student), withdraws from the brain, passes down the vertebrae, enters the solar plexus, changes the refined essences of the ganglia into pure fire, endows it with portions of its own divine life, sends a supply to every point where the communications are not cut off by disease; and so increases the vigor, life, and bulk of the body.
When this recuperative work is done, the soul sometimes rests awhile, and remains shut out from this world for hours; during which time our existence is vegetative only, and we are in a deathly slumber, so far as outward consciousness is concerned. At such times, the soul is making itself familiar with the elements of that lofty and transcendant knowledge which all good human beings are destined to fully acquire after death. It is talking with God, and God is in turn conversing with it. It is perusing its volume of Reminiscences, and these sometimes vaguely, dimly flash forth on the outward memory, causing men to doubt the story that they have not pre-existed. Sometimes it is intently listening to the glorious melodies which the seraphim sing, or drinking in the knowledge of archangels; for it is indeed true that—
"Sometimes the aerial synod bends,
And the mighty choir descends,
And the brains of men thenceforth
Teem with unaccustomed thoughts."
The soul returns from the inner to the outer life, and, in spite of philosophy or reasoning to the contrary, will entertain vague memories, indistinct yet half-positive assurances of having been aforetime in some other place than earth, or hell, or heaven; nor can it get rid of this conviction, because it is true! We have existed somewhere else! We have lived and acted parts before,
