"Did you ever see a ghost?" said a gentleman to his friend.
"No, but I once came very nigh seeing one," was the facetious reply.
The writer of this article has had still better luck,--having _twice_
come very nigh seeing a ghost. In other words, two friends, in whose
veracity and healthy clearness of vision I have perfect confidence, have
assured me that they have distinctly seen a disembodied spirit.
If I had permission to do so, I would record the street in Boston, and
the number of the house, where the first of these two apparitions was
seen; but that would be unpleasant to parties concerned. Years ago, the
lady who witnessed it told me the particulars, and I have recently heard
her repeat them. A cousin, with whom her relations were as intimate as
with a brother, was in the last stages of consumption. One morning, when
she carried him her customary offering of fruit or flowers, she found
him unusually bright, his cheeks flushed, his eyes brilliant, and his
state of mind exceedingly cheerful. He talked of his recovery and future
plans in life with hopefulness almost amounting to certainty. This made
her somewhat sad, for she regarded it as a delusion of his flattering
disease, a flaring up of the life-candle before it sank in the socket.
She thus reported the case, when she returned home. In the afternoon she
was sewing as usual, surrounded by her mother and sisters, and listening
to one who was reading aloud. While thus occupied, she chanced to raise
her eyes from her work and glance to the opposite corner of the room.
Her mother, seeing her give a sudden start, exclaimed, "What is the
matter?" She pointed to the corner of the room and replied, "There is
Cousin ------!" They all told her she had been dreaming, and was only
half wakened. She assured them she had not even been drowsy; and she
repeated with great earnestness, "There is Cousin ------, just as I saw
him this morning. Don't you see him?" She could not measure the time
that the vision remained; but it was long enough for several questions
and answers to pass rapidly between herself and other members of the
family. In reply to their persistent incredulity, she said, "It is very
strange that you don't see him; for I see him as plainly as I do any
of you." She was so obviously awake and in her right mind, that the
incident naturally made an impression on those who listened to her. Her
mother looked at her watch, and despatched a messenger to inquire how
Cousin ------ did. Word was soon brought that he died at the same moment
he had appeared in the house of his relatives. The lady who had
this singular experience is too sensible and well-informed to be
superstitious. She was not afflicted with any disorder of the nerves,
and was in good health at the time.
To my other story I can give "a local habitation and a name" well known.
When Harriet Hosmer, the sculptor, visited her native country a few
years ago, I had an interview with her, during which our conversation
happened to turn upon dreams and visions.
"I have had some experience in that way," said she. "Let me tell you a
singular circumstance that happened to me in Rome. An Italian girl named
Rosa was in my employ for a long time, but was finally obliged to return
to her mother, on account of confirmed ill-health. We were mutually
sorry to part, for we liked each other. When I took my customary
exercise on horseback, I frequently called to see her. On one of these
occasions, I found her brighter than I had seen her for some time past.
I had long relinquished hopes of her recovery, but there was nothing in
her appearance that gave me the impression of immediate danger. I left
her with the expectation of calling to see her again many times. During
the remainder of the day I was busy in my studio, and I do not recollect
that Rosa was in my thoughts after I parted from her. I retired to rest
in good health and in a quiet frame of mind. But I woke from a sound
sleep with an oppressive feeling that some one was in the room. I
wondered at the sensation, for it was entirely new to me; but in vain
I tried to dispel it. I peered beyond the curtain of my bed, but could
distinguish no objects in the darkness. Trying to gather up my thoughts,
I soon reflected that the door was locked, and that I had put the key
under my bolster. I felt for it, and found it where I had placed it. I
said to myself that I had probably had some ugly dream, and had waked
with a vague impression of it still on my mind. Reasoning thus, I
arranged myself comfortably for another nap. I am habitually a good
sleeper, and a stranger to fear; but, do what I would, the idea still
haunted me that some one was in the room. Finding it impossible to
sleep, I longed for daylight to dawn, that I might rise and pursue
my customary avocations. It was not long before I was able dimly to
distinguish the furniture in my room, and soon after I heard, in the
apartments below, familiar noises of servants opening windows and doors.
