 |
vol. title: Miscellaneous Scraps from January 1st 1878 vol. period: 1875-1878 pages in vol.: 153 |
< Two Great Inventions (continued from page 5-39) >
For of course, if the retina in question were conceived as travelling from the earth so rapidly that in a minute's time it could overtake the ray which left the earth a thousand years ago, then for that one point of space, such a retina would travel in a minute over the history of a thousand years. Well, that was but an imaginative illustration of the subjective character of the meaning of time. But here is a real illustration of it which we may all witness. It may happen even in the lifetime of living men that real conversations will be carried on between the most distant points when beings with earthly bodies can manage to reach; and it may happen, too, also in the lifetime of living men, that the perfect semblance of the voice of one who died during a man's infancy may vibrate in his ear and repeat his own very words, in his young contemporary's old age. The future, indeed, may bear more wonderful things still. It may hear the voices of every century, from and after the nineteenth, though of none before it, reproduced ages hence. The problems which we discuss so hotly as to the mode in which the Greeks and Romans spoke their language may have no existence in relation to the pronunciation of words in any age later than this, for the actual sound of every existing provincial dialect may be reproduced literally, and this for ears to which not only such dialects, but the most classical forms of the most classical languages of our day, will have become quite obsolete. The thirtieth century may hear the orations of a Welsh Eisteddfod and the broad clamor of a Yorkshire horse-fair in the very accents of our own time. Surely nothing could be more impressive as a lesson on the undue importance which we attach to time. We have heard with our ears, and our fathers have told us, may in future apply not merely to the fathers we have seen, but to the forefathers we have never seen. The distinction between dead and living languages, indeed, may thus be in great measure obliterated. The ancient world—ancient, that is, to our posterity—may be, to the ear at least, and to the eye also, as far as photography can make it so, present and living still. Men may live, as it were, in the nineteenth century and in the twenty-ninth at the same time, belonging, indeed, to the twenty-ninth, but being auricular confessions communicated straight from the nineteenth. Will a man so situated have any notion like that which we attach to the irrecoverable 'past?' Will he not live in a sort of focus of all spaces and all times, hardly distinguishing, as we do, ancient from modern, and hardly even the near from the distant? Whatever he may lose by that bewildering position, he will certainly gain a clearer view of the highly subjective character of time and space, and its almost purely personal significance—a significance, that is, requiring entirely separate interpretation, in reference to the particular conditions of particular organizations.—London Spectator.
Mr. M. D. Conway on Oriental Religions
We listened, last Sunday evening, to Mr. Moncure D. Conway, who lectured in the Masonic Temple upon Oriental Religions. Acquainted as we were with this gentleman's views upon the general subject, we were not surprised that the lecture should have for its central thought the universality of the religious idea—the great points of resemblance, and not the minor differences, between the various religious systems of the world. And this thought Mr. Conway presented in a very entertaining and instructive manner. We regretted that he seemed to feel pressed for time, and thus apparently omitted from his lecture certain portions which, if given, would, perhaps, have lent more completeness to the whole. Occasionally there was manifested a tendency toward discursiveness and a disposition to wander from the immediate topic. But the general impression left upon the mind was certainly a very favorable one. Mr. Conway's researches have been extensive, and he is almost embarrassed by the abundance of his treasures and the inability to put all that he desires into the limits of a single lecture, while the striking style in which many of his ideas were presented and his evident earnestness did not fail to make a strong impression upon his hearers.
Starting out with the statement that people who wished to investigate other religions than their own too often came to this study with a preconceived prejudice, regarding the idols of such systems as hideous and senseless rather than the embodiments of an ideal, Mr. Conway touched upon the true method of study. We ought to look upon these religious expressions from the standpoint from which the believers themselves regard them. Every religion is a soul that builds about itself a body, and such expressions are not so very different in essential meaning. All religions inculcate justice, honesty, chastity and charity.
Mr. Conway traced the growth of several religious systems, showing how their founders were never held in honor in their own country, and that the countries in which they were born were quite sure to embrace the religion of some other prophet than their own. Almost all the Oriental religions begin with the worship of the heavens, but the purely abstract is soon abandoned and the countless gods and goddesses soon find entrance.
The lecturer spoke at some length of the faith of Persia, the literature of Sufism, the character of Buddhism and its teachings of a pure morality. He discussed the cause of the failure of the missionaries in the East, and in this connection gave a touching story of a young Hindoo of high caste who had given up all to embrace Christianity and had become disgusted by finding that the Christianity of creed and dogma, in which he was asked to believe, was a very different thing from the Christianity of Christ. Then followed a brief sketch of Mohammedanism and a glowing eulogy of its noble founder. In conclusion, Mr. Conway begged all his hearers to study these religions with the desire to find what was good and true in them; to remember that these beliefs were the expressions of humanity's struggle after perfection, and that in them we also were seeking for light; that in the faith of the Buddhist and Parsee and Zoroastrian we were involved. In this portion of his address the speaker was most earnest and eloquent, and sent his hearers home with the conviction that no one religion contains the whole vision of goodness, that God manifests Himself in many countless ways, and that there are many and wonderful paths by which humanity is led upward.
We have not noticed the abundant anecdotes, illustrations and quotations from Oriental literature which Mr. Conway introduced. To readers of the Sacred Anthology many of these passages—as those from the Persian Dante—were quite familiar, but always beautiful. In reciting the story of the Indian Martyr to Truth—much the same story as that of Job in our Scriptures—Mr. Conway strongly moved the hearts of his hearers. In the stories illustrating the idea of charity which find place in different religions, in the permanence of the notion of a Madonna or feminine element, in the Buddhist legend of the poor man who cast his cloak in the path of the great prophet, and in the account of Mohammed's last hours, we did not fail to see that true religion is not confined to Christianity, but that some of its sweet and gracious meaning has lived in the hearts of every nation under heaven.
Such is a brief and very inadequate report of a most interesting and valuable lecture. We could wish that instead of a single discourse, five or six lectures could be given by Mr. Conway upon this same general subject, that his hearers might be able to follow out more fully the rise and progress of religious systems among different peoples. But we venture to say that no fair-minded and liberal person who heard Mr. Conway last Sunday evening could go away without admitting to himself that in this lecture was indicated the true attitude of Christianity toward these Oriental beliefs—an attitude which should be less that of defiance than of respect and sympathy, with the acknowledgment that, however superior our Christian faith may be, these peoples and races have also had their vision; that there is a beautiful similarity underlying all which it is our duty to recognize, rather than that we should be always searching for differences and dissimilarities; that there is a gracious evolution and unfolding in religions as in nature, and that he is wise who reverently seeks to study such manifestations. In giving this thought prominence, and in showing how much of goodness and beauty there is in these systems of faith which we are far too ready to misinterpret, Mr. Conway is doing a great and valuable service. It is earnestly to be hoped that thoughtful and liberal people everywhere will attend his lectures.
The Present Opinions of the Late Mr. Guppy
Sir,—Being in a position to communicate with my old friend Samuel Guppy, I send you some of his remarks from the other side. They are, for the most part, answers to questions of a nature likely to be interesting to all, and of especial interest to the numerous friends he has left behind him, who cannot but be glad to learn from so acute an observer his impressions of the spirit world. Madame de Veh is the medium, and the communications are made by means of a common saucer, with a black line marked on it. This saucer, being inverted, is moved quickly, when her hand is placed upon it, over a large piece of
Editor's notes
Sources
-
London Spiritualist, No. 191, April 21, 1876, p. 13