{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_60406/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_60406","id":"gutenberg_60406","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/60406","summary":null,"tags":["Automatism","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Clairvoyance","Extrasensory perception","Planchette","Spirit writings"],"text":"Transcriber\u2019s Note: struck-through text is indicated ~like this~.\n\n\n\n\nTHE SEVEN PURPOSES\n\n\n\n\n                                  _The_\n                             SEVEN PURPOSES\n\n                            _An Experience in\n                           Psychic Phenomena_\n\n                                   BY\n                            MARGARET CAMERON\n\n                             [Illustration]\n\n                      _Harper & Brothers Publishers\n                          New York and London_\n\n                           THE SEVEN PURPOSES\n\n                  Copyright, 1918, by Harper & Brothers\n                 Printed in the United States of America\n                         Published October, 1918\n\n\n\n\n\u201c_That is what we hope to establish as a recognized truth in your life\nthere; that a force as yet unknown to science is operating between the\nplanes, and can be developed and used in your life._\u201d\n\n\u201c_A force compared to which electricity is spring water._\u201d\n\n\u201c_Some day your scientists will discover and prove by experiment certain\nlaws now unrecognized._\u201d\n\n\u201c_If you will only believe and know that I am not dead._\u201d\n\n\u201c_Come, all ye who struggle and strive! Perceive once and forever the\npurpose of life. Join now the forces of construction, and bring to all\nmen brotherhood._\u201d\n\n\u201c_A great brotherhood is only possible when its component parts are\ngreat._\u201d\n\n\u201c_Forget the class and remember the man. Forget the price and remember\nthe pearl. Forget the labor and remember the fruit. Forget the temple and\nremember God._\u201d\n\n\n\n\nINTRODUCTION\n\n\nTwenty-five years or more ago my attention was attracted to the\nentertaining possibilities of a planchette, and, like other young\npersons, I played with one at intervals for several years. Like others,\nalso, I speculated concerning the source of the remarkable statements\nsometimes obtained in this way, but the assumption that these statements\nwere dictated by disembodied personalities always seemed to me rather\nabsurd.\n\nAt no time has my interest in the matter been sufficient to lead me\nto read anything describing or discussing psychic phenomena, with\nthe exception of an occasional magazine article. Neither have I read\nphilosophies to any extent. I have been always a busy person, taking\nlife at first hand, without much regard to what students have said about\nit. Such faith as I have had in anything, human or divine, has been\nbased upon works, and, without convincing demonstration, it has been\nimpossible for me to be sure that individual life continued.\n\nAfter the beginning of the war, however, when interest in the possible\nsurvival of the individual was so suddenly and pathetically increased,\nand one heard on every hand of attempts to establish communication with\nthose gone before, I resolved to experiment again with planchette; but\nit was not until our friend V\u2014\u2014 expressed a desire to try it with me,\nsometime in 1917, that I really bought one. For almost a year it lay\nuntouched in its box, and when finally we found opportunity to test it we\nhad no success. It did not move from the spot where we placed it, and I\nmade no attempt to try it alone.\n\nSeveral weeks later, two friends, Mrs. Wylie and Miss Gaylord, told me\nthat they had been making efforts, through some one near their home,\nto get into touch with their brother Frederick, with results they\nthought promising. A day or two later we tried planchette together, with\nsome success. It moved briskly, wrote \u201cFrederick ... mother ... love\n... happy ...\u201d and other detached words. It also persisted in making\nlittle circles, perhaps two inches in diameter, the pencil tracing the\ncircumference again and again. This was so often repeated that Mrs. Wylie\nthought it might be a symbol, but could obtain no satisfactory reply to\nquestions about it.\n\nMy friends went home without renewing the experiment, and my interest was\nnot greatly stimulated. It seemed quite probable that the words written\nhad reflected the thoughts and desires of Frederick\u2019s sisters, and\nthat the whole episode could be explained by the theory of unconscious\nresponse by the muscles of the hand to the prompting of the subconscious\nmind. I had dismissed the matter, as far as my own participation in it\nwas concerned, when a letter came from Mrs. Gaylord, saying that her\ndaughters had told her I had \u201cmediumistic power,\u201d and suggesting that I\nmight be able to help her.\n\nI knew that the exceeding bitterness of her grief lay, not in the\nseparation from her only son, but in her inability to believe that his\nidentity and development continued, and that the assurance that he had\nnot \u201cgone out, like a snuffed candle,\u201d as she afterward expressed it,\nwould bring her the greatest\u2014indeed, the only possible comfort. Therefore\nI replied at once that while I had no reason to believe that I possessed\n\u201cmediumistic power\u201d to the slightest degree, I would make further\nexperiments, at the same time warning her that the attempt would probably\nprove fruitless.\n\nThe following pages contain a partial history of the result. It was soon\nevident that certain of these revelations were of too great moment to\nbe withheld from public knowledge. In addition, while much of the more\nintimate personal matter has been omitted, most of those to whom these\nmessages were given have felt impelled to share, in this tragic time, the\ncomfort and assurance of their conviction, and have voluntarily yielded\ntheir privacy, hoping thereby to bring to those in sorrow an added faith\nin the continuance of personality, with all that this implies.\n\nTo facilitate reference, and to avoid breaking the sequence of the twelve\nimpersonal communications forming the basis of the whole revelation,\nthis report has been arranged in three parts. First, the genesis and\nrapid development of the individual message, brief at first, and purely\npersonal, but growing both in volume and in import with each day. Second,\nthe Lessons. Third, additional individual messages, no less personal in\ntheir original application than the first, but more impressive in their\nwider human appeal and significance, illuminating and emphasizing the\nmeaning of the Lessons.\n\nFor obvious reasons, the names and initials used have been substituted\nfor those of the persons involved, with three or four exceptions.\n\n\n\n\nPart I\n\n\u201c_That is the eternal battle, between the purposes of progress and\nbuilding, and the purposes of disintegration. It goes on in your life,\nand it goes on less bitterly in ours. Help me build as we began, toward\nthe great unity._\u201d\n\n\u201c_This is the battle to which we call you and all who are for\nprogress._\u201d\n\n\n\n\nI\n\n\nMy first serious attempt to establish communication through planchette\nwith a person or persons in a life beyond ours was made Sunday morning,\nMarch 3, 1918. Not so very serious an attempt, either, for I anticipated\nno success, and was not without a humorous appreciation of my position,\nsitting with my hand on a toy, inviting communication with celestial\npowers. I remember laughing a little, as I pictured the sardonic glee\nwith which certain of my friends would be likely to regard such a\nproceeding.\n\nPerhaps this is as good a time as any to say that I was seeking a\nstranger. I never saw Frederick. When our friendship with his parents\nbegan they lived in one city, we in another, and he in a third and more\ndistant one, where he was first a reporter and later a political and\neditorial writer on the staff of a leading newspaper. I knew that he was\nyoung, successful, a bachelor, and singularly devoted to his family,\nas they to him. But his habits of thought and speech had never been\ndescribed to me, at first because it was expected that we would meet, and\nin the much closer intimacy of our later acquaintance, because the pain\nof his loss was so poignant that no member of the family could speak of\nhim with composure. I had never seen a photograph of him, even.\n\nAfter perhaps twenty minutes, during which planchette did not move, I\nleft the paper\u2014a roll of blank wall-paper, called lining-paper, which I\nfound years ago to offer the most continuous and satisfactory surface for\nuse with planchette\u2014spread over the table, and went into another room,\nintending to return later. But I forgot it, and only when I was putting\nthings in order for the night did I re-enter that room and remember my\npromise to Mrs. Gaylord. I decided to make one more attempt, that I might\nbe able to tell her positively that I had been unsuccessful. All other\nmembers of the household were away\u2014Cass at Atlantic City, recuperating\nfrom an illness\u2014and I was entirely alone in the apartment.\n\nFor some minutes planchette was motionless, but almost immediately I\nfelt the curious sense of vitality, very difficult to describe, that\nprecedes movement. It is like touching something alive and feeling its\nlatent power. Presently it began to move. Unfortunately no exact record\nof those first messages was kept, and this report of them is taken from\nmy letters to Cass, written immediately after each interview, and from\nthe typewritten record begun a week or ten days afterward, in which was\nincluded what I could remember of details not written to him. At first\nthere was little capitalization, but within a few days capitals were used\nfreely. The punctuation throughout has been added, except in cases noted.\n\n                         _From a letter dated Monday morning, March 4th_:\n\n... Instead of doing the usual loop sort of thing, it made straight runs\nacross the table. I asked, \u201cAre you ready to write?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d Then, as\nnearly as I can remember, it went like this:\n\n\u201cAre you Frederick?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you Mary Kendal?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you Anne Lowe?\u201d[1] \u201cNo.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid I know you in life here?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d\n\n\u201cRecently?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you my father?\u201d At this it ran sharply toward me, point first, but\nfor some time did not reply, perhaps because I so hoped it would write\n\u201cyes.\u201d Eventually, however, it wrote a very clear and uncompromising\n\u201cNo.\u201d\n\n\u201cCan you tell me who you are?\u201d \u201cYes. Mary.\u201d\n\n\u201cMary Kendal?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhich Mary? What Mary?\u201d \u201cMary ...\u201d followed by a character that might\nhave been either K or H, but looked more like K.\n\n\u201cMary Kendal?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d\n\n\u201cTell me again.\u201d \u201cMary K.\u201d\n\n\u201cMary _K._?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d Planchette was down at the lower right-hand corner\nof the table when I asked the last question, and it swung to the center,\nwriting that \u201cyes\u201d very quickly and firmly.\n\n\u201c_My_ Mary K.?\u201d \u201cYes ... yes ... yes.\u201d\n\nHer name was Mary Katherine M\u2014\u2014, but I always called her Mary K. She has\nbeen dead sixteen years or more. Over and over she insisted that she was\nMary K. Sometimes, in pauses, with the casters hardly moving at all, the\nthing would write \u201cMary,\u201d in tiny script, but round and clear.\n\nI asked if there were any message, and it wrote, \u201cMon ...,\u201d trailing off\ninto a series of waves, a good many times. I guessed Monday ... money\n... Mons ..., but always the answer was, \u201cNo.\u201d Finally it wrote \u201cman\u201d\nvery clearly. I could not get more for quite a while. Finally came, \u201cMany\nthanks.\u201d\n\n\u201cThanks for what?\u201d \u201cFor knowing.\u201d\n\nI asked if Frederick or Anne were there. \u201cNo.\u201d\n\n\u201cAny message?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d\n\n\u201cFor whom?\u201d \u201cBroth ...,\u201d trailing off again. This several times.\n\u201cBrother?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhere?\u201d \u201cAlbany.\u201d\n\n\u201cHis name?\u201d \u201cJames.\u201d\n\n\u201cJames M\u2014\u2014?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d This was confusing.\n\n\u201cWhere?\u201d Beginning apparently with U, the writing trailed off. Finally\nmade out \u201cUnited ...,\u201d but no more. Then I remembered that Mary K.\u2019s only\nbrother was killed in an accident, years before she went over herself. I\nsaid so, and the thing began making loops. That used to be planchette\u2019s\nway of laughing at me.\n\n\u201cWhy did you say that?\u201d \u201cJoke.\u201d This was not at all like Mary K. She had\na fine mind and was not given to buffoonery. I have since thought that\nshe might have been trying to get over a message to some other person\u2019s\nbrother.[2]\n\n\u201c... Can you get word from Frederick Gaylord?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d[3]\n\n\u201cWill you come again?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you been trying all these years to get into touch with me?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d\n\n\u201cWill you help me make a bridge between those on your side and those\nhere?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d Then immediately it went back and wrote, \u201cYes,\u201d over the\n\u201cNo.\u201d Very curious.\n\nAfter a long pause, I said I would go to bed, if there were nothing more,\nand it wrote, quickly, \u201cGo.\u201d I said, \u201cGood night.\u201d \u201cGood night. God bless\nyou.\u201d I asked again if this were Mary K., and got the same quick \u201cYes.\u201d\nThen I put planchette away and came out to my room. It was one o\u2019clock.\nThree before I went to sleep. Can you imagine anything more weird than\nmy sitting here alone in the middle of the night, with that thing fairly\nracing under my fingers part of the time, insisting it was nobody I\nexpected? Claiming to be a very dear old friend, but the last I should\nexpect under the circumstances. It was certainly queer, but I am very\nsure something outside of myself was doing it. I shall try again to-night.\n\n                         _From a letter dated Monday evening, March 4th_:\n\nI have just had another amazing try at planchette. This time it was Mary\nKendal, writing one word at a time. \u201cLet ... Manse[4] ... know ... I ...\nam ... here....\u201d She gave me several intimate messages for him, and when\nI finally said I would write and ask him to come, so she could tell him\nherself, she wrote, \u201cYes ... yes ... yes,\u201d very quickly.\n\nWhat do you make of this? Isn\u2019t it the queerest thing you ever heard\nof? In the midst of her talk, another hand took hold, very brisk and\nenergetic.\n\n\u201cNot Mary?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d\n\n\u201cPerhaps Frederick?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d\n\n\u201cMessage?\u201d \u201cYes. Mother.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnything more?\u201d \u201cHappy.\u201d\n\n\u201cMore yet?\u201d \u201cOnly love.\u201d\n\nThen he was gone, and Mary came again, writing \u201cMiss A\u2014\u2014, messenger,\u201d\nmany times. Later, Frederick interrupted to write one word, \u201cfamily.\u201d[5]\nThen another hand began writing \u201cAnnie Manning,\u201d over and over, and,\n\u201ctell Manning.\u201d I said that I knew no Manning. How find him? Answer,\n\u201cQuestion.\u201d I did not know what that meant.... There was a lot more, but\nI am too tired to write it to-night.\n\nB\u2014\u2014 Gaylord telephoned to-night. She is either coming to New York\nThursday or going to Atlantic City, if I am there.... This is the most\namazing thing that ever happened to me! To-night it was as if several\nwere trying to talk at once. I am almost afraid to have B. G. come,\nyet it was for her sake that I began this. It seems too indefinite\nand unsatisfactory. But at least she can be sure I am not faking it.\nSomething outside of me does it.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThat same evening I wrote to Mansfield Kendal, though what his attitude\ntoward this situation would be I could not even guess. We had known\nhim well for several years, but our numerous discussions had never\ntouched questions of religious faith and a future life. A man of\nextensive reading and of wide interests, supplemented by long residence\nabroad, he has been engaged for years in the executive conduct of large\nengineering and agricultural enterprises. I knew him to be intellectually\nopen-minded. But I also knew him to be a devoted adherent of the orthodox\nChurch, giving much time and thought to its support, and I was afraid\nthat an assumption on my part of ability to communicate with the departed\nmight offend some deep and reverent sense in him. Therefore, while I\nwrote him fully of my surprising experience, giving him Mary\u2019s messages,\nI promised at the same time never to force the subject in conversation,\nshould he prefer not to discuss it. Subsequently, impelled by Mary\u2019s\ncontinued insistence, I wrote several other letters to him, which, like\nthe first, were sent to his club in New York City, as I knew him to\nbe traveling in the Middle West and thought they would reach him more\nquickly in this way than if sent to his business headquarters in the\nSouth.\n\nThus, curiously, I found myself vicariously engaged in a double search\nfor a mother on this plane seeking her son on the next, and for a wife on\nthe next plane seeking her husband here, and it is significant that, of\nthe two, Mary Kendal was the more insistent. As she said, later, \u201cWe know\nhow much it means.\u201d\n\n               _From a letter to Cass, dated Tuesday morning, March 5th_:\n\nAnother evening with Mary! H. dined with me. I told her something about\nplanchette, and she wanted to see it work.... This time it wrote, \u201cMary\nKendal,\u201d at once, and, \u201cTell Manse I love him.... Tell him Miss A\u2014\u2014\nis messenger from some one he knows.... Mentally beautiful people are\nfearless.... Faith is fearlessness.... Mannerisms are essential to\nrecognition.\u201d Some of these took a long time to work out.\n\nH. asked, \u201cDo you mind my being here?\u201d \u201cExcellent portent.\u201d\n\nI asked why. \u201cIntellectual interest.\u201d\n\nH. said, \u201cYou mean that you are glad to have intelligent people\ninterested?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d\n\nWhen we were talking about H.\u2019s interest, it wrote, \u201cTell others.\u201d This\nwas repeated several times. \u201cI am a missionary,\u201d came as clearly as I\nhave written it here. We asked if she meant a missionary from that life\nto this. \u201cYes.\u201d At the end she again urged H. to tell others. I laughed,\nsaying, \u201cTell as many others as you like about the experience, but don\u2019t\ntell too many that it came through me.\u201d \u201cSorry.\u201d\n\n\u201cSorry that I am unwilling to be overwhelmed by a flood of curiosity and\nhysteria?\u201d \u201cSorrow.\u201d I said I would be glad to help people in sorrow.\n\u201cSorrowful people suffer.\u201d Isn\u2019t that like Mary Kendal?\n\nWhen H. was leaving, it wrote: \u201cGood night. Tell others.\u201d\n\nAfter she had gone I went back, and got another movement entirely.\n\u201cFrederick?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d He seems to have more difficulty in writing than she\ndoes. Is very clear at first, but becomes illegible sooner.\n\n\u201cDo you know that your mother is coming?\u201d \u201cYes.... Wish to make her at\npeace.\u201d I said I wished to make her at peace, too, and would do all I\ncould, and he wrote, \u201cThank you.\u201d\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAs has been said, Cass had been ill, and his improvement after going to\nAtlantic City had not been as rapid as we had hoped it might be. A letter\nreceived from him on Tuesday reported a slight relapse, and promised a\ntelegram on Wednesday. It had been arranged that I should join him if he\nneeded me.\n\n                      _From a letter dated Wednesday evening, March 6th:_\n\nYour letter and wire both came after four, though the letters usually\narrive with the first mail in the morning. I was getting a little\nanxious. Went to planchette and asked Mary Kendal whether she knew\nanything about you. She said you were better to-day and that a letter was\ncoming, but that I must go to Atlantic City.[6]\n\nFrederick also came, seeming very anxious lest the meeting with his\nmother fail. Wrote \u201cmessage\u201d several times, and by dint of some\nquestioning I found it was not a message he wished to send, but one he\nwished me to send to her about coming at once. Wrote of her \u201cmental\nanguish,\u201d an expression I never should have used myself, and wanted her\nto join me at Atlantic City. Knew nothing about you, but was keen to meet\nher.\n\nLater, he seemed to go, and Mary Kendal wrote a little. Then came\nsomething very hard to get. Over and over we tried. \u201cCom ... come ...\ncomf ... comp....\u201d I suggested various words. Always the answer was \u201cNo.\u201d\nFinally, very clearly and slowly, \u201cComfort dear Mother.\u201d After the M of\nthe last word I expected Manse, as I thought Mary was still writing. When\nit proved to be \u201cMother,\u201d I said, \u201cIs this Frederick?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d I promised\nagain to do all I could. He wrote, \u201cThank you,\u201d and went.\n\nIt is an amazing experience!... To sit all alone here and have that\nfoolish toy move firmly and definitely under my hands, write things I\nhave to puzzle out, sign names of persons who are what we call \u201cdead,\u201d\nand beg me to send messages to those they love\u2014all this is startling and\ndeeply impressive. Deeply moving.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe next day I joined Cass at Atlantic City. He had never seen a\nplanchette used, and was much interested in the whole matter. In the\nevening we experimented, and \u201cMary Kendal\u201d was written at once.\n\nHe exclaimed, \u201cGod bless you, Mary Kendal!\u201d\n\n\u201cGod bless you, too. Tell Manse I love him. Don\u2019t fail to tell him\nthat.\u201d During all the preceding days this had been her constant plea.\nRepeatedly I assured her that I had told him, and as often she urged,\n\u201cTell him again.\u201d\n\nThen came a strong, brisk movement, to and fro, for a space of about\nfive inches. I asked if this were Frederick, and received an affirmative\nanswer, after which planchette ran about, as if in uncontrollable\nexcitement, presently pausing to write:\n\n\u201cYou are a trump!\u201d We laughed, and he added, \u201cYou bet!\u201d\n\nAs we had never known Frederick, and were unaware at that time of the\ncontinuance of what some one familiar with this experience has defined\nas \u201cthe subtleties of personality,\u201d this enthusiastic use of slang was\nstartling.\n\nWhen I asked if he had thought I would fail him, he replied, \u201cNo, but I\nwas afraid Mother would not come.\u201d\n\n[The next day Mrs. Gaylord told me that when Frederick begged me, on\nWednesday, to send her a message about coming at once, she had almost\ndecided to postpone her visit until after our return to New York.]\n\nMore running about followed, during which Cass said that it was a pity to\nobliterate the earlier messages in that way. Planchette then swung back\nto a clear space and wrote clearly, \u201cMother is coming!\u201d Beneath this, the\nbow-knot flourish we have since learned to associate with Frederick.\n\n\u201cYou are a brick!\u201d was a later comment. When Cass said he had thought the\nlast word would be friend, Frederick concluded: \u201cFriend, too. Thank you a\nmillion times.\u201d\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAn interesting, but rather confusing, feature of these earlier\ncommunications was the constant interruption by Annie Manning. On all\noccasions, frequently even breaking into messages from some other person,\nshe wrote her name and her one request,\u201cTell Manning.\u201d During this\nperiod, also, I repeatedly asked Frederick to give me a message for his\nfather, and was unable to account for his invariable refusal.\n\nOnce, I asked Mary Kendal if she had no message for me, personally, and\nshe returned, \u201cYes, believe,\u201d which seemed, at the moment, somewhat\ncryptic, though the relation of my faith to the full development of this\nintercourse was afterward explained.\n\nThursday night, at the end of the fifth day, I was fairly certain that\nI had established communication with three definite and recognizable\npersonalities on the next plane, but I dreaded Mrs. Gaylord\u2019s arrival the\nfollowing day, lest these fragmentary messages fail either to convince or\nto comfort her.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\n\nThe next morning, Friday, March 8th, before giving Frederick an\nopportunity to communicate with his mother, I read her my letters to\nCass, wishing her to know just what had occurred and my attitude toward\nit. Then we turned to planchette.\n\nFrom this point, the account is taken from the original manuscript. At\nfirst we did not realize the importance of writing in our questions, some\nof which we were unable to remember later. During those first days, also,\nthe messages were sometimes confused by other messages written over them,\nor by lines and circles done in apparent excitement and joy, and were\nimpossible to decipher afterward.\n\nFrederick\u2019s writing, from the first moment with his mother, was quick and\nfirm\u2014at that time the most rapid and consecutive I had ever seen done\nthrough planchette, although in comparison with later communications\nthese were slow and fragmentary.\n\n\u201cMother dearest,\u201d he began, immediately, without question or comment\nfrom either of us.\n\nShe told me that this had been his name for her, which I had not known.\nHe went on, writing eagerly, with brief pauses between phrases.\n\n\u201cI am here, dearest.... Just believe.... Mother, you do believe, don\u2019t\nyou?... Tell me you do.\u201d\n\nAfter replying to some questions, he began making the small circles first\nnoticed during the preliminary episode when his sisters were in New York.\nI asked what they meant.\n\n\u201cJoy.... Don\u2019t fail to make her believe.\u201d I reminded him that this was\nhis responsibility, and he added, \u201cYou and I.\u201d\n\nA question of which there is no record drew this reply: \u201cYes, busy every\nminute.... Work is so interesting.... I love you just the same.... Go\nhome when I can.... Tell Dad I am with him ... helping all I can ... I\nam so glad you came.... I was afraid you would not.... Go home in peace,\nMother dearest. I am alive and happy and busy and well.\u201d\n\nShe said it was like him to sum it all up that way.\n\n\u201cOf course it is like me. It is \u2018me.\u2019\u201d\n\nSome personal comment concerning members of the family followed, in\nthe midst of which Annie Manning interrupted with her invariable, \u201cTell\nManning.\u201d Asked if she had any connection with the Gaylord family, she\nsaid, \u201cNo, good-by,\u201d and Frederick resumed his sentence where it had been\nbroken off.\n\nThroughout this and subsequent interviews Mrs. Gaylord and I kept up a\nrunning conversation, impossible to reproduce here\u2014my hand still resting\non planchette\u2014to which Frederick frequently contributed a remark,\nprecisely as if he had been present in the flesh. Again, he would break\na pause by addressing some characteristic statement or appeal to his\nmother, sometimes, she told me afterward, answering her unspoken thought.\n\nOver and over he begged her to say that she was convinced of his presence\nand identity, and at last she gave him this assurance.\n\n\u201cOh, thank God!\u201d He made strong circles, before running up to a clear\nspace some inches above, to add, \u201cTell Dad.\u201d\n\nFor the first time, a possible explanation of his inexorable refusal to\ngive me a message for his father occurred to me, and when I asked, he\nsaid, \u201cYes, I want to reach them through her.\u201d\n\nHe told her not to think of him as he had been during the months of his\nlast illness, saying: \u201cForget all that. It is over, and I am well and\nstrong, and happier than ever\u2014now.\u201d When we wondered whether it had\ndistressed him to be unable to communicate with his family, he said,\n\u201cYes, I needed that.\u201d\n\n\u201cWill you talk every day, you and she?\u201d he asked, presently. \u201cThank you.\u201d\n\n\u201cMrs. Gaylord, Frederick is a fine force,\u201d followed immediately, in a\nmore running script, and when I said this must be Mary Kendal, the answer\nwas: \u201cYes. Tell Manse I love him.... Tell him again.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe doesn\u2019t need to be told that,\u201d I assured her, as I had so many times\nbefore.\n\nAnd again she returned: \u201cYes, he does. There are reasons. Tell him.\u201d I\npromised to write to him once more, and she continued: \u201cMrs. Gaylord,\nFrederick wants you to be sure that he is doing more here than he could\nthere. You should not grieve for that, should you? You have a fearless\nmind in other things. Trust for that. Good-by.\u201d\n\n\u201cMother dearest, that was Mrs. Kendal,\u201d Frederick resumed, with his more\nvigorous movement. \u201cShe is a missionary, and a fine force.\u201d\n\nNoticing the repetition of this word, I asked, \u201cYou say force, not\nspirit?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, force is what moves things.\u201d\n\nTo his mother\u2019s inquiry about a friend, he replied: \u201cHe is here with\nme, working. Bob\u2019s little girl is here, too.\u201d She told me that a medium\nvisited by his sisters had described him with a little girl, saying that\nhe wanted them to \u201ctell Bob.\u201d [I had heard this from them, also, and the\nsubject recurred later.]\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d he acquiesced. \u201cSame child.\u201d\n\nWhen she expressed her belief that he was still alive and growing,\npromising that she would be happier in future, he said: \u201cThank you,\nMother dearest. That is all I need. Tell Dad to be happy, too. I am with\nhim. He has not lost a son. I am better and bigger and more useful than I\never could have been there, but I have been sorry you suffered so much.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you been trying recently to let us know you were with us?\u201d she\ninquired.\n\n\u201cYes, for months. At first I could not.\u201d\n\nHe said that Mary Kendal had found him for us, and when I mentioned that\nMary K. had come first to me, he explained: \u201cYes, she is more used to it.\nShe found Mrs. Kendal, and she told me.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou had better get your lunch,\u201d he suggested, after a pause, rousing us\nfrom our complete absorption to a consciousness that it was late. Mrs.\nGaylord denied being hungry, but he warned her\u2014characteristically, I\nlearned afterward, \u201cYou will have a headache, Mother dearest, if you\ndon\u2019t.\u201d\n\nAfter luncheon we went out for a walk, and then to our respective rooms\nto rest, the morning having been fatiguing in its emotional strain.\nPlanchette and paper had been left in Mrs. Gaylord\u2019s room, and in the\nafternoon, while Cass and I were still alone, I picked up a lead-pencil\nand placed its point on a sheet of letter-paper, expecting no response.\nTo my great surprise, I was conscious almost instantly of its vitality.\nThe sensation is comparable to that of holding a quiet, live bird,\nwrapped in a handkerchief, its energy muffled but palpable. Sometimes\nthis sensation of a current from without is communicated to the hand and\narm, sometimes only to the fingers.\n\nIn a short time the pencil moved, writing, \u201cMary Kendal,\u201d followed by the\nusual messages for Manse.\n\nCass asked whether it annoyed them to be questioned, or interfered with\nthings they might wish to tell us.\n\n\u201cNo, it does not interfere. We are here to tell you what we can, but we\ncannot tell everything.... You have the right to know what we can tell\nyou.... You are getting nearer the big things every day.\u201d This made Cass\nwonder whether \u201cthe big things\u201d would come to us in this life or the\nnext, and she added: \u201cBoth. You begin there and keep on growing. As soon\nas you are ready, big truths are shown to you.\u201d\n\nAddressing me, he made some allusion to what \u201cshe\u201d had said, suggesting\nthat it seemed to support a theory he had once held, that this world is\none of elimination.\n\n\u201cNo, it is one of growth,\u201d was her answer. \u201cAnd \u2018she\u2019 is trying to tell\nyou that growth begins there and does not stop. It goes on and on, as\nlong as you are worthy.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen unworthiness kills?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt does not kill. It defers.\u201d\n\nWeeks afterward, it was interesting to turn back to these early pages\nof the record and find how much of the wide significance of later\nrevelations had been foreshadowed from the first.\n\n\u201cAre you as eager for this communication as we are?\u201d\n\n\u201cWe are more eager, because we know how much it means. We know that more\ntruth can be taught this way than any other.\u201d\n\nCass turned to Mrs. Gaylord, who had rejoined us, saying that this seemed\nto imply that they were our superiors.\n\n\u201cNo, we are your elders,\u201d said Mary Kendal.\n\nAs has generally been the case during these interviews, we were talking\namong ourselves, frequently going on with our conversation while the\npencil wrote. Some one wondered how or why they had time or desire to\nleave their presumably more important work to talk to us.\n\n\u201cBecause we are all humans, after all,\u201d Mary responded, \u201cand it is our\nwork to help, just as it is yours. Many people do not want to help, here\nor there.... This life is just a continuation of yours under happier\nconditions.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you happier there than you were here, Mary?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, except for Manse.\u201d\n\nMrs. Gaylord asked whether a man who had loved books, and had always kept\nhimself surrounded by them in this life, would find that interest there.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d Mary said, \u201cbut we have its equivalent interest.\u201d\n\nMrs. Gaylord then explained that the medium already mentioned had\ndescribed Frederick to his sisters as surrounded by books.\n\n\u201cHe told her that to identify himself, as characteristic.\u201d\n\n[In this connection, an incident occurring three months later is\ninteresting.\n\n[One night, about the middle of June, a group of us had been talking for\nsome time, through my pencil, with friends on the next plane, when one\nof the women announced that she could see distinctly a large man\u2019s hand\nresting upon the hand of a man present.\n\n[The person in question\u2014a hard-headed, practical business man,\nsuccessfully conducting large affairs\u2014looked startled, saying that he had\nnoticed a peculiar sensation in that hand, and asked whether a friend,\nwhom he named, was actually present.\n\n[\u201cYes,\u201d was the reply through the pencil. \u201cR\u2014\u2014 saw. I manifested physical\nattributes for a minute. I have no hands, but I can imagine them and\nproject them in your minds, occasionally.\u201d\n\n[No one else saw the hand, and at no other time in my experience has\nanything of this kind occurred.]\n\nI asked Mary Kendal whether they preferred planchette or pencil, and she\nsaid, \u201cIt is easier for us this way.\u201d Therefore, except on one memorable\noccasion, all later writing has been done with a pencil.\n\nFor the information of persons interested in physical details, it may\nbe explained that I generally use a long pencil, which is held erect,\nalmost at right angles to the paper, the fingers clasping it lightly two\nor three inches from its point, the hand and arm entirely unsupported.\nIn the very rapid writing that has sometimes been done, and occasionally\nin moments of great eagerness or emotion, the force propelling the\npencil\u2014which seems to be applied sometimes above, sometimes below my\nhand\u2014has forced it to a sharply acute angle in relation to the surface of\nthe paper. From the first, I have used right and left hands alternately,\nand the writing, with exceptions so few as to be negligible, has been\ndone in rather large script on wall-paper, many rolls of which have been\ncovered.\n\nOne of the exceptions to the use of wall-paper was this first experiment\nwith a pencil, when loose sheets of letter-paper were used, and as many\nof them were missing when I tried to assemble them the next day, much of\nthis interview has been lost.\n\n\u201cFrederick, shall we ever have our holidays again?\u201d Mrs. Gaylord asked,\nin the evening.\n\n\u201cJust as many holidays as you will take,\u201d he replied. \u201cI am always there\non high days and holidays. Why leave me out?\u201d This was the first time\nhe made an interrogation point. It was traced slowly and with great\nprecision, as if to emphasize his inquiry.\n\nHis mother then explained to us that the celebration of certain\nfestivals, which had always been days of family reunion, notably\nChristmas and Easter, had been impossible to them since his death.\nShortly afterward he expanded this theme.\n\nThat night Mrs. Gaylord telegraphed to her husband that she had received\nmessages for him and for the family. She said, as other members of the\nfamily have said since, that there was in everything Frederick had\nwritten a familiar and convincing sense of his personality, a quality\nwhich we were unable to recognize, never having known him.\n\nThe next day he announced, buoyantly: \u201cMother dearest, I am here. Thank\nyou for wiring Dad. Made him happier.\u201d\n\nGreatly comforted by the conviction of her son\u2019s continued life and\ndevelopment and devotion, Mrs. Gaylord\u2019s thought was already turning to\nother bereaved and suffering mothers, and more than once she expressed\nher desire to share with them her new knowledge, urging me to make\npreparations for the publication of the messages she was sure Frederick\nwould give us, to which, for personal reasons, I demurred. We asked\nFrederick whether he thought it should be published, and he replied in\nthe affirmative. After some discussion, leaving me still unconvinced, he\nresumed his appeal to his mother.\n\n\u201cYou will be happy now, won\u2019t you? You can\u2019t be sorry I am so much\nbetter off and more useful. I get your thoughts and you get mine, only\nyou don\u2019t recognize them always as mine. You will now.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs there any way I can know when you are with me?\u201d she asked.\n\n\u201cYou will learn, now you know I am there. I can\u2019t tell you how, but you\nwill learn. That is part of this big knowledge, dearest. You are both\njust beginning, but, like other knowledge, growth is rapid, once begun.\nYou will meet skeptics, who will laugh, but don\u2019t be disturbed. This is\nthe next big revelation, and you are with the first over the top.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you still interested in the war?\u201d she asked, and the reply came with\ngreat vigor.\n\n\u201cYes. How can anybody help that? It is great and hideous and wonderful,\nand the salvation of the civilized world. Something had to wake the souls\nof most men. They have been quiet too long. Growth is always struggle.\nIt is hard struggle there, because you don\u2019t see far ahead. We see\nfarther\u2014much farther\u2014and it is easier to climb.\u201d\n\n\u201cWas the war the fault of the Germans, or the result of world conditions?\u201d\n\n\u201cBoth. The Germans had long been obsessed by a lust of power, and the\nrest of the world by a lust of ease and money, and individual interests.\nThere has been real unity of purpose only in Germany.\u201d When she said that\nthis thought of Germany\u2019s unity had been much in her mind of late, he\nadded, quickly, \u201cThat was I, Mother dearest, trying to tell you what I\ncould of what I know.\u201d\n\nA long talk on personal topics followed, during which he referred to me\nas a \u201cmessenger,\u201d explaining Mary Kendal\u2019s previous use of the word. By\nthis time, many of the messages were conveyed to my consciousness before\nthe pencil wrote them. Sometimes I had no previous impression of them;\nsometimes only the meaning reached me, being expressed by the pencil in\nother phrases; sometimes I knew what the words would be. I mentioned\nthis, with some misgiving, and Frederick dryly remarked: \u201cYou are very\nsensitive for so obstinate a person.\u201d\n\nReferring to his earlier statement about Germany, Cass asked: \u201cWhat would\nnational unity of purpose lead to? Hasn\u2019t it elements of great danger?\u201d\n\n\u201cMany men feel that unity of purpose is dangerous, but it is up to men\n... to guide the purpose to sane and right ends. It must come through the\nawakening of the souls of the people everywhere. We work for that here,\nbecause the growth of the part is the growth of the whole. You can help\nus and all life by working for that unity with us.\u201d\n\nThis was the first intimation, apparently personal and casual, of that\ngospel of unity and co-operation so fully developed later.\n\n\u201cMother dearest, you are normally a builder,\u201d he went on, after a\nlittle. \u201cNow clear away the d\u00e9bris of things outlived, and begin the new\nstructure with me.\u201d\n\nShe replied that she had been feeling for some time that she must free\nher life of many small, insistent demands, and have time to think.\n\n\u201cNot only that, dearest. You must get out of shadow into light. Out of\nmourning into building. Out of black into color and life. Out of grieving\ninto joy with me in our work together. It is not that I object to black,\u201d\nhe continued, when she expressed her unwillingness to lay aside her black\ndress, \u201cbut to a symbol of mourning. Sorrow is not constructive, after\nit has done its first big work. Leave it behind and go on. Can\u2019t you do\nthat? Won\u2019t you please try?... As for me, this is a great time to be\nhere. Think what this war means here. We are busier than you are. There,\nI should be in the army, I suppose. I am doing bigger work than that\nhere. Just now, I am on a sort of furlough, to visit with you. That is\npermitted. But when I go back to work I can\u2019t be with you all the time,\nthis way.\u201d\n\n\u201cCan you get into touch with my father, who died years ago?\u201d Cass asked.\n\u201cAnd do the young stay young, and the old, old?\u201d\n\n\u201cI will try to find your father. Some of us go on into remoter places to\nwork, but almost all of us come back, at intervals. We are tremendously\ninterested in life there, for it is the root and beginning of all our\nwork. When things improve there, they are just that much better here....\nAge is a matter of experience here, not of time.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoes your work affect us in this world, or only those joining you?\u201d\n\n\u201cWe try constantly to help you with our greater knowledge, but some of\nyou are easier to help than others.\u201d This led to a question as to whether\nall our knowledge here is given to us from his plane, and he went on:\n\u201cNot all. We help develop what you are willing to work for, if you are\nreally sincere in wanting it. Sincerity is the crowning virtue.\u201d\n\nWe talked this over, and in the midst of our discussion he interrupted\nwith a question of his own:\n\n\u201cMother dearest, are you getting tired?\u201d She denied it, but he said, \u201cShe\nis tired,\u201d and we talked no more that afternoon.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\n\nShortly before dinner that night I picked up a pencil again, and \u201cMary\nKendal\u201d was immediately written. It had become customary for her to write\nher name both at the beginning and at the end of her communication,\nprobably to avoid confusion with Frederick.\n\n\u201cManse is in New York,\u201d she told us, repeating it several times. For some\nreason I questioned this, and she said: \u201cYou must not doubt. He is coming\nto-night.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you happy, Mary?\u201d Cass asked.\n\n\u201cVery, especially now, since I am with you. You can reach Manzie.\u201d\n\nKeenly sympathizing with her eagerness to reach her husband, from whom\nno word had come, he suggested telephoning to Mansfield at his club, but\nI demurred, feeling that, if he were there, he would receive my letters\nand communicate with us, unless, as I began to fear, he preferred not\nto approach the subject in any way. Repeatedly, however, Mary insisted\n\u201cCall him up,\u201d and Cass put in the long-distance call accordingly.\n\n\u201cHe is there.... He will answer,\u201d she reiterated again and again, while\nwe waited.\n\nIt is impossible to make a fully accurate report of this interview. The\nmessages were confused and broken, and there were many monosyllabic\nreplies to questions not recorded.\n\nAt one time we asked about Anne Lowe, and Mary said: \u201cAnne is not here.\nShe is a lovely character. She works for children.... Manse is not\nthere.... Manse is out.... He will answer.... He is not there.\u201d\n\nEventually the long-distance operator reported that Mr. Kendal was not at\nhis club and was not expected.\n\nI asked Mary why she had said that he was there, telling her that this\nwas making me doubt my powers of correct transmission, to which she\nreplied that this was better than too much credulity, adding: \u201cManse is\nthere.... He is out of the club.... He must be there.\u201d\n\nWe called up the \u2014\u2014 Club a second time and I talked to the clerk,\nwho said Mansfield Kendal was not registered there, nor had they\nbeen notified that he was coming. Long afterward we learned that he\nhad expected to be there at that time, but had been detained in the\nNorthwest by business.\n\nMeanwhile, there was much confused writing from Mary. \u201cManse is in the\nclub.... He is not there.... He must be there.... He is out.\u201d Effort to\nwrite the name of a city was followed by, \u201cMinneapolis recently.... Manse\nwill be there soon.\u201d\n\nIt was Mansfield Kendal himself who ultimately arrived at a possible\nexplanation of some of these apparent inaccuracies, Mary having explained\nothers meanwhile. But at the time it was all very contradictory and\nconfusing, and after dinner Cass demanded an explanation.\n\nMary Kendal came at once, admitting that she had been wrong in saying\nthat Mansfield was at the club, and asserting that she \u201cthought he would\nbe.\u201d\n\n\u201cDidn\u2019t you know?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo.