A Journey in Other Worlds (34 page)

"In Revelation, xx, 6, we find these words, 'Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power.' I have often asked myself, May not this mean that those with a bad record in the general resurrection after a time cease to exist, since all suffer one death at the close of their period here?

"This is somewhat suggested by Proverbs, xii, 28,. 'In the way of righteousness is life, and in the pathway thereof there is no death.' This might limit the everlasting damnation, so often repeated elsewhere, to the lives of the condemned, since to them, in a sense, it would be everlasting.

"Let us now turn to the bright picture--the soul that has weathered the storms of life and has reached the haven of rest. The struggles, temptations, and trials overcome, have done their work of refining with a rapidity that could not have been equalled in any other way, and though, perhaps, very imperfect still, the journey is ever on. The reward is tenfold, yet in proportion to what this soul has done, for we know that the servant who best used his ten talents was made ruler over ten cities, while he that increased his five talents by five received five; and the Saviour in whom he trusted, by whose aid he made his fight, stands ready to receive him, saying, 'Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.'

"As the dark, earthly background recedes, the clouds break and the glorious light appears, the contrast heightening the ever-unfolding and increasing delights, which are as great as the recipients have power to enjoy, since these righteous souls receive their rewards in proportion to the weight of the crosses that they have borne in the right spirit. These souls are a joy to their Creator, and are the heirs of Him in heaven. The ceaseless, sleepless activity that must obtain in both paradise and hades, and that must make the hearts of the godless grow faint at the contemplation, is also a boundless promise to those who have Him who is all in all.

"Where is now thy Saviour? where is now thy God? the unjust man has asked in his heart when he saw his just neighbour struggling and unsuccessful. Both the righteous and the unrighteous man are dead. The one has found his Saviour, the other is yearly losing God. What is the suffering of the present momentary time, eased as it is by God's mercy and presence, compared with the glories that await us? What would it be if our lives here were filled with nothing else, as ye know that your labour is not vain in the Lord? Time and eternity--the finite and the infinite. Death was, indeed, a deliverer, and the sunset of the body is the sunrise of the soul."

The priest held himself erect as a soldier while delivering this sermon, making the great cathedral ring with his earnest and solemn voice, while Ayrault, as a spirit, saw how absolutely he meant and believed every word that he said.

Nearly all the members of the congregation were moved--some more, some less than they appeared. After the benediction they rapidly dispersed, carrying in their hearts the germs he had sown; but whether these would bear fruit or wither, time alone could show. Ayrault had noticed Sylvia's father and mother in church, but Sylvia herself was not there, and he was distressed to think she might be ill.

"Why," pondered Ayrault, "am I so unhappy? I was baptized, confirmed, and have taken the sacrament. I have always had an unshaken faith, and, though often unsuccessful, have striven to obey my conscience. The spirits also on Saturn kept saying I should be happy. Now, did this mean it was incumbent upon me to rejoice, because of some blessing I already had, and did not appreciate, or did their prescience show them some prospective happiness I was to enjoy? The visions also of Violet, the angel, and the lily, which I believed, and still believe, were no mere empty fancies, should have given me the most unspeakable joy. It may be a mistake to apply earthly logic to heavenly things, but the fundamental laws of science cannot change.

"Why am I so unhappy?" he continued, returning to his original question. "The visions gave promise of special grace, perhaps some special favour. True, my prayer to see Sylvia was heard, but, considering the sacrifice, this has been no blessing. The request cannot have been wrong in itself, and as for the manner, there was no arrogance in my heart. I asked as a mortal, as a man of but finite understanding, for what concerned me most. Why, oh why, so wretched?"

Hic Ille Jacet

At daybreak the thunder-shower passed off, but was followed by a cold, drenching rain. Supposing Ayrault had remained in the Callisto, Bearwarden and Cortlandt did not feel anxious, and, not wishing to be wet through, remained in the cave, keeping up a good fire with the wood they had collected. Towards evening a cold wind came up, and, thinking this might clear the air, they ventured out, but, finding the ground saturated, and that the rain was again beginning to fall, they returned to shelter, prepared a dinner of canned meat, and made themselves as comfortable as possible for the night.

