given Him a name which is above every name : 
 
 10 That at the name of Jesus every knee should 
 bow, of {things) in heaven and in earth, and under 
 the earth ; 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 377 
 
 11 And every tongue should confess that Jesus 
 Christ is Lord, to the glory of God, the Father. 
 
 The meaning of being called in the name is, as I 
 have said, the same as being filled with the spirit of 
 Christ, for holy influence can fall only into the soul 
 whose aspirations are pure and good and holy. No 
 hatred, no impurity, no pride, can hold its place, if the 
 Comforter is to enter. Surely of all those moral states 
 which act as obstacles to the influx of (rod's Spirit, 
 there is one which must be most active, that of attri- 
 buting to the Source of all holiness, and whose name is 
 Love, wrath, cruelty, and revenge, and all the lowest 
 feelings of humanity. It is true that in the old Scrip- 
 tures we meet with such phrases as a jealous God, &c, 
 but we must remember that the inspiration could only 
 fall into the words and ideas familiar to the receivers, 
 and these impressions were suited to the character of 
 receptivity inseparable from the e gree of spiritual 
 education attained at the time. 
 
 We look down with supreme contempt on the heathen, 
 who attributed to their deities actions which at this 
 time bring men to the gallows ; but for those who have 
 seen the glory of God in the face of Christ, we are no 
 better than the heathen. We malign and misrepresent 
 the God whom we worship. I had lately an instance 
 of this blasphemy of the Holy Ghost in a letter from a 
 friend, who writes of the little children in a fishing 
 village far from London, — 
 
378 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 ( They are well taught as to conduct, and are good 
 kind-hearted little creatures, who sit round and sing 
 hymns about blood and wrath and damnation, with the 
 utmost good humour.' 
 
 When the Saviour took the fishermen's children on 
 his knees and blessed them, did he teach them about 
 blood and wrath and damnation? Those who write 
 and teach such hymns profess to be called in the name 
 of Christ. Let them think whether they do not take 
 that name in vain — 
 
 For the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh 
 His name in vain. 
 
 The trials and conflicts encountered by mediums on 
 their entrance into spiritual life are to the temptation 
 of the Saviour as the atom to the crystal, or as the 
 crystal to the rock, but they are similar in kind ; and so 
 for every state and process of spiritual developement we 
 have a type and example in the Book of the Spirit. 
 This thought brings up a serious question ; — 
 
 Is all that I have described as spiritual developement, 
 with all its accompanying processes and trials, due to 
 1 unconscious cerebration,' or self-delusion, or irregular 
 nervous action, or imposture ? 
 
 6 It is,' will be the unhesitating answer of those 
 whose philosophical compass points in a contrary 
 direction. 
 
 Then the Bible is a history on a large scale, and of 
 great antiquity, of unconscious cerebration, irregular 
 
THE WORD OF GOD. 379 
 
 nervous action, self-delusion, and imposture. It is 
 hard to say in what way those who pronounce the 
 judgement can escape the conclusion. 
 
 But we who lean on the Book which has furnished 
 spiritual food to all ages and conditions of men, whose 
 prophecies have been fulfilled and are going on to their 
 completion in the second coming of the Saviour, which 
 is the entrance of the living Word into every soul — 
 we need not fear that our staff will ever prove to be a 
 broken reed. 
 
 The thought may occur — If it be true that the Bible 
 is only a history of these mesmeric and psychological 
 phenomena, it loses at once all its authority and its 
 sacred character. These mesmeric and psychological 
 phenomena are parts of a great whole, and are found to 
 be a connecting link between what has been called the 
 world of matter, and the world of spirit. And the 
 ascent from matter to spirit is not difficult, neither are 
 their respective boundaries undefined, if we remember 
 that matter is the deposit of the life force, and that it 
 becomes dead, and falls back into other forms, only to 
 be acted on by new forces in the constant outpouring 
 of spirit from the Fountain of life. We need not appre- 
 hend a diminished reverence for Scripture. The Bible 
 will be found full of instruction, comfort, and hope for 
 every soul in need, and in every degree of spiritual 
 opening, and all the more when the obscure and myste- 
 rious passages whose meaning has been lost, are restored, 
 
380 FROM MATTER TO SPIRIT. 
 
 to life by a better knowledge of the states they describe, 
 and. when the things of the Spirit are recognised in the 
 world as they are treated of in the history of the Word 
 of God. 
 