\u201d\n\nAgain the messages are confused and fragmentary. \u201cYou must not doubt....\nHe will be there soon ...\u201d are among those now decipherable, each many\ntimes repeated. She seemed profoundly distressed.\n\nTo ease the tension, Cass made a little joke, eliciting no response from\nher, whereupon he asked whether they retained a sense of humor over\nthere.\n\n\u201cYes, but this is no time for humor.... I am so afraid of missing Manse.\u201d\n\nAgain she urged me to write to him, but I refused, reminding her that I\nhad made every possible advance until some reply to my letters should be\nreceived.\n\n\u201cYes, I know, but it means so much! You will help, won\u2019t you?\u201d\n\nKnowing nothing then of the tremendous forces of attraction and repulsion\nunconsciously put into operation by persons ignorant of their existence,\nand assuming\u2014not unnaturally\u2014that she must be able to learn at least\nas much about Mansfield\u2019s whereabouts and condition as both she and\nFrederick evidently knew about ours, I was unable to understand, even\ndimly, the contradictions of the present situation, and the cloud of it\nhung over me all that evening and the next day. I was oppressed by a\nsense of my responsibility in conveying messages from sources seeming\nsuddenly so uncertain.\n\nFollowing Mary, Frederick came again, his buoyancy undiminished.\n\n\u201cMother dearest,\u201d he began, without question, \u201cMrs. Kendal is true. She\nis a fine force.\u201d I rather held back on this, and the writing was angular\nand unyielding. \u201cThere are things we cannot explain.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou have too little faith. Mary Kendal.\u201d\n\nThis statement was made without preliminary comment, and until she signed\nher name I thought Frederick was writing. I reminded her that she had\nmade it impossible for me to trust her wholly.\n\n\u201cI am sorry I shook your faith,\u201d she said. \u201cI welcome you to this\nrelation, and want you to believe.\u201d\n\n\u201cMother dearest, you know I am here, don\u2019t you?\u201d Again Frederick made his\nown interrogation point. \u201cBecause I am, and you will feel my presence\nmore and more clearly as time goes on.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you know all that we want to know?\u201d Cass inquired.\n\n\u201cNot all you want to know. We know more than you do, and will tell you\nall we can, as soon as you are ready for it.\u201d We were uncertain whether\nthis meant mentally and spiritually ready, or that we must learn the\nconditions through which they can best reach us, and he explained. \u201cWe\ncan tell you anything you are prepared to understand, and the more you\nlearn there the better you will do your work here.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you still interested in politics here?\u201d he was asked, a little later.\n\n\u201cOh yes. But they are in a state of transition that is fearfully\ndifficult to understand or to influence now. The seed has been sown, but\nthe harvest is not yet garnered. Nobody knows what will come of it in\nthis country.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you conscious there of what people here call God?\u201d his mother asked.\n\n\u201cWe are conscious of a great purpose. Some of us call it God. I see it as\nlight in dark places. Others see it as power. Others as love. But we all\nrecognize it as a purpose.\u201d\n\nAt luncheon that day we had spoken of Prof. William James and Sir\nFrederick Myers, and later in the evening Mrs. Gaylord asked Frederick\nwhether he knew Professor James.\n\n\u201cI know him, but I am not sure he knows me. He is a great force, and many\nof us go to him for help and instruction. Only one other man has the same\nsort of power. That is Sir Frederick.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you with people from this world only?\u201d some one asked. \u201cAnd does\neverybody go there, or only a certain element?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere are people from this world only, but it is as with you, not all\npeople are equally prepared. Growth is easier here if one has earned it\nthere. But not all have earned it, and the penalty for laziness is long\nstruggle.... Purgatory is not a bad definition of it. The right to do\nbig work must be earned. Some people have a terrible struggle of it.\n[Their?] Moral muscles are flabby.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you agree with Mary Kendal that there is humor there, but that this\nis no time for it?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, she didn\u2019t mean that! She meant that this particular crisis is not\nhumorous to her. She is deeply concerned to get into touch with him....\nGood night, Mother dearest. I\u2019ll be with you all night.\u201d\n\n\u201cGood night,\u201d said Mary Kendal. \u201cI\u2019m sorry I upset you.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\n\nThe more I thought about the Kendal affair the more perplexing it seemed,\nand since I could neither question that Mary Kendal and Frederick had\nactually communicated through me nor believe that she would wilfully\ndeceive me, there seemed no possible explanation of the episode Saturday\nnight, except some unconscious influence of my own mind. By the next\nafternoon I had almost persuaded myself that the repeated erroneous\nstatements about Mr. Kendal had been induced, in some way not traceable,\nby my increasing anxiety concerning his reception of the letters I had\nsent to his club.\n\nAfter luncheon, we took up the communication again, and immediately,\nwithout interrogation, the pencil wrote, \u201cYou are a good messenger.\u201d\n\n\u201cWho is writing?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cFrederick.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow much of this do I do, and how much is yours?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou do very little. Mostly, you lend a hand.\u201d This is so literally\nwhat I do that we laughed. \u201cYou are by nature skeptical,\u201d he continued.\n\u201cMother dearest, you must not let her make you doubt that I have said all\nthese things.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt unsettles me when I know what the message is to be before it is\nwritten,\u201d I persisted. \u201cDo you suggest it to me, or I to you?\u201d\n\n\u201cSometimes you suggest things to me and I say them,\u201d he returned.\n\u201cSometimes I don\u2019t.\u201d This reassured me somewhat, for I had frequently\nnoticed that a thought strongly in my mind seemed to delay the pencil,\nyet was not written.\n\nReturning for a moment to the discussion of politics, Cass asked: \u201cBy\nreason of our different environment, am I not more interested in large\ndetails, and you in large movements?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere can be no real movement without a mass of detail. Here we are\ninterested equally in both. They are inseparable.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou said yesterday that the seed had been sown and the harvest not yet\ngarnered. Has the seed generally been good seed?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere is no telling how much of it will come up. There has been seed,\ngood, bad, and indifferent, sown in all sorts of soil. The crop is not\nforeordained. We work and hope.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs there anything in this life to any degree a counterpart of what you\nhave there?\u201d his mother inquired. \u201cOr is it something so wholly new that\nwe can\u2019t even imagine it?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is so much more expansive, so much more beautiful and free, that we\ncan give you no conception of it.\u201d\n\n\u201cPerhaps it\u2019s better that we shouldn\u2019t know,\u201d it was suggested; and\nFrederick\u2019s reply seems to hold a hint of humor.\n\n\u201cIt might make you envious.\u201d\n\nWhen I wondered what became of suicides, Cass said, \u201cThey probably get\nthe purgatory he mentioned yesterday.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s what they get; and it\u2019s a long, hard road back to mental....\u201d The\npencil hesitated. After some efforts to write a word beginning with p or\nf\u2014we were uncertain which\u2014Mrs. Gaylord suggested, \u201cPoise?\u201d\n\n\u201c... poise. Yes.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs there unconsciousness at first, when you go over?\u201d she asked.\n\n\u201cIt depends on circumstances and persons. Sometimes there is a period of\nunconsciousness. I was conscious from the first moment, and so happy to\nbe here.\u201d When Cass interpreted this to mean that he greatly preferred\nbeing there, he corrected: \u201cNo, to be free. But for the first weeks I was\ndazed by the bigness of it.\u201d\n\nLater in the afternoon Frederick discussed with his mother various\npersonal matters, with a good deal of humor. Afterward, more seriously,\nhe continued: \u201cYou\u2019ll do better work, and be more open to suggestion from\nme, if you don\u2019t dull yourself by too constant harping on one chord. Play\na little, you and Dad.\u201d\n\nShe told him they had not been happy enough to play.\n\n\u201cYou will be happier now. Tell Dad few men are as near their sons as he\nis to me. He and all of you have only to learn to recognize me, when I am\ntrying to tell you I am there.\u201d\n\nWe spoke of her desire to receive his communications through her own\npencil and he said that if she would \u201ckeep on trying and believing,\u201d he\ncould talk directly to her before long, as he has since demonstrated.\n\n\u201cIt is difficult for us to overcome doubt in a messenger,\u201d he said.\n\u201cFaith is a positive force. It helps us reach you. Doubt, being negative,\nhampers us.\u201d\n\nThis reminded me of Mary Kendal\u2019s first personal message to me,\n\u201cBelieve.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you hampered by my doubt to-day?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cNo. That is not doubt of us, but of yourself. It is a safeguard.\u201d\n\nAt this point we went to dinner. Later in the evening, when we had\nreturned to the pencil, Cass said:\n\n\u201cYou were facetious last night, Frederick, so perhaps I may ask if you\nhave dined?\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ve had a feast of reason, thank you,\u201d was the instant retort.\n\nAsked whether the different races were represented where he was, he\nreplied: \u201cWe have groups. People naturally divide themselves. But not\nactual race distinction.\u201d When Cass explained that he had wondered\nwhether peoples of widely differing religious beliefs, Christians,\nConfucians, Mohammedans, and so on, would be together there, Frederick\ncontinued: \u201cCertainly. Each group does its work more or less in its own\nway, but all to the same purpose.\u201d Here again is a clear reference to\nconditions and forces of which we had then no knowledge and concerning\nwhich, apparently, he had at that time no authority to speak in detail.\n\nMrs. Gaylord was sitting in silence, at a little distance from the table.\nAfter a pause, Frederick began again, as if in answer to some unspoken\nthought:\n\n\u201cMother dearest, you will get what you are asking from me when we are all\nmore accustomed. Margaret is afraid to let me handle her.\u201d I said that\nthe Kendal episode the night before had disturbed me, and that I had been\ncareful all day not to yield to any impulse in the pencil unless it were\nvery definite, to which he returned: \u201cThat\u2019s all right. You be as careful\nas you like, as long as you don\u2019t deny us.\u201d\n\nCass asked whether he could put us in touch with a friend on his plane,\none David Bruce.\n\n\u201cMary Kendal can. That is part of her work. Mother dearest, you won\u2019t\nbackslide?\u201d\n\nMrs. Gaylord turned astonished eyes on me, asking: \u201cIs \u2018backslide\u2019 a part\nof your ordinary vocabulary?\u201d When I assured her that it was not, she\nlaughed, saying that it was \u201ca Gaylord word.\u201d \u201cI\u2019m not sure that I won\u2019t\nbackslide when I get home again, away from these daily messages,\u201d she\nsaid.\n\n\u201cThen you come to us\u2014Margaret and me. We\u2019ll fix you!\u201d He drew a circle\naround this, as if to emphasize it. When she wondered whether she might\nnot find a messenger nearer home to give her occasional help, he added:\n\u201cYou can get help, but you can\u2019t trust everybody.\u201d\n\nThe pencil was moving slowly, with many false starts and delays. I asked\nwhether he would prefer planchette, and he said he would, so his mother\nwent to her room to get it, while Mary Kendal talked to us about Manse.\nAs soon as planchette was placed on the table, however, Frederick took\npossession again, moving it briskly back and forth, in a space of about\nsix inches, as if warming it up. Mrs. Gaylord was then sitting opposite\nme, and Cass to the right, some distance away.\n\nSuddenly planchette swung sharply down to the lower right-hand corner of\nthe table, from my position, and addressing Mrs. Gaylord directly\u2014that\nis, writing from right to left and upside down from my viewpoint, so that\nhis mother sitting opposite me read it as it came\u2014Frederick wrote rapidly\nand strongly:\n\n\u201cMother dearest, this is your boy, come back to stay.\u201d\n\nWe were astounded. Given a fresh surface, planchette raced all over the\nsheet, in energetic circles and flourishes. It ran toward me, point\nfirst, as if it would leap off the table, paused, wheeled, crossed toward\nMrs. Gaylord, retreated, darted to where her hand lay on the papers,\nfollowed as she moved it, and then resumed its apparently meaningless\ntracing of angles and circles. When I said that I did not understand this\nperformance, the reply came with a whirl, followed by one of his big\nflourishes.\n\n\u201cI am trying to show you that I am running this myself!\u201d Then, very\nrapidly, upside down again to me: \u201cYou can\u2019t doubt this. Even Margaret\ncan\u2019t doubt this.\u201d\n\n\u201cI haven\u2019t doubted that you were here, Frederick,\u201d I said.\n\n\u201cNo, but you\u2019ve got to believe in me.\u201d\n\nAgain I placed the instrument at my left, in readiness to write, as\nusual, across the sheet, but he had not finished. Swinging down to the\nright, and moving toward the left, once more reversed from my point of\nview, he wrote: \u201cMother dearest.\u201d Then he ran to the upper right-hand\ncorner and wrote along that edge of the table: \u201cNow I\u2019ll do it this way,\nMr. L\u2014\u2014.\u201d In circles and flourishes he crossed, to write along the left\nedge: \u201cNow I\u2019ll do it this way.\u201d Up then, to the edge opposite me. \u201cNow\nI\u2019ll do it this way.\u201d\n\nBy this time the paper was completely covered with interlacing lines and\nwords, except a narrow margin along the right edge. Sliding over to this,\nhe wrote, slowly, \u201cNow are you convinced?\u201d\n\nWe were amazed, breathless, and all somewhat moved by his determination\nto demonstrate his presence.\n\nCircling again to the center, already so covered with lines that we had\nto watch the pencil-point to make out the message, he said: \u201cNow get the\npencil.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid I show you then who is running this?\u201d he demanded, when I had\ncomplied with his request. \u201cMother dearest, when you are inclined to\nbackslide, remember that little exhibition, and ask yourself how you can\ndoubt any manifestation of me that you perceive.\u201d\n\nMrs. Gaylord said that it was peculiarly characteristic of Frederick to\ninsist upon making his point, and in one way or another to succeed.\n\n\u201cDad won\u2019t need to see that,\u201d Frederick stated, when Cass wished that his\nfather might have witnessed this extraordinary performance, \u201cbut if he\ndoes, I\u2019ll do it for him with trimmings.... He has not lost a son in any\nbut the most superficial sense. Tell Sis I\u2019ll do stunts for her, too, if\nshe\u2019ll come where Margaret is, and Babe can have her own show, too.\u201d\n\nAgain Mrs. Gaylord gasped, for he had used his own intimate names for his\nsisters, neither of which I had ever heard before.\n\n\u201cNow were really getting down to business,\u201d he remarked, presently. \u201cI\nhad to convince Margaret before she would loosen up.\u201d Cass began to\nexplain that it had not been necessary to convince me, but before he was\nfairly started the pencil ran on: \u201cYes, it was. She didn\u2019t quite believe\nI was running this show. Now she\u2019s nice and amenable.\u201d Verily, all\nresistance had been taken out of me! Thereafter he had his own way with\nthe pencil.\n\nCass began another question, but broke off, saying that it was not fair\nto keep Frederick answering impersonal inquiries when he wanted to talk\nto his mother.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s what it\u2019s all for,\u201d was the candid admission. \u201cThe L\u2014\u2014s are all\nright, but it\u2019s for Mother dearest and the Family that I\u2019m here.... This\nisn\u2019t exactly what religious people call heaven, but it is life eternal\nin the biggest sense. But I can\u2019t be quite happy in it unless you whom\nI love so much are happy, too. Don\u2019t you backslide! Only let me have a\nchance, and I\u2019ll keep you convinced; but doubt is the hardest thing to\ncombat because it destroys the very proof we are trying to bring against\nit. Believe every suggestion of me until it is proved false.\u201d\n\nOne of us asked whether their greatest difficulties in communicating with\nus were caused by doubt or by dishonest messengers.\n\n\u201cBoth. It is hard to find a good messenger, but, having found one, doubt\nis apt to destroy all his work.\u201d\n\n\u201cAll four points of the compass, Mother dearest.\u201d This we took to be an\nallusion to his writing along the four edges of the table, earlier in\nthe evening. \u201cYou see, we have not much time left, and you must go home\nfortified and happy, and glad for yourself and me.... It will mean a lot\nto Dad. He has thought I was in some remote and far-off heaven, and he\nwill like to know that we are working more nearly shoulder to shoulder\nthan ever before, as we are in some ways.... I want to talk to him\nstraight.\u201d Long afterward one of his sisters told me that \u201cshoulder to\nshoulder\u201d was a characteristic phrase of Frederick\u2019s.\n\nAgain sliding over to the lower right-hand corner, he wrote quickly, in\nbig swinging script, upside down to me: \u201cMother dearest, don\u2019t forget the\nfour points of the compass. I want you to remember that I am your boy\ncome back. Not lost at all. Please remember that.\u201d\n\nWhen a fresh surface offered and the pencil was placed at my left, as\nusual, he said, \u201cNo,\u201d and swung once more down to the right, writing\nquickly and firmly toward the left and upside down to me.\n\n\u201cI am going to write a little letter to Dad and the girls. I love them\njust as well as ever, and it hurts me to have them think I am not alive\nand loving them, because I know they still love me.\n\n                                                             \u201cFREDERICK.\u201d\n\nAlthough the movement in this reversed writing is rapid and definite, as\nif great energy were exerted to accomplish it, it is extremely difficult\nto follow, perhaps because the muscles of the hand are accustomed to move\nfrom left to right in writing, or because the mind instinctively resists\na movement it cannot readily understand.\n\n\n\n\nV\n\n\nThe next day (Monday, March 11th) we all returned to New York together,\nMrs. Gaylord rejoining us in the evening, after dining with other friends.\n\nBefore her arrival, we talked a little to Mary Kendal, who was still\nuneasy about the failure to reach her husband, from whom no word had\ncome. We asked if she knew David Bruce, and she replied: \u201cNo, but he is\nhere, and most of us know what he does. He is a sweet force.\u201d\n\nWhen Mrs. Gaylord came, we told her of this characterization, after some\npersonal talk with Frederick, and at once he took up the suggestion.\n\n\u201cMother dearest, you are a sweet force, too. Help me build a structure of\nstrength, which is Dad, sweetness, which is you, and illumination, which\nis my part.\u201d\n\nWe remembered then his asking her to \u201cclear away the d\u00e9bris of things\noutlived and begin the new structure with me,\u201d but not until greater\nrevelations followed did we understand fully what he meant.\n\nA little later he said of his father: \u201cHe will discover that I am more\na force than ever, and then he will be as proud as men who have sons\n\u2018over there.\u2019 ... Should you prefer a son in the trenches or in the place\nof accomplished peace?... I am nearer you now than I have ever been\nbefore, but the price of that is apparent separation. Your life knows no\nsuch companionship as ours can be now, but that is possible only at the\ncost of apparent and visible contact. This is gain, not loss. You are\nquestioning that, but trust me. I know. You can\u2019t even guess what this\nmeans to all of us, Sis and Babe and Dad and you and\n\n                                                             \u201cFREDERICK.\u201d\n\nHis name was dropped a line, like a signature.\n\nIt was coming slowly, with hesitations and false starts, and I asked:\n\u201cAre you tired, Frederick? Or am I?\u201d\n\n\u201cBoth,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is not the simplest thing I ever did.... I am not\ntired, as you understand weariness, but it is easier sometimes to get\nthings through than others.\u201d\n\nThe next evening\u2014the last we had with Frederick at that time\u2014his first\nmessages were personal, expressing his desire to \u201ctalk straight\u201d to other\nmembers of the family.\n\n\u201cBut there\u2019s no hurry,\u201d he went on. \u201cWe\u2019ve all eternity together now....\nOnly one thing can separate us. If you doubt my existence, I shall still\nexist, but your doubt will destroy the thread that links us like a\ntelegraph-wire, only more closely and warmly. So you must not backslide,\nfor my sake as well as your own.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy don\u2019t you stay on?\u201d he asked presently. \u201cI can reach you, but not\nso definitely for a while to your sense, and actual speech with you is\nkeen joy. Tell ~Dad~ ...\u201d\u2014the erasure is his own\u2014\u201c... the family I want\nto talk to them, too. Let\u2019s have a reunion. One that won\u2019t leave me out.\nI want to _be in_.\u201d Rapidly and strongly, he underlined the last words\nthree times.\n\nHis mother promised that the family festivals should be held again, in\nthe full consciousness that he was there with them.\n\n\u201cThank you, Mother dearest. You don\u2019t know how we hate being left out.\u201d\nWhen she explained that they were \u201cleft out\u201d ignorantly, rather than\nintentionally, he continued: \u201cNo, we know you don\u2019t mean to leave us out.\nBut you\u2014and we, too\u2014would be so much happier if you knew we were there\nand we could know you were not grieving. You see, we are really nearer\nto you than you are to each other, and only memory tells us why you\ngrieve. There is no reason for grief in what you call death and we call\nknowledge.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy hasn\u2019t all this been told to us before?\u201d she demanded. \u201cIt was cruel\nnot to let us know it!\u201d\n\n\u201cAs I wrote you the other day, not everybody has been prepared for the\nknowledge. It is known only to the few\u2014those first over the top I spoke\nof. But it will be the next great revelation. As well say it was cruel\nnot to have known chloroform in the Middle Ages, when it was sorely\nneeded, or wireless telegraphy in the Napoleonic wars. There is an\nevolution of soul, as well as of biology and chemistry. Many fine souls\nhave still lacked this peculiar preparation.\u201d\n\nThis started a little discussion between us. One said that many persons\nhad lost faith in the orthodox religions, thus making the need of a new\nrevelation great. Another spoke disparagingly of the modern theory of\na pervasive and impersonal energy, from which we come and to which we\nreturn, losing individuality. At this point Frederick took the lead again.\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t you let them fool you! There is no such thing as Bergson\u2019s stream\nof energy, unless every individual of us is a well-defined drop in the\nstream. That is all a philosopher\u2019s dream, coated with poetry and\ntinctured with science.\u201d\n\nMrs. Gaylord said she had never heard of Frederick\u2019s reading Bergson,\nand I mentioned that I had read nothing of his, except one article in a\nreview.\n\n\u201cI never read Bergson, either, but you could not live in the world, or\npick up a Sunday supplement, some years ago, without encountering that\nstream of energy.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere speaks the newspaper man!\u201d his mother said, laughing.\n\nDuring all these talks with Frederick he had frequently made the little\nretraced circle, which we had been told meant joy. He made it again now,\nwith vigor, and some one suggested that he seemed excited.\n\n\u201cWouldn\u2019t it excite you to get into actual touch with your family, after\nlong doubt and pain? I am no angel, you know, and thank God I am not\nabove being excited. When I am I _will_ be dead!\u201d Again he underscored a\nword.\n\nMrs. Gaylord spoke of her feeling of his presence, of his characteristic\npersonality, saying that he seemed \u201cjust the same.\u201d\n\n\u201cPlus, Mother dear. You\u2019d like me better now. I don\u2019t mean that I am\nperfect, you know. I\u2019ve got more to learn than I ever knew existed, but I\ncan see ahead now. And you _would_ like me better.... I didn\u2019t say love\nme better,\u201d he added.\n\nWe talked about the force moving the pencil, which on this occasion was\nvery strongly applied, though I was greatly fatigued by the efforts of\nthe past few days, and I asked Frederick whether he could move it without\nmy co-operation. But he said, \u201cOnly as you hold it.\u201d To a suggestion that\nhe expressed himself not through the pencil, but through me, he replied,\n\u201cShe is like the battery.\u201d\n\nFrom the first Mrs. Gaylord had been experimenting with planchette\nand pencil, hoping to establish direct communication with Frederick.\nWhile placing more emphasis on a possible communion of thought, without\nmaterial aid, he had encouraged these efforts. \u201cMother, you can do it,\nI am sure,\u201d he said once, \u201cbut don\u2019t expect much fluency for some time.\nI have not written except through Margaret yet, but they tell me she is\nexceptionally sensitive as a messenger.\u201d\n\nReferring to this, he was asked whether others, not known to me\npersonally, had desired to communicate through me, and replied: \u201cNo, but\nthey have watched her, this last week.\u201d Ten days later, when the most\namazing of all the communications began to come, we remembered this.\nAfter enumerating some of the qualifications of a good messenger, he\nsaid: \u201cWhen that combination is found we are all interested, if we want\nto reach our own people.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you over there especially interested in reaching your own families\nand friends, or in reaching persons who might be interested in the\npossibility of these communications?\u201d\n\n\u201cBoth. But if you have ever been unable to communicate with those you\nlove, for months and years, and have known they were suffering, then you\nknow which interest is keenest. The one is immediate and urgent, the\nother more or less a matter of evolution.\u201d\n\n\u201cShall I try to talk to some of you occasionally?\u201d I asked. \u201cOr shall I\nwait for a call?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are over the top. We shall be glad to come.\u201d\n\n\u201cCan you let me know, if you have something to say through me?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot always. Sometimes we can suggest the thought to you.\u201d\n\nSince that time, however, a more perfect connection has been established\nand I am often conscious of a definite summons. On these occasions the\npencil starts at once, generally with great vigor, and almost always\nwrites some message not conveyed to my consciousness except as I spell it\nout after the pencil.\n\nToward the end of the evening, when Mrs. Gaylord had suggested going back\nto her hotel, the pencil made a little circle and some apparently aimless\nmarks inside it.\n\n\u201cIs this Frederick?\u201d I asked, wondering at indecision from him.\n\n\u201cYes. I want to do something Mother can\u2019t forget.... You don\u2019t need any\nmore fancy stunts, do you?\u201d\n\nShe said she did not, but that she was very tired and could stay no\nlonger.\n\n\u201cOh, don\u2019t go!\u201d he begged. \u201cI\u2019ll go with you, but I like gassing this\nway.\u201d Another characteristic phrase, she said.\n\nAfter some further assurances of his frequent presence and constant\nwatchfulness, she said she really must go. Frederick then moved the\npencil down to the right corner again, and wrote, very clearly and\ncarefully, one more \u201cupside-down\u201d message\u2014a touching little message of\nlove to \u201cdear Dad and the girls,\u201d which he signed, \u201cYour boy, Frederick.\u201d\n\nThe next day Mrs. Gaylord went home, where she immediately destroyed all\nher black-bordered cards and stationery and similar symbols of mourning.\nShe wrote me that she felt it was false and wicked to mourn for a son as\nvitally alive and happy as she now knew Frederick to be.\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\n\nOne of my letters to Mr. Kendal had been marked \u201cUrgent.\u201d On the day\nof Mrs. Gaylord\u2019s departure a telegram came from him, asking that a\nduplicate of this letter be sent to him at Chicago. It developed later\nthat all my missives, after some delay, had been forwarded from his club\nto his business address in the South, where, owing to the uncertainty of\nhis plans, his secretary had held them, notifying him by wire of the one\nevidently demanding immediate attention.\n\nAfter some hesitation\u2014reluctant to shock him by a bald and startling\nannouncement unaccompanied by any explanation of a situation concerning\nwhich I was convinced he would be skeptical, if not wholly unsympathetic,\nand yet impelled by his wife\u2019s distressed insistence to reach him before\nhe should go South again\u2014I telegraphed him that I had reason to believe I\nhad been in direct communication for several days with Mary and others,\nand asked him to return _via_ New York, if possible.\n\nEarly that evening I took up a pencil, which moved at once.\n\n\u201cManzie has your message.\u201d\n\nThis could be no one but Mary Kendal. To my inquiry concerning his\nreception of my telegram she replied: \u201cHe is startled. He is wiring you.\u201d\nAn expression of her happiness followed, concluding, \u201cHe is thinking of\nme ... and I can help him.\u201d\n\n\u201cCan\u2019t you help him unless he is thinking of you?\u201d\n\nApparently this presented difficulties, but after long effort and many\nfalse starts she achieved what I felt to be only a part of the answer she\nhad intended. \u201cOn power I can.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou mean that you can influence his work? His strength, or\naccomplishment?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, but not his heart and soul.\u201d After assurances that he would come\nsoon, she thanked me touchingly.\n\nLater in the evening she said, \u201cManzie is so amazed!\u201d When I asked\nwhether he believed it, she returned: \u201cHe does now. He has thought....\u201d\nDetails personal to him followed.\n\nStill later I asked whether Mr. Kendal had telegraphed me, and she said\nthat he had not, though he had intended to do so. As a matter of fact,\nhe had not at that time received my telegram, but he afterward told\nme that when it reached him, twelve hours later, his reactions were\nexactly as she had described them. Also, his intention of telegraphing me\nimmediately was delayed several hours by business necessities. This is\none of several instances when a difference of plane has seemed to enable\nthem to look ahead for a limited space and foretell events.\n\nThe next morning, for the first time in ten days, the pencil was merely a\npiece of dead wood between my fingers, without impulse. After long delay\nit moved slowly, making light circles, but no words came.\n\nI knew that Mrs. Gaylord had intended to make an effort that day to get\ninto touch with Frederick through a semi-professional medium in her\nvicinity, and in the evening I took up a pencil, wondering whether we\ncould learn what success had attended the attempt.\n\n\u201cMary.\u201d\n\nSupposing this to be Mary Kendal, I made some allusion to Mansfield, and\nwas immediately corrected.\n\n\u201cNo. Mary K.\u201d\n\nThis was surprising, as it was the first time she had responded since\nmy initial effort to establish this intercourse. She said that Mary\nKendal was not present, and that Frederick had met his mother at Mrs.\nZ\u2014\u2014\u2019s, with results only partially satisfactory\u2014which letters from the\nGaylord family afterward verified. We suggested that this might have been\ndiscouraging, and she replied: \u201cDiscouragement is not for Frederick.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow do you know so much about Frederick now?\u201d I asked. \u201cTen days ago you\nsaid you did not know him.\u201d\n\n\u201cMrs. Kendal interested me in him. He is for justice, light, and\nprogress. My work, too.\u201d\n\nTo my expressed hope that she found life happier there than it had been\nfor her here she returned, \u201cYes, I was glad to come,\u201d following the\nstatement with the little circle so often used by the others. She, too,\nsaid that it meant joy. We have since learned that it means much more,\nbut apparently they were educating us by degrees. In this case the joy\nwas not hers alone, for the renewed communion with her brought me great\ngladness.\n\nOur friendship began long ago, in a Western city, whither she had come\nin search of health. Both were young, she a few years the elder. She was\nalone. I never saw any member of her family, and we had few friends in\ncommon, but between us, from the day we met, there was a strong bond of\nsympathy, which grew to deep affection, notwithstanding many differences\nbetween us. She was more widely read than I; I more actively in touch\nwith life than she. She was a church woman; I was not. Her point of view\nwas Eastern, mine at that time entirely Western. Our many disagreements\nwere argued warmly and at length, but at bottom each knew that she could\ndraw at will upon whatever strength or resource the other possessed, and\nthe debt in the end was mine, when her death left a blank to which I\ncould never be quite reconciled.\n\nHer brief career seemed to contradict the law of compensation, upon\nwhich, until recently, my philosophy of life has been based. Meticulously\ntruthful, scrupulous in all things, strong of purpose, giving of her best\nto life, life passed her by with a shrug. Keenly sensitive to beauty,\nwhether spiritual, intellectual, or material, she was hampered in its\npursuit by limited health and limited means. For years she struggled with\nuncongenial employment of one sort or another, denying herself the loaf\nshe needed to procure the hyacinth she needed more. Longing for life\nat its fullest and richest, she scarcely touched its margin. Yearning\nfor high peaks and wide outlook, she lived always on the plain. When,\nfinally, the path seemed to be opening before her and she was pleasantly\nestablished, doing a healing and constructive work for which she was\nfitted, she died suddenly, still baffled, having given the last proof of\nher love for humanity by yielding her life for it, worn out by hard work,\ncombating an epidemic in a college town.\n\nRejoiced to learn that at last she was happy, I asked whether she could\ntell us of her work, and she began, easily: \u201cYes, on the ... on ... on\nthe....\u201d After long difficulty she accomplished it. \u201cOn the perpetual\ntour.\u201d\n\nWhen she had verified this astonishing statement as correct, I suggested,\n\u201c\u2018Off ag\u2019in, on ag\u2019in, gone ag\u2019in\u2019?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s it.\u201d For an eager spirit like Mary K.\u2019s no happier heaven could\nbe imagined.\n\nReplying to further questions, she said that it was not just luck that\nI had caught her that first night. No, neither had she come to me from\nthe other side of the world. \u201cI\u2019ve been working on you for a month,\u201d she\nsaid. \u201cEver since V\u2014\u2014 was here.\u201d It was considerably more than a month,\nbut time and place seem to have little significance to those on her plane.\n\nShortly after this Annie Manning interrupted again. It was said that\nMary K. knew Annie Manning and wished me to find her brother. Inquiry\ndeveloped the fact that he was the brother mentioned the first night I\nused planchette. His name was given as James Manning, and his address,\nAlbany, New York. \u201cUnited States Ho....\u201d We could not get beyond that. At\none time the word seemed to be \u201cHotel.\u201d Unable to find any United States\nHotel listed in Albany, I suggested Saratoga, but this was not accepted.\nRepeatedly asked to write to him, I could obtain no address.\n\nAfterward the address was given as Albany, but not New York. Long efforts\nto write the name of the state resulted in \u201cI ...,\u201d ending in wavy lines.\nSuggestions of Illinois and Iowa brought negatives, but the mention of\nIndiana was greeted with a quick, \u201cYes.\u201d Vain and fatiguing efforts to\nget the rest of the address resulted in the indefinite \u201cUnited States Ho\n...\u201d and at last I gave it up, disappointed.\n\nAn hour later Annie Manning came again, but I asked her to let me talk to\nMary K.\n\n\u201cHere! Mary K.,\u201d was the prompt response. \u201cDo you remember all the good\ntimes?\u201d I told her I did, and thought of them often. \u201cAll the many ae\n... an....\u201d There I lost it. She began it many times, in many ways,\napparently trying to get a momentum that would carry her through. \u201cAll\nthe many am ... I mean ae ... I meant to say anm....\u201d Too tired to\ncontinue, again I abandoned the attempt.\n\nAnnie Manning came once more, making futile efforts to give me her\nbrother\u2019s address. She finally said it was \u201cjust United States Home.\u201d\nOnce she wrote, \u201cjust Home.\u201d And once, \u201cHonest, that\u2019s all.\u201d\n\nI have never learned the whole truth about Annie Manning, who ceased,\nafter the first fortnight, to manifest herself; whether because she\nlacked perseverance or because other influences were already at work, I\ndo not know.\n\nThe next day I took up the pencil, expecting Mary Kendal, with news\nof her husband, but Mary K.\u2019s strong, underlined signature greeted\nme instead. She said that Mr. Kendal was coming, adding: \u201cOn cen ...\ncent....\u201d\n\n\u201cCentury?\u201d I suggested. \u201cTwentieth Century Limited?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo ... cen ... ce ... cent....\u201d Finally, she agreed to\nCentury\u2014compromised on it, I learned later. Within five minutes a\ntelegram came from Mr. Kendall\u2014the first word I had received from\nhim\u2014saying that he would arrive in New York Sunday or Monday.\n\nWhen I told him of this experience he exclaimed: \u201cCentral! New York\nCentral!\u201d Which, for some reason, had not occurred to me. At the hour\nwhen Mary K. gave me this information he had ordered, at his club in\nChicago, a ticket for the Lake Shore Limited\u2014like the Twentieth Century,\na New York Central train. Later, having the ticket actually in his\npossession, he telegraphed me that he would come by that train, reaching\nNew York Sunday evening, but afterward changed to another road.\n\nThis second message arrived Saturday afternoon, and I at once inquired of\nMary K. why she had said \u201cCentury.\u201d Instead of her familiar signature,\nhowever, \u201cFrederick\u201d was written.\n\nHaving ascertained that this was Frederick himself, and not a message\nabout him, I asked him to go on.\n\n\u201cThe Family are happy.\u201d At no time during this brief interview had I the\nslightest inkling of what was coming. As he had been always so courteous\nin acknowledgment, the first letters led me to think he was beginning his\ncustomary \u201cThank you.\u201d Saying that their happiness added greatly to my\nown, I asked if he had anything else to say.\n\n\u201cYes. At your service.... At the next large family reunion you both will\nbe present, won\u2019t you?\u201d\n\nI said we would try to be, and again he wrote his name, indicating that\nhe had nothing more to say, whereupon I called Mary K., reproached her\nfor inaccuracy, and asked why she had said Mansfield Kendal would come by\nthe Century.\n\nApparently despairing of penetrating such density, she replied, merely:\n\u201cHe wanted to leave to-day.\u201d Later in the afternoon she said, \u201cHe will be\nperfectly ready to believe,\u201d which seemed to me highly improbable.\n\nSome things written that afternoon came to my mind before they did to my\nfingers, and I asked whether she could not write the messages without\nfirst telling me what they were to be.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d she returned, \u201cbut it is harder for us and more exhausting for\nyou.\u201d Weeks afterward, when this separate control of mind and pencil had\nbeen more fully demonstrated, it was more fully explained.\n\nRemembering her statement that her work took her \u201con perpetual tour,\u201d I\nasked how long she would be here.\n\n\u201cI shall be near you for months,\u201d she said, and then began again her\nnever wholly relinquished effort to write the message first attempted two\ndays before. \u201cAo ... an ... aon ... aem ... aeons ago ...\u201d\u2014here she made\na frantic little joy circle\u2014\u201c... we were lovers.\u201d\n\nThis surprised me, for it seemed unlike her and was absolutely foreign\nto my thought, but when she had verified it, I asked: \u201cIs reincarnation\ntrue, then?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo. Aeons ago ... I was a friend of yours in \u2014\u2014.\u201d She mentioned a\nperson whom I have known all my life. Again this seemed utter nonsense,\nbut again she verified it. \u201cWe were concerned in being more and more\ncuriously limited ... more and more animal.\u201d Some of this came readily,\nsome with halting and false starts, which\u2014like Frederick\u2014she crossed out\nherself.\n\nAt first this, too, seemed devoid of meaning, but after a little thought\nI asked whether she meant that we had been associated in some way as pure\nspirit.\n\n\u201cEverybody was pure spirit once, and will be again,\u201d was the rapid reply.\n\n\u201cIs this life a punishment, then?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, a beginning of individuality.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoes the individual continue to exist forever?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes.\u201d\n\n\u201cAs pure spirit?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen how were we associated as pure spirit?\u201d\n\n\u201cWe were the same purpose.\u201d\n\nCompletely puzzled, I asked, \u201cWhy do you say we were friends in \u2014\u2014?\u201d\n\n\u201cHe was the larger purpose, of which we were a part.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe original purpose is not all the same, then?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, there are many purposes in the beginning, but only one in the end.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoes Frederick know all this?\u201d\n\n\u201cAll of it.\u201d\n\nWhen she said good night, she added, \u201cGod bless you,\u201d and I asked: \u201cMary\nK., how do you see God? Frederick sees Him as light in dark places.\u201d\n\n\u201cJustice, light, progress.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs that God, or God\u2019s work?\u201d\n\n\u201cTested.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou mean that you have tested it?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes.\u201d\n\nThe next day, Sunday\u2014two weeks from the day she had first talked to\nme through planchette\u2014she returned to this theme, which still seemed\nsomewhat fantastic to my practical and pragmatical mind, with further\nallusions to our long association.\n\nDuring the days of confusion and uncertainty before Mr. Kendal replied\nto my telegram, when his wife constantly implored me to write to him\nagain, and I as constantly refused, insisting that she first show cause\nwhy she had misled me about his movements and whereabouts, I wrung from\nher an admission that in some way he had put her so far from him that she\nneither knew nor could learn anything about him, except that he suffered\nand needed her, which both Mary K. and Frederick verified. I said once\nto Mary K. that it was incredible that this could be, to which she\nlaconically returned, \u201cIt can.\u201d After his actual receipt of my telegram,\nMary Kendal never returned to me until she came with him, and the\ncharacter of her earlier banishment, and consequent inability to perceive\nhis movements, was still unexplained.\n\nAs the hour of his arrival approached I grew uneasy, and asked Mary K.\nwhether he came happily or in dread.\n\n\u201cCertainly with o\u201d\u2014the joy circle, and as we have since learned, the\ncircle of completion.\n\nWhen I asked her to write it out in full to reassure me, the pencil ran\nback, underscoring \u201ccertainly.\u201d She said further that Mary Kendal was\nwith him, and very happy.\n\n\u201cHas Mary Kendal been very unhappy?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cNo. Aeons ago they were one purpose.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat has that to do with it?\u201d\n\n\u201cShe knew that he must answer if she could reach him.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoes that hold good of evil purpose, too?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nVII\n\n\nIt seemed to me that if Mr. Kendal had not received my letters, and was\nin possession only of the meager information contained in my telegram,\nit was best that he should read the record of the earlier interviews\nwith his wife before coming to communicate with her, and to that end the\nbook containing the whole story was to be sent to his club before his\narrival. Having decided this, it occurred to me to consult Mary K., who\nemphatically negatived the plan.\n\n\u201cNo. Mary Kendal is most anxious to tell him herself now.\u201d She told us to\nmake brief explanations, adding: \u201cAll he needs now is Mary Kendal.\u201d\n\nShortly afterward Mary K.\u2019s now familiar summons\u2014an indescribable\nsensation in the arm or hand\u2014recalled me to the pencil, and she wrote,\nquickly and firmly: \u201cMary Kendal wants you to change your record.\u201d\n\nSurprised, I asked what change she wished, and was told to take out\neverything relating to her banishment from Mansfield\u2019s life, because she\npreferred to tell him that in her own way.