"I am surprised," said Cortlandt, "that Dick did not try to return to us, since he had the mackintoshes."

"I dare say he did try," replied Bearwarden, "but finding the course inundated, and knowing we should not need the mackintoshes if we remained under cover, decided to put back. The Callisto is, of course, as safe as a church."

"I hope," said Cortlandt, "no harm has come to him on the way. It will be a weight off my mind to see him safely with us."

"Should he not turn up in the morning," replied Bearwarden, "we must begin a search for him bright and early."

Making up the fire as near the entrance of the cave as they could find a dry place, so that Ayrault should see it if he attempted to return during the night, they piled on wood, and talked of their recent experiences.

"However unwilling I was," said Cortlandt, "to believe my senses, which I felt were misleading me, I can no longer doubt the reality of that spirit bishop, or the truth of what be says. When you look at the question dispassionately, it is what you might logically expect. In my desire to disprove what is to us supernatural, I tried to create mentally a system that would be a substitute for the one he described, but could evolve nothing that so perfectly filled the requirements, or that was so simple. Nothing seems more natural than that man, having been evolved from stone, should continue his ascent till he discards material altogether. The metamorphism is more striking in the first change than in the second. Granted that the soul is immaterial, and that it leaves the body after death, what is there to keep it on earth? Gravitation cannot affect it. What is more likely than that it is left behind by the earth in its orbit, or that it continues its forward motion, but in a straight line, till, reaching the paths of the greater planets, it is drawn to them by some affinity or attraction that the earth does not possess, and that the souls held in that manner remain here on probation, developing like young animals or children, till, by gradually acquired power, resulting from their wills, they are able to rise again into space, to revisit the earth, and in time to explore the universe? It might easily come about that, by some explainable sympathy, the infant good souls are drawn to this planet, while the condemned pass on to Cassandra, which holds them by some property peculiar to itself, until perhaps they, too, by virtue of their wills, acquire new power, unless involution sets in and they lose what they have. The simplicity of the thing is what surprises me now, and that for ages philosophers have been racking their brains with every conceivable fancy, when, by simply extending and following natural laws, they could discern the whole."

"It is the old story," said Bearwarden, "of Columbus and the egg. Schopenhouer and his predecessors appear to have tried every idea but the right one, and even Darwin and Huxley fell short in their reasoning, because they tried to obtain more or less than four by putting two with two."

Thus they sat and talked while the night wore on. Neither thought of sleeping, hoping all the while that Ayrault might walk in as he had the night before.

At last the dawn began to tint the east, and the growing light showed them that the storm had passed. The upper strata of Saturn's atmosphere being filled with infinitesimal particles of dust, as a result of its numerous volcanoes, the conditions were highly favourable to beautiful sunrises and sunsets. Soon coloured streaks extended far into the sky, and though they knew that when the sun's disc appeared it would seem small, it filled the almost boundless eastern horizon with the most variegated and gorgeous hues. Turning away from the welcome sight--for their minds were ill at ease--they found the light strong enough for their search to begin. Writing on a sheet of paper, in a large hand,

"Have gone to the Callisto to look for you; shall afterwards return here," they pinned this in a conspicuous place and set out due west, keeping about a hundred yards apart. The ground was wet and slippery, but overhead all was clear, and the sun soon shone brightly. Looking to right and left, and occasionally shouting and discharging their revolvers, they went on for half an hour.

"I have his tracks," called Bearwarden, and Cortlandt hastened to join him. In the soft ground, sure enough, they saw Ayrault's footprints, and, from the distance between them, concluded that he must have been running or walking very fast; but the rain had washed down the edges of the incision. The trail ascended a gentle slope, where they lost it; but on reaching the summit they saw it again with the feet together, as though Ayrault had paused, and about it were many other impressions with the feet turned in, as if the walkers or standers had surrounded Ayrault, who was in the centre.

