Then, not yet recognising him, I said, "Tell me your name, Lord."

At this he laughed and answered, "I have been about you from the beginning. I am the white cloud on the noonday sky." "Do you, then,"

I asked, "desire the whole world to abandon the use of fire in preparing food and drink?"

Instead of answering my question, he said, "We show you the excellent way. Two places only are vacant at our table. We have told you all that can be shown you on the level on which you stand. But our perfect gifts, the fruits of the Tree of Life, are beyond your reach now. We cannot give them to you until you are purified and have come up higher. The conditions are G.o.d's; the will is with you."

These last words seemed to be repeated from the sky overhead, and again from beneath my feet. And at the instant I fell, as if shot down like a meteor from a vast height; and with the swiftness and shock of the fall I awoke.

--Hinton, Sept. 1877

----------------- * The book referred to was a volume ent.i.tled Fruit and Bread, which had been sent anonymously on the previous morning. The fig-tree, which both with the Hebrews and the Greeks was the type of intuitional perception, was an especial symbol of Hermes, called by the Hebrews Raphael. The plural used by the seer included myself as the partner of her literary and other studies. The term virgin in its mystical sense signifies a soul pure from admixture of matter.--(Ed.) -----------------------

X. The Difficult Path

Having fallen asleep last night while in a state of great perplexity about the care and education of my daughter, I dreamt as follows.

I was walking with the child along the border of a high cliff, at the foot of which was the sea. The path was exceedingly narrow, and on the inner side was flanked by a line of rocks and stones.

The outer side was so close to the edge of the cliff that she was compelled to walk either before or behind me, or else on the stones.

And, as it was unsafe to let go her hand, it was on the stones that she had to walk, much to her distress. I was in male attire, and carried a staff in my hand. She wore skirts and had no staff; and every moment she stumbled or her dress caught and was torn by some jutting crag or bramble. In this way our progress was being continually interrupted and rendered almost impossible, when suddenly we came upon a sharp declivity leading to a steep path which wound down the side of the precipice to the beach below. Looking down, I saw on the sh.o.r.e beneath the cliff a collection of fishermen's huts, and groups of men and women on the shingle, mending nets, hauling up boats, and sorting fish of various kinds. In the midst of the little village stood a great crucifix of lead, so cast in a mould as to allow me from the elevated position I occupied behind it, to see that though in front it looked solid, it was in reality hollow.

As I was noting this, a voice of some one close at hand suddenly addressed me; and on turning my head I found standing before me a man in the garb of a fisherman, who evidently had just scaled the steep path leading from the beach. He stretched out his hand to take the child, saying he bad come to fetch her, for that in the path I was following there was room only for one. "Let her come to us," he added; "she will do very well as a fisherman's daughter." Being reluctant to part with her, and not perceiving then the significance of his garb and vocation, I objected that the calling was a dirty and unsavoury one, and would soil her hands and dress. Whereupon the man became severe, and seemed to insist with a kind of authority upon my acceptance of his proposition.

The child, too, was taken with him, and was moreover anxious to leave the rough and dangerous path; and she accordingly went to him of her own will and, placing her hand in his, left me without any sign of regret, and I went on my way alone. Then lifting my eyes to see whither my path led, I beheld it winding along the edge of the cliff to an apparently endless distance, until, as I gazed steadily on the extreme limit of my view, I saw the grey mist from the sea here and there break and roll up into great ma.s.ses of slow-drifting cloud, in the intervals of which I caught the white gleam of sunlit snow. And these intervals continually closed up to open again in fresh places higher up, disclosing peak upon peak of a range of mountains of enormous alt.i.tude.*

By a curious coincidence, the very morning after this dream, a friend, who knew of my perplexity, called to

---------- * Always the symbol of high mystical insight and spiritual attainment-- Biblically called "the Hill of the Lord" and "Mount of G.o.d. " (Ed.) ----------

recommend a school in a certain convent as one suitable for my child.

There were, however, insuperable objections to the scheme.

