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DUKE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2018 with funding from 
 Duke University Libraries 
 
 https://archive.org/details/diakkatheirearth01davi 
 
THE DIAKKA, 
 
 i| 
 
 THEIR EARTHLY VICTIMS; 
 
 BEING AN EXPLANATION OP MUCH THAT IS 
 
 FALSE AND REPULSIVE IN SPIRITUALISM. 
 
 BT 
 
 ANDREW JACKSON DAVIS. 
 
 “Be advised: 
 
 Heat not a furnace for your foe bo hot 
 That it do singe yourself. We may outrun 
 By violent swiftness, that which we run at 
 And lose by over-running.” 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 BANNER OF LIGHT PUBLISHING COMPANY, 
 
 NO. 9 BOSWORTH STREET. 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the yet r 1873, by 
 ANDREW JACKSON DAVIS, 
 
 In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. 
 
 TROWS 
 
 PRINTING AND BOOKBINDING COMPANY, 
 NEW YORK. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Description of the Diakka Country in the Summerland. 
 
 Appearance of James Victor Wilson, and Conversations with him. 
 Story of a Diakka’s Visit to Boston and Vicinity. 
 
 His Delight in Mischief and Intrigue at the Expense of others. 
 How he influenced the Tongue and Imagination of a Lady Medium. 
 An Old Man’s Testimony concerning the Actions of Diakka. 
 
 Effects of the Diakka upon the Passive, Credulous, and Susceptible. 
 How they perform Materializations at Dark Circles. 
 
 Important Reflections regarding the Use of these Manifestations. 
 
 A Discourse upon the present State and Mission of Spiritu alism. 
 
LAW OF SPIRITUAL INTERCOURSE. 
 
 “There are certain dark epochs, or cycles, during 
 which the approach of spiritual beings is all but im¬ 
 possible. During these periods mankind retard—dark 
 ages set in ; these dark ages are recorded in the past of 
 the development of the human race; they mark the 
 absence of spiritual intercourse. But there are, and 
 that periodically, seasons of approach—they are like to 
 your summer months, as the darker cycles resemble 
 your winter solstice. This alternate act, the systole, 
 and diastole of the creative act, is an all-governing law, 
 and rules in all the phenomena of life; for the great 
 ruling principles repeat themselves in Nature’s working. 
 Spiritual intercourse alternates like seasons, and the 
 approach of spiritual beings is easy or difficult, just as- 
 the season is favorable or not. Mankind are now fast 
 nearing a period of spiritual approach. This approach, 
 like the base of rivers—a tide swelling above another 
 tide—will outstride the great river-current of the pres¬ 
 ent. The great ocean wave behind presses onward and 
 onward, overcoming all, rising, conquering over the 
 current of the present. Spiritual truth must conquer; 
 the natures above attract you; try to unfetter the bonds 
 of the material .”—Extract from a recent message. 
 
DESCRIPTION OF THE CELESTIAL COUNTRY OF THE 
 DIAKKA IN THE SUMMERLAND- 
 
 During the past twenty years, but divided by differ¬ 
 ent periods of time, the telescopic power of self-regu¬ 
 lated vision called “ independent clairvoyance,” has 
 been frequently directed upon that wonderful and 
 invariably mysterious portion of the Summerlaiul 
 named by a certain astronomer there “Draco Major” 
 meaning in our language “ The Great Dragon.” Seen 
 from Starnos, or contemplated from the right shoulder 
 of the beautiful mountain east of the Seven Lakes of 
 Cylosimar,* it appears like an immeasurable wilderness 
 covering the whole sphere to the south-west, and throw¬ 
 ing a shadow far up into the dome of the rosy blue 
 heavens resembling a beautifully decorated trapezium, 
 with a countless chain of bars and swings, trembling in 
 the atmosphere, supported and upheld by nothing , but 
 so amazingly attractive and seductive, like the enchant¬ 
 ing arch of a rainbow to a child’s mind, that great self- 
 government is necessary to save one from hastening 
 
 * For some knowledge concerning Starnos and the Lakes of 
 Cylosimar, see the author’s volume, the Penetralia , new edition, 
 12mo., pp 161 -274. 
 
6 
 
 TITE niAKKA 
 
 with precipitation to enter a country which has for 
 millions of ages excited the admiration, the curiosity, 
 the cupidity, and the jealousy of the imperfect inhab¬ 
 itants of all worlds. 
 
 The observer (and here the author refers to his own 
 clairvoyant observations and feelings) is first amazed 
 with the apparent boundless magnitude of this celestial 
 wilderness, stretching in a semi-circle from the far 
 north-west to the equally far south-west, and this, too, 
 in a heavenly land ineffably glorious and perfect,—that 
 is, when compared with anything seen or dreamed of 
 among the most imaginative minds on earth. 
 
 This wonderful country of the Diakka excites your 
 unenlightened fancy, first, by its mighty wealth of 
 magnitude, and, second, by the wonderful character of 
 its aerial crown, over the shadow of the enchained 
 trapezium, mottled with delicate brilliant points, so 
 dazzlingly bright and exquisitely prismatic as to make 
 the immediate surroundings black, giving the beholder 
 an impression that the hills and dales and forests be 
 neath must be insufferably splendid with diamonds and 
 golden riches too perfect for earthly eyes to gaze upon. 
 Intense, central globular lights, softened rapidly into 
 frames of perfect globes of blackness, but with very 
 jagged and broken outline, appearing and disappearing 
 under the eye, sometimes in bars and lines of incalcula¬ 
 ble length, at other times at irregular intervals and with 
 the free variety of order, almost complete chaos, peculiar 
 to the appearance of stars and the constellations visible 
 at night from earth in different parts of the sky. 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 7 
 
 All the external appearances of the Wilderness of the 
 Diakka impress the observer with its mysterious and in¬ 
 tensely occult character. 
 
 For years I permitted no appropriate chance of in¬ 
 vestigation to escape me; and from time to time my 
 perseverance and industry (elairvoyantly speaking) has 
 been suitably rewarded. Not satisfied with observa¬ 
 tion from the more agreeable places in the Summer- 
 land, and as a rule carefully closing my mind to the 
 hints and suggestions of associates, I have penetrated 
 into the recesses of that mysterious realm, and have ex¬ 
 plored many of its sad human experiences. 
 
 In this pamphlet I am admonished to condense whole 
 volumes into pages, and to crowd histories of persons 
 into paragraphs. 
 
 The country of the Diakka, then, in a sentence, is (to 
 give you my own definition) a Garden of Eden, to call 
 it by no harsher name, where the morally deficient and 
 the affectionally unclean enter upon a strange proba¬ 
 tionary life. 
 
 .Reverting for a moment to its magnitude (supposing 
 it were a complete belt of country, instead of only a 
 third in the form of a semi circle) b would require* 
 not less than one million eight hundred and three thou¬ 
 sand and twenty-six diameters of the earth to measure 
 the longitudinal extent of the celestial wilderness. 
 
 The name it bears signifies rather the interior character 
 of its inhabitants than the shape or external appearance 
 
 * Here I give the figures of my friend James Victor Wilson, a pro- 
 found and accurate mathematician. 
 
8 
 
 TIIE DIAKKA 
 
 of the country. (I apply the term “ country ” in con* 
 fortuity with the ordinary use of language.) 
 
 Having investigated for myself I am no longer sur¬ 
 prised at the name, “ Draco Major” which a celebrated 
 astronomer gave to my friend Wilson, when he had re 
 turned from his extended travels among the Diakka. 
 This startling epithet tells the whole story at once— 
 
 “ Sparing no idol, great nor small; 
 
 Passing one sentence on them all.” 
 
