I use the words “ascension” and “arising” in the superficial sense of
earthly imagery. Of course, carefully speaking, there can be no up or
down to the motion of beings detached from a revolving globe, and set
adrift in space. I thought of this in the first moment, with the
keenness which distinguishes between knowledge and experience. I knew
when our journey came to an end, by the gradual cessation of our rapid
motion; but at first I did not incline to investigate beyond this fact.
Whether I was only tired, or giddy, or whether a little of what we used
to call faintness overcame me, I can hardly say. If this were so, it was
rather a spiritual than a physical disability; it was a faintness of the
soul. Now I found this more energetic than the bodily sensations I had
known. I scarcely sought to wrestle against it, but lay quite still,
where we had come to a halt.
I wish to say here, that if you ask me where this was, I must answer
that I do not know. I must say distinctly that, though after the act of
dying I departed from the surface of the earth, and reached the confines
of a different locality, I cannot yet instruct another _where_ this
place may be.
My impression that it was not a vast distance (measured, I mean, by an
astronomical scale) from our globe, is a strong one, which, however, I
cannot satisfactorily defend. There seemed to be flowers about me; I
wondered what they were, but lay with my face hidden in my arm, not
caring yet to look about. I thought of that old-fashioned allegory
called “The Distant Hills,” where the good girl, when she died, sank
upon a bed of violets; but the bad girl slipped upon rolling stones
beneath a tottering ruin. This trifling memory occupied me for some
moments; yet it had so great significance to me, that I recall it, even
now, with pungent gratitude.
“I shall remember what I have read.” This was my first thought in the
new state to which I had come. Minna was the name of the girl in the
allegory. The illustrations were very poor, but had that uncanny
fascination which haunts allegorical pictures--often the more powerful
because of their rudeness.
As I lay there, still not caring, or even not daring to look up, the
fact that I was crushing flowers beneath me became more apparent; a
delicate perfume arose and surrounded me; it was like and yet unlike any
that I had ever known; its familiarity entranced, its novelty allured
me. Suddenly I perceived what it was--
“Mignonette!”
I laughed at my own dullness in detecting it, and could not help
wondering whether it were accident or design that had given me for my
first experience in the new life, the gratification of a little personal
taste like this. For a few moments I yielded to the pure and exquisite
perfume, which stole into my whole nature, or it seemed to me so then.
Afterwards I learned how little I knew of my “whole nature” at that
time.
Presently I took courage, and lifted my head. I hardly know what I
expected to see. Visions of the Golden City in the Apocalypse had
flitted before me. I thought of the River of Death in the “Pilgrim’s
Progress,” of the last scene in the “Voyage of Life,” of Theremin’s
“Awakening,” of several famous books and pictures which I had read or
seen, describing what we call Heaven. These works of the human
imagination--stored away perhaps in the frontal lobes of the brain, as
scientists used to tell us--had influenced my anticipations more than I
could have believed possible till that moment.
I was indeed in a beautiful place; but it did not look, in any respect,
as I had expected. No; I think not in any respect. Many things which
happened to me later, I can describe more vividly than I can this first
impression. In one way it was a complex, in another, a marvelously
simple one. Chiefly, I think I had a consciousness of safety--infinite
safety. All my soul drew a long breath--“Nothing more can happen to me!”
Yet, at the same time, I felt that I was at the outset of all
experience. It was as if my heart cried aloud, “Where shall I begin?”
I looked about and abroad. My father stood at a little distance from me,
conversing with some friends. I did not know them. They had great
brightness and beauty of appearance. So, also, had he. He had altered
perceptibly since he met me in the lower world, and seemed to glow and
become absorbent of light from some source yet unseen. This struck me
forcibly in all the people whom I saw--there were many of them, going to
and fro busily--that they were receptive and reflecting beings. They
differed greatly in the degree in which they gave this impression; but
all gave it. Some were quite pale, though pure in color; others glowed
and shone. Yet when I say color, I use an earthly word, which does not
express my meaning. It was more the atmosphere or penumbra, in which
each moved, that I refer to, perhaps, than the tint of their bodies.