An old clock, with ringing vibrations, proclaimed the hour. I counted
one, two, three, four, five, and resolved to rise immediately. My bed
was partially screened by a long curtain looped up at one side. As I
raised my head from the pillow, Rosa looked inside the curtain, and
smiled at me. The idea of anything supernatural did not occur to me. I
was simply surprised, and exclaimed, 'Why, Rosa! How came you here,
when you are so ill?' In the old familiar tones, to which I was so much
accustomed, a voice replied, 'I am well, now.' With no other thought
than that of greeting her joyfully, I sprang out of bed. There was
no Rosa there! I moved the curtain, thinking she might perhaps have
playfully hidden herself behind its folds. The same feeling induced me
to look into the closet. The sight of her had come so suddenly, that, in
the first moment of surprise and bewilderment, I did not reflect that
the door was locked. When I became convinced there was no one in the
room but myself, I recollected that fact, and thought I must have seen a
vision.
"At the breakfast-table, I said to the old lady with whom I boarded,
'Rosa is dead.' 'What do you mean by that?' she inquired. 'You told me
she seemed better than common when you called to see her yesterday.'
I related the occurrences of the morning, and told her I had a strong
impression Rosa was dead. She laughed, and said I had dreamed it all. I
assured her I was thoroughly awake, and in proof thereof told her I had
heard all the customary household noises, and had counted the clock when
it struck five. She replied, 'All that is very possible, my dear. The
clock struck into your dream. Real sounds often mix with the illusions
of sleep. I am surprised that a dream should make such an impression on
a young lady so free from superstition as you are.' She continued to
jest on the subject, and slightly annoyed me by her persistence in
believing it a dream, when I was perfectly sure of having been wide
awake. To settle the question, I summoned a messenger and sent him to
inquire how Rosa did. He returned with the answer that she died that
morning at five o'clock."
I wrote the story as Miss Hosmer told it to me, and after I had shown
it to her, I asked if she had any objection, to its being published,
without suppression of names. She replied, "You have reported the story
of Rosa correctly. Make what use you please of it. You cannot think it
more interesting, or unaccountable, than I do myself."
A remarkable instance of communication between spirits at the moment of
death is recorded in the Life of the Rev. Joseph S. Buckminster, written
by his sister. When he was dying in Boston, their father was dying in
Vermont, ignorant of his son's illness. Early in the morning, he said to
his wife, "My son Joseph is dead." She told him he had been dreaming.
He calmly replied, "I have not slept, nor dreamed. He is dead." When
letters arrived from Boston, they announced that the spirit of the son
had departed from his body the same night that the father received an
impression of it.
Such incidents suggest curious psychological inquiries, which I think
have attracted less attention than they deserve. It is common to explain
all such phenomena as "optical illusions" produced by "disordered
nerves." But _is_ that any explanation? _How_ do certain states of the
nerves produce visions as distinct as material forms? In the two cases I
have mentioned, there was no disorder of the nerves, no derangement of
health, no disquietude of mind. Similar accounts come to us from all
nations, and from the remotest periods of time; and I doubt whether
there ever was a universal superstition that had not some great,
unchangeable truth for its basis. Some secret laws of our being are
wrapt up in these occasional mysteries, and in the course of the world's
progress we may perhaps become familiar with the explanation, and
find genuine philosophy under the mask of superstition. When any
well-authenticated incidents of this kind are related, it is a very
common inquiry, "What are such visions sent _for_?" The question implies
a supposition of miraculous power, exerted for a temporary and special
purpose. But would it not be more rational to believe that all
appearances, whether spiritual or material, are caused by the operation
of universal laws, manifested under varying circumstances? In the
infancy of the world, it was the general tendency of the human mind to
consider all occasional phenomena as direct interventions of the gods,
for some special purpose at the time. Thus, the rainbow was supposed
to be a celestial road, made to accommodate the swift messenger of the
gods, when she was sent on an errand, and withdrawn as soon as she had
done with it. We now know that the laws of the refraction and reflection
of light produce the radiant iris, and that it will always appear
whenever drops of water in the air present themselves to the sun's rays
in a suitable position. Knowing this, we have ceased to ask what the
rainbow appears _for_.