 Here, for a brief moment, it is deemed important to 
 digress, and introduce the circumstances of the long- 
 expected visit from my celestial friend, whose name I 
 have already written. Soon after entering upon this 
 new enterprise * in behalf of Human Progress in 
 Spiritual Ideas, about six o’clock in the evening of the 
 sixth of March, 1873, while walking alone up and down 
 the floor, thinking about how to arrange the shelving 
 and furniture for the new Bookstore, the ringing of the 
 outside bell induced me to unfasten the front door. 
 There stood an occupant of an upper story, who, having 
 forgotten his pass key, was unable to enter ; he thanked 
 me for opening the door, and immediately went up¬ 
 stairs to his apartment. But something induced me to ex¬ 
 amine the bell-knobs arranged in the door-frame for the 
 tenants of the several floors. While thus engaged, my 
 back to the street and aside from the vestibule, I felt a 
 warm wind (quite unlike the cold air of March) pene- 
 
 * Meaning the opening of a “ Progressive Publishing House,” at 
 No. 24 East Fourth Street, in the city of New York. 
 
AND THEIK VICTIMS. 
 
 9 
 
 trate my garments, fanning the surface of my body, 
 which naturally induced me to look around suddenly. 
 But I saw nothing that could have caused the surprising 
 and agreeable sensation. Then I re-entered the store. On 
 turning to close the door, which I had unwittingly left 
 open behind me, O, glad was my soul 1 for there 
 smilingly before me stood my faithful young friend, 
 formerly an occasional associate during his residence 
 upon earth—James Victor Wilson. 
 
 What happened during this visitation need not be ra 
 corded in this place. 
 
 Just one month after, op the sixth of April, Sunday 
 evening about nine o’clock, opposite 1120 Broadway, as 
 I was returning from a protracted walk, a telegram 
 from Victor said—“ Meet me on the evening of the 
 1 Sth in your own place? * 
 
 All the working hours of these days were devoted to 
 the organization of business in our new Publishing 
 House; so much so, in fact, that, amid the multiplicity 
 of “things” and consequent “cares,” my memory 
 seemed to have lost the date fixed in the telegram for 
 the next visitation. Then, again, such a visit seemed 
 impracticable, because our business apartments and liv¬ 
 ing rooms were limited, leaving to me no actual place 
 of isolation wherein I might receive and hold a 
 lengthened conversation with such a guest. But the 
 difficulty was practically solved, and very naturally, 
 too, without any thought on my part, in this way : My 
 
 * A teleg~am from a person in the Summerland is a pulsation (in 
 my case) on the left temple imparting words inwardly to the mind. 
 
 1 * 
 
10 
 
 THE DIAKKA. 
 
 beloved companion, to whom I had said nothing con 
 cerning Victor’s intended third visit, one morning said 
 she “ felt like going out to Orange” (our place of resi¬ 
 dence for thirteen years), and added that, if she did not 
 return by the six o’clock p.m. train, I need not look for 
 her until the following day. She did not return, and 
 thus I was alone. About eleven o’clock that same night, a 
 loud rapping was heard on the door at the rear end of 
 the hall. On my opening it Victor entered; and to¬ 
 gether we proceeded into the room. He stood by my 
 side as I sat by the table, with pencil and paper pre¬ 
 pared, and thus we enjoyed a protracted conversation.* 
 The following is but an outline report, not including 
 anything which passed during his first visit, save one or 
 two important references to things yet to come. 
 
 “ The Diakka! ” said he ; “ what would you know of 
 them ? ” 
 
 I looked up at his bright dimpled face, and replied 
 —“ If possible, I would have you remove the veil of 
 mystery from that people.” 
 
 “ There is no mystery to divulge. A Diakka means 
 a person with an occult temperament; often polished 
 and dignified; with propensities bubbling from a 
 fountain-head of overcharged self-consciousness.” 
 
 “Perhaps, Victor,” I said, “your language does not 
 inform me correctly. Do I understand you ? ” 
 
 “ A Diakka is one,” he continued, “ who takes insane 
 delight in playing parts, in juggling tricks, in person- 
 
 * This conversation was mostly mental; but frequently each spok« 
 audibly, like one “ talking to himself.” 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 11 
 
 ating opposite characters; to whom prayers and pro 
 fane utterances are of equi-value; surcharged with a 
 passion for lyrical narrations; one whose every attitude 
 is instinct with the schemes of specious reasoning, 
 sophistry, pride, pleasure, wit, subtle convivialities; a 
 boundless disbeliever, one who thinks that all private 
 life will end in the all-consuming self-love of God.” 
 
 “ Why, Victor! ” I exclaimed, “ do I understand you 
 V> say that a Diakka—now an inhabitant of the spirit- 
 world (as men term it)—is one who believes in ultimate 
 annihilation ? ” 
 
 “ Intellectually,” he replied, “ an inhabitant of the 
 belt called Draco Major may be a Bacon, a Byron, a 
 Shakspeare; but, being morally deficient, is without 
 the active feelings of justice, philanthropy, or tender 
 affection. He knows (by feeling) nothing of what men 
 call the sentiment of gratitude; the ends of hate and 
 love are the same to him ; his motto is often fearful 
 and terrible to others—SELF is the whole of private 
 living, and exalted annihilation the end of all private 
 life. Only yesterday, one said to a lady medium, sign¬ 
 ing himself Swedenborg, this: ‘ Whatsoever is, has 
 been, will be, or may be, that I am ; and private life is 
 but the aggregative phantasms of thinking throblets 
 rushing in their rising onward to the central heart of 
 eternal death!’” 
 
 At this point in our conversation my recollection 
 brought among iny thoughts a droll narrative of a 
 “ Visit to the City of Notsob,” which, months before, I 
 had written partly to gratify a good-humored, satirical 
 
THE DIAKKA 
 
 a 
 
 spirit-guest, who wanted to be known only as “ David 
 Exodus,” affirming as his reason therefore that he would 
 otherwise be recognized by many of the citizens, which 
 he particularly wished to prevent. Victor immediately 
 6miled and said : “ He was a Diakka! ” 
 
 “ That explains much,” I replied. For whenever 
 he entered my room in Orange, although singing and 
 looking radiant in a rosy robe, with a delicate feathery 
 ornament upon his head, yet more than once I was 
 almost overcome with a faint exhalation, as from a mass 
 of noisome vegetation mingled with an odor slightly 
 like the vapor arising from ammonia. 
 
 “ Strange birds of inversions!” said Victor. “He 
 was until recently a Diakka.” 
 
 “ What shall I do with the narrative ? ” I asked. Vic 
 tor replied, in substance, that its publication would serve 
 a good purpose—to teach people how they seem to an 
 invisible visitor and observer—and, meantime, rebuke 
 the conceits of materialists who decide, in the face of 
 facts, against the possibilities of an existence after death 
 “ But, Victor,” said I, “ there is much of other matters 
 in his narrative.” 
 
 “ He is no longer a Diakka,” replied my gentle vis 
 itor; “ and yet, in the frolicksome sensuousness of his 
 trips and expressions, the people will discern some¬ 
 what of the mental estate from which he is now almost 
 wholly redeemed.” 
 
 This last word caused me to ask: “ Then it is possi¬ 
 ble to escape from the counts y of the Diakka ? ” 
 
 “ Providence, as men call the beneficent and omni 
 
AND THEIR YI0TIM8. 
 
