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grow accustomed to the change. Later, I was told, I should be shown the beauty of the
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afterlife, and in good season should come again into the house of mourning. I was not for one
moment unconscious in passing from one world to the other.
"Many of those who had preceded me into the afterlife, who came to help in the change, went
with us to the house of rest; there was great joy among them, but my heart was filled with
sorrow, for many dear ones left in your world needed a mother's care. I could not at that time
comprehend the wisdom of the infinite, or realize that each change in Nature means progress.
I will not undertake," she continued, "to describe the joy of meeting with those who had
preceded me, or of the coming and going of friends and acquaintances. Their good cheer and
happiness were a great comfort, but my thoughts were ever with those in the old life who
grieved so much. I felt that I must go and tell them, but I was informed that the time was not
opportune, for they were without knowledge. Further, I was assured that both they and I must
learn many things before help would be possible, except by suggestion, and that I should be
instructed in good time.
"What impressed me most after a period of rest, and my faculties had become alert, was the
reality of all things. I looked at my own body, which seemed as tangible as before the change,
although it had perhaps a more etheric appearance. I stood upon my feet, and moved my legs,
arms, and head; my senses of touch, smell, and sight were more acute; I spoke to those about
me, and they answered; I looked over a valley and saw running brooks, and lakes, trees, grass,
and flowers of many kinds. I took long deep breaths of wonderfully vitalizing air, and as the
new conditions dawned upon me, I turned to those about me questioningly.
'I do not understand,' I said.
"'No,' they answered, 'as you have never been taught anything concerning this life, how could
you understand? But let us tell you one fact: the life you have now entered is just as material
as the one you have left. Stop for a moment and realize that truth. Moreover, everything in the
earthplane is only a poor imitation of a part of what exists in this plane.'
" 'Did it never strike you as absurd,' a spirit said, 'that houses, trees, flowers, and all animal
life should be limited to the physical plane; such a proposition must assume that the universe
is limited to the earth planet?'
'I could not grasp the suggestion,' I said, and I asked that I might rest for a while. Turning my
head, I saw the smiling face of my husband beckoning, and I went with him with confidence,
as in the days of youth.
"I am weary now," she said, "the material seems to be falling from my lips and throat; there is
so much that I want to say; I will come again."
Her strength was exhausted, with the experience half told.
"You have said that in the world of spirit, you have lands and waters, lakes and rivers, trees
and shrubs, vines and flowers; tell us of them in language we may comprehend," I said to
another spirit who greeted us.
"In the first place," he answered, "you must disabuse your mind of the idea that nothing
existed before your poor earth-planet came into being, or that nothing exists beyond the
physical. The truth is that all things which in the ages have found expression on the earth-
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plane, have existed in the etheric world since the beginning. There were rivers flowing down
from mountains, and lakes in the valleys among the hills, and lands and trees and embracing
vines, and flowers long before this planet was fertile, and now only a few of the wonderful
things of our plane are able to find expression in yours. Then again, there is much vegetation
developing in our etheric material that the earth in its crude state cannot clothe, and your
inability to comprehend vegetation beyond or outside the earth lies in the fact that you have
heretofore had an erroneous idea that all life originated in the physical."
CHAPTER VII A UNIVERSE OF MATTER
A JUST and full appreciation of the fact that the Universe is composed of Matter in varying
degrees of activity is a condition precedent to a true comprehension of the great problem of
life. Through it we can understand dissolution and learn something of the conditions
prevailing beyond the physical.
The suggestion that the whole Universe is Material, and the different spheres are, in fact,
substance with varying vibration and intensity, and that individual life continues in those
different planes similar to life in our plane, is startling, but no more so than the advancement
of the Copernican theory, or the discovery of the law of gravitation. It took hundreds of years
for the acceptance of the first proposition, and upon the enunciation of the second the jealous
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