That a spiritual form is contained within the material body is a very
ancient and almost universal belief. Hindoo books of the remotest
antiquity describe man as a triune being, consisting of the soul, the
spiritual body, and the material body. This form within the outer body
was variously named by Grecian poets and philosophers. They called
it "the soul's image," "the invisible body," "the aërial body," "the
shade." Sometimes they called it "the sensuous soul," and described it
as "_all_ eye and _all_ ear,"--expressions which cannot fail to suggest
the phenomena of clairvoyance. The "shade" of Hercules is described by
poets as dwelling in the Elysian Fields, while his body was converted to
ashes on the earth, and his soul was dwelling on Olympus with the gods.
Swedenborg speaks of himself as having been a visible form to angels in
the spiritual world; and members of his household, observing him at such
times, describe the eyes of his body on earth as having the expression
of one walking in his sleep. He tells us, that, when his thoughts turned
toward earthly things, the angels would say to him, "Now we are losing
sight of you": and he himself felt that he was returning to his material
body. For several years of his life, he was in the habit of seeing and
conversing familiarly with visitors unseen by those around him. The
deceased brother of the Queen of Sweden repeated to him a secret
conversation, known only to himself and his sister. The Queen had asked
for this, as a test of Swedenborg's veracity; and she became pale with
astonishment when every minute particular of her interview with her
brother was reported to her. Swedenborg was a sedate man, apparently
devoid of any wish to excite a sensation, engrossed in scientific
pursuits, and remarkable for the orderly habits of his mind. The
intelligent and enlightened German, Nicolai, in the later years of his
life, was accustomed to find himself in the midst of persons whom he
knew perfectly well, but who were invisible to others. He reasoned very
calmly about it, but arrived at no solution more satisfactory than the
old one of "optical illusion," which is certainly a very inadequate
explanation. Instances are recorded, and some of them apparently well
authenticated, of persons still living in this world, and unconscious of
disease, who have seen _themselves_ in a distinct visible form, without
the aid of a mirror. It would seem as if such experiences had not been
confined to any particular part of the world; for they have given birth
to a general superstition that such apparitions are a forerunner of
death,--or, in other words, of the complete separation of the spiritual
body from the natural body. A friend related to me the particulars of a
fainting-fit, during which her body remained senseless an unusually long
time. When she was restored to consciousness, she told her attendant
friends that she had been standing near the sofa all the time, watching
her own lifeless body, and seeing what they did to resuscitate it. In
proof thereof she correctly repeated to them all they had said and
done while her body remained insensible. Those present at the time
corroborated her statement, so far as her accurate knowledge of all
their words, looks, and proceedings was concerned.
The most numerous class of phenomena concerning the "spiritual body"
relate to its visible appearance to others at the moment of dissolution.
There is so much testimony on this subject, from widely separated
witnesses, that an unprejudiced mind, equally removed from superstition
and skepticism, inclines to believe that they must be manifestations of
some hidden law of our mysterious being. Plato says that everything in
this world is merely the material form of some model previously existing
in a higher world of ethereal spiritual forms; and Swedenborg's
beautiful doctrine of Correspondences is a reappearance of the same
idea. If their theory be true, may not the antecedent type of that
strange force which in the material world we call electricity be a
_spiritual_ magnetism. As yet, we know extremely little of the laws of
electricity, and we know nothing of those laws of _spiritual_ attraction
and repulsion which are perhaps the _cause_ of electricity. There may be
subtile and as yet unexplained causes, connected with the state of the
nervous system, the state of the mind, the accord of two souls under
peculiar circumstances, etc., which may sometimes enable a person who is
in a material body to see another who is in a spiritual body. That such
visions are not of daily occurrence may be owing to the fact that it
requires an unusual combination of many favorable circumstances to
produce them; and when they do occur, they seem to us miraculous
simply because we are ignorant of the laws of which they are transient
manifestations.