 There is a deep meaning in the fact that the lowest 
 spirit manifestations, or those in which the action of 
 spiritual electricity on material substances is displayed, 
 appeared soon after the means of communicating by 
 earthly electricity were completed. We do not despise 
 the child who first tried to catch up a thread by a piece 
 of amber or sealing-wax, for the knowledge growing out 
 of that simple experiment led to results which are yet 
 far in the future. Neither should we undervalue the raps 
 and movements, strange and childish as they appear : 
 they form but the lowest step of a ladder whose base is 
 on the earth, and whose top rests at the feet of the 
 Lamb in the centre of the Throne. 
 
381 
 
 NOTES TO CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Note 1, p. 350. 
 
 The word Loikh signified, in ancient Irish, the Holy Spirit. 
 The belief in divers spiritual emanations coming in successive 
 waves from the first fountain, and forming the pleroma of 
 heaven, was not confined to the Platonic philosophy; it is 
 found in all Eastern nations, and the Jews held it in a distinct 
 though modified form in the Cabbala. Much of the con- ■ 
 fusion in which thes^ doctrines are involved arises from our 
 loss in this time of their essential spiritual truth. This, like 
 all other such truths, is embodied in the phraseology and 
 ideas of the people holding it, and is besides much incrusted 
 with material growth. These two circumstances have been 
 both cause and effect of the utter contempt with which it has 
 been treated by the learned of modern times. 
 
 Note 2, p. 356. 
 
 I omitted to give in the right place a description of visions 
 in which angels or very beautiful spirits were seen attending 
 on a sick person. A writing medium was asked what those 
 angels were, and her hand wrote ' seraphs, or healing angels.' 
 
 The serpents which bit the children of Israel were saraph, 
 translated fiery serpents, so, we may suppose, was the brazen 
 one made in imitation. Gesenius says, on the word seraphim, 
 
382 NOTES. 
 
 that if anyone wishes to follow the Hebrew usage of language, 
 in which saraph is a serpent, he may render it winged serpent, 
 since the serpent among the ancient Hebrews (Num. xxi. 8, 
 2 Kings xviii. 4), and among the Egyptians (Herod, ii. 74, 
 Aelian, Var. Hist, ii.17, 2), was the symbol both of wisdom and 
 healing power. This notion is criticised very severely by the 
 Editor of the Lexicon ; but though the ' notion of winged 
 serpents surrounding the throne of God, is wildly incon- 
 gruous,' yet there is unquestionably a something which the 
 magnetic serpent has in common with the glorious angel, 
 though this something may be only a symbol. 
 
 Not one of the explanations given by Gesenius is satisfactory. 
 There seems to be an unsuspected truth concealed in these 
 and some other obscure Hebrew expressions, the understand- 
 ing of which might throw some light on this part of my 
 subject. I ask pardon of unlearned readers, though more 
 apology is due to learned ones, for trying to call attention to 
 these words in connection with spiritual processes, while I 
 am unable to do more than guess at their specific meaning. 
 
 One derivation of the word seraph, traces it from the 
 Arabic ; if so, it is possible that it may be connected with the 
 word rapha, to heal. I must, however, in order to justify my 
 interpretation, ' healer,' connect the word seraph with winged 
 serpent. I believe that the healing power of the angel, and 
 the magnetic property of the serpent, are the attributes which 
 have made one the symbol of the other, and that this sym- 
 bolization was really used may be proved from the remains of 
 early Egyptian worship. The seraphim, or supposed repre- 
 sentations of glorious angels, are not originally Hebrew figures. 
 Whatever their use, or whatever they represent, they were 
 symbolic images derived from Egypt, and adapted to the holy 
 worship of the tabernacle and temple. For the Cherubim of 
 
NOTES. 383 
 
 the Temple were acknowledged by antiquarians to have been 
 Seraphim. We find in Isaiah vi. 2 — l Above it stood the 
 Seraphims,' which in the Septuagint is translated c the Cheru- 
 bim stood round about him. ' The description in the same 
 chapter, of figures with faces and wings, identifies the two. 
 Remembering that the Cherubim are essentially the same as the 
 Seraphim, we may turn to some of the earliest representations 
 of cherubim, and see whether the original identity of these 
 symbols with that of the ' winged serpent' will not be apparent. 
 I find in Kitto's Cyclopaedia of Biblical Literature, art. Cheru- 
 bim, an engraving of old Egyptian sculptures, such as are 
 found on a tablet or shrine. One of these consists of two 
 figures standing on each side of a representation of the 
 Divine power (a winged globe), with wings outstretched, 
 exactly in the position of the Cherubim in the Temple, and 
 each of these figures is a winged serpent', not the serpent with 
 its tail in its mouth, like the ancient symbol of eternity, or 
 rather, perhaps, of an age or aliov, but a waved serpent, not 
 unlike those in the caduceus or staff of Mercury, which also 
 had healing power, or like the Egyptian symbol of healing. 
 The name of the Egyptian healing god was Serapis, in whose 
 temples, as in those of JEsculapius, the sick man passed a night, 
 and the remedy was revealed in a dream. There is evidence 
 that other mesmeric phenomena were introduced in the Sera- 
 peia, or temples of healing, but I have not the authority at 
 hand. 
 
