closes the book in impatience, pronouncing summary judgment. But what does he really know of these sublime and beautiful truths?"

"Doubtless these works suffer from prejudice," said Israel, "like almost all others; but I am now chiefly interested to learn the Swedenborgian view of departed spirits."

"We of this faith believe that the spirits of the departed are about us. Those who loved goodness and good use in this life, perform corresponding work in the next. Death makes no change except in conditions. It disrobes us of the natural body, and clothes us with a spiritual one that is indescribably more We do not mourn for We believe that they are

capable of obeying the will. the dead as do some others. near us as before, only in a much more favorable condition. Our friend who has just left our sight has only gone out of this state of existence, as it were, from one room into another, the separating door being what we call death. It was necessary that he should go at this time. He had fulfilled the appointed work of his mortal life. His spirit had completed its earthly conditions, and hence could not remain in the flesh another instant.

"I sometimes smile at the short-sightedness of those persons who speak of this or that contingent circumstance as controlling the death of a person. 'If the physician had done thus, or if another had omitted that, it might have been otherwise.' When we are ripe for death, we die, whether it be at one age or another, and no mortal power can speed or detain us. Death is always a blessing; hence an event never to

be mourned. In the case of the good, who by a prepared life are capable of entering a glorious service there, a acknowledge that it is infinite gain. We believe it is gain to them, and in a certain sense, to us who are left. They are far more capable of doing us good than when here, subject to the flesh. more clearly and perform more perfectly.

They see

"In the case of the wicked, it is also a cause of joy, for they are prevented from accruing evil and evil development of themselves. Sometimes this wickedness flows from ignorance and mistaken education. These are permitted to receive new and heavenly tuition by degrees they become receptive of heavenly blessedness. Their understanding being opened, they, of their own free will, gradually turn to the light which is another name for truth.

"Those persons who have had the privilege of great light on earth, and yet set their faces as a flint against the truth, exalting their own wisdom above that which is divine, and refusing to love the Lord and the neighbor, by death are placed in more favorable conditions for the purification of their understanding and will. If they continue to resist this light, they become evil spirits, and consociate with the inhabitants of the hells. "To these, also, death is a blessing, for longer life in this world would only have added to their capabilities of evil."

"Your theory of an intermediate state has plausibility, but, I. apprehend, no Scriptural authority," remarked Israel; and added after a slight pause, "Do we not read in Ecclesiastes, eleventh chapter and second verse, In the place where the tree falleth,

there it shall be," and also elsewhere, 'He that is unjust, let him be unjust still,' etc."

"Your quotation from Ecclesiastes," said his friend, "has no reference to a future state. Examine the context, which is an exhortation to benevolence, and teaches that we ought to give whenever needful, to all classes of persons, for we know not how soon we may fall into their power, when it will be in their hands to deal unto us. Vicissitudes of life are inevitable. Events must take place when the causes are matured, and no earthly power can change their course. If the calamity falls across our threshold, or our most remote project, to the north, or the south, it cannot be averted or escaped. Therefore we should be charitable unto all, that in the day of our suffering the bread which we cast upon the waters may return to us. This lesson of the inevitable course of events teaches us mutual love and charity.

"In regard to your other quotation, it is exactly accordant with the doctrine of Swedenborg as revealed to him by the Lord. I have just said that there are those who, from their own will and enlightened understanding are evil. These continue to be what they were at death.

"Let me read to you," continued Stilwell: "The first state of man after death is similar to his state in the world, because then in like manner he is in externals. * * This first state continues with some for days, with some for months, and with some for a year; and seldom with any one beyond a year.

The second state of man after death is called the state of the interiors, because he is then let into the interiors

* *

which are of his mind, or of the will and thought. * All men whatever are let into this state after death, because it is proper to their spirit. When the spirit is in this state of his interiors, it then manifestly appears of what quality the man was in himself during his life in the world, for he then acts from his own proprium. All who have lived in good in the world, and have acted from conscience, as is the case with all those who have acknowledged a Divine, and have loved divine truths, especially those who have applied them to the life, appear to themselves when let into the state of their interiors, like those who, being awakened out of sleep, come into the full use of sight, and like those who from shade enter into light; heaven also flows into their thoughts and affections with interior blessedness and delight, of which before they knew nothing; for they have communication with the angels of heaven: on this occasion also they acknowledge the Lord, and worship Him from their very life. But altogether contrary is the state of those who in the world have lived in evil, and who have had no conscience, and have hence denied a Divine,

*

"The third state of man after death, or of his spirit, is a state of instruction; this state appertains to those who come into heaven, and become angels, but not to those who come into hell, since these latter cannot be instructed; wherefore their second state is likewise their third, which closes in this circumstance, that they are altogether turned to their own love, thus to the infernal society which is in similar love. But the good are brought from the second state into the third, which is a state of their preparation for heaven by instruction.

"The good spirits who are to be instructed are conveyed thither by the Lord, when they have passed through their second state in the world of spirits, but still not all; for they who had been instructed in the world were there also prepared by the Lord for heaven, and are conveyed into heaven by another way; some immediately after death; some after a short stay with good spirits, where the grosser thoughts and affections, which they contracted from honors and riches of the world, are removed, and thus they are purified."

"He goes on to say," continued Stilwell, "that some of these suffer severely before being fitted for heaven, because they had confirmed themselves in falses, and still have led good lives.

"He next proceeds to describe in what way these different societies are instructed, and afterwards how they are admitted into the heavenly societies."

Israel continued: "I think you have alluded to the general belief of the resurrection of the natural body as somewhat distinctive from your own. May I ask if this is so?"

"The followers of Emanuel Swedenborg, accepting his instruction upon this point, do not believe in the resurrection of this body which we see, nor in any other resurrection than what takes place at death."

"Then you reject the doctrine of the Bible upon this point?"

"On the contrary we receive every word of Holy Writ which we deem the word. of divine inspiration. You are aware that we as a church, accept as canonical only twenty-nine books of the Old Testa