Lord Bacon says,--"The relations touching the force of imagination and
the secret instincts of Nature are so uncertain, as they require a great
deal of examination ere we conclude upon them. I would have it first
thoroughly inquired whether there be any secret passages of sympathy
between persons of near blood,--as parents, children, brothers, sisters,
nurse-children, husbands, wives, etc. There be many reports in history,
that, upon the death of persons of such nearness, men have had an inward
feeling of it. I myself remember, that, being in Paris, and my father
dying in London, two or three days before my father's death I had a
dream, which I told to divers English gentlemen, that my father's house
in the country was plastered all over with black mortar. Next to those
that are near in blood, there may be the like passage and instincts of
Nature between great friends and great enemies. Some trial also would be
made whether pact or agreement do anything: as, if two friends should
agree, that, such a day in every week, they, being in far distant
places, should pray one for another, or should put on a ring or tablet
one for another's sake, whether, if one of them should break their vow
and promise, the other should have any feeling of it in absence."
This query of Lord Bacon, whether an agreement between two distant
persons to think of each other at a particular time may not produce an
actual nearness between their spirits, is suggestive. People partially
drowned and resuscitated have often described their last moments of
consciousness as flooded with memories, so that they seemed to be
surrounded by the voices and countenances of those they loved. If this
is common when soul and body are approaching dissolution, may not such
concentration of loving thoughts produce an actual nearness, filling the
person thought of with "a feeling as if somebody were in the room"? And
if the feeling thus induced is very powerful, may not the presence thus
felt become objective, or, in other words, a vision?
The feeling of the nearness of spirits to when the thoughts are busily
occupied with them may have led to the almost universal belief among
ancient nations that the souls of the dead came back on the anniversary
of their death to the places where their bodies were deposited. This
belief invested their tombs with peculiar sacredness, and led the
wealthy to great expense in their construction. Egyptians, Greeks, and
Romans built them with upper apartments, more or less spacious. These
chambers were adorned with vases, sculptures, and paintings on the
walls, varying in costliness and style according to the means or taste
of the builder. The tomb of Cestius in Rome contained a chamber much
ornamented with paintings. Ancient Egyptian tombs abound with sculptures
and paintings, probably representative of the character of the deceased.
Thus, on the walls of one a man is pictured throwing seed into the
ground, followed by a troop of laborers; farther on, the same individual
is represented as gathering in the harvest; then he is seen in
procession with wife, children, friends, and followers, carrying sheaves
to the temple, a thank-offering to the gods. This seems to be a painted
epitaph, signifying that the deceased was industrious, prosperous, and
pious. It was common to deposit in these tombs various articles of
use or ornament, such as the departed ones had been familiar with and
attached to, while on earth. Many things in the ancient sculptures
indicate that Egyptian women were very fond of flowers. It is a curious
fact, that little china boxes with Chinese letters on them, like those
in which the Chinese now sell flower-seeds, have been discovered in some
of these tombs. Probably the ladies buried there were partial to exotics
from China; and perhaps friends placed them there with the tender
thought that the spirit of the deceased would be pleased to see them,
when it came on its annual visit. Sometimes these paintings and
sculptures embodied ideas reaching beyond the earthly existence, and
"the aërial body" was represented floating among stars, escorted by
what we should call angels, but which they named "Spirits of the
Sun." Families and friends visited these consecrated chambers on the
anniversary of the death of those whose bodies were placed in the
room below. They carried with them music and flowers, cakes and wine.
Religious ceremonies were performed, with the idea that the "invisible
body" was present with them and took part in the prayers and offerings.
The visitors talked together of past scenes, and doubtless their
conversation abounded with touching allusions to the character and
habits of the unseen friend supposed to be listening. It was, in fact,
an annual family-gathering, scarcely sadder in its memories than is our
Thanksgiving festival to those who have travelled far on the pilgrimage
of life.
