VI
SPIRIT LOCOMOTION
WE HAD been walking along in leisurely fashion when Roger turned to me: ‘Is walking the only means of getting about?’ he asked. ‘I can’t see any roads anywhere, and the countryside seems to stretch for miles.’
‘It does stretch for miles,’ I replied; ‘thousands of them. What you mean, Roger, is: where’s the transport system and what is it? The answer is that we each of us carry our own transport system about with us, the most efficient and the most rapid in the universe. That is in addition to walking. So far we have relied upon our two legs since we brought you here, but the time has obviously come when we must show you something of what we can really do here.
‘Personal locomotion is done by the thought process, and it’s perfectly easy to do when once you’re shown how; then it becomes second nature. It may sound like a contradiction in terms, but the thought process of locomotion hardly requires thinking about when once you’re accustomed to it.
‘Can you remember when you first learned to walk on earth, Roger?’
‘No, I can’t say I do.’
‘I don’t suppose there are many who can. But there did come a time when you could keep upright successfully and without tumbling down. Since then you have walked many miles on earth, and some distance here as well. Do you ever think about it?
‘Suppose you are sitting in a chair and you wish to rise and cross the room, you simply rise and walk without thinking of all the muscles that have to be controlled to get your limbs on the move. You do all that without thinking, though there must be some thought somewhere, obviously, or else you would remain rooted where you were. What particular line does the thought take: that you must walk, or that you wish to rise, or that you want to cross the room, or all three? It doesn’t matter. Basically, the desire is to get across the room —the other side of the room is your destination. And that’s all you need to consider here in using the thought process to move yourself about.
‘At first, you must make a really conscious effort; you must think about it. A little practice, and you’ll find that no sooner do you think, than you are wherever you wish to be. Sounds rather fantastic, don’t you think?’
‘It does a bit.’
‘It’s the sort of thing skeptical folk on earth like to poke fun at, and generally ridicule. Such a splendid joke, and causes roars of laughter. The same folk should take out their Bibles and study them a little more, and then bring their wits to bear upon what they read there.
‘A great many of our ways here form a constant source for derision among the incarnate, Roger. Taking the earth as the standard for everything, including life itself, they cannot imagine anything better or different. Of course, they’ll regard “heaven” as a place or condition of perfection, but of perfection of what, they know not, and cannot imagine. I would say seriously to such people not to pour scorn upon our spirit lands and the way we do things unless they are prepared to provide better. If there is any single feature or factor or law to which they take exception, let them at once suggest a better or finer or more sensible, and all of us here in the spirit world will gladly listen, and see that their suggestions reach the right quarter.
‘We need not, of course, worry ourselves unduly about these folk. If there is anything of which they disapprove when they come here, they are at liberty to depart, to remove themselves, leaving us in the enjoyment of our own mode of life, while they betake themselves elsewhere and create their own bleak void—and live in it.’
My two companions had such a merry twinkle in their eyes, that I subsided into laughter.
‘You know, Roger,’ said Ruth, ‘Monsignor feels very strongly on some subjects. He caught the public eye and ear when he was a priest, and since coming here he has done the same thing again in a very different way. He knows how hard it is to get people to shake off old and wrong beliefs for the truth, and it really vexes him. That is perhaps one of the penalties, if one can call it so, for being in such close touch with the earth. I’m not, though I visit it occasionally with Monsignor purely to watch proceedings and give a greeting to our friends there.
‘Thoughts are very real, Roger,’ she continued, ‘and can reach us here from earth as easily and as surely as they can reach us here between ourselves. And ours can go to the earth people too, though they don’t always notice them.’
‘Perhaps that’s what accounts for the feeling I’ve had. I don’t know how to describe it, but there seems to be a sort of pulling, if you follow; a kind of urge to go—well—I don’t know where. Oh, this is all terribly vague. I’ve felt peculiar; not ill, but restless, I suppose.’
‘Poor Roger,’ said Ruth; ‘I think we can diagnose your “complaint” without difficulty. The trouble is caused by friends or relations, or both perhaps, sending out a few thoughts of grief. It’s natural they should be sorry you’ve left them, though their sorrow is not deep, or else you would have felt it very keenly yourself, and that would have been troublesome. I doubt if this feeling will get stronger, but if it should, tell us, Roger, and we’ll help to dispel it. You have no personal regrets yourself on any account?’