"I hope," said Cortlandt, "these are nothing more than the footprints we have seen formed about ourselves."

"See," said Bearwarden, "Dick's trail goes on, and the others vanish. They cannot have been made by savages or Indians, for they seem to have had weight only while standing." They then resumed their march, firing a revolver shot at intervals of a minute. Suddenly they came upon a tall, straight tree, uprooted by the wind and lying diagonally across their path. Following with their eyes the direction in which it lay, they saw a large, hollow trunk, with the bark stripped off, and charred as if struck by lightning. Obliged to pass near this by the uprooted tree-whose thick trunk, upheld by the branches at the head, lay raised about two feet from the ground--both searchers gave a start, and stood still as if petrified. Inside the great trunk they saw a head, and, on looking more closely, descried Ayrault's body. Grasping it by the arms, they drew it out. The face was pale and the limbs were stiff. Instantly Cortlandt unfastened the collar, while Bearwarden applied a flask to the lips. But they soon found that their efforts were vain.

"The spirit!" ejaculated Cortlandt. "Dick may be in a trance, in which case he can help us. Let us will hard and long."

Accordingly, they threw themselves on their faces, closing their eyes, that nothing might distract their concentration. Minutes, which seemed like ages, passed, and there was no response.

"Now," said Bearwarden, "will together, hard."

Suddenly the stillness was broken by the spirit's voice, which said:

"I felt more than one mind calling, but the effect was so slight I thought first I was mistaken. I will help you in what you want, for the young man is not dead, neither is he injured."

Saying which, he stretched himself upon Ayrault, worked his lungs artificially, and willed with an intensity the observers could feel where they stood. Quickly the colour returned to Ayrault's cheeks, and with the spirit's assistance he sat up and leaned against the tree that had protected him from the storm.

"Your promise was realized," he said, addressing the spirit. "I have seen what I shall never forget, and lest the anguish--the vision of which I saw--come true, let us return to the earth, and not leave it till I have tasted in reality the joys that in the spirit I seemed to have missed. I have often longed in this life to be in the spirit, but never knew what longing was, till I experienced it as a spirit, to be once more in the flesh."

"You see the mercy of God," said the spirit, "in not ordinarily allowing the spirits of the departed to revisit earth until they are prepared--that is, until they are sufficiently advanced to go there unaided--by which time they have come to understand the wisdom of God's laws. In your case the limiting laws were partially suspended, so that you were able to return at once, with many of the faculties and senses of spirits, but without their accumulated experience. It speaks well for your state of preparation that, without having had those disguised blessings, illness or misfortune, you were not utterly crushed by what you saw when temporarily released. While in the trance you were not in hell, but experienced the feelings that all mortals would if allowed to return immediately. Thus no lover can return to earth till his fiancee has joined him here, or till, perceiving the benevolence of God's ways, he is not distressed at what he sees, and has the companionship of a host of kindred spirits.

"The spirits you saw in the cemetery were indeed in hell, but had become sufficiently developed to revisit the earth, though doing so did not relieve their distress; for neither the development of their senses, which intensifies their capacity for remorse and regret, nor their investigations into God's boundless mercies, which they have deliberately thrown away, can comfort them.

"Some of your ancestors are on Cassandra, and others are in purgatory here. Though a few faintly felt your prayer, none were able to return and answer beside their graves. It was at your request and prayer that He freed your spirit, but you see how unhappy it made you."

"I see," replied Ayrault, "that no man should wish to anticipate the workings of the Almighty, although I have been unspeakably blessed in that He made an exception--if I may so call it--in my favour, since, in addition to revealing the responsibilities of life, it has shown me the inestimable value and loyalty of woman's love. I fear, however, that my return to earth greatly distressed the waterer of the flowers you showed me."

"She already sleeps," replied the spirit, "and I have comforted her by a dream in which she sees that you are well."