ask. Are we to be mere wisps of gaseous happiness floating about in
the air? That seems to be the idea. But if there is no body like our
own, and if there is no character like our own, then say what you will,
WE have become extinct. What is it to a mother if some impersonal
glorified entity is shown to her? She will say, "that is not the son I
lost--I want his yellow hair, his quick smile, his little moods that I
know so well." That is what she wants; that, I believe, is what she
will have; but she will not have them by any system which cuts us away
from all that reminds us of matter and takes us to a vague region of
floating emotions.

There is an opposite school of critics which rather finds the
difficulty in picturing a life which has keen perceptions, robust
emotions, and a solid surrounding all constructed in so diaphanous a
material. Let us remember that everything depends upon its comparison
with the things around it.

If we could conceive of a world a thousand times denser, heavier and
duller than this world, we can clearly see that to its inmates it would
seem much the same as this, since their strength and texture would be
in proportion. If, however, these inmates came in contact with us,
they would look upon us as extraordinarily airy beings living in a
strange, light, spiritual atmosphere. They would not remember that we
also, since our beings and our surroundings are in harmony and in
proportion to each other, feel and act exactly as they do.

We have now to consider the case of yet another stratum of life, which
is as much above us as the leaden community would be below us. To us
also it seems as if these people, these spirits, as we call them, live
the lives of vapour and of shadows. We do not recollect that there
also everything is in proportion and in harmony so that the spirit
scene or the spirit dwelling, which might seem a mere dream thing to
us, is as actual to the spirit as are our own scenes or our own
dwellings, and that the spirit body is as real and tangible to another
spirit as ours to our friends.

CHAPTER IV.

PROBLEMS AND LIMITATIONS

Leaving for a moment the larger argument as to the lines of this
revelation and the broad proofs of its validity, there are some smaller
points which have forced themselves upon my attention during the
consideration of the subject. This home of our dead seems to be very
near to us--so near that we continually, as they tell us, visit