trance of Paradise; the barking dog is Cerberus who scares away those who approach; all the phantoms and monsters you see are Furies and Eumenides who threaten to ill-treat and annihilate us before we reach Elysium. You have to fight and drive off this phantasmagoria under whatever form they appear; then you will enter Paradise, the Eternal Heaven where nothing can disturb your peace any longer, but Truth in her purest splendor will fill, enlighten, and guide you as your law of life.

Silbert felt encouraged by those words and said: "I thank you and give you my word never to rest until I have conquered and dispelled all my doubts, in whatever horrible shapes they may mask themselves."

He kept his word; but for full five months he had to struggle before he gained rest. Once the crying monster possessed itself of his nature

to such an extent that he was no more master of himself and even uttered words of insult against his friend. On such occasions Fielding would remain perfectly calm and, at most, say "Speak out! speak out! and vanish with your words in the air! The demon sees his perdition near and raves in his last efforts. Let him rage, and invoke the Eternal Thought for help."

Silbert did so and behold, his countenance cleared up and peace was re

established in his heart.

Once, when walking to and fro' with his friend in the garden, he said: "The life begins to stir in my heart. It hurts when the true spark strikes it, but I feel that a main spring of our forces flows thence and that in possessing that I shall possess myself."

"So it is," answered Fielding. In your heart is the centre of that star you often see. It will come nearer and nearer, until it will fill and illumine you and show you, in all the rays of its circle, a vital power that is inflowing continually and thereby constitutes us a self-dependent individuality to whom nature, by immutable law, administers, yea, is bound to administer, its sustaining substance!"

Silbert, since he realized such results, continued his work with redoubled zeal and but little heeded the phantoms that circled around him on all sides. Yet some hard struggles awaited him. Skepticism once more stood up aginst him with all its power, forming new, dazzling, deceitful images before his eyes. A legion of desires awoke in him that he had known hardly by their names before. Fielding in this crisis called on Mohrland for help, and when he arrived said to him: "Our friend stands in the gate of life; give him courage to enter."

When they called on Silbert and he saw Mohrland, he seemed to be frightened rather than pleased; but he recovered himself and bid him welcome.

Mohrland, noticing his embarrassment, said: "Why are you so shy, my friend? I hoped to find, you calm and cheerful, and now I see you excited and in combat with yourself."

Silbert, passing his hand over his forehead, looked at him as at a stranger and as though awaking from sleep. "You find me," he then said, "in a strange condition. I have attained more than I ever dared to hope for, yet I cannot rid myself of all doubts! Why are we permitted in our youth to step out unwatched into the world of hypotheses in the snares of which our better feelings are entangled and finally choked! Now I see with my eyes, and yet cannot believe, because doubt in me has grown

a living power, whose weapons are stronger than my newly awaked sentiments.'

Mohrland replied: "I realize your condition. Your heart is not opened yet. The ideas of that new heaven are too much at variance with your accustomed ways of thinking to take root so suddenly. Only keep up your courage! The victory will not be delayed long. With such deeprooted skeptics as you are, the understanding must constantly be attended by experience, in order to impart due power to the intuition. Theorems are of no virtue in your situation; living images alone, or comparisons taken from life, are adapted to impart to you the necessary firmness. Therefore listen to this tale:

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Among my acquaintances in younger days there was one Lehmann who had an extraordinarily keen eyesight, for near objects as well as those at a distance. He could not understand how a man could be so foolish as to wear glasses and use telescopes to see better. "Any substance" he said, "be it the purest glass, condenses the space and interrupts the rays of light and therefore cannot possibly show the objects to the eye any clearer." They explained to him the refraction of the rays, the properties of the concave and convex lenses, the concentration of the light in the lens etc.; but he stuck to his opinion: he could not understand, nor did he believe, that behind that small lens the objects could be magnified.

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So it is with you. You cannot see how it is possible to direct our senses to spiritual objects; yet the case is the same as with the visible glasses. Our physical eye is too dull for celestial representations, we, therefore, must accustom ourselves to introduce them into our body through our vital organs, to construct a perspective glass there and to look through a lens behind which all super-earthly objects can be recognized in full clearness, as the earthly ones are through a perspective glass. Yea, more; in the realm of Life not the eye only, but all senses form their lens and see, smell, taste, hear, even speak and receive perceptions of which common man has no idea and, therefore, declares them to be nonsense as that friend of mine did. Try to get this comparison clear in your mind, and you will find that it gives you a strength against your doubts and those fierce phantoms, that will increase with its realization and will furnish you new weapons every day, first for defence, then for aggression and, at last for victory.

