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One day I was summoned from my labors into a kind of reception-room to
meet a visitor. A visitor! I had been imprisoned thirty years and no one
had ever called to see me. I had forgotten the outer world and supposed it
had forgotten me. It was with surprise and some trepidation that I
advanced to present myself to the stranger.
He was of small size, ugly, stoop-shouldered and bald. His face was
sallow, his nose aquiline, his brows heavy and joined between his eyes.
His air was embarrassed and timid and his speech slow. With this
unprepossessing appearance, his manner was cordial and engaging, his tones
agreeable, and when warmed up in conversation, his features were radiant
with thought and genius.
This remarkable man was Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles.
After satisfying himself that I had been thirty years in prison and that I
was really Lazarus whom Christ raised from the dead, he became very
animated and communicative.
“You will be interested,” said he, “to know how I found you out. I was
called, a few days before I left Rome on this tour to the Eastern
churches, to see a dying man. He was one of the most miserable wrecks I
have ever witnessed, bearing the mark of the beast and the seal of sin. He
was a Greek and his name was Demetrius. He wished to be baptized into the
Christian faith, and to confess his sins before he died. He told me that
you had been sentenced for life under a false name to hard labor on the
public works of Antioch. He begged, as a favor to a dying sinner, that I
would visit you if possible, and beg your pardon for the crimes he had
committed against you.”
It seemed that all my friends supposed I had been burned as one of the
Christian candles, on the eventful night of the death of Magistus. My
sisters and the disciples had mourned for me as one of the first martyrs
of the new faith. Mary and Martha had arrived safely in Gaul, and had
founded a beautiful church with a convent and Christian schools at
Marseilles. Their wealth had contributed immensely to the spread of
Christianity. They were devoted and holy women, and Paul was eloquent in
praise of their zeal and piety.
“And Mary Magdalen?” said I, with a slight tremor at pronouncing the name
of a woman who had of late taken ardent possession of my thoughts.
“The humblest, sweetest, gentlest creature in the world! She always wears
her black veil and devotes herself to the most menial offices. She is the
grandest type I have yet seen of the purifying and sanctifying influence
of the religion of Christ.”
I felt a sweet glow of satisfaction at this announcement; and old man as I
was, something like a blush mounted to my cheeks.
I learned from the great apostle the history of the Church from its
infancy to the present time. He was modest and even depreciating in
narrating his own share in the stupendous labors of the early disciples. I
was not slow in detecting, from what he said, the immense changes in
thought and spirit which had taken place in the Christian commonwealth
since I had been withdrawn from its sphere.
Jesus Christ had left them a religion; Paul had made it a theology.
Paul drew from me a narration of my experiences in the spiritual world. I
was very explicit and enthusiastic, for I deemed my revelations of the
utmost importance to the Church and the world. He listened with interest,
but with evident incredulity. We exchanged ideas at some length on all the
leading questions of theology. I became more and more anxious to impress
him with the truth of what I was saying.
“Remember,” said I, “that the germs which you now plant in the Church,
will expand in the form and direction you give them for hundreds and may
be thousands of years. The slightest deviations now from the genuine
truth, will grow into gigantic errors.
“If you teach the destructibility of this physical globe and the
resurrection of our dead bodies from the dust, the Church will not have a
true conception of the spiritual world, nor of the relation of that world
to this.
“If you teach the separate and distinct personality of the Father, Son and
Holy Ghost, the proper or supreme divinity of Jesus Christ will not be
understood, and the germ of polytheism will take root in your creed.
“If you ignore the great judgment executed by Christ in the world of
spirits, you will fail to comprehend the true object of his incarnation;
and you will commit the sad mistake of supposing that the next and last
judgment predicted, will take place in the world of nature.
“If you speak, as you did just now, of the blood of Christ cleansing from
sin, your hearers may fall into the error of supposing that the material
blood shed upon the cross is what cleanses and saves from sin; whereas the
truth is, that the blood shed for the remission of sins, is the wine of
the New Testament—the spiritual truth and spiritual life which flow forth
from the Divine Man for the healing of the nations.”
