It is my earnest desire that the reply may honor the author by the expressions of candor, philanthropy and grand thought. If his talent be that of a Swift or a Juvenal, his temptation will be great to adopt the loose style of the infidel. Let not compliance deceive the unwary. Between ridicule and reasoning the distinction is eternal. The most important and solemn truths have been the subject of both. The sober school of Socrates furnished a comedy for the Athenian stage. And Voltaire could tell us from the Apocalypse, how incommodious their situation will be who shall inhabit the upper story of New Jerusalem.
Unhappy man! thy fruits of genius furnished a feast of intellectual dainties. But the figs of Cleopatra covered the basilisk, and a world was ruined by the tree of knowledge. The termination of Satyre was horror; and the pure day of awful truth now glaring upon thee from every point has impressed sobriety eternal.
The result of this whole inquiry is that of consolation. Our death will not be total. Our souls will survive our bodies. We shall think and reason and know the moral conduct of this world, and perhaps the very names of particular persons, after our bodies are turned to dust.
Among us are a considerable number of people who say that the Spectre knew and told them their thoughts past, present or future, or all three; and such thoughts as she could not have known or conjectured by ordinary means. To one of them, whose veracity is doubted by none, she foretold the time, before several witnesses, when his mind would be struck with horror for opposing her messages.
When the time was come, which was about six months after the prediction, his mind at first, as he informed me, was calm as usual. To disturb him he saw nothing, expected nothing, and was about to reject the prediction as nothing. Instantly he was surprised by a new train of ideas. The evil of his conduct was set in order before him, and his distress was apparent to others, as some of them, whose witness cannot for a moment be suspected, informed me.
Now this instance alone, would prove but little; yet, when connected with ten or twelve others, of undoubted credibility, attesting the same kind of experience, while they have no visible combination by kindred, employment, age or interest, it is certainly worthy of some consideration.
If one departed saint is capable of knowing our thoughts, so may others. That uncorporeal spirits are witnesses of the conduct of this world, appears not only from that of Spectres, but from the scriptures, as in Dan. 8: 13. Rev. 6: 10. Eccl. 5: 6. 1 Tim. 5: 21. No reason can be assigned why our conduct may not be as visible to a saint made perfect, as to an angel: for neither of them can know us by bodily organs, such as we now possess, and their knowledge of our thoughts without these organs, is just as easily accounted for, as their knowledge of our external conduct. The spirits of just men, when they leave this world, are made perfect. “But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away. Now I know in part; but then shall I know, even as also I am known.” This cannot mean that I shall know other souls and even Christ himself as perfectly as he knows me; but I shall know them in the same manner. I shall know other souls intuitively as Christ knows me. Indeed, what idea can we have of mere spirits seeing each other, and being present with each other, but that of the mutual intuition of thoughts?
If that day should find the saints as ignorant of the human character as they are at the hour of death, their judgment will be of small account for their own satisfaction or that of others.
And should evasion tell us that Christ and his angels will then reveal to the saints the character of this world; still this character would be only the object of faith, not of sight, and satan and his adherents, could say that the saints had condemned them for the most part by hear-say, and that of those who had always opposed them from the beginning.
Now it does not seem probable that the enemies of Christ will ever find occasion for such a plea as this. Every mouth will be stopped. And the mouths of wicked men will be stopped, not merely by the testimony of foreign angels, but by witnesses taken from their own family, and such too as have been the greatest and most constant friends that ever they had in the world: such as had counselled and warned them—had experienced the most cordial and warmest zeal for their salvation and had often wept for them in secret places. Thus mankind will be judged by their peers. Their quarrel with God and each other, will be decided in their own family. “The Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment to the Son,” in union with his spiritual members, and there must be knowledge in them for this purpose. And what better method of acquiring it can we conceive so easy and natural as that of their contemplating the moral conduct of mankind through all ages of the world. May we not then indulge the idea that, when the humble and afflicted leave this body of sin and death, they hear the voice of the Beloved saying, “Come ye blessed of my Father:” possess in perfection my spirit of holiness and unerring wisdom, to know as you as are known. Great is the work for which you are ordained. You have been faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many. You must judge the world with me. Henceforth watch their conduct, know their character, and prepare for it.