by Prof. Michael Faraday

Ever since the creation of the world, man, animal, bird and vegetable kingdom existed. They have all been developed to a higher plane of sensibility; man’s finer faculties of intellect are also responsible in a great measure, for the alertness and intelligence of animals; for in his progression he causes all forms of life to do likewise. You see in the spring time the unfoldment of the grass, the leaf and the wild flowers that nature has planted with her own will. Can you conceive of anything more pure and innocent than the flower? Many writers tell you that man evolved from the lower form or type of the animal kingdom; such is not the case, for man has always existed as man, but through the spiritual unfoldment alone he has become civilized; in a great measure, men have been brought to realize that through their own efforts, they are powerful to free themselves from their barbarous and uncivilized condition. Nature did not intend man to war against his brother, for all life evolved from the one great Source of all Intelligence; and that is Love! The same elements that are required to make one piece of machinery, must be also used to make others, and so with the human being, the only difference is that the elements in the machinery are of grosser matter than the millions of atoms in the human being. Did you ever stop to think what a wonderful piece of mechanism is man! First, the atomic stage, the embryonic condition, and then the earthly life of man. All life is unfolded in darkness because darkness is negative, and light is positive. These two forces are essential in all forms of life; therefore, it requires the same elements to produce any spiritual manifestation.

Man came upon your earth plane without his volition, and will go away the same route, and passing out of the material form is inevitable, and although a natural law, there are thousands of men and women who never think of passing out; they think only of material things, not knowing how soon they may cross to the Great Beyond; as life is everlasting, and eternal. You are the children of the same mother, and the same journey awaits you all! Another life is sure, and you will know and love again the ones who loved you here. The All-wise and Infinite Intelligence has placed upon you, your earth-nature, in all her perfection for you to improve and utilize; and caused the great wheel of progress to revolve. Without this intelligence, what could man hope to accomplish?

Many developments of the past ages go to show that a very thin veil separates the known from the unknown. And what are called occult or spirit powers, are nothing but natural powers not yet revealed by the efforts of science, or are manifested so definitely that they can be apprehended as natural facts. Wireless telegraphy is an accepted scientific fact, because its power of manifestation has been shown to be within the sphere of Nature’s laws. And your scientific men are working to dispel the cloud of ignorance which prevents you from understanding. Every fact which can be brought within the cognizance of the senses, is a natural fact. There is no such thing as supernatural; in fact there is nothing supernatural. All things are natural; even your organs of apprehension are not yet attuned to it and they may never be. It would almost seem as if science herself were about to demonstrate the existence of a higher sphere of vibration by strictly inductive methods. These refined states of matter bring you consciously nearer the limits of what you may conceive of the spiritual. Science will yet prove the fact of a future life for man.

Man is conceded to be the highest and most intelligent of organized beings, and if he were asked the extent of the universe, he would reply that it was bounded by the visible horizon. The vast sweep of land and sea encircling your stupendous globe, the innumerable host of suns and planets, comets and nebulae are to him unknown. To him they do not exist, and any attempt to prove their existence would be futile, because he cannot conceive of them since they are entirely beyond the grasp of his senses. So with the materialist. A spiritual universe does not exist for him, simply because he cannot examine it with any of his five senses. Man in his primitive state was held so close under the thrall of superstition that he attributed the moving of the leaves, the flowing of streams, the falling of rain, and other phenomena of Nature to invisible spirits, and whatever might be the harm or benefit therefrom, he would distinguish likewise to be visited upon him with good or evil! Scientific spirituality has shown the super-physical cause of many, or all of these phenomena while science seeks for the physical cause of things rather than be content with the primitive assumption of superphysical.

But the human mind has a tendency to ascribe almost anything to the superphysical, that it cannot understand. It is well known that science has not yet discovered the nature of life nor its origin. For this reason there always have been and still are many persons who hold that in addition to the chemical components of all living beings, there is a mysterious force. They object that natural forces are just as capable as any other mechanical principle to explain life. To this the opponents answer: “It does not follow that you never will find a satisfactory physical explanation of life.” It is and has been a query as to a future existence ever since the creation of the world. All of the great religions have taught it, but have never been able to prove it. The most savage races of people are visited by spirits. Is it not strange that those noble souls, so full of hope and interest in earth life and in human affairs, should pass away and never be heard of again; and those hearts, bound to you by an affection so strong, should love you and never come to you any more? This is not the case, my friends, they do come to you whether you are aware of it or not; there has always been a vague belief in spirits, apparitions of the dead, and Spiritual manifestations. Another great difficulty as to your continued existence, is the dissolution of the body.

All that you know of human life is in connection with the body. You believe that man existed; then why not believe that spirits existed? Without man’s physical existence, there would be no spiritual existence. Bear that in mind, my friends. Can you make something out of nothing? We do not refuse to the animal all hope of continued existence. The living principle in the animal is capable of development into a higher mode of existence after the death of the body. All life has a counterpart (spirit) for all creation of life is from one great Source of Intelligence. Man’s soul is developed by knowledge; as his body grows old and decays, his mind continues to advance. So careful is Nature that she never uses one atom of matter, one molecule of organized matter or one unit of power without its effect and results.

