practical Christian, though not a professing one. He was looking for
that ideal social state which we all hope is sometime coming, of
"peace on earth and love to all." His spirit state was revealed to me
as among those arisen workers and reformers, whose work for humanity
he loved and shared on earth, and learning of the wise ones,--a vast
and wonderful sphere of individualities, who are still laboring for
the good of humanity. I wished to know of my father, who passed out
from the mortal form when I was thirteen years of age, and who was
often my spirit teacher in my early life, why, after my mother had
passed on, he was not always with her as in earth life. He replied,
with a rare smile: "We are together; our work is different, but when
we need each other we cannot be apart."
Singly or in groups, or as my needs seemed to require, I was aware of
every relative and friend who had passed from mortal life, whom our
mutual wish or need attracted toward me. I am sure there may be those
related by ties of consanguinity whom I have not seen, and many
related only by spiritual sympathy and kinship whom I have met and
loved in that state.
My babe, now a beautiful young woman in the spirit state, is my almost
constant companion in those visitations and experiences. I have "seen
her grow," to use our mortal speech; have noted her spiritual
unfoldment, and have many times been her pupil,--so wise are these
"little ones" in the love of the angels, so sweet and simple is she in
her teaching.
How few know the real meaning of "nearness" as applied to those they
love! One thinks of the friend whose bodily presence is removed by
mountains, rivers, and oceans as being far away; yet London, China,
and India are as near in thought as the chair beside one, and doubly
near the one whose body may be sojourning there. This very nearness of
sympathy debars any separation. If people would turn to the real
indications,--sympathy, intuition,--whenever desired the friend is
near. Doubly true is this of those who have passed the barrier of
death and are revealed to the heart of love. They have not died, they
have not gone; they are so near as not to be seen or felt by the
grosser sense that governs the physical state of recognition; so very
near that even the thoughts of the friend still immured in the
earthly form are shared by them, the very innermost longings responded
to. Yet people unaccustomed to seek them in the inner instead of outer
realm of existence, cannot find them, and say, "They are gone." With
space and time annihilated, what shall prevent the loved from being
ever near?
Teachers and guides bear a nearer relationship than those in human
states, and teach by the magic law of adaptation and love. I cannot
name, in earthly language, the tie that binds me to those who have led
me through these many realms, who have taught by vision, illustration,
and thought, until the awakened _perception_ knew, the _a priori_
knowledge came.
I have often been conscious of visiting at desire a realm of music
that led through the world of tone, through the spheres of matchless
harmony in which the great masters of music abide,--Beethoven,
Mendelssohn, Mozart, and to the divine realm of Wagner.
The realm of art, leading through color and form to the images of
perfect life, until form and tint and tone are merged in the supreme
soul of beauty, and sculptured image or architectural grandeur is lost
in the eternal, all-forming, all-changing changelessness of the Soul
of Art.
The realm of nature (the material universe), seen from the inverse
side, appears to be the effect of causes that are in that realm of
consciousness; laws that are the operation of the Supreme Will, the
Logos. There science is reconstructed and made plain, and made secure
by the knowledge of these fundamental principles.
The realm of philosophy, traced to its primal sources, reveals the
truths concerning universal knowledge, often perceived by the great
teachers, but dimly stated by minds enshrouded by the environments of
earth.
The realm of religion,--the ineffable meaning of the All-Love and
Wisdom; the nearness, the perfectness, the absoluteness of the Divine;
the kinship of souls, the fraternity of spirits,--never in all this
realm was there a thought, or teaching of thought, separate from a
conscious individual entity.
I find that there is no Time or Space in this inner realm; the entity
is not governed by the limitations of the person, so the terms and
usages of earthly existence must fall into desuetude. One is not
hampered by an ox-team while flying across the plains in a palace
coach impelled by steam, and one does not need winter garments and
furs in the tropics. The state of spirit needs no earthly day and
night; all these are but incident to the physical earth and physical
existence. The spirit is free from these limitations--time, space, and
sensuous environment.
It will be interesting for the reader to know that my physical health
does not suffer from these experiences, nor from the active duties
incident to my spiritual work in human life.
I enter this spirit realm as naturally and easily as one enters the
realm of sleep; yet it is not sleep. The body and brain are actively
employed by another intelligence, loaned as an instrument might be,
while the individual consciousness, the _ego_ of the human being, is
set free to visit these illimitable realms or states of the "inner,"
the vaster, life.