They had bodies, very like such as I was used to. I saw that I myself
was not, or so it appeared, greatly changed. I had form and dress, and I
moved at will, and experienced sensations of pleasure and, above all, of
magnificent health. For a while I was absorbed, without investigating
details, in the mere sense of physical ease and power. I did not wish to
speak, or to be spoken to, nor even to stir and exercise my splendid
strength. It was more than enough to feel it, after all those weeks of
pain. I lay back again upon the mignonette; as I did so, I noticed that
the flowers where my form had pressed them were not bruised; they had
sprung erect again; they had not wilted, nor even hung their heads as if
they were hurt--I lay back upon, and deep within, the mignonette, and,
drowned in the delicate odor, gazed about me.
Yes; I was truly in a wonderful place. It was in the country (as we
should say below), though I saw signs of large centres of life, outlines
of distant architecture far away. There were hills, and vast distances,
and vistas of hill tints in the atmosphere. There were forests of great
depth. There was an expanse of shining water. There were fields of fine
extent and color, undulating like green seas. The sun was high--if it
were the sun. At least there was great brilliance about me. Flowers must
have been abundant, for the air was alive with perfumes.
When I have said this, I seem to have said little or nothing. Certain it
is that these first impressions came to me in broad masses, like the
sweep of a large brush or blender upon canvas. Of details I received
few, for a long time. I was overcome with a sense of
Nature--freedom--health--beauty, as if--how shall I say it?--as if for
the first time I understood what generic terms meant; as if I had
entered into the secret of all abstract glory; as if what we had known
as philosophical or as poetical phrases were now become attainable
facts, each possessing that individual existence in which dreamers upon
earth dare to believe, and of which no doubter can be taught.
I am afraid I do not express this with anything like the simplicity
with which I felt it; and to describe it with anything resembling the
power would be impossible.
I felt my smallness and ignorance in view of the wonders which lay
before me. “I shall have time enough to study them,” I thought, but the
thought itself thrilled me throughout, and proved far more of an
excitant than a sedative. I rose slowly, and stood trembling among the
mignonette. I shielded my eyes with my hand, not from any glare or
dazzle or strain, but only from the presence and the pressure of beauty,
and so stood looking off. As I did so, certain words came to mind with
the haunting voice of a broken quotation:
“_Neither have entered into the heart of man_”--
“_The things which God hath prepared_”--
It was a relief to me to see my father coming towards me at that moment,
for I had, perhaps, undergone as much keen emotion as one well bears,
compressed into a short space of time. He met me smiling.
“And how is it, Mary?”
“My first Bible verse has just occurred to me, Father--the first
religious thought I’ve had in Heaven yet!” I tried to speak lightly,
feeling too deeply for endurance. I repeated the words to him, for he
asked me what they were which had come to me.
“That is a pleasant experience,” he said quietly. “It differs with us
all. I have seen people enter in a transport of haste to see the Lord
Himself--noticing nothing, forgetting everything. I have seen others
come in a transport of terror--so afraid they were of Him.”
“And I had scarcely thought about seeing Him till now!” I felt ashamed
of this. But my father comforted me by a look.
“Each comes to his own by his own,” he said. “The nature is never
forced. Here we unfold like a leaf, a flower. He expects nothing of us
but to be natural.”
This seemed to me a deep saying; and the more I thought of it the deeper
it seemed. I said so as we walked, separate still from the others,
through the beautiful weather. The change from a New England winter to
the climate in which I found myself was, in itself, not the least of
the great effects and delights which I experienced that first day.
If nothing were expected of us but to be natural, it was the more
necessary that it should be natural to be right.
