But we are quite as far from having asserted the existence of such preternatural phenomena, and we shall surely not attempt to establish facts of which we have no experience whatever. All that we have done has been merely to question the validity of that curt and summary argument, which assumes that matter and spirit are incapable of acting upon each other, and in this way cuts off all investigation. We were somewhat disappointed and discouraged as we followed our contributor into that passage in which he seems to think that after death, the soul of man is removed beyond all knowledge of material things, and becomes incapable of ever perceiving their existence. It is true, this is but the logical deduction from his premises; and yet we felt some emotions of terror--some shrinking from that great and impassable gulf which he represents as then to be fixed between us and the objects of our life-long acquaintance--'the gulf which separates time from eternity.' But we were soon relieved; for in the conclusion of his article he waxes eloquent upon the higher faculties with which the soul will doubtless be endowed in its new state of existence, and with apparent unconsciousness of all inconsistency, assumes the very opposite of the whole preceding part of his argument. 'But,' he exclaims, 'when we shall stand in all the nakedness of _pure, unfettered spirit_,' 'and gaze with all the clearness of unveiled spiritual vision _upon the wonderful mechanism of the universe_,' etc. We might inquire of our author how, upon his principles, with merely spiritual vision, we can expect to behold anything so gross and material as the mechanism of the universe; but we overlook and forgive the apparent inconsistency--we are willing ourselves to be vanquished in the argument--for the sake of the noble idea that we may hereafter 'pass from blindness to far-stretching, unimpeded sight,' and 'be able at a glance _to count the very stars_, and to see the network of laws which binds them to their places, and controls, not only their motions, but the minutest particulars of their internal organism.' We are thankful, at all events, that, though matter and spirit may be so far apart in this our mortal state of existence, in the spiritual world, at least, we shall not lose all memory and knowledge of the grand material creation, of which we have learned so little here, but shall still be able, with even clearer vision, to perceive and comprehend the works of God, and, in the light of a nobler understanding, to adore the unfathomable wisdom which the Omnipotent Spirit has displayed in the arrangements of the boundless universe--the magnificent dwelling place of his creature man. F. P. S. EXTRATERRITORIALITY IN CHINA.[10]