Professor Wheaton devised a means of beautifully illustrating this sympathy. If a sounding board is placed so as to resound to all the instruments of the orchestra, and connected by a metallic rod of considerable length with the sounding-board of a harp or piano, the instrument will accurately repeat the notes transmitted.
The nervous system, in its two-fold relation to the physical and spiritual being, is inconceivably more finely organized than the most perfect musical instrument, and is possessed of finer sensitiveness.
But it must not be inferred that all minds are receptive. Light falls on all substances alike, but is very differently affected. One class of bodies absorbs all but the yellow rays; another, all but the blue; another, all but the red, because these substances are so organized that they respond only to waves of the colors reflected.
Some individuals have the ear so organized that they can hear certain sounds, but are totally deaf to others. The waves of sound strike all tympanums alike; yet in these instances they are incapable of responding to certain waves. Some person who delight in music, although all the lower notes are plainly heard, as soon as the tune rises to a high key, can not hear a single sound. In others, this is reversed. The eye of some individuals is similarly arranged—some colors being undiscernible, while others are perceptible. The vibrations are the same in all these cases, but owing to peculiarities of organization are not felt. As musical instruments to respond must be attuned in harmony, so there must be correlated harmony between minds which transmit and receive thoughts. All minds give out vibrations, as all musical strings give out sounds; and as there must be a corresponding string to receive its notes, so there must be not only a sensitive but harmoniously attuned mind to receive the thought vibrations.
Individuals not mutually harmonious—at least in some point—do not excite a mental influence on each other; but if they are thus organized, they will influence each other. This is unavoidable, whether the will is excited or not; but if the stronger will is exerted, its power is proportionally greater, and it will magnetize the weaker; and the peculiar phenomena attending that mental state will be manifested.
It is not the body which magnetizes or is magnetized; it is the mind; and these effects are produced outside of the physical system. The fact that one person can magnetize another by the simple power of the will, though at a distance, is evidence that the mind in this exercise of power is independent of the body.
If we grant, for the sake of the argument, that there is a spirit back of the physical aspect of mortal life, it will be readily seen that all that has been said of the transference of thought between individuals, holds true between spiritual beings, as this transference at last resides in the spirit-being. As man is a spirit incarnated, differing in that respect only from a disembodied spirit, the body is the only obstacle between him and the spirits above him. Sensitiveness to impressions from another, or from a spirit, rest on the same cause; and in the higher realm of spirit, the transference of thought is controlled by the same laws, and reaches more perfect expression.
Intimations of an Intelligent Force.
Belief in Guardian Angels.—Memory brings back the days of our childhood and again we hear our mother sing that simple song of joy, which, it is said, Bishop McKendree murmured on his dying bed: