always authoritative, may mistake this magnetic envelope for the real substance whence it is evolved.

During the process of death, consciousness, in the seeming, is sometimes suspended, as with those who are suddenly ushered into the spirit world by capital punishment, suicide or accident, and with those especially whose habits of life, given to pernicious gratification, have materialized their senses, as if locked in "chains of darkness." Those who have lived pure and exalted lives, aglow with truth and charity, do not lose their consciousness for a moment, but cognize the transition from a darker to a more illumined room in the mansions of the Father.

There are no idiots to the spiritual vision. Imbecility is caused by malformation of the physical organization. Entering the spirit world, released from ante-natal and social perversions, they immediately commence their upward march of knowledge and wisdom.

Infants are immortal from the sacred moment of embryonic existence. Uniting the alkali and acid, instantly you have the third and higher compound-the salt. So when the positive and negative relational forces blend, then and there is the divine incarnation. Nature never takes a retrogressive step. If purposely blasted, during the gestative life, the spiritual principle remaining undisturbed, and the individuality in tact, the tender riven bud is borne by matronly angels to the nursery gardens of innocence to be trained in the virtues of the spheres. Designed abortion is murder! Multitudes will meet those offended little ones that ought to have had a natural, physical birth and the experiences of an earthly life, preparatory to a ripened entrance into the world of spirits. Prematurely ushered there, the spiritual objective being based upon the material, they are necessitated by a law of their being, to return under heavenly guidance to the mediumistic spheres of sympathizing friends to gather glimpses of, and participate in, earthly struggles and victories.

Identity is cognate with existence itself. It is the natural attribute of spirit-its very impressibility. It depends not on form for recognition, but the form on it. Every part of the grain we sow is represented in the harvest. Essential spirit being inseparable substance, and ever reporting itself magnetically, we recognize it by sympathy, the same as a Ichild in the darkness knows its mother without the aid of sight or hearing. Our spheres are ourselves extended-our very loves and thoughts in telegraphic communication. When, therefore, spirits from the mortal lands meet the gone before, instantly, by sympathy, they recognize each other, and the past, with all its checkered pilgrimages, indellibly engraved on the tablet of memory, rolls in upon the consciousness with light and shadow, all in order of relations and events, in sweet, unspeakable joy and full of glory.

The king will know his subjects there-they the more kingly now; the Indian chief will know his tribe there; the teacher, the pupil; the parent, the cherub child; congenial souls will blend in sweetest fellowship; harmonial spirits will mingle in holiest tenderness; and weary, thorn-crowned pilgrims of earth, finding rest, will meet their redeemers, face to face. "Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord;" that is, die in the sphere of the Christ-life-" they rest from their labors, and their works do follow them." The works of the good both follow and precede them into the heavenly courts of blessedness. Courage, sister! Every pure thought breathed, every generous word uttered, every charitable deed wrought, every heart-beat for virtue and peace, will live forever!

With pale, sweet face, and eyes cast meekly down,
The while from withered leaves and flowerless stalks
She weaves thy fitting crown."

Courage, brother! Martyrs have trodden the paths of peril-saints have paced the cold cells-hearts have achedsouls have hungered-fires have burned around the forms of the faithful-storms and adversities have pelted the prophets -eyes have wept tears of blood, and brows platted with coronals of persecution, ere the world knew them, or they reaped the harvests of their diligent sowing. Courage, sister, brother, speaker, medium, worker-courage!

A beautiful, guardian angel once said to her mate on earth: "Mind echoes to mind; heart throbs with heart. Together we will read beauties-together sing one melody of lovetogether twine garlands to deck the brow of sorrow-together tread eternal pathways, and bathe in life's fountain of light. Yes, together we will sing the song of life-together and forever. We shall be there together; no partings ever there; the hands once joined at greeting, shall never be unloosed; two buds blossom in one flower. I am ever near thee. Ask me not to come. Shall the rose say, I wait for fragrance? Does it invite sweetness? Thus are we united!"

"I shall know her there! I shall know her there,

By the shining folds of her wavy hair,

By her faultless form with its airy grace

That an angel's pen might fail to trace-
By the holy smile her lips will wear,
When we meet above, I shall know her there!

I shall know her there, and her calm, dark eyes
Will look in mine with glad surprise,
When my bark, wild-tost o'er life's rough main,
The far-off port of heaven shall gain;

Though an angel's robe and a crown she wear,
By the song she sings I shall know her there."

Existence is unitive-eternal. This life is a hotel in which mortals tarry but a little season for rudimental experiences. Earthly furniture is not transferable. Ripening through toil and suffering, the soul emerges from this chrysalis state, through a sweet death-trance, to form new connections and go up one step higher in the graduated ascent of creation.

Not the drooping willow, nor dark cypress; but myrtle, laurel, rose-buds and immortelles are fitting funeral emblems. Mourning apparel belongs to the superstitions of the past. Pleasant words-cheerful music, should be voiced in the calm hour of burial, and cemeteries should be made as beautiful as the groves of tropical climes.

"No gloomy vault, no charnel cell,

No emblem of decay,

No solemn sound of passing-bell,

To echo-'gone away;'

But angels whisper soft and clear

'The loved, now risen, is standing near.'"

- "He gathers the prayers as he stands,

And they change into flowers in his hands,

Into garlands of purple and red;

And beneath the great arch of the portal,
Through the streets of the city immortal,
Is wafted the fragrance they shed."

Not pre-arranged words or the utterance of measured phrases, after the custom of the ancient Pharasee and modern hypocrite, but aspiration is prayer, the up-welling of the soul's holiest desires and struggles to attain the moral altitudes of perfection, the language of the innermost panting for the actual, the rising flame, the incense of pure thought, the prophecy of a better life, the chariot of love bearing us into the realm of the divine.

Prayer, uttered or repressed, affects no deific law or principle. Dews freshen the evening; sunlight bathes the morning; fruits fall in the autumn-time; meteors descend to the earth; stars move in nightly battalions over the radiant plains of heaven, all in accordance with infinite causation, reckless of prayers or intercessions.