“My God!” exclaimed I, “it cannot be that I am in the spirit world! Why, look at the houses and churches, and temples! What magnificent buildings!” But I must say the material alone struck me as something sublime and unearthly. So transparent and rich in color, reflecting light as if through a veil or mist! “This caps all,” said I, as doctors and lawyers, artists and authors, whom I had known, stepped up to greet me, smiling and full of life. “Why, how is this?” “Is this you?” “Where did you come from?” Questions like these came from all sides. Francis and Brady, Willis, Morris, and a host of New Yorkers who had slipped out of sight and almost out of mind, now gathered around me as if by miracle. I rubbed my eyes in wonder. Spying Brown, I cried out, “Why, how is this, Brown? It can’t be that I am in heaven! Do you have such things here? Houses, stores, and works of art on every side?”
“Yes; people must live,” said he, “wherever they be.”
“And are men here the same, with all their faculties?” I asked.
“Yes; why not? Have you any you’d like to lose?”
I shook my head and walked on absorbed in thought. And are all our paraphernalia for funerals, our solemn black, and our long prayers but useless ceremonies? Why, according to this, the beliefs of the Chinese, Hottentot, African, and Indian are nearer the truth than our civilized creeds!
I find that there are few things in which society in this world so much differs from that of earth as in its social and political arrangements.
All the great system of living for appearances, and the habit of self-deception whereby men live outwardly what their secret lives disavow, are here entirely done away with.
In the first place the marriage relations differ materially from those of earth, and no false sentiment nor custom, nor religious belief, holds together as companions those who are dissimilar in their nature. Neither do men crucify their tastes and feelings from a mistaken idea of duty.
The miseries and disasters which are attendant on a life on earth they view as a parent would view the whooping-cough or scarlatina which afflict the body of his child—as necessary steps toward his growth and progress from youth to manhood.
A remarkable instance of this came under my own observation. You remember that the singular and sudden death of Abraham Lincoln was a matter of surprise to us. We could not see the purpose of an all-wise Providence in this sudden closing of an eventful career. It was discussed in every newspaper in the land, and the conclusion was that the Creator had some special purpose in his removal, and this we all believed.