St. Paul teaches that "there is a natural body, and there is a spiritual
body." The early Christians had a very vivid faith, that, when the
soul dropped its outer envelope of flesh, it continued to exist in
a spiritual form. When any of their number died, they observed the
anniversary of his departure by placing on the altar an offering to the
church, in his name. On such occasions, they partook of the sacrament,
with the full belief that his unseen form was present with them, and
shared in the sacred rite, as he had done while in the material body. On
the anniversary of the death of martyrs, there were such commemorations
in all the churches; and that their spirits were believed to be present
is evident from the fact that numerous petitions were addressed to them.
In the Roman Catacombs, where many of the early Christians were buried,
are apartments containing sculptures and paintings of apostles and
martyrs. They are few and rude, because the Christians of that period
were poor, and used such worldly goods as they had more for benevolence
than for show. But these memorials, in such a place, indicate the same
feeling that adorned the magnificent tombs of Egypt, Greece, and Rome.
These subterranean apartments were used for religious meetings in the
first centuries of our era, and it is generally supposed that they were
chosen as safe hiding-places from persecution. Very likely it was so;
but it is not improbable that the spot had peculiar attractions to
worshippers, from the feeling that they were in the midst of an unseen
congregation, whose bodies were buried there. If it was so, it would be
but one of many proofs that the early Christians mixed with their new
religion many of the traditions and ceremonies of their forefathers, who
had been educated in other forms of faith. Even in our own time, threads
of these ancient traditions are more or less visible through the whole
warp and woof of our literature and our customs. Many of the tombs in
the Cemetery of Père la Chaise have pretty upper apartments. On the
anniversary of the death of those buried beneath, friends and relatives
carry thither flowers and garlands. Women often spend the entire day
there, and parties of friends assemble to partake of a picnic repast.
Most of the ancient nations annually observed a day in honor of the
Souls of Ancestors. This naturally grew out of the custom of meeting in
tombs to commemorate the death of relatives. As generations passed away,
it was unavoidable that many of the very old sepulchres should be seldom
or never visited. Still it was believed that the "shades" even of remote
ancestors hovered about their descendants and were cognizant of their
doings. It was impossible to observe separately the anniversaries of
departed millions, and therefore a day was set apart for religious
ceremonies in honor of _all_ ancestors. Hindoo and Chinese families have
from time immemorial consecrated such days; and the Romans observed a
similar anniversary under the name of Parentalia.
Christians retained this ancient custom, but it took a new coloring from
their peculiar circumstances. The ties of the church were substituted
for ties of kindred. Its members were considered _spiritual_ fathers
and brothers, and there was an annual festival in honor of _spiritual_
ancestors. The forms greatly resembled those of the Roman Parentalia.
The gathering-place was usually at the tomb of some celebrated martyr,
or in some chapel consecrated to his memory. Crowds of people came
from all quarters to implore the spirits of the martyrs to send them
favorable seasons, good crops, healthy children, etc., just as the old
Romans had been accustomed to invoke the names of their ancestors for
similar blessings. Prayers were repeated, hymns sung, and offerings
presented to the church, as aforetime to the gods. A great banquet was
prepared, and wine was drunk to the souls of the martyrs so freely that
complete intoxication was common. In view of this and other excesses,
the pious among the bishops exerted their influence to abolish the
custom. But it was so intertwined with the traditional faith of the
populace, and so gratifying to their social propensities, that it was
a long time before it could be suppressed. A vestige of the old
anniversaries in honor of the Souls of Ancestors remains in the Catholic
Church under the name of All-Souls' Day.
In France, the Parentalia of the ancient Romans is annually observed
under the name of "Le Jour des Morts." All Paris flock to the
cemeteries, bearing bouquets, crosses, and garlands to decorate the
tombs of departed ancestors, relatives, and friends. The gay population
is, for that day, sobered by tender and solemn memories. Many a tear
glistens on the wreaths, and the passing traveller notices many a one
whose trembling lips and swollen eyelids indicate that the soul is
immersed in recollections of departed loved ones. The "cities of the
dead" bloom with fresh flowers, in multifarious forms of crosses,
crowns, and hearts. From all the churches prayers ascend for those who
have dropped their earthly garment of flesh, and who live henceforth in
the "spiritual body," which becomes more and more beautiful with the
progress of the soul,--it being, as the ancients called it, "the soul's
image."