Instances like those recorded in this paper might, I believe, be almost indefinitely multiplied, were attention directed to them, and the experience of survivors more generally communicated and recorded. Reviewing them, the question seems to press upon us, Why should we _not_ thus catch a glimpse of the spiritual world through that half-open portal wherein our dying brother is passing? If the soul of man exist at all after the extinction of the life of the body, what is more probable than that it should begin at the very instant when the veil of the flesh is dropping off to exercise those spiritual powers of perception which we must suppose it to possess (else were its whole after-life a blank), and to become conscious of other things than those of which our dim senses can take cognizance? If it be not destined to an eternity of solitude (an absurd hypothesis), its future companions may well be recognized at once, even as it goes forth to meet them. It seems indeed almost a thing to be expected that some of them should be ready waiting to welcome it on the threshold. Is there not, then, a little margin for hope, if not for any confident belief, that our fondest anticipations will be verified; nay, that the actual experience of many has already verified them? May it not be that, when that hour comes for each of us which we have been wont to dread as one of parting and sorrow,-- “The last long farewell on the shore Of this rude world,” ere we “put off into the unknown dark”,--we may find that we only leave for a little time the friends of earth to go straight to the embrace of those who have long been waiting for us to make perfect for them the nobler life beyond the grave? May it not be that our very first dawning sense of that enfranchised existence will be the rapture of reunion with the beloved ones whom we have mourned as lost, but who have been standing near, waiting longingly for our recognition, as a mother may watch beside the bed of a fever-stricken child, till reason reillumines its eyes, and with outstretched arms it cries “Mother.”