\n\n\u201cShall I show him the record at all?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cYes, but take that out first.\u201d Fortunately, the record is kept in a\nloose-leaf, typewritten book, so this was not difficult.\n\nAs the day wore on I grew more and more nervous. Suppose he should be\nmore hurt than helped? Suppose we should fail? Rarely in my life have I\ndreaded anything so much, or felt so little confidence in anything I had\ndeliberately undertaken to do. By nine o\u2019clock I was in a nervous chill.\nMeanwhile Mr. Kendal telephoned that he had found my letters, which had\nbeen returned to his club, and that he would join us presently.\n\nUpon his arrival he told us that he had been one of the early members\nof the Society for Psychical Research in this country, and had spent\nseveral years investigating phenomena of this nature, together with\nvarious other young men, under the general supervision of Prof. William\nJames, Dr. Minot Savage, and others of that group. He mentioned some\nof the frauds and self-deceptions uncovered at that time, but said he\nbelieved the ultimate conclusion to have been that there were certain\nwell-authenticated phenomena for which no logical or scientific\nexplanation had been found.\n\nNothing that he said, however, indicated to the slightest degree his\nattitude toward the question in hand, and I received an impression that\nhis mood was critical, which steadied me. The disappointment, should we\nfail, would be less hideous. In the end, he suggested a trial, and after\npreparing the table, Cass left us alone.\n\nThe pencil started almost immediately, with a strange, jerkily rhythmical\nmovement\u2014due possibly to Mary\u2019s agitation, possibly to mine, but wrote\nvery distinctly, without pause or faltering. It was evident at once that\nthe message conveyed more to him than its words suggested.\n\nMuch later in the evening he told me that for some time after Mary left\nhim he had believed that if she still existed anywhere in the universe\nshe would contrive somehow to let him know; but as months had passed\ninto years, with no sign from her, while never entirely losing faith\nin the continued integrity of the individual after death, his despair\nhad deepened with his growing conviction that \u201cthe drop that was Mary\u201d\nhad been swept on in the stream and forever lost to him. Widely read in\nphilosophies and unable to forget them, steeped\u2014despite his practical\noccupation\u2014in scientific and intellectual theory, he had feared to rely\nupon a reunion in a future of which no proof had been given him, lest he\nbe grounding his faith in the sands of his own hope.\n\nIt was to this unhappy conviction\u2014a conviction so strong in its negation\nthat for a time she had been unable to penetrate in any way the psychic\natmosphere it created\u2014that she addressed herself in those first written\nlines. She used, also, her intimate name for him, which I had never\nheard, and his for her, which I knew, although I supposed the peculiar\nspelling used on this occasion to be an error, until he told me otherwise.\n\nHe asked one or two questions about personal matters, which I assumed to\nbe in the nature of tests, which she answered briefly, though not very\nspecifically, concluding: \u201cI cannot tell you anything to-night, except\nthat I am so happy. I had lost you, and you are found again. Let me talk\nto you to-morrow.\u201d\n\nSome time later he wanted to know why he could not read her mind direct,\nand she replied: \u201cYou can, in time, if you will let me in, and learn.\nWe can have such communion as we never had before, because one veil is\nnow removed. But that will take time to learn. It is true. It can be....\nTake me into your heart and soul joyfully, without resentment or grief,\nand you will soon learn to read my thoughts as I have read yours since I\nseemed to leave you.\n\n\u201cThen I can tell you things that I cannot say through any messenger....\nYou can learn.... All I want now is to convince you that I am alive and\nlonging to be with you and to have communication directly with you. It is\nimpossible for me to do that alone. But I had to reach you somehow, and\nMargaret was the first way I found.\u201d\n\nWe talked a little of the possibility of his establishing direct\ncommunication with her. I asked whether he could use a pencil in this\nway, and she returned: \u201cYes, if he will try every day, he could in time,\nI think. There is always a way for us to reach our dearest ones, if they\nonly persevere.\u201d\n\nDuring a pause, with the pencil-point still resting on the paper, I told\nhim of Mary K.\u2019s assertion that eons ago some of us had been one and that\nwe still continue one in purpose. Mary Kendal took it up immediately.\n\n\u201cManzie, you and I are the same purpose. That is the reason that, once\nreunited, we cannot be separated, except by our deliberate yielding\nto a different and disintegrating purpose. That is the eternal\nbattle\u2014between the purposes of progress and building and the purposes\nof disintegration. It goes on in your life, and it goes on less bitterly\nin ours. Help me build, as we began, toward the great unity.... All of\nus here are working against those forces of disintegration so rife in\nyour life now, and every bit of retention of unity that is for upbuilding\nhelps us and helps the great purpose for which we work.... You and I\nbegan working for that long ago, and each of us will always continue to\nwork for it. But we shall be happier if we do it consciously together....\nDon\u2019t think of me as far away.... We will welcome to our unity anything\nor anybody who strengthens the purpose, but let us always hold fast to\neach other.\u201d\n\nHere was the first actual statement, however brief and incomplete, of\nthat theory of life which seems\u2014to us who received it first, at least\u2014so\nrational, and so full of inspiration and hope.\n\nReferring to her phrase, \u201call of us here,\u201d he asked: \u201cIs \u2018here\u2019 a place,\nor a state, or both?\u201d\n\n\u201cBoth,\u201d she answered, quickly. \u201cIt is the beginning of eternal life.\u201d\nAfter a moment, she added: \u201cThe state is fluid; the place is ephemeral.\u201d\n\n\u201cI believe it!\u201d he exclaimed. \u201cThat\u2019s more nearly an explanation than\nanything I ever heard before.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis is more nearly the truth than anything you ever heard before.\nThat\u2019s why.... Truth in your life is comparative. Here it is absolute,\nbut not dogmatic.\u201d\n\nHe said that she had not been given to the use of a philosophic\nvocabulary in this life, and must have acquired it there, to which, at\nthe moment, she made no response.\n\nSome time after Cass rejoined us Mr. Kendal asked how much farther, or\nhow much more clearly, they could see about purely business or political\nmatters than we.\n\n\u201cWe can see much farther, but we are not permitted to tell you, except by\nethical suggestion. Part of your development comes through your struggle\nto decide, and while we see your struggle, we can help only by giving\nyou as much of our strength and light as you can take. It _is_ a moral\nuniverse, Manzie.\u201d The underscoring is hers.\n\nOut of his wide experience with psychic phenomena, he gave me much\ncomfort regarding the inaccuracies and misleading statements that had so\ngreatly disquieted me. He argued that these discrepancies might easily\nbe caused by some factor or factors unknown to us, operating on another\nplane, and was entirely untroubled by them. In this connection, Mary\nK. said to me the next day: \u201cWe regard things successfully started as\naccomplished.\u201d\n\n[Some weeks later Mr. Kendal suggested another possible reason for these\napparent inaccuracies, using as a comparison a familiar experiment in\nphysics. He reminded us that if a rod be projected in a straight line\nbetween the eye and a coin at the bottom of a bowl of water, its tip\nwill miss the coin by a distance varying with the angle of vision and\nthe depth of the water. Assuming that the difference between this plane\nand the next must be vastly greater than that between air and water,\nhe argued that there might be a factor comparable to this deflection\nof ray influencing their perception of material, specific details of\nthis plane\u2014a simile which Mary K. subsequently characterized as \u201calmost\nperfect.\u201d]\n\nIt was three o\u2019clock in the morning when Mr. Kendal left us to return\nto his club\u2014but he went convinced. Like Mrs. Gaylord, his confidence\nwas inspired not only by the temper and tenor of the messages he\nhad received, but by the accompanying consciousness of a familiar\npersonality, akin to the certainty of identity one feels in talking to a\nfriend by telephone or in reading a characteristic letter. Like her, too,\nhe said that in several instances his unspoken thought had been directly\nanswered.\n\nThe next day we resumed our conversation\u2014for it amounted to that\u2014with\nMary.\n\n\u201cThere will be hours, and sometimes days, when you cannot feel me, just\nat first,\u201d she warned him. \u201cBut I beg of you, do not let the doubts\nprevail. I shall be there, unless that disintegrating force drives me\naway. That\u2019s a power we here cannot fight alone. Faith is not the desire\nto believe, as some men have said. It is the thread that connects your\nlife and ours, and when it is broken we are powerless to reach you.\u201d\n\nWe spoke again of inaccuracies concerning mundane activities, and he\nelaborated somewhat his theory that it is unwise to ask and unsafe to\nrely upon answers about concrete, specific things, because in translating\nthem into terms of our plane we are apt to overlook some transforming,\nunknown factor, and so go wrong.\n\n\u201cBesides that,\u201d Mary took up the discussion, \u201cyou must work out your\nproblem yourself. We can only help you definitely and directly in the\nlarger things that pertain to the life of our purpose. Your present\nproblem may be solved in any of several ways, and will perhaps affect the\nephemeral part of your life. Your greater concern, and my only concern,\nis with the fluid part, which we shall share together always, now.\u201d\n\nHe asked, after some further talk, whether there was danger of my being\nexploited or employed by malign influences\u2014a suggestion entirely new to\nme\u2014to which she replied in the negative, adding: \u201cTrust us for that.\nHer own purpose is definite, and with that foundation, we can protect\nher fully.\u201d Apparently she underestimated the strength of the enemy,\nor perhaps she merely disregarded the temporary confusion created by\noccasional sorties.\n\nThinking that he might know something about New Albany, Indiana, I\ntold him of the Annie Manning episode and my failure to ascertain her\nbrother\u2019s address. Our conversation was interrupted by an unsigned\nstatement that the brother was not in New Albany, Indiana, but in Albany,\nNew Hampshire, flatly contradicting a previous statement. My impatient\ncomment was answered by an assurance that Annie Manning had recently\npassed to the next plane and was confused. A suggestion that possibly\nAnnie Manning was one of the malign forces mentioned brought no response,\nunless Mary Kendal\u2019s next words constituted an indirect reply.\n\n\u201cManzie dear, ... you will have entirely different forces working against\nyou, from those trying to control Margaret, but we will truly and surely\nprotect you both.\u201d\n\nAgain, following a period of silence, she wrote a brisk reply to his\nunspoken thought, adding, when he commented upon it: \u201cYou see, I do know\nwhat is in your mind, and the time may not be far away when you can read\nmine as clearly. I don\u2019t always answer your thought, because Margaret has\nstill some fear of being deceived in her reception of my message, and it\nis hard, but as she works with us she will learn unconsciously to yield,\njust as you will learn to detect my presence.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs there anything I can do to help you or your work?\u201d he asked. \u201cOr must\nit be all take and no give with us?\u201d\n\nI have no record of her reply. She began by saying that any actively\nconstructive effort here helped them there, because it helped the great\npurpose. This was followed by a message so intimately and exquisitely\nhis that I felt it almost a desecration to be the messenger through whom\nit necessarily came. He took that part of the roll away with him, and I\nam glad to say that twenty-four hours later no word of it remained in my\nmemory. It was truly his.\n\nThe next night he came again, very happily. She, too, was in a lightsome\nmood, and while there was some serious talk, most of it was pure\neffervescence, frequently witty, sometimes brilliant. Unfortunately,\nlittle of this may be quoted, either because of its too personal\ncharacter or because, like much amusing conversation, it was too\nessentially of the mood and the moment to bear translation into type.\n\nConstantly he exclaimed at the characteristic quality of her repartee, to\nmy great surprise. I said that I had never seen this merry side of her,\nand had not dreamed that it existed, to which she replied: \u201cYou never saw\nus when we were not in trouble\u2014before.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet me in and don\u2019t chafe,\u201d she told him, in one of her more serious\nmoments, \u201cand I can tell you much of what I see ahead. Grief, resentment,\nbitterness and doubt are our highest barriers. There is no cause for\ngrief in a relation closer than your life there knows. There is no ground\nfor resentment in the price we pay. There can be no bitterness in growth\nand development together\u2014quicker growth, fuller development, than could\nbe possible if one of us were not here. It is largely in the point of\nview, this thing that is called grief.\u201d\n\nIn the course of their drifting talk he asked her how to go about\nstarting persons who have no starting-point\u2014\u201cno peg to hang things on.\u201d\n\n\u201cSometimes a bomb is effective. But the fragments are not always\nefficient.\u201d We laughed, and she added: \u201cThey just have to wait and\ngrow up, Manzie dear. We learn here that our frantic haste there has\nbeen foolish. Growth must take its own time.... No, I didn\u2019t!\u201d I had\ncalled attention to her failure to cross a t, and she returned to it\nwith a flourish. Several times thereafter she made a little joke by\nconspicuously dotting her i\u2019s.\n\nIn the midst of one ecstatic whirl she paused to inquire: \u201cWho ever\nstarted the foolish notion that there was no life beyond that one?\nWas he a philosopher, or a dyspeptic, or both?\u201d And again, following\nsome amusing nonsense, \u201cYou don\u2019t think this would sound trivial to a\nscientific investigator, do you?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter with the scientific type of mind?\u201d he asked.\n\n\u201cMostly it\u2019s pure intellect\u2014and life isn\u2019t.\u201d\n\nDuring another moment of jesting he said: \u201cI don\u2019t think I\u2019ll bother to\nwalk home. I\u2019ll just float.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome on! We\u2019ll float together,\u201d she retorted. \u201cDo you raise that, or\ncall?\u201d\n\nLaughing, he returned: \u201cI\u2019ll pass the buck to Saint Peter,\u201d whereupon she\nintimated that Saint Peter was not immediately available.\n\n\u201cWho hold the keys?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou hold your own\u2014not transferable.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are mostly pure idealist,\u201d was another comment, a little later,\nreplying to something he said about his own attitude toward life, \u201cand\ngot lost for a while in the dark.\u201d He began to say that he should hardly\nhave called himself an idealist, but already she was answering. \u201cA true\nidealist is not a man who limits life to ideas, but a man who puts his\nideals into life.\u201d\n\nOne otherwise serious statement, concerning the influence of\n\u201chard-headed, intelligent men who are not afraid to testify to their\nfaith\u201d in these revelations, was given a humorous touch by the signature,\n\u201cMissionary Mary.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you want me to go forth and testify, also?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cNo, you do it, and that involves too much,\u201d she replied. \u201cLet your\nconverts testify. You go on playing hermit.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you seen William James?\u201d he asked.\n\n\u201cHe is instructing many of us. Some of my newly acquired vocabulary he\ntaught me. He is more certain and less philosophical than he was. The\nwill to believe has given way to the duty of faith. He has learned more\nquickly than most do, because he is truly sincere and had cultivated his\nground well. Now he is still a leader of thought and accomplishment, but\nhis instruction is dynamic.... He is a very fine force, Manzie, and is\ndoing magnificent work here, but he no longer smothers it in language.\u201d\n\nMuch of this parting interview must be omitted.\n\nAt nine o\u2019clock Sunday night Mr. Kendal had approached this experience in\na state of high nervous tension. At midnight on Tuesday, fifty-one hours\nlater, he left us to return home, imbued, like Mrs. Gaylord, with the\nvitalizing quality of this touch with the unseen and carrying with him\nthe happy conviction that he did not go alone.\n\n\n\n\nVIII\n\n\nUp to this time the messages, while frequently impersonal in tenor,\nhad seemed entirely personal in direction. It happened, fortunately,\nthat both Mrs. Gaylord and Mr. Kendal were more interested in the wide\nmeaning and purpose of life than in the narrow, individual details of\nits conduct, and to that interest chiefly those nearest them on the\nnext plane had addressed themselves. The rapidity with which these\ncommunications came, and their surprising volume, was attributed to the\nfact that in both cases the time in which they could be given through me\nwas limited.\n\nAside from the attendant nervous strain\u2014which has been less, on the\nwhole, than one would expect, probably because these efforts have been\nfollowed by such sound and refreshing sleep as I had not known before in\nyears\u2014the manual labor involved in taking these long messages, and in\ntypewriting them afterward, has been excessive. Assuming, however, that\nthis flood of disclosure would be diminished when the necessity for\nimmediate expression passed, I looked forward to leisure and opportunity\nfor some long talks with Mary K., which should be more detailed and\npersonal than our somewhat fragmentary intercourse thus far had been.\n\nThis was briefly delayed by requests to establish interplane\ncommunication for one or two other friends, whose need was more\nimperative than my own, when significant and beautiful messages\u2014not to\nbe quoted here\u2014were obtained. One of these slightly elaborated the now\nfamiliar idea of the close and intimate relation of certain persons to\none another, because of their union in a common and eternal purpose. In a\nletter to Mr. Kendal I mentioned this, adding: \u201cIt begins to look like a\ngospel, doesn\u2019t it?\u201d\n\nFinally, however, my own opportunity came, on Thursday, March 21st, but\ninstead of permitting me to propound any of the many questions I had in\nmind, Mary K. delivered a detailed message of instruction that left me\nastounded and incredulous. Most of this is too personal to repeat, but\nsome of it must be quoted, in view of what followed.\n\n\u201c...We have much to tell, and few through whom to tell it. You have the\nsensitiveness to receive and the power to convince. When you have fully\ngrasped the meaning of what we have to tell, you must make it known, but\nnot before we give you the whole of it. You will get the truth slowly,\nthrough helping many people, but keep the full knowledge frankly back\nuntil it is all told.... Let them know you are withholding it, but do not\nlet them have it in fragments.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou mean they are not to be told of the division of original purpose\ninto individual life?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, they must have that to build on. But there will be more given to\nyou in fragments. Piece it together for yourself, but do not give it to\nany one as long as you are still receiving it.... The light is breaking,\nand you are the ~aces~ ... accustomed ...\u201d\u2014later she returned, to write\n\u201caccredited\u201d over this word. I think neither was what she tried for.\nPerhaps accessible?\u2014\u201c... force to make the meaning clear.... It is what\nwe have long sought and just found. That is the reason we are giving you\nthings never told before. You are to pass them on when the time comes....\nThis is your work, your contribution to the great purpose, which will be\nrevealed to you little by little. Keep clear of disturbing contacts, as\nyou have done, and keep your purpose true. You have already recognized\nthis as a gospel. It is more. It is a faith. Be true to it and it will\nsave many from suffering. That is the reason I am here now and shall\nremain. I am the force used by greater forces to reach the world through\nyou. We have always been the same purpose, and I can reach you freely.\u201d\nAfter an allusion to mental purpose, she defined it thus: \u201cMental purpose\nis the force that convinces men. Moral purpose is that which persuades\nthem. We prefer conviction. It lasts, where persuasion fades. Nothing\nmore now, but this is only the beginning. Mary K.\u201d\n\nAfter the first phrase, save for one or two brief pauses, this long\ncommunication was so rapidly written that I could not follow it with\nmy left hand, though I made several attempts, as my right arm became\ngreatly fatigued. At no time had I the slightest impression of what was\nto be said, and during most of it I was too bewildered to think clearly,\nmy mind being filled with blank wonder and vague questioning, scarcely\nformulated, yet immediately answered.\n\nThe next day she resumed her exhortation.\n\n\u201c... This is war work. It is going to make the war seem what it is,\na reawakening of the souls of men. There is no higher duty than to\nmake a man know his own soul and the souls of his fellows. The war\nwill be justified only if this result is obtained. We work for that\nhere, and we ask you to help us. There can be no victory unless this is\naccomplished.... Be true to your purpose and ours, and help us build for\nlight and progress, against the forces of doubt and disintegration.\u201d\n\nTo an inquiry about Germany, apropos of her mention of the war, she\nreplied: \u201cGermany is the united purpose of fear. It is her weapon and\nher weakness, and it is to defeat the force she symbolizes that we all\nwork.... There you have the real war, the battle that has gone on from\nthe beginning. This is one of the crises of eternity.\u201d\n\nHere I thought of certain past wars, when the victorious barbarians set\ncivilization back.\n\n\u201cSometimes the forces of disintegration have won, sometimes we. But\ntheir victory is never permanent, because they are negative and we are\npositive. They delay us, but we live and work. We shall win in the end,\nbut that is far away. We call you to fight with the forces of life and\nlight. You can do more with us than you can alone.\u201d\n\nThe following day found me still incredulous, and she said:\n\n\u201c... Tell them that you are doing the people\u2019s work, under secret\norders, and that they will perhaps know presently what it is. They\nwill all recognize it when it is given to them, except those souls not\nmentally free from fear.\u201d\n\nFrom this she passed immediately into the first of that remarkable series\nof communications which she has called Lessons. Again the writing was so\nrapid that my arm ached to the shoulder, long before she had finished,\nfrom the incessant movement to and fro across the table, and again my\nmind was filled with blank amazement.\n\nPerhaps it should be stated that, although I have written more or less\nlight fiction during the past fifteen years, literary composition is to\nme a slow and laborious exercise. Especially is this true of opening\nparagraphs, which generally require many hours of work. Unfortunately,\nthe time consumed in writing one of these Lessons was never noted, but\nwith one or two exceptions, when I was too tired to receive readily, they\nwere done without hesitation and with extraordinary rapidity. Also, while\nin personal messages the mental impression is sometimes given to me a\nlittle before the physical movement occurs, never during the writing of\nthe Lessons had I the slightest inkling of what was to follow. One by\none the words were revealed by the moving pencil, my principal sensations\nbeing wonder and incredulity. Until frequent repetition had accustomed me\nto this experience, I felt as if I must be dreaming.\n\n\n\n\nPart II\n\nTHE LESSONS\n\n\n\u201c_The lessons came from great forces combined. They represent unity of\nall purposes, and were framed by the co-operation and agreement of the\ngreatest forces of each constructive purpose, to reach the consciousness\nof men in general terms of your plane._\u201d\n\n\n\n\nI\n\n\n                                                             _March 23d._\n\n\u201cAll pure purpose is fearless, whether for good or evil, but few humans\nare pure purpose, and the first fight is in themselves. All this has been\nsaid before in effect, but based on other premises. This is the first\ntime the original purpose has been defined and explained. For centuries\nmen have sought the source of life. This is the first time they have been\nready to accept the whole truth about that, or to be prepared for the\nnext step.\n\n\u201cOnce convinced that chaos grew from purposes born of the Force Beyond\nPerfection, purposes perfect from the beginning, but at war because\nthey contained within themselves all the elements of life and of\nconflict\u2014once convinced of this, men will gradually find their own clear\npurposes defined, and the war within themselves will cease. They will\nchoose definitely to build or to destroy, to be honest or dishonest.\nSelf-deception will be less easy or possible, and the fight will then\nbe with you, as it is now with us, between forces clearly indicated.\nNow you are all confused by a war within a war, infinitely continued.\nConflict multiplied by the number of purposes in each purpose. This has\nbeen recognized, but the remedy has never been clearly found. It lies in\nthe conviction that force of every nature is purpose, which has existed\nfrom the beginning, and that the force which builds is beneficent and may\nbe clearly segregated and united.\n\n\u201cThe Force Beyond Perfection is composed of all things, and therefore\nunderstands all things. The original purposes were all good, and will\nbe again, if they can all become intelligent. They became evil through\nattraction of like for like, akin to your atomic attraction, and chaos\nresulted. This struggle created a desire and determination to exist in\nconcrete form, to add a new force to the forces of chaos. That was a\ngreat conflict, resulting in a tie. Purposes became fused in the same\nindividual, and the battle infinitely multiplied, but yet not lost. Now\nthe effort of both participants is for united purpose again, and the\nfusion of purposes in each individual makes the confusion greater and\nthe fight more bitter. Men are swayed first by one purpose and then by\nanother, and are themselves unable to distinguish between good and evil.\n\n\u201cThis precipitated the Great War with you, the purposes in the Central\nEmpires being more nearly united than elsewhere. Their purposes are\nfundamentally destructive, because fundamentally autocratic, based on\nfear, and would ultimately reduce civilization to infancy again. The\nreason Germany has been able to fight so long is because her purpose is\nconscious, while the Allies fight blindly but determinedly, moved by\npurposes they do not recognize and yet must obey. They talk of unity,\nbut do not perceive its nature. They are misled by phrases hollow, but\nplausible, and do not perceive them to be the enemy in disguise\u2014not the\nmortal enemy, but the ancient purpose, divided into many.\n\n\u201cThe light is beginning to break now, and the hour has almost come for\nthe forces of construction to unite and smite powerfully. But it must\nbe consciously, as the purpose of construction, if the victory is to be\npermanent or truly for progress. Men must learn to choose their purposes\nconsciously and intelligently, to be definitely and actually building\nfor a definite and actual future. There is too much quarreling about\nways and means, and too little recognition of the goal. Too much self,\nand too little sympathy. This is equally true of all classes of society.\nMaterialism has been rank in the tenement and in the cottage, as in\npalace and counting-room.\n\n\u201cIt is a common purpose we serve, for building or for tearing down. It is\nimpossible to be consistently for both continuously. That has made the\nGreat War, and that is the struggle that must be settled in the minds\nof men before there can be peace on earth or lasting and progressive\nbrotherhood.\n\n\u201cThis is the first lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nII\n\n\n                                                            _March 26th._\n\n\u201cThis is the second lesson.\n\n\u201cThe forces of disintegration are gathering for a titanic struggle, of\nwhich your Great War is only the beginning. Had Germany won there, they\nwould have a foothold with you that we would find it difficult, if not\nimpossible, to combat effectively for many years. The spirits of free men\nwould have been soiled with fear and despair, and the forces of doubt and\ndisintegration would have held civilization captive.\n\n\u201cGermany has felt her forces weaken and fail under the onslaught of\nfreedom, light, and progress, and the forces of disintegration are\ndeserting her. She is left alone, to work her way, through mazes of\ndespair, back to a place in the sun. She must find her own way. She chose\nto follow the forces of destruction, and they will surely destroy her.\n\n\u201cBut the forces she followed are uniting for a fiercer fight, more\nsubtle, more deadly, more furious. Hidden beneath the garments of\npeace and good will, they make ready to poison the minds of men before\ndestroying their forces and delaying their purposes.\n\n\u201cThis is the battle to which we call you and all who are for progress.\nThis is the message you are to give the world, to warn them of the\ndanger at hand. The time has come when men must choose consciously to\nfight for or against the forces of construction. They are confused from\nthe conflict within themselves, running hither and thither, calling for\nhelp from the gods they have made unto themselves, but looking only to\nthe present good, perceiving only the present purpose, fearing only the\npresent defeat. They will find no help from these gods, for they have\nimpotent feet of clay.\n\n\u201cThe forces of disintegration have made friends with the poor and the\nneedy, and have fed them husks of brotherhood. They have made friends\nwith the powerful and rich, and have tempted them with earth and its\nkingdoms. They have fed the artist falsehoods, and the writer fear of\nfear. They have touched the priest with tainted hands, and rulers with\nfear of the people. They have entered the home and rent it asunder, and\nthe temple is a market-place. These are the works of the purposes we\nfight, and thus do they disguise themselves. Unless this can be brought\nhome to the souls of men, the fight will be long and bitter.\n\n\u201cForget the class and remember the man. Forget the price and remember the\npearl. Forget the labor and remember the fruit. Forget the temple and\nremember God.\n\n\u201cMen fight together for one end alone\u2014the purpose for which they live.\nIt is hard to find there, in the confusion of personal conflict, but the\ntime is at hand when it must be found.\n\n\u201cThe forces of light are positive. Shun negation. The forces of freedom\nare individual. Shun dependence. The forces of progress are fearless.\nShun fearful combinations. Work together as individuals, consciously\ncooperating, not as sheep. You will learn to think. You will learn to\nfeel. You will learn to see. Then we may move on to the next phase of\ndevelopment toward the great purpose.\n\n\u201cThe forces of disintegration are wily, but fearful. Bullies and cowards.\nBut when they are united in sufficiently strong numbers, fearless and\nunscrupulous. They fear the reawakening of the forces of progress in your\nlife. This is the reason they gather now, to smite while the world is\nweary. Disguised as purposes of light, they hope for welcome.\n\n\u201cThis is our call to arms. Arouse ye! Come forth for freedom, light,\njustice, and progress\u2014consciously, freely, strongly.\n\n\u201cThis is the second lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\n\n                                                            _March 31st._\n\n\u201cThis is the third lesson.\n\n\u201cWhen men learn that the Force Beyond Perfection is purpose, which has\npersonified itself in them, they will grow to feel the possibilities to\nwhich they have heretofore been insensible.\n\n\u201cLife is purpose. Purpose is force. Force is personality, from highest to\nlowest, from saint to stick and stone. Men have called it many things,\nbut what it is none have perceived clearly.\n\n\u201cEternal purpose is perfect justice, perfect fearlessness, perfect\nunderstanding, perfect honesty, perfect sympathy, perfect unity, and\neternal growth, which is progress perfectly expressed. This is the end\nfor which we work. Not Nirvana. Not oblivion. Not power stagnant and\npowerless. But a perfect balance, progressing to purposes and powers as\nyet undreamed. This is the Eternal Purpose, toward which all purpose\nmoves. Purposes of construction consciously and determinedly, purposes\nof destruction unwillingly and inevitably. They fear us, they fight us,\nthey seek to destroy us, not perceiving that they must in the end rejoin\nus, having left us in the beginning.\n\n\u201cTo bring this home to the souls of men is our first duty, and for that\nreason those of us nearest to your life work first among men. Purpose\nfrees forces you but dimly apprehend, and free forces construct a\nfoundation in your life for the perfect unity of Eternal Purpose.\n\n\u201cAny force not free destroys itself. Any good not animated and active\ndestroys itself. Force imprisoned becomes destruction. Good imprisoned\nbecomes evil. All are fundamentally good, fundamentally beneficent,\nbut have become powers for destruction through lack of progressive\ndevelopment and exercise.\n\n\u201cAll men are fusions of many purposes, moved by many forces, answering\nto many calls. Each responds to the call of his dominant purpose, which\nflows and fluctuates with his life\u2019s struggle. One day he destroys, and\ncares not. One day he builds, and marvels at his power. One day he sleeps\nand forgets. One day he fights to the death for a purpose he had not\nyesterday, and loses to-morrow. This is the life of man, and this our\nfield of battle. There are other lives, other struggles, other lessons\nto learn, but this is the first.\n\n\u201cPurpose manifests itself in man inevitably in action. His purpose is not\nwhat he believes, not what he desires, but what he is and does. If he\ndestroys, and builds not on the ruins, he is against us. If he falls and\nfails not, he is with us, though he stumble an hundred times. He fights\nwithin himself the ancient fight, and if he win that, his eternal battle\nis won. Thereafter, he is part and parcel of the forces of construction.\n\n\u201cPurpose answers freely only to its kind, freely and fearlessly it\nresponds to the call of self. If a man be captive to destructive forces,\nhe responds to the cry, Destroy! But if he be given to powers of\nprogress, he builds, though his eyes be blinded and his hands cut off.\n\n\u201cIn every man captive to forces of disintegration the builder lies\ndormant. To reach that faint glow of Eternal Purpose is the first duty\nof every constructive force. Call to it, rouse it, free it, and it will\neventually respond. But do not smother it with false charity, darken it\nby conflicting precepts, weaken it by fictitious aid. Every individual\nmust serve his own purpose. Only thus is the integrity of the whole\nconserved. Though he be only a doorkeeper in the house of the Lord, yet\ndoes he serve his eternal purpose as truly as the priest. Let each man\nlearn his purpose and serve forcefully where his development has placed\nhim. Only thus can he progress.\n\n\u201cPurposes are divided. Thus do they show themselves to men. The purpose\nof Progress is first and greatest, because it moves all the others toward\nthe Great Purpose. The other constructive purposes are these, divided\nand subdivided: Light, Justice, Truth, Production, Healing, Building.\nEach divided and divisible by any of the others, yet pure and perfect in\nitself. Light may dwell with Healing or Production, but only Light calls\nunto Light, only Justice unto Justice.\n\n\u201cAll forces of construction work together, yet each purpose separate unto\nitself. Choose ye, therefore. Build or tear down, produce or destroy,\nillumine or obscure, free men, or hold them captive to themselves. Choose\ndaily and hourly the purpose ye serve.\n\n\u201cThis is the third lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\n\n                                                             _April 1st._\n\n\u201cThis is the fourth lesson.\n\n\u201cThe world fears purpose that is free and fearless. All the forces of\nhumanity are turned against freedom. The church imposes its creed, the\nclass imposes its caste, the profession imposes its etiquette, the\nmoralist imposes his fear, the libertine imposes his folly. All men are\nbound by the conventions of church, caste, profession, or moral status.\nThus do they throw wide the door to forces of disintegration. Each man\nassumes a purpose not his own; a force that is his own deserts him.\n\n\u201cFree development demands free purpose and concentrated force. Wherever\ntwo or three are gathered together to follow the same purpose in free and\nconscious co-operation, there force is multiplied. Wherever an hundred\nare assembled to be led like sheep by the bell-wether, there force is\ndebauched and disintegrated.\n\n\u201cBecause men have huddled together in fear, destruction threatens them.\nBecause free speech has been debauched to fell purpose, free men distrust\nit. Men, forces of disintegration, but possessed of glib tongues, have\nplayed bell-wether to the multitude. Priests of purpose, whose counsel\nwas inspired by the Eternal, have been thrust aside and stoned. Better\nwere it for the immortal man to follow his purpose to death and mortal\noblivion, than to lose his force to the bell-wether. Many purposes make\ngreat purpose. Many forces unite for freedom. But better for immortal man\nto destroy greatly and greatly strive than to sink his purpose in the\nmedley disguised as brotherhood.\n\n\u201cA great brotherhood is possible only when its component parts are great.\nStrength lies not in numbers, but in purpose. The fit may not lie down\nwith the unfit, and their progeny survive. The strong may not yield their\npurpose to the weak, and their force remain.\n\n\u201cA light breaks in the East\u2014Russia, given as a sacrifice to the\nbrotherhood of men. A light not of star or dawn, but of sacrificial fire.\nHeed it, guard it, ye youths and virgins, for by its flaming sacrifice\nare ye saved.\n\n\u201cBrotherhood is purpose of progress, not purpose of profit. Brotherhood\nis made beautiful by unity, not by schism. Brotherhood suffereth long,\nand is kind. Brotherhood regardeth every brother, great and small.\nBrotherhood waiteth upon brother and grumbleth not. All build together\nthe common home of all.\n\n\u201cSeek ye those of your own purpose. Unite together all who fain would\nbuild. Master and man, architect and mason, financier and farm laborer,\nall work to the same end, and this is Brotherhood.\n\n\u201cTo work for the same purpose, in whatever capacity may be necessary,\nthis is the only true Brotherhood.\n\n\u201cThis is the fourth lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nV\n\n\n                                                              _April 3d._\n\n\u201cThis is the fifth lesson.\n\n\u201cMen have long cherished the ideal of Brotherhood, but they have clung\nto the letter of the ancient law and lost its spirit. Before the days of\nliberty, when men were languishing in slavery or bound as vassals, sell\nall thou hast and give to the poor had a significance lost in a day of\nfree labor and industrial progress. The spirit of the law is unchanged\nand unchangeable, but the letter progresses with civilization\u2019s advance.\n\n\u201cTo-day, the first essential of brotherhood is freedom. Freedom to\nthink, freedom to believe, freedom to strive, freedom to develop, from\nhighest to lowest. And the employer who refuses this opportunity to the\nmen who work under him is no more truly a force for disintegration than\nthe laborer who refuses to co-operate with his employer and thus proves\nhimself unworthy of a place in the procession of progress.\n\n\u201cThere can be no house that will stand against storm that has not\nfoundation, walls, and roof. There can be no society that will withstand\ndisintegration that has not labor, capital, and market. When capital\noppresses labor, forces of disintegration are freed. When labor dominates\ncapital, forces of disintegration are freed. When the people forget\njustice, forces of disintegration are freed. And the destruction of one\nis the destruction of all. The rich man who denies his brother freedom is\na destroyer. The poor man who denies his brother freedom is a destroyer\nin no less degree. Each is a part of the other, and each follows eternal\npurpose to one end\u2014construction and progress.\n\n\u201cThe man who has freedom of thought, freedom of purpose, freedom of\naction, is free, though he be a pauper, and is free to choose whether\nhe will build or destroy. The man who is bound by any tie that dictates\nhis thought, belief, or action is a force of disintegration, because\nhe may not follow his purpose freely and with all his force. The man\nwho has freedom and wealth, and, forgets his brother, is a force of\ndisintegration. The man who has strength and poverty, and forgets his\nbrother, is a force of disintegration. Equality of opportunity does not\ndemand or imply equality of development. Many men are rich who use their\nwealth to forward the purposes of construction. Many there are who waste\nit and invite disintegration. Many men are poor, who use their strength\nto help along construction. They are forces of progress, and will find\ntheir places here. Many there are who delay the march, and invite\ndisintegration. What shall it profit a man, though he gain the earth, if\nhe lose his own soul?\n\n\u201cThere are seven purposes. Progress, Light, Truth, Healing, Building,\nProduction, and Justice. Equally great, save Progress, which moves them\nall. One of these must each man serve, if he proceeds toward the Great\nPurpose. Whether great or small, high or low, wise or foolish, learned\nor ignorant, rich or poor, powerful or apparently impotent, each human\nindividual is a force for construction or for disintegration, and follows\nhis purpose to its inevitable end: constructive forces to construction of\ngreat purposes, disintegrating forces to the long struggle that can have\nbut one end, however distant\u2014construction.\n\n\u201cThere are many phases of development, each looking onward to the next.\nIf a man climb without envy, forgetting himself in his purpose, he shall\nclimb far. If he look with envy at his higher brother and with scorn at\nthose below him, he shall climb on slipping sands and find himself again\nat the foot.\n\n\u201cBear ye one another\u2019s burdens is a command unchanged and unchangeable.\nGive unto each his opportunity to grow, and to build for progress.\nFreedom to strive is the one right inherent in existence, the strong and\nthe weak each following his own purpose, with all his force, to the one\ngreat end. And he who binds or limits his brother\u2019s purpose binds himself\nnow and hereafter. But he who extends his brother\u2019s opportunity builds\nfor eternity.\n\n\u201cChoose ye.\n\n\u201cThis is the fifth lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\n\n                                                              _April 3d._\n\n\u201cThis is the sixth lesson.\n\n\u201cMen are afraid of fear. They fear to fear, and fall into folly. Fear\nof disintegrating purposes makes for wisdom, and wisdom makes for\nconstruction. Fear is a disintegrating force made constructive, when\ndirected against disintegration.\n\n\u201cWisdom in high places has been dethroned, and intellectual curiosity\nusurps the scepter. Men who should lay foundations of wisdom experiment\nwith fantasies of the intellectual dreamer.\n\n\u201cBrotherhood, to one class, is a defensive organization, for protection.\nBrotherhood, to another class, is an offensive organization, for pillage.\nBrotherhood, to another class, is an organized attempt to preserve the\nunfit. Brotherhood, to another class, is a dream of unorganized following\nof untried theories. None of these know that all men are brothers.\n\n\u201cEvolution of matter follows evolution of purpose, but when material\nthings are left behind, purpose continues to progress. Why, then, lose\nyour purpose in pursuit of material gain?\n\n\u201cChurch and state alike urge morality for personal ends, and recommend\npersonal punishments. There is no morality. There is only purpose,\nconstructive or destructive. There is no punishment. There is only\nconsequence.\n\n\u201cPersonal motives are deterrent forces, neither actively constructive nor\nactively destructive, except as they may be applied. These forces crowd\nin between the contending purposes, hindering both and helping neither,\nexcept when compelled by sheer force of numbers to sweep on with one or\nthe other.\n\n\u201cForces of disintegration are frequently mistaken for personal motives.\nThey are always destructive. Personal motives are always deterrent.\nSelf-interest excludes sympathy. Purpose demands sympathy. Self-interest\nexcludes true unity. Unity is the Great Purpose. Any morality based on\npersonal interest is, therefore, a deterrent force.\n\n\u201cThe time has not yet come when men in the mass have vision. The great\nPurpose to the small mind is vague and of no significance. Personal\nmotives are more easily recognized than purpose, and Church and state\nemphasize and encourage them. But the time is at hand when great\nconflicting purposes will meet in combat for control of men. Wake the\nsleepers. Cast off little things. Sink personal motives. Rouse Church and\nstate to perception of force and purpose, and unite together, regardless\nof class, creed, or party, to win the world to purposes of construction.