affair, it has not been manifest to my apprehension: and I must decline to
lend my countenance to any such pretensions."

That would be the reply of the sceptic who was equal to the emergency. But
let us suppose that he is not equal to it: that he is a weak-kneed,
impressionable person, with a tendency to jump at conclusions; and that he
is scared or mystified into believing that "spirits" may be at the bottom
of it. What, then, will be the character of the faith which the Positive
Revelation has furnished him? He has discovered that existence continues,
in some fashion, after the death of the body. He has learned that there
may be such a thing as--not immortality exactly, but--postmortem
consciousness. He has been saddled with the conviction that the other
world is full of restless ghosts, who come shuddering back from their cold
emptiness, and try to warm themselves in the borrowed flesh and blood, and
with the purblind selfishness and curiosity of us who still remain here.
"Have faith: be not impatient: the conditions are unfavorable: but we are
working for you!"--such is the constant burden of the communications. But,
if there be a God, why must our relations with him be complicated by the
interference of such forlorn prevaricators and amateur Paracletes as
these? we do not wish to be "worked for,"--to be carried heavenward on
some one else's shoulders: but to climb thither by God's help and our own
will, or to stay where we are. Moreover, by what touchstone shall we test
the veracity of the self-appointed purveyors of this Positive Revelation?
Are we to believe what they say, because they have lost their bodies? If
life teaches us anything, it is that God does above all things respect the
spiritual freedom of his creatures. He does not terrify and bully us into
acknowledging Him by ghostly juggleries in darkened rooms, and by vapid
exhibitions addressed to our outward senses. He approaches each man in the
innermost sacred audience-chamber of his heart, and there shows him good
and evil, truth and falsehood, and bids him choose. And that choice, if