So I went on, reiterating all the grand points of doctrine which
distinguished the teachings of the angels I had conversed with, from the
teachings of Paul. He became more and more restive under my impetuous
torrent of argument, and at last rose to depart. He excused himself on the
plea of urgent business and short time. He said he would call again if
possible, and would interest the Church in Antioch to labor for my
release.
He left me with a pleasant smile. He passed into a gallery where he met
the governor of the prison. They were conversing as they walked slowly
along beneath a window at which I had stopped. I heard Paul say,
“He is evidently insane.”
“I wish the world was full of such madmen,” was the bluff answer of the
governor.
And that was the result of my interview with the great thinker, the
leading spirit of the Christian world!
Insane!
This visit of Paul was of immense service to me. It helped me to subdue
one of the strongest points of my selfhood. I still cherished the dream
that my spiritual knowledge had been entrusted to me for the special
benefit of the Christian Church. My only reason for wishing to get out of
prison, was that I might communicate the Doctrine of Christ, as it appears
to the angels, to my fellow-men.
After mature reflection upon my conversation with Paul and its results, I
came to the conclusion that I had labored under a great mistake and had
cherished an impossible hope. There are certain successive steps in the
grand evolution of the general human mind, which make one revelation of
truth necessary and proper at one time and another at another. The world
and the Church were not ready for the knowledges which had been given to
me. The transition from Jewish darkness to angelic light was too great,
too sudden. A long period of twilight must intervene—a period of literal
interpretations, of janglings and wranglings and schisms. In the fullness
of time, perhaps, and after another judgment in the world of spirits,
another church may be instituted capable of receiving without adulteration
the sublime verities of the spiritual world.
So I abandoned my mission. God knew better than I did, and I was
satisfied.
It is strange what a new, sweet, beautiful life sprung up in my soul after
I discovered that I had no mission in this world to fulfill, but to spread
cement between stones, to plant flowers, to read the Psalms and to nurse
my sick fellow-prisoners. I was a new creature.
I then entered upon what I have designated as the third state or era of my
spiritual life. And this state was so marvelous, so exceptional to all the
experiences of my fellow-men, that I shall not dwell long upon it. It may
be a thousand or two thousand years before Providence repeats the
phenomenon and produces another case like mine; and although in the
far-off perfection of the world they will be common enough, the story of
it will for centuries fall upon the ears of men as an idle dream.
The first intimation I had of a further change of state, was received
while I was reading the Scriptures. The good Christians of Antioch, it
seems, failed in procuring my release; but they contrived to send me a
copy of the ancient Scriptures and the Gospel of Matthew. These were
priceless jewels to an old man and a prisoner dead to all things except
the life of religion.
One day when reading in the Psalms and applying the thoughts to my own
individual experience, I became suddenly aware, by a kind of interior
illumination, that the secret soul-life of the Lord Jesus Christ in his
combats with the powers of hell, was embodied and concealed in the sacred
pages. They contain more wonderful things than all the heights and depths
of this external nature which we so much admire. They contain the
mysteries of life and death.
Every day brought new revelations to my mind of the interior meaning of
the sacred writings. I found that the spiritual history of the incarnation
of Christ was concealed in the narrative of the lives of Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob. The first chapters of Genesis, under the figure of the creation
of the world, revealed the successive steps by which the human soul is
built up from its original chaos into the image of God. The wanderings of
the Israelites from Egypt to Canaan, was the spiritual history of every
man’s regeneration. And the prophets—oh, the prophets! with their dark
sayings and grand imagery, concealed with a mystic veil the most beautiful
and holy truths of the spiritual universe.
These things were not invented by my imagination. They were not discovered
by my ingenuity. They pre-existed in the Scriptures, but are invisible to
the mind which rests in the mere sense of the letter. Their existence was
revealed to me by an interior light, the operation of which I did not
comprehend. I learned also that this wonderful spiritual sense of the
Divine Word was clearly understood in heaven, and was the mental food of
angels.