If you would ask the skeptic what do you know about another life, he must reply that he knew very little about it. And if he did, it might take his thoughts too far away from his earthly duties. He thinks if he was able to look into the Great Beyond, he might regret being obliged to remain in this life so long. So he makes it his duty to think, not of the hereafter, but of the world that is now. The All-wise and Infinite power sends death to every one of his creatures to whom he has given life; since death is as universal as life, death must be a blessing as well as life. It is a part of the great change; it is a step forward only to another phase of living.

There are a great many advantages connected with the event which you call death. Consider what the great Infinite Intelligence has done for you in your earthly abode, and then what it will do for you in spirit life. There is infinite variety in the spirit world: there are flowers and trees, lakes and rivers; there is a greater variety over here; for surely the wise Intelligence has not exhausted itself in making your world. There is beyond, for the eye and ear, problems for the intellect to investigate; work to do, usefulness in social intercourse and affection; the power of progression, the signs of goodness and greatness and the hope to aspire. Here you will enter more into the interior life of nature, and can come nearer to the work of the creative power.

Nature not only wisely and kindly provides the supply to satisfy all proper desires, but it has created within you a longing, an instinct that is well nigh infallible, in leading you to the source of this supply. We might illustrate this by the migratory instincts of birds; they instinctively yearn for the South, and implicitly following that instinct, it directs them to the South.

It is also noticeable again, that in the instinct of direction, with which animals are endowed, and following the impulse of that instinct, it leads them to the desired point, in their journeying. When animals are sick they have an instinct that there is a remedy, and following that instinct, they find the desired remedy. So in the physical department of your being, you hunger for food, and following that longing of hunger, you are speedily directed to a supply of that which you most need.

In the mental department of your being, you may have constant cravings for knowledge, and the longing of the mind carries it to the fountain of learning. If you reason by analogy, would it not seem exceedingly reasonable, that desire would be as reliable in the higher realms of your being as in those lower departments?

If you are safely guided by desire in the physical, the social, and the intellectual departments of your being, you would be fully as safely guided by the higher desires of the soul. All of life’s earthly avenues have been trodden in vain, and man has returned to the point of beginning, as thoroughly unsatisfied as when he entered them. When I speak of being abundantly satisfied, when your spiritual desires lead you to the great Infinite Spirit, I do not mean to imply that this satisfaction, or sensuous fervor is delicious ecstasy, or soft, dreamy rapture. Being satisfied with spiritual truth, you do not retire from domestic life, nor from congenial society, nor from business activities, nor from educational enterprises, nor from philanthropic efforts, nor from reform movements.

You take spiritual knowledge into your heart, and being satisfied in it and with it, you are better fitted to enter all of these spheres just mentioned; and all the other avenues of life that are honorable and pure, than you were before; and all the callings of secular life, are hallowed and made sacred by taking Spiritual knowledge into your soul. But having found complete satisfaction in Spiritual knowledge, you have been saved from that sickly, morbid craving, for sinful pleasures and worldly amusements, that had so constantly controlled you hitherto. What the soul has been seeking hither and thither, has found, at last, in Spiritual truth, and seeks no farther in other directions.

Your world has been abused by the intense cultivation of a narrow and ignorant religious spirit concerning a future life. Nothing should be more glorifying to the average race than the hope of another life. As the Spirit world overarches the earth, so the great life of the hereafter overhangs and perfects the feeling of evanishing existence. To all-wise and intelligent minds, force meant something when it created your world, and established its manifold economies. It was not made on a chance. The experiences of your world are all valuable and necessary.

Your environment on earth is absolutely necessary to your education and culture. Our chief business just now is with the material world. We know it, laws and their influence over you and human civilization. The world you live in was evidently framed to bring to you happiness. Beautiful light for the eyes, sweet sounds for the ear, pure air for the lungs, scenes of glorious beauty for the soul, facts for the perceptive faculty, truth for the conscience, law for the reason.

You abuse your world when you deny the right to be happy in it. Your world is the stepping stone to the next. It suggests and necessitates a higher and better world. There is no love on your earth in child, or maiden or mother, or martyr, that does not point to the immortal love that shall outweary mortal sin. All things in nature are real, and human life confirms the testimony that you complete beyond, what you begin on earth. Your world is a school-house, and men and women are the pupils. For what purpose do you learn your lessons and slowly acquire your culture, if there be no other, no progressive life? There is such a life. It is yours if you but strive for it. You win it by faithful, honest loving action in the life that now is.

While the world lasts, Spirituality must be preached and will succeed only as the same rules are steadily followed. We want earnest living men and women, who will stoop down to suffering humanity, and manifest the spirit of the Good Samaritan; stop with a word of comfort, a look of love, a helping hand. Note the vastness of the sea, the grandeur of a towering mountain, the measureless concave of the midnight sky blazing with constellations, each of these soothes and settles the agitated mind, and fills the soul with sublime musings of him who notes the fall of a sparrow, as well as superintends the destiny of worlds. It is and has been a familiar utterance, that your world is full of sin. My friends, you should not forget that sin is not so much in the world as it is in the people. The more you study the work of Nature, the more intense and intelligent will be your love for it. Do not the spirits direct the attention of its hearers to the world of Nature around you? It must be seen however, to the most casual observer, that the wisdom of Nature is displayed in the adaptation of means to ends. In all animal, vegetable and plant life, from the simplest to the most complex, there is a plan for each, a condition and a means. Human life is not plundering the world, but for improving it.

Excerpt from The Dawn Of Another Life