of evolution does not
harmonize exactly with my own, but I cannot deny that the whole system
is worked out with perfect consistency, and wherever I asked the
writer difficult questions as to some special problems, she was at
once ready to give the answers with completely logical deduction from
her premises. She is by no means mentally diseased, and she does not
mix her theories with her practical activity. If she sits as nurse at
the bedside of a patient, she recognizes of course from the finger
nails that this particular soul may be three or five thousand years
old, and accordingly in a decaying state, but that does not interfere
with her conscientious work as a nurse and helper.

To be sure, not every one spends twenty-five years on the elaboration
of some twisted fancies. Most of my correspondents write the
monumental thoughts of their systems with decisive brevity. A
physician informs me that every thought and act of our lives is
transfixed on the etheric vapours that surround our earth, and that it
is therefore only natural that a clairvoyant is able to see those
fixed events and write them down afterward from the ethereal
inscriptions. Another tells about his discovery that the human body is
a great electrical magnet. I am the more glad to make this fact widely
known, as the author writes that he has not given it to the public
yet, as he is not financially able to advertise it. Yet he himself
adds that after all it is not necessary to advertise truth. On eight
quarto pages he draws the most evident consequences of his discovery
and shows how he is able to explain by it the chemical change of each
cell in the brain and to prove that "foolish so-called spirits are
simply electrical demonstrations." "I can demonstrate every current,
nerve cell, and atom of the human body. It may seem strange to you
that I claim so much, but with the induction every investigation has
been so easy for me. I have never been puzzled for any demonstration
yet, but I am still searching for more knowledge. Yours for
investigation...." I may say that this is a feature common to most of
my correspondents of this metaphysical type. They are never "puzzled."

Nearly related to this type of theories are the systems of astrology;
and in our upper world very few are really aware what a role astrology
is still playing in the intellectual underworld. Some of the
astrological communications I receive periodically go so far beyond my
understanding t