--Paris, Nov. 3, 1877

XI. A Lion In the Way

Owing to the many and great difficulties thrown in my way, I had been seriously considering the advisability of withdrawing, if only for a time, from my course of medical study, when I received the following dream, which determined me to persevere:--

I found myself on the same narrow, rugged, and precipitous path described in my last dream, and confronted by a lion. Afraid to pa.s.s him I turned and fled. On this the beast gave chase, when, finding escape by flight hopeless, I turned and boldly faced him.

Whereupon the lion at once stopped and slunk to the side of the path, and suffered me to pa.s.s unmolested, though I was so close to him that I could not avoid touching him with my garments in pa.s.sing.

--Paris, Nov. 15, 1877

------------ * The prognostic was fully justified by the event.--(Ed.) -------------

XII. A Dream of Disembodiment

I dreamt that I was dead, and wanted to take form and appear to C.

in order to converse with him. And it was suggested by those about me-- spirits like myself I suppose--that I might materialise myself through the medium of some man whom they indicated to me. Coming to the place where he was, I was directed to throw myself out forward towards him by an intense concentration of will; which I accordingly tried to do, but without success, though the effort I made was enormous.

I can only compare it to the attempt made by a person unable to swim, to fling himself off a platform into deep water. Do all I would, I could not gather myself up for it; and although encouraged and stimulated, and a.s.sured I had only to let myself go, my attempts were ineffectual. Even when I had sufficiently collected and prepared myself in one part of my system, the other part failed me.

At length it was suggested to me that I should find it easier if I first took on me the form of the medium. This I at length succeeded in doing, and, to my annoyance, so completely that I materialised myself into the shape not only of his features, but of his clothing also. The effort requisite for this exhausted me to the utmost, so that I was unable to keep up the apparition for more than a few minutes, when I had no choice but to yield to the strain and let myself go again, only in the opposite way. So I went out, and mounted like a sudden flame, and saw myself for a moment like a thin streak of white mist rising in the air; while the comfort and relief I experienced by regaining my light spirit-condition, were indescribable.

It was because I had, for want of skill, dematerialised myself without sufficient deliberation, that I had thus rapidly mounted in the air.

After an interval I dreamt that, wishing to see what A. would do in case I appeared to him after my death, I went to him as a spirit and called him by his name. Upon hearing my voice he rose and went to the window and looked out uneasily. On my going close to him and speaking in his ear, he was much disturbed, and ran his hand through his hair and rubbed his head in a puzzled and by no means pleased manner. At the third attempt to attract his attention he rushed to the door, and, calling for a gla.s.s, poured out some wine, which he drank. On seeing this, and finding him inaccessible, I desisted, thinking it must often happen to the departed to be distressed by the inability or unwillingness of those they love to receive and recognise them.

--Paris, Jan. 1878

XIII. The Perfect Way with Animals

I saw in my sleep a cart-horse who, coming to me, conversed with me in what seemed a perfectly simple and natural manner, for it caused me no surprise that he should speak. And this is what he said:--

"Kindness to animals of the gentler orders is the very foundation of civilisation. For it is the cruelty and harshness of men towards the animals under their protection which is the cause of the present low standard of humanity itself. Brutal usage creates brutes; and the ranks of mankind are constantly recruited from spirits already hardened and depraved by a long course of ill-treatment.

Nothing developes the spirit so much as sympathy. Nothing cultivates, refines, and aids it in its progress towards perfection so much as kind and gentle treatment. On the contrary, the brutal usage and want of sympathy with which we meet at the hands of men, stunt our development and reverse all the currents of a our nature. We grow coa.r.s.e with coa.r.s.eness, vile with reviling, and brutal with the brutality of those who surround us. And when we pa.s.s out of this stage we enter on the next depraved and hardened, and with the bent of our dispositions such that we are ready by our nature to do in our turn that which has been done to us. The greater number of us, indeed, know no other or better way. For the spirit learns by experience and imitation, and inclines necessarily to do those things which it has been in the habit of seeing done. Humanity will never become perfected until this doctrine is understood and received and made the rule of conduct."

--Paris, Oct. 28, 1879

XIV. The Laboratory Underground