\n\n\u201cChurch and state urge unity, and yield none. Tolerance, freedom,\nfearlessness, light\u2014these are almost strangers to temple or court. Little\nby little the lines are softening. Little by little we gain on fear. Here\na tolerant and noble clergyman, there a statesman who serves the state.\nBut for one of these, a thousand huddle under creed or slogan, and fear\nof freedom impels them all. This is because they have not recognized\npurpose, and they impede progress who might be its power.\n\n\u201cCome forth, then, priests, teachers, and leaders! Call upon the people,\nnot to follow, not to huddle, not to hesitate, but, to choose. Set ye\nthe seven purposes clearly before them, clearly perceiving them, ye that\ncall, and bid them choose, for the life of all, the purpose they will\nserve.\n\n\u201cThus may deterrent forces become constructive, and the Great Purpose\nknown of all men.\n\n\u201cThis is the sixth lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nVII\n\n\n                                                             _April 5th._\n\n\u201cThis is the seventh lesson.\n\n\u201cBefore the light of freedom dawned on the world, a puissant chaos of\npurposes and forces fought for control of the liberties of men. A short\nspace of time brought liberty of body, after the perception of the\npeople had been clarified by the gradual development of the ideal of\nliberty. They moved rapidly toward it, when they began to understand it,\nwith halts and hesitations and blunders, but forcefully and inevitably\nstill. They overthrew kings and barons, and took into their own hands\nthe physical and material government of their kind. But their minds and\nforces are still enslaved and shackled by outworn tradition. \u2018Onward\nChristian soldiers\u2019, is a plea for progress; but it has become a\nrecessional, not a marching song. Men have made their justice vassal to\ntradition, and their brotherhood fief to gain.\n\n\u201cMen have learned the value of free bodies, but free force, mental\nor spiritual, terrifies and puzzles them still. They have learned to\ndiscipline their bodies, to keep them strong and clean. But they fear to\ntrust the purposes and forces, without chains and prison bars to hold\nthem, lest they make chaos of civilization. Church, state, profession,\ntrade, guild, or society commands: Thou shalt not think. Follow, yield,\naccept, and endure, but let not thought be found among ye, lest the bars\nbe broken and destruction loosed.\n\n\u201cMany men follow; a few men think. These are the overlords, the kings and\nbarons of forces that might be free. But freedom demands free purpose,\nand free purpose demands justice.\n\n\u201cNo man is free who commands not himself. No man is free who forgets his\nbrother. No man is free who fears to follow his own purpose with all his\nforce. No man is free who fails to carry his share of common load. He may\nhave wealth and luxury; yet is he slave. He may be tempted by beauty; yet\nis he slave. He may be frightened by calamity; yet is he slave. He may\nbe beaten by strangers; yet is he slave. No man is free who commands not\nhimself in any emergency. He may lose wealth and luxury, and still be\nfree. He may dwell with squalor, who loves beauty, and still be free. He\nmay be defrauded by his brother, and still be free. He may be shackled by\nstrangers, beaten and imprisoned, and still be free.\n\n\u201cFreedom lieth not in a man\u2019s estate, but in the man himself.\n\n\u201cThis is the seventh lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nVIII\n\n\n                                                             _April 8th._\n\n\u201cThis is the eighth lesson.\n\n\u201cMany men try to perceive the purpose of God in truth and beauty and\njustice, and fail to recognize that the Eternal Purpose is unlimited\nby the detached conceptions of men. Truth is one of the fundamental\npurposes. Beauty is a subdivision of Building. Justice is fundamental.\nAll are part of the Eternal Purpose. But the Great Purpose is unity.\n\n\u201cThe fundamental purposes are common to all men, of whatever race, color,\nbelief, or prejudice. They are the foundation from which the forces of\nEternal Purpose start, and by their divisions only are men ultimately\ngrouped. As a commander divides his army into infantry, artillery,\ncavalry, air forces, quartermaster, engineer, and medical corps, so\nare the eternal forces divided into the seven purposes for the eternal\nconflict.\n\n\u201cThe purposes of disintegration are more than seven. They divide into\nmyriad motives as they fight the aspirations of immortal man. Free men\nchoose freely how they will array themselves, but slaves are driven by\ntheir masters, visible or invisible, to fight for purposes not their own.\nOnly when they have learned to discipline and develop their minds, as\nthey now discipline and develop their bodies, may they choose freely the\nforce with which they will be arrayed.\n\n\u201cRich man against poor man. Capital against labor. State against\noffender. Poor man against wealth. Labor against development. Criminal\nagainst law. All are false distinctions.\n\n\u201cSeek ye the man of your own purpose, and cleave to him. If ye would\nbuild, seek a builder. If ye would heal, seek a healer. If justice absorb\nye, seek a man furthering justice. But be not misled by the slave-driver,\nwithout or within. Beware of the bell-wether, and of personal or material\nmotives. Govern yourselves first, and then choose ye whether to fight for\nprogress or for disintegration, for unity or for destruction. Then choose\nye the purpose ye will serve forcefully through eternity.\n\n\u201cThis is the eighth lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nIX\n\n\n                                                             _April 8th._\n\n\u201cThis is the ninth lesson.\n\n\u201cMen have lived in fear of forces from without, and have not perceived\nthat within themselves all forces are made potent. Men have feared\npurposes from without, and have not perceived that their own purpose is\neternal. Men have talked of power, and failed to perceive its source.\nMen have dreamed of possession, and failed to find freedom. Possession\nis temporary and ephemeral. Freedom is eternal. Should a man yield the\nfreedom of his eternal purpose for any possession whatsoever?\n\n\u201cBuild ye with all possessions, that purpose may be free. For brotherhood\ncommandeth service, and for this are possessions hallowed. He who hath,\nand denieth his brother opportunity, destroys his own purpose. He\nwho hath possessions, and giveth his brother opportunity, builds for\neternity. He who hath power and plenitude, and giveth his brother help,\nhas given all men more than the one can take. He has built for eternity.\n\n\u201cThe man who has this power to build with possessions for eternal\nprogress has a force beside his own, the force of material purpose to aid\nhis brother\u2019s force. Many there be who build for eternity with material\npossessions. They are the keepers of the keys for all who labor, stewards\nof opportunity.\n\n\u201cHe who has opportunity to strive, and striveth not, destroys his own\npurpose. He who has the key to opportunity for building offered him, and\nfails to free the force, destroys both his own purpose and that of his\nbrother.\n\n\u201cOne purpose are all to serve\u2014Progress. And whether it be with purpose\nand possessions, or with purpose and poverty, all serve equally who put\ntheir whole force into service.\n\n\u201cSo may all men know they are brothers.\n\n\u201cThis is the ninth lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nX\n\n\n                                                             _April 9th._\n\n\u201cThis is the tenth lesson.\n\n\u201cThe purposes of disintegration are these. Malice, Envy, Doubt,\nFalsehood, Ignorance, Lust, Cupidity, Fear. All these make for\nDestruction, which is the strong purpose that moves them all. Each of\nthese is divided and subdivided into myriad motives of disintegration,\nmany of which disguise themselves before daring to enter the\nconsciousness of man.\n\n\u201cMalice and Envy present themselves most often as Light or Justice. Doubt\nas Light, Lust as Justice or Production, Cupidity as Building, Fear and\nIgnorance as Truth, and Destruction as Progress. But the disguises vary\nwith the individual and with the moment, and the motives springing from\nthese purposes are legion.\n\n\u201cEach individual in your life is a battleground of purposes that have\nfought from the moment the purposes of disintegration gathered one to\nanother. Each man struggles to ally himself permanently with one or\nanother of the purposes within him. Thus is it that a man whose desire\nis for light falls victim to malice, envy, and destruction; and he whose\ndesire is production, to lust. Weakness of purpose is a subdivision of\nfear, and folly a minion of ignorance.\n\n\u201cAll men aspire. Some with reluctance and halting, but all feel the\npurpose of progress working within them. They may mistake its nature\nor deny its power, but no man lives who has not felt its prompting.\nThis is the purpose beyond all others, the Eternal Purpose of United\nConstruction. No man can thwart it, no man can evade it, no force can\ndefeat it. Why, then, oppose and delay it?\n\n\u201cCome, all ye who struggle and strive! Perceive once and forever the\npurpose of life, join now the forces of construction, and bring to all\nmen Brotherhood.\n\n\u201cThis is the tenth lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nXI\n\n\n                                                            _April 12th._\n\n\u201cThis is the eleventh lesson.\n\n\u201cThere is no man who has not force. He may be frail of body, weak of\npurpose, light of mind, faltering of step. Yet to some degree has he\nforce, for without force personality cannot exist. There is no man so\nfrail of body, so weak of purpose, so faltering of step, that he has not\npersonality. There is no personality that is not a force for construction\nor for destruction. None that may not serve to build.\n\n\u201cThere is no man so bound up in himself, so personal of motive, so\nnarrow of vision, that he may not be turned from a deterrent force into\na force for construction, save only those already given to purposes of\ndisintegration.\n\n\u201cBut no man is so vigorous of body, so firm of purpose, so profound of\nmind, so sure of step, that he may perfect his brother\u2019s life. \u2018Am I\nmy brother\u2019s keeper?\u2019 has been transformed from a question uttered in\ndefense of iniquity to an assertion uttered in defense of arrogance. \u2018Am\nI not my brother\u2019s keeper?\u2019\n\n\u201cNo man is his brother\u2019s keeper. The utmost that he may do for his\nbrother is to arouse his brother\u2019s purpose, whether for construction\nor for destruction. Call to the purpose of Progress. Call to the seven\npurposes of construction. Help ye each brother to find the onward\nway. But if he will not answer, if calling fail to move him, then bid\nhim destroy after his own purpose, that the fight may be open and his\nallegiance known of all men.\n\n\u201cFreedom to choose is the inalienable right of every human soul. Who\nhinders his brother\u2019s purpose delays the end of battle. Win him to\nprogress, if he can be won by calling. Bid him declare himself, if he\nanswer not the call. But he who coerces his brother, though it be toward\nconstruction, prolongs the struggle and delays the Great Purpose.\n\n\u201cNo man is his brother\u2019s keeper.\n\n\u201cThis is the eleventh lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nXII\n\n\n                                                            _April 12th._\n\n\u201cThis is the twelfth lesson.\n\n\u201cMany men there be who fight for liberty and coerce their brothers.\n\n\u201cIn war, all men must fight. But there is no man who may choose for\nanother how his allegiance may be given.\n\n\u201cHe who is not for progress is against it. He who has no allegiance that\nhe will declare, is traitor to himself and to the purpose he follows.\nCast him out and he will find his purpose known.\n\n\u201cSo shall the opposing forces be clearly indicated. So shall each man\nfind his own purpose clearly defined. So shall the wars within wars cease\namong men, and the fight be with you, as it is with us, between purposes\nand forces known and united, one against the other, until all purposes of\ndestruction have been conquered and transformed, and the Great Purpose\nrendered free to progress to greater glories without end.\n\n\u201cThis is the twelfth lesson.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nNOTES\n\n\nAsked to explain one phrase in the first Lesson, \u201cthe original purposes\nwere all good,\u201d Mary K. said: \u201cAll were balanced. There is no evil that\nmay not be good in proper combination. Evil is the gathered force of\nundirected and not fully animated good, combined in a destructive purpose\nby the attraction I mentioned.\u201d\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAn apparent contradiction of a statement in the first Lesson\u2014\u201cAll pure\npurpose is fearless, whether for good or evil\u201d\u2014by one in the second\nLesson\u2014\u201cThe forces of disintegration are wily, but fearful. Bullies and\ncowards\u201d\u2014seemed to imply that forces of disintegration are not pure\npurpose. Mary K. explained: \u201cThey are pure purpose, fearless in pursuance\nof destruction, wily in bringing it about, brutal in consummating it, but\ncowards individually. Fearless of consequences when they pursue, but\nfearful when they fail. Like Germans.\u201d\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nEarly in June, I discovered a relation between the definition of Eternal\nPurpose in the second paragraph of the third Lesson, and the divisions of\nthe purpose of Progress near the end. \u201cEternal purpose is perfect justice\n(Justice), perfect fearlessness (Production), perfect understanding\n(Light), perfect honesty (Truth), perfect sympathy (Healing), perfect\nunity (Building), and eternal growth (Progress), which is progress\nperfectly expressed.\u201d\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe end of the seventh Lesson seemed obscure, until the relation between\nits clauses was discovered. Written thus, its meaning is clear: \u201c(1) No\nman is free who commands not himself. (2) No man is free who forgets\nhis brother. (3) No man is free who fears to follow his purpose with\nall his force. (4) No man is free who fails to carry his share of the\ncommon load. He may have wealth and luxury, yet is he slave (1) _if\nhe commands not himself_. He may be tempted by beauty (2) _to forget\nhis brother_, yet is he slave, _if he commands not himself_. He may be\nfrightened by calamity (3) _in following his purpose_, yet is he slave,\n_if he commands not himself_. He may be beaten by strangers (4) _while\ncarrying his share of the common load_, yet is he slave _if he commands\nnot himself_.\u201d\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n_9th Lesson._\n\nA curious inconsistency in the use of verbs will be noticed here, archaic\nand modern forms appearing in the same sentence repeatedly. This may have\nbeen due to my great fatigue when this lesson was taken, to the presence\nin the room of other persons, or to some condition or intention as yet\nunexplained.\n\n\n\n\nPart III\n\n\n\u201c_Science is the ladder by which life may quickly ascend, but until\nscience recognizes a spiritual force as the one essential force, of which\nall other forces are incidental phenomena, progress must be limited._\u201d\n\n\u201c_We have purpose to progress beyond the vision of man, but even material\nprogress, to be constructive and permanent, must be governed by a vision\nbeyond the day. We are trying to extend that vision._\u201d\n\n\n\n\nI\n\n\nImmediately after the first Lesson had been given, Cass telephoned that\nthe news from France was alarming. It was Saturday, March 23d. The great\nGerman offensive of 1918 had begun two days earlier, and the Allied\nforces were falling back, with appalling losses. I asked Mary K. whether\nshe could tell us anything about it.\n\n\u201cYes. It is a force of destruction, momentarily victorious, but Germany\ncannot win. She moves steadily toward her destruction.\u201d\n\nRemembering our differing conceptions of time, I asked: \u201cDo you speak in\nterms finite or infinite?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou will see her defeat soon, but the fight eternal will not be over\nwith the end of the Great War. That will be only a temporary lull, and we\nshall have it all to do over and over, until conscious purpose ends it.\n_Do not fear._\u201d The emphasis is hers.\n\nTo be sure I had made no mistake, I pressed the inquiry again.\n\n\u201cYou need not fear the end of the war. It is certain and inevitable.\nGermany is doomed, and must work her way back to light. This is not\nforeordained, but here we already see the end, and are looking toward the\nbattles that will still be raging when the countries of the world seem\npeaceful.\u201d\n\n[Some weeks later, this confident prophecy was slightly modified in its\nletter, though not in its spirit, when she said: \u201cUnless the Allied\npurpose is undermined by forces of spiritual disintegration, Germany is\ndoomed, but the fight must be kept up with confidence and consciously\nunited force and purpose.\u201d This, however, merely emphasizes the teaching\nof all the lessons, that constructive purpose cannot find expression in\npassivity, that he who would live must fight, and that he who is not\nactively striving for progress is arrayed against it.]\n\nAs has been said, my knowledge of philosophies is of the slightest, and\nthere is scarcely a suggestion contained in the first Lesson that was\nnot new to me and entirely foreign to my habit of thought. Therefore,\nI sent a copy of it to Mr. Kendal, asking him to tell me whether the\ncosmic theory there outlined was familiar to him. Conscious of Mary K.\u2019s\nsummons, I took up a pencil.\n\n\u201cTell Mr. Kendal the philosophers have perceived the truth in fragments.\nThis is to be the whole truth, as far as it can be understood on your\nplane. It may sound, at moments, like a patchwork of philosophies,\nbecause all\u2014or most\u2014of them have some truth. He will help you in this. He\nfound the truth in spite of philosophies, and it is part of his work to\nhelp others find it because of one\u2014a philosophy not dreamed, but lived\nand proved and known. Therefore, not a philosophy, but a faith.\u201d\n\nThe next day, we dined with friends of that Anne Lowe for whom I had\nasked the first night Mary K. came to me, and from her long messages to\nthem, a few may be quoted.\n\n\u201c... It has always been easy for me to reach you, because you never\ndoubted that I was there. Doubt is one of the things we cannot reach\nthrough. Doubt, bitterness, grief\u2014all these are destructive forces.\u201d To\na statement that they had felt deep grief, she returned: \u201cYou have not\nhad the kind of grief that would shut me out. You have shut out some\nhelpful forces, but you will do that no longer. It is because the force\nmay reach you through me that I can come. We are the same purpose, and\nI can reach you freely. We can always reach those who are very near and\ndear. Sometimes people are dear to us there who are not really near us\nhere. They do not need us, nor we them. It is an ephemeral relation. Love\nlasts eternally. Please don\u2019t ever forget that.... Listen to me. I cannot\nalways reach you as directly as this, but just as soon as you learn to\nread my thoughts, as I now read yours, a messenger will not be necessary.\u201d\n\nBriefly she explained to them the eternal significance of the Great\nWar, the united purpose of Germany, and the failure of the Allies, thus\nfar, to comprehend the essence of unity. Elizabeth, one of her friends,\nmentioned that it was like her to drop personalities for great issues,\nand she replied:\n\n\u201cThe reason that I told you the thing I did about the great purposes and\nthe eternal conflict is that I want you to realize a little of what it\nis all for, and to help you recognize the great ends toward which your\nproblems lead. Build, build, never cease to build. Unite yourself to\nanybody who is of your purpose. Keep as clear as you can from entangling\nyourselves with forces of disintegration.\u201d\n\nMiss S\u2014\u2014, a teacher, and a stranger to me, was present, and after a\nlittle her brother took control of the pencil.\n\n\u201cYou cannot realize how intimately we work together still,\u201d was one of\nhis assertions to her. \u201cYou are a fine force for progress. You are being\nand teaching the things we all work for here. Teach, above all, unity\nof purpose. Never mind the method. Look to the goal. Building, light,\nfreedom, faith\u2014these are what the forces of construction stand for, the\nway to the great purpose. The forces of disintegration are gathering for\na tremendous fight. The Great War is one of the crises of civilization,\nbut the battle to come still is one of the crises of eternity. It is\nfor that we are preparing now. This is what we must say to all dear to\nus and, through them, to as wide a public as we can reach.... It is a\ngreat message that is to be given. To-day I only want you to be sure\nthat I know all you feel and all you have suffered, and that the more\nconfidently and freely you reach out to me, knowing I am there, the more\neasily and surely I can reach you.\u201d\n\nLike the others, this man used the circle, which we were beginning to\nperceive must signify more than joy, as we understand the word. For\nexample, on this occasion it was used thus: \u201cYou will look for me now,\nlisten for me, feel me near you, and the (O) will be as near your life\nas it ever can be there.\u201d After telling her of the frequent use of this\nsymbol, I asked him whether it had not a deeper significance\u2014perhaps\ncompletion, perfection, consummate unity, something joyous of this larger\nsort, to which he replied in the affirmative.\n\nA night or two after this, Cass suggested that we must make an effort to\nget into touch with David Bruce, but I said that we had asked about him\nseveral times, and that if he wished or needed to communicate with his\nfamily he would undoubtedly let me know. Aware of Mrs. Bruce\u2019s interest\nin psychic phenomena, I thought they might have established communication\nin some way. Within a few minutes I was conscious of a summons to the\npencil.\n\nFirst came Mary K.\u2019s strong signature. Then, very quickly: \u201cDavid Bruce\nis here, and wa....\u201d There it ran off into nervous, illegible waves. When\nI said I could not follow, and asked that the message be more slowly\ngiven, it was resumed where it had been dropped. \u201c... wants to talk to\n~E~ ... Bess.\u201d His wife\u2019s name is Elizabeth, and naturally was in my\nmind, but having written E, the pencil balked, delayed, crossed out the\nE, and finally wrote \u201cBess,\u201d firmly.\n\n\u201cThank you,\u201d was the response to my promise to arrange the interview. For\nthe first time it occurred to me that possibly Mary K. had given over\nthe pencil, and I asked who was writing, to be told quickly: \u201cD. B.\u201d\n\nMrs. Bruce came the next day to talk to him, and Mary K. told me,\nbefore her arrival, to give her no details about the previous messages,\nadding: \u201cHe will tell her.\u201d And while his opening message to her merely\nsummarizes similar assertions previously received, it is interesting as\nthe first consecutive personal statement of the survival of individuality\nin the eternal pursuance of constructive purpose.\n\n\u201cI am here with you, darling Bess, as I have been with you from the\nstart,\u201d he began at once. \u201cYou have known it all the time, and I have\nbeen able to reach you in a way that I can only describe to you as\nspiritual.\u201d\n\nHere was the first veiled allusion, at first rather puzzling, to that\nunknown force afterward mentioned by William James and others.\n\n\u201cWe so long to tell you whom we love not to grieve. We are of you,\nas you are of us. Even more closely than we were when I was visibly\nwith you. Perfect union is only possible to pure spirit. That will\ncome. Meanwhile, one of us is pure spirit, and both of us so much the\nricher thereby. Once, in the beginning of things, you and I were the\nsame purpose. Purposes are eternal. They may be temporarily divided,\ntemporarily overcome by the forces of disintegration, which are forever\nseeking to destroy, but forever each divided purpose answers to the call\nof its own. You and I were one purpose in the first, and we shall be\nperfectly reunited when you have joined me here. But while we were one\nin the beginning, one with many others of our great purpose, we are now\neternally definite and separate individuals, but united as perfectly,\nafter the first life there, as if we had returned to one unit.... The\nfirst message any of us send must be this one. That is the reason we can\ncome so freely now and tell so much.\u201d\n\nA little later, speaking of their children, he said: \u201cAll young people\nhave battles to fight and problems to solve. Don\u2019t try to spare them\nthat. It is thus they learn life\u2019s lessons, and the more they learn there\nthe readier they will be to do the fine and glorious work here.\u201d\n\nHe had spoken before of being very busy, and now she commented: \u201cHe seems\nso interested in the work!\u201d\n\n\u201cInterested is not the word. It\u2019s more like inspiration.\u201d\n\n\u201cWas the passing difficult?\u201d she asked.\n\n\u201cNot difficult at all. The pain ended with unconsciousness.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut you had no pain!\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, I had some\u2014not expressed, nor quite definite. Difficult to explain\nuntil experienced. Words do not convey the sensation. Not quite fear, not\nquite pain, but a strange moment of suffering. Then consciousness again,\nbeauty, force, perfectly clear perceptions, but a period of something\napproaching incredulity.\u201d I mentioned Frederick\u2019s statement that he had\nbeen \u201cdazed by the bigness of it,\u201d and Mr. Bruce went on. \u201cThat\u2019s it. The\nbigness of it is indescribable, and so extraordinarily lovely and high\nthat it is not readily realized or grasped.\u201d\n\nShe said she had dreaded to have him go alone, and asked whether some one\nmet him.\n\n\u201cYes, we are very tenderly received. There is always a part of one\u2019s own\npurpose waiting.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you seen Jack?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes; he is still a little bewildered, but will soon be in fighting trim\nagain.\u201d This young man had been killed in an accident.\n\n\u201c\u2018In fighting trim\u2019!\u201d she repeated. \u201cHow funny!\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, it isn\u2019t funny. We fight perpetually, and love it. It is a wonderful\nthing to fight with the great forces, and to know why. Most of those in\nyour life fight in confusion and doubt, and suffer. But here we unite\nourselves to a definite and constructive purpose, and the fight is\nglorious.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you see Granny?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo. She has gone on to a life beyond ours. She will come back, some day,\nand I will see her.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou have helped me very much by believing that I lived,\u201d he told her, at\nanother point. \u201cIt is very hard for us to be put aside.... We know here\nhow intimately our life and yours are lived together, and the one almost\nintolerable thing is to have our dear ones live and believe that we do\nnot. It defers things so.... It hurts us when the apparent separation is\nmade real.\u201d\n\n\u201cI hope you won\u2019t get so far beyond that I can\u2019t catch up,\u201d she said.\n\n\u201cNever! You will begin farther along than I did. We shall go on together\nnow, for eternity. Since you know that I am with you, and especially as\nwe live and work consciously together, we shall grow together.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid I do all I could for you, at the last? Did you feel my fear?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, I did not feel your fear. But when one knows that the step is\ncoming, there is one blinding moment of dread.... You kept me a little\nwhile,\u201d he continued, when she said that she had tried to hold him here,\n\u201cbut the thing had gone too far.\u201d\n\n\u201cWas there anything we could have done that was not done?\u201d\n\n\u201cNothing. It had to be.\u201d But when she inferred that the time had come for\nhim to take up work in the next plane, he protested. \u201cNo. Nothing like\nthat is \u2018intended.\u2019 There is no foreordination. It is all a matter of\nforces, constructive and destructive. My material energy was too little\nto withstand the material forces of destruction. My flesh yielded. That\nhas no real relation to eternal force.... One serves one\u2019s purpose, here\nor there. I am doing better work here than I could have done there, but\nthat has no relation or part in death. It is entirely a physical thing.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid \u2014\u2014 make you nervous?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo mere man could make me fail to respond to your call to courage. I\nknew and you knew, that it might be the end of life there; but there was\nno possible thing that you could have done, mentally, physically, or\nspiritually, that you did not do. It was your courage that kept me calm,\neven through that dread moment; your spirit that met me when I woke here;\nyour tenderness that soothed my first bewilderment; your purpose that\nroused me to better, broader, finer work than I had ever dreamed before.\nIt has been you\u2014you and I, one always\u2014that have helped and upheld me, as\nyour faith has enabled me to reach and uphold you.\u201d\n\nThis interview took place in the afternoon, and with a good deal of\nincidental conversation, covered several hours, leaving me very tired.\nBut after dinner the familiar summons warned me that my services were\nagain in demand. I took up a pencil, and Mary K. announced the second\nLesson, which followed rapidly, with the same unhesitating flow that had\ncharacterized the first one.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\n\nMeanwhile, happy letters were coming almost daily from the Gaylord\nfamily, and less frequently, but with expressions of equal conviction,\nfrom Mr. Kendal.\n\nMrs. Gaylord had promised to spend Easter week with relatives, in a\nMiddle Western town, which she had not visited\u2014indeed, had scarcely dared\nto think of\u2014since taking Frederick\u2019s body there for burial; and the day\nafter the second Lesson was given she arrived in New York, where she\npaused briefly _en route_, her elder daughter and son-in-law joining her\nthe next morning.\n\nAlthough her train arrived late in the evening, we talked a little to\nFrederick before separating for the night. We had been commenting on her\nchanged appearance.\n\n\u201cMother dearest, you are not much differenter than I am,\u201d he began, after\nthe usual signature.\n\n\u201cWhy, Frederick!\u201d she exclaimed. \u201cAre you better, too?\u201d\n\nHe made the enthusiastic little circle so often used. \u201c(O) So much\nbetter! You can\u2019t guess how much better I am. It helps me as much as it\ndoes you.\u201d\n\n\u201cWere you at Mrs. Z\u2014\u2014\u2019s the other day?\u201d she asked, referring to a visit\nto a \u201cmedium,\u201d of which I had not been informed.\n\n\u201cI was that, but she fell down on what I was trying to get over,\u201d was the\nreply. When his mother said she had not received what she expected on\nthat occasion, he returned: \u201cNor what we expected.... She\u2019s all right,\nas far as she goes.\u201d He told her, also, that the woman accompanying him,\ndescribed by Mrs. Z\u2014\u2014, had been his father\u2019s mother.\n\n\u201cThis is a nice, peaceful powwow we\u2019re having to-night,\u201d he commented,\nwhen they had exchanged views concerning various personal matters. \u201cI had\nto work last time, but this time I\u2019m here for....\u201d\n\nThe pencil paused, and I asked: \u201cFor what?\u201d\n\n\u201cJust for a good time, Mrs. L\u2014\u2014. Sis is coming to the party to-morrow.\nHooray!\u201d\n\nA little later, when she expressed some uncertainty about her ability to\ngo through an Easter in K\u2014\u2014, with all its sad associations, unshaken, he\nwarned her: \u201cDon\u2019t you go backsliding!\u201d Continuing, she told us that his\nlast illness had developed just before Easter, and that in his desire to\ngive the family an unclouded day he had persuaded a friend to send them\na typewritten letter, which he signed, containing no intimation of his\nillness.\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll write you a letter this Easter with a lot more pep in it,\u201d he\npromised. \u201cYou go on and have your Easter presents, and flowers, and\neggs, and all, and when you begin backsliding, stop ... look ...\nlisten[7] ... and I\u2019ll be on the crossing, ringing the bell.\u201d\n\nWith an ejaculation of surprise, his mother told us that she had been\nrecently in the home of a traffic expert, whose large hall was strikingly\ndecorated with signs for the regulation of traffic.\n\n\u201cI believe that\u2019s what he\u2019s thinking of!\u201d she exclaimed.\n\n\u201cSure, you\u2019ve got it! I\u2019ll ask Sis to buy you a bell for me, to remind\nyou.\u201d\n\nThis diversion had completely banished the gathering sadness of her\nreminiscences, and she began talking of Washington, whence she had come,\nsaying that there seemed to be a good deal of pessimism in official\ncircles concerning war conditions. It will be remembered that the\nbombardment of Paris, by a long-distance gun, began March 23d.\n\n\u201cThere are lots of things Washington doesn\u2019t know,\u201d Frederick assured\nher. \u201cThe end of the war must come soon.\u201d\n\nWe wondered, as I had before, how much difference there was between his\nconception of time, as indicated by the word \u201csoon,\u201d and ours.\n\n\u201cNone of us can name the day and hour, but we see the inevitable end\ncoming soon. Germany knows she is weakened, but doesn\u2019t know why. We do,\nand we have told you. No nation on earth can fight this fight alone,\ndeserted by all purposes, both for good and evil, and with only one force\nleft\u2014Fear.\u201d\n\n[Long afterward, Mary K. said to me, in this connection: \u201cWe see the\nawakening purpose of forces for progress in your life, and are able to\nhelp them in proportion to the vigor with which that purpose is put into\naction. Germany, on the other hand, fights now with only physical power.\nEternal forces are implacably against her, and the forces of destruction\nhave abandoned her. She has no ally here now. Her unity is destroyed,\nwhile ours is strengthening. The only danger, as far as the war is\nconcerned, lies in a weakening of actual purpose, forcefully expressed\nin action. We are your allies, answering your call and inciting you to\nendeavor. When Germany began this war she had superhuman strength,\nwhich the world was unprepared to meet, but for every vibration of pure\nconstructive purpose among the Allied forces we have added two, and only\na weakening of your purpose can defeat us now. Every individual among you\nwho fails to strive for victory with all his strength invites disaster.\u201d]\n\nFrederick\u2019s talk with his mother was brief that night, and when she\narose, to return to her hotel, he said: \u201cGood night. I am going home with\nyou, if I may.\u201d\n\nThis seemed to Cass and me a curious phrase, under the circumstances,\nand we also commented upon his generous use of slang, especially in the\nlatest interview, wondering whether it were characteristic of him.\n\nThe next morning his sister, Mrs. Wylie, arrived with her husband, to\nspend a day with Mrs. Gaylord in New York. It chanced that they had\nbeen away from home for several weeks and had seen none of Frederick\u2019s\nmanuscript, nor any copy of it. As she read\u2014from the original roll\u2014his\nmessages of the preceding evening, she constantly exclaimed: \u201cHow\ncharacteristic!\u201d and his closing phrase brought tears to her eyes.\nShe told me, then, that along with a copious use of slang, Frederick\nhad preserved an odd little formality of phrase, even in his closest\npersonal relations\u2014a trait not common to other members of the family.\n\nLater, in glancing for the first time through the typewritten record of\nearlier interviews, again and again she expressed astonishment at the\ncharacteristic quality of his phraseology, which had not been mentioned\nto me before. Mrs. Gaylord had spoken of her vivid consciousness of\nhis personality, imbuing all he said to her, and had told me, during\nthe earlier days of this intercourse, more or less about his habit of\nthought, but it is characteristic of her to ignore minor details, and\nonly when Mrs. Wylie arrived did I learn anything about his habit of\nspeech.\n\n\u201cFrederick,\u201d he announced, when we invited communication, his bold\nsignature stretching across the whole width of the paper. \u201cHello, Sis!\nThis is too good not to be true! Hello, Dick!\u201d This to Mr. Wylie, whose\nmarriage to his sister had taken place during the last weeks of his\nillness. \u201cWelcome home to the family! We\u2019re all in it now, for good and\nall. This is the thing we\u2019ve all needed, I almost as much as the rest of\nyou, but I did know that sooner or later it must come, so I could bear it\nbetter than you could.\u201d\n\nIt must not be understood that all these communications came as\nconsecutively as they are presented here. There were frequent pauses;\nsometimes because of our preoccupation in conversation; sometimes,\napparently, because of difficulties of transmission not explained.\nOccasionally I stopped to verify a word or a phrase, asking if it had\nbeen correctly taken, and with increasing frequency the pencil returned\nwithout suggestion from me, to cross out false starts. Some of the\nlatter, which seemed significant, will be indicated from time to time.\nThe following message, however, came rapidly, without pause.\n\n\u201cWe are all of kindred purposes. That\u2019s the reason we cling to each other\nso. Family hasn\u2019t a thing to do with it. It was our good fortune to have\nno forces of disintegration in our immediate group. We are all builders,\nin one way or another. Not all in the same way, but all for the great\npurpose. This is one of the things I have wanted to say to you. Don\u2019t be\nmisled by transient relationships of that life. Respect them, but don\u2019t\nbe eternally influenced by them, because when you get over here you\u2019ll\nfind that some of the people you\u2019ve thought you were most fond of have\nsimply dropped out. You don\u2019t need them, nor they you. Find your purposes\nclearly, and stick to them. We all have purpose, but not all of you there\nhave found out just what yours is. Find it, and follow it fearlessly.\nThere, that\u2019s off my chest!\u201d\n\nMr. Wylie spoke of the \u201cupside-down stunt,\u201d of which some one had written\nhim, and I said it had been done chiefly to convince me\u2014to show me, in\nFrederick\u2019s phrase, \u201cwho was running it.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou know now who is running it,\u201d he contributed, \u201cbut you\u2019re certainly\nformal with strangers!\u201d\n\nIn the midst of some talk of ours, the pencil swung off with vigor,\nwriting, \u201cSis!\u201d in huge script, like a joyous exclamation, ending in\nstrong circles. \u201cJust wait till I catch Dad!\u201d he went on. \u201cAnd Babe, too!\nAll of us together! Margaret will have to forget her formality then, I\ntell you!\u201d\n\nMrs. Wylie mentioned the common impression that personality must be\ntransmuted by death into something remote and strange\u2014that only the soul\nsurvived. \u201cOf course, we love the soul of any one dear to us,\u201d she said.\n\u201cBut, after all, the thing we know best, and therefore love best, is\nthe habit of thought\u2014the characteristic mental attitude, and it is so\nwonderful to find Frederick unchanged\u2014just like himself.\u201d\n\n\u201cSure! Why not?\u201d he returned. \u201cYou people must learn that this isn\u2019t\n\u2018like himself.\u2019 It _is_ himself. Right here on the job.\u201d\n\n\u201cThose words!\u201d His mother and sister exchanged startled glances. Then\nthey told me that just before his long struggle for life on this plane\nended, when during six months his powers of recuperation had repeatedly\nastonished surgeons and nurses, he opened his eyes, to find his father\nbending over him, and whispered for the last time: \u201cOn the job.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ve always been on it since, too,\u201d he rapidly assured them, \u201cand\nlonging to tell you so. You never can know, until you try it, how we hate\nto be left out. We\u2019re on the job as you can\u2019t even imagine, and it makes\nus sort o\u2019 sick that we can\u2019t get it over to you of our own love and\npurpose.\u201d\n\nHe interrupted the talk following this with: \u201cTrot along to lunch! I want\nto start going and not stop. Get it over, do!\u201d\n\nSo we trotted, and got it over as soon as possible, though throughout\nthe meal he insisted upon having a voice in the conversation, writing\nmessages on all the blank paper we had about us, and over the backs of\nthe available menu cards.\n\n\u201cYou can\u2019t lose me, and needn\u2019t try,\u201d he told me, and when I protested\nthat he was making it impossible for me to finish my luncheon, he\nretorted: \u201cYou have a perfectly good left hand. Eat with that.\u201d\n\nSeveral times Mr. Wylie expressed his interest in what he called \u201cthe\nupside-down stunt,\u201d and when we were again seated about a writing-table,\nFrederick \u201cdemonstrated.\u201d\n\n\u201cIncidentally, Dick,\u201d he mentioned, starting at my right and writing\ntoward my left, \u201cyou wanted to see this work. Well, here you are. This is\nthe way it is done.\u201d\n\nAs this began, Mrs. Gaylord smiled, pulling her chair nearer to the\ntable, where she could watch every movement of the pencil.\n\n\u201cSit up closer, Mother dearest,\u201d Frederick continued, \u201cand everybody\nhold hands.\u201d Looking slightly bewildered, she held out her hands to the\nothers. I said that he had used a figure of speech, but she thought he\nhad meant it literally, and we referred the question to him. \u201cYes, all\nbut your writing-hand,\u201d he said; so we all joined hands, and I asked why.\n\n\u201cJust to make us know more surely that we are all one and indivisible,\nfrom now on through eternity. Easter resurrection for every one of us.\nWe are all born again, to some extent, by our communion in this way; I\nmore than you, because I have left the flesh behind. But to you has come\nnew life, new force, new purpose, new faith, through your touch with this\nlife of pure spirit. It is truly your resurrection. This is your Easter\nmessage. Hail! And be happy ever after!\u201d\n\nI anticipated none of this message, and its tenor surprised me greatly.\nBefore I had recovered from my astonishment Mrs. Gaylord exclaimed: \u201cThat\nmust be the Easter letter he promised me!\u201d Immediately he signed it.\n\u201cFrederick, to Mother and all of you.\u201d\n\nWe spoke of the relation of this whole revelation to orthodox religion,\nand some one said that it was not in accordance with the Bible.\n\n\u201cYes, it is,\u201d he contradicted. \u201cYou have never learned to read the\nBible in this light. The great prophecies have always been phrased in\nthe language, and more or less in the spirit, of the time in which they\nwere uttered. This is the first time in the history of the world when\nphysical science has been sufficiently advanced to enable us to tell the\npeople the truth in terms they would truly understand. Prophecies have\nbeen veiled, apparently, not because the truth was vague, but because men\nwere not prepared to understand it in all its details. Nor are they now.\nBut this is to be the whole truth, as far as it can be understood now by\nyour prophets and people. And for the first time it is possible to give\nit to you directly in this way, without pretense or mystery, book or\nbell, a natural law operating naturally and freely, through an accredited\nmessenger who makes no claim to inspiration.\u201d\n\nIn the course of our drifting talk his mother remembered that Mrs. Z\u2014\u2014\nhad tried to convey a warning through her from Frederick to Mr. Wylie,\nbut had been unable to tell her what it concerned. After some effort\nto discover its connection, suggesting possible journeys or business\nventures, Mrs. Z\u2014\u2014 had finally said that Dick was about to do something,\nshe did not know what; but whatever it was, Frederick said he must not do\nit. Mrs. Gaylord now asked Frederick what he had intended to say.\n\n\u201cShe didn\u2019t get my message. I was trying to tell him not to be fearful\nabout anything.\u201d Mr. Wylie is sometimes prey to nervous apprehension and\nworry. \u201cIt keeps us back and we can\u2019t help him as we\u2019re trying to do.\nOpen up, Dick! Let us in and we\u2019ll all pull together.\u201d This apparently\ntouched some situation unknown to me, for Mr. and Mrs. Wylie exchanged\nglances, and instantly Frederick made his quick circles. \u201c(O) That\u2019s\nit! Now we\u2019re off! No, it isn\u2019t incredible,\u201d he added, replying to some\ncomment of theirs. \u201cIt\u2019s the truest thing you ever heard. But Mrs. Z\u2014\u2014\ncan\u2019t get beyond externals.\u201d\n\nThis seems to be a very good example of the way certain messages are\nconfused by the persons through whom they come. In this case, while the\nintended warning was conveyed, a purely subjective and spiritual message\nwas so distorted, however unconsciously and unintentionally, that it was\ngiven an objective and material significance.\n\nAsked whether an acquaintance of theirs would be helped by a knowledge\nof their intercourse with him, he said: \u201cShe is not ready for this\nyet. Few people, comparatively, are free enough to accept it. It has\nbeen forbidden by the church, ridiculed by the laity, and labelled\n\u2018poison, don\u2019t touch\u2019 by neurologists and the scientific, half-baked\nintellectuals.\u201d\n\n\u201cFake mediums have done a lot to bring it into disrepute,\u201d Mr. Wylie\nsuggested.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s the reason for some of it. Another reason, less obvious to you,\nbut equally potent, is that people who had the sensitiveness to be\nmessengers frequently lacked the purpose of truth fundamentally, and\nthough thinking they were honest, entertained devils unaware.... That is\nthe reason so many people have gone to pieces, mentally and physically.\nThe purposes of disintegration caught them and destroyed them. But this\ntime, we beat them to it.\u201d\n\n\u201cAll philosophies have had some foundation of truth,\u201d he told us, a\nlittle later, \u201cor they would not have been permitted to live. This new\nfaith will be attacked by the disintegrating forces, in an attempt to\ndiscredit it as a patchwork of philosophies. The new truths they will\nignore, or flatly deny. But this is the whole truth, as far as it can be\ntold now. Believe it, follow it, preach it, live it, and we shall truly\nbuild that structure I told you of, Mother dearest, of force, light, and\nsweetness\u2014which is you. I seem to be doing a darned lot of preaching!