 It has never been clearly settled what was the nature of the 
 teraphim, images which were used early in the Jewish wor- 
 ship (Judges xvii. 5). 
 
 The man Micah had an house of gods, and made an ephod, 
 and teraphim, and consecrated (Heb., filled with the hand), one 
 of his sons, who became his priest. The teraphim were used 
 
384 NOTES. 
 
 afterwards, even as late as the time of David. "We have seen 
 that the ephod was put on to induce a spiritual state ; is it 
 not likely that the teraphim, a kind of household god, used 
 in conjunction with an ephod, were for some similar purpose ? 
 Spencer, De Legibus Hebraeorum, tries to show, from the 
 constant interchange of T and S in Eastern languages, that 
 teraphim and seraphim are the same, or kindred words. I find 
 in Kitto's Cyclopaedia, that the Targum on Ilosea iii. 4, calls 
 the teraphim the expounder of oracles. The Rabbi Levi ben 
 Gerson says that the teraphim were human figures, by which 
 the imagination of diviners was so excited that they supposed 
 they heard a low voice speaking about future events, with 
 which their own thoughts were filled, &c. Many etymologists 
 connect the word with depcnreveiv, l to heal.' As the spiri- 
 tuality of the Jewish worship declined, and their moral sense 
 deteriorated, these images were formed in the most horrible 
 way, and the adoration or invocation of them became idolatry 
 of the worst kind, when the idol worshipped becomes the 
 representation of an evil spirit. There is nothing wrong in 
 the ephod or teraphim mentioned in the Book of Judges. 
 The original use of the whole apparatus seems to involve 
 some process of healing, and also of producing a spiritual 
 state. 
 
 Qepcnreveiv is the Greek ' to heal,' whence our English 
 1 therapeutics.' One sect, either connected with, or a division 
 of the Essenes, was called therapeutae, healers. The Essenes 
 were a contemplative sect who had spiritual gifts. They had 
 their name from Essen, an oracle. Here, again, we find the 
 prophetic and healing gifts conjoined. 
 
 There is another obscure word which with its derivation 
 seems to bear a distinct specific meaning, in reference to 
 spiritual processes. This is the word naphalj translated 
 
NOTES. 385 
 
 ' to fall.' Gesenius says that it is in one sense ( used of 
 a prophet who sees visions.' The word used to express 
 the state of Balaam when he saw the visions of God (El 
 schaddai) is nophel, l fallen.' I think ' entranced ' or ' clear- 
 seeing ' would be better. In many places naphal is used to 
 express inspiration, Isaiah ix. 8 : The Lord sent a word into 
 Jacob and it lighted {naphal) upon Israel. 
 
 The spirit of God, or the hand of God, is said to descend 
 
 (naphal) upon anyone. Ezekiel viii. 1 the hand of 
 
 the Lord God fell there upon me. Ezekiel xi. 5 : And the 
 Spirit of the Lord fell (naphal) upon me and said unto me, 
 &c. It is used for the coming on of a deep sleep (trance ; 
 the same word is used when God is represented as taking the 
 rib from Adam). 
 
 Gen. xv. 12. And a deep sleep fell upon (naphal) Abram. 
 
 There are other senses in which the verb is used, but this 
 one, which expresses spiritual influx, or its magnetising effect, 
 seems to be the primary. We know how often mention is 
 made in Scripture of sleep or trance, as the effect of spiritual 
 action. It is one of the commonest phenomena described, 
 and its occurrence is spoken of, as in the modern experience, 
 as occurring in every degree, from the deep sleep of Adam, to 
 the ' eyes heavy with sleep,' of the Apostles on the Mount of 
 Transfiguration. Mahomet, who saw visions, has been sup- 
 posed to have had epilepsy; in antiquated phrase, 'falling 
 sickness.' It is more likely that he had simple trances, for 
 the reception of spiritual influx does not depend on nor 
 cause, epileptic attacks, though it is always found that the 
 complaint predisposes to clairvoyance and other magnetic- 
 states. 
 
 The word nuph, probably related to naphal, means to 
 move up and down. Naaman says, ' / thought he would move 
 
 C C 
 
386 NOTES. 
 
 up and down his hand over the part? &c. This is to mesmerise. 
 Again, nephesh is the soul or life. Elisha, when he mesmer- 
 ised the widow's son, prayed, l Let now the sold of this child, I 
 pray thee, return unto him." 1 Is nephesh a kindred word ? 
 