‘None whatever, Ruth, thank you.’
‘Good; that’s a great help.’
‘We seem to have wandered a trifle from Roger’s question. Do you recall, Ruth, soon after we had arrived here, how we discussed the quaint notion of “angelic beings” having wings? Strange idea, isn’t it, Roger. The only thing one can imagine is that long ago, people, especially artists, must have wondered how “angelic beings” managed to get about. Legs would seem preposterous, out of the question, by being far too mundane. I mean for perambulating purposes. But if one eliminates the use of legs, what remains? Nothing, so far as I can see, and I suppose that is how it struck the artists.
‘Angels must be able to move; they can’t be rooted to one spot for all eternity. That, one supposes, led some genius to invent huge wings for all inhabitants of the spirit world. I believe Satan himself was endowed with a pair, as, of course, it was essential for him to be extremely mobile so that he could get about comfortably and quickly “seeking the ruin of souls”, as one pretty prayer expresses it.
‘Can you think of anything more clumsy and ponderous than having an enormous pair of wings fastened upon you somewhere in the region of the shoulder-blades? I can’t.
‘I should imagine,’ said Roger, ‘that a large flock of angels would stir up an awful breeze when in flight.’
‘Roger, I’m afraid you’re being highly irreverent in referring to a large number of angels as a flock.’
‘Well, what would they be, then?’
‘I really don’t know; it’s not easy to find a word for what doesn’t exist, except poetically, perhaps. But you are severely practical when you say that a great concourse—that is more elegant than flock, Roger—would disturb the atmospheric conditions, and that’s something the artist fellows never thought of. It is astonishing how the idea originally caught on and has persisted even to the present day. The conventional way of portraying a being from this world—and they still don’t look upon us as human; only half-human—is with two large wings. Even symbolically it’s a pretty poor idea. As a means of personal locomotion, wings would be useless, an impossibility, and we should be anatomical monstrosities. We’re obviously not built for such apparatus, the wonders and marvels of the spirit world notwithstanding.
‘Angels with their fantastic wings being another of the many extraordinary misconceptions of the true way of things in spirit lands, it really is no wonder that in the end, with all these falsifications, the people of earth regard us as sub-human. The higher we go in spiritual advancement the less human we become, it would seem, and the more grim. Did either of you ever see a picture of an angel, or a piece of sculpture of one, especially in a cemetery, where the artist had put a smile upon the face of his subject? Smiling is not “heavenly” enough. Isn’t it too awful for words? Aren’t you very glad, Roger, that things are as they are, and not as they might be if some folk were given a free hand?’
‘I should jolly well think so,’ the boy agreed.
‘A loud Amen to that,’ exclaimed Ruth.
‘Otherwise,’ I added, ‘we should have to get all the doors heightened to allow sufficient clearance for our wings. Truth is better than fiction, in this case, Roger, and the truth of moving ourselves about these lands by the process of applied thought is the simplest and best. Now suppose you try.’
‘What do I have to do?’
‘Only a little thinking. You needn’t be alarmed. Everyone has to try at some time. Ruth and I were delighted with the results when we first managed, and you will be the same.’
We were sitting on the grass at the time, and I suggested that Roger desire himself to be at a tree we could see, some quarter-mile distant.
‘You need not make a gigantic effort of will, old man,’ I said; ‘merely think firmly that you would like to be under that tree yonder—or anywhere else you fancy. I suggest the tree because it’s not too far off, and you can see us easily from there. As “a good outset is half the voyage”, Ruth and I will send a thought with you. Now, then; off you go.’
Of course, he vanished from our presence, as we knew he would, and we saw him beneath the distant tree, where he waved to us. We waved back, and then joined him.
‘Well, did you enjoy the journey, Roger?’ asked Ruth.
The boy laughed. ‘There was nothing much to enjoy; one second I was there, the next here. But it is wonderful though; there’s no getting away from that. What a marvelous feeling of independence it gives you. Wouldn’t I love to have been able to do this back on earth. My goodness, it would have frightened the life out of mother, though.’