When the mundane consciousness returns, it is instantaneous; but the
mental and physical sensations vary according to whether the
experiences have been "near or far" from the human state, with
reference not to distance, but to resemblance or similarity in
quality. When the experiences have been furthest removed from those
usual in human consciousness, many minutes, and sometimes hours, are
required to adjust myself to the conditions. This inner state is far
more intense, but not unlike that experienced when one has been wholly
wrapped and folded from the outer world in perusing a favorite
author--living with and experiencing the scenes depicted; or when one
has listened for hours to the all-absorbing strains of music in the
grand operatic creations of Wagner. On returning to the mundane state
my food has often tasted like chips or straw; the fabric of my dress
would feel coarse to the touch, as though woven of cords or ropes; and
every sound seemed harsh or far too loud. Gradually these
supersensitive conditions would depart, leaving the usual state of
mind and body.
I have said it is easy to pass into that state; not so easy is the
returning to the human environment; yet one _must_ return. Like the
child bidden to the task, reluctant to leave the garden of flowers and
the freedom of the outer world, yet, constrained by love and duty, one
consents to return. I suspect that these sensations I experience, of
return to the human state, are something like those of resuscitation
after one has been nearly drowned. The drowning is easy, because one
is going into life; the restoration is painful, because one returns,
if not to death, to mere existence. The work, the duty, the loved who
are embodied here must win one to the form which has been loaned; but
the spirit seems reluctant sometimes to leave that freedom and
knowledge for the narrow walls of clay, the prison-house of sense. The
only true way is to bring that realm with one into daily life. One
learns after a time to do this: to clothe the earthly scenes with the
inner brightness, and the human tasks with the spiritual aura of love
and wisdom.
I cannot judge whether the scenes of earth seem lovelier to me than to
most mortals; whether there is more ravishing sweetness in the
springtime, more glory in summer, more richness and beauty in the
autumn, more rest and whiteness in the winter, more transcendent
splendor in the sunset sky and glory in the starlit heavens. But it is
certain that in being admitted to this inner realm the writer has not
lost any blessing of earth,--of love, of home, of friends, of
practical knowledge and interest in the daily duties and work of life;
nor, I believe, can one be barred from any needed experience, however
bitter. These teachings, visions, and experiences of soul-life have
given to earth an exquisite beauty; to life's work a meaning and
impetus; to trials a lesson and interpretation; to the change called
death a glory and radiance; to spirit states a nearness, and to soul a
reality. Nor do these experiences rob one of one's individuality; the
petty _personality_ to which mortals cling is, happily, forgotten or
cast aside, but the _individuality_ cannot be lost, merged in another,
or governed, except for its good. When the _personal_ is cast aside,
one is grateful for the impersonality of the _individual_.
Trailing clouds of glory accompany me across and into the barriers of
time and sense, and when the sharp contrast is over--which the guide
ever prevents from being too sudden--I realize the great sweetness of
the gardens of paradise by the fragrance that is filling the earthly
dwelling, and I know that being aware of the visitations of angels,
and of somewhat of the light which is theirs, does not hinder, but
helps human endeavor and accomplishment.
THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF CIVICS.
BY HENRY RANDALL WAITE, PH. D.
The standard represented by popular institutions will seldom be
higher, and as time goes on may become lower, than that set for
themselves by the majority of the people who established and are
intrusted with the duty of maintaining them. They may represent noble
aims and point to high ideals, but the extent of their duration and
salutary influence must always be dependent upon a sufficient
manifestation of the spirit which called them into being.
Institutions and laws, however perfect in other respects, cannot,
therefore, safely omit from their functions provisions for the
fostering and developing of the spirit which gave them birth. This
spirit, it is to be remembered, may, and too often does, without
extinguishment, actually become a thing so much apart from the
machinery which it has established, as to have little appreciable
influence in controlling its operation.
The institutions and laws of the United States, in their inception,
represented the spirit of a people who were actuated by the highest
concepts of human duty, and who sought to establish a political system
which should realize the highest ideals. The possibilities of the
system have been demonstrated by the experience of more than a hundred
years. Functionally considered this experience has made painfully
evident the failures which have attended the system in its operation.
It is evident to every intelligent student of American history that
these failures have been chiefly due to the fact that the spirit which
gave life to the American Republic has too often and too far been
supplanted in the control of its affairs by a spirit utterly hostile
to that which it was intended to be, and which, if the partial or
complete failure of the system is to be averted, must, everywhere and
always, be dominant. It is undoubtedly true that citizens whose
character and ability fit them for the service necessary for the
proper control of political affairs, constitute a sufficient number in
the voting population to assure the ascendency of right ideas if
their efforts can be united for the purpose. The fact that intelligent
and controlling convictions of duty are absent, and that they do not
thus unite, however explained, clearly accounts for the subversion of
the spirit which founded our institutions, and the ascendency of a
spirit of chicanery, greed, and corruption.