 Naphal refers especially to the influx of spirit power. My 
 object now is, by showing that this word and the word rapha, 
 to heal, are used in the same connection, to bring forward 
 another instance in which the two modes of spiritual manifes- 
 tation are attributed, in the more ancient Jewish history, to 
 the same class of people. 
 
 In that obscure and much disputed passage, Gen. vi. 4, 
 And there were giants in those days, &c. the word translated 
 giants is nephilim, the plural of a noun made from naphal. 
 The word is only used twice, and in both places is translated 
 giants. The other instance is Numb. xiii. 33 — And there 
 we saw the giants (nephilim) the sons of Anak, of the 
 nephilim. 
 
 But the same people are called Rephaim, healers, also 
 translated giants. Josh. xii. 4 — And the coast of Og king of 
 Bashan, of the remnant of the giants (Rephaim) that dwelt at 
 Ashtaroth and Edrei. 
 
 Deut. ii. 10. The Emims dwelt therein in times past, a 
 people great, and many, and tall, as the Anakims ; which also 
 were accounted giants (Rephaim) as were the Anakims. 
 This is not the same attribute as the size and strength ; they 
 were tall and strong, like the sons of Anak, of whom the king 
 of Bashan was one, and like them they were accounted 
 Rephaim, healers. Gen. xiv. 5 — And smote the Rephaims in 
 Ashteroth Karnaim. 
 
 I suppose the two words nephilim and Rephaim to express 
 respectively men having both spiritual vision and healing 
 power. There is one more word which seems to bear a 
 
NOTES. 387 
 
 spiritual as well as a natural sense ; this is Gebir, powerful ; 
 trans, might?/. We find El Gebor, the mighty God. 
 
 The word is also used of Balaam, ' the man (Gebir) which 
 saw the visions of El Shaddai,' &c. 
 
 May I venture to suggest the application of these different 
 readings to Gen. vi. 4 ? — There were men having magnetic power 
 in the earth in those times ; and after that, on the marriage of 
 the sons of God {this always means men having an influx of 
 spirit, ' to them gave he power to become sons of God 1 ) with the 
 daughters of men, their children became powerful prophets 
 which were of old, men of the Name. 
 
 It may be that the word translated of old is of the age in 
 the sense of alwv — Welsh, awen ; I know too well the misleading 
 nature of etymologies, especially in an ancient obscure lan- 
 guage, to do more than hint at this possible application of the 
 difficult word nolam. Indeed, it is with much hesitation that 
 I have tried to call attention to these few words in Hebrew, 
 which have never yet received any coherent or definite ex- 
 planation. There are many more such words, and I believe 
 that their meaning, as well as that of the whole Scripture nar- 
 rative, will become clear as the processes to which they relate 
 are studied and understood. 
 
 Note 3, p. 360. 
 
 The moving or scintillating appearance of spiritual light has 
 been several times mentioned in this book. It appears to be a 
 phenomenon often visible to seers, and gives the idea of in- 
 tense life. The Hebrew word rachaph, and its Syriac equiva- 
 lent, seem to express this movement. I have lately seen it 
 translated by a good scholar, ■ to vibrate or fan.' Gesenius 
 says it is figuratively (?) ' used of the Spirit of God, who 
 
388 NOTES. 
 
 brooded over the shapeless mass of the earth, cherishing and 
 vivifying.' It occurs in Gen. i. 2 : And the spirit of God 
 moved over the face of the waters. In Syriac it is used in 
 speaking of Elisha vitalizing the body of the dead child, and 
 also of a voice descending from heaven. It is the word for 
 brooding over, and vifalizing, as a hen does her eggs. 
 
 All the above actions are spiritual, in one or other degree. 
 The ancient Eastern nations had more real knowledge than is 
 attributed to them. 
 
 Note 4, p. 364. 
 
 The Hebrew word is michtab. It occurs in Exod. xxxii. 
 16, Deut. x. 4 (in both which places it is used for the Divine 
 writing of the law), and 2 Chron. xxi. 12, for the letter of 
 Elijah, which I believe to have been spiritually written. On 
 the word michtam, found at the heading of three psalms, 
 Gesenius and his English editor are at variance — Gesenius 
 believing the word to be the same as michtab, with the com- 
 mon change of b for m y the Editor approving the rather fanci- 
 ful translation, golden poem. We know that David's hand 
 was spiritually guided for the patterns of the Temple ; does 
 Michtam of David mean that the psalm was written under 
 spiritual influence ? 
 
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