\u201d\n\n\u201cIt isn\u2019t like you, either,\u201d his mother remarked.\n\n\u201cYou see, we\u2019ve got to get this over. It\u2019s imperative.\u201d\n\nAt that, she said it was like him, after all, because he had always\ntalked eagerly to the family about his \u201cjob,\u201d whatever it might be,\nadding: \u201cIs it \u2018imperative\u2019 because of the war and the sorrow? Or because\nthe time is ripe?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s because there\u2019s the very devil of a fight coming, and we\u2019ve got to\ngather every force we have, and unite it.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs beating the Germans helping the constructive force? Or is the war\nmerely the awakening through suffering?\u201d\n\n\u201cGermany has been united in purpose as a destructive force for many\nyears. They gave themselves deliberately, not as individuals, but as a\npeople, to what parsons call the powers of darkness. We know them to be\nforces of disintegration, which found in Germany their strongest ally in\nthe civilized world. We\u2019ve been fighting Germany and her purposes here\nfor years, I find. Suffering makes people readier to listen to truth, but\nbeating Germany was as necessary to the world\u2019s health as sanitation to a\nhospital.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s a clear and explicit statement,\u201d some one said.\n\n\u201cWe are perfectly definite and explicit about questions of eternal\npurpose. The difficulty with most people is that they want to know how\nmuch U. S. Steel will go up next Tuesday, or whether to give the baby\nsoothing-syrup.\u201d\n\nAfter some interchange concerning his father and younger sister, he said,\n\u201cI want to write them an Easter greeting.\u201d So we got a fresh roll of\npaper, and he wrote a brief but tender letter, which was sent to them\nthat night.\n\n\u201cWhich one of us will be best able to do this?\u201d Mrs. Wylie asked.\n\n\u201c... The time will come when this sort of thing is unnecessary. We can\ntalk without material aid.... We never know when the power is going to\ndevelop. It\u2019s much like an electric current. You never know it\u2019s there\nuntil you feel it\u2014until your signal comes over the wire.... Try it out,\nall of you. We know no more about who can do it than you do, except in\ncases of extraordinary power.\u201d Some time afterward, however, he warned\nthem of the dangers of attempting to handle this force, intimating that\ngreat conservation of energy in other directions should accompany the\nendeavor.\n\nHis mother spoke of his being happy, and he returned: \u201cPerfectly happy\nnow, thank you. It\u2019s the eternal thing, really started. I hate to have\nthis party break up, but anyhow it isn\u2019t for long. I\u2019ve been away longer,\nwhen I lived there, than I shall be now, and we are all of us as sure of\nthe next meeting, and the next good time, as we were then.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe knows it is ending, and we must go to our trains,\u201d Mrs. Gaylord said.\n\n\u201cNot ending at all. Beginning! _Hooray!_\u201d\n\nOn that triumphant note they took their departure, Mrs. Gaylord westward\nbound, the Wylies to New England; but, owing to a defective timepiece,\nboth missed their trains. Within an hour, Mrs. Wylie telephoned me that\nher mother had caught\u2014by the narrowest margin\u2014a later train, hoping to\nsecure sleeping-accommodation after leaving, a dubious venture in these\ndays of diminished service and crowded trains. We arranged to dine and\nspend the evening together.\n\nAfterward, it occurred to me that Frederick might prefer to be with his\nmother that night, and I asked Mary K. about it.\n\n\u201cFrederick has engaged his mother in (O) ...\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat does that mean now?\u201d I interrupted. \u201cBliss?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes ... and will come here to-night to see the others.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\n\nLike the rest of the family, Mrs. Wylie feared the effect of the Western\nvisit upon her mother\u2019s new-found tranquillity of spirit, and she\nwas also uneasy lest Mrs. Gaylord had been unable to secure Pullman\naccommodations.\n\n\u201cMother is all right and happy,\u201d Frederick told us, in the evening. \u201cShe\nis still reading her precious book\u201d\u2014a copy of his earlier interviews,\nwhich she carried with her.\n\nSome one asked whether he meant that her general condition was \u201call\nright,\u201d or that she was \u201call right\u201d on the train.\n\n\u201cOn the train. She\u2019s blissful!\u201d\n\nThis was verified a day or two later by a letter from Mrs. Gaylord, in\nwhich she said: \u201cI came away filled with strength and calm and joy.\u201d She\nalso mentioned casually that she had found a vacant section on the train,\nand traveled comfortably.\n\n\u201cHow does purpose combat forces of evil?\u201d Mr. Wylie asked.\n\n\u201cIt is done by overpowering them, as the sun dispels mist, separating\nthem into smaller particles or units. And when that is impossible, by\ndriving them like clouds before a high wind. They work for evil, but can\nbe separated sometimes from the mass and united with constructive forces.\nOnly small fragments of the main forces can be so converted, at present.\nMostly we rout them.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoes an evil soul lose personality?\u201d his sister questioned. \u201cIs it\nabsorbed, or broken into fragments?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe individuality that finds its first expression in your life is never\nabsorbed or broken up. I speak of the forces of disintegration, composed\nof more individuals than the greatest army, as being routed. We mass\nourselves and our purposes against them and theirs, when we fight in the\nopen here. But as has been explained in the Lessons, the very material\nform you have was originally an effort to evolve a force not conquerable\nby purpose alone. Both good and evil forces, in your phrase\u2014constructive\nand destructive, in ours\u2014took possession of these concrete forms, and now\nthe bitterness of the fight is greatest where both forces are represented\nin one individual. The only way we can fight that effectively is to sit\non the job, and try to call to the purpose that is ours more clearly and\nappealingly, or more commandingly, than the other fellow does. That\u2019s the\nreason we are begging you now to work with us. A great crisis is at hand,\nand we want you to meet it consciously in your life there, knowing its\nnature, so that we can have your help, not only in withstanding material\nonslaughts, like Germany\u2019s invasions and brutality, but in things of the\nspirit\u2014the real things, the eternal things\u2014so that together we may win a\nreal victory. The individual whose purposes are fundamentally destructive\nis not damned nor lost. He is just delayed. Sooner or later he must\nwork his way up, and it is entirely up to him whether he does it sooner\nor later\u2014after he reaches this life, especially. In your life, he is\nsometimes confused or misled. He pays for that, too\u2014not pays, but makes\ngood for it, by working here for the development he had not sense enough\nto take there. But his delay is brief, beside that of the essentially\ndestructive force.\u201d\n\nA little later, Mrs. Wylie spoke again of her uneasiness about her\nmother\u2019s visit to K\u2014\u2014, and some one suggested telegraphing her that\nFrederick had been with us that evening.\n\n\u201cGive her my love when you wire,\u201d he directed, \u201cand tell her I\u2019m on the\ncrossing, still ringing that bell. Don\u2019t you worry, Sis. I\u2019ll go and stay\nwith her most of the time she\u2019s there, and she\u2019ll know it. I\u2019ll come to\nyou, Easter, too, for a little while.... Tell Dad I\u2019ll be taking care of\nMother. He needn\u2019t fret about it.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you want me to look up \u2018Bob\u2019 and tell him about his little girl?\u201d she\nasked.\n\nHe replied, \u201cYes, do.\u201d And when she asked if he could give her something\nmore definite than a Christian name by which to trace this unknown man\namong his large and scattered acquaintance, he wrote the name of a Middle\nWestern city, adding: \u201cYou can find out from the fellows. All of them\nknow Bob.\u201d\n\nThis seems to be a case of marked deflection of ray, to use Mr. Kendal\u2019s\nsimile, for up to the day when this manuscript goes to the printer the\nGaylord family have been unable to identify \u201cBob,\u201d although there was\na confused intimation, late in April, that Mrs. Z\u2014\u2014 had made a mistake\nin the name, and a suggestion that the surname was Roberts. It is not\nimpossible that this was one of those wily incursions of disintegrating\nforce, with intent to confuse, to which we afterward grew accustomed.\n\nOn Friday and Saturday of that week (March 29th and 30th), there were\ninterviews of great interest, but of too personal a character to be\nextensively quoted.\n\nReplying to the inquiry of a man for his father, Mary K. said: \u201cHe was a\ngreat force here, but has passed on into the life beyond ours. He can and\nwill return to talk to you, but not immediately.\u201d\n\n\u201cTell G\u2014\u2014 the constructive forces are working for him, as he for them,\u201d\nwas the answer to questions about a man in this life. \u201cTemporary\ndisappointments are unimportant. Do not fear. We build together, and\nsurely. The result is certain and for his purpose\u2014progress, light, and\njustice. His individual concern is to have faith, follow his purpose,\nand trust us. The only failure possible comes from admitting doubt,\ndisintegration, and fear.\u201d\n\nAn expression of anxiety concerning another man on this plane was met\nthus: \u201cN\u2014\u2014 has felt his own purpose stirring a little.... A perfectly\ngood purpose when he finds it. He has had many forces fighting, within\nand without. He will wake when this message is given to the world. He is\ntoo intelligent not to recognize truth as obvious as this will be.\u201d Some\none asked when this would occur. \u201cWhen Margaret completes the book she\nwill publish soon.\u201d This was the first intimation of the way in which I\nwas expected to carry out Mary K.\u2019s instructions to make this experience\nknown, concerning which we had wondered not a little.\n\nIt was suggested that a member of this person\u2019s family might help him,\nfrom the next plane, but this was said to be impossible, as they were not\nof the same purpose.\n\n\u201cThe family connection is nothing here. His own purposes know him, both\ngood and bad, and they are fighting it out. He has answered first one,\nthen another. But fundamentally he is for justice. He will answer to that\nin the end.... Sometimes he will shut it all out and yield to the forces\nseeking to destroy him, but he will fight in the end for freedom and\njustice.\u201d\n\n\u201cShe is not of our forces,\u201d was the reply to an inquiry about an artist\nwho left this life twenty years ago. This was crossed out, however, and\n\u201cnot mentally free\u201d substituted.\n\nWhen I was alone, I asked Mary K. about this woman, and she returned:\n\u201cShe is not a destructive force, but is deterrent. She is working out\nproblems not met when she should have met them, and is fighting for\ngrowth, just as she soon or late will fight for progress. She fights for\nherself, her own growth, and not for progress in the larger sense.\u201d\n\nAfterward, I learned, from some one who knew her well, of this woman\u2019s\ndevouring and unquenchable ambition for supremacy in her profession.\n\nWhimsical Anne Lowe, writing to three friends of her continued\nassociation with them, said: \u201cBelieve\u2014_know_\u2014that we are a positive\nforce, and united we stand, hurrah! Our faith helps all beneficent\npurpose. Its force is freed and multiplied by the sum of your\nparticipation.\u201d\n\n\u201cI wonder if she could tell us what our purposes are?\u201d Elizabeth said.\n\n\u201cYours is Progress, Ruth\u2019s is Light, Katharine\u2019s is Healing and Light.\nYou are blended. Elizabeth to push, Ruth to illumine and interpret,\nKatharine to understand and soothe.\u201d\n\nRuth said, wistfully: \u201cThen all I can do is to shine?\u201d\n\n\u201cInterpreters are really prophets,\u201d she was told. \u201cThat is all the\ngreatest prophets ever were. You are of their purpose, so cheer up!\u201d\n\nInterrupting a little discussion as to whether dominant purpose is born\nin us or developed, she said: \u201cWe are born with many purposes, latent and\nstriving, but as we live we make daily choice.\u201d\n\nThat evening, our old friend Maynard Holt came for a long talk. After\nsome entirely personal exchange, Cass spoke of Maynard as having been, in\nthis life, a believer in individualism.\n\nBeginning with some allusion to former discussions between them,\nconcerning what he called \u201cthe temporary manifestations of Socialism,\u201d\nMaynard replied: \u201cNow I can tell you definitely that the salvation of the\ncivilized world is dependent on the independence of the individual....\nIt\u2019s a big and glorious period in eternal history. The time has almost\ncome for the open fight. Prepare your ground carefully, and gird up your\nloins for combat. It\u2019s coming.\u201d\n\nA little later, in a similar connection, he said: \u201cThe conscious\nco-operation of purpose is the only sound principle of Socialism. That is\neternally sound. And now that we are consciously and forcefully working\nin harmony with the great and eternal purpose, they can\u2019t stop us.\u201d\n\n\u201cHas this new opportunity of communication with this plane made you over\nthere happier?\u201d he was asked.\n\n\u201cIt has opened an entirely new channel to us here in this part of the\nworld. In the Far East, we have the channel, but no hard-pan to support\nthe stream. Here science gives us a foundation from which to work, but\nwe have had no channel through which to reach it.... Everywhere in the\ncivilized world the minds of intelligent people have turned to this.\nThere is reaching and questioning and longing, and a dawning faith.\u201d\n\nAt this time I did not know how frequently belief in the possibility\nof communication with those in a life beyond is accompanied by an\ninclination toward the Oriental philosophies, but Maynard\u2019s allusion\nto the Far East was given greater significance by the replies to later\nquestions.\n\nTo an inquiry concerning the possible influence of these teachings in\nGermany, he returned: \u201cThey are a philosophical and abstract-minded\npeople, and they\u2019ll be hunting a plausible and satisfactory explanation\nof themselves before long. And this is less uncomplimentary than the\nothers will be, besides having the undeniable advantage of being true,\nwhich they will have learned, by that time, to appreciate.\u201d\n\n\u201cCan\u2019t those with eyes, ears, and understanding learn wisely to control,\nlead, and uplift the mass?\u201d Cass asked. \u201cIn Russia, for example?\u201d\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t be in such a hurry. There\u2019s all eternity, and evolution is slow.\nBut the mills of the gods grind on, and the grist is sure. The Russians,\nlike the Germans, must climb their own hills. America has a few to climb,\ntoo. This will help many, uplift a few, escape the mass, but leaven the\nwhole. There is no millennium at hand. This is just a light by which\nthe path is made more clear. It will influence many thousands, in many\ncountries, but the inert mass must work its way on, through the old\nchannels of evolution, made easier by knowledge and by experience of\nthose ahead, but not to be evaded or avoided by any miracle.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut it will bring conscious purpose and effort to bear in helping this\nevolution?\u201d\n\n\u201cSurely. It is a message eagerly awaited and desired.\u201d\n\nLater that evening, I asked Mary K. whether she could tell me anything\nabout the book Anne Lowe had said I was to publish.\n\n\u201cYes. It must be ready for publication by Fall.\u201d\n\n\u201cEvidently sordid, material details of book manufacture escape your\nattention,\u201d I said, laughing. \u201cThis is the thirtieth of March, and you\nhave not yet given me all the material for your book. When you have\ndone that, it still must be edited, assembled for publication, copied,\naccepted by publishers, printed, and sold. Perhaps you don\u2019t know that\nsalesmen for publishing-houses begin taking orders for Fall publications\nin June, and generally carry sample copies of the books with them?\u201d\n\nShe said I would have the necessary material in a month or six weeks,\nand that editing would \u201ctake another month,\u201d from which it is evident\nthat no eight-hour law is operative on her plane. She also advised me to\nsee publishers at once, tell them what was happening, read them parts\nof communications already received, and arrange for Fall publication,\nconditional upon their satisfaction with the completed manuscript\u2014which,\nnot without misgivings concerning such procedure, I immediately prepared\nto act upon.\n\nA night or so later, Maynard Holt came again, with his mother, who said:\n\u201cMaynard brought me to call.\u201d\n\nWhen we asked if she worked with those on this plane, she replied: \u201cYes,\nbut also with undeveloped purposes, here before their time.\u201d\n\nReturning to the subject of Russian upheaval, Maynard said: \u201cThey are\ngoners for some time, now. It will take them long to assemble their\npurposes again constructively.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf you had been here,\u201d Cass asked, \u201cwould you have viewed the Russian\nsituation and its effect on the world as you do now?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot quite, I think. We see farther ahead, and have sounder premises from\nwhich to argue than you\u2019ve ever had there.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis plan, of course, includes all the people of the world,\u201d Cass\ncontinued. \u201cAre those who leave here undeveloped, still undeveloped\nthere?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere is a large and growing population here of the undeveloped,\u201d was\nMaynard\u2019s reply, \u201cwhich is one of the lesser reasons for our keen desire\nto purposize the world.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\n\n\u201cWhat place have the unfit on your plane?\u201d we asked Mary K., at the\nconclusion of the sixth Lesson.\n\n\u201cNo place. They are errors of development, and have a long struggle ahead\nbefore they can reach the degree of development that should have been\ntheirs in your life. They are fusions of weak purposes, and should not be\npermitted to hold back the strong and the fit. Development will come to\nthem slowly, at best, but more quickly here than there.\u201d\n\n\u201cIn the present stage of our development, is there a sufficient incentive\nto progress, without hope of material gain or personal improvement?\u201d\n\n\u201cAny material gain that is for the constructive purpose is a force for\nlight and progress in the larger sense. Material gain is deterrent only\nwhen purpose is its price. Personal ambition is an incentive always.\nWhen it is for personal gain, at any price, it is deterrent. When it is\nambition to serve a great purpose worthily, it becomes a constructive\nforce, to which material gain adds only more constructive force.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you all history spread out before you? Or are you taught after you\nget there?\u201d\n\n\u201cWe have a grasp of results, not easily understood in your life. It\nis like seeing a landscape from a high and distant hill. The salient\nfeatures are easily distinguished.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre these messages for all people? Or only for civilized people? Do they\ncome from Christians on your plane?\u201d\n\n\u201cThis is a message to the civilized world.... Jew or Gentile, Christian\nor agnostic, all men are brothers in the larger sense. Uncivilized little\nbrothers will grow, or come to this freer plane to join their larger\npurposes.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen from whom do these Lessons come?\u201d\n\n\u201cFrom great constructive purposes. There is no sect or creed, color or\nprejudice, here.\u201d\n\nSaturday, April 6th, Mrs. Bruce came again to talk to her husband, and\nhe thanked her for a public gift which she had just made in his name,\npromising such co-operation in the work it promoted as could be given\nfrom his plane. She said that she had felt suddenly impelled to make this\ncontribution, and had acted at once upon the impulse.\n\n\u201cYou all feel impelled to work with us as soon as you realize we are\nhere near you,\u201d he told her, \u201cand the things we can do together are as\nyet undreamed in your life.\u201d\n\nShe spoke of his former interest in the arts, which he said he had left\nbehind as \u201cmaterial manifestations.\u201d Discussing the relation of artistic\nexpression to constructive purpose, he said: \u201cArt, when it is a real\ninterpretation of life, is a high and noble thing, but the art that is\nmerely self-expression is a disintegrating force. Too much of it is that\nnow.\u201d\n\nAt that time, she had read none of the Lessons, and he told her of the\nseven purposes of construction, continuing: \u201cTo purpose of any nature\nonly similar purpose calls, and when the call is heard there is no\nchoice but to answer. No choice after the call has been admitted to\nconsciousness. It may be shut out and denied, but once listened to,\nwhether for construction or for destruction, the answer is bound to come.\nThat is why we so insistently urge the discovery of purpose and the\nbeauty of construction. Character, as you understand it, results from the\npurposes admitted to consciousness. Not always recognized, but always let\nin.\u201d\n\nHe had some difficulty in getting one word written, and she spoke of his\nerasures of wrong starts as extraordinary and unusual.\n\n\u201cNot a bit unusual, if you think how often the words of your languages\nfail as convincing and accurate symbols. You often correct them\nyourselves. A translation may be made in any of several ways, depending\non the reactions of the translator to certain symbols. So, when Margaret\nreacts freely, we let it stand. When she fails, wholly or in part, we\ncorrect it.\u201d\n\nIn view of later statements concerning the force used in these\nmanifestations, I assume this to mean, not that I make the translation\nmentioned, but that certain symbols used in translation are sometimes\ndifficult to convey through me. Frequently other words have been\nsubstituted for those originally begun, when there was trouble in\nwriting them. Another explanation of these occasional difficulties of\ntransmission was suggested afterward, first by Frederick and later more\nexplicitly by Mary Kendal.\n\n\u201cDo you see us visibly?\u201d Mrs. Bruce asked.\n\n\u201cYes, of course. We see all you do, and more. We see motives, where you\nsee appearance.\u201d\n\n[Long afterward (May 26th), Mr. Kendal asked Anne Lowe whether she could\nsee sunsets, and she replied: \u201cNo, but we see their equivalent in dawn of\npurpose.\u201d\n\n[She had previously expressed approval of a room, which had been\narranged with great care for one dear to her, and he asked whether she\nsaw its physical details, or only its effects upon the minds of persons\nentering it, to which her answer was: \u201cWe never see material things. We\nsee their significance.\u201d\n\n[Similarly, Mary K. said (May 31st), \u201cWe read your thought frequently,\nand always perceive motive, intention, and the mental and spiritual\nsignificance of your reactions to material things, in themselves\nunimportant. So we say we see the thing itself, because we perceive its\nessential significance.\u201d]\n\nMrs. Bruce said her daughter wanted to know whether dogs continue to\nexist after life here, feeling that they must.\n\n\u201cThey do not come as animals, exactly. But there is no manifestation of\nforce that is not purpose, and purposes are united and gather here, in\nways not possible for you to understand, in the progress toward the great\npurpose.\u201d Ten days later, Frederick stated this more explicitly.\n\nAfter a pause, Mr. Bruce said: \u201cWe are so full of our fine but tremendous\ntask here, at this great moment of crisis, that I\u2019m afraid I\u2019m not very\nentertaining. We talk shop to you, because that is the reason we can come\nso freely now.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou refer to the great crisis?\u201d she asked. \u201cNot to our present crisis\nhere?\u201d\n\n\u201cGermany is bereft of all purpose. Purposes of destruction have left her.\nShe has one sole, frantic force remaining\u2014fear. After that, destruction,\nlong followed, will turn and rend her, and fear will be lost in despair.\u201d\n\n\u201cAren\u2019t there some good Germans?\u201d she suggested, adding that their\ndaughter thought it unfair to condemn a whole people for the sins of some\nof them.\n\n\u201cMany good Germans have admitted to consciousness the call of destructive\npurposes, and have for the moment joined forces against us. For many\nyears this preparation has been going on. No German who has ever admitted\nthe forces of disintegration is quite free from them now. There were some\nofficers who took their own lives and faced the consequences, rather\nthan join forces with the dominant purpose of their people. No person\ncan live in Germany now who is not party to disintegration. No German\nlives in the world, who still calls himself German, who is not party to\ndisintegration.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou say they have \u2018joined forces against us for the moment,\u2019\u201d I\nmentioned.\n\n\u201cSome of them will see light, and build forcefully for true progress.\nSome of them will destroy while they live. Some will be for years\ndeterrent, and the end is impossible to foresee.\u201d\n\nA day or two after this, when I was alone, I asked Mary K. what Mr.\nBruce meant by saying that once the call of purpose is admitted to\nconsciousness, there is no choice but to answer.\n\n\u201cHe meant that your personal struggle is only with the purposes admitted\nto consciousness. All forces are constantly trying to reach you, to\nenlist you for the great struggle. Once admitted to your consciousness,\nyou have no choice but to answer, and the struggle between opposing\nforces is fought with your help. Many waver between the two, now lending\naid to this one, now to that. A few choose instantly; some to progress,\nsome to delay, some to build, some to destroy. This is what men call\ncharacter.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe said also that no German who has ever admitted to consciousness the\nforces of disintegration is quite free from them now. Why?\u201d\n\n\u201cBecause there is in your life, as here, a group loyalty. But whereas\nhere we are grouped by purpose, there you are grouped largely by\ngeographical location. And any German who justified this war in the\nbeginning is party to disintegration to some extent still. His group\nloyalty holds him, though his purpose protest. That will be the final\ntest. Purpose, or finite loyalty to finite group.\u201d\n\nOne or two interesting statements were made, about this time, during an\ninterview with the widow of a well-known New York surgeon.\n\n\u201cYour husband\u2019s work is healing still,\u201d Mary K. told her. After\nenumerating the constructive purposes, she continued: \u201cHealing was always\nhis purpose, and he follows it still, with all his great force. He has a\nfreer field here, and fulfils his purpose fully. That is the reason he is\nunable to be here to-day. The Germans are liberating many bewildered and\nfear-stricken souls, and all our great healers are held by their need.\u201d\n\nWhen we spoke of ways of finding happiness she said: \u201cWho fears the\npurpose he should serve with force destroys it. Fear not. Find it, serve\nit, and happiness of a positive kind will find you.... Your force is\nscattered among many latent purposes. Find the dominant call of Progress\nto your soul, and follow that, leaving the rest behind.\u201d\n\nAgain, a day or two later, the present preoccupation of healers on the\nnext plane was mentioned, when I asked Mary K. whether a certain woman\nwould come at a given time to meet friends who had asked for her.\n\n\u201cShe may. I shall try to have her here,\u201d she said. \u201cHer work is healing,\nand all our healers are working constantly.... She was an artist with\nyou, and somewhat deterrent. She has found a new purpose.\u201d\n\nThe day before the last Lessons were given, Maynard Holt, explaining\nto a friend the seven purposes, said: \u201cEvery Human being who is for\nprogress and construction serves one or more of these purposes. It is by\nthem that what you know as human force is ultimately grouped for eternal\nadvance. Our effort now is to unite all forces for Progress in conscious\nco-operation.\u201d After speaking of Germany\u2019s unity of purpose, he went on:\n\u201cShe is, and has been for years, the center of forces and purposes of\ndisintegration in your life. She is, in theological parlance, the ally\nof his Satanic Majesty. We have learned here that there is no evil, per\nse. There is only purpose, constructive or destructive.... But the forces\nof disintegration are gathering for a battle of wits and morals, and we\nare emulating Germany in just one thing.... We are preparing. We want\nyou to wake up and realize what is going on. We want every one of you to\nfind and recognize not only your own purpose, but the other fellow\u2019s.\nFind out who is for progress, and who merely camouflages disintegration.\nConscious co-operation of constructive purpose is warranted to beat the\ndevil. He can\u2019t defeat it, nor yet delay it. (O) _That_ is what it means\nto all of us.... Come on in. The water\u2019s fine!\u201d\n\n\n\n\nV\n\n\nAs has been said, our invisible friends have seemed somewhat hazy in\ntheir perceptions of time and place and of mundane details generally, and\nthey have shown no inclination to concern themselves with our trivial\npersonal affairs. When pressed for specific statements about small\ndetails, their replies have been sometimes in exact accordance with\nthe fact as we have perceived it, sometimes not, but they have rarely\ndiverged widely from the truth. In the larger matters directly related\nto spiritual unity and growth they have been correct, as when Mary K.\nexplicitly stated, March 23d (already quoted), that the German offensive\nthen in progress and up to that time successful would ultimately fail.\n\nOn one occasion, apropos of certain questions her husband had asked, Mary\nKendal said: \u201cWe are not here to satisfy intellectual or any other kind\nof curiosity. If we were not sure you would use this information for\nconstruction, we wouldn\u2019t fuss about it\u2014except you and I, Manzie.\u201d\n\nSeveral times during March and April, however, Mary K. gave me correct\nand specific information about various minor affairs, and these incidents\nare mentioned here because I have been asked repeatedly whether such\nstatements had been made and verified, rather than because undue\nimportance is attached to them.\n\nFor example, hastening to an appointment one morning (March 29th), I\ncarelessly left my muff in a taxicab. Discovering the loss an hour later,\nI telephoned to the cab company, to be told that no report had been\nreceived from the cabman, but that they would try to locate him at one of\ntheir various stands. It was arranged that I should call at their office\nfor it late in the afternoon, had it been found.\n\nDuring luncheon, which I took at a restaurant, Mary K. indicated that she\nhad something to say, and on the back of an envelop wrote: \u201cYour muff is\nfound for you.\u201d Two hours later, when I reached home, the muff had been\nreturned by the cabman.\n\nAnother incident, less accurate in detail, but substantially correct,\nconcerned Mr. Kendal and my record-book. Having had, during his brief\nstay in New York, no leisure in which to read the record\u2014which then\ncontained only the genesis of this experience, Frederick\u2019s first\ninterviews with his mother, and some messages from Mary Kendal not\nincluded in my letters to her husband\u2014he had taken the book away with\nhim (March 20th), and three or four days later I began looking for its\nreturn. When, on the 29th or 30th (exact date not noted), it had not\narrived, I asked Mary K. whether she knew anything about it, and she\nreplied that it had been sent and would probably reach me that day. At\nthat time the record, wrapped and addressed, lay on his desk, where he\nhad left it with instructions that it be mailed when he left home for the\nEaster week-end. It had been overlooked, and he found it there when he\nreturned on the following Monday. Apparently Mary K. perceived only his\nintention and belief that it was on its way to me.\n\nOn the 1st of April she told me that a letter concerning these\ncommunications, then several days overdue, for which I waited with great\nanxiety, had at last been written.\n\n\u201cReally written?\u201d I asked. \u201cOr is this one of those successfully started\nthings you regard as accomplished?\u201d\n\n\u201cReally written.\u201d\n\nAt the same time she promised me other letters, from persons\nspecifically named, and gave me certain information concerning a member\nof the Gaylord family.\n\nTwo days later, when none of these letters had appeared, I said, \u201cWhere\nare those letters you promised me?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe letters are coming, fearful and wonderful messenger,\u201d she humorously\nassured me. \u201cYou have not made a ~m~ ... ~fr~ ... ~friend~ ... ~free~ ...\nfantom (O) friend in vain.\u201d\n\nLaughing, I asked: \u201cIs \u2018fantom friend\u2019 right?\u201d\n\nShe said it was.\n\nHalf an hour later the long-delayed letter arrived, and as she had told\nme, it was dated April 1st. The other letters came later the same day,\nthe one from Mrs. Wylie verifying the information already given by Mary\nK. about a member of her family.\n\nOn Monday, April 1st, I sent a copy of Frederick\u2019s recent interviews\nwith his mother and sister to Mrs. Gaylord at K\u2014\u2014, hoping that it might\nreach her by Wednesday morning. Wednesday night Mary K. told me that an\nexpected letter from Mrs. Gaylord had not been written, adding: \u201cShe\nwaits for the record.\u201d A week later, after a happy visit in K\u2014\u2014, Mrs.\nGaylord returned to her home and notified me that she had not received\nthe manuscript from me. Fearing that it had been lost in the mails, I\nasked Mary K. about it, and was told that it would be received. This was\nrepeated at intervals covering several days.\n\nWhen, on Monday, April 15th, two weeks from the day it had been sent, it\nwas missing still, I told Mary K. that it must have been lost.\n\n\u201cThey shall have it soon,\u201d she said. \u201cIt is not lost, but delayed.\u201d\n\n\u201cShall I make a duplicate for them?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou must trust us.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are positive that it will arrive?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, it will.\u201d\n\nIt was delivered to Mrs. Gaylord the following day, April 16th.\n\nOn one occasion I asked Mary K. about a woman for whom I had been\nrequested to arrange an interview with a person on the next plane, but\nabout whom I knew nothing whatever.\n\n\u201cShe is deterrent,\u201d was the reply, and during the subsequent interview,\nfor the first time since the beginning of this experience, I encountered\nan individual whose outlook and desire was limited to the narrowly\npersonal.\n\nOne of the most striking of these examples of specific information\noccurred on the night of Tuesday, April 2d, the day of the Senatorial\nelections.\n\nCass said: \u201cAsk Mary K. whether she will answer a specific, mundane\nquestion for me.\u201d When she had written her name and indicated her\nwillingness, he inquired: \u201cWho was elected in Wisconsin to-day, Lenroot\nor Davies?\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you there?\u201d I questioned, when no reply came.\n\n\u201cYes.\u201d\n\nAfter another delay, when the pencil wandered lightly and aimlessly,\nshe wrote: \u201cLenroot.\u201d Supposing that she had finished, I put the pencil\naside, but she summoned me again, to add: \u201cLenroot elected by latest\ncount. Close in some places. We consider him elected.\u201d Cass looked at his\nwatch. It was five minutes past twelve.\n\nThe next morning our papers announced Mr. Lenroot in the lead, with final\nreturns not yet received, and not until Cass reached his office did we\ndiscover how truly \u201cexclusive\u201d our information had been. He learned\nthen that the suburban editions of several New York City papers, which\nprobably went to press about the time we talked to Mary K., practically\nconceded the election to Mr. Davies, reporting him ahead by returns then\navailable.\n\nOf many other specific statements that were either absolutely correct,\nor so nearly correct that Mr. Kendal\u2019s theory of a difference of\nperceptive method might easily account for the error, one is notable.\nOn Sunday, May 19th, I asked Mary K. whether she could tell me anything\nabout the projected German drive.\n\n\u201cYes. It will be fierce, but futile. All forces here see her doom, and\nthe war will last only as long as unsupported human endeavor can endure\nagainst eternal purpose. Germany has no ally here. The forces that have\nimpelled her for these many years are overpowered by world-purpose, and\nhave left Germany to her destruction, while they prepare to destroy the\nfinest spiritual fruits of victory.\u201d\n\nSimilarly, while writing to friends at the front of our entire confidence\nin the outcome of the Picardy drive then in progress, May 30th, I paused\nto ask Mary K. whether she had anything more to say about the war.\n\n\u201cOnly that we are the victors. Germany does not win this drive, either.\nOur forces rally, and the end is near. Defeat this time will leave them\ndespairing and afraid.\u201d\n\nTo this Maynard Holt added, \u201cAll the forces have withstood the blow and\ngather for the final and decisive defeat of Germany.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\n\nThe actual existence of intelligent, invisible forces, constantly doing\nbattle for and against spiritual progress, through possession of what\nwe are wont to call our souls, was at first difficult for me to accept\nliterally, the idea being in direct opposition to my whole mental\ntendency. While the theory was interesting, it seemed hardly credible\nin its specific, individual application. However, I was soon given a\nmanifestation of the strength and pertinacity of the disintegrating\nforces, which\u2014although it ultimately strengthened my conviction, proving\nhighly corroborative\u2014threatened for a time to end this effort, as far as\nI was concerned.\n\nThe last two Lessons were given to me on the 12th of April, and it had\nbeen arranged that Mr. T\u2014\u2014, the representative of a publishing-house,\nshould come on the evening of the thirteenth for a demonstration of the\ncommunication with the next plane. From the day this arrangement was\ncontemplated, frequent assertions were made under Mary K.\u2019s signature,\nconcerning Mr. T\u2014\u2014 and his attitude toward this experience, many of which\nwere afterward proved untrue, and all of which I doubted, notwithstanding\nrepeated proofs, already quoted, of her general correctness of statement.\nDay by day these messages grew more confusing, and I less able to account\nfor them by any theory then formed. That a deliberate \u201cdrive\u201d by malign\npowers was in progress never occurred to me, and would have seemed too\nabsurd to credit, even had I thought of it.\n\nAs there seemed to be no close tie between Mr. T\u2014\u2014 and any of those from\nwhom he had expressed a desire to hear, no great eagerness on either side\nto complete a circle of which each was a part, I felt that the interview\nmight present difficulties not encountered before, and resolved to do no\nwriting during the day, reserving my strength for the evening\u2019s work.\n\nIn the morning, however, I had occasion to ask Mary K. for some brief\ninformation. Beginning, as usual, with her signature\u2014somewhat haltingly\ndone\u2014the pencil wrote quickly, but erratically: \u201cMr. Farrow is dead.\u201d\nThis man is a business associate of Cass\u2019s, living abroad.\n\nStartled, I thought I must have taken the message incorrectly, but it was\nrepeated.\n\n\u201cMr. Farrow is dead. Cass will hear later.\u201d When I insisted that this\ncould not be true, it was reiterated. \u201cYes, he is here, and ~b~ ...\n~blon~ ... ~latter~ ... bewildered. Mary K.\u201d\n\nOur personal relations with Mr. Farrow, while pleasant, have never been\nclose, being based entirely upon a business connection, and my affections\nwere in no way responsible for my resistance to this announcement, nor\nwould our personal affairs have been in any way influenced by his death.\nBut I did not believe it.\n\n\u201cFarrow is here with us. May ... Mary K.\u201d This signature was slow and\nirresolute, beginning as Maynard and ending as Mary K., but lacking the\nfirmness of either\u2014an indecision and inconsequence characteristic, I have\nsince learned, of disintegrating force in these invasions.\n\n\u201cWas he killed in an accident?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo. Pneumonia. Maynard. Tell Cass.\u201d\n\n\u201cShall I telephone to Cass now?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo. I am watching over him. Maynard.\u201d\n\nThe use of the word \u201cdead\u201d in this connection was surprising, since the\nwhole trend of former communications had been toward elimination of the\nidea of death. Once more I asked Mary K. if they were sure there had been\nno mistake.\n\n\u201cYes. He is dead to your life.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou mean Farrow of P\u2014\u2014? Not his brother? Or his son?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, P\u2014\u2014. It is true. You will hear soon. Cass must go there.\u201d\n\nI telephoned to Cass, saying nothing of this experience, and found him\nin good spirits, proving that he had not heard of Mr. Farrow\u2019s death.\nReturning to the pencil, I told Mary K. I did not believe the information\nwas correct.\n\n\u201cYes, he is dead. A telegram on the way to Cass. He will receive it soon.\nBefore one o\u2019clock.\u201d\n\nSome time later, having heard nothing from Cass, I told Mary K. again\nthat there had been a mistake.\n\n\u201cNo, it is true. Mr. Farrow of P\u2014\u2014 is here with us. Cass will know in a\nfew minutes. He will telephone.\u201d\n\nI warned her then that my faith in her veracity was at stake, and that\nwhile I could not doubt that Frederick, Mary Kendal, Maynard Holt, and\nothers, had communicated through me, I could not take the responsibility\nof publishing anything she had told me unless I could trust her in all\nthings, adding: \u201cIf this is not true how can I be sure that any of it is?\u201d\n\n\u201cMary K. It is true. Don\u2019t doubt.\u201d\n\nI said I had no wish to doubt, but that unless this message came from\nsome other than Mary K., I could not believe her again, if it proved, as\nI was sure it would, to be untrue. I began to suspect that disintegrating\nforces were at work.\n\n\u201cIt comes from the constructive force. Be confident. It perplexes you.\u201d\n\nLater experience has taught me that while either force may be in complete\ncommand at moments, during these struggles for control, not infrequently\na message begun by one is finished by the other. During the three days\nof this first persistent attack, however, I held no key to the mystery,\nand the occasional clearly constructive and characteristic messages from\nMary K. and Maynard Holt merely added to my bewilderment and dismay. Yet\nnever for one instant during those three days did I accept the repeated\nstatements of Mr. Farrow\u2019s death as true. Weeks afterward, Mary K. told\nme why I was not deceived.\n\nSince that time, too, I have learned more clearly to distinguish\npersonality by the degree and quality of force applied to the pencil,\nwhich varies greatly with individuals, though it sometimes varies in the\nsame individual at different times. But in the first experience it did\nnot occur to me to apply that test of identification.\n\nAll that Saturday afternoon the argument went on at intervals, I\ninsisting that Mr. Farrow was not dead, the pencil reiterating that he\nwas.\n\nAt two o\u2019clock Maynard said: \u201cBelieve in us, Margaret. We can help you\nbetter.\u201d It is evident now that this referred to the conflict with the\ndisintegrating force, but at the moment I misunderstood it and reminded\nhim of the many specific and inaccurate statements made, during the past\nfew days, regarding the man who was coming that evening by appointment,\nasking if this were more misinformation of the same sort, to which the\nreply was: \u201cNo, Farrow is here. He is dazed, but will be taken care of.\u201d\n\nAn hour later, I returned to the pencil, begging them to tell me, before\ndefinite information reached me from other sources, that there had been a\nmistake.\n\n\u201cMary K. You must not doubt. We shall lose control of you if you do.\u201d\nWhen I said that what I sought was truth, she said: \u201cI know, but you\ndoubt our control, and weaken it.\u201d\n\n\u201cI also doubt my own correctness.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are correct.\u201d As, indeed, I was. Her message reached my\nconsciousness.\n\nAt three o\u2019clock the insistence that Mr. Farrow was dead continued,\nand attempts were made to explain former inaccuracies, on the plea of a\ndifference in plane, creating \u201cerrors in terms of finite space.\u201d\n\nShortly before five, it was said that Cass had received news of Mr.\nFarrow\u2019s death, and was on his way home. A few minutes later Mary K.\nwarned me again.\n\n\u201cYou must not doubt.... You can\u2019t be a messenger without faith.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow am I to know when you are telling the truth and when it is error?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe truth is the truth, and you must learn to differentiate between the\nplanes.\u201d I suspect that she intended the last word to be \u201cforces,\u201d and\nthat control was wrested from her before it was written.\n\nResenting the whole confused situation, and entirely unable to account\nfor my conviction that this message was false, I said: \u201cIf Cass tells me,\nwhen he comes home, that Mr. Farrow is dead, I will believe anything you\ntell me in future. If he is not dead, I\u2019ll have nothing further to do\nwith you or your book.\u201d\n\n\u201cMary K. You will go on with our work. He is dead.