Were it true, could we summon to our side the spirits of those whom we have so fondly cherished and converse with them of things holy and eternal, could we learn wisdom from their fuller knowledge, could we be assured in their own sweet accents of their fadeless love, could we now and again be comforted with a sight of their well-known faces, the touch of their hands upon ours, were it God’s will that this should be so, then assuredly Spiritism is a most blessed and sacred thing, consolation to the afflicted, succour to the distressed, a shining light upon earth’s dark ways, a very ready help to us all. But if on the other hand there is reason and grave reason to suppose that the spirits, with whom it is possible under certain exceptional conditions and by certain remarkable devices to establish a contact, although often claiming to be departed friends or relatives and supporting their contention (we acknowledge) with no little plausibility, are again and again found to be masquerading intelligences, in some cases undoubtedly actors of excellence who play their part for a time with consummate skill, but who have never at any séance whatsoever anywhere been able conclusively to demonstrate their identity, if in fact these manifesting intelligences are deceivers, imposing for purposes of their own a fraudulent impersonation upon those who with breaking hearts are so eagerly longing to communicate with son or husband fallen in battle, it may be, or on some lone shore, if they are proven liars, if their messages are trivial, ambiguous, cryptic, incapable of verification, shifty, ignorant, nay worse, blasphemous and hideously obscene, then are we justified—and we are in point of fact fully and completely justified—in concluding that the spirits are not those of the departed, but evil intelligences who never have been and never will be incarnate, unclean spirits, demons, and then assuredly Spiritism is most foul, most loathly, most dangerous, and most damnable.