I felt the full force of this conviction as it had never been possible
to feel it in the other state of being, where I was under restraint. The
meaning of _liberty_ broke upon me like a sunburst. Freedom was in and
of itself the highest law. Had I thought that death was to mean release
from personal obedience? Lo, death itself was but the elevation of moral
claims, from lower to higher. I perceived how all demands of the larger
upon the lesser self must be increased in the condition to which I had
arrived. I felt overpowered for the moment with the intensity of these
claims. It seemed to me that I had never really known before, what
obligation meant. Conduct was now the least of difficulties. For
impulse, which lay behind conduct, for all force which wrought out fact
in me, I had become accountable.
“As nearly as I can make it out, Father,” I said, “henceforth I shall be
responsible for my nature.”
“Something like that; not altogether.”
“The force of circumstance and heredity,”--I began, using the old
earthly _patois_. “Of course I’m not to be called to account for what I
start with here, any more than I was for what I started with there. That
would be neither science nor philosophy.”
“We are neither unscientific nor unphilosophical, you will find,” said
my father, patiently.
“I am very dull, sir. Be patient with me. What I am trying to say, I
believe, is that I shall feel the deepest mortification if I do not find
it natural to do right. This feeling is so keen, that to be wrong must
be the most unnatural thing in the world. There is certainly a great
difference from what it used to be; I cannot explain it. Already I am
ashamed of the smallness of my thoughts when I first looked about in
this place. Already I cannot understand why I did not spring like a
fountain to the Highest, to the Best. But then, Father, I never was a
devotee, you know.”
When I had uttered these words I felt a recoil from myself, and sense of
discord. I was making excuses for myself. That used to be a fault of the
past life. One did not do it here. It was as if I had committed some
grave social indecorum. I felt myself blushing. My father noticed my
embarrassment, and called my attention to a brook by which we were
walking, beginning to talk of its peculiar translucence and rhythm, and
other little novelties, thus kindly diverting me from my distress, and
teaching me how we were spared everything we could be in heaven, even in
trifles like this. I was not so much as permitted to bear the edge of my
regret, without the velvet of tenderness interposing to blunt the smart.
It used to be thought among us below that one must be allowed to suffer
from error, to learn. It seemed to be found here, that one learned by
being saved from suffering. I wondered how it would be in the case of a
really grave wrong which I might be so miserable as to commit; and if I
should ever be so unfortunate as to discover by personal experience.
This train of thought went on while I was examining the brook. It had
brilliant colors in the shallows, where certain strange agates formed
pebbles of great beauty. There were also shells. A brook with shells
enchanted me. I gathered some of them; they had opaline tints, and some
were transparent as spun glass; they glittered in the hand, and did not
dull when out of the water, like the shells we were used to. The shadows
of strange trees hung across the tiny brown current, and unfamiliar
birds flashed like tossed jewels overhead, through the branches and
against the wonderful color of the sky. The birds were singing. One
among them had a marvelous note. I listened to it for some time before I
discovered that this bird was singing a Te Deum. How I knew that it was
a Te Deum I cannot say. The others were more like earthly birds, except
for the thrilling sweetness of their notes--and I could not see this
one, for she seemed to be hidden from sight upon her nest. I observed
that the bird upon the nest sang here as well as that upon the bough;
and that I understood her: “_Te Deum laudamus--laudamus_” as distinctly
as if I had been listening to a human voice.
When I had comprehended this, and stood entranced to listen, I began to
catch the same melody in the murmur of the water, and perceived, to my
astonishment, that the two, the brook and the bird, carried parts of the
harmony of a solemn and majestic mass. Apparently these were but
portions of the whole, but all which it was permitted me to hear. My
father explained to me that it was not every natural beauty which had
the power to join in such surpassing chorals; these were selected, for
reasons which he did not attempt to specify. I surmised that they were
some of the simplest of the wonders of this mythical world, which were
entrusted to new-comers, as being first within the range of their
capacities. I was enraptured with what I heard. The light throbbed about
me. The sweet harmony rang on. I bathed my face in the musical
water--it was as if I absorbed the sound at the pores of my skin. Dimly
I received a hint of the possible existence of a sense or senses of
which I had never heard.