\u201d\n\nAt this point, Cass arrived. He said that he had received neither letter\nnor cablegram from Mr. Farrow for ten days, although an expected and\nimportant letter from him was some time overdue. This seemed to lend\ncolor to the report of his death, but my conviction was unshaken.\n\nFrom the beginning of these communications with the next plane, although\nat times excessively fatigued, I had enjoyed an increasing mental\nserenity, but with the first announcement of Mr. Farrow\u2019s death, this had\ngiven way to the peculiar nervous instability and apprehension invariably\naccompanying these mischievous invasions.\n\nBy night my mind was in a turmoil and my nerves on edge, my confidence\nshaken, my faith in the balance\u2014which did not lessen the difficulties\nof an interview prompted chiefly by intellectual interest. Establishing\nconnection with an unfamiliar personality is not easy, at best, and\nfrequently some time is required to obtain free communication. On this\noccasion, instead of devoting the evening to perfecting one connection,\nseveral persons were called, all but one responding, and the messages,\nwith one or two exceptions, were unsatisfactory. There were vain and\nfatiguing efforts to write a name unknown to any of us, and most of the\nefforts to obtain specific evidential data were unsuccessful. Whether\nthis was due to my own lack of confidence, to interference by the\nenemy, or to the fact that at no time have the individuals communicating\nthrough me concerned themselves with personal and specific details\u2014except\noccasionally, for my own greater conviction\u2014I do not know.\n\nAt midnight, when this interview was over and we were alone, although\nwearied to the point of exhaustion, I asked again about Mr. Farrow,\nreceiving the same reply, with a variation to the effect that the\ncablegram announcing his death had been delayed by the censor, and with\noccasional phrases of appeal and encouragement\u2014merely intensifying my\nbewilderment\u2014from Mary K. and Maynard.\n\n\u201cAre you sure you haven\u2019t been away and let in disintegrating forces?\u201d I\nasked Mary K.\n\n\u201cNo, we have been here. They can\u2019t touch your purpose. Don\u2019t fear. You\nwill be perfectly reassured soon,\u201d was her reply, which, had we but\nrecognized it, was an intimation that disintegrating forces had been in\npartial control in spite of all effort to overcome them.\n\nAgain I asked why the word \u201cdead\u201d had been used, and was told: \u201cThat is\nwhat the cable to Cass says.\u201d Which manifestly did not explain.\n\nSunday morning, Maynard Holt\u2019s familiar signature came at once, followed\nby a long, personal message to a friend who was present, steadily\nwritten, and pointed by an occasional characteristic turn of phrase,\nindicating a clear and uninterrupted connection.\n\nWhen this had been finished, Cass asked, \u201cShall I go to the office for\nthat cable?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is not there.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s all a mistake?\u201d I urged.\n\n\u201cFarrow is here.\u201d\n\nBut I knew he was not there. Had he been present in the flesh, I could\nnot have been more certain that he had not left this plane.\n\nAll day we discussed the bearing of these persistent\nmisstatements\u2014provided they were misstatements\u2014upon the experience as a\nwhole, and I was oppressed, in addition to my personal disappointment,\nby a sense of my responsibility to those others to whom this new faith\nhad brought active happiness and hope. I had arranged to go to L\u2014\u2014 on\nthe following Tuesday, to spend a few days with the Gaylord family;\nMr. Kendal expected to arrive in New York a week or ten days later,\nanticipating further communication with his wife; and various other\nappointments were pending. But though I could neither question the\nauthenticity of former personal communications, nor deny the constructive\nquality of the Lessons, I felt that I could not continue to act as\nintermediary if it were possible for persons like Mary K. and Maynard to\nlend themselves to this sort of thing, nor could I encourage others to\nhold a belief after it had become impossible to me.\n\nIn the afternoon, Mary K. told me to go to L\u2014\u2014 as soon as possible. When\nwe asked about Mr. Farrow, Maynard\u2019s signature preceded the message.\n\n\u201cHe is here. Why don\u2019t you accept it?\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t know why I can\u2019t,\u201d was my reply. \u201cWhy don\u2019t you convince my\nmind, as you have at other times? Why don\u2019t you make me feel it? I can\u2019t\nbelieve it\u2019s true.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou have the statement of two friends.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou\u2019ve been mistaken before in specific statements.\u201d\n\n\u201cOnly in those relating to dimensions of finite space, which we are\nunable to gauge accurately.\u201d\n\nThat evening, Mary K.\u2019s signature came first. \u201cYou must see how foolish\nit was to mistrust us,\u201d the pencil wrote. \u201cMr. Farrow is here, and Cass\nwill learn of it soon.\u201d\n\n\u201cUnless you take refuge again in that difference of plane,\u201d I commented,\nrather bitterly. \u201cWhy don\u2019t you remember it before, instead of after, the\nerror it creates?\u201d\n\n\u201cBecause you should not distrust us.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut why not encourage me to trust you by remembering that difference of\nplane in the first place?\u201d I insisted. \u201cWhy be so explicit about things\nyou know may be inaccurately stated?\u201d\n\n\u201cI do not deceive you intentionally. We feel that a thing certain\nof accomplishment is done, and are frequently misled into premature\nstatements by the strength of intention, or purpose, or movement in a\ngiven direction. We are accurate from our point of view, and not always\nable to gauge yours.\u201d\n\nAdmitting this to be conceivable, I said: \u201cNow tell me about Mr. Farrow.\u201d\n\n\u201cMr. Farrow is here with us. When Cass gets to the office in the\nmorning he will find the truth.\u201d Again the signature was hesitating and\nindefinite, first Maynard, then Mary K. I felt that neither of them wrote\nit, but could not reconcile the frequent constructive statements, urging\nfaith and continuance of this work, to destructive purpose, nor could I\nunderstand why, if Mary K. and Maynard were present, they did not warn me\nof false statements by malign forces, provided such were the case.\n\nMonday morning, the situation was unchanged, save that the statements\nwere slightly elaborated. Repeatedly I asked whether they were not\nconfusing Mr. Farrow with some other member of his family, or whether\nthey had accepted serious illness as death.\n\nA curious statement followed this suggestion, under Maynard\u2019s signature.\n\u201cFarrow is both here and there. He is here in essence, there in body....\nHe is both here and there for some time after death.\u201d\n\nImmediately afterward, however, when I said that this sounded\npreposterous, Mary K.\u2019s name was written, with: \u201cMr. Farrow is here. He\nis dead to you. Actually now dead. Go to L\u2014\u2014 at once.\u201d\n\n\u201cI can\u2019t go to L\u2014\u2014, with affairs in this state,\u201d I told her.\n\n\u201cYou will know soon. Wait.\u201d\n\nMaynard followed, with an appeal to \u201chave faith,\u201d adding: \u201cIt will be\nclear soon.\u201d\n\nThis went on, at intervals, until after two o\u2019clock, when I had promised\nan interview to a woman who had not visited me before. Fully resolved to\ntell her that I could take no messages for her, I made one last attempt\nto obtain the truth before her arrival\u2014this time with partial success.\n\n\u201cMaynard. It is a mistake ...\u201d\n\nAt that moment, my guest arrived. I told her that I might be unable to\nget any satisfactory communications for her, but her daughter, who left\nthis plane years ago, came at once, writing steadily and clearly, with\nthe exception of one brief interruption. She told her mother of the seven\npurposes and their meaning, urging her, as had all the others, to put\nherself consciously in touch with constructive purpose, and to open her\nmind and spirit to those on the next plane who were eager to work with\nher.\n\nWhen I was again alone, I returned to the pencil, which wrote quickly and\nstrongly: \u201cMaynard. It is a mistake about Farrow. The ...\u201d Here again\nthe opposing forces evidently gained control. \u201cFarrow here, but not your\nFarrow.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen why have you insisted that he was our Farrow?\u201d\n\n\u201cHe led us to think so.\u201d\n\nI said with some emphasis that I wanted a better explanation than that.\n\n\u201cMaynard. You are messenger for us only if you trust us.\u201d\n\nA fortnight later, after a second, similar experience, Mary K. told\nme, when I asked about this first confused period: \u201cWe had a terrific\nstruggle for you then. We told you the truth, but the other forces\ncontrolled the pencil.... The forces of disintegration compelled us for\nthe moment. We were not theirs, but they overpowered and used us.\u201d\n\nEarly in June, while preparing this manuscript, I asked her: \u201cWas it you\nwho wrote, \u2018You must not doubt. We shall lose control of you if you do\u2019?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes. We were fighting for your faith.\u201d\n\n\u201cCan you tell me why you did not explain then\u2014why you have never\nexplained\u2014that the enemy had control?\u201d\n\n\u201cWe have certain limitations in conflicts of this nature.... In actual\nconflict we can only affirm. Remember that.... When attacked by\ndisintegrating force, the only way we can help you is to call to your\npurpose and to affirm our own. In your individual struggle we may not\ninterfere, even when it concerns our work. You must believe or doubt,\naccording to your own choice.... We cannot tell you that disintegrating\nforces threaten you, until you have recognized them. Then we can help\nyou repel them. Always we call to you and try to encourage you.... You\nmust make your own choice and your own deductions, and learn in that way\nto discriminate between the forces appealing to you. Details of your\npersonal struggles may not be explained. They are your development.\u201d\n\nKnowing nothing of all this in April, however, I insisted upon a detailed\nexplanation of the Farrow mystery, and again the disintegrating forces\nplayed upon my doubt and bewilderment, elaborating excuses for the\nmistake, in Maynard\u2019s name.\n\nRefusing to accept any of these ingenious but illogical assertions,\nI contended that they were unfair to me, having first specifically\nvolunteered this erroneous information, which they now attempted to\naccount for by obviously specious explanations.\n\n\u201cWe volunteer information pertaining to the message we have for the world\nthrough you.\u201d\n\nThis, it will be perceived, was an affirmation indirectly disclaiming the\nFarrow messages, but I did not so recognize it, and reminded them that\nthey had reproached me for not trusting them in this matter.\n\n\u201cYou are logical within your limits,\u201d was Maynard\u2019s only reply to that.\n\n\u201cAnd you still expect me to go on with your work?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou have had many manifestations of our force,\u201d Mary K. returned. \u201cMr.\nKendal will show you how this occurred.\u201d\n\nWhen I mentioned, with some heat, that some one would have to show me, as\nthey had asked me to shoulder a heavy responsibility in this matter, she\nsaid: \u201cYou are puzzled and frightened, but knowledge of our constructive\nwork through you should decide your action.\u201d\n\nRemembering how fear and grief and despair, in certain cases, and cynical\nindifference in others, had been banished from the lives of the men and\nwomen to whom these messages had come, I conceded the constructive work.\n\n\u201cThen come along and build.... You are unable to distinguish the\ndifficulties under which we work. Many messengers have failed to convey\nthe message we have tried to give.... Many mistakes happen with the best\nmessengers.\u201d\n\n\u201cWas this my mistake?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cNo. You make only one mistake, so far. You shut us out by doubt. Don\u2019t\ndoubt. We are all working for the same great end.\u201d\n\nEventually, although far from satisfied about the Farrow affair, I\ndecided to go to L\u2014\u2014, feeling that if disillusionment must come to the\nGaylord family, it would better come now than later, but still hoping\nthat some explanation would be given while I was with them. In this I was\ndisappointed. Not until a fortnight later did I even begin to understand\nit. But after the first interview with Frederick at L\u2014\u2014, I wrote Cass\n(April 17th): \u201cIf ever I had any doubts about the truth of this, they are\ngone! Somebody did something I don\u2019t understand, but this is _real_.\u201d\n\nI have given this experience in some detail, not only because it\ncorroborates the statements that malevolent and crafty forces are about\nus, striving to thwart progressive effort, but because it seems also\nto offer at least a partial explanation of the inconsistencies and\ncontradictions that long have baffled and discouraged investigators of\npsychic phenomena. Obviously, until the identity and character of the\ninvisible communicating personality have been established and clearly\nrecognized, and the purpose prompting the communication manifested\nthrough a series of experiments, it is unsafe to rely upon information\nreceived in this way. And it is equally obvious that forces of\ndisintegration could scarcely find a more fruitful method of implanting\nin the human mind doubt and cynicism concerning the possibility of\nobtaining authentic and enlightening revelations from planes beyond,\nthan by contradicting and confusing such messages, or by deliberately\nmisleading the applicant for information.\n\nLater experience brought further demonstration of the diligence of the\nsinister purposes, together with greater knowledge of ways to defeat\nthem.\n\n\n\n\nVII\n\n\nBefore beginning the Gaylord interviews at L\u2014\u2014 (April 17th), Mary K.\nasked me not to tell the family the details of the Farrow episode.\n\n\u201cAre you ever going to explain that clearly?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cNot until you know more about these conditions.\u201d\n\nThat night, for the first time, I saw a photograph of Frederick. During\nthe year of her grief and despair Mrs. Gaylord had been unable to bear\nthe added poignancy of a portrait\u2019s suggestion, and only when I arrived,\nto manifest his actual presence in the family circle, was the hidden\nphotograph\u2014a singularly lifelike and virile reproduction\u2014brought to light.\n\n\u201cHooray!\u201d he began, after the customary signature. \u201cHere we are again,\nall of us together at last! Dad! (O)\u201d It will be remembered that this\nwas the first time that either his father or his younger sister, Lois,\nhad witnessed these manifestations. \u201cYou have been the one I wanted\nmost, after Mother. The girls I knew I could get sometime, for this is\nthe future for everybody with purpose, and I knew they\u2019d come to know\nme again soon. But you and Mother dearest I had to have (O) right now.\nYou both need this knowledge and intercourse as much as I do. The fuller\ndevelopment that comes there with age and experience, and here\u2014where\nthere is no age except experience, makes me nearer to you and Mother in\nfeeling and outlook than I am to the girls and Dick. Not that I am not\none with all of you. But being here has showed me the reasons for the\nthings\u2014protective, overseeing, far-seeing things\u2014that you stand for, and\nhave learned there through your experience in that preliminary life. So\nwe are a lot nearer of an age than we used to be. Now we are off together\nagain, and there is no reason, unless somebody backslides, why we can\u2019t\nkeep step through the countless aeons of eternity.... Mother dearest,\nthis time I sure am in. Thank you for putting me on the mantel. I like\nit. Coming home is lots happier business now. It used to make me sorry to\nsee you all so sad. But this is bully!... Dad, look happy for the boy!\nHe\u2019s here for keeps now.\u201d\n\nMr. Gaylord had generally spoken of Frederick, during his life here, as\n\u201cthe Boy.\u201d I had never heard him use any other name.\n\n\u201cCan you give your father the proof of your presence that you give me?\u201d\nhis mother asked. \u201cNot only by writing, but by the feeling in his heart?\u201d\n\n\u201cI will in time. Remember, he hasn\u2019t yet grown used to this communion. It\nhits everybody hard, at first, and this fluency is inconceivable to any\none who has not seen and felt it at first hand. Give us time to get used\nto it, and Dad will be as fully in touch with me and my life as he ever\nwas when I lived there. The shock and grief of my supposed departure are\ntaking force from him still, but he\u2019ll see, just as you have, that I am\nthe better and bigger for this one great experience, and that I never was\nso deeply and truly a part of his life.... Come on, now everybody talk!\nI sure do preach, but you called the turn the other day, Mother dearest.\nIt\u2019s my job to get this across, first to you who are my own, and through\nyou to every one you can reach. It\u2019s all our jobs.\u201d\n\nBoth Mrs. Gaylord and Lois had had some success in establishing\ncommunication with the next plane, through the pencil\u2014obtaining detached\nwords, and some names. And the former now asked: \u201cWhere were you Sunday?\nI tried to get you.\u201d\n\n\u201cI had a big job, attacking a pro-German newspaper editor in South\nAfrica. He didn\u2019t give in, either, but we\u2019ll get him yet. He doesn\u2019t\nfight openly. He poses as a Pharisee, but he\u2019s really pro-German, and\nthanks God he is like other Germans.\u201d\n\nLois asked whether there are any pro-Germans where he is, and he replied\nthat disintegrating force is \u201cpro-anything that destroys.\u201d\n\nDuring his last illness, one of his diversions had been to plan with\nhis father a long journey they were to take together when he should be\nconvalescent. Now, after a pause, he wrote slowly and distinctly, as if\nto emphasize the deliberation of his intention:\n\n\u201cDad, do you remember that trip we were going to take? You take it with\nMother some day, and I\u2019ll go with you, and we\u2019ll do all the things we\nplanned. And I can tell you, if you will just let me in and listen, all\nthe things you want to hear. We don\u2019t need a messenger, you and I, but as\nlong as I can\u2019t get to you any other way, I\u2019ll use one. I can help you\nactually\u2014physically, mentally, spiritually, materially\u2014as for so many\nyears you helped me. It was due to you and Mother that I got such a good\nstart here. Now I am here, it is for all of us still, as it always was.\nBut it\u2019s my turn to lift a little. You carried me for years. Let me come\nin again now, as a real, existing, active, growing force\u2014your son, sir,\nwanting to be nearer and more intimately yours than ever. You go on and\ntake our trip, and I promise I\u2019ll go with you. Frederick.\u201d\n\nA little later, he said: \u201cI wish there could be any way of showing you\nvisibly the radiant force I am, now that we are all united. You have to\nbe translated to this plane before you can understand what it means to be\nbrought back into the family circle. Not all families, but ours. We are\nall of kindred purposes, and there\u2019s no separating us.\u201d\n\n\u201cI wish you\u2019d do some of your \u2018stunts\u2019 for Father,\u201d Lois suggested.\n\n\u201cAll right. If you want stunts, here is my best one.\u201d This was written\nbriskly, upside down and backward from my position. \u201cDad, this is the way\nI wrote the letter to you and the girls. Here\u2019s another, with my love and\ngreeting. I said I\u2019d do this with trimmings. This is the beginning.\u201d\n\nWe gave him fresh paper, and he wrote rapidly, in winding circles,\nstarting at the edge of the table and finishing at the center: \u201cNow I\u2019ll\ndo it this way, all around the family circle. All of you in, and I am not\nleft out.\u201d Diagonally across the whole in bold script, \u201cFrederick.\u201d\n\nIn moving the paper again, it was torn a little. Mr. Gaylord made some\nsuggestion as to the way it should be handled, and Lois humorously\ncomplained that he was \u201calways interfering with other people\u2019s purposes.\u201d\nBeginning at the upper right-hand corner of the table, Frederick wrote\nalong the edges, and then in circles toward the center, as indicated in\nthe diagram:\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t you mind, Dad. Let them laugh. You and I will be laughing at them\npresently, from all four points of the compass.\u201d Again his name was\nsigned diagonally across the whole.\n\n\u201cI always did like circuses, and I can be a four-ringed one now, all by\nmyself, if I have a sympathetic audience,\u201d was his next achievement,\ndone once more in circles from edges to center, but this time his name\nwas signed in the center, in small script, surrounded by a flourish.\n\nWhen again a clear surface offered, he drew a large circle around the\nedge of the table\u2014the symbolism of which, curiously, occurred to none of\nus until the next day\u2014and then ran to the center, to circle toward the\nedge: \u201cAll of us together again, and all being happy in the consciousness\nthat this is real and eternal union, and that from now on we are going to\nkeep our family circle intact.\u201d\n\nSome one suggested that unquestionably he was keeping his promise to \u201cdo\nit with trimmings,\u201d and in an intricate pattern, impossible to describe\nclearly, he replied: \u201cSure! I\u2019m doing all the trimmings I can think of,\nand after a minute or two I\u2019ll think of more.\u201d\n\nBy this time the astonishment and curiosity aroused by these performances\nhad perceptibly lowered the emotional pressure, and the interview again\nproceeded more normally.\n\nNot unnaturally, in this first family reunion Frederick\u2019s messages were\nchiefly personal. Frequently, in pauses, he made enthusiastic little\ncircles, as has been his custom from the first, and I asked him whether\nit was the circle of infinity, all-inclusive.\n\n\u201cYes, partly. Put out all disturbing factors and all forces of\ndisintegration, add more to eternity and infinity\u2014and that is the circle.\u201d\n\n\u201cGood night,\u201d he said, a little later. \u201cI\u2019ll stay here to-night and as\nlong as Margaret stays. You\u2019ll talk often, won\u2019t you?\u201d\n\nThe next night, he began with a suggestion that the rest do the talking,\nadding: \u201cI\u2019ll listen and answer questions.\u201d After some discussion\nof purpose, in its personal application, and inquiries concerning\nother members of the family on his plane, Mr. Wylie asked whether his\ngrandfather could talk to him in this way.\n\n\u201cI can get him, I think, by to-morrow,\u201d Frederick replied. \u201cHe\u2019s\nsheltering a lot of poor, undeveloped wretches who have come out of\nconditions not making for fitness or growth. He teaches, and urges, and\noffers them opportunity, and is too busy and helpful to come away often.\u201d\n\nAfter this had been written, I was told that this man, during his earthly\nlife, had devoted time and money to providing opportunity for others;\nnever offering charity, but building roads that the unemployed might\nhave work, exchanging some commodity needed by a poor man for some other\nof which he had enough and to spare, and always encouraging his less\nfortunate fellows to retain and develop their self-respect.\n\nOf another on his plane, now a healer, Frederick said: \u201cI haven\u2019t seen\nhim. Every healing force here, as with you, is occupied with war-stricken\nforces. They come so dazed, and sometimes terrified\u2014and almost always\nstartled, if they come from battle. And all our healing forces are\nrequired every minute.\u201d\n\nThis reminded Mrs. Gaylord of an experience of her own, a few days\nbefore, when her pencil had written detached words, suggestive of battle.\n\u201cLost ... many lost ... another dead ... shot ...\u201d etc. She asked whether\nthis came from a friend, and was answered in the negative. To her\ninquiry, \u201cDid you live here?\u201d the reply was: \u201cNear.\u201d She asked for the\nname, and it was written clearly, \u201cK\u2014\u2014.\u201d A few days later the name of\nLieutenant K\u2014\u2014, of a neighboring city, headed the American casualty list.\n\n\u201cK\u2014\u2014 caught his one chance before his consciousness dimmed,\u201d Frederick\ncommented. \u201cHe is now too bewildered to talk. Just after what people who\ndon\u2019t know call death, there is a moment of singular clarity and vision.\nHe happened to catch you in that moment.\u201d\n\nWe fell to wondering, then, whether these messages could be flashed to us\nfrom a distance, or whether the person communicating must be present,\nand I asked Frederick whether he could send me a message from a distance.\n\n\u201cNo, but we travel in a flash.\u201d\n\nWe who had had some experience in receiving these communications spoke of\nthe fear we all had lest we might unconsciously influence the pencil, at\ntimes, to write our own imaginings.\n\n\u201cYou people have such a fear of imagining things that you shut out a\nlot we try to tell you,\u201d Frederick interpolated. \u201cWe can\u2019t get through\ndoubt, bitterness, resentment, or selfish grief. Fear can be conquered,\nbut doubt shuts the door in our faces. Please relax a little of this too\nrigid vigilance, and at least entertain the idea we are trying to put\nover.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo I shut things out by too much vigilance?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cYou bet you do! But you do it for the best of reasons. You can\u2019t take\nchances of giving the wrong message.\u201d\n\nTo a question about the desire of others on his plane to communicate with\nthose here, he replied: \u201cThey are all eager to get in touch, just now.\nEvery one of us here is pulling every thread of connection he can there,\nbecause this is a critical time and because never before in the world\u2019s\nhistory have so many people been reaching out for the thing that means\nco-operation and progress, in the biggest and broadest sense, if we can\nonly reach them and convince them that we are all working together, and\nthat we here can help if they will let us.\u201d\n\nMr. Wylie spoke of some one whose \u201cmake-up,\u201d he thought, might enable him\nto receive these communications.\n\n\u201cMake-up has a lot to do with it,\u201d Frederick returned, \u201cbut the peculiar\nquality of following accurately a thought put forth by a force so\nsubtle that science has failed to detect it is a thing that none of you\nrecognize until it has demonstrated itself.\u201d\n\nSome one asked about a prominent politician, whom Frederick had known\nwell in this life, and he replied: \u201c\u2014\u2014 is working his way back to a place\nin the forces of Production. He had a great opportunity, and used it for\npersonal ends, and now he is learning how to use it for Progress. He\nis not destructive, nor even deterrent. He is a fine force, delayed a\nlittle.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you ever seen my mother and father?\u201d Mr. Gaylord asked, thereby\neliciting the most rapidly written communication\u2014with the possible\nexception of one coming the next night\u2014that I have ever taken, the force\nmoving the pencil being so strongly applied, at moments, that the\ninstrument was almost pulled out of my fingers.\n\nIt should be explained that in this appeal to his father Frederick was\naddressing neither reluctance nor doubt, but a certain mental tensity,\nresulting from deep emotion, deeply repressed.\n\n\u201cYes, I had Grandmother at Mrs. Z\u2014\u2014\u2019s one day,\u201d he began. \u201cShe is very\nanxious to talk to you, but she has gone on to a life, or a plane, beyond\nthe one I am on, and I can\u2019t always reach her. I hope to get her some\ntime before Margaret goes home.... She never wholly left you, any more\nthan I have. She tried for years to tell you she was there, and she wants\nto come back as soon as possible and tell you herself that there is no\ndeath, no separation, no cause for pain, or grief, or fear, or sadness of\nparting, except as it is made in the hearts of those who do not know the\ntruth.\n\n\u201cWe are nearer to you than you are to each other, Dad, and we can prove\nit, if you will let go of yourselves and take hold of us. We want to\ncome to you. We do come to you. We try and try to tell you that there\nis nothing to grieve about, nothing to dread. Only love, and hope, and\ngrowth, and beauty of completer union. But we can\u2019t do it alone. We\nmust have a free heart, a free mind, a free hope to come into. Give us\nthat, and we will show you that we are more truly your own\u2014not your own\nflesh and blood, but your own purpose and force, which was one in the\nbeginning, and will inevitably be one in the end. We want to make it one\nnow. Don\u2019t you, Dad? Won\u2019t you try to let the bars down and take us in?\nWe\u2019ll come, and we\u2019ll all be happier than you\u2019ve ever been in all your\nlife yet, because the Eternal Purpose is Unity, and we can begin it right\nhere and now, if you there will join us and be part with us, as we with\nyou, of the glorious and happy and (O) irresistible movement toward the\ngreat end\u2014which, after all, is not an end, but an eternal and infinite\ngrowth toward bigger things.\n\n\u201cIt is a big gospel we are giving you, sir; a man\u2019s gospel; a gospel of\nhope and beauty and construction. And I am asking you to let me come\nin again to your every-day life, to let the dread and misgiving and\nunhappiness go, to think of us here\u2014all of us who are yours\u2014as still\nyours, still with you, still loving and working and hoping with you and\nfor you; and if you can do that, I promise you we shall all be happier\nthan any of us have ever been before.\n\n\u201cYou see, sir, we are all of the forces of Progress. We are all for\nLight, and Building, and Justice, and Truth, and when one of us holds\nback we are all held back. This is the first time it has been possible\nto tell you all this. This is the first time we have been able to reach\nyou freely, in a way you could not mistake. But the people who have\npreached the gospel of happiness as a curative force have not been\nentirely wrong. They have not been wholly right. But the forces here\ncannot possibly affect a tense and resisting mind as they can a relaxed\nand receptive one. And the forces here are potent and eager and ready.\nYou know that must be true, because I am one of them, and the only change\nin me\u2014absolutely the only one, Dad\u2014is that I have left the limitations\nof the flesh behind and grown in perception and knowledge. I am the same\nBoy,[8] plus the better things, and minus the limitations.\n\n\u201cGrandmother is the same, too\u2014plus. She is sweeter, finer, broader,\nmore loving, than when you knew her. Just as she was, but expanded,\nirradiated, deepened. That\u2019s all that death means, so you see it isn\u2019t\ndeath at all, nor separation, nor anything but beauty, and greater love,\nand wider opportunity, and higher ideals to live to.\n\n\u201cThis is what we want to share with you. We can, now. You can have a\nlittle of our knowledge, while still in that preliminary life. You can\nhelp us and yourselves by realizing and living the purpose that is ours.\nYou have always lived it, but you haven\u2019t always recognized it. Do that,\nrecognize it, recognize us, let us in as recognized and essential parts\nof your life and hope and happiness, and I shall not need to tell you\nthat this is a true gospel. You will have proved it for yourself.\n\n                            \u201cYour son always,\n\n                                                             \u201cFREDERICK.\u201d\n\nWe were all deeply moved. After a little, Mr. Gaylord asked: \u201cIs there\nanything more?\u201d\n\nFrederick began making circles, and his mother said: \u201cHe\u2019s so happy!\u201d\n\n\u201cHappy isn\u2019t the word for it! I\u2019m personified radiance and bliss! There\nisn\u2019t anything more to-night, except my love to all of you, always\u2014and\nto-morrow, and the next day, and all the days to come, we are reunited\nand indivisible. That\u2019s enough, isn\u2019t it, sir? Good night. FREDERICK.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nVIII\n\n\nThe next day, that grandfather for whom Mr. Wylie had asked came briefly,\ndiscussing purpose, like the rest.\n\n\u201cI didn\u2019t half understand my own impulses there,\u201d he said, \u201cbut I know\nnow that the best thing a man can do for other men\u2014and for himself,\ntoo\u2014is to give them a chance to develop whatever is in them. Sometimes it\nisn\u2019t much, from the point of view of the intelligent man, but the fact\nremains that it is force, and the more quickly it is developed the more\nquickly the sum of the whole will be raised.\u201d\n\nHe closed more personal assurances by saying: \u201cThere may be no way to put\nit into words, but you may be sure I am watching, and helping, and being\nhelped, too, by your reaching toward our common purpose.\u201d\n\nWhen Frederick had taken over the pencil again, Mrs. Gaylord spoke of the\nlong message to his father the night before, to which he replied: \u201cIt was\nonly a beginning. This thing we have to tell you can\u2019t be given, nor\nyet accepted, in a day or a month. That letter last night was a sort of\nforeword, just to get us all started even. The proof of the pudding is\ncoming later.\u201d\n\nSome more or less personal discussion followed, during which Mr. Gaylord\nasked whether certain arrangements he contemplated making were wise.\n\nFrederick replied that they were, as far as he could see, adding: \u201cThis\nis hardly a time for making permanent arrangements, for while the end\nof the war is certain, the economic conditions with you, following the\nwar, are impossible now to foresee. We have no way of knowing how that\nstruggle between labor and capital, power of foundation and power of\ndevelopment, will end. That is one of the reasons we are so eager to get\nall forces for true progress united now. There are thousands of laboring\nmen misled. Get them in for our work. There are hundreds of employers\nignorant or indifferent. Turn them out.\u201d\n\nMr. Gaylord, who had not at that time read the Lessons carefully,\ninterpreted this as championship of the cause of labor as opposed to\ncapital. Some one else suggested that every one, employer or laborer, who\nwas not for united progress, should be \u201cturned out.\u201d\n\n\u201cSure,\u201d Frederick answered. \u201cTurn out the unions, as they work now. Get\nin unity, regardless of class.\u201d\n\nWhen Mrs. Gaylord inquired about a member of her own family, he replied:\n\u201cHe has gone on, and I haven\u2019t seen him. To some of us here there comes\na lessening of interest in your life, and an intensified feeling of the\nimportance of work beyond your plane. He has this interest, I hear, and\nvery rarely comes back now. There is a lot I want to tell you some time\nabout the differences and conditions of the many planes, but I can\u2019t do\nit now. The first work of those of us who have still close ties there is\nto give you all we can of the possibilities and meaning of the life you\nlive. Some day I\u2019ll tell you what I can of the life ahead, which as yet I\nonly aspire to.\u201d\n\n\u201cI suppose there\u2019s no use asking whether you inhabit space, or planes, or\nstars?\u201d Lois inquired.\n\n\u201cThere are things that I can tell you later about those matters of\nplane and future progress,\u201d he said, \u201cbut there is so much that is more\nimperative now that I am told not to tell more, at present, than the\nimmediate needs of your life require.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you feel any depression, when you realize the immensity of the\nuniverse and the smallness of each individual?\u201d was the next question.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s a thing you\u2019ve got to learn. There is no force that is not true\nforce, and no atom so small that its weight doesn\u2019t count. If one atom\nis for destruction, that means two atoms lost to construction, the one\nthat is against us and the one that balances it here, without any forward\nmovement.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you seen my father?\u201d Mr. Gaylord asked.\n\n\u201cNo. He is a healer now, and has come back from the plane beyond to help\nthe newly arrived find their balance. I have tried to get in touch with\nhim, but he is busy and I haven\u2019t yet met him, but still hope to. Few\ncome back for any work here, and their greater knowledge makes them very\nmuch in demand, just as a great surgeon is with you in times like these.\u201d\n\nAgain the talk turned into more personal channels, and Mr. Gaylord asked\na specific question, affecting future arrangements.\n\n\u201c... Your choice will be influenced, probably, by many considerations,\nas choice must always be in your life.... I can influence you in ways I\ncan\u2019t define in words, but I can\u2019t properly tell you how to choose\u2014as\nyou know better than I. You taught me that, and it\u2019s true. Every fellow\non his own feet.... Not that I\u2019m not eager to help, sir. You understand\nthat, don\u2019t you? But the way I can help most is by a close and constant\nassociation and suggestion, that still stops short of definite expression\nof choice for you. That is your privilege. Mine is to help you see the\nway more clearly.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you know what we are thinking, at all times?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot always. We read most of the thought of the sympathetic forces, and\nsome of everybody\u2019s. I can\u2019t always answer the thought I read, though I\ncan sometimes. But Margaret keeps up such a stiff guard, I can\u2019t always\nget over a thing she doesn\u2019t know is asked.\u201d\n\nI said I was sorry for that, and did not understand it, as I thought I\nhad lowered all guards as far as he was concerned.\n\n\u201cYou can\u2019t understand all the barricades\u2014and the limitations, too\u2014of\nconsciousness. Sometimes I sneak one through on you, but you are from\nMissouri, all right! You want to see the works before you admit the\napplicant.\u201d\n\nAfter dinner, we talked a little about the publication of these\ncommunications, and of the extent to which personal messages should be\nquoted.\n\nAs soon as we gave him opportunity, Frederick said: \u201cYou people can\u2019t\nguess what it means to hear you talking about me, in the old, happy way.\nI\u2019ve missed myself terribly, you know.... You\u2019ve been talking about\nthe book. If you\u2019ll permit a suggestion from me, the plan of copious\nquotation from all the interviews that have bearing on the big message,\nas well as some characteristic extracts from the more personal messages,\nunder initials frankly substituted for real ones, is to my notion the way\nto do it.... A good deal of what we have been allowed to say was because\nthis message was given through Margaret, and the rest of us have told\nthings that illumine and carry on the message for the world. We have all\nwanted you of our own to know these things, but the channels through\nwhich this has come to her have been chosen for her fuller conviction,\nand to enable her to deliver this with greater force.\u201d\n\nIn this connection, it is interesting to note that in every instance\nwhen messages of importance have come, it has been during intercourse\nprimarily requested by those gone before, who have asked me to send for\nthe person here through whose co-operation the freest communication could\nbe established\u2014Frederick writing more fluently to some member of his\nfamily than to me alone, Mary Kendal to Mansfield, David Bruce to his\nwife, and so on. Conversely, interviews arranged at the instigation of\npersons on our own plane have been generally without satisfactory result.\n\n\u201cWe who can tell it clearly, and whom she can absolutely identify,\u201d\nFrederick went on, \u201chave had extraordinary fluency, and almost unlimited\nauthority to speak. We have spoken to our own, and through them to all\nwho will listen. Keep the personal part of all we have said as sacredly\nto yourselves as you like, but my own desire is that the parts of my\nmessages that will carry conviction or comfort to people suffering in\nignorance of all this may be given to them through you\u2014as your faith and\nconviction will lead you to do, I know\u2014not in your name or mine, but in\nthe spirit of light, healing, and progress we all serve.\u201d\n\nWhen this was construed as an intimation that he did not want his name\nused, he returned: \u201cI have no slightest objection. I have only a feeling\nthat this personal revelation belongs to you. Use it as you choose. I do\nnot ask anything, except that you share its essence with those who suffer\nas you have suffered. Give them what will relieve them, and do it as you\nthink best.\u201d\n\nAt this point, the question of publication was dropped, though he\nreturned to it the next day. A short pause followed. Then the touch\non the pencil changed, Frederick\u2019s bolder writing being succeeded by a\nsmoother, more flowing, and exceedingly rapid script, in a message to Mr.\nGaylord from his mother, for whose early death he had never ceased to\ngrieve.\n\n\u201c\u2014\u2014 dear, this is Mother.\n\n\u201cFrederick told me I could reach you at last. I have had always the\ngreatest desire to touch you, to tell you that your mother could not\nleave you, could not cease to love you, could not leave off watching over\nyou, hoping for you, guarding your highest hopes and ideals. To have\nknown the darkness that fell upon you, and to be unable to lighten it,\nor to soothe your anguish, made me as sad as one can be in this fine and\neverlastingly expanding life. I knew that you must some day come back to\nme, and into full knowledge of all that eternal life means, so I could\nbear it.\n\n\u201cYou have been always a joy and a source of great happiness to me, in\nyour splendid adherence to the things we know now to be the first and\nfundamental principles of life. We did not know, when I was with you, all\nthe wonders and beauties of the eternal life we talked about. We thought\nheaven was quite different from this. But it is heaven, in a much higher\nand finer way than anything we dreamed of then, and to be able to come\nback to you now\u2014to my boy, through his boy\u2014and tell you all this, is\nalmost as wonderful and blessed to me as it is to you.\n\n\u201cI have gone on to a life and a work I cannot easily explain to you now.\nI have lost touch with the material things of your life. But you, your\npurpose, your achievement of force, the love you have never ceased to\ngive me, the love with which you bless and are blessed by your family\u2014all\nthese things I know, dear, and have always known.\n\n\u201cFor so long, I tried to tell you not to grieve. We have been so close\ntogether, in the ways that are real and infinite. Never grieve again,\ndear son, for any loved one coming to this happy life. We do not leave\nyou. We do not part in any way, except the way of flesh. We are happy,\nbut can be so much happier if you know us with you and of you, and if you\ncan come to us in confidence and love and conviction of our life, as we\nnever cease to go to you.\n\n\u201cYour father wanted me to tell you this is from him as well as from me.\nHe is doing a great work and cannot come to you now, but he knew that I\nshould soon come to say this, and he wants you to know that he, too, is\nhappier in your growing knowledge of our unceasing life, and unceasing\nlove, and unceasing upward growth.\n\n\u201cYour family are all dear to us as part of you, and therefore part of us.\nIt is a light increasing the light in which we dwell, to be at last in\nthis close communion with you. I will come again some time\u2014many times\u2014and\nI want you always to think of me as loving you, keeping watch over you,\nand living in you and yours.\n\n\u201cFrederick is splendid. You know that. Please be as sure that I am\u2014and\nyour father, too\u2014always so full of happiness in the thought and knowledge\nof you and your love.\n\n                                                    \u201cYour loving MOTHER.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nIX\n\n\n\u201cI am with all of you as I never could be before,\u201d Frederick said, the\nnext day, \u201cbecause until we are realized and recognized the communion\ncan\u2019t be complete. Now I can tell all of you lots of things you can\nget without words or messenger. Sometimes you will know they are my\nsuggestions, sometimes you won\u2019t. But the fact that I am closely and\nintimately in touch with you is the important thing for all of us. The\nrecognition of my definite suggestion will come later, when you are more\naccustomed to all this and have learned the little signals by which I\nidentify myself to you.\u201d\n\n\u201cCan you tell us what those signals are?\u201d some one asked.\n\n\u201cThey are like the force I am, too subtle for scientific analysis or\ndescription, but you\u2019ll know them, all of you. This thing can\u2019t be\ndeveloped in a minute, you know. Wait, and watch, and let the bars down,\nand you\u2019ll know me when I come, in a comparatively short time.\u201d\n\n\u201cCan you tip tables with us?\u201d Lois inquired.\n\n\u201cYes, probably; but that\u2019s a clumsy way of doing it. Some of you can run\na planchette. None of you are likely to get anything like this.... This\nfluency of reception is hardly to be expected. We can talk, however....\nYou can always get me, for the essential intercourse, and somehow we\u2019ll\nget it across.\u201d\n\n\u201cI want you to give your father something like the \u2018stop\u2014look\u2014listen\u2019\nreminder to me,\u201d his mother said.\n\n\u201cAll right; but I can\u2019t do it in cold blood. Let me cogitate, and I\u2019ll\ntry to think up a password that can\u2019t fail to accomplish the desired\neffect. You and Dad are the same purpose in essentials, but your force is\ndifferently applied and can\u2019t be approached in the same way.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow far down in the scale does the possession of a soul go?\u201d Mr. Wylie\nasked, presently. \u201cHow about animals?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere is no such thing as soul, in that sense. All purpose is force. All\nforce personified is individuality. All individuality is eternal. The\ndevelopment is unequal. The undeveloped force finds quicker development\nhere. But the force that has been developed to a point of intelligence in\nyour life, and is not actively put to work, goes down in the scale, is\ndeterrent, and has to work just as hard to get back as the force that\nnever has developed at all.