1007. “The answer to this all-absorbing question, which sheds light into the gloomy recesses of the skeptic’s mind, and gives joy to his despairing heart—which supplied evidence where none had been sought, conviction where it had been sought in vain, and imparts to the accepted hope and faith of the professional believer, the confirmation of a demonstrated fact—is to be found in the irrefutable evidence of _Spiritual Philosophy_. 1008. “How invaluable is this dispensation of an Almighty Providence, which has made his despairing creature, a believer in the immortality of the soul of man; has cleared from his mental vision the clouds of doubt and disbelief, and has opened to his rejoicing mind the irrefragable evidence of a future life beyond the grave! 1009 ‘Hail now on earth the glorious day, When infidels have learnt to pray; When heaven’s laws by reason blessed, Are all with fondest love confessed! When man in bliss can look above, And see a God in all his love; Can own with joy the mighty King, And loud his hallelujahs sing. Throw back the gates, ye heavenly band, To loved ones show the spirit land; Hang out the beacon lights to see A home _for all_, the bond and free. And now the dreams of former days Behold in those celestial ways; Where sorrow’s eye is never seen, Where love and hope are ever green.’—W. G. 1010. “The exhibition of so-called spiritual agency in New York City by the Misses Fox and their mother, was the first incident that claimed my notice, and excited my laughter and ridicule, in this apparent new phase in the science of legerdemain. 1011. Blitz and his wonders crossed my mental vision, and seemed outdone by the results of this feminine exhibition, in which the spirits of another world were invoked, and aided in the performance. 1012. This happened when psychology had been developed to a wondering world, as the climax of magnetic phenomena in the wonderful attributes of man, and was regarded by myself among many as the culmination of human research in the science of animal life. 1013. Meeting an intelligent friend who had bestowed much pains in the investigation of this department of science, and inquiring of him as to the progress of magnetism, I was answered, that something much more wonderful than magnetism engaged his attention and occupied his mind at that time. 1014. Asking what the subject might be, and being asked in return, if I had not heard of the wonders of Spiritualism, a painful impression was made on my mind and feelings that, where all had been regarded as sound and straight, there must be some latent obliquity of thought; that my friend, as the Spaniards say, was a little _tonto_, or that he was likely soon to become so, was quite apparent.