 13 
 
 ecient government of the spiritual universe, dooms no 
 soul to an inversionary existence.” 
 
 As Victor spoke, I gazed upon his beautiful youthful 
 face. Never before beamed such ineffable joy through 
 the countenance of a celestial visitor. His eyes shone 
 with an inward gratitude which filled him with inex¬ 
 pressible delight. 
 
 “ A Diakka,” he added, “ is an unbalanced, not an 
 evil person—he wanders in his own congenial forest, 
 never resting, never satisfied with life, often amusing 
 himself with jugglery and tricky witticisms, invariably 
 victimizing others; secretly tormenting mediums, caus¬ 
 ing them to exaggerate in speech, and to falsify by acts ; 
 unlocking and unbolting the street doors of your bosom 
 and memory; pointing your feet into wrong paths, and 
 far more; nevertheless, the good physicians of love and 
 the ministers of truth labor among the Diakka (the nu¬ 
 merous angel women as missionaries far exceed the 
 men); so that in time each and all is reached and deliv¬ 
 ered from the dense wilderness of discord into which 
 circumstances and a voluntary yielding to wrong incli¬ 
 nations primarily consigned them.” 
 
 “Friend Wilson,” said I, “ do you feel at liberty to 
 answer me this question, namely: ‘ Have you knowl¬ 
 edge of any class in the Summerland, or of persons 
 once men and women in mortal bodies, located any¬ 
 where, who are essentially more evil or more inverted 
 in character than the Diakka ? ’ ” 
 
 “ Swedenborg,” he replied, “ was a philosopher, and 
 wrote as a philosopher should write, an hundred years 
 
14 
 
 THE DIAXKA 
 
 before bis arrival here. His spiritual illumination did 
 not extinguish the sub-lights kindled by his pi’evious 
 reasonings. Guided by his natural lights,” Yictor con¬ 
 tinued, “ the noble Seer wrote with profound truth that 
 ‘ hell ’ and ‘ heaven ’ signify mental states—thus : A 
 man governed by selfishness, who takes delight, and 
 that continually, in sensual thoughts, and in the inces¬ 
 sant and supreme gratification of evil affections, is in 
 hell, in which he is, to a certain degree, happy; and 
 this describes, in general terms, the condition of the 
 Diakka; from which condition, by help of the Divine 
 Mercies as communicated by and through the missiona¬ 
 ries of unselfishness and heavenly loves, the inhabitants 
 of the mental wilderness come forth, one by one, as the 
 will and affections of each choose the good and reject 
 the evil; and thus there is under the Divine govern¬ 
 ment a constant and perpetual process of universal sal- 
 ration from a place and situation which you would feel 
 to be a boundless and insupportable hell; and while 
 the various inferior earths in the universe are constantly 
 and every moment supplying the innumerable realm of 
 the Diakka (this term meaning mental antagonisms, or 
 minds with cross purposes), the angels of redemptive 
 love are constantly and beautifully at work in that 
 realm, changing the disposition and destiny of persons 
 there consociated by force of attraction, and every mo¬ 
 ment bringing some soul out of darkness into the heav¬ 
 enly light.” 
 
 The foregoing is as near as possible in Victor’s own 
 words. Very many other things were spoken of during 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 15 
 
 this interview, but they do not belong in this pamphlet. 
 Before introducing the Diakka’s story, however, I but 
 obey my impression, endorsed by the best conclusion of 
 my reason, when I affirm, what by observation I have 
 been long familiar with, that a very large proportion of 
 discordant and repulsive and false experiences in Spir¬ 
 itualism is to be explained by admitting into your hy¬ 
 pothesis a fact, namely : that the Diakka are continually 
 victimizing sensitive persons, making sport of them, and 
 having a jolly laughing “ time ” at the expense of 
 really honest and sincere people, including mediums, 
 whom they especially take delight in psychologizing 
 and dispossessing of the use of will. There is no kind 
 of alleged obsession, no species of assumed witchcraft, 
 no phase of religious insanity where such psychology 
 is not possible. 
 
 The remedy consists in the knowledge. Remove the 
 mystery of spiritual intercourse, and you remove the 
 danger. No person of ordinary judgment, with will 
 enough to draw a pail of water, or to walk a mile up 
 hill, need complain that he cannot overcome the influ 
 ence of a Diakka. They at most can do nothing more 
 than confuse your thoughts, break up the lines of your 
 memory, mingle their inclinations with your own, and 
 psychologize your nervous and muscular systems. If 
 you yield, in your moments of curiosity or when mor¬ 
 ally weak, you cannot escape legitimate punishment. 
 If you walk one mile with your enemy, he will try to 
 force you to go twain ; gratify his trifling impertinence 
 for thirty minutes, and he may try to exhibit you as a 
 
16 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 fool to your neighbors during the ensuing thirty days 
 Beware of the “ first false step ! ” 
 
 It seems that in the Summerland the police regula¬ 
 tions are based upon the principle of securing the em 
 joyment of the utmost personal freedom, including 
 privileges and opportunities not conflicting with the 
 exercise of the utmost personal freedom on the part of 
 every other; so that, even the intellectually gifted and 
 witty and tricky Diakka, with their known deficiencies 
 in the higher moral principles of character, are not re¬ 
 strained in their visits to earth, because personal educa¬ 
 tion through experience, is a part of the scheme of de¬ 
 veloping personal responsibility. 
 
 All the splendid livery of the terrestrial landscape, 
 with its seolian music and sweet sympathies, with its 
 sylvan sensuousness and inscrutable ways, are not un¬ 
 known in the high country of the Diakka. When you 
 go into their wonderful wilderness you find yourself in 
 a garden of beauty. The Divine Love and wisdom are 
 there, shining in splendor from the sad-leaved trees, 
 and tremblingly emanating from the feathery and 
 downy grasses that carpet the beautiful land. The 
 trees resemble in their foliage our pine and fir, which 
 have the effect to cast a wonderful golden shade 
 throughout the entire realm ; and yet the light of the 
 upper sky perpetually shines through everything, and 
 far down into the very foundations of the land beneath 
 the people; and thus, although there is an amazing 
 solemnity and a tearful sadness and melancholy mur¬ 
 mur over all, magnetically subduing the egotistic extrav- 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 17 
 
 agances and dire witticisms of the inhabitants, yet travel¬ 
 lers from ether countries * enter the society of the 
 enlightened Diakka, and enjoy their life and scenery as 
 you would a picnic, in the free, artless spontaneousness 
 of innocence and childhood. 
 
 BIOGRAPHICAL ITEMS. 
 
 Of the narrator, whose drolleries fill the following 
 pages, the author learned of Victor, this: 
 
 He was born in Old Cambridge, Mass. Entered 
 Harvard, and became a Divinity student with the solemn 
 intention of becoming a Unitarian minister. Theodore 
 Parker’s theological ideas had, however, attracted his 
 profoundest attention ; and, after considerable reading 
 and reflection, his mind passed through an entire revo¬ 
 lution on the subject of religion. His new convictions 
 made him excessively unpopular with the professors; 
 and among the students with whom he frequently dis¬ 
 cussed theological points, he was treated disdainfully. 
 In a few months he left the Divinity School and entered 
 upon a mercantile pursuit in Boston. He was success¬ 
 ful until the beginning of the great Rebellion. Stricken 
 with a serious business disaster, and prostrated soon 
 after by a severe inflammation, his will and ambition gave 
 way, and, through death, he became a citizen of the 
 Summerland. 
 
