“My dear friend: The above is the communication which I received, verbatim, and which you will please accept for what it is worth. I believe it came from the source whence it purports to have emanated. I questioned W. W. regarding the nature of the marks of approbation. His reply was, ‘We rapped several times.’
[15] First spiritual sphere.
[16] This spirit, I have ascertained, was the late Mr. McIlhenny, treasurer to the Athenæum, who died in August, 1854. I took the more interest in this as he was my classmate, and was present at some of the investigations which led to my conversion. I took leave of him one evening in July, 1854, after a walk in Walnut street. He then appeared to be nearly a convert to Spiritualism, though he did not deem it prudent to acknowledge his opinions publicly. His remarks coincided with those ascribed to him by the truly angelic Maria. Within the last month Maria brought him to communicate with me.
[17] To meet the curiosity of the reader, it may be well to say that communications by the pen are either impressional—that is, resulting from the volition of the writer, aided in the matter by the influence of a spirit—or they are automatic; that is, produced by the mechanical action of the spirits on the hand of the medium, entirely independent of the medium’s volition.
[18] I would state, on the authority of this lady and her relatives, many of whom were opposed to Spiritualism, that this was the first time that she had ever produced a poetical effusion; though it has not been an uncommon circumstance for her, since then, when under spiritual influence, to write page after page of extremely beautiful and excellent composition, both in prose and verse, far surpassing in elegance of language her natural powers of thought and fancy.
[19] This article should have been inserted earlier, but was mislaid.
[20] The fact that my father, my brother, my nephew, and my friend General Cadwalader, are each residing with their mundane wives, proves that in this world a hymeneal torch may be lighted, which may not be extinguished by death.
[21] I quote here the language of Samuel, the wicked pope of Judea, to Saul, respecting the destruction of the tribe of Amalek: “Thus saith the Lord of hosts, I remember that which Amalek did to Israel, how he laid wait for him in the way, when he came up from Egypt. Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass. And he took Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword. But Saul and the people spared Agag, and the best of the sheep, and of the oxen, and of the fatlings, and the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them: but every thing that was vile and refuse, that they destroyed utterly.”
One would think here was butchery enough to satisfy a devil, but it does not satisfy the God of the Bible. Saul is deposed for giving quarter to Agag, and not carrying his revenge so far as to destroy the flocks and herds as well as the captive king, of whom the blood-thirsty, blasphemous pontiff becomes himself the cold-blooded executioner, hewing Agag to death before the Lord. Dr. Berg alleges that men are assimilated to the god whom they worship. What ought then to be the effect of worshipping the God thus described in the Bible?
How does this comport with the extravagant precepts of Christ, agreeably to which we are to return good for evil?