and all the money expended annually for the keeping of them up, except what is devoted to charitable purposes, is worse than thrown away. It is squandered, it may be through ignorance in most cases, in perpetuating what is very dear to many, but which is in reality solemn mockery, a snare and a delusion, the outcome of dogmatism founded on barbaric superstition. Therefore the sooner people are awakened to the fact, and commence to investigate the Eternal Truth with the reason with which a merciful Father has endowed them, the better.

That with nature as our Bible, experience as our guide, reason as our interpreter, a loving God as our merciful heavenly Father, living truthful, pure, and honest lives, assisting our fellow-creatures as far as in our power, we need not dread "the grim monster, death," as it has been termed, but with the fullest confidence look forward to it as a beneficent change, the new birth of the spirit, whereby we shall be ushered into a more exalted sphere of existence, rational, intellectual, and progressive, where we shall meet those loved ones gone before, and where

"Eternal day excludes the night

And pleasures banish pain."

Having quoted extensively from the writings of various authors, to all of whom I must express my indebtedness, though I have not stopped to give their names, &c., I shall conclude the present part of the "Holy Truth" with the sentiments expressed by another, which I can fully endorse and have added to. The evidences which I

have received from time to time of the reality of spirit intercourse have been overwhelmingly convincing, and to doubt them would be tantamount to the ignoring of my own existence. I have made the investigation of spiritualism my special study, and I have found it what I little anticipated it to be, a grand fact, and I have been well repaid for the time and the perseverance I have devoted to it. It has produced quite a revolution of my sentiments and feelings; it has destroyed the fear of death; it has removed the pernicious errors of dogmatic orthodoxy, or at least the last lingering doubts regarding them; it has given me more ennobling and elevating thoughts of the Great Creator of the universe; and it has brought me into closer sympathy and contact with those (to most of us) unseen messengers who are ever present to succour in weakness, to comfort in sorrow, to aid us in the day of affliction and temptation, and, by words of kindness and goodly counsel, encourage us to persevere in our earth pilgrimage amid the buffetings of unreasonable and unreasoning men, until, having finished our allotted task, having accomplished in us and by us the purposes of creation, we shall lay aside the mortal man, while the glad spirit, escaped from the earthly tenement, shall soar up the shining path to meet those dear and loved ones gone before, who wait to greet and welcome us to the summer land.

"O happy is the man who hears
Instruction's warning voice;
And who celestial Wisdom makes
His early, only choice.

For she has treasures greater far
Than east or west unfold;
And her rewards more precious are
Than all their stores of gold.
She guides the young with innocence
In pleasure's paths to tread,
A crown of glory she bestows
Upon the hoary head.

According as her labours rise,
So her rewards increase;

Her ways are ways of pleasantness,
And all her paths are peace."

And now I would courteously ask the question of those who may read this, Have you investigated spiritualism? If your reply be in the negative, let me ask you to suspend your judgment; for to express an opinion on a matter of which you absolutely know nothing is to exhibit consummate assumption and profound ignorance, which those who have a knowledge of these things can only regard with feelings of pity. Be slow to judge, be not hasty to condemn; be like the noble Bereans, commended by Paul, who, having heard him, searched if these things were so. Emulate their manly example with reference to this grand philosophy. I ask you to take nothing for granted, nothing upon credit; search all things; try the spirits, and hold fast only to that which is good; treasure the golden grains of truth; discard the chaff of error and falsehood, trample them under foot, and, entering upon the investigation of that which a great cloud of witnesses can testify to be a glorious fact, in the spirit of sincere inquiry to know what is truth, your perseverance and efforts will in due time be amply rewarded and crowned with success. You

will have the abundant consolation of knowing that your dear friends who, in their physical bodies, have passed from your presence, are hovering near you that they are exercising over you, unconsciously to you, a potent influence for good, leading you by a way you know not of, joying in your joys, sharing in your sorrows, sympathising in your conflicts, and endeavouring to guide you with unerring footsteps to that blissful abode of many mansions into which they wait to receive and welcome you.

Therefore, ye mourners for the dead (but who live, and that eternally), dry up your tears, and turn your lamentations into songs of praise to our all-merciful Father, who, in His infinite love and unerring wisdom, hath prepared unspeakable and everlasting joys for all who act aright in this life according to the reason He has graciously endowed us with.

"And oh! in that future and lovelier sphere,

Where all is made right which so puzzles us here,
Where the glare and the glitter and tinsel of time
Shall fade in the light of that region sublime,
Where the soul, disencumbered of flesh and its sense,
Unscreened by its trappings, and shows, and pretence,
Must be clothed for the life and the service above
With purity, truthfulness, meekness, and love."

VI.

THE HOLY TRUTH.

PART II.

THIS part will consist of communications illustrating the real state of existence in spirit life by means of a course of lectures received through the organization of Mr. J. H. B. Harris when in deep trance, and taken down by shorthand writers as uttered. Some of them are the experiences of William Shakespeare during the two hundred and fifty odd years he has been in the spirit world, delivered to a circle of six persons (nominated by the spirit lecturer through the medium), consisting of Mrs. Harriet Grace, Mrs. Harris, Mr. Arthur Devlin, junior, Mr. Richard Moorfield, my wife, and self, meeting at my house two evenings a week for the purpose. Mr. Harris, as I have already stated, is an illiterate young man, quite incapable, in his normal state, of delivering these lectures, and not even understanding many of the words used in conveying the spiritual lecturer's experiences, &c., therein. I may also state Mr. Harris goes off in trance entirely through the agency of his spirit guides, whom my daughter has seen and described