THE “ANGEL STORY.”
Another instance of intervention on the physical plane which occurred
a short time ago makes a very beautiful little story, though this time
only one life was saved. It needs, however, a few words of preliminary
explanation. Among our band of helpers here in Europe are two who were
brothers long ago in ancient Egypt, and are still warmly attached to
one another. In this present incarnation there is a wide difference in
age between them, one being advanced in middle life, while the other
was at that time a mere child in the physical body, though an ego of
considerable advancement and promise. Naturally it falls to the lot
of the elder to train and guide the younger in the occult work to
which they are so heartily devoted, and as both are fully conscious
and active on the astral plane they spend most of the time during
which their grosser bodies are asleep in labouring together under the
direction of their common Master, and giving to both living and dead
such help as is within their power.
I will quote the story of the particular incident which I wish
to relate from a letter written by the elder of the two helpers
immediately after its occurrence, as the description there given is
more vivid and picturesque than any account in the third person could
possibly be.
“We were going about quite other business, when Cyril suddenly cried,
‘What’s that?’ for we heard a terrible scream of pain or fright. In a
moment we were on the spot, and found that a boy of about eleven or
twelve had fallen over a cliff on to some rocks below, and was very
badly hurt. He had broken a leg and an arm, poor fellow, but what was
still worse was a dreadful cut in the thigh, from which blood was
pouring in a torrent. Cyril cried, ‘Let us help him quick, or he’ll
die!’
“In emergencies of this kind one has to think quickly. There were
clearly two things to be done; that bleeding must be stopped, and
physical help must be procured. I was obliged to materialize either
Cyril or myself, for we wanted physical hands at once to tie a bandage,
and besides it seemed better that the poor boy should _see_
some one standing by him in his trouble. I felt that while undoubtedly
he would be more at home with Cyril than with me, I should probably be
more readily able to procure help than Cyril would, so the division of
labour was obvious.
“The plan worked capitally. I materialized Cyril instantly (he does
not know yet how to do it for himself), and told him to take the boy’s
neckerchief and tie it round the thigh, and twist a stick through it
‘Won’t it hurt him terribly?’ said Cyril; but he _did_ it, and
the blood stopped flowing. The injured boy seemed half unconscious,
and could scarcely speak, but he looked up at the shining little form
bending so anxiously over him, and asked, ‘Be you an angel, master?’
Cyril smiled so prettily, and replied, ‘No, I’m only a boy, but I’ve
come to help you;’ and then I left him to comfort the sufferer while I
rushed off for the boy’s mother, who lived about a mile away.
“The trouble I had to force into that woman’s head the conviction that
something was wrong, and that she must go and see about it, you would
never believe; but at last she threw down the pan she was cleaning, and
said aloud, ‘Well, I don’t know what’s come over me, but I must go and
find the boy.’ When she once started I was able to guide her without
much difficulty, though all the time I was holding Cyril together by
will-power, lest the poor child’s angel should suddenly vanish from
before his eyes.
“You see, when you materialize a form you are changing matter from its
natural state into another--temporarily opposing the cosmic will, as
it were; and if you take your mind off it for one half-second, back it
flies into its original condition like a flash of lightning. So I could
not give more than half my attention to that woman, but still I got her
along somehow, and as soon as she came round the corner of the cliff I
let Cyril disappear; but she had seen him, and now that village has one
of the best-attested stories of angelic intervention on record!
“The accident happened in the early morning, and the same evening I
looked in (astrally) upon the family to see how matters were going on.
The poor boy’s leg and arm had been set, and the great cut bandaged,
and he lay in bed looking very pale and weak, but evidently going to
recover in time. The mother had a couple of neighbours in, and was
telling them the story; and a curious tale it sounded to one who knew
the real facts.
“She explained, in very many words, how she couldn’t tell what it was,
but something came over her all in a minute like, making her feel
something had happened to the boy, and she _must_ go out and see
after him; how at first she thought it was nonsense, and tried to throw
off the feeling, ‘but it warn’t no use--she just had to go.’ She told
how she didn’t know what made her go round by that cliff more than any
other way, but it just happened so, and as she turned round the corner
there she saw him lying propped up against a rock, and kneeling beside
him was the ‘beautifullest child ever she saw, dressed all in white and
shining, with rosy cheeks and lovely brown eyes;’ and how he smiled at
her ‘so heavenly like,’ and then all in a moment he was not there, and
at first she was so startled she didn’t know what to think; and then
all at once she felt what it was, and fell on her knees and thanked God
for sending one of his angels to help her poor boy.
“Then she told how when she lifted him to carry him home she wanted to
take off the handkerchief that was cutting into his poor leg so, but he
would not let her, because he said the angel had tied it and said he
was not to touch it; and how when she told the doctor this afterwards
he explained to her that if she _had_ unfastened it the boy would
certainly have died.
“Then she repeated the boy’s part of the tale--how the moment after he
fell this lovely little angel came to him (he knew it _was_ an
angel because he knew there had been nobody in sight for half a mile
round when he was at the top of the cliff just before--only he could
not understand why it hadn’t any wings, and why it said it was only a
boy)--how it lifted him against the rock and tied up his leg, and then
began to talk to him and tell him he need not be frightened, because
somebody was gone to fetch mother, and she would be there directly;
how it kissed him and tried to make him comfortable, and how its soft,
warm, little hand held his all the time, while it told him strange,
beautiful stories which he could not clearly remember, but he knew they
were very good, because he had almost forgotten he was hurt until he
saw mother coming; and how then it assured him he would soon be well
again, and smiled and squeezed his hand, and then somehow it was gone.
“Since then there has been quite a religious revival in that village!
Their minister has told them that so signal an interposition of
divine providence must have been meant as a sign to them, to rebuke
scoffers and to prove the truth of holy scripture and of the Christian
religion--and nobody seems to see the colossal conceit involved in such
an astonishing proposition.
“But the effect on the boy has been undoubtedly good, morally as well
as physically; by all accounts he was a careless enough young scamp
before, but now he feels ‘his angel’ may be near him at any time, and
he will never do or say anything rough or coarse or angry, lest it
should see or hear. The one great desire of his life is that some day
he may see it again, and he knows that when he dies its lovely face
will be the first to greet him on the other side.”
A beautiful and pathetic little story, truly. The moral drawn from the
occurrence by the village and its minister is perhaps somewhat of a
_non sequitur_; yet the testimony to the existence of at least
something beyond this material plane must surely do the people more
good than harm, and after all the mother’s conclusion from what she
saw was a perfectly correct one, though more accurate knowledge would
probably have led her to express it a little differently.
An interesting fact afterwards discovered by the investigations of
the writer of the letter throws a curious side-light upon the reasons
underlying such incidents. It was found that the two boys had met
before, and that some thousands of years ago the one who fell from
the cliff had been the slave of the other, and had once saved his
young master’s life at the risk of his own, and had been liberated
in consequence; and now, long afterwards, the master not only repays
the debt in kind, but also gives his former slave a high ideal and an
inducement to morality of life which will probably change the whole
course of his future evolution. So true is it that no good deed ever
goes unrewarded by karma, however tardy it may seem in its action--that
Though the mills of God grind slowly,
Yet they grind exceeding small;
Though with patience stands He waiting,
With exactness grinds He all.