‘Yes, it has its possibilities on earth, and its impossibilities. There it would revolutionize life. Here it is part of life, and has been, ever since there’s been a spirit world.’
‘Here is something that occurs to me,’ said Roger. ‘Would it be possible for me to lose myself. I mean, suppose I got out of touch with either you or Ruth; what then?’
‘You mean,’ I replied, ‘suppose Ruth or I were to take you to some spot far away from this particular locality, and then disappear and leave you to your own devices?’
‘Yes, that’s it.’
‘Then your own devices would get you out of your difficulty very nicely, Roger. Don’t be disturbed, though. We shouldn’t dream of abandoning you on a door-step, so to speak, and leaving you for someone else to find!
‘This is precisely what would happen. Suppose for a moment you could not conjure up in your mind any sort of recollection of our house, there is yet the connecting link between ourselves—the three of us. And if the worst really came to such extremes, you would have but to concentrate your mind upon either Ruth or myself, and you would see and feel an instantaneous response. So that, wherever we happened to be, you could come to us. I say you could come to us, but it by no means follows that you would, because we might prevent you—or send someone to do so. You see, my boy, Ruth and I penetrate into some very unpleasant quarters of the spirit world, places that we have not mentioned to you yet, and it would not do for you to approach them.
‘Wherever Ruth and I might be, you would always be in touch with us in mind. Of course, you have not forgotten our house, its arrangements, and surroundings, so really the matter doesn’t arise. Merely for the sake of argument, if you did forget, there’s Radiant Wing’s home and his delightful family. You could hardly fail to recollect all that we saw there, and so you would have that refuge in case of failure of memory, and he would look after you.
‘But there’s one thing to be considered, though perhaps we have not mentioned it specifically, and that is the impossibility of memory failure. That resolves your difficulty finally and completely. You’ve not forgotten our home and all its appurtenances, have you?’
‘No, indeed not; it’s all very clear in my mind.’
‘Exactly; and so it will remain. You cannot forget, because the memory is itself unfailing in operation. I know one can imagine all kinds of difficulties or perplexities of the same sort, but they have no substance, and cannot be otherwise. To lose one’s self, for instance: impossible. To forget something or other: equally impossible.
‘You spoke about a transport system, Roger, no doubt having in mind the usual earthly services and arrangements: trains, ‘buses, cars and so on. As you see, we don’t need any of those for carrying us about these lands.’
‘Yes, but suppose you want to move house. How do you shift the stuff?’
‘Why, we shouldn’t find much difficulty, no difficulty, in fact, in moving it. We may not be giants here, Roger, but we do have powers—and we use them when called upon to do so. We could, between us, move all the furniture in our house with the greatest ease, and feel none the worse for it afterwards. We shouldn’t have blisters on our hands, nor strained backs! We could transport the whole contents of our home a dozen times over, while the earth folk were thinking about it—and without fuss and breakages!
‘We do move house when we feel we should like to live in another part of these realms. We are not necessarily tied to one spot, or unable to move without many formalities. The fact is, once we have chosen a spot in which to have our dwelling we mostly stay there, at least until such time as we leave the realm altogether. But we don’t become stale, as it were, or tired of our surroundings, for the reason that there are always changes of some sort going on, large or small, to alter or enhance the precincts of our dwellings. For instance, our house, as you see it at this moment, is not exactly as it was when I first arrived. With our various activities we thought we should like to enlarge it for convenience sake, and so we had an annexe built, the fairly large apartment we showed you, with the tapestries on the walls, the long table with the chairs round it, something in the style of the “great hall” in the ancient mansions on earth—and in the spirit world, too. That was one alteration.
‘The gardens themselves have undergone all manner of rearranging. That in itself is a delightful occupation carried out by real artists in horticulture and garden design. So you see, the movement of our goods and chattels presents no problem. We don’t require great lorries and vans. The mere effort of one person can move the largest piece of furniture, because all things, everything, in this world is endowed with life. There’s no such thing as inert matter, as I told you. Between us we could remove the entire contents of our house—or any other house—without the least trouble.
‘Now, Roger, would you care to go and see the city at first hand? You’ve only seen it from the house so far. Come along. Walk—or otherwise? Otherwise, then, by all means.’