 From Victor, the author further ascertained that, 
 
 * Of this I have been assured by Victor and others, at different 
 
 times. 
 
IS 
 
 Til IC DIAKKA 
 
 when in youthful years, this ex-divinity student and 
 himself were intimate and devoted friends. They cor¬ 
 responded upon religious and other subjects while yet 
 in their teens. Upon the sacred altar of friendship 
 they mutually pledged to each other eternal fidelity. 
 They even pledged that in case of painful misfortune 
 or accident, they would aid and stand faithfully by each 
 other. But time, with its changes, separated these 
 mutual young friends. Victor confessed that for sev¬ 
 eral years after his own departure from earth, he did 
 not even make the attempt to seek out the friend of his 
 youth ; and thus remained in ignorance of his situation 
 and condition, until, while on the Isle of Akropanamede, 
 one came to him and requested a moment’s interview. 
 A flash of intuition revealed to Victor the presence of 
 the companion of his boyhood years ! They embraced. 
 Immediately they began a delightful conversation, during 
 which Victor, for the first time, ascertained to his aston¬ 
 ishment that his friend had been, from the day of his 
 death until that moment, sojourning among the Diakka 
 The explanation was that, in consequence of his peculiai 
 mental state and disposition, the people of the Wilder¬ 
 ness strongly attracted him. His visit to Boston, to the 
 Free Religious Conference, to the Woman’s Conven¬ 
 tions, and to other places, was his first approach since 
 his death, to familiar scenes and persons. 
 
 Just here I ask you to observe how this invisible vis¬ 
 itor seems to make himself one of the visible company. 
 Another point: His indifference to all religious senti¬ 
 mentality, his scornfulness (expressed in terms of mirth 
 
AND TIIEIK VICTIMS. 
 
 19 
 
 ful innuendoes) of everything like faith and hope—his 
 subtle scepticism of the Divine existence ; notwithstand¬ 
 ing all which we are given to understand that he has 
 undergone a moral purgation, and is henceforth free 
 from the world of the Diakka. 
 
 THINGS TO BE REMEMBERED. 
 
 In closing these prefatory remarks, the author will 
 say, founded upon his most careful investigations, that 
 the evil forces of human selfishness are not confined in 
 their effects to men’s individual lives. Under the con¬ 
 trol, or rather by permission, of superior minds the 
 Diakka play important parts in great assaults upon bad 
 governments, upon pernicious organized customs, upon 
 evil social conditions, and frequently upon religious 
 errors and superstitions. But for these spiritual free¬ 
 booters little progress would be made. The evil commu¬ 
 nications of the meddlesome minds are, in time, com¬ 
 pletely overruled for good. Because Good and not 
 Evil, is positive. The selfishness of the unredeemed 
 carpets the floors of the coming temple of Humanity. 
 
 According to the Scriptures there are “ many man¬ 
 sions ” in the celestial Heaven, signifying the manifold 
 families and associations into which the Summerland 
 populations are naturally divided and subdivided; not 
 antagonistically as popular orthodox minds are taught 
 to imagine ; but these communities differ only as “ one 
 star differeth from another ” as to size, position, funo 
 tion, and glory. And here, regarding the use of in 
 
20 
 
 THE DIAKKA AND THEIIi VICTIMS. 
 
 tercourse, the words of a high-minded Spirit (through 
 the tongue of the entranced Mr. Ilome) seem most ap¬ 
 propriate : 
 
 “ At present we have so little power, can do so very 
 little; our very language cannot convey to you what 
 we fain would wish to say; your language is too im¬ 
 perfect, you cannot understand us. The germs of all 
 are in all—only undeveloped. Why do you quarrel 
 with your weaker brethren ? Withdraw not the hand 
 eon have stretched out in aid ; let it rest, and blessings 
 will come; withdraw it harshly, and the briars and 
 thorns of passion will lacerate. We know not of time 
 in the sense you speak of it; to us yesterday, and to¬ 
 day, and the morrow are all one; bear in mind that 
 had spiritual life hours, days, years, or even ages, our 
 souls would weary, tire; but we never weary, for in 
 our spiritual life the principle of the eternal breathes 
 everlasting existence. We are not perfect; we, too, 
 have work to do, to elevate ourselves ; we also work to 
 elevate others, to draw you upwards and onwards, so to 
 speak, by magnetic attraction. It is one of our great 
 duties to be constantly watching over you—to guide you 
 in your aspirations upwards to God. Our love, our 
 sympathy, our fellow-feelings are with you ; we never, 
 never weary; we do not judge you ; God alone judges 
 you. We were once as you ; therefore who are fitter 
 to be your associates than we who have passed through 
 the ordeal of development you have to pass through 1 
 You ask why we always speak of love; it is because 
 love brings us to you.” 
 
A DIAKKA’S STORY OF HIS VISIT TO THE CITY OF 
 NOTSOB. 
 
 The city of the sagacious and wealthy Notsobians had 
 been for a long time attracting the narrator like a 
 mountain of loadstone. He was, for years after leaving 
 the earth, a constant prey to the invasions and stormy 
 su£ 2 :estiveness of this marvellous terrestrial attraction. 
 Hut he steadily and courageously withstood the distract¬ 
 ing temptation, until every objection and every obstacle 
 to the journey appeared to have vanished. Whereupon, 
 after employing a period in singing hymns and in sup¬ 
 plicating for protection from the dangers and enemies 
 that might beset the way, he provided himself with 
 only the common necessaries, then girded on his armor 
 for a trip earthward, and with great cunning concealed 
 every distinguishing mark or hint of his rank, associa¬ 
 tion, and quality. 
 
 Thus he set out for the great terrestrial city. 
 
 Fortunately, at an early hour in the morning, when 
 he was fully on the descending way, he suddenly ob¬ 
 served a connected company of travellers also bound on 
 a journey to earth. 
 
 Addressing himself to the foremost man, who wai 
 guiding the others— 
 
22 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 “ Sir,” lie said, “in exchange for the promised hospi¬ 
 talities of my country, will you grant me a position in 
 one of your lines as far as the great city of Kotsob ? ” 
 The gentleman gracefully bowed, and replied, “ Be¬ 
 lieve me, sir, in consequence of the duration and im¬ 
 portance of the journey, which we have but this moment 
 undertaken, much danger and inconvenience will be 
 spared you b} r securing for yourself a place in our beau¬ 
 tiful march.” A remarkable smile of winsome kind¬ 
 ness shone upon his face, and the narrator permitted 
 himself to be unreservedly allured by the stranger’s 
 personal charms. Upon his garments were visible 
 minute figures, pictures, and other strange devices, pecu¬ 
 liar to his position and society. He assigned to him an 
 easy place in the magnificent chariot drawn by a mighty 
 magnet consisting of high purposes. 
 
 “ O Genesis! ” exclaimed the narrator, as he buckled 
 on his armor, grasped his share of the common necessa¬ 
 ries, and stepped from the line about five leagues from 
 the city. Approaching the depot wherein travellers 
 alight from the cars, he observed many warlike citizens 
 drawn up in battle array. Each was armed with a 
 frightful-looking long whip; each also had a certain 
 number engraved upon plates of silver, which were in¬ 
 geniously fixed upon their hatbands ; and with a per¬ 
 suasive countenance, each shouted at the passing stran¬ 
 ger, “ Have a coach, sir ? ” There was, however, on the 
 part of these wliip-armed soldiers no breach of the rules 
 of honor and dignity, and many of them seemed desir¬ 
 ous to pursue their calling merely as a punishment for 
 
AND THEIK VICTIMS. 
 