What wonders were to come! What knowledge, what marvel, what stimulation
and satisfaction! And I had but just begun! I was overwhelmed with this
thought, and looked about; I knew not which way to turn; I had not what
to say. Where was the first step? What was the next delight? The fire of
discovery kindled in my veins. Let us hasten, that we may investigate
Heaven!
“Shall we go on?” asked Father, regarding me earnestly.
“Yes, yes!” I cried, “let us go on. Let us see more--learn all. What a
world have I come to! Let us begin at the beginning, and go to the end
of it! Come quickly!”
I caught his hand, and we started on my eager mood. I felt almost a
superabundance of vitality, and sprang along; there was everlasting
health within my bounding arteries; there was eternal vigor in my firm
muscle and sinews. How shall I express, to one who has never
experienced it, the consciousness of life that can never die?
I could have leaped, flown, or danced like a child. I knew not how to
walk sedately, like others whom I saw about us, who looked at me
smiling, as older people look at the young on earth. “I, too, have felt
thus--and thus.” I wanted to exercise the power of my arms and limbs. I
longed to test the triumphant poise of my nerve. My brain grew clearer
and clearer, while for the gladness in my heart there is not any earthly
word. As I bounded on, I looked more curiously at the construction of
the body in which I found myself. It was, and yet it was not, like that
which I had worn on earth. I seemed to have slipped out of one garment
into another. Perhaps it was nearer the truth to say that it was like
casting off an outer for an inner dress. There were nervous and arterial
and other systems, it seemed, to which I had been accustomed. I cannot
explain wherein they differed, as they surely did, and did enormously,
from their representatives below. If I say that I felt as if I had got
into the _soul of a body_, shall I be understood? It was as if I had
been encased, one body within the other, to use a small earthly
comparison, like the ivory figures which curious Chinese carvers cut
within temple windows. I was constantly surprised at this. I do not know
what I had expected, but assuredly nothing like the fact. Vague visions
of gaseous or meteoric angelic forms have their place in the
imaginations of most of us below; we picture our future selves as a kind
of nebulosity. When I felt the spiritual flesh, when I used the strange
muscle, when I heard the new heart-beat of my heavenly identity, I
remembered certain words, with a sting of mortification that I had known
them all my life, and paid so cool a heed to them: “There is a
terrestrial body, and there is a celestial body.” The glory of the
terrestrial was one. Behold, the glory of the celestial was another. St.
Paul had set this tremendous assertion revolving in the sky of the human
mind, like a star which we had not brought into our astronomy.
It was not a hint or a hope that he gave; it was the affirmation of a
man who presumed to know. In common with most of his readers, I had
received his statement with a poor incredulity or cold disregard.
Nothing in the whole range of what we used to call the Bible, had been
more explicit than those words; neither metaphor, nor allegory, nor
parable befogged them; they were as clear cut as the dictum of
Descartes. I recalled them with confusion, as I bounded over the elastic
and wondrously-tinted grass.
Never before, at least, had I known what the color of green should be;
resembling, while differing from that called by the name on earth--a
development of a color, a blossom from a bud, a marvel from a
commonplace. Thus the sweet and common clothing which God had given to
our familiar earth, transfigured, wrapped again the hills and fields of
Heaven. And oh, what else? what next? I turned to my father to ask him
in which direction we were going; at this moment an arrest of the whole
current of feeling checked me like a great dam.
Up to this point I had gone dizzily on; I had experienced the thousand
diversions of a traveler in a foreign land; and, like such a traveler, I
had become oblivious of that which I had left. The terrible incapacity
of the human mind to retain more than one class of strong impressions at
once, was temporarily increased by the strain of this, the greatest of
all human experiences. The new had expelled the old. In an intense
revulsion of feeling, too strong for expression, I turned my back on the
beautiful landscape. All Heaven was before me, but dear, daily love was
behind.
“Father,” I said, choking, “I never forgot them before in all my life.
Take me home! Let me go at once. I am not fit to be alive if Heaven
itself can lead me to neglect my mother.”