So far as the existence of this land of happiness goes, it would seem
to have been more fully proved than any other religious conception
within our knowledge.
It may very reasonably be asked, how far this precise description of
life beyond the grave is my own conception, and how far it has been
accepted by the greater minds who have studied this subject? I would
answer, that it is my own conclusion as gathered from a very large
amount of existing testimony, and that in its main lines it has for
many years been accepted by those great numbers of silent active
workers all over the world, who look upon this matter from a strictly
religious point of view. I think that the evidence amply justifies us
in this belief. On the other hand, those who have approached this
subject with cold and cautious scientific brains, endowed, in many
cases, with the strongest prejudices against dogmatic creeds and with
very natural fears about the possible re-growth of theological
quarrels, have in most cases stopped short of a complete acceptance,
declaring that there can be no positive proof upon such matters, and
that we may deceive ourselves either by a reflection of our own
thoughts or by receiving the impressions of the medium. Professor
Zollner, for example, says:
"Science can make no use of the substance of intellectual revelations,
but must be guided by observed facts and by the conclusions logically
and mathematically uniting them"--a passage which is quoted with
approval by Professor Reichel, and would seem to be endorsed by the
silence concerning the religious side of the question which is observed
by most of our great scientific supporters. It is a point of view
which can well be understood, and yet, closely examined, it would
appear to be a species of enlarged materialism. To admit, as these
observers do, that spirits do return, that they give every proof of
being the actual friends whom we have lost, and yet to turn a deaf ear
to the messages which they send would seem to be pushing caution to the
verge of unreason. To get so far, and yet not to go further, is
impossible as a permanent position. If, for example, in Raymond's case
we find so many allusions to the small details of his home upon earth,
which prove to be surprisingly correct, is it reasonable to put a blue
pencil through all he says of the home which he actually inhabits?
Long before I had convinced my mind of the truth of things which
appeared so grotesque and incredible, I had a long account sent by
table tilting about the conditions of life beyond. The details seemed
to me impossible and I set them aside, and yet they harmonise, as I now
discover, with other revelations. So, too, with the automatic script
of Mr. Hubert Wales, which has been described in my previous book. He
had tossed it aside into a drawer as being unworthy of serious
consideration, and yet it also proved to be in harmony. In neither of
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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