Silbert had listened to this parable with great interest. "I will seek the lens," he said, "and when the images of doubt appear, look at them in their true form; then perhaps I shall get the better of them and be able to banish them from my sphere."

He resumed his investigations with a fresh zeal and acquired the ability of forming a lens in all the parts of his body, from the toes to the top of the head, and to see in its true shape whatever object he chose. Seventeen weeks passed in such exercise, when he said to Fielding: "I need supervision no longer, and if it continues in this way I hope to penetrate through all hindrances in a short time, and to enter the so long desired New Heaven."

He returned to his farm-house, and remained for another year free of all public business, in order to get more and more firmness by uninterrupted practice.

He experienced a wonderful transformation in himself; he could see into the future and at a distance. He got possession, by and by, of the keys

to all knowledge, and after the elapse of a year he felt strong enough to resume his life of a citizen. He disclosed this resolution to both his friends. Fielding doubted, but Mohrland said: "Let him do so; but this interrupted activity should be slowly resumed, otherwise he runs the risk of grounding half-way and thereby doing harm instead of good." Silbert promised the utmost precaution and vowed to absolutely obey the law of the Spirit in his future career, and to give account of his doings every

year.

Mohrland was moved to a high degree of solemnity when Silbert, full of gratitude, grasped their hands and took leave. "You have found," he said "what is vouchsafed only to few. Eternity has unlocked its gates, and Immortality is no longer an enigma for you. Much can be attained yet, however, if you persevere, for a new world is open before you in which to gather experience.

The image-world of illusion is behind you to a certain extent, and you are entering a new realm, where as yet no forms appear to you, and all is in the gloom of the early dawn ere it becomes daylight. New images must make their appearance, images that do not delude, but, being formed of pure light, indicate and speak nothing but truth. Therefore, when in future new doubt assails you, turn to that realm; in that immutable light the souls of the departed will show themselves to you and give you full information. Farewell, in a year we shall meet again."

After the allotted time had expired the three met, and Silbert reported: "The law practice would not do yet, therefore I have kept entirely aloof from business." His friends approved of this course and rejoiced at his progress in the art of contemplating Eternity.

THE NEW HEAVEN.

FOUR times he came again in this way, as a disciple, so to speak. But the last time he made such disclosures, that Mohrland solemnly exclaimed: "He is finished! Now he may do what his heart desires, it will nevermore lead him astray."

Silbert, giving account of himself, among other things said: "The spirit-realm is open to me; whatever I want to know of history I learn through those who have been participants of it. Even my father comes as often as I wish him, and guides and teaches me in the most difficult matters. I have attained to what you appointed for me when you said: you do not believe the living ask the dead?' The departed live, they appear to me, they give me answer and therewith the road to the immortal is passed over."

'If

"It is passed over," said Mohrland; "we are united and live, already here, in Eternity. Thou art ours, thou art one with us, and thus the cir cle is completed. We are one heart and one thought; we shall never lose each other, even when the visible sun passes away and a new creation takes the place of this one. Brother Fielding, let us rejoice! Entertain us to-day as guests from a better land in which holiness is coupled with true glad

ness."

It was a happy holiday for all three. Silbert felt so exalted that he exclaimed in rapture: "Now I realize what it means 'to live in heaven"! Such feelings as these can come only from beyond, because there only rest is combined with full activity. I seem to be dissolved in love and bliss, whilst a power pervades me that I have never felt before and that as

the

sures me of my own self against all dissolution. Eternity rules in me; splendor of the Creator who stands above all perishable things, radiates again in my heart; all Creation seems to mirror itself in my interior and to proclaim an eternal Hallelujah to the Throne of Omnipotence."

Under such effusions and feelings the day passed. The next morning they parted with the glad consciousness of living in each others' mind wherever events might lead them. Mohrland returned to his shaft, Fielding resumed his account-books, and Silbert began to accept again the clients that applied to him in his profession, and attained, by the comprehension and management of most complicated cases, such renown that persons came from far distant countries to consult him.

(To be continued).

RENEWED YOUTH.