 23 
 
 some wickedness of which they had been adjudged 
 guilty. Upon inquiry, it was ascertained that these 
 Ishmaelites were condemned to this degree of daily servi¬ 
 tude because that they were guilty of “ the crime of 
 poverty! ” Moreover, the narrator for himself soon dis¬ 
 covered that there were many pious and faithful in the 
 great city who had been condemned in a similar man • 
 ner by the rich, the idle, and the powerful. 
 
 Now the narrator vehemently prayed to be endowed 
 with the judicial wisdom of Aliitliophel, the great coun¬ 
 sellor and minister of war in the house of Absalom; 
 inasmuch as he had no sooner descended into the street, 
 than a peculiar infatuation possessed his heart, and it 
 blinded his eyes so that he was sorely puzzled ; the nat¬ 
 ure of which was, that his eyes seemed to behold a 
 great number of streets leading away here and there, in 
 directions altogether contradictory and impenetrable ; 
 all of which had the effect to perplex and overpower his 
 mind with the puzzling infatuation to immediately pro¬ 
 ceed down each street at one and the same time, which 
 seemed the only sure and short way to his destination. 
 
 Perplexed by the subtleties thus practised by the 
 Athenians, he did not know his right hand from his 
 left, nor whether to follow his left foot or his right; 
 for, strange to tell, each of his feet was seized with the 
 wicked infatuation to go off in opposite streets at the 
 same moment; so that the judicial abilities of an 
 Ahithophel were more to be desired than all the wealth 
 and honor of the Scribes and Pharisees. 
 
 At this moment, a person of military bearing in blue 
 
24 
 
 THE HTA TCKA 
 
 coat and brass buttons, approached with a dignified and 
 magnificent step ; whom the narrator, with great pres¬ 
 ence of mind, at once concluded was one of the pro¬ 
 prietors of the great and powerful city of ISTotsob • 
 under which conviction he addressed him: “ Sir, a 
 serious misfortune has this moment befallen me. I 
 implore you, I entreat you, sir, to direct my steps to 
 some hospitable house.” 
 
 The captain of the guard, thinking that he heard the 
 voice of a man, replied with exceeding bigness of voice 
 and ponderous gravity of manner, “ With pleasure, sir.” 
 (Looking at a man standing on the sidewalk near him.) 
 “Proceed up that street” (pointing to the left) “three 
 blocks; then take your right hand some twenty-eight 
 yards, which carries you into 42° N. lat. x 70° W. long. ; 
 the next street’s name will remind you of the father of 
 his country; then, by inquiring amongst the citizens, 
 you may learn anything that anybody knows in ain 
 part of the world.” 
 
 This delightful information filled the narrator with 
 delicious and springlike feelings. He for a moment 
 wished for pieces of gold with which to reward the 
 magnificent captain; happily, however, the officer had 
 “ moved on,” leaving his mistake wholly undiscovered ; 
 and thus the narrator was left quite at liberty to pursue 
 his explorations amid alternate chilling winter blasts and 
 oppressive summer heats, but without in the least feeling 
 them ; meanwhile enjoying the indescribable eccentric¬ 
 ity of the thoughts and motives behind the quiet faces 
 of the citizens. 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 25 
 
 Time rapidly passed, as it always does when one is 
 busy; minutes melted and vanished into hours, until 
 two whole days were forever gone, which is nothing to 
 an eternal mind. The narrator entered an inn kept by 
 a publican for the entertainment of travellers. “ This 
 place,” thought the narrator, “ would have delighted 
 Bagoses himself. Exterior to its tinted walls, and be¬ 
 yond its green blinds, the room of the wide sphere is 
 immense; a great world embellished with twinkling 
 stars, arranged with wondrous wisdom in a blending 
 canopy of blue and gold.” 
 
 It happened one morning, as the narrator was inves¬ 
 tigating humanity beneath the great trees, in front of 
 the temple wherein the State governors and command¬ 
 ers often assemble, he was approached by a Ptolemy 
 of the West, who, with the epitome of good manners, 
 said : “ About an hour hence there will be a meeting 
 of the Sages of Notsob. I have a ticket of admission 
 sanctioned by one of the chief sages ; and if it be your 
 pleasure, sir, 1 will conduct you into the presence of the 
 wise ones.” 
 
 This mental offer was with gratitude accepted, and 
 together we entered the hospitable residence of an 
 illustrious and. wealthy citizen. We were soon estab¬ 
 lished as guests among the magi of the great city. It 
 was with difficulty that the narrator believed himself to 
 be invisible to the eyes of those about him. Besides 
 the remarkable sages themselves, there were present 
 many guests of rank and renown, a goodly number of 
 Ptolemaic women, several distinguished Ahithophels, 
 
26 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 four members of the Sanhedrim who were just recov¬ 
 ering from the disease of idolatry, and three great 
 Hubopolitans who had outlived the captivity of The¬ 
 ology into which they were born. Each had appar¬ 
 ently committed some serious wrong, too deep to be 
 mitigated by the Divine compassion, and, as a just pun¬ 
 ishment, each pair of eyes was clothed with and hidden 
 by glasses curiously arranged in frames of steel, silver, 
 and gold. The women appeared like the sybils and 
 prophetesses of the days of Jacob, the very man who 
 buried the gods of Laban which Rachel had stolen, and 
 the vei’y man who offered sacrifices in Bethel, in accord 
 with the visions and dreams he had had when he went 
 first into Mesopotamia. 
 
 STOKY OF THE FIRST SAGE. 
 
 The sage who spoke first was but thirty minutes 
 from the city of the vast temples of learning, whose 
 inhabitants display an amazing insensibility to the emi¬ 
 nent men who expedite culture and overthrow impedi¬ 
 ments to individual greatness. This, the first sage, 
 said: “ Grant me one favor, that you will hear my 
 story, and then judge whether I be in the right or in the 
 wrong.” 
 
 A consenting silence reigned throughout the comfort¬ 
 able house of ancient times and modern adjuncts. In 
 this silence he began a strange recital of transforma¬ 
 tions, a story of marvellous events continued through 
 a rosary of successive ages, by which a prc toplastic 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 27 
 
 paste was fashioned into myriads of living creatures. 
 “ These creations were the Moseses, the Abrahams, 
 the Isaacs, the Jacobs, the Joshuas, and the Eleazars 
 of the innumerable generations that came after them 
 out of the super-vitalized paste. The chief centres 
 from which the successive generations came, corre¬ 
 sponded to the ten cities which Moses caused to be 
 builded for the Levites. In this order he found au¬ 
 thority in a modern Zelophehad, an eminent man, in 
 the land of Victoria, called Darwin, so that the centres 
 of Bezer, Ramoth, and Golan were no longer attractive 
 unto him. Whereupon he (the sage) made haste for 
 the divine habitations of full-grown men and women. 
 Among these he found evidences that once upon an 
 immense mass of time the people lived in caves, and 
 involuntarily walked upon all fours, not knowing the 
 difference between a new-fledged liberal republican 
 and an old-line democrat; a time when unmarried 
 women were childless and single men were wifeless; 
 a time long before the flood was thought of as a politi¬ 
 cal expedient for equalizing the rights and privileges 
 of both sexes as a reward for their horrid wickedness ; 
 a time when a father often died from three to five years 
 before the birth of his last child ; in short, a time wheu 
 marrying was confined to the heads of tribes and fami¬ 
 lies, who resolved upon preserving the blood pure and 
 undefiled, and free from the Israelitish rascalities which 
 vaccination perpetuated, in the form of plagues and 
 great pimples on the faces of the most beautiful Egyp¬ 
 tians. Sixty-nine thousand beeves, seventy-five thousand 
 