The Gospel of Matthew contains similar spiritual mysteries enfolded in the
literal story of our Lord. The Epistles of Paul, however,—glowing,
eloquent, devout, impressive as they are—contain no interior or spiritual
signification. I saw at once that they had no organic connection with the
heavens; in other words, that they were not divinely inspired. They were
simply the earnest, saintly utterances of a great and good man to his
brethren.
“And yet,” said I to myself, “so potent has this zealous and eloquent
apostle been in organizing the Church, and so dense is the darkness of the
natural mind, that it would not surprise me, if in the far future the
words of Paul are reckoned of equal value with the history of Jesus, or
with the Law and the Prophets.”
The peace and joy inspired by the spiritual perception of the Word, were
ineffable. My mind was in a state of continual felicity. I began also to
have the most exquisite and beautiful dreams. I was frequently awakened by
strains of the most heavenly music, and the darkness of my little cell was
illumined by flashes of light, auroral and rainbow colors darting and
twinkling here and there in the most surprising manner. I felt that some
organic change in my spiritual constitution was impending.
One Sabbath morning when I was reading in the Prophets, I became suddenly
aware of a presence in my room; and lifting my eyes I beheld my father
standing before me. He was as youthful and beautiful as ever. He was clad
in shining garment, and said with a beaming smile:
“Do you understand what you read?”
“Better than I ever did before. But, O father! how is it that you have
descended into the natural world?”
“Have you so soon forgotten your instructions in the world of spirits? I
have not descended into the world of nature. I see nothing material which
surrounds you. I am invisible to all eyes but yours. The change is in
yourself. Your spiritual sight has been partially opened into the world of
spirits where I am—enough to see my form, but not my surroundings. You
seem to come to me, while I seem to come to you. You see me with your
spiritual eyes and your material surroundings with your natural eyes.”
It is needless to explain the philosophy, as it is impossible to describe
the joy, of this happy reunion. Suffice it to say that my father came
frequently to see me, or I went to see him, however the case may be
interpreted. He assisted me in my studies of the Word, and we had many
long discourses on the mysteries of regeneration. Many of these things are
incommunicable in human language, for when my spiritual sight was open, I
spoke unconsciously the language of spirits and not the language of men;
and I find it impossible to embody in material expressions what was
perfectly intelligible in my spiritual state.
“Your case,” said my father, “so strange and exceptional at present, is a
proof of the possibilities of the human spirit. As long as the powers of
hell reign on earth, it will be fearfully dangerous for man to have
communication with spirits; and the Lord in his mercy will, as far as may
be possible, keep each world a secret from the other. When He comes again
with an open Word and his angelic hosts in the far-off ages of terrestrial
time, such cases as yours may occur not unfrequently, and will announce
the approaching conjunction of heaven and earth.”
This double life, this wheel within a wheel, is no part of my earthly
autobiography. I must draw the veil over its mysteries. I am permitted,
however, to tell my readers that my uncle Beltrezzor was revealed to my
eyes. He appeared as a young man of unspeakable beauty, clad in a purple
robe of dazzling splendor. He had become a member of a heavenly society
situated nearest to the Sun of the spiritual world. The atmosphere in
which they live is a tissue of golden light, and the emblem of their
spiritual love is a flame of sacred fire.
Would you call that a convict’s cell or the gate of paradise, which was
brightened by the halo of such presences?
The old man who thus lived in both worlds, at once escaping the common
limitations of time and space, was not withdrawn from the practical
discharge of his homely and difficult duties. Never in his life was he
more faithful, more zealous, more careful in the little every-day affairs
which really make the happiness or the misery of life.
One day I was working on the walls of a new palace. The chief architect, a
man of noble character and great influence, happened to approach very near
me in one of his rounds of inspection. He said in a pleasant tone:
“You spread your cement with very great care.”
“So it ought to be,” said I, “for the cement is the brotherly love which
binds the hearts of the brethren together.”
He lifted his hand and made a certain signal.