It is passing strange that, from the standpoint of a Christian believing in the omnipotence of the Most High, so many religionists regard it as essential to maintain the doctrine of natural immortality at all hazards. Does Christianity depend for its existence on such an article in the creed? Do individuals perish, character and all, from the mind of God when their bodies crumble to dust? Surely, if the Lord can create a man that has not existed, He can resurrect one that has; nor do we see why, to accomplish this, it is a necessary resource for Him to be able to unlock some limbo of departed shades, march them forth at the sound of the last trump, and give to each a brand-new tailor-cut vesture of clay to cumber them for the rest of eternity.
That is why we marvel. Does the whole fabric of Christianity stand or fall with the theory of inherent conscious soul persistence? Will some profound theologian kindly explain the reason for this nervous anxiety to bolster up such a belief? Is it because a sinful heart finds more assurance of a future life in the thought of an indestructible soul than in trusting to the power of Jehovah to bring forth from the dead? For us, we prefer to sleep in Jesus rather than rely upon any qualification whatever (much less a mooted one) of our own. We would rather express our hope for eternity in Stephen's dying words, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit,” than in the old serpent's assertion, “Thou shalt not surely die.”
But this notion that the rock and corner-stone of the church of Christ is natural immortality, and that without it the whole superstructure of faith must crumble, is the very thing which is driving the world into Spiritism. And let it be noted that this practise of interrogating the dead has been the habit of every heathen nation of whom we have any authentic annals. So oppressed is the mind of Herbert Spencer with the unlimited quantity of evidence of the universality of some sort of Spiritistic belief, that he attempts to find in it the origin or genesis of the religious idea of mankind. In connection with a considerable number of illustrations drawn from many nations and tribes, he concludes, that “we get from this kinship of beliefs among races remote in time, space, and culture, strong warrant for the inference that ghost-propitiation is the origin of all religions.” While the conclusion he adopts is worthless, his citations establish our point beyond question. Since our limited space forbids the introduction of any of the volumes of testimony to this fact, we shall content ourselves with transcribing the general summary of another—
“Believing that their dead friends continued to exist, they naturally reasoned that they continued to hunger and thirst just as they did here. So they brought and poured out on the grave drink for them, and laid upon it food, believing that they ate the spiritual essence, knowing of course that the substance, which they could see and handle, was not thus consumed. . . . That which at first was only food and drink for the dead developed later into sacrifice; and this sacrifice at first was a communion meal, of which the god [soul] partook along with his worshipers.”
We have supplied the italics in this quotation, since we wish it to be noted that this eating of sacrifices to the dead is the identical thing mentioned in Psalms 106:28, and is simply an ancient form of Spiritism. Turning to Numbers, chapters 22 to 25 inclusive, we find that this incident referred to in Psalms was the abomination into which Balaam seduced the people of the Lord. The results are plainly stated: “They began to commit whoredom” and went into degrading idolatry. As it is said in the warning given to the church of Pergamos, Balaam “taught Balac to cast a stumbling-block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed unto idols, and to commit fornication.” Rev. 2:14. Is it to be wondered at that their practise of Spiritism “provoked” the Lord to anger and “the plague brake in upon them” (Ps. 106:29), so that there died in the plague “twenty and four thousand” (Num. 25:9)? Who, in the face of these facts, will question the wisdom of the ancient legislator for passing the law for the commonwealth of Israel, that “a man also or woman that hath a familiar spirit, or that is a wizard, shall surely be put to death” (Lev. 20:27)? But, since Israel was then a theocracy, with God ruling directly, and Moses received this law from Him, it follows, since the Lord changeth not, that for all time and eternity His attitude toward Spiritism is made manifest, and it is stated as plain as words can express it, that death, from the standpoint of divine government, is not only the merited penalty, but the sure result of the practise of Spiritism.
