"I stood alone with my former guide, and Chapman. I felt moved by some
singular enthusiasm; the exaltation of the moment possessed me, and
unannounced, as yet unquestioned, I rose to my full height upon a narrow
rostrum in the platform, and turning from side to side spoke with an
elation that seemed to propel my ringing words over the great assembly
with the power and shock of a trumpet:
"'Men and women,' I cried, 'I have reached your wonderful world from
that habitation of mortal men known to many of you as the Earth, where
death ceaselessly destroys generation after generation, and only the
incessant processes of birth as quickly renew the falling ranks of life.
To us on earth, the disappearance of those we love and cherish, the
sundering of ties which a lifetime of love and companionship has
established, the sharp vanishing away into nothingness and silence of
the faces and spirits of the great and glorious, the good, the helpful,
the true and noble, has made death an awful, hideous, to some a hopeless
mystery.
"'We stand on earth speechless before the unseen power which snatches
from our caresses all that we most cherish, all that makes our life
there worth living. There is no solution of the mystery, no voice, no
return, no message, only a blankness of doubt, misgiving and desperate
yearning in those who must continue. There is indeed with those on Earth
a partial confidence by reason of religious faith, but strong as that
seems to be, the endless succession of centuries, each crowding the
viewless habitations of the dead with the still more and deeper streams
of disembodied souls, unaccompanied by any response, any utterance or
return, limit or telltale apparition, has somehow filled all minds with
a creeping wonder if even the assurances of Revelation can be believed.
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