This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
DEALINGS WITH THE DEAD
235

theory is founded, that I call the attention of the Thinking World, and challenge its respect.

Not a human being, whom I ever saw, was fully satisfied with either Modern Spiritualism, or what is called Harmonial Philosophy; for the more a man bases his hopes of a life hereafter upon either of them, the more he stands on slippery ground. Doubt after doubt seizes on the mind, until at last people turn away, sad-hearted and desperate, from so-called systems of Immortalism, to take refuge in the church, which erewhile they so loudly berated and condemned—resort once again to the Blessed Book, or else unhappily drift out upon the shoreless, hopeless sea of atheism. There are untold multitudes who will gladly hail anything that promises to remove the dreadful doubts concerning, not only their continued existence, but their chances of bliss beyond the veil. To such this book and its fellow comes; for the benefit of such they both are, and are to be sent forth upon the world's great tide.

Thoroughly imbued with the spirit of the truths here written—with the principles set forth and running like a gold-vein through that portion which is descriptive mainly—no one can help feeling strong in the certitude of an hereafter—this being the only attempt ever yet made in this country to treat of the soul per se, and in its higher and deeper relations, so far as the writer is aware.

Concerning the absolute origin and final destiny of the soul itself, the answer to the question, What is God, and a few others of equal import, the reader must wait for the second volume; for, in the present, we have only entered the outskirts of the illimitable course—have scarcely touched the preface of the mighty volume,