28 
 
 THE DIAKXA 
 
 sheep, and four hundred thousand asses, with immense 
 quantities of hay, oats, corn, and gold and silver, patent 
 mowing inventions, four hundred best Beckwith ten- 
 dollar sewing-machines, two ham-strung Colibri pianos, 
 and twenty thousand teeth extracted by Colton from 
 the mouth of the whale that swallowed Prof. Jonah. 
 By the flood which overwhelmed the inhabitants and 
 killed all the troglodytes, whereby everybody and 
 everything was desti-oyed, excepting a few of the better 
 breed of asses ; after which came generations upon gen¬ 
 erations of idolaters, Digger-Indians, Dutchmen flying 
 with long pipes in their mouths, wealthy Jews with 
 jewels in every pocket, scissor-grinders, and priests who 
 employed their leisure hours in grinding the faces of 
 the poor. This will account for the exceedingly thin 
 and sharp expression which envious poor people auda¬ 
 ciously turn toward the rich and comfortably rotund.” 
 
 For an hour and more the first sage thus discoursed. 
 Tears filled the eyes of many Hubopolitans when he 
 had finished. But there immediately arose another and 
 much older magi, with huge glasses shielding his bril¬ 
 liant eyes ; he had a long white beard, and snowy curls 
 falling in high-art about his broad shoulders. He said : 
 “ Although the story you have just heard is strange and 
 transcendental, yet it is as nothing compared with what 
 I have to relate. If it be the pleasure of this sagacious 
 company, I will immediately begin my story, wdiich, 
 with your indulgence and permission, I will call, 
 “ Steps of Belief ; or, Rational Christianity Maintained 
 against Atheism, Free Religion, and Romanism.” On 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 29 
 
 hearing these strange words, there was a simultaneous 
 movement among all the sages and guests. Several 
 opened their mouths extremely wide, as if to yawn ; 
 all with one accord crossed their legs in an opposite 
 direction ; then they sat bowed down with thought 
 while they listened to the story of the second sage. 
 
 Thus concluded the first interview. In private conference the nar¬ 
 rator assured me that the Diakka country in the Summerland was 
 populated with persons in every grade of society, and from every 
 part of the world. He acknowledged, in answer to a question 
 of mine, that while many Diakka were proud and high-minded, their 
 great intelligence was of an exceptional character, being associated 
 with imposture, deception, and delusion. Next morning he came 
 again and related 
 
 THE STORY OF THE SECOND SAGE. 
 
 “ 1 was born,” began the wise man, “ of rich but 
 honest parents. My grandfather was one of the most 
 famous ministers in the land of Notsob. Observing that I 
 possessed a tenacious excitability and great quickness 
 of perception, my family, with wonderful prodigality 
 of means, procured for me many famous savans who 
 taught me science, the fine arts, and all knowledge of 
 the basis, precepts, and comprehensive principles of our 
 religion. Religion, however, absorbed all my thoughts, 
 and in the presence of the most learned and gifted, 
 I resolved to leave the credo of my forefathers and 
 make a journey into the country of Monotheopolitans, 
 not far from No-Man’s-land on the shore of the great 
 Sea of Atheism, which by many strangers is imagined 
 
30 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 to be a far greater waste of water than the Asphaltura 
 Lake covering Sodom.” 
 
 While the Second Sage was thus speaking, a noise of 
 many voices was heard at the door. The beautiful lady 
 of the house hastened to see what was happening; 
 when the name of the Grand President of the free religi¬ 
 ous magi was announced ; at which many sages and the 
 chief prophetesses arose from the cushioned sofas, 
 and with graceful genuflections (talking and whispering 
 were both prohibited), and thus all in silence welcomed 
 the formidable Master. There was no shaking of the 
 house as by an earthquake, neither were there peals on 
 peals of thunder, nor did the fierce lightning flash 
 athwart the sky. No sooner were all seated with one 
 knee resting upon its fellow, and as quickly as the 
 metal and glass and like harnesses over each pair of 
 eyes were once more properly adjusted, than the distin¬ 
 guished sage continued in these words: 
 
 “ Arrived among the monotheopolitans, I set about 
 using the qualities of earnestness and industry which I 
 had inherited, and soon became noted and courted 
 by the respectable and influential. M} r intellect was 
 naturally eclectic and aggressive, and never suffered the 
 least inconvenience by maintaining that two contradic¬ 
 tory propositions are both true and both false. My 
 mentally acrobatic fame went before me, and which¬ 
 ever way 1 travelled, whether forward or backward, or 
 from side to side, I was sure to be accosted with saluta¬ 
 tions of joy, and reproached with wavering from the 
 faith of my fathers. 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 31 
 
 “ One day a great Minister from the vast and rich 
 country of the Polytheopolitans, (which is the kingdom 
 sought bj all pilgrims from the land of Btidda and the 
 Orient), insisted tha* I should then and there relate 
 the outline or my journeyings. ‘Religion,’ said I to 
 him, ‘consists of an indefinite something which we wil. 
 cal] spirit, which is rational Christianity, as opposed to 
 the romantic or catholic Letter which killeth; step by 
 step,’ said I to the learned querist, ‘ I travelled from 
 the immense objective country of the Letter to the imper¬ 
 ishable subjective land of the Spirit; but in entering 
 the land of Spirit, I was compelled to run hazardous 
 risks, when journeying from No-Man’s-land wherein 
 exists sure Theism, to One-Man’s-land, wherein abideth 
 pure Atheism, and thence to Rich-Man’s-land, wherein 
 is found popular Protestantism ; but, Heaven be praised ! 
 here at last I am in the country of reverence, faith, 
 obedience, gratitude, hope, and love—the rich and non- 
 immortal land of the monotheopolitans.’ ” 
 
 The sage was here interrupted by a white-haired 
 prophetess, who asked,—“ Pray, sir, how is it that the 
 citizens of your wealthy land are numbered among the 
 non-immortal ? ” 
 
 “ Because we utterly refuse to search with our five 
 senses for signs and symbols. Evidence through Bud- 
 distic materialities we will not receive. Such gods as 
 houses, stones, images, talking horns, tipping tables, 
 writing on the arm, ghosts of dead men !! our citizens, 
 with their extremely tenacious excitabilities in the most 
 cultured parts of the brain, reject such signs of im 
 
32 
 
 TIIE IIIAKKA 
 
 mortal life. Wherefore it is granted unto us that we 
 die perfectly dead at the end and thus achieve the 
 whole purpose of our present being.” * 
 
 At this saying all the sages with one accord lifted the 
 metal-and-glass hampers from before their eyes. Then 
 they crossed their legs over to the other side ; while not 
 
 * A writer in the Day Break , issued February 7, 1873, meets this 
 point, thus : That the educated materialists of the Caucasian race 
 cannot arrogate to themselves a monopoly of thought on the material 
 plane, may be gathered from the valuable narrative of the hero of 
 the day, Mr. H. M. Stanley, in his book, lately published, “ How I 
 Found Livingstone.” The following replies to Mr. Stanley, from a 
 black man of the land of Mgogo, are so like the style of argument 
 held by some of his Caucasian brothers, that we are led to the con¬ 
 clusion that we are all more or less in a state of infancy, and that 
 there are two classes of opinions the opposite of each other all the 
 world over: each class much alike everywhere, the only difference 
 being in the greater art of putting an opinion attained by the higher 
 or more educated races. 
 
