Part 10 (1/2)

A non-compliance with these conditions generally spoils the experiment.

SPIRITUALISM.

BY MRS. HARRIET BEECHER STOWE.

[The following was written for, and published in the _Christian Union_. It was reprinted in THE PHRENOLOGICAL JOURNAL in 1870. We present it here, as in some measure explanatory of all the matter which precedes it. There are many who do not accept all that is claimed to be true, in Modern Spiritualism, who will entertain the moderate views expressed by The Author of Uncle Tom's Cabin.

EDITOR.]

It is claimed that there are in the United States four million Spiritualists. The perusal of the advertis.e.m.e.nts in any one of the weekly newspapers devoted to this subject will show that there is a system organized all over the Union to spread these sentiments. From fifty to a hundred, and sometimes more, of lecturers advertise in a single paper, to speak up and down the land; and lyceums--progressive lyceums for children, spiritual pic-nics, and other movements of the same kind, are advertised. This kind of thing has been going on from year to year, and the indications now are that it is increasing rather than diminis.h.i.+ng.

It is claimed by the advocates of these sentiments that the number of those who boldly and openly profess them is exceeded by the greater number of those who are _secretly_ convinced, but who are unwilling to encounter the degree of obloquy or ridicule which they would probably meet on an open avowal.

All these things afford matter for grave thought to those to whom none of the great and deep movements of society are indifferent. When we think how very tender and sacred are the feelings with which this has to do--what power and permanency they always must have, we can not but consider such a movement of society ent.i.tled at least to the most serious and thoughtful consideration.

Our own country has just been plowed and seamed by a cruel war. The bullet that has pierced thousands of faithful b.r.e.a.s.t.s has cut the nerve of life and hope in thousands of homes. What yearning toward the invisible state, what agonized longings must have gone up as the sound of mournful surges, during these years succeeding the war! Can we wonder that any form of religion, or of superst.i.tion, which professes in the least to mitigate the anguish of that cruel separation, and to break that dreadful silence by any voice or token, has hundreds of thousands of disciples? If on review of the spiritualistic papers and pamphlets we find them full of vague wanderings and wild and purposeless flights of fancy, can we help pitying that craving of the human soul which all this represents and so imperfectly supplies?

The question arises, Has not the Protestant religion neglected to provide some portion of the true spiritual food of the human soul, and thus produced this epidemic craving? It is often held to be a medical fact that morbid appet.i.tes are the blind cry of nature for something needed in the bodily system which is lacking. The wise nurse or mother does not hold up to ridicule the poor little culprit who secretly picks a hole in the plastering that he may eat the lime; she considers within herself what is wanting in this little one's system, and how this lack shall be more judiciously and safely supplied. If it be phosphate of lime for the bones which nature is thus blindly crying for, let us give it to him more palatably and under more attractive forms.

So with the epidemic cravings of human society. The wise spiritual pastor or master would inquire what is wanting to these poor souls that they are thus with hungry avidity rus.h.i.+ng in a certain direction, and devouring with unhealthy eagerness all manner of crudities and absurdities.

May it not be spiritual food, of which their mother, the Church, has abundance, which she has neglected to set before them?

Now, if we compare the religious teachings of the present century with those of any past one, we shall find that the practical spiritualistic belief taught by the Bible has to a great extent dropped out of it.

Let us begin with the time of Jesus Christ. Nothing is more evident in reading his life than that he was acting all the time in view of _unseen_ and spiritual influences, which were more p.r.o.nounced and operative to him than any of the _visible_ and materialistic phenomena of the present life. In this respect the conduct of Christ, if imitated in the present day, would subject a man to the imputation of superst.i.tion or credulity. He imputed things to the direct agency of invisible spirits acting in the affairs of life, that we, in the same circ.u.mstances, attribute only to the const.i.tutional liabilities of the individual acted upon by force of circ.u.mstances.

As an example of this, let us take his language toward the Apostle Peter. With the habits of modern Christianity, the caution of Christ to Peter would have been expressed much on this fas.h.i.+on: ”Simon, Simon, thou art impulsive, and liable to be carried away with sudden impressions. The Jews are about to make an attack on me which will endanger thee.”

This was the exterior view of the situation, but our Lord did not take it. He said, ”Simon, Simon, Satan hath desired to have thee that he may sift thee as wheat; but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not.” This Satan was a person ever present in the mind of Christ. He was ever in his view as the invisible force by which all the visible antagonistic forces were ruled. When his disciples came home in triumph to relate the successes of their first preaching tour, Christ said, ”I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven.” When the Apostle Peter rebuked him for prophesying the tragical end of his earthly career, Christ answered not him, but the invisible spirit whose influence over him he recognized: ”Get thee behind me, Satan! Thou art an offense unto me.”

When the Saviour's last trial approached, he announced the coming crisis in the words, ”The prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me.”

When he gave himself into the hands of the Sanhedrim, he said, ”This is your hour and that of the powers of darkness.” When disputing with the unbelieving Jews, he told them that they were of their father, the devil; that he was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth; that when he spoke a lie he spoke of his own, for he was a liar, and the father of lies.

In short, the life of Christ, as viewed by himself, was not a conflict with enemies _in the flesh_, but with an invisible enemy, artful, powerful, old as the foundations of the world, and ruling by his influences over evil spirits and men in the flesh.

The same was the doctrine taught by the Apostles. In reading the Epistles we see in the strongest language how the whole visible world was up in arms against them. St. Paul gives this catalogue of his physical and worldly sufferings, proving his right to apostles.h.i.+p mainly by perseverance in persecution. ”In labors more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft; of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one; thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned; thrice have I suffered s.h.i.+pwreck--a night and a day have I been in the deep. In journeyings often, in perils of water, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils among false brethren.”

One would say with all this, there was a sufficient array of physical and natural causes against St. Paul to stand for something. In modern language--yea, in the language of good modern Christians--it would be said ”What is the use of taking into account any devil or any invisible spirits to account for Paul's trials and difficulties?--it is enough that the whole world has set itself against what he teaches--Jew and Gentile are equally antagonistic to it.”

But St. Paul says in the face of all this, ”We are not wrestling with flesh and blood, but with princ.i.p.alities and powers and the leaders of the darkness of this world, and against wicked spirits in high places;”

and St. Peter, recognizing the sufferings and persecutions of the early Christians, says, ”Be sober, be vigilant.” Why? ”Because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour.”

In like manner we find in the discourses of our Lord and the Apostles the recognition of a counteracting force of good spirits. When Nathaniel, one of his early disciples, was astonished at his spiritual insight, he said to him, ”Thou shalt see greater things than these!

Hereafter ye shall see heaven open, and angels of G.o.d ascending and descending on the Son of man.” When he spoke of the importance of little children, he announced that each one of them had a guardian angel who beheld the face of G.o.d. When he was transfigured on the Mount, Moses and Elijah appeared in glory, and talked with him of his death that he was to accomplish at Jerusalem. In the hour of his agony in the garden, an angel appeared and ministered to him. When Peter drew a sword to defend him, he said, ”Put up thy sword. Thinkest thou that I can not now pray to my Father, and he will give me more than twelve legions of angels?”

Thus, between two contending forces of the invisible world was Christianity inaugurated. During the primitive ages the same language was used by the Fathers of the church, and has ever since been traditional.