Yes, as Canon Holland well says, "Facts have been too much" for those who would cling to the old and the less intelligent ideas of the future life. The ethereal world will even cease to be mysterious before advancing scientific investigation and knowledge. Through the ether, as Canon Holland notes, sounds and motions transmit themselves "under conditions which transform our whole idea of what space or time may mean." In the realm of present life the same assertion may be made. Who can contemplate wireless telegraphy without having opened to him a range of activities and conditions undreamed of heretofore? "We become sure," continues Canon Holland, "that both above and below our normal consciousness we are in touch with mysteries that travel far, and that we lie open to spiritual acts done unto us from a far distance, that we assimilate intimations and intuitions that reach us by inexplicable channels.
"This world of spirit powers and activities has been opened afresh; and now even physical science is compelled to recognize the evidence for it, and a new psychological language is coming into being to describe its phenomena. We are only slowly recovering our hold upon this life of mystic intuition, of exalted spiritual communications; we are only beginning to recognize the abnormal and exceptional spiritual condition with which Saint Paul was familiar, when, whether in the body or out of it, he could not say,--God only knows,--he was transported to the third Heaven and heard unutterable things."
This remarkable sermon is an initiation of a new era of religious teaching. The light is breaking and the full illumination is only a question of time.
Life is exalted in its purpose and refined in its quality by holding the perpetual consciousness of the two worlds in which we dwell; by the constant realization that
"The spirit world around this world of sense Floats like an atmosphere...."
This atmosphere is all peopled, and it is magnetic with intelligence. Every spirit-call for aid, for guidance, for support, is answered. If a man fall on a crowded street in the city, how instantaneous is the aid that cares for him. He is lifted and conveyed tenderly to his home, or to a hospital, or to some temporary resting-place if the ill be but a slight one. Strangers or friends, it matters not, rush to his rescue. This, which occurs in the tangible and visible world, is but a feeble illustration of the more profound tenderness, the clearer understanding, the more potent aid that is given instantly to man from the unseen helpers and friends in this spirit world which floats like an atmosphere around this world of sense. It is all and equally the help of God; it is the Divine answer to the call; but the Heavenly Father works through ways and means. If a man fall on the street God does not cause a miracle to be wrought and a bed to descend from the clouds, but He works through the sympathies of the bystanders. Is it not equally conceivable that the appeal for leading and for light sent into spirit spheres meets the response of spirit-aid; that it awakens the interest and the infinite tenderness and care of those who have passed from this life into that of the next stage beyond, and that they are, according to their development and powers, co-workers with God, even as we who are yet on earth aim and pray to be?