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhere does the force animating babies come from?\u201d I asked. \u201cWhat was\nlittle Dick before he was little Dick?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s what I want to explain, if I can. The force that manifests itself\nin animals is a grade higher in force than the vegetable manifestation,\nand that higher than inanimate stone and metal. The force of an animal\ncomes here, to swell the forces that become individual and human through\nbirth, but individuality begins with human consciousness. All force that\nis not human may eventually become human, but there is no persistence of\nindividuality until birth as a human and more or less productive force\nbegins it. Animals do not produce anything but their kind. Only man\ncreates, and that is the eternal attribute.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs there a struggle between purposes to enter a new-born human?\u201d\n\n\u201cMany purposes are latent in every human being from birth. None is\nin absolute possession. Life on your plane is one perpetual struggle\nbetween the eternal warring purposes. No newly born child has chosen. The\ntraining of a child should, from the first, be a preparation for battle,\nfor daily\u2014almost hourly\u2014choice. Diligence, vigilance, purpose to work\nunceasingly and against all disintegrating influences, determination to\nconstruct and to progress in spite of anything, mental, moral, physical,\nor material\u2014these are the essential things in training a child to live\nforcefully and eternally.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat becomes of babies who die at birth?\u201d\n\n\u201cThey have undeveloped personalities and are developed here. We have\nstrong forces of Light and Truth devoted to their teaching.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen a man is consciously determined to construct, is he ever overcome\nby disintegrating forces?\u201d\n\n\u201cSure thing he is, if he doesn\u2019t fight. Sometimes he sways and recovers.\nRead the Lessons. They\u2019ll tell you more every time you read them. They\ncome from General Headquarters.... The arousing force of this message\nis to be measured by conviction manifested in action. Again you are\nrespectfully referred to the Lessons.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt doesn\u2019t seem fair that physical and nervous conditions should affect\none\u2019s ability to resist or receive the forces,\u201d Lois mentioned.\n\n\u201cIt doesn\u2019t. You just think it does. The forces of construction are\nalways eager to come in. The thing you call nervous exhaustion generally\ncomes from yielding to forces of disintegration. A person yields to one\nor more of them, and then is sorry for himself because some doctor\ndoesn\u2019t rout them. What he needs is to buck up and kick them out\nhimself.\u201d Evidently he referred here to the nervous disorders arising\nfrom mental disturbances, for the next day he emphasized the government\nof physical forces by physical laws.\n\nIt was suggested that while many nervous disorders might be controlled\nin their incipiency by the person suffering from them, they eventually\nget beyond his control, and Frederick replied: \u201cYou think so; but there\u2019s\nalways force where there\u2019s personality, and if it can just be put up to\nyou, by yourself or another, that the choice in the end is yours and\nnobody\u2019s else, you can help yourself. In the end, you help yourself,\nanyhow, unless you slide back to protoplasm of purpose. Get busy and buck\nup, or backslide and slump. It\u2019s up to every fellow for himself, and\nevery one who slips back impedes the way for somebody else.\u201d\n\nIn the talk following this, some one spoke of the constant teaching of\nbrotherhood and regard for one\u2019s neighbor as a vicarious gospel.\n\n\u201cNot vicarious,\u201d Frederick corrected. \u201cIt is not vicarious to give the\nother fellow a chance. No man is his brother\u2019s keeper. No man has a\nright to impede construction, unless he\u2019s destructive. But it\u2019s every\npersonality developed to its highest that makes the strong constructive\narmy. The weak should have a chance to develop, but no strong force\nshould yield its purpose. Nothing vicarious about that. Just common sense\nand good organization.\u201d\n\nMr. Gaylord\u2014the successful head of a large manufacturing concern\u2014asked,\nwith a twinkle: \u201cCan you successfully run a business in accordance with\nthe principles laid down in these Lessons? Before you answer, I want to\nsay that I believe it can be done.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou\u2019re right, Dad. It can\u2019t be done easily, nor quite consistently, at\npresent, because of the complexity of modern business conditions. You are\nall bound to some extent by association with some one else, whether by a\nman, a directors\u2019 board, an association, or a contributing concern. These\nall limit, to a certain extent, your freedom of action; but fundamentally\nthe principle is practicable, and can gradually be put into consistent\npractice by uniting with those of your own purpose, instead of with those\nwho seem expedient.\u201d\n\nThat evening, Mrs. Wylie said that the repeated assertions of invisible\nforces of construction and of destruction, alertly striving to influence\nus, reminded her of the old theories of guardian angels and possessing\ndevils.\n\nI think it was that night, too, though I made no record of it at the\ntime, that Mr. Gaylord said, when Frederick\u2019s good night had been\nfollowed by his customary signature: \u201cI wish he\u2019d sign the name I used to\ncall him by.\u201d Efforts to obtain it then, however, were unsuccessful.\n\nThe next day\u2014the last of my visit\u2014Frederick said of a man of whom we\nhad been talking: \u201cHe hasn\u2019t just found himself yet, but he will. He\nlikes to produce some things, and he will respond to the higher call\nto build for the higher end. You can all help him, and yourselves, and\nour whole purpose, by calling to the latent builder in him. He wants\nto come in, but doesn\u2019t know just where to start.... More effort, more\nconcentration, more force applied for purpose, is the thing to strive for\nfirst. I can\u2019t tell him how to build. That\u2019s for him to choose.... You\ncan build together. Each of you helping the other, each of you bringing\neffort, willingness, perception, force of various kinds. But first and\nforemost, devotion to the purpose of progress, regardless of intervening\ndifficulties and discouragements. Habit is strong in every human force.\nRemember that, and watch\u2014watch for the little masquerading devils of\ndestruction. They are clever and subtle, and come in plausible guise.\nKick them out and work.... You said this sounded like the old stories of\npossession by devils, Sis. It\u2019s not that. The devils of old possessed a\nman in spite of himself. The forces of destruction govern him only when\nhe permits them to. He can always be constructive, if he will. He may do\nno more than carry bricks to the mason, but still he builds. The man who\nhas great opportunity must use it greatly. The little chap can use only\nthe force he has. Thus endeth this preachment.\u201d\n\nLois asked whether he had been present at a moment when several members\nof the family had been in great physical danger, and he replied that he\nhad come at once, from a great distance, in response to a summons from a\nforce \u201cthat is always with you when I am not.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere is always a connecting force between you and the free forces\nhere,\u201d he explained. \u201cWe are always in touch that way. That is equally\ntrue of the forces for destruction. The greater forces for good or evil\ncan be instantly summoned to reinforce your choice.\u201d\n\nThis led to a discussion of prayer, in which certain members of our group\nhad lost faith.\n\n\u201cYou can always summon help, if you call the (O) eternal constructive\nforces to build with you,\u201d he told us. \u201cBut most people pray for\nphysical or material aid. Physical forces follow physical laws. Forces\nof eternity affect them to some extent, but do not govern them. Prayer\nwith other people is a sort of lying down on the Infinite and giving up\npersonal effort. The prayer that is most truly and promptly answered\nis the one that begins and ends with a determination not to yield to\nweakness, or fear, or the other disintegrating powers. Prayer implies an\nopen mind, and is too often made with a closed one. Not wilfully closed,\nbut fearfully, and therefore not truly open.\u201d\n\n\u201cPhysical forces, Mother, were too much for my physical resistance,\u201d\nhe said, when she spoke of her effort to hold him here. \u201cNo amount of\nprayer, or influence of the forces of eternal progress, could affect\nthat, beyond the extent to which it was affected. That is the reason it\nwas a long fight. The forces helped all they could. But the physical\nthing is a minor thing, after all. The eternal thing is all that really\ncounts. And to be able to put you, whom I love so much, in touch with\nthe eternal while still in that preliminary life, is worth all that\nI\u2014and you\u2014went through to make it possible. To be able to pass on this\nknowledge to that life of yours is worth anything.\u201d\n\n\u201cIsn\u2019t the time coming when we shall be able to control our physical\ncondition better than we do now?\u201d Mrs. Wylie asked.\n\n\u201cYes, the mind\u2014and what we call force in the eternal sense\u2014has great\ninfluence over personal physical force. It performs no miracles, but\nprevents much yielding to what is really the forces of destruction,\ntrying to hamper and delay accomplishment of any constructive kind....\nThe forces of disintegration are the busy boys, and it takes force and\npurpose and struggle to keep them out.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs our decision to use your first name in the book right?\u201d his father\nasked.\n\n\u201cYes, sir. I am very happy about that. It will identify me, and therefore\nthe message, to many people I should like to reach personally, and will\nnot identify you to the public at large. I should not like to have Mother\nand the girls annoyed by publicity, but that was for you to choose.\nThe message, as you know, is important and general. But to a lot of\nfellows I want to reach, Frederick will carry where Z. X. would fail to\nconvince.... Your attitude about the book pleases me, too.... You and\nI both know the force of the primitive masculine feeling that a man\u2019s\nfamily is his own, and its affairs private and personal. This time, the\npersonal affair is also the eternal affair, vital and illuminating. And\nthe fact that I have been one of the channels through which this came,\nthat it was the search for me that made Margaret begin this work, must\nnot be confused in anybody\u2019s mind with the fact that the message is more\nthan a message\u2014it is a revelation. For that reason, you and I both will\ngladly sink the personal reluctance and remember the purpose we serve.\u201d\n\nA long pause ensued, while we sat soberly about the table, waiting. Then\nsome one suggested that perhaps he wished us to ask questions.\n\n\u201cAll I want is to talk like folks to the family,\u201d he announced, with a\nforce and rapidity amounting to emphasis. \u201cFor the love of Mike, stop\nthinking of me as different, and translated, and serious, and solemn! I\ndo preach a lot, I admit. That\u2019s for reasons you know. But I\u2019m just as\nfond of a joke as I ever was, and I refuse to be set aside as a superior\nbeing! Come on, now, count me in as the Boy, and out as a thing to be\ntreated with solemn reverence! I\u2019m myself, and I want it recognized!\u201d\n\nAfter this, the talk drifted, much as it might have done had he returned\nvisibly after a long absence, touching here and there.\n\nPresently Lois asked, referring to a friend in Europe: \u201cDid you know H\u2014\u2014\nwas married? And to an American woman?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, I didn\u2019t know that. He should marry a free force, like an American\ngirl. He was too blamed medieval in his feeling about females. We are all\na bit inclined that way, we men, but American women are doing a lot to\nfree force, the world over. They are more nearly free in purpose than any\nother women in the world, more truly individuals\u2014when they don\u2019t abuse\nit, and turn into dolls. American girls help women everywhere. They don\u2019t\nstand for any harem stunts. H\u2014\u2014 will learn a lot of things he needs to\nknow, if she\u2019s the real thing.\u201d\n\nConcluding a long reply to a personal question of his father\u2019s, he said:\n\u201cKnow that I am enjoying every pleasure you take, doubly, once for you\nand twice for myself. There\u2019s your watchword, Dad! One for myself, and\ntwo for the Boy. Remember that every time you are worried, every time you\nare tempted to overwork, every time you put off physical repairs, every\ntime you feel depressed, every time you need rest and relaxation and\npleasure, every time you play with Mother and the girls, every time you\nrenew your fellowship with other men\u2014always remember: One for myself, and\ntwo for the Boy.\u201d\n\nThat evening, Mrs. Gaylord said that she had received a message about a\nrelative in the West, purporting to come from her brother on the next\nplane, which she thought was not true, but one of her daughters told her\nthat a letter received the night before had verified it.\n\n\u201cMother dearest, all messengers have that trouble,\u201d Frederick warned her.\n\u201cThere are certain things concerning details of your plane, that will\ncome to you through forces around you, that get confused in transmission.\nThat\u2019s as near as I can come now to explaining what happens. Some day,\nI can perhaps tell you more about it. But don\u2019t let that disturb or\ndiscourage you. The explanation is as natural as a deflected ray of\nlight, or an electric current grounded.[9] It is a part of the conditions\nunder which we work with your plane, and is never encountered regularly\nor continuously. Certain detached experiences of that sort come to every\nmessenger. This one you mention was not one of them, but I tell you this\nnow, because the experience may come to any of you, including Margaret,\nany day. The current gets mixed. That\u2019s the best way I can express it.\nBut it doesn\u2019t persist for any length of time.\u201d\n\nWe talked about the force moving the pencil. Mr. Gaylord asked whether\nI wrote the words, after receiving the message through my mind, and I\nreplied that the force, on the contrary, seemed to be applied to the\npencil from without\u2014sometimes above my fingers, sometimes below them\u2014my\nonly participation being to hold the pencil upright and to follow its\nmovement. Mrs. Wylie mentioned the theory that the message comes through\nthe subconscious mind, the muscles of the hand supplying the motive\npower. We asked Frederick whether he could tell us anything about it.\n\n\u201cThe subconscious mind is like the battery,\u201d he said, slowly, \u201cbut the\nconnection is made through the hand. The motive power for the pencil\ndoes not come, as scientists claim, from the subconscious mind, but\nfrom the subtle force I mentioned, put into connection with the hand by\ncertain sympathetic and sensitive conditions of the subconscious mind.\nThe comparison is not exact. The force is not electric, and has certain\ndefinitely distinctive qualities not to be expressed in any terms now\nfamiliar to your plane; but in time words will be found\u2014or coined\u2014to\nexpress this connection.\u201d\n\nSome weeks afterward, Mr. Kendal obtained a little additional information\nabout this unknown force from his wife.\n\nIn endeavoring to establish communication with Frederick, through a\npencil, one of his sisters had been overwhelmed by insistent, and\nfrequently unknown, personalities seeking expression, and had had some\nrather violent and annoying manifestations of the force they employ.\n\n\u201cYou mustn\u2019t do too much of this writing stunt,\u201d Frederick now advised\nher, \u201cunless you give up a lot of other things. You can\u2019t burn your\ncandle of force at both ends. Margaret gave up a lot of outside\nactivities long ago. You are sensitive, and could do this in time very\nfreely, but the receptivity is decidedly a strain upon the messenger at\nbest, and if any amount of writing is to be done, you can\u2019t do other\nthings, too.\u201d After mentioning that she would probably be beset by \u201cany\nnumber of yearning forces,\u201d he added: \u201cSo either say \u2018not at home\u2019 to\nanybody but Uncle J\u2014\u2014 and Bud ...\u201d\n\nI halted the pencil, supposing that he had intended to write either Boy\nor Brother, and that there had been a mistake in transmission.\n\nLois glanced at the sheet, and ejaculated: \u201cBuddie!\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s the name I\u2019ve been waiting for!\u201d her father exclaimed.\n\nThe pencil then went on, completing the name as if no interruption had\noccurred: \u201c... die, or give up other things, or quit.\u201d\n\nAfterward, when it had been explained that certain members of the family\nhad called Frederick Buddie, Bud, or Buzz, variations of Lois\u2019s baby\nattempts at Brother, he added: \u201cI\u2019ve been trying to get that through, but\nthe Missourian held me to known names.\u201d\n\nAt first, names came to me with little difficulty, but latterly\u2014possibly\nbeginning with the Annie Manning episode\u2014I have been generally unable to\ntransmit them. Some one asked Frederick the reason for this.\n\n\u201cBecause names are specific,\u201d he said. \u201cShe knows my name. She knew I\nhad a special name, besides. But while an idea expressed in familiar\nwords can be transmitted, however unfamiliar the idea, the definite and\nspecific spelling of an unfamiliar name is very difficult to get through,\nespecially if the messenger is a little nervous about it, or constantly\nalert for possible mistakes. We can sometimes get it through, as I did\nthis, in a rush of other stuff.\u201d\n\n[A few days later, when I was very tired, receiving with difficulty,\nand therefore questioning every statement made through the pencil, Mary\nK. said: \u201cYou are the most mentally ... el ... elas ... el ... elastic\nis not the word. Means elastic and masterful ... impregnable messenger\nI ever tried to work through.... That is the reason names are almost\nimpossible to send through you. You try to get them, but the almost\ninvincible character of your mental resistance to deception makes it\ndifficult for us to penetrate where a doubt exists in your mind. A name\nis specific to the highest degree, and resistance, however unconscious\nand unrecognized, prevents its free transmission.\u201d]\n\n\u201cYou will come again, won\u2019t you?\u201d Frederick asked, as the hour of my\ndeparture approached. \u201cI have had a bully time talking to the family, and\nI can do better work now, because they are all happier, and all with me\nin conscious purpose. It\u2019s true that every bit of conscious co-operation\nwith us helps us, as well as you. So that \u2018One for myself and two for the\nBoy\u2019 is not bunk, Dad. It\u2019s the real thing, for both of us.\u201d\n\nWith a final brief message to every member of the group, the last of\nthese L\u2014\u2014 interviews closed.[10]\n\n\n\n\nX\n\n\nThe experience at L\u2014\u2014, while stimulating, was also fatiguing, and for\nseveral days thereafter I was tired and dull, receiving with difficulty\nthe few communications that were attempted.\n\nTuesday evening, April 23d, two of Anne Lowe\u2019s friends wished to talk to\nher, but were told that she was busy and could not come. Mary K. answered\nsome of their questions, concluding: \u201cAnne sends love to you both, and\nsays please come again soon. She is sorry she can\u2019t come now.\u201d\n\nAfter giving me the twelfth Lesson, Mary K. had said: \u201cThat is the last\nformal lesson. The rest will be given in other ways.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou mean through interviews and personal messages?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot entirely. You will be given signed letters, by great forces.\u201d\n\nAfterward, she mentioned these prospective communications sometimes as\n\u201cletters,\u201d sometimes as \u201ctalks,\u201d but Mary Kendal told us, May 13th, that\nthis intention had been temporarily abandoned, as sufficient material for\nthe book had already been given. Evidently this decision had been reached\nonly recently, however, for an attempt to give me the first letter was\nfrustrated on the 25th of April, and a second period of confusion and\npartial control by invading forces ensued.\n\nDuring the morning, Mary K. prepared me for this letter, in a\ncommunication written quickly and easily, as follows:\n\n\u201cMen will ask the theory of the letters that are coming to them through\nyou. This must be explained.\n\n\u201cAs the Lessons have been given to me to deliver to the world through\nyou, so the letters that are to come will be given to me by the forces\nfrom whom they come. The reason that they come through me is that I reach\nyou more freely, when you are alone, than any other force known to you\nand therefore commanding your confidence....\n\n\u201cThe Lessons came from great forces combined. They represent unity of\nall purposes, and were framed by the co-operation and agreement of the\ngreatest forces of each constructive purpose, to reach the consciousness\nof men in general terms of your plane.\n\n\u201cThe reason that these forces do not come to you personally is that not\nall of them can reach you as freely as I do. Your simile of wireless\ntelegraphy is a good one. It does not fully explain the connection\nbetween you and me, but is as good an explanation as the progress\nof physical science enables you on that plane to follow. The full\nexplanation will inevitably be possible, as physical scientists are\nalready beginning to work toward it.\n\n\u201cYou and I may be regarded as the receiving and sending instruments\nthrough which forces here transmit their messages. You receive from many\nother instruments, I send through others. But for impersonal messages you\nand I are most completely in accord, and thus it is that these greater\nforces use us as a means of communication. The first letter is ready now.\u201d\n\nIt chanced, unfortunately, that I was called away, and when I was\nprepared to take the letter, later in the day, almost two hours were\nconsumed in an attempt to write the name of its author, who was described\nas \u201ca leading educator.\u201d Eventually I was assured that \u201cMatthew Alden\u201d\nwas correct, but, while the name was repeatedly written, I had a strong\nimpression that it was not what Mary K. had intended to write. Reminding\nmyself of previous difficulties in obtaining names, I tried to believe\nthat the delay and fatigue incident to this effort had contributed to my\ndoubt of its authenticity. But the doubt remained.\n\nThe long letter which followed was also received with great difficulty\nand many delays, and proved, when completed, to be a verbose jumble of\nplatitudes concerning educational methods, with here and there a striking\nphrase. It was signed, \u201cMatthew Al....\u201d By this time, I was excessively\ntired and could obtain but one statement from Mary K. \u201cYou have not the\nname right.\u201d\n\nLater in the evening, I took up a pencil, and it wrote: \u201cMar ... Matthew\nAld....\u201d The name was not finished.\n\n\u201cIsn\u2019t Mary K. here?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo. No, she will return.\u201d\n\n\u201cShe said she would be with me through this work.\u201d\n\n\u201cShe will again. Mary K....\u201d Illegible lines followed.\n\n\u201cIs this Mary K. now?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo. Mary K. has gone. This is Mar....\u201d Again the reply trailed off\nindeterminately.\n\n\u201cMary Kendal?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo. Mary K. has gone. Matthew.\u201d\n\nEventually, failing to elicit any response from Mary K., I asked whether\nMatthew had anything to say to me, and he replied with vague phrases, so\nreminiscent of the \u201cletter\u201d that I impatiently gave up the attempt for\nthe day.\n\nThe next day, Friday, Matthew\u2019s signature was the only one obtainable,\nbut I have no record of any messages. I think I refused to take them from\nhim. Saturday morning, I tried again.\n\n\u201cMatthew ald....\u201d\n\n\u201cI want Mary K. Why isn\u2019t she here?\u201d\n\n\u201cMary K. will be ~ret~ ... eternally with you.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen isn\u2019t she here now?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, she was called away. She will come back soon.\u201d\n\n\u201cWas that letter from the \u2018educator\u2019 yours?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, I am not a force for light. I am for truth and healing.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid you deliver it to me?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen why was your name given before it?\u201d\n\n\u201cMary K. ~to~ ... ~taken~ ... ~told~ ... ~took~ ... tried to tell you I\nwas here and would guard you. She will return soon.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you know about the letter? Did she give it to me?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot all of it. She will explain. I am just Mary K.\u2019s ~tatl~ ... ~to~ ...\n~tr~ ... ~tried~ ... trained substitute.\u201d\n\nAsked how he could be her substitute, when admittedly not of her\npurpose, he said: \u201cHealing is her purpose and mine, and truth the best\nguard.\u201d\n\nAt this time, the Farrow mystery was still unsolved. Not until after this\nsecond prolonged experience was I given any explanation of these attacks\nby opposing forces, or of the conditions governing such struggles, and\nwhile I was less disquieted than upon the first occasion, I was still\npuzzled and uneasy, strongly suspecting interference of some kind.\n\nThat afternoon, Mrs. Gaylord and one of her daughters, passing through\nthe city, came in for a brief talk with Frederick, and while there was at\nfirst some interference, he was soon writing with his customary clarity\nand vigor.\n\nWhen his sister asked about a personality aggressively demanding\nutterance through her pencil, he said: \u201cNot much! Don\u2019t give in to\nhim.... Don\u2019t you let anybody you don\u2019t know tell you anything. It may\nbe true and it may not, and it\u2019s not a game to play any more blindfolded\nthan you have to be. You have to take a good deal on faith, at best.\nIdentify anybody who comes, as far as possible.\u201d\n\n\u201cCan you tell me from whom that \u2018letter\u2019 came?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cThat letter got deteriorated in transmission. It short-circuited, so to\nspeak, and was somewhat damaged. The next, we hope, will be better.\u201d\n\nAfter my friends\u2019 departure, I caught Mary K. briefly, when she told me\nthe source of the letter she had tried to deliver, adding that it had\nbeen too much interrupted. \u201cOther forces tried to intervene and dominated\nyou temporarily,\u201d she said, after which the pencil wrote only \u201cMa ... Ma\n... Ma....\u201d sometimes surrounding the letters with two reversed circles.\nI suggested Maynard, but the answer was, \u201cNo ... Ma ... Ma ... Matt....\u201d\n\n\u201cI am not a disintegrating force,\u201d was the reply to my accusation. \u201cI am\nMary K....\u201d\n\n\u201cMary K. back?\u201d\n\n\u201c... no ... her substitute. Mary K. will return soon.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you sure of that?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes. Mary K. is here.\u201d This was followed by Mary K.\u2019s characteristic and\nvigorous signature. \u201cYou should know me.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt seems easy for the others to masquerade,\u201d I mentioned.\n\n\u201cNot to your touch,\u201d she returned, indicating a means of identification\nthat I had hesitated to trust.\n\n\u201cWhy do you leave me?\u201d I demanded.\n\n\u201cYou know I have followed light, healing, and justice all my life,\u201d was\nher retort. \u201cWhy doubt me now? I leave you that ... Ma ... Ma ... Ma ...\u201d\n\nBy a curious coincidence, the names of several persons connected with\nthese communications begin with those two letters\u2014Mary K., Mary Kendal,\nMansfield, Maynard, Margaret\u2014and I suggested each of them in turn, before\nit occurred to me that \u201cM. A.\u201d signified Matthew Alden, the usurper.\n\nThat evening was spent with Anne Lowe and her friends\u2014Anne in one of her\nwhimsical moods, jesting most of the time, with occasional more serious\nmoments.\n\nSpeaking of a dog for whose death they had grieved, she said: \u201cHe came,\nand grew into a better force, and some day he\u2019ll make an adorable baby.\nPart of him, anyway. He was almost human. Every force goes on to a higher\none\u2014unless it slides back. In the end it\u2019s got to go on, so why fret\nand fume about a step either way? Whichever way it is, it\u2019s one step\nnearer the end, and the end is inevitable and fine. If people must have\ncoasting, let them coast. They\u2019ll begin climbing that much sooner.\u201d\n\n\u201cMatt ...\u201d was written once, but with one voice we refused to talk to\nhim. Mary K. followed, with a reference to a promise she had made to\nRuth, several weeks before. Then Anne again, with an apparently clear\nconnection.\n\nSunday, I was unable to get anything from Mary K. I was told she was\naway, doing my work. Monday morning, M. A. told me that Mary K. would be\n\u201cthrough with the task soon,\u201d and wrote various phrases intended to be\nmisleading. In my note-book, at this point, I find the following entry:\n\u201cI am beginning to get M. A.\u2019s messages a little more freely, but they\nare still slow and difficult.\u201d\n\nUpon the departure of a visitor, late in the afternoon, I was conscious\nof a strong summons, and of a strange sense of turmoil and commotion.\nWhen I took up the pencil, the applied force was very strong at moments,\nthen ceased utterly\u2014sometimes sharply, in the middle of a word, or with a\nletter only half formed. Occasionally, the pencil was dragged down until\nit almost lay flat on the paper, and cancelations were frequent.\n\n\u201cMatthew Alden is ~destructive~ ... Ma ... M. A.... Matthew is destr....\ndes ... ~de~ ... disturbed about Mary K. She means to be the force ~de~\n... to ~have~ ... han ... handle you, but she ~destr~ ... has not ~done~\n... been ~here~ ... held to her purpose, and has departed to the other\nside of the world. She must be held firmly to her purpose.\u201d\n\nKnowing Mary K.\u2019s steadfastness in all things, I said that this was\nabsurd.\n\n\u201cShe will be ~pursued~ ... ~bett~ ... forced to strong pleading to be\nallowed to do the rest of the letters. She should be having a following\nof our forces. She has been detained for a long time. Matthew Alden ...\nis having a battle.... Matthew has been defeated and ... M. A.... Matthew\nis de ... det ...\u201d\n\nBewildered and irritated, I demanded: \u201cWhat does this mean?\u201d\n\n\u201cMeans that the ~powers~ ... forces of ~de~ ... construction are\ndefeated. We have been beaten.\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t believe that for a minute,\u201d I said. \u201cOr do you mean the military\nforces? Is Germany winning a battle to-day?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, that is the least of it.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you trying to tell me that Germany will win?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, we are defeated. Her forces have reassembled, and have helped her\nslaughter ours.\u201d Again I said I did not believe it. \u201cM. A.... Matthew is\ndoing his best.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou said he was defeated.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe lost a fight.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf you are Mary K.\u2019s substitute, why doesn\u2019t she come to the rescue?\u201d I\nasked.\n\n\u201cShe didn\u2019t. She believes Matthew held out.... Message from Mary K.\nMargaret, I do.... I do fight for you.\u201d I asked if Mary K. were writing.\n\u201cNo. Go to high forces for help. Only be forceful for us first. Mary K.\nwill do her best for forces of light and progress. Matthew is better and\ndanger is passing. ~M. A.~\u201d I demanded Mary K. \u201cNot this time. All the\nforces have gathered.... She ~should~ ... said be forceful.\u201d\n\nSaying that the whole thing seemed absurd, I asked whether it had to do\nwith Germany and the war, or with the book and me\u2014provided it had to do\nwith anything, which I began to question.\n\n\u201cIt is the ~flander~ ... it is the ~battle~ ... book, not the ~godse~ ...\ngod sent war.\u201d\n\nAmazed, I questioned: \u201cIs God-sent war right?\u201d\n\nAfter some delay\u2014when one of the numerous blanks occurred, all force\nbeing withdrawn from the pencil\u2014the impression of tumult instantly\nceased, leaving a sense of sudden quiet and peace. Then\u2014\u201cMary K. Mary K.\nMary K.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat feels like Mary K.,\u201d I said.\n\n\u201cIt means Mary K., too.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat did all that mean?\u201d\n\n\u201cMeant that the forces of disintegration have had control of you for\ndays, at moments. Matthew was a force for fear.\u201d\n\nWhen I asked whether she had been away she wrote quickly: \u201cNo, not\nfor one instant. He held me back, and called to your fear in accents\nof truth.... We have the forces all about us, and sometimes we are\noverpowered and compelled to let them through temporarily, but they can\nalways be fought away in time.\u201d\n\nBrisk circles of affirmation followed my suggestion that possibly this\nexplained the Farrow episode, and she made the statement previously\nquoted: \u201cWe had a terrific struggle for you then. We told you the truth,\nbut the other forces controlled the pencil.\u201d\n\nWeeks afterward, I asked her to explain more fully this dual control, and\nher reply seems to me singularly illuminating.\n\n\u201cThe connection with the pencil has no influence on your consciousness.\nWe may control the consciousness, through purpose and its unity, even\nthough other forces control the material instrument.\u201d\n\nThis seems not only to show why these messages are written sometimes\nwith and sometimes without the messenger\u2019s previous knowledge of their\ncontent, but also to offer a possible explanation of phenomena of a much\nwider range.\n\nTo my great surprise, Mary Kendal announced herself a day or two after\nthis, having preceded Mansfield, she said, because I was \u201cfairly\nbeleaguered by the enemy\u201d in an attempt to prevent the publication of the\nmessage.\n\nIn spite of this reinforcement, however, M. A. persisted in attempts to\nengage my attention. On one occasion, he invited me to \u201ctry a little\nchange\u201d and talk to him. On another, he asked me to let him write, as he\nhad \u201ca long story to tell\u201d about my husband, who was out of town. Again,\nhe assured me that I had disappointed \u201cthem,\u201d that \u201cthey\u201d felt that I\nhad failed as a messenger, and that Mary K. had departed permanently.\nStill again, when confusion seemed to have overtaken the book project, he\ndeclared, quite frankly: \u201cWe have stopped you now. M. A.\u201d\n\nNo longer troubled by these intrusions, however, I never permitted him\nto use the pencil after his identity had been discovered. Occasionally\nI was deceived for a moment, and not infrequently it was his failure to\ncomplete a sentence or a word that betrayed him.\n\n\u201cHe defeats himself by his fear, like all cowards,\u201d Mary K. said, one\nday, and when I mentioned that his messages lacked continuity, she\nreturned: \u201cNo coward is consecutive. How could he be?\u201d\n\nThese were by no means the last of the encounters with Matthew. Mr.\nKendal arrived on the 7th of May, and a night or two later, when several\nof those interested in these communications were together, M. A. made\nhis appearance again. For some time his initials followed every attempt\nto establish communication with our invisible friends, but eventually we\nobtained Mary Kendal\u2019s clear signature, and a message, slowly written,\nwith frequent pauses, during which the personality striving to oppose her\nwas gradually overcome. M. A.\u2019s erratic touch was occasionally evident,\nlessening in strength as Mary\u2019s steady, gentle control increased.\n\n\u201cCome on,\u201d she said, finally. \u201cWe are ready for a little fun now, and\nwe will leave the more serious matters until we have more truly a clear\nfield.\u201d\n\nAccordingly, we abandoned our intended inquiry, for the moment, resorting\nto persiflage, in which she took an active part, writing with increased\nfluency.\n\n\u201cLaughter is a constructive force, children,\u201d she told us, when things\nwere going smoothly again. \u201cRemember that when you fight fiends.... If we\nkeep our touch close, and laugh like that, with real mirth, they can\u2019t\nget in.\u201d\n\nLater that evening, Anne Lowe came for a moment, just to tell us, she\nsaid, that we had made a step in learning what laughter that is from the\nheart will do. \u201cIt is protective, constructive, curative, and the devil\nfor devils. They can\u2019t get over, or around, or through it. That\u2019s your\nbest weapon and your best protection, aside from fundamental purposes.\nUse it, and more power to your\u2014what is it you laugh with? Diaphragm, or\nwhat?\u201d\n\nThe next night, when conditions were normal from the first, we asked Mary\nKendal about this incident, and she said: \u201cIt was just a massed attack,\nwhich will occur from time to time. They will fight as long as they\nexist, but the virulence and violence of their present efforts is due to\nour united attack on them.\u201d\n\nAn interesting and illuminating variation of these occasional sorties\noccurred during an interview between a man of whose personal relations\nand interests I have only the most casual knowledge, and a personality on\nthe next plane whom I knew not at all.\n\nThe first messages to him, as to most of the others, concerned purpose\nand its unity. Apparently not convinced of the authenticity of their\nsource, he repeatedly asked for an intimate, characteristic, personal\nmessage. Not receiving it, he asked a question relating to an entirely\nimaginary situation\u2014\u201cjust to see,\u201d as he afterward explained.\n\nThe question was answered in detail, immediately followed by the\nstatement, \u201cPhil fears too much.\u201d\n\nSuspecting interference, from the peculiar movement of the pencil, I\nasked him who Phil was, and when he replied that he knew no such person,\nI demanded to know who was writing.\n\n\u201cM. A.\u201d This signature was not complete, but the reply to a question\nin this connection, purporting to come from Mary K., was followed by\na vigorous repetition of M. A.\u2019s initials, inclosed in two reversed\ncircles\u2014his characteristic signature when in full control of the pencil.\n\nMy visitor then admitted that he had asked a fictitious question,\nbut attempts to learn who had answered it resulted in contradictory\nassertions from various sources, and knowing the difficulty of\nre-establishing a connection once effectually broken, I refused to\ncontinue the interview.\n\n\u201cThe integrity of the seeker,\u201d Mary K. said, the next day, \u201cis the\nmessenger\u2019s only protection from disintegrating force during an\ninterview. These forces should be persistently repelled, not invited.\nIgnorance of their presence and power frequently opens a way for them,\nas in this instance. Absolute sincerity and candor are essential to\nthe maintenance of a connection with constructive forces, in these\ninterviews.\u201d\n\n\u201cForces of disintegration do not wait to be invited,\u201d she asserted,\non another occasion. \u201cThey constantly attack, and seize the first\nopportunity to take possession. We, also, watch and call, and enter where\nwe can. But the idea of original sin is so strongly implanted in the\nminds of most men, that an assumption that disintegrating force can only\nenter where it is invited is inevitable. It must be clearly understood\nthat attack by forces of disintegration does not imply weakness, or fear,\nor sinful desire. It implies only a desire on the part of the attacking\nforce to destroy. That there are individuals given to disintegration is\nanother matter. Those most desirous of construction and progress are more\noften attacked by persistent, massed forces of destructive purpose. To be\nconscious of this is to be protected, to some degree. For that reason, we\nurge the publication of these truths, that the struggle may no longer be\nwaged in ignorance and doubt and confusion.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoes \u2018massed forces of destructive purpose\u2019 imply some combination, or\nco-operation, or co-ordination, among disintegrating forces?\u201d Mary K. was\nasked, at another time.\n\n\u201cYes, they combine every appealing force, as we do. One man may answer\nto doubt, fear, cupidity, and envy. Another to malice, doubt, and lust.\nAny forces that can reach him mass themselves in attack and call on their\npurposes in him to respond.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen there must be a considerable degree of intelligence among them. You\nsaid they would become constructive when intelligent.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen intelligent enough. I never meant to imply that the purposes and\nforces of destruction are unintelligent. They are not fully intelligent.\nThey are not balanced, not fully animated. All forces of construction\ncomprehend destruction. No forces of destruction comprehend construction.\nThey are intelligent and wily in destruction, but fail to apprehend its\nfutility.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre they what we on this plane call uneducated, unlearned, ignorant in\nthat sense?\u201d\n\n\u201cThey are sometimes found on your plane among the highly educated,\nlearned, and powerful. Here we regard them as undeveloped forces, to be\nfought unceasingly until they consent to become constructive.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou don\u2019t call that coercing your brother, do you?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cNo, we do not compel them to construct, if they would destroy by\npreference. We oppose them until they perceive that they must fail, and\nseek light. Then we accept them, instruct them, and are stronger....\nThe forces opposing us have no faith, hence no knowledge of a future.\nThey dread destruction, fear the end of existence, deny a future, and\nconstantly seek to destroy the inevitable.\u201d\n\nIn this connection, Mr. Kendal once asked Mary: \u201cWhat do the evil forces\nthink they\u2019re trying to do? Have they lost the great primary idea? Was\nthere a great primary idea? Or are they just bandar-logging it around\nin a chaotic forest of spiritual upas-trees, screaming at anything they\nhappen to see?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere was no great primary idea of destruction,\u201d she returned. \u201cA lot of\nidle force gathered together, and finding itself behind the procession\nin strength, radiance, and beauty, began envying and coveting and\nbackbiting, and from that to destruction is a logical and inevitable\nprogression. Why is anybody among you envious, or malicious, or cowardly,\nor destructive? There is no great idea behind it. They see they are\nbehind somebody else in something, and instead of developing what\nconstructive power they have of their own, they, hate the person who has\nmore and try to destroy him, or his reputation, or his property. There\nyou have concrete examples of all the idea there is in destructive\npurpose. It\u2019s spiritual unintelligence.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy did they quit Germany?\u201d he asked, then. \u201cIsn\u2019t the apotheosis of\nsuch personal and deterrent and soul-driving and dominating purposes just\ntheir caliber?\u201d\n\n\u201cThey see the forces of progress gathering among you, and know that\nthey cannot win through Germany. She still follows their methods, but\nwithout their help, while every vibration of progressive and co-operative\npurpose among you enables us to help you more. So they have left her to\nthe fruits of their union, the consequence inevitable, and hatch fresh\nmischief themselves.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nXI\n\n\nOn the evening of his arrival, May 7th, Mr. Kendal asked his wife whether\nshe could stay with us during his visit to New York, and she replied\nthat she would outstay him, unless the forces attacking me were defeated\nbefore his departure.\n\n\u201cIt really helps, then, for us to get together here,\u201d he inferred.\n\n\u201cYes, indeed, it helps. All combination of force adds by the sum of its\nparticipation to the original amount of force combined.\u201d\n\nTaken in conjunction with other, similar assertions in this\nconnection\u2014\u201cIts force is freed and multiplied by the sum of your\nparticipation\u201d; \u201cFor every vibration of pure constructive purpose among\nthe Allied forces, we have added two\u201d; \u201cForce united is more powerful by\nhalf than similar forces separately striving\u201d; etc.\u2014it seems probable\nthat these expressions were intended as figures of speech, emphasizing\nthe increased potency of united purpose on our plane and the ability of\nthe free forces to reinforce it in proportion to its actual vitality,\nrather than as mathematical statements of the exact degree to which this\nreinforcement and co-operation may be carried.\n\nMentioning that sometimes they seemed to make a distinction between\npurpose and force, and again to use the terms interchangeably, Mr. Kendal\nsaid he would like to know the character of each. \u201cIs purpose like the\ndirection of an electric current, and force like amperage and voltage?\u201d\nhe asked. \u201cOr is purpose the road, and force the velocity in following\nit? Is purpose qualitative, and force quantitative? Is the distinction\nbetween them along some of these lines?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is along all those lines,\u201d was the reply. \u201cPurpose is the force that\ndraws. Force is the purpose that pushes.\u201d\n\nLike various others to whom these messages first came through me,\nMr. Kendal had been trying, with some success, to obtain direct\ncommunication. Mary facetiously described his pencil as \u201ca good burro,\u201d\nand mine as \u201ca real hawse.\u201d I had thought this dialecticism differently\nspelled, but he reminded me that \u201choss\u201d belonged to New England, and\n\u201chawse\u201d to Mary\u2019s native state, Kentucky.