 Here is the dialogue between Mr. Stanley and a Mgogo man: 
 
 “ Who do you suppose made your parents ? ” 
 
 “ Why, Mulungu, white man.” 
 
 “ Well, who made you? ” 
 
 “ If God made my father, God made me, didn’t he ? ” 
 
 ‘ ‘ That’s very good. Where do you suppose your father is gone to, 
 now that he is dead ? ” 
 
 “ The dead die,” said he solemnly, “ they are no more. The sul¬ 
 tan dies—he becomes nothing; he is then no better than a dead dog, 
 he is finished, his words are finished—there are no words from him 
 It is true,” he added, seeing a smile on my face, “the sultan be¬ 
 comes nothing. He who says other words is a liar. There 1 ” 
 
 “ Then he is a very great man, is he not ? ” 
 
 ‘ ‘ While he lives only; after death he goes into the pit, and there 
 ■ no more to be said of him than of any other man.” 
 
AND TIIEIK VICTIMS. 
 
 33 
 
 a few caressed their knees and combed their beards with 
 their nervous fingers; meanwhile all participated in 
 smiling ineffably into the very eyes of the Grand Presi¬ 
 dent, whose face seemed pale and furrowed with 
 mingled emotions of gratitude, doubt, joy, and despair. 
 (The narrator here mentioned the lofty absurdity of 
 the reasoning which denied at once his own existence 
 and the world which he had but just left behind 
 him!) 
 
 And yet the second sage proceeded: “ Religion, 
 wherever you find it, as far as it goes, is always one 
 and the same; and this pleasing aspiration called £ im¬ 
 mortality,’ has little to do with its progressive develop¬ 
 ment or application to life. A Mussulman is governed 
 by a religious philosophy as high as the cultured ration¬ 
 alists of Notsob. The poet Shiraz, the famous Hafiz 
 of the Orient, taught the golden rule in these appealing 
 lines: 
 
 “ 1 Learn from yon orient shell to love thy foe, 
 
 And store with pearls the hand that brings thee woe; 
 
 Free, like yon rock, from base, vindictive pride, 
 
 Emblaze with gems the wrist that rends thy side ; 
 
 Mark where yon tree rewards the stony shower 
 With fruit nectarious, or the balmy flower ; 
 
 All nature cries aloud, shall man do less 
 Than heal the smiter and the railer bless ? ’ 
 
 “Thus,” the sage continued, “the unity of the spirit of 
 religion is apparent through all the letters and organi¬ 
 zations with which it may perchance be encompassed.” 
 
 At this moment one distinguished Hubopolitan, a 
 scholar and a man gifted in the lore of the transeel! 
 
 2 * 
 
34 
 
 THE HIAKKA 
 
 dentalists, declared himself dissatisfied. He said it was 
 “an insupportable misfortune to be so spiritual, so 
 filled with the riches of conservative forces and corre- 
 latife subjectivities, as not to inherit an immortal exist¬ 
 ence. Cries of alarm should be raised. For one, I 
 must be permitted to believe that mj ‘ aspiration for 
 immortality ’ is somewhat more inherent and prophetic 
 than the noble sage would have me think. My own 
 longings teach me that the ‘ idea ’ of living after death 
 is not to be eliminated by cultivation of my intellectual 
 powers. I am far too devotedly in love with God to 
 admit that, in my constitution, He has cunningly fixed 
 a flattery and a deception, which continually whispers 
 that ‘ I shall never die,’ but which by the processes of 
 true culture, and through generations of time, shall 
 nevertheless be eliminated from my mind, and at last 
 rejected, even as an inherited and foolish superstition.” 
 
 The assemblage now began to resemble a council of 
 war. A disturbing influence like the disorder of Herod 
 filtered through the feelings of the learned men. One 
 of the most agreeable and the sweetest of the proph¬ 
 etesses, who looked enough perfect to be the wife of 
 Caesar, raised her eyebrows and chin, and opened 
 her winsome mouth and said : “The son of the high- 
 priest Jehoiada, whose name was Zachariah, was or¬ 
 dered by a Jewish King to be stoned to death in the 
 temple, simply because that prophet had bravely given 
 good counsel to the people and to the King. Zachariah 
 thus suffered for saying things not agreeable, for 
 prophesying heavy punishments to befall those who 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 35 
 
 did -wickedly. And now, it seems, because a sage tells 
 his story without flattering our vanity or approving 
 our pleasing sentiments, he is, forsooth, to be stoned to 
 death by the spiritualists who feel an affront! ” 
 
 Here the prophetess smoothed her winkled front and 
 composed herself with matronly reserve and dignity. 
 And for a time no one opened his mouth. Presently 
 she resumed: “We stumble over the ground because 
 it is new ground. We see before us new difficulties at 
 the opening of every new path. We are confronted 
 with two new questions. One is called Materialism, 
 the other, Spiritualism. The first places supreme 
 authority in matter and force; the other in an indefi¬ 
 nite something, call it what you will, say ‘ Spiritual 
 Manifestations.’ In the scheme of progress it is but 
 natural to expect the ignorant to look upon miracles 
 as the divine credentials, even as a serpent, a calf, 
 a crocodile, or as a shell full of graven images may 
 stand for so many gods and intelligent providences in 
 the land of the heathen. For one I quite agree with 
 the sage, and look gladly forward to the day when 
 from my imagination the sentimental longing for per¬ 
 sonal immortality will be eliminated.” 
 
 All at once four men stood up to speak. One ap¬ 
 peared like a shipwrecked king, or like an astrologer 
 recently recovered from a desert island, or a specimen 
 dervish, or perchance a mendicant friar of Europe. 
 (The narrator remarked, aside, that he himself mixed 
 and muddled up this man's thoughts.) The appearance 
 of this learned man caused the others who had arisen 
 
36 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 to return to their former places. At this he made a 
 low bow in token of thanks for their obliging manners 
 toward him. 
 
 “ Speaking of horses,” he began, “ a thought struck 
 me that there is a kinship between men and horses, or 
 rather between mankind and the docile brutes who 
 serve us; and it occurred to me that I may have been 
 a horse myself, or rather, when I am driving and whip¬ 
 ping a horse, that I may be driving and whipping some 
 very dear friend of mine who died years ago; and it 
 also occurred to me that it should be unlawful to abuse 
 a dumb beast, inasmuch as one and the same spirit fills 
 a man and the animal, and a wrong done to the one is 
 a wrong committed against the other. This doctrine of 
 Metempsychosis is no proof of my mental unsoundness,” 
 he continued ; “ here is transmigration argued by a 
 learned law-giver, who showeth that my mind is not 
 necessarily insane because of my belief. This belief is 
 what is known as metempsychosis, which, simply stated, 
 is a speculation as to the destiny of the soul after death, 
 and is urged as an evidence of the insanity of the speaker. 
 To no human being has been given the positive knowl¬ 
 edge of an existence after death. The instincts of the 
 human mind prompt us to believe, or at least to hope, 
 that, although there may be a death of the body, yet 
 that there is an intellectual or spiritual part of our nat¬ 
 ure which survives in some form or other. But, in a 
 logical sense, there is no major premiss of knowledge ; 
 it is, to all of us, either a matter of speculation, or a 
 belief, based on the religious doctrines or tenets which 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 an 
 
 we accept. The world is divided into many sects, each 
 sect presenting a creed more or less different, as to a 
 future state. This very doctrine, metempsychosis, as 
 shown in my case, has been believed in by Pythagoras, 
 Plato, and others of the ancient philosophers and sages 
 of the East, and even in modern times by intellectual, 
 wise, and good men, and is at this day accepted by a 
 larger portion of the human race on the globe at large 
 than that which reject it. Moreover, if a Court is to 
 ascribe insanity to a man, or a class of men constituting 
 a sect, on account of his or their opinion or belief as to 
 a future state, and a particular sect had, in fact, at¬ 
 tained to a real knowledge of the future, the logical de¬ 
 duction would necessarily be that a major portion of 
 mankind, comprised in all other and different sects, 
 were of unsound mind, or monomaniacs on that sub¬ 
 ject. 
 