The great magical means of preserving the youth of the body is to prevent the soul from growing old, by carefully preserving its primeval freshness of sentiments and thoughts, which the corrupt world calls illusions, and which we name the primitive reflections of eternal truth. To believe in bliss on earth, to believe in friendship and love, to believe in a maternal Providence which takes account of all our steps and recompenses all our tears, is to be completely duped, says the corrupted world, and it fails to perceive that the dupe is he who thinks himself to be strong when depriving himself of all the delights of the soul. To believe in good, in the moral order, is to possess good, and this is why the Saviour of the world promised the Kingdom of Heaven to those who become as little children. Infancy is the age of faith; the child as yet knows nothing of life, so is he glowing with confiding immortality. Can he doubt of self-devotion, tenderness, friendship, love, when he is in the arms of his mother? Become children in heart and you will keep young in body!

*

The realities of God and Nature infinitely surpass all the dreams of men both in goodness and beauty. Thus the blasés are those who have never known how to be happy, and the disillusioned prove by their disgust that they have only drunk at muddy springs. To enjoy even the sensual pleasures of life, we must possess moral sense and those who calumniate existence have certainly abused it. Supreme magic directs man to the purest moral code. Vel sanctum invenit, vel sanctum facit, an adept has said, for it shows us that to be happy even in this world we must be holy. To be holy! something said with ease, but how shall we obtain faith when we believe no longer? How recover the taste for virtue in a heart depraved by vice? *** It is a question of recurrence to the four maxims of science to know, to dare, to will, and to keep silent. Silence must be imposed on our disgusts, we must study duty and begin practising it as if we loved it. You are a skeptic, for example, and you wish to be a Christian, pray regularly, using Christian formulae, approach the sacra ments assuming faith, and faith will come. By analogous exercises, a fool, if he willed it persistenbly, might become a man of understanding.

By changing the habits of the soul we assuredly change those of the body. What contributes above all to make us old by deforming us are rancors and bitter thoughts, unfavorable judgments on others, the fury of wounded pride and of ill-satisfied passions. A benevolent and mild phi

*It either finds, or makes, a saint.

losophy would save us from all these evils. If we closed our eyes on our neighbor's faults, taking account of his good qualities only, we should find goodness and kindness everywhere. The most perverse man has his good points, and softens when we know how to take him. Had we nothing in common with human vices we should not even perceive them. Friendship and the self-abnegation which it inspires, are found even in the prisons and galleys. The abominable Lacenaire faithfully returned money when it was lent to him and many times performed acts of generosity and benevolence. No one is absolutely bad or absolutely good. "No one is good but God," said the best of masters.

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What we mistake for the zeal of virtue in ourselves is often only a secret self-love, dissimulated jealousy, and a haughty instinct of contradiction. "When we see manifest disorders and scandalous sinners," say the authors of mystical theology, "believe they are subjected by God to greater trials than we are, that certainly, or at least very probably, we are not of such worth as they, and that we should do far worse in their place." Peace, peace! This is the supreme soul-good, to give us which Christ came into the world. Glory to God in the highest and peace on earth to men of good will!" The early Christian fathers reckoned sadness as an eighth deadly sin. In fact, the very repentance of the Christian is not a sadness but a consolation, joy, and triumph. "I desired evil and I desire it no longer, I was dead and am alive. The father of the prodigal son has killed the fatted calf, for his son has returned, and what can the prodigal do? Weep, feel a little confused, but above all, be joyful. Folly and wickedness are the only sad things in the world. As soon as we are delivered from them, let us laugh and utter cries of joy, for we are saved and all the dead who love us rejoice in Heaven.

(Eliphas Levi in "The Mysteries of Magic.")

THE MATERIAL AND THE IMMATERIAL WORLD. EVERY one that has studied Mental Philosophy knows that man is endowed with the five corporal senses by which he is made acquainted with the material or physical world. The knowledge that we can gain of physical existence flows through these channels and may be defined as consciousness. The external world addresses itself to us as phenomena, or nature in activity, and the reality of these phenomena is not modified by conditioned intelligence, but the consciousness of phenomena is much conditioned by intelligence, because all men do not see things in the clearest light and the extent of one's knowledge and development has much to do with the representation of objects made upon his imagination.

The darkness spread over the earth in consequence of the fall of man is what would, and does to a great extent, prevent men from seeing things as they really are.

When a person who has been regenerated looks out on the world it appears to him in a light different from that in which he has ever seen it before. He is then brought into harmony with nature as well as revelation.

When matter was created, it was in its most attenuate condition, endowed with potentiality and subjected to change according to laws, whose culmination is organization; and hence we see, as a result of this, planets and suns having sprung from primeval chaos, rolling in silent majesty through