CHAPTER VI.
SCENES AND INCIDENTS IN THE SPIRIT LAND.
As you gather around your cheerful firesides as mortals, and rejoice in the sweet associations and affections of the family circle, do you not sometimes think of those homes not made with hands, which the great army of your so-called dead inhabit? and do you not long to know something of them and their manner of existence?
I have recently visited one of these homes in the spirit world, of which I will endeavor to tell you. Imagine a large, white building, surrounded by pleasant grounds, and shaded by lofty trees (similar to your trees of maple and oak), in form, construction, and surroundings much like a substantial, comfortable country-seat of some well-to-do merchant in earth life. This home of which I speak is situated in “Pleasant Valley.” No wintry storms, no sudden waves of cold, no visitations of extreme heat, ever come to this place! The temperature of the valley is mild and delightful. There are many such homes as this of which I speak in Pleasant Valley, but they are not all inhabited by the same class of people.
TRIAL AND TRIUMPH.
In this comfortable home dwell two beings, male and female, companions in every sense of the term, whose delight it is to minister to the wants of others. I know not all the roads of suffering they passed, but I do know that on earth, many years ago, this woman loved and trusted in this man, and through the force of circumstances and conditions (perhaps because of a vacillating, fickle nature), he abandoned her to the merciless scorn of an unpitying world. Left alone, friendless and unaided, to fight the battles of life, what wonder that she was plunged in despair! Her babe lived scarcely three months on earth, ere it passed to the spirit world.
Crazed at this culmination of all her woes, the poor mother ended her mortal existence by suicide. For a time she led an aimless, restless existence in spirit, owing to the law of association drawing her back to former scenes; but soon, through the aid of ministering spirits, she was aroused to her true condition and prevailed upon to reach outward for a higher life.
Her mother-heart yearned and prayed for the tiny babe she had lost, when, lo, it was brought to her arms by tender mother-spirits, who had tended and cared for it with loving kindness. Mother and child were taken to a bright home, where flowers bloomed and branches waved, where all was beautiful, and there was nought of selfishness or woe to mar the serenity of the scene. Here in Pleasant Valley, surrounded by loving helpers and guides, these two beings unfolded in sweetness and purity, their lives growing into harmony with all mankind.
But the mother, whom I will call Mary, could not forget her early love; the object of her fondest affections was still dear to her soul, and in spite of unkindness, desertion, and neglect, her woman’s heart went out to him in a devotion born of undying love. At times, she could feel something like a chord vibrating within her, as if with pain, and she would feel that the spirit of her dear one was calling her to him.
At length she found him, still on earth, but, oh, how changed! Sorrow, want, and pain were marked on every feature. Oh, what tribulation and suffering had been his! Friends had died or deserted him; fortune had fled, and sickness marked him as her own. In hours of misery, thoughts of Mary had come to him; bitterly did he repent his past conduct, sadly did he mourn over his wasted life.
Soon he was called to the spirit world, but not at first did he find the angel of his dreams; though she was near, seeking to aid and assist him to throw off the clouds that pressed upon him, and to aid him to emerge from the terrible conditions that surged around him, it was impossible for her to announce her presence.