\n\nWhile the pencil-point rested idly on the paper, we talked about the\nsensations accompanying its movement, and about the probable direction\nof the force propelling it. To him, the impulse seemed to come first\nand chiefly through the consciousness; to me, it seemed a physical\nforce externally applied to the pencil, notwithstanding occasional\nconsciousness of what the message would be; but we were agreed that it\nwas difficult, at first, to be sure that the impulse was not in some\nunrecognized way our own.\n\n\u201cIt has been amusing to us to see you two struggle against our psychical\nintrusions,\u201d Mary remarked, at this point. \u201cWe do push the pencil. We\nalso reach the mind. Sometimes the one, sometimes the other, is what does\nthe trick. It is easier for us to impress the mind, but harder for you to\nrecognize that suggestion as ours. You think it\u2019s your own, and fight.\nMargaret is even more resistant than Manzie\u2014perhaps because she has more\nresponsibility to other people.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre present conditions\u2014the gathering of the clans for the coming\nstruggle\u2014going to enable many people to do this, who have never done it\nbefore and otherwise would have been unable to do it?\u201d he asked.\n\n\u201cYes; but the danger of that is that the other forces will find their own\nchannels, and steal and defile some of ours. So we can\u2019t advise people\nto experiment, unless they can absolutely identify the force here, and\nonly a few, comparatively, can do that.\u201d\n\nHe said that he had hesitated to ask questions of his own pencil, being\nunwilling to go too far in this until he had checked it up through me.\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s scairt,\u201d she teased, before he had fairly started to speak. \u201cYou\ndon\u2019t trust yourself or me.\u201d\n\nLaughing, he retorted: \u201cThat\u2019s another!\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are right to be careful,\u201d she went on, serious again. \u201cIt\u2019s a\ndangerous adventure, unless you keep your balance, follow your own\npurpose, keep close tab on the force handling the pencil, and lean on it\nonly spiritually. The minute advice in material things is sought, that\nminute there is danger.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s no danger that anybody can impersonate you and fool me,\u201d he\ndeclared.\n\n\u201cNever! The danger is that somebody might lie to you about me; or if\nyou cease to stand on your own feet and make your own choice in matters\nof your plane, only then somebody might impersonate me for a moment.\nSometimes I can tell you those things, but the habit of depending on them\nis bad for you.\u201d\n\nA night or two later, beginning with a reply to a question concerning\nanother subject, she returned to the discussion of the force used in\nconveying these communications\u2014\u201ca force compared to which electricity\nis like spring water,\u201d she said\u2014declaring, like Frederick, that its\nexplanation is still impossible in terms of our plane.\n\n\u201cThere is a vital and potent force, not yet isolated\u2014and hardly\ndiscovered\u2014by your most advanced scientists,\u201d she told us. \u201cIt has\ncharacteristics and attractions not explainable until its discovery and\nanalysis give rise to a new set of words. There is no adequate comparison\nthat may be used to indicate its force, or the conditions and degrees\nof its variations. It has some resemblance to electricity, yet the\ncomparison in certain cases would be misleading.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am talking about the force we use in moving this pencil, and to some\nextent in affecting your thought,\u201d she continued, when Mr. Kendal had\nmentioned certain recent scientific experiments of which he had read.\n\u201cThe scientists have long associated the power of thought with the brain,\nand have seriously argued that, as we could not be seen, measured,\nweighed, or condensed, we did not exist. We do. And we have a force at\nour command that cannot be explained, as yet. It can only occasionally\nbe demonstrated as clearly as this. Electricity is the most likely to\nimpress the man in the street as a comparison, but to argue from that as\na premise would lead to misconception. At present, it must be accepted as\na recognized but not understood force, only dimly perceived, as for years\nelectricity was.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoes it help, if we emphasize what we know of static electricity, as\nwell as thinking of the comparison in terms of electric current? A static\nforce in your plane, perhaps?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, that helps; but the static force is in your plane, quite as much\nas here. We have more knowledge of the current, to continue the simile,\nbut encounter static conditions both here and there, as well as counter\ncurrents here.\u201d\n\nThis would seem to offer reasons\u2014in addition to David Bruce\u2019s explanation\nof the difficulties of translation when the messenger\u2019s reaction to\ncertain word-symbols fails\u2014for occasional delays in the transmission of\nthese communications.\n\n\u201cMargaret hasn\u2019t tried us yet with an antagonistic force on your plane,\u201d\nshe said, on another occasion. \u201cWe don\u2019t do it this way when the forces\nthere are not harmonious.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs your forward sight much greater than ours?\u201d her husband asked. \u201cOr is\nit, in relation to other planes, about what ours is in regard to yours?\u201d\n\n\u201cWe can see the end as you have not even dreamed it yet, but our detailed\nknowledge is limited to two or three planes beyond ours. Even here,\ndevelopment is uneven, and some of us see farther than others. We are\nfar from omniscient or omnipotent. We have advanced beyond you, our\nindividual purposes are clear where yours are confused, we know where we\nare bound and why, we see much farther ahead than you can, and we work\nin three planes\u2014yours as teachers, ours as laborers, and the next as\nstudents.\u201d\n\nReferring to the statements about Russia, of which we had told him,\nhe asked whether there were the same relative differences of opinion\nand judgment among them as among us, as to psychological policies to\nbe pursued for the Great Purpose, and as to the applications of those\npolicies on this plane.\n\n\u201cThere are some differences of perception. Light, for example, sees\nshadow and desires to dispel it. Truth sees error and wishes to correct\nit. But, broadly speaking, the opinions are the same. The impediments\nin the path of progress are many. Each purpose deals with its own;\nLight with darkness, Truth with error, and so on. Each may work in the\nsame field, even in the same individual, but here we work for the same\nultimate purpose. We do not disagree. Each follows his own work, and\nrecognizes the other\u2019s field.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe have a united policy,\u201d she said, at another time, \u201cbut each our\nindividual application of it in personal relations and messages like\nthese. It is all intended to enlighten and inspire you, but only in\ncertain fundamental and specific matters are we instructed what to say.\u201d\n\n\u201cCan you determine time there, by other than the memory of it here and by\nclose inspection?\u201d was another question.\n\n\u201cWe have no time here, in your sense. We watch you, and remember, but we\nlose track of you, sometimes.\u201d\n\nMr. Kendal then said\u2014explaining his phrase, \u201cclose inspection\u201d\u2014that he\nthought they saw time dimly, as we see through water or through fog.\n\n\u201cIs memory with you as acute as answers to some of these questions seem\nto indicate?\u201d one of us inquired.\n\n\u201cNot of material things, generally. We don\u2019t pay much attention to them,\nunless they interfere with purpose. Just now they are interfering a good\ndeal\u2014or were, before the war, which is itself a material manifestation\nof purpose.\u201d We said that we should have thought this interference in\nfull force still, and she continued: \u201cThe real interference, from our\npoint of view, came before the war, when the world outside of Germany\nwas too much occupied in pursuit of material things to see what was\nhappening. They failed even to see Germany\u2019s intention. Much less did\nthey discover their own danger, of which Germany\u2019s purpose, materially,\nwas the least. The war woke them up by degrees, fortunately, or there\nwould be no use telling them this.\u201d\n\nA question concerning the possibility of communicating with a person\nrecently departed from this plane, was met with the statement that he had\n\u201cfree communion\u201d still to learn. This expression had been used several\ntimes by others, and now I asked: \u201cMary, what is free communion?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou don\u2019t think we vocalize our talk, do you?\u201d\n\nMansfield suggested that when a man found himself suddenly without his\nmaterial veil, he must be at a loss how to proceed, and asked whether\nthat was what she meant.\n\n\u201cNot entirely. The veil isn\u2019t missed particularly, but there is a ...\na....\u201d\n\n\u201cDifference of medium?\u201d he asked. \u201cLike a water-color artist who can\u2019t\npaint in oil?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s it.\u201d\n\n\u201cReferring to your assertion in March that truth is absolute,\u201d he said,\n\u201cis not truth itself relative on this plane? Truth as a statement of\neternal law is absolute, but when applied to concrete facts and ideas, it\nchanges from time to time? That is, a concrete statement which expressed\nthe relations of certain mundane conditions to the eternal verities in\nB.C. 1000, would not necessarily be a correct statement of the relations\nof corresponding conditions to those verities in the year 1900 A.D.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat is the idea on which this whole revelation is based,\u201d she returned.\n\u201cThese things have always been true. They would not have sounded true in\nthe year one, any more than a lot of the \u2018truths\u2019 of that day are true\nnow.\u201d\n\nA night or two after this, he said he would like more light on the\npractical application of these principles, especially those in relation\nto freedom. \u201cHow, for instance, would you go about helping a school?\u201d he\nasked. \u201cTake, as concrete examples, a University like \u2014\u2014, its Faculty\nheld in subjection by hidebound trustees, and the proposed People\u2019s\nUniversity, to be governed from day to day by plebiscite or referendum,\nwith no defined policy for procedure beyond a general idea of freedom.\n\u2018You may lead a horse to water, but you can\u2019t make him drink.\u2019 Should\nthe construction of the trough be left to chance, or should it be planned\ncarefully? In other words, should mundane provision and prevision be\nemployed in building it?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt has been said already that men must first learn to think, and\nto govern themselves, before they can be free.\u201d It was Mary K. who\nanswered. \u201cIf experience were not taken into consideration, progress\nwould be impossible. Mundane prevision and provision is essential to all\nconstructive activity on your plane. Opinions will differ as to ways and\nmeans of applying principles of progress. The first way to help a school\nis to establish unity among the teachers. Not only unity of purpose, but\na certain large unity of method, that one may not tear down what his\nbrother builds. Ideals of freedom have been confused by men resenting\nthe first law of freedom\u2014discipline. Lack of discipline, carried to its\nlogical conclusion, would return the world to chaos. The school that is\nfree in its teaching must be carried on by disciplined teachers, united\nin a purpose of progress clearly recognized and agreed upon, to teach\ndiscipline that the minds of men may dare to be free.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe idea underlying that, I take it, is that as the athlete whose body\nis thoroughly trained and co-ordinated dares to jump an abyss, without\nfear of falling, so the man whose mind and spirit are disciplined can\njump an intellectual abyss, without losing balance or sanity.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes. And as a man trained to carry great weights on his shoulders must\nbe trained to it from youth, so the man who would carry government and\nfreedom of thought must train his mind to carry its weight\u2014not alone to\nhold it briefly, but to carry it on.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs it true, then,\u201d he asked, \u201cthat safe freedom and constructive freedom\nare only possible after prior discipline and self-control?\u201d\n\n\u201cHow can undisciplined freedom be safe or constructive? It makes the\nwilderness. It makes the jungle. It makes the uncharted and devouring\nsea.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nXII\n\n\nOne day, about the middle of May, discussing these manifestations over a\nluncheon table, a man who described himself as \u201ca sympathetic agnostic\u201d\nmentioned that while all those on the next plane reported that they were\nbusy, none to his knowledge had told just what they were doing.\n\nAt that time, we had received several statements concerning their\nactivities. Frederick had spoken of his efforts in connection with \u201ca\npro-German newspaper editor.\u201d Maynard Holt\u2019s mother had told us that\nshe worked \u201cwith undeveloped purposes, here before their time.\u201d It had\nbeen said of a famous editor: \u201cHe is for Justice.... He is one of the\nforces determining the grouping of the newly arrived.\u201d Anne Lowe had\nsaid: \u201cI handle children. Some of them thought they were grown up when\nthey left you.\u201d And the work of the healers, in receiving and soothing\n\u201cwar-stricken forces,\u201d had been repeatedly mentioned.\n\nHowever, with the comment of the \u201csympathetic agnostic\u201d in mind, we\nasked Mary Kendal, apropos of some allusion to the healers on her plane,\nwhether she could tell us of their work in detail.\n\n\u201cYou have already seen that our ability to be specific, even about\nthings here, is dependent on your ability to understand conditions of\nour plane,\u201d she reminded us. \u201cAs fast as we can, we give it to you. But\nas well explain the operation of wireless telegraphy to an illiterate\n\u2018cracker,\u2019 as to try to explain healing, as we understand and practise\nit, to the person unprepared by thought and study of these truths.\u201d\n\nThe next day, in another city, Frederick, writing through a member of his\nfamily, said that he had been doing some work in developing some spirits\nwho had \u201clet their lowest tendencies be their guiding force.\u201d\n\n\u201cThey were men who were very unhappy, because they had left the world\nbefore they were ready, and did not know what this life meant,\u201d he said.\n\n\u201cHad they recently gone over?\u201d he was asked.\n\n\u201cYes, not very long on this side. They were so bewildered that they\nthought they were in some kind of dream that they could not wake from.\nThey had been sick, but not long enough to let them get any idea of\ndeath, or light after death, so they were sorry to come over.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo they call you teacher?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, just a friend.\u201d\n\nReplying to a question about a specific activity on this plane, he said:\n\u201cI can tell you that a lot of those things that seem bewildering are not\nimportant enough to be doing what we call work here.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat do you call work?\u201d\n\n\u201cConscious development of spiritual forces.\u201d\n\nA month later, a question about a woman known here as a sculptor brought\nthe following reply from David Bruce.\n\n\u201cShe is working with a development of the purpose of production, which is\nthe foundation that underlay her work there. She is producing force by\ndeveloping the undeveloped producers.\u201d\n\nProbably the most specific information yet received by any of our small\ngroup concerning the practical application of these principles to the\naffairs of our plane, came through Maynard Holt.\n\n\u201cMy work lies principally with business men on your plane,\u201d he said,\none day, to a family connection. \u201cWe are much concerned about the lack\nof co-operation among persons of constructive tendencies, and my own\njob is to apply this force we cannot fully explain to you, in any way\nthat will influence men or women toward co-operation. Sometimes we use\nit to suggest a new idea. Sometimes we use it to so direct apparently\nconsequential circumstances and events that the person we wish to\ninfluence gets an object lesson.\u201d\n\nIn support of this is a statement of his made in April. While writing a\nlong message, most of which was intimately personal, he indicated his\ninterest in business conditions, and urged a greater and more far-seeing\nco-operation among business men. In the midst of a sentence the pencil\nstopped, creating a long delay. Failing, after repeated efforts, to\ntransmit the word he had attempted, he drew a series of singularly\nuniform arches across the whole width of the paper.\n\nAfter puzzling over it a moment, I drew a line above the arches, and\nsaid, perceiving no significance in the symbol: \u201cThat looks like a\nviaduct.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s what I mean,\u201d he resumed, vigorously, and proceeded with an\nelaboration of his theme, comparing co-operation to a viaduct.\n\n\u201cIn the end, the forces for progress will cross to all lands by that\nviaduct,\u201d he continued, \u201cand those who balk and refuse it will be\ndiverted and delayed by following old paths through the tortuous chasm\nof competitive destruction. Not that we discourage competition. The\nindividual organization, like the individual man, must follow its purpose\nand develop its force, but ... competition at its best is entirely\nfriendly and constructive. Boys have it taught them in the simplest\nform in college sports. There it is personal, but co-operative in the\ndevelopment of college spirit. Each man does his best for himself and\nhis own record, but loyally and cheerfully supports against opposing\nforces the more successful man who is of his own group. With increasing\nresponsibilities, temptations and difficulties increase, but experience\nshould bring ability to meet them. The code of school and college forces\nmay be developed and applied to business and productive forces. This is\nthe first application of college training to competitive business.\u201d\n\nAfterward, when Mr. Kendal had expressed his cordial sympathy with the\ntheory of co-operation, widely applied, Maynard said: \u201cThat\u2019s where the\ncollege team has won and the union has failed. The union was good in\nconception, but has made for the suppression of individual development,\nwhere the college team encourages it.\u201d\n\nLater still, following a conversation concerning national economics and\ninternational commerce after the war, he said:\n\n\u201cCo-operation is moral. Commercial supremacy is material. Material\nsuccess is constructive only if permanent, and permanent only if\nconstructive. Until co-operation for permanent progress becomes a\nprinciple of international as well as national purpose, there will be\nlittle actual progress toward permanent peace, or lasting prosperity.\n\n\u201cAs the college boy works first for his own power, but most for his team,\nand first, last and all the time for clean athletics, so the business man\nshould work first for his unit, definitely for his country\u2019s welfare, but\nfirst, last and always for clean co-operation with all who make for the\nworld\u2019s progress.\n\n\u201cThe exponents of national supremacy at the expense of world progress are\nexactly in the position of the exponents of personal prosperity at the\nexpense of national welfare. The situations are analogous to a degree as\nyet comprehended by few men.\n\n\u201cIt took many years to convince the manufacturer that increased\nproduction would follow shorter hours and improved working conditions. It\ntook many years to convince merchants that decreased cost and increased\nprofit followed combination of forces. It took some time to convince\nfinanciers and manufacturers that success, not failure, would follow the\nco-operation of competing concerns in the foreign field. Yet it is now\nrecognized that all these things are true and practicable. No less\u2014even\nmore\u2014is it practicable to unite world forces of progress in commerce as\nthey are united now in war, the fight at all times being for construction\nand development, against destruction and regression.\n\n\u201cThis cannot be done in a day or a year, but this is the goal toward\nwhich enlightened forces should move. It may sound Utopian now. So did\nmodel factories and tenements, a few years ago. Their advocates were\nscoffed at and discredited. Now, the manufacturer who fails to provide\nhealthful working conditions for his operatives is called short-sighted\nand pig-headed, and cheats himself twice, while cheating his employees\nonce.\n\n\u201cCo-operation is the basic principle of all progress, and the point at\nwhich it stops is the measure of strength of man or nation. The nation\nthat refuses to co-operate for progress is a nation confessing itself\ndeterrent.\u201d\n\nAgain, in June, Maynard returned to this subject, saying that men must\nbecome \u201cstrong enough to let the other fellow live and prosper, without\nfearing him.\u201d After mentioning \u201cfear of what may come, or lust for what\nmay be seized,\u201d as motives making for destruction, he added: \u201cNeither is\nconstructive or progressive, and neither can win in the end.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe have purpose to progress beyond the vision of man,\u201d he went on,\n\u201cbut even material progress, to be constructive and permanent, must be\ngoverned by a vision beyond the day. We are trying to extend that vision.\n\n\u201cCo-operation in individual enterprise has succeeded. Co-operation\nin national enterprise would succeed no less. More and more, men are\nrecognizing the value of united effort in commercial enterprise, however\nlong it took the truth to dawn. Must other centuries pass, other wars be\nfought, other dynasties rise and fall, before the larger truth ushers in\na new day? Will co-operation in business, co-operation in war, teach them\nto study and practise co-operation in world welfare and progress? Will\nthey learn that it is not only in war that a weakened Belgium means an\nendangered England, that a hungry France means short rations in America,\nthat a link weakened means the chain weak?\n\n\u201cHow many times must this premise be demonstrated before the argument is\ncarried to its logical conclusion, and national co-operation, free and\nvoluntary, provide for the good of one by protecting and developing all?\n\n\u201cThis is not a Utopian fantasy. It is common sense.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nXIII\n\n\nTalking about the Lessons one day, Mr. Kendal mentioned his impression\nthat Zoroaster had said something approaching the first one in theory,\nand then asked, a whimsical gleam in his eye: \u201cMary, has Professor James\nsaid anything about Zoroaster in this connection?\u201d\n\n\u201cManzie, Mr. James has no philosophical library here to refer to,\u201d was\nthe prompt retort. She told us, however, that he would soon come himself\nto talk to this former pupil of his, adding a characteristic glint of\nhumor in the assurance that he would then give \u201ca demonstration of a\nphilosopher simplified to a force.\u201d\n\nA night or two afterward (May 13th), she announced: \u201cManzie, here is Mr.\nJames.\u201d\n\nThere was a brief delay, and when the pencil moved again, it was with a\nchanged application of force and a new movement, the first words being\npersonal. Referring to an early period in his own investigation of\npsychic phenomena, he said:\n\n\u201cYouth, in its nearness to inspiration, sometimes sees more clearly than\nage, with its academic dependence upon theory and precedent and what men\ncall the wisdom of experience. When this wisdom is based on perception,\nconscious or otherwise, of eternal purpose, it transcends the vision of\nyouth. But when it is based on perception of physical phenomena and the\naccumulated theories of other men, youth has an inspiration and a faith\nthat leads it, all unknowing, to the brink of great mysteries.\u201d This\nwas followed by an allusion to those \u201cbefogged in precedent, physical\nphenomena, and intellectual theory,\u201d who were \u201cunable to follow where\nthey should have led.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere has seemed to be a good deal of genuine feeling underlying the\nhumorous persiflage through the pencil about the scientific state of\nmind,\u201d Mr. Kendal suggested. \u201cHasn\u2019t the time come when we can reach the\nscientific type of mind? And isn\u2019t it worth while to do so? And if so,\nwhat is the best psychological line of attack?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe scientist is not by any means hopeless, but like many men in\nyour plane, he is overbalanced and therefore unbalanced by physical\nconsiderations. Physical phenomena are of vital importance in your life,\nand their study and analysis has led to a degree of material progress\nwhich would have been incredible to the third\u2014and all but incredible to\nthe second\u2014generation back. It is only because scientists have persisted\nin the study of physical phenomena that you are enabled to understand in\nsome part what is now being given you. The misapprehension has been that\nphysical phenomena alone could be recognized. Those who have believed\nthat have denied the existence of the greatest and most persistent of all\nforces. Attempts to explain spiritual phenomena by physical formul\u00e6 have\nbeen found unsuccessful by every one save those who took refuge in denial\nof the thing that moved them to deny, the eternal and indestructible\npurpose.\n\n\u201cWhen to their laboratories scientists bring perception of spiritual\nphenomena exceeding any material manifestation known to man in strength\nand significance, then they may hope to discover and develop a force\nbeside which all known forces are insignificant. Science is the ladder\nby which life may quickly ascend, but until science recognizes a\nspiritual force as the one essential force, of which all other forces are\nincidental phenomena, progress must be limited.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen, generally speaking,\u201d Mr. Kendal said, \u201cperhaps the most effective\nappeal to scientists would be the appeal to scientific ambition.\u201d\n\n\u201cAlways the most effective means to win any man to anything is to appeal\nto his purpose. If it be personal, appeal to his vanity. If it be\nprogressive, appeal to his eagerness. If it be intellectual, pique his\ncuriosity. Scientists, like others, are divided in purpose.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe have been much interested in the decisive definiteness with which\nour friends on that plane have been able to classify the purposes of\npersons here,\u201d Mr. Kendal mentioned. \u201cIs this as clear to you as physical\ncharacteristics are to us, and as quickly determined?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, and in much the same way. We see motive and intention and their\nvariations as you see physical appearance, vitality and its variations.\nWe see disintegrating moral factors more clearly than you see physical\nills. We judge of purpose by its vitality and persistence under strain,\nprecisely as you judge of physical health by its vitality under strain\nand by its persistence in spite of occasional disease.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen you see disintegrating force as the scientist sees germs?\u201d Cass\ninquired. \u201cAs disease?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, we see them as foes. I speak here only of the way we judge purpose.\nThere is no diseased purpose. There may be struggle between more or less\nintelligent forces, but in using the simile of physical health, I did it\nin a limited sense.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs there an inherent reason for the different types of philosophies?\u201d\nMr. Kendal now questioned. \u201cThat is, the Nirvana-oblivion type in\nthe Orient, as contrasted with the hell-fire-and-brimstone type in\nthe Occident. If inherent, is its cause geographical, intellectual,\nbiological, or what?\u201d\n\n\u201cA little of all of them. Philosophies are the outgrowth of conditions,\nphysical, moral and geographical\u2014and therefore to some extent\nbiological\u2014to a much greater degree than is generally recognized. It has\nbeen said that food makes the man. To a greater degree, environment makes\nthe philosopher.\u201d\n\n\u201cMay we publish this as coming from you?\u201d\n\n\u201cCertainly. I am here for that purpose.... Light and Progress are my\npurposes, and teaching still my work.\u201d\n\nAfter a few lines of purely personal significance, this was signed:\n\u201cWilliam James.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nXIV\n\n\nOf the messages that may be quoted, there remain only a few detached\nstatements, removed from their personal context, but reproduced because\nof their general interest or significance.\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t worry about C\u2014\u2014\u201d was one bit of specific advice, given in March,\nbefore any of the Lessons had been received. \u201cShe will have her troubles,\nbut she must dree her own weird. You might save her some pain, but life\u2019s\npurpose may not be taught. It must be fought for, with blood and sweat.\nLet C\u2014\u2014 get her wounds in her own way. You may then soothe the pain.\nBut don\u2019t try to spare her the fight. That has to do with the larger\nquestions of life and eternity.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018Life\u2019s purpose may not be taught,\u2019 but the laws underlying the search\nfor it may be?\u201d\n\n\u201cOf course. We are trying now to wake the world to consciousness that\nthese laws exist. Most people, broadly speaking, have forgotten them, in\nthe general contempt for laws where they are not enforced, and in the\ngeneral hatred of them where they are enforced in oppression and fear.\u201d\n\nA few days later, another person, writing of another and much younger\ngirl, said: \u201cShe may have a hard time over the conflicting purposes.\nEverybody does. But with you to give her a foundation, I do not fear for\nher.... Her struggles will only make her stronger. Do not try to save her\nfrom pain. Remember that it is her mother who says this. Let her meet\nlife fully and work her way upward. She will always yield in the end to\nthe sublime purpose.\u201d\n\nOn a later occasion, this same person said: \u201cWe help all we can, but even\nwhen you want us to, we are unwilling to hold back the larger and vital\ndevelopment in order to hasten some smaller conclusion. Even when the\nsmall conclusion is important to you, it must be your own choice that\nhelps you; and if the choice is wrong at the moment, it still helps in\nthe end.\u201d\n\n\u201cShe\u2019s too sympathetic for her own good,\u201d was said of another young\nwoman. \u201cShe\u2019d do the vicarious atonement act for all creation, if she\ncould. What she needs is to have this purpose business driven into her.\nEvery fellow has to do his own fighting, and his own atonement, and\nhis own climbing, and take what\u2019s coming to him while he does it. She\u2019s\nalways trying to soften the path and take the swipes herself, and it\ncan\u2019t be done. She gets the blow and the strain and the struggle, all\nright, but it impedes her and gets the other fellow nowhere. It helps\nnobody to save them the consequences of their own choice. The way to help\nis to call to their constructive purpose and give them a chance. If they\nchoose not to take it, then let them take all the consequence that\u2019s\ncoming. If that doesn\u2019t teach them, there\u2019s nothing more to do, except\nto turn them over to somebody who can arouse their purpose, if they have\nany. Anyhow, making a buffer of yourself just batters up good material\nfor no gain in force or purpose.\u201d\n\nAgain, another person to another group. \u201cLet any fighting force do his\nown fighting. Suggest, enlighten, encourage, but don\u2019t try to carry the\nburden of another\u2019s life. You can\u2019t hurry their development, and you\nimpede your own and that of others of your own purpose.... You are like\nthe fellow in the fable, who finished by carrying not only the pack, but\nthe donkey, too. It\u2019s a very sweet and unselfish disposition, but do\nyou think it improves the donkey for his station in life? Not that I\u2019m\ncalling S\u2014\u2014 a donkey, but like all mankind, he carries a pack. You can\u2019t\ncarry both, and he won\u2019t learn to apply his force evenly here if you do\nit for him there. Lots of people develop unevenly and have to even up\nsomewhere. Why delay the process by vicarious labor, especially when it\nonly exhausts you and doesn\u2019t develop his muscles any? Selah!\u201d\n\n\u201cYou can train O\u2014\u2014 to carry physical temptations, if you begin early,\u201d\na man said, writing of his nephew. \u201cDon\u2019t let him yield to impulse or\ndesire when it is destructive. Make him build his body first, as a boy.\nMake him respect it and its promise. That\u2019s a bully thing for a boy to\nknow at the beginning. He reasons from that to other things. A boy is a\nbrute first, but a thinking brute. If he respects the flesh, he respects\nall things in time.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat is my purpose?\u201d a young man asked, one day.\n\n\u201cBuilding. You are going to be \u2018him that hath.\u2019 Build with your\npossessions. Begin the foundation now. Build.... Build as a producer, or\nas a healer, or in any way that makes for progress, keeps you growing,\ndevelops forces for construction, and gives the other fellows a chance to\ndo their best also.... Not for yourself alone, but for all who may climb\nby your ladder of opportunity.\u201d\n\nMaynard Holt, writing to a friend here, spoke of him as a good fighter,\nand when this person said that he would not have been able to fight\nat all, but for the little hand of a lady on the next plane, Maynard\nreturned: \u201cI know you fought hard, though in darkness, before you found\nthat hand. That\u2019s one reason we count on you now. A man who will fight\ncontinuously in darkness is a ... a ...\u201d The pencil paused, and after\nfutile efforts to proceed, retraced its path, apparently to cross out\nagain and again the last letter. We were talking and paid no attention to\nits movement, but when it ceased again, we discovered that Maynard had\ndrawn a five-pointed star. Then he proceeded: \u201c... luminary of force\nhimself, when light breaks.\u201d\n\nThere were many interesting characterizations, both of persons on this\nplane and of those on the next.\n\n\u201cE\u2014\u2014 is a fine force, but A\u2014\u2014 is a force multiplied and refined to\npower,\u201d was said of one couple.\n\nA striking example of the determination of our \u201cfantom friends\u201d to convey\ntheir meaning despite obstacles, was indicated when some one had told me,\nduring an interview, of a boy\u2019s objection to his mother\u2019s activity in one\nof the recent \u201cdrives\u201d connected with war work, on the ground that it\n\u201cmade her conspicuous.\u201d\n\n\u201cM\u2014\u2014 is an entirely tra ... trem ... tr ... normal and tra ... tremulous\nyouth, where his mother and sister are concerned,\u201d was his father\u2019s\nhumorous comment.\n\nApparently, in this case, the connection was imperfect, no intimation of\nhis meaning reaching me, and only by altering the form of his sentence\nwas he able to get it written.\n\n\u201cMiss T\u2014\u2014 has much to learn and much to suffer before a teaching based\non unity of force or purpose will reach her forcefully,\u201d we were told,\non another occasion. \u201cShe must learn the shallows of self before she\ncan sound the depths of individuality, in the larger and eternal\ninterpretation of the word.\u201d\n\nFollowing one of the numerous discussions of Germany and her purposes,\na question about a man of German parentage brought this reply: \u201cB\u2014\u2014 is\nAmerican. The national taint of docility is not in him.\u201d\n\nThe meaning of purpose and its application was stated many times in many\nways. One of the most characteristic of these expressions came from a\nfamous humorist.\n\n\u201cThere are things brewing here and among you there,\u201d he said, \u201cthat are\ngoing to make the wars of the tribes of Hohenzollern, Hapsburg and\nMephisto look like a village prayer meeting. The carnage of Verdun and\nMons and the whole show since his little nibs was assassinated is a\npicayune proposition compared to the losses of time, purpose, force and\nsaving grace that we\u2019re all going to feel, if we can\u2019t wake you people up\nto pull together against the devil\u2019s crew.\u201d\n\nSome one asked whether a husband and wife, not too congenial in this\nlife, were together there, and was told that he was \u201cflocking with birds\nof his own feather,\u201d and that she had \u201cpeacefully and tranquilly found\nher own.\u201d Another member of this family group was with neither of the\nothers, it was said, \u201cbecause she found her very own, for which they were\nonly a substitute.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you seen Jim? Is there any feeling about his wife\u2019s marrying\nagain?\u201d was a question which will interest many persons.\n\n\u201cJim is here and very happy. He has no resentment, and wishes Alice to be\nhappy. They are both of the forces of progress, but not of just the same\npurpose. They harmonize, but do not touch.\u201d\n\nAgain, some one asked whether one party to an uncongenial marriage\nregretted the other\u2019s rejoining him so soon.\n\n\u201cShe didn\u2019t,\u201d was the reply. \u201cHe hasn\u2019t seen her yet, and won\u2019t. He is\nwilling to work with her purpose, but not eager to touch her force.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat about Laura?\u201d a woman asked.\n\n\u201cShe is coming to us soon, but do not be afraid, dear. She will be\ntenderly met and guided, and will be much nearer you all, much happier\nand more helpful, than she is now. Never grieve again for death. It is\nbirth, and so happy.\u201d\n\nWithin a few weeks, this came to pass.\n\nWhen I asked Mary K. for a message for a mother bereaved by war, she\nsaid: \u201cTell her we will send for her when he has grown accustomed enough\nto talk to her. Tell her that he is cared for tenderly and guided, and\nthat she must not grieve. She hurts him and herself. Make her understand\nthat she can help him by knowing that he lives and loves her and is near\nher, and that it is part of her work as a mother to help him in this ...\nto find his purpose more quickly through her love.\u201d\n\nWe were afterward told that he had not yet learned the \u201cfree communion,\u201d\nbut that from the moment his mother began to \u201clift her spirit to meet\nhis,\u201d this young man\u2019s development was hastened.\n\nFrequently, when telling about these revelations, I have been asked:\n\u201cWhat do they say about reincarnation?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere is no possible reincarnation,\u201d Mary K. said, when I referred\nthe question to her. \u201cThat is a dream of the Orient. The idea of\nreincarnation is regressive. Not destructive, but deterrent. Not\nprogressive. It is born of bodily desire.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs it like the desire of old men for youth?\u201d\n\n\u201cMore. It is a mask, covering material desire with spiritual semblance.\nIt is taught from this plane by deterrent or partly deterrent forces,\nlacking free vision.\u201d\n\nIn another connection, but with similar meaning, David Bruce said: \u201cSome\npersons hide their love of the flesh by an exaggerated expression of\nspirituality, and then think of ways of insisting on the flesh.\u201d\n\nSimilarly, writing through her husband\u2019s pencil, Mary Kendal said, when\nhe asked her what had become of persons like C\u00e6sar, Luther, Cobden,\nArchimedes, and others in general: \u201cThere is a great difference in the\nlength of time people stay in this plane nearest to that of the earth,\nwhich depends not only on the stage of development which they have\nattained when they come here, but also on the character of work they\nare best fitted to do. If they can be of more use in direct or indirect\ncontact with your plane, they stay here sometimes many years, as you\nmeasure time; but if they are retarded in their development when they\narrive here, they have a long road to travel before they can go on to\nany other plane. There is no such thing as transmigration of souls as\nyou understand it, but that idea is akin to what actually does happen,\nin the sense that such individualities have to pass through stages of\ndevelopment which are relatively inferior in status to those that they\nmight enter into, coming from your plane, if they had made greater\nprogress there, or had fought a better fight on that plane.\u201d\n\nWhen he said that his idea in asking about specific individuals was\nto get concrete instances by which to check up the general law, she\nreturned: \u201cThe danger in that is that your idea of what those individuals\nreally were is very apt to be wrong, and starting from wrong premises\nyou could hardly avoid reaching wrong conclusions.... Martin Luther was\na mixture of purposes. He did great work for progress in fighting the\nconventions and binding tendency of ecclesiasticism in his times, but he\nhad personal motives which were deterrent, and which he spent a long time\nin working out when he left that plane.\u201d Of Napoleon she said: \u201cThere\nhave been few instances of greater prostitution of great talents and\ngreat opportunity in history, and he paid\u2014and is paying\u2014the penalty, or\nthe consequence.\u201d\n\nTo the many inquiries as to how direct communication may be established\nbetween persons here and the dear ones gone before, this message of David\nBruce\u2019s to his wife contains the briefest and most comprehensive answer.\n\nShe said: \u201cI wonder what he\u2019s going to tell me?\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019m going to tell you to be calm and serene of spirit, no matter what\nseems to be happening to disturb you. Most of the disturbing factors of\nindividual life on your plane are ephemeral\u2014things of the moment and of\nthe place. Others are more important than they seem. I am not always\nable to tell you about them. It delays you, instead of helping you, when\nthe decision is not your own. One way that I can truly help when you are\ntroubled is by what we can best describe as the free communion. When you\nare perturbed in spirit and full of doubt, it is difficult for us to\nreach you.... Open the door of spiritual force to forces here, and we\ncan always help. That is what we hope to establish as a recognized truth\nin your life there. That a force as yet unknown to science is operating\nbetween the planes, and can be developed and used in your life there\u2014to\na less degree than in ours, but still with great effect. It is for this\nthat we work in this communion, which is more definite to you now and\nless so to us. We know the limits to which material manifestation like\nthis is confined, and are eager to teach you gradually the freer and\nfuller way.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nXV\n\n\n\u201cA thought that will occur to many persons is that the truths we endeavor\nto teach are not entirely new.\n\n\u201cTruth is fundamental and eternal. There is no new truth; there is only\nnew understanding and application of truth that has always existed. No\ngreat teacher has ever told new truth. No great teacher has ever told\ntruth in a new way, until the older teachings had begun to lose their\nhold on the minds of men. No great teacher has ever found an audience\nfor his new interpretation of truth, until the minds of men had groped\nthrough darkness toward a light dimly perceived, if at all.\n\n\u201cThe time is ripe now for the crystallization of new application of\neternal truth. Men hunger for bread of the spirit, and thirst for the\nwaters of eternity. This is the answer of eternal forces to their search,\nand it comes, for the first time, not through a teacher or a prophet, but\nthrough a human instrument sensitive to a high degree to the influence\nof the force that is life\u2019s motive power.\n\n\u201cThere are many conditions affecting the application of that force in\nthese communications, that cannot now be explained; many conditions\ninfluencing its direction, that you do not understand. Some day your\nscientists will discover and prove by experiment certain laws now\nunrecognized, and these days of doubt and scoffing will disappear in a\npast filled with denial and discouragement of almost every discovery now\ncalled modern and progressive.\n\n\u201cTwo things only we have striven for through you: to prove to a group\nof intelligent persons that this force exists and may be practically\napplied between your plane and ours, and to warn mankind of the nature\nand eternal import of impending struggles. We have more to tell when they\nare ready to listen, and upon the choice of them who hear this truth the\nimmediate progress of the world depends. It is a warning to unite and\nprepare for combat.\n\n\u201cThis is the truth. Heed it.\n\n                                                                \u201cMARY K.\u201d\n\n_June 13, 1918._\n\n\nTHE END\n\n\n\n\nFOOTNOTES\n\n\n[1] These names occurred to me, because these three persons left us\nwithin a twelvemonth, about three years ago, and all were either friends\nor closely identified with friends of ours.\n\n[2] I now believe that this was Annie Manning\u2019s first interruption.\n\n[3] I had asked whether she knew any of the three persons previously\nmentioned, and each time she had replied in the negative.\n\n[4] Her husband, Mansfield Kendal.\n\n[5] I have since learned that this was characteristic of him. His letters\nhome frequently began: \u201cDear Family.\u201d\n\n[6] Several hours later I read Cass\u2019s letter and telegram to his\nphysician, who advised me to go at once to Atlantic City.\n\n[7] Each of these words was written in larger script than the preceding\none.\n\n[8] Later developments make it seem probable that this was an attempt to\nwrite the familiar diminutive for which his father afterward asked, and\nthat my \u201ctoo rigid vigilance\u201d shut out the suggestion.\n\n[9] Short-circuited?\n\n[10] In describing Frederick\u2019s pyrotechnical \u201cupside-down stunts\u201d and\nthe later \u201ctrimmings,\u201d the great facility with which they were executed\nshould have been more strongly emphasized. They were all written with\nextraordinary rapidity and firmness.","title":"The Seven Purposes: An Experience in Psychic Phenomena","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":60553}