Apropos of the analogy between early and modern Spiritistic accompaniments, it is within the knowledge of this generation, so much so that I need cite no testimony, that the ancient lasciviousness in the rites has had a counterpart in the “free-love” teachings of modern representatives of Spiritism. We say “has had,” for we know that most adherents of that faith will repudiate its present application. They will now deny that it is any part of their creed. Yes; so do Mormons abjure polygamy—when the law is likely to get after them. We may, however, say in justice, that free-loveism, or any other heinous immorality, is not so much a doctrine of Spiritism as it, and almost everything else proscribed by the canons of Christianity, is a necessary result of the loosening of all moral restraints which follows logically from the true meaning of Spiritism, which we have amplified in a former chapter; namely, that eternal life does not depend upon character. A concrete illustration of this relation of its teachings to Christian ethics is found in the fact that open repudiation of the Bible and of the cardinal teachings of Christianity, as of faith in Christ, does not unfit one for being a high priest of the cult—a perfect medium for the transmission of messages from the spiritual world. Indeed, when we read, in the scriptures already cited, that the worship of idols, which means the repudiation of the true God, was a part of the ceremony, it is evident that the acceptance then of Spiritism involved the rejection of God; and that the principle has not changed in the Christian dispensation is seen not merely from the fruits of the belief to-day, but from the explicit testimony of Paul and John. The former, naming Spiritism along with its concomitants, adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, calls them all works of the flesh and adds: “Of the which I forewarn you, even as I did forewarn you, that they which practise such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.” Gal. 5:20, 21, R. V. And John, carried forward in apocalyptic vision to the time when that kingdom is ushered in, sees without the walls of the eternal city this same class, still associated and destined to destruction with whoremongers and idolaters and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie. Rev. 22:15.
We are not yet able to conceive of the Omnipotent God as destroying with sulphurous flames an idol worshiper for the mere stupidity of bowing down with either fear or reverence to so senseless a thing as a mere image. We are therefore compelled to search for some deeper meaning in the act. And this the Word of God reveals; for it says that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils (demons). And that the thought above is the one in the mind of the inspired writer is shown from the preceding verse: “What say I then? that the idol is anything, or that which is offered in sacrifice to idols is anything?” 1 Cor. 10:19, 20. The fearful enormity of Spiritism thus stands out in its nakedness. Tho the ancient incident of sacrifice in connection with the practises of necromancy has been dropped from the modern revival of it; none the less the essence of the thing, DEMON WORSHIP, is the same, whether called witchcraft or sorcery as in days agone, or “Spiritualism,” as now.
How can we close this brief survey more fittingly than in the words of our God, which shall stand forever: “I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils. Ye can not drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye can not be partakers of the Lord's table, and of the table of devils.” Therefore, “When they shall say unto you, Seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep, and that mutter: should not a people seek unto their God?” for is it not folly, as well as wickedness, for “the living” to look for knowledge “to the dead”? 1 Cor. 10:20, 21; Isa. 8:19.
Death does not end all; but as the epigraph of earth's teeming millions, whom the hoary ages have seen fall in the inevitable tragedy which ends the mortal hour, we may adopt till the morning of the resurrection, that final summons, the words of the poet:—
“No dreams have they who take their slumber here,
No restless starting at the night's mid-hour;
Peace falls on them, as at the break of year
The early sweetness of an April shower.
“The crocus stains the sod, they do not heed;
The poppy flaunts, they make no faintest sign;
Above their heads the aster drops its seed,
And unremembered passes to decline.”
Or even more fittingly the inspired epigraph of the human race, uttered ages ago by the Idumean seer,—
“So man lieth down, and riseth not;
Till the heavens be no more, they shall not awake,
Nor be raised out of their sleep.
—If a man die shall he live again?—
All the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my
change come.
Thou shalt call, and I will answer Thee:
Thou wilt have a desire to the work of Thine hands.”
Job. 14:12, 14, 15.
And then, dear Lord,—
“E'en tho beyond our bourne of time and space
My bark should bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar.”
[A most interesting article will follow this series, and is intimately connected with it, entitled “Can I Be Bewitched?”]
