Posted on 02 December 2024, 7:57

American clergyman Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) is said to have communicated through the mediumship of Marcella De Cou Hicks (1888-1942), author of the book titled Eternal Verities, providing some indications as to what the afterworld is like.  Much of what Beecher (below) had to communicate was recorded in the January 10, 1940 issue of “The Psychic Observer” and was set forth in my blog of September 9, 2024. The Psychic Observer article was continued in its January 25, 1940 issue, which I could not find.  Thanks to David Chilstrom for providing the article from that issue. This blog quotes part of that issue.  The final part will follow in a future blog. 

The Spirit World Explained

“Now MAN is essentially SPIRIT wherever he may be and however he may be expressing himself.  Man, on the earth plane, is immortal spirit expressing himself in a physical body, enduring the hampering circumstances, the limitations, the hindrances of the flesh. The earth and its environs constitute an elementary testing laboratory of spirit in which spirit-man works on the alchemy of that attribute known as character. And on passing out of mortality the spirit-soul gravitates to that spirit group and into that spirit phase to which his earth life has adapted his vibration rate.

“The second plane of spirit life is in and all about the earth itself, not in some remote part of space.  It has no definite boundaries in the sense of being separated or divided off from other planes. It gradually merges into other phases.  I might say it has boundaries in the sense that your states have boundary lines.  One does not see them as he travels from state to state and is not conscious of any change in landscape. Nevertheless what may be permitted and lawful in one state may not be permitted or lawful in another.  Likewise each and every phase of spirit life has certain privileges and certain taboos. For instance those inhabiting the realms of darkness may not, and cannot, visit the higher phases and mingle with the dwellers therein.

“Because even in its lowest aspects the conditions of the second plane vibrate with so much greater velocity than matter or substance, its habitants and environment are invisible to human sight and can only be seen through clairvoyant vision. Also, because of vibratory velocity the second plane can coexist in the same place as matter and not interfere with, or be interfered with, by substance.”

Spirit Progression

“This statement raises a question in your mind, doesn’t it.  Well, consider this fact – in the cubic content of your living room, for instance, there can exist at one and the same time air, light, heat, and or, sound.  These elements can and do occupy the same space at the same time due to the fact that their differing vibration velocities do not interfere with each other. Moreover, none of these elements are any more visible to the human eye than spirit is visible. So you see that since spirit conditions vibrate with even greater velocity than these intangibles, they can coexist with substance.

“When a spirit-soul tells you that he has progressed to the third, four, or fifth plane, he must mean – of the first sphere of the first zone of which earth itself is the first plane.  Because any spirit-soul qualified to work in any plane of the second sphere will probably have lost all desire to contact mortality and its problems.  Unless he be one of the Great Mentors – and the rank and file do not contact such. They come only to earth who has been charged ‘from the high’ with a great mission.

“One must pass through all the planes of all the spheres of all the zones before he can take up extra-cycle work but he need not go through all the phases of all the planes.  The system may be compared to the regime that obtains in school and college courses of earth.  In order to graduate one must make certain points but he need not take every subject in the curriculum.  Some subjects are required and others are elective.  Also, one may ‘skip a grade’ and after graduation, if he chooses, he may return for a post-graduate work.”

The Good and the Bad

“Similarly, in spirit life one may be so adept at absorbing knowledge that while he has been studying one course or phase, he may have absorbed so much of another that he will be permitted to skip it if, after examination, it is proved that he does not require it.  Also, after passing on to a higher phase one may return to a lower for review or for some study he has not chosen to take previously.  In this connection, bear in mind that earth world is just as much a plane of spirit as any of these realms of the disembodied, and many do not learn its lessons well.  However, I think we had better not go into that.  I well remember the letters of abuse you received some time ago when you let slip a remark or two about reincarnation. Wel, well – the vagaries of the mortal mind!

“The second plane of spirit life, in which most spirit-souls gravitate upon leaving the body, is as conglomerate as the earth itself.  It harbors in its various phases every sort and type of consciousness.  It might well be called the clearing house or kindergarten of spirit.  The bad are there because they vibrate only into the lowest phases of spirit life.  The good are there because they come, knowing nothing of the facts of spiritual progress or the plan of progression, and must start at the beginning and learn the fundamentals before they can qualify to take up the work of advancement.  But make no mistake, my dear, the good and the bad are not harbored in the same phases. No, no, they do not vibrate into the same condition.

“In this second plane of spirit life are the places of darkness.  These also have their gradations and phases to take care of the manifold and varied stages of spiritual degeneration, disintegration, and ignorance. To one or another of these phases the deliberate wrongdoers, and each spirit-soul is placed according to his irrevocable responsibility in the matter of his wrong-doing.  This darkness, together with remorse, constitutes a soul’s punishment.  Black darkness, silence, solitude, and remorse can be very terrible things.  Form any point of view in darkness a spirit-soul, through coming to a full realization of his misdeed and repenting fully therefor, and becoming possessed of a sincere desire to rectify his wrong doing and start on his journey or progression, may finally emerge from the blackest dark into phases of less darkness until finally he is permitted to follow some ministering spirit out into the light.”

Soul Culture

“The reason that these places of punishment are in darkness is that the spirit-souls inhabiting them have no effulgence, no light. You understand, child, that the spirit world is lighted by the radiance of its spiritual occupants.  You have experienced this gorgeous effulgence when sitting in the silence in your own home.  Many times, in the dead of night, your room has lighted up with a radiance whose beauty you cannot describe and many times you have seen spirits, themselves manifesting only as lights, some tine as pinpoints, some like flickering candle flames, some great balls of fire: every shade and hue from the palest mauve-violet to the deepest purple, from the faintest pink to the deepest rose, from the frailest yellow to the most flamboyant orange.  Is it not so?

“In the realms of spirit, soul culture is made manifest by the color and brightness of a spirit-soul’s light and those of a high degree of development radiate lovely, vivid colors.  As one progresses spiritually his light and color become more glorious and intense until it becomes difficult for those in his own phase to look upon his blazing radiance.  He is then about to pass on into the next higher phase or plane.

“As a spirit-soul qualifies through works of progress to advance from phase and plane to plane, his vibration rate is immeasurably accelerated and and his soul-body becomes more and more refined as to the ethereal substance that composes it, until in his final expression of being, he becomes pure consciousness without the need of anything but spirit-mind with which to satisfactorily demonstrate personality. He may, of course, retain the soul-body of his last expression, if for any reason he wishes to do so.”
___________________

(The final part, including “No Spirit Graveyards,” Requirements of Spirit,” Nothing to be Feared” and “Mistaken Concepts” will appear in a future blog.”

Michael Tymn is the author of The Afterlife Revealed: What Happens After We Die, Resurrecting Leonora Piper: How Science Discovered the Afterlife, and Dead Men Talking: Afterlife Communication from World War I.
His latest book, No One Really Dies: 25 Reasons to Believe in an Afterlife is published by White Crow books.