Franchezzo
sees the circling belt of the great Earth plane, its magnetic currents
like the ebb and flow of an ocean tide, bearing countless
spirits.
He sees all the strange elemental astral forms—
Some grotesque, some hideous, some beautiful—
And the earthbound spirits
tied by their gross pleasures, or their sinful lives, many using
the organisms of living souls to gratify their degraded cravings.
These, and kindred mysteries, and waves of dark and
awful beings, ten times more deadly than those dark spirits of the
earth plane, sweep up from the dark Spheres below and crowd and cluster
thickly near the living—
And where they gather, they shut out the brightness of the spiritual sun whose rays shine down on the earth continually.
They shut out this light, with the dark mass of their own
cruel thoughts, and where this cloud rests, there comes murder and robbery
and cruelty and lust and death and sorrow—
The restraints of conscience have given way to greed and selfishness and pride and ambition and the light of truth is shut out with their dark bodies.
And they hang about the earth’s atmosphere in helpless sorrow—
Their spiritual lamps growing dim.
There are some whose spiritual sight is partly unveiled, and whose ears are not quite deaf to the glorious strain of music from the celestial spheres, and they speak of the spirit world and its wondrous beauties.
They feel great thoughts, and hear the wondrous music, and try to give it expression.
They see
lovely visions, and try to paint them, and their music and pictures
all help to raise men’s souls nearer to God, for all
that is highest and purest and best comes from the inspiration of the
spirit world.
Yet, with all this beauty of art and music and literature—
With all these aspirations—
There is still no way open
to hold communion with the loved ones who have gone before them into
the land of shades.
The perfect sight, which the spirit world seeks to give is clouded and
imperfect and broken.
The walls of material life are pierced with many doors, and at each door, an angel stands to guard it.
The walls of material life are pierced with many doors, and at each door, an angel stands to guard it.
Man is given the keys to these doors—
Doors that lead to a higher, purer knowledge of truth—
But the joys and gifts of earth allure, and he turns aside.
Others keep their doors
partly open, but they suffer error and darkness to creep in, and light
and truth is sullied and broken, as it passes through these darkened
doorways.
As time passes on, the light ceases to shine, and gives place
to the thick impure rays from dark deceitful spirits from the lower
sphere—
And that door closes.
These doorways are
thronged with beautiful, bright spirits, and others whose raiment is dark, but in whose souls there is a desire for good, and there is joy, for
death’s dark curtain is drawn aside and there is news from those beyond
the grave.
Great armies of spirits from all the higher spheres, their raiment of purest white and gold and silver helmets glittering in the glorious spiritual light direct others in their work.
Great armies of spirits from all the higher spheres, their raiment of purest white and gold and silver helmets glittering in the glorious spiritual light direct others in their work.
Who are these?
Were they ever mortal men?
Black thunder clouds gather dark, as night over the earth, and the conflict that surrounds it.
A rushing sound sweeps upwards from the dark spheres of hell
and storm-tossed waves roll up against the sea of bright spirits—
Sweeping them back, and rolling over the earth, as though to blot out the
light of truth—
To assail and overwhelm each door of light.
This war in the spirit world becomes a war amongst men—
Nation fighting against nation for supremacy.
It is as though, in the great thirst for wealth
and greed for conquest, all must be engulfed—so universal is this war.
The seething masses of dark spirits attack those doors of light and
strive to sweep away the faithful who stand within them.
A glittering and dazzling light grows until a vast host of radiant angels from the heavenly spheres—
A glittering and dazzling light grows until a vast host of radiant angels from the heavenly spheres—
This great ocean of light—
Sweeps down to
earth, and surrounds it with a great belt of glorious light.
Rays of
light—like spears—dart down, and render the dark mass in a thousand
places, and these dazzling rays flash like the swords of fire and cut
through the dark wall of spirits on all sides, scattering them to the
four winds of heaven.
Their leaders seek vainly to gather their forces
together again—
Seek vainly to drive them on, but a stronger power hurls
them back until they sink down, rolling back to those dark spheres from
which they have come.
These bright angels hold these mighty forces of evil in check, not with the sword of destruction, but by the force of their mighty wills—
These bright angels hold these mighty forces of evil in check, not with the sword of destruction, but by the force of their mighty wills—
By the eternal power of good over evil.
They are the redeemed of the darkest
spheres who have washed their sin-stained garments in the pools of
repentance, and who have risen from the ashes of their dead selves to
higher things, and whose earnest labours and acts of atonement have
conquered their own evil.
These are the angels of the heavenly spheres
of earth—once men—who sympathise with all the struggles of sinful men.
They are a mighty host, ever strong to protect, and powerful to save.
