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Hence the only question with regard to Spiritualism, is simply whether it is an apparent and practical truth; for we may know with absolute certainty, if we have enough of the faculty of reason to be able to know anything, that no doctrine of a positive nature can be really true. Utility is a very important element in determining what really seems true. We are not to suppose that men are endowed with any new sense faculties in these latter days, but may suppose that old delusions are ever taking new forms. There is an old form of the doctrine of Spiritualism that is essential to morality, as the assumption of its truth underlies all our notions of right and wrong. Materialism can furnish no valid basis for such notions. It finds their basis in a Spiritualism latent in our own nature. Yet to suppose the doctrine an absolute truth, because it underlies our moral notions, is just as destructive of genuine morality as materialism can be. Materialism, though but a negation, can furnish us with a semblance of morality, and any positive truth that is held as absolute, can do no more. If we would have a genuine morality, we must take both kinds of truth at their own worth and value, neither mistaking the apparent and practical truth for real and absolute, nor the negative and real truth for the practical.

Hence the only question with regard to Spiritualism, is simply whether it is an apparent and practical truth; for we may know with absolute certainty, if we have enough of the faculty of reason to be able to know anything, that no doctrine of a positive nature can be really true. Utility is a very important element in determining what really seems true. We are not to suppose that men are endowed with any new sense faculties in these latter days, but may suppose that old delusions are ever taking new forms. There is an old form of the doctrine of Spiritualism that is essential to morality, as the assumption of its truth underlies all our notions of right and wrong. Materialism can furnish no valid basis for such notions. It finds their basis in a Spiritualism latent in our own nature. Yet to suppose the doctrine an absolute truth, because it underlies our moral notions, is just as destructive of genuine morality as materialism can be. Materialism, though but a negation, can furnish us with a semblance of morality, and any positive truth that is held as absolute, can do no more. If we would have a genuine morality, we must take both kinds of truth at their own worth and value, neither mistaking the apparent and practical truth for real and absolute, nor the negative and real truth for the practical.

To make the modern form of Spiritualism of any practical value, so that we may concede so much of it as to say that it appears to be true, you must give us something more than marvels that appeal only to our wonder, aid communications from the departed that add nothing to out stock of useful knowledge. All this, if we take the sensible view of it, but makes it appear a senseless and debating superstition. The attempt ta make things appear beautiful and true that are not merely useless, but positively harmful, is a mark of a low order of wisdom. To the young lady who spoke about “disordered stomach,” I would say:—

To make the modern form of Spiritualism of any practical value, so that we may concede so much of it as to say that it appears to be true, you must give us something more than marvels that appeal only to our wonder, aid communications from the departed that add nothing to out stock of useful knowledge. All this, if we take the sensible view of it, but makes it appear a senseless and debating superstition. The attempt to make things appear beautiful and true that are not merely useless, but positively harmful, is a mark of a low order of wisdom. To the young lady who spoke about “disordered stomach,” I would say:— {{Style S-HPB SB. Continues on|1-31}}

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