 “Now,” he continued, “ the good man Jehoshaphat, 
 who was once a great king, and who was most myste¬ 
 riously succeeded by his son, Jehoram, and who was en¬ 
 tombed in royal style in Jerusalem, might have been a 
 better man, notwithstanding he had faithfully imitated 
 many of the actions of David, if he had never planned 
 a battle, ate fresh meat, whipped a horse, smoked segars, 
 or imbibed immense quantities of Old Kentucky. My 
 conclusion therefore, is: be kind to animals, because 
 they may be our relatives.” 
 
 With these words the shipwrecked king, who had 
 the look of a sheikh, regained his seat on the sofa. 
 Notwithstanding all the care exercised by the magi, yet 
 
38 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 ■ two of them and the prophetess smiled a smile that was 
 a considerable distance across. But the Great Presi¬ 
 dent did not smile, neither did he longer remain seated, 
 but made a motion signifying his wish to be heard. 
 Wherefore you will now read the 
 
 STORY OF THE THIRD SAGE. 
 
 “ If the narrations so far have greatly excited your 
 wonder,” he began, “then your amazement will know 
 no bounds when you shall hear what I have to relate. 
 At some things said here I have been excessively 
 astonished, and I confess that in every word I have 
 found either hint or fact, by which I may derive 
 wisdom. But I have exalted my sails and put to sea too 
 many times to be alarmed by rolling billows or flashing 
 tempests. I entreat you all, both prophetesses and 
 magi, to hear what I have to say.” 
 
 The sages looked inquiringly at each other, and the 
 women seemed uneasy, as if they were about to hear 
 some unpleasant intelligence; but they all took a 
 different hitch in their chairs, looked up good-naturedly 
 through their spectacles, and thus signified their readi¬ 
 ness to listen. 
 
 Three days intervened. On the morning of the fourth day, “ David 
 Exodus”—alias “Loga”—alias “Boston John”—alias “Wm. Henry 
 Cambridge ”—reappeared with his pure Oriental features, rather 
 dark visage, olive complexion, bright piercing eye, twinkling with 
 subtle wit; and immediately there entered the room a girl full of 
 the freshness and loveliness of childhood; her light golden hair in 
 profusion curling around the forehead and flowing in wavy ringlets 
 ever her rounded neck and shoulders ; a face beautiful with laughing- 
 dimples; her attractive countenance delicately veiled with an ex- 
 
AND THEIK VICTIMS. 
 
 39 
 
 pression of singular tenderness; a graceful and healthy beauty in 
 her every gesture and bodily movement. This saving angel, his 
 redeeming guardian, looked at him for a moment, then stretched out 
 her hand yearningly toward him, which he tenderly covered with 
 his own, his eyes speaking volumes of love and gratitude. It wa3 
 not consistent at that moment to ask him to let me understand the 
 object of her appearance by his side. But I had a conviction 
 (subsequently confirmed) that her influence upon him was that of 
 truth and love exerted upon a mind abandoned to self-gratification 
 in trifling with what millions of earthly minds deem sacred, sad, and 
 momentous. He proceeded as follows: — 
 
 SPEECH OF THE THIRD SAGE. 
 
 “ My forefathers,” lie began, “ were ministers of onr 
 holy religion. So were all my foremothers also minis¬ 
 ters. These ministered unto their husbands, even as 
 the latter ministered unto the people ; and in me you 
 observe the combined administrations of the whole line 
 of ministering ministers. 
 
 “Notwithstanding all these disadvantages, I have in¬ 
 herited the trait of strict honesty ; and along with much 
 that is aristocratic and exclusive, I find in me a strong 
 tendency to personal freedom and honorable indepen¬ 
 dence. All my misfortunes have arisen from this ten¬ 
 dency, which, in the face of a proud ancestry, and 
 against the wishes of living relatives and many famous 
 men in the ministry, I have spared no pains to gratify. 
 Ministers, as you are very well aware, are born with a 
 veil over their faces. They also inherit spectacles, 
 wife, children, houses, and lands; hence they are half¬ 
 blind at birth, and see things through their delicate im¬ 
 aginations, as if peering ‘ through a glass darkly.’ The 
 highest Pisgah peak is the point where self-annihilation 
 
40 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 is evolved from their inner consciousness. This was 
 my first misfortune.” 
 
 The sage here turned slightly pale and trembled. 
 Yet he continued his address, thus : “ As I look back 
 to my first sermon, it seems almost a dream, full of 
 great lights and various shadows, which show the pict¬ 
 ure in all its complex beauty and uncertainty. Al¬ 
 though a minister, I had resolved upon freedom of 
 conscience, individuality of character, and a life con¬ 
 secrated to the service of humanity. Of this resolve 
 the basis was honesty, and in laying this corner-stone 
 all my troubles began. People full of self-indulgences 
 being rich and in my best-cushioned pews just before 
 the altar, expect a preacher, whose large salary they 
 pay, to wink at their faults and tickle their vices. 
 Again, these wealthy occupants of the choice seats near 
 the pulpit, with fine susceptibilities and a pampered 
 appetite of excitement, can forgive impropriety, but 
 not dulness. One day I drew a low-water line of 
 morals in the great metropolis. So long as my remarks 
 were abstract, the rich and proud listened with respect 
 and admiration. They looked like lambs beneath a 
 visitation of eloquence and New England culture. 
 Presently, however, I ventured to apply conclusions, 
 and instantly their aesthetic taste was minus quality, a 
 complete moral indifference laid broadly upon every 
 face, and in five minutes the sweetest and choicest 
 flowers of my congregation appeared like lethargic ar¬ 
 tists of the mediaeval ages. 
 
 “ Again, one day I drew a lew-water line of social 
 
AND TIIEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 41 
 
 life in the modern Sodom. A crusader, or a Puritan in 
 the days of perpendicular virtue, could not have more 
 disenchanted the questions of love and matrimony. I 
 pictured the vulgarization of marriage which prevailed 
 under the name of true affection between the sexes 
 Instantly my hearers lost all their boasted spiritual in¬ 
 sight ; they complained that I had overheated the 
 family oven. Instead of acknowledging the abounding 
 ignorance, blindness, folly, sin, and wretchedness, they 
 professed next day to be more than half-pleased because 
 the public scribes published my discourse as in advo¬ 
 cacy of Free Love! 
 
 “ Now, speaking of evolving from one’s inner con¬ 
 sciousness, I have some ‘eliminations,’ some ‘inspira¬ 
 tions,’ some full-fledged ‘ conclusions,’ which have come 
 to me over oceanic thoughts and infinite feelings ; one 
 is the smoking out of orthodox doctrines concerning 
 the Saviour of mankind. No spiritual insight can dis¬ 
 cern a historical Jesus as essential to religion. Love 
 descends and broods with infinite tenderness over the 
 wants, sins, and sorrows of humanity. It is simply 
 dