PART II.

OPINIONS AND THEORIES.

The credulous have their weak points, but the belief of unbelievers surpasses all credulity.

There is no position a man can assume so weak as that of extreme skepticism in the face of fair evidence.

* * * * *

Heat, light, electricity, and force are common things. We accept them as matters of everyday life; our familiarity with them prevents surprise. In our attempts to discover or learn what they are we have utterly failed. All that we have found is how they act under certain conditions. They are the elements necessary to the existence of physical life, and by cultivating their acquaintance we have made friends with them. They walk beside us, lending a helping hand in everything; still they are our masters--we know them not. For the moment we comprehend a thing we are greater than the thing we comprehend: it is behind us, not in front.

Those who are seeking to know how these spirit-forms are created will seek in vain, for there is no language by which the process can be conveyed to our understanding. When it is said that they come out of invisible space, and depart in the same way, all is said that can be in explanation of their advent among us.

OPINIONS AND THEORIES.