Buchanan's Journal of Man, May 1887: Volume 1, Number 4
Religion
Buchanan's Journal of Man, May 1887: Volume 1, Number 4
Medicine -- Periodicals; Phrenology -- Periodicals; Science -- Periodicals
"In this eventful revolution, what the patriots of the past failed to
accomplish their descendants will perform, with the timely assistance of
invisible powers. By their sides the heavenly hosts will labor,
imparting courage and fortitude in each hour of despondency, and urging
them onward to a speedy and magnificent triumph. Deploring, as we do,
the existence of slavery, and the means to be employed to purge it from
America, yet our sympathies will culminate to the cause of right and
justice, and give strength to those who seek to set the captive free,
and crush the monster, Slavery. The picture which I have presented is,
indeed, a hideous one. You may think that I speak with too much
assurance when I thus boldly prophesy the dissolution of the American
Confederacy, and, through it, the destruction of that gigantic
structure, human slavery! But this knowledge was not the result of a
moment's or an hour's gleaning, but nearly half a century's existence in
the seraph life. I have carefully watched my country's rising progress,
and I am thoroughly convinced that it cannot always exist under the
present Federal Constitution, and the pressure of that most terrible
sin, slavery!"
Had the people of this country been sufficiently enlightened to
investigate these messages fairly, they would have seen that there was
sufficient evidence that this warning really came from Washington, and
the pulpit would have enforced its solemn truths. But our destiny was
fixed; Washington knew that his voice would not be heeded, and that
war could not be prevented.
Again came the warning in 1860, through the lips of a more
intellectual medium, more capable of expressing the bright thought of
the higher world. Mrs. E. Hardinge Britten tells the story in her
"History of American Spiritualism," pages 416-419. She refers to the
stupid and criminal action of the Legislature of Alabama; and a
similar piece of brutality has been recommended by a committee in the
Pennsylvania Legislature recently. The following is quoted from the
History.
THE ALABAMA LEGISLATURE AND THE SPIRITS--PROPHECY IN THE ALABAMA
LEGISLATIVE HALLS--RETRIBUTION.
Sometime about the month of January, 1860, the Legislature of Alabama
passed a bill declaring that any person or persons giving public
spiritual manifestations in Alabama should be subject to a penalty of
five hundred dollars.
We have given the substance, though not the exact wording of this
edict, which was met by considerable opposition, not only on the part
of great numbers of Spiritualists resident in the State, but also by
the governor himself, who refused to give his sanction to the bill.
Mr. George Redman, the celebrated physical test medium, had just
passed through the South, and remained long enough to create an
immense interest throughout its length and breadth.
The author was already engaged to deliver a course of lectures in
Mobile, and numerous invitations were sent to her from other parts of
the State.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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