It is also evident that the political evils which challenge our
attention are primarily due, not to faults in our institutions
themselves, but to failures in the assertion of the spirit of true
Americanism by which they are intended to be controlled. How to secure
ascendency for this spirit and thus to restore, in every part of the
republic, the sovereignty of highest manhood, is the most pressing
problem which can engage the attention of patriotic and intelligent
American citizens.
For more than fifteen years this question has been a matter of
profound interest to the writer. The fact that ordinary uprisings
against political evils fail to accomplish permanent results, seemed
to him to afford convincing evidence that attention must be given to
the roots and not confined to the branches; and that this foundation
work must represent patient, persistent, and unselfish efforts for the
promotion everywhere of the basic virtues of true patriotism,
intelligence, integrity, and fidelity in citizenship relations.
Believing that this work could be best accomplished through a
permanent national institution which should invite and command the
coöperation of good citizens everywhere, regardless of party, creed,
sex, or class, he sought the advice and coöperation of a few
distinguished men in the preparation of plans for such an institution.
The assistance sought was willingly extended by such citizens as
Morrison R. Waite, William Strong, and S. F. Miller, then respectively
Chief Justice and Justices of the United States Supreme Court; by
Theodore Woolsey, Noah Porter, F. A. P. Barnard, Mark Hopkins, Julius
H. Seeley, and Theodore W. Dwight, among educators; and by such other
eminent Americans as U. S. Grant, William Fitzhugh Lee, Robert C.
Winthrop, Hugh McCulloch, John J. Knox, Orlando B. Potter, A. H.
Colquitt, George Bancroft, Hannibal Hamlin, John Jay, Right Reverend
William I. Kip, David Swing, and Phillips Brooks.
The result of conferences and correspondence with these and other
citizens of like character led to the founding, in 1885, of the
American Institute of Civics, which was subsequently chartered under
the laws of Congress, and was dedicated to the service of promoting
the qualities in citizenship which Washington sought to promote by his
latest labors and final bequests, and which he, in common with
Jefferson, Hamilton, and Madison, believed to be necessary "to the
security of a free constitution," and to the welfare of the government
and people of the United States. Its distinctive purposes are
succinctly set forth in its charter as follows:
1. To promote on the part of youths and adults generally, without
reference to the inculcation of special theories or partisan
views, a patient and conscientious study of the most essential
facts relating to affairs of government and citizenship, to the
end that every citizen may be qualified to act the part of an
intelligent and upright juror in all affairs submitted to the
decision of the ballot.
2. To promote, in the same spirit, such special attention to the
study of Civics[7] in higher institutions of learning, and
otherwise, as shall have a tendency to secure wise, impartial,
and patriotic action on the part of those who shall occupy
positions of trust and responsibility, as executive or
legislative officers, and as leaders of public opinion.
[7] Defined in the Standard Dictionary as follows: "The
science that treats of citizenship and of the relations
between citizens and the government: a new word directly
derived from the adjective _civic_, introduced by Henry
Randall Waite."
Organized under such auspices and with such purposes it represents the
only practical and sustained effort which has been made by the people
of the United States for the realization of the aims above outlined;
and with persistency of purpose and increasing usefulness it has for
more than twelve years prosecuted its mission for the safeguarding of
American institutions.
Political conditions past and present clearly justify the views of
Washington and his contemporaries, and the opinions of the Institute's
founders, as to the need of a central source of salutary influences in
the form of a national institution wholly devoted to a propaganda of
the principles and ideas comprehensively described in Washington's
words as "the fundamental maxims of true liberty."
The sole object of this national, non-partisan, non-sectarian,
popular, and permanent institution, is to voice these maxims, to
inspire the spirit and give force to the principles which should have
supreme control in affairs of government, citizenship, and social
order.
What the national military establishments at West Point and Annapolis
are intended to accomplish in the way of preparing a few citizens for
useful service in times of war, it is the purpose of this popular
civil institution, with patriotic insistency and through all available
efficiencies, to aid in accomplishing through provisions for properly
preparing all citizens for the highest service of their country at all
times.
