[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
and futile action. Man is a creature. Creatures are thoughts of God. It is the nature of thought to be
irrevocable.
P. I do not comprehend. You say that man will never put off the body?
V. I say that he will never be bodiless.
P. Explain.
V. There are two bodies - the rudimental and the complete; corresponding with the two conditions of the
worm and the butterfly. What we call "death," is but the painful metamorphosis. Our present incarnation is
progressive, preparatory, temporary. Our future is perfected, ultimate, immortal. The ultimate life is the full
design.
P. But of the worm's metamorphosis we are palpably cognizant.
V. We, certainly - but not the worm. The matter of which our rudimental body is composed, is within the ken
of the organs of that body; or, more distinctly, our rudimental organs are adapted to the matter of which is
formed the rudimental body; but not to that of which the ultimate is composed. The ultimate body thus
escapes our rudimental senses, and we perceive only the shell which falls, in decaying, from the inner form;
not that inner form itself; but this inner form, as well as the shell, is appreciable by those who have already
acquired the ultimate life.
P. You have often said that the mesmeric state very nearly resembles death. How is this?
V. When I say that it resembles death, I mean that it resembles the ultimate life; for when I am entranced the
senses of my rudimental life are in abeyance, and I perceive external things directly, without organs, through a
medium which I shall employ in the ultimate, unorganized life.
P. Unorganized?
V. Yes; organs are contrivances by which the individual is brought into sensible relation with particular
classes and forms of matter, to the exclusion of other classes and forms. The organs of man are adapted to his
rudimental condition, and to that only; his ultimate condition, being unorganized, is of unlimited
comprehension in all points but one - the nature of the volition of God - that is to say, the motion of the
unparticled matter. You will have a distinct idea of the ultimate body by conceiving it to be entire brain. This
it is not; but a conception of this nature will bring you near a comprehension of what it is. A luminous body
Information prepared by the Project Gutenberg legal advisor 42
imparts vibration to the luminiferous ether. The vibrations generate similar ones within the retina; these again
communicate similar ones to the optic nerve. The nerve conveys similar ones to the brain; the brain, also,
similar ones to the unparticled matter which permeates it. The motion of this latter is thought, of which
perception is the first undulation. This is the mode by which the mind of the rudimental life communicates
with the external world; and this external world is, to the rudimental life, limited, through the idiosyncrasy of
its organs. But in the ultimate, unorganized life, the external world reaches the whole body, (which is of a
substance having affinity to brain, as I have said,) with no other intervention than that of an infinitely rarer
ether than even the luminiferous; and to this ether - in unison with it - the whole body vibrates, setting in
motion the unparticled matter which permeates it. It is to the absence of idiosyncratic organs, therefore, that
we must attribute the nearly unlimited perception of the ultimate life. To rudimental beings, organs are the
cages necessary to confine them until fledged.
P. You speak of rudimental "beings." Are there other rudimental thinking beings than man?
V. The multitudinous conglomeration of rare matter into nebulæ, planets, suns, and other bodies which are
neither nebulæ, suns, nor planets, is for the sole purpose of supplying pabulum for the idiosyncrasy of the
organs of an infinity of rudimental beings. But for the necessity of the rudimental, prior to the ultimate life,
there would have been no bodies such as these. Each of these is tenanted by a distinct variety of organic,
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]