Page:The astral world, higher occult powers; (IA astralworldhighe00tiff).pdf/158

 well how they appear there. I know very well how it is that persons suppose they do exist, and why Spirits in the Spiritual world appear to have their dogs, cats—their pet animals. To them they are actualities. Nevertheless, I understand that the idea that a cat or dog has an immortal soul is not only inconsistent with any principle of philosophy in the universe, but is contradicted by every principle of philosophy. To say that a cat or dog is immortal is to affirm that to be immortal which God himself can not make so. The condition of immortality can not pertain to the mere animal being. The representations of animals, forests, fields, and things of this kind, have no basis upon that which has a material or actual existence in the universe. They are only developed under the law of representation. Man has a sort of creative faculty, by which he forms the images which are mistaken in the Spiritual world for actualities. When Spirits are thinking of animals they have seen in this world, they throw out their images, and the individual who chances to be in rapport with these Spirits sees these images, and thinks they are actualities.

If you will only investigate the law of representation, you will have no difficulty in accounting for these things in the Spiritual world. Man makes these—they are not real. God makes all that is real in the universe. Man works in the sphere of representation, but God works in the sphere of actuality.

Had I time, to-night, I should be happy to go into a careful investigation to justify the conclusion that dogs and cats, etc., are not immortal. There is no end to be subserved in their being immortal. If the animal