In the accomplishment of its objects, it directs its endeavors not so
much to the creation of new agencies as to the giving of inspiration
and energy to those already existing; and in pursuing this wise policy
it has been a most useful factor in establishing the solidarity and
increasing the power of the influences which represent civic virtue
and true patriotism.
Its efficiencies include, beside its National Board of Trustees,
composed of thirty-three members, and its advisory faculty, composed
of twelve members, the following departments:
1. Department for the extension of information and activities
promotive of good citizenship, through which provisions are made for
home studies, and for lectures, discussions, studies, etc., in
connection with schools, lyceums, civic associations, labor
organizations, and institute clubs; this work being carried on with
the coöperation and under the supervision of councillors in the
communities where they reside, and with the aid of a corps of
lecturers now numbering more than two hundred.
2. Department of Educational Institutions conducted in coöperation
with State and local officers of public instruction, teachers in
elementary and high schools, and members of faculties in nearly two
hundred and fifty higher institutions of learning.
3. Publication Department, through which the equivalent of nearly
twenty million pages of octavo matter has been issued under its
auspices.
4. Department of Legislation, in connection with which councillors and
citizens generally have efficiently aided in securing needed reforms
in the administration of public affairs, the protection and elevation
of the suffrage, and the conservation of the highest interests of
citizens and the state in other respects.
5. Department of Applied Ethics, in connection with which efforts are
made to properly and efficiently enlist the great body of citizens,
including youths as well as adults, who profess to be governed by the
highest concepts of duty, in practical labors for the establishment of
wise, just, and salutary civic and social conditions.
It is obvious that an institution of this character cannot depend for
its maintenance upon citizens of merely negative virtue, nor can it
expect the sympathy of scheming politicians to whose plans and power
it is in direct opposition. Its dependence must be solely upon the
willing services and financial support of those members of the body
politic who are animated by the spirit of Washington, and who believe
that in matters affecting the highest interests of our free
institutions, such as civic virtue and civic fidelity, formation is
better than re-formation, and that to constantly maintain salutary
political conditions is infinitely preferable to frequent and
disappointing struggles with corruptible elements, which through
neglect of civic duty have been permitted to secure controlling power;
in other words, that it is better to safely guard our inheritance of
freedom than to battle for its rescue from unworthy hands.
The Institute admits to membership in its National Body of Councillors
all citizens who are commended to its Board of Trustees, by those
already members, or by other citizens of known high character, as
worthy of such membership by reason of their ability to contribute in
some degree to the accomplishment of its purposes. It does not solicit
the membership of citizens whose political affiliations are such as to
rank them among those who are contributing to the evils which it seeks
to correct. Its councillors are asked to share in an undertaking which
tests the character of their citizenship by offering no rewards for
their coöperation. It has employed no paid officers and no paid agents
for the solicitation of funds. The united activities of its members
have enabled it, and it is believed will continue to enable it, to
present in itself an eloquent object-lesson in patriotism and a potent
appeal to the spirit in citizenship--the true Americanism--which it
seeks to foster. Its contributing councillors are asked for annual
remittances of sums of from $2.00 upward, in accordance with their
financial ability and the degree of their interest in its work. Those
contributing $3.00 or more annually are entitled to receive all of its
own publications, and also THE ARENA, whose aims are largely identical
with its own, and through which its official announcements will
hereafter be published.
It will be seen that the degree of responsibility resting upon its
councillors financially and otherwise is a matter for their own
determination, and one which will be decided in accordance with the
disposition of each to recognize the truth, that the patriotic and
unselfish labors of those who have gone before us, and of which we
enjoy the priceless benefits, have laid upon us a sacred obligation
which we can discharge only by the performance of similar labors.
The foregoing statements, however encouraging, are chiefly significant
as indicative of what may be, rather than of what has been,
accomplished. Gratifying as the results of the Institute's work have
been, they represent but a tithe of what it might have accomplished
with a larger degree of moral and pecuniary support. The extent of its
field and the magnitude of the labors necessary in order to make it
widely and effectively useful, when compared with the resources at its
command, have constantly presented difficulties which would have
discouraged its officers but for their abiding confidence in the
ultimate willingness of the American people to give to it the measure
of support warranted by the importance of the objects to which it is
devoted. It has been not inaptly compared to a noble piece of
enginery, whose highest possibilities in the way of efficiency and
usefulness cannot be realized because the fuel furnished is
insufficient for the supply of motive power. Its highest possibilities
are, in truth, little more than dreams, the fulfilment of which may
not be realized in the lives of those who are now giving it such
unselfish service as they find possible in the midst of other pressing
occupations.