sea.

ing forth in deep diapason; tintillating in rapturous trills; rising and falling in gamut, tone and scale unheard by me before! And then there seemed to float vibrations, solemn and low, as though rolling from an endless cable, battling with storms, that undulated and heaved in the depth of this Such tones! How could mortal man ever conceive of them? And then this sea appeared to calm itself to sleep, murmuring a lullaby of love-so soft, so sweet! it seemed that a zephyr's breath would mar its tone! The starlight glittered over it, and where each ray twinkled on each tiny drop upon its surface, there rose a dulcet note, each note the other's chord and counterpart, sounding and floating as from afar.

Infinitude appeared transfigured into a vast orchestra of praise, which thundered, and sang, and murmured, and chanted, every tone and note the Master wished.

Flute notes floated in symphonic ether; harp strings quivered in resonant air; cymbals clashed, and dulcimers danced ! The vast domes, and turrets, and peaks of the mighty Temple seemed to be bellowsed, and piped, and keyed, and then filled with some compressed, ethereal force or rhythmic substance; and the very elements and recesses and vistas of the Temple seemed tensed as with myriad strings and chords of pulsating, vibrating ether; and there appeared to be every design and form and substance out of which perfect melody could issue. And upon all these the inspired elements seemed to play and finger; and through them and within them the rhythmic substance vibrated, and flew, and danced, and glided, and sped, and crept, and hovered. The incarnate music flowed, and leaped, and shouted, and chanted, and reverberated, and echoed, and drew near, and glided far away—until the vast realm seemed a universe of music! Or rather that God Himself, the great Creator and Master of all Art, was revealing to us His nature in divine harmony!

There was joy everywhere. Every tongue was tune, and

every mouth was music. And as I sit and attempt to describe, in cold and formal words, this sublime Te Deum, that filled the Temple, my pen grates harshly upon my ear, and out of my soul wells up the prayer :

"O thoughts ineffable! O visions bless'd!

Though worthless our conceptions all of Thee,
Yet shall thy shadowed image fill our breast,
And waft its homage to Thy Deity.

God! thus alone my lowly thoughts can soar;

Thus seek Thy presence ;-Being wise and good! 'Midst Thy vast works admire, obey, adore;

And when this tongue is eloquent no more,

The soul shall speak in tears of gratitude!"

That part of the Holy Service being over, wherein God's blessing is received, and His praise and worship offered, then takes place a "Discourse of Knowledge," delivered by some mind who delights in imparting knowledge to other minds.

Here are minds congregated from various and varied. states and spheres. At each service some mind imparts its

knowledge to the assembled brothers.

God has provided ceaseless activity for His children. He has given them faculties of thought, and he has provided a universe both infinite and eternal for the exercise, enjoyment, and satisfaction, of these faculties.

Thought is as necessary to the mind, as food is to the material body, or light to the eye, or sound to the ear, or joy to the heart.

There is the body and there is food.
There is the eye and there is light.

There is the ear and there is sound.

There is the heart and there is joy.

There is the mind and there is the universe.

There is the soul and there is God!

So in this "Home of Psyche" there was no stagnation, nor inaction. Mind communicated to mind a ceaseless, unlimited

variety of knowledge.

The didactic portion of the service was often in the form of dialogue, instead of an unbroken, formal discourse. I realized at once the importance and efficacy of this form of imparting knowledge. It enlists intensest interest among the hearers, and brings out in clear perspicuity the various thoughts of the teacher and hearers.

This was the occasion of Ariel's address to the assembled minds on subjects connected with the material planet, Earth, whereon he had been created, and had lived. Ariel departed from earth after the commencement of the last quarter of the nineteenth century from the advent of Christ into this sphere. On earth he had been a very learned man, and must have been a man who earnestly sought for truth and righteousness, for he was among the pure and good celestial minds. So he found and loved God, and God took him.

Ariel's discourse, which follows, may appear to some as long and tedious, but its delivery in the Temple of Knowledge appeared but as quick-gleaming flashes of pure thoughtforms; and we, who received it, were hardly conscious of what we know here on Earth as the passage of wearisome time. Every mind seemed to scintillate in interest to the irradiation of Ariel's thought. My experience as I beheld, and listened, cannot be comprehended by my readers. I write out this discourse as it is fixed in my mind, as nearly exact as I can express it in language.

Those who care so little as not to study it, can omit it in this book.

During the discourse Ariel referred to the writings or authority of many of earth's thinkers, with whom he evidently was familiar. Some of these references I have traced, and give them in foot-notes.

CHAPTER XIV.

HOW WE ON EARTH ARRIVED AT THE TRUTH OF ETERNAL LIFE-ARIEL'S DISCOURSE -CONCERNING SPIRITUAL TRUTH ATTAINED BY MINDS ON EARTH.

ARIEL arose, elevated in the midst of this vast concourse of eager minds, and in thought-forms, said :

“On earth I was, intellectually, what was known as a philosopher. I sought for God's Light and Truth through all the manifestations made of Himself; through his material phenomena, as well as through the higher revelations, the spiritual perception and the divine reason. I was a philosopher in the sense that I was a lover of, and seeker after, wisdom. I studied all phases of truth, in its relation to, and connection with, material elements, sentient life and human consciousness.

"Before proceeding on any special line of thought connected with the earth and its various life, I would be pleased if some mind would suggest to me what subject-matter of earth, or of the thought of mind admixed with matter, would be most acceptable and profitable on this occasion."

On the instant a grand and learned mind, whom I understood was from the Celestial Sphere, Sirius, said :—

"Dear Ariel, I think I express the desire of many in requesting that you instruct us with this topic of thought in view :

:

"Did the investigation by the human mind, of matter and its elements, and the higher forces, deduce, or arrive at, any great spiritual or religious truths pointing to God and these

celestial realms and forces, and this Eternal Life, outside of any special revelation of such truths!"

"Thank you, dear and learned brother, for your suggestion. If there be no objection by this vast assemblage, I will direct my thought in the way pointed out by you.

"As you are already well aware, God has expressed His thought in an infinite variety of manifestations, from Pure Ego, Pure Mind, Pure Emotion, on down through ethereal substances, then through an indefinite variety of super-attenuated substances, then through attenuated substances, on to the gaseous, that potentiality of matter; then from the gaseous to the liquid, and from the liquid to the solid gross

matter.

66 You, who were created Pure Mind, can no more conceive of matter in the forms of matter, than, as we used to say on earth, a deaf man can conceive of music in the forms of sound. If I, who was created admixed with matter, who was impinged into it, and thereby was enabled to convert matter into the forms of thought and idea, if I, thus experienced, can express to you in forms-of-thought the relations and phenomena of matter as leading up to spiritual truth, then I will have accomplished all that I can do. We, whom God created in that grossest sphere, having triumphed over that, ascend to higher spheres, where our minds disenthralled may enjoy their true and perfect relations. But you, who were created pure mind by God, cannot descend now into material organism, unless for some divine purpose, as our elder Brother, Christ, was empowered to do; for all God's plan and work doth upward tend forever higher towards Himself.

"To those, who, like myself, inhabited earth, my thought will be real and tangible, for they can see and comprehend, the thing-in-itself about which I speak; but to you of higher spheres, my thought will have only such form and meaning as the spiritual idea bears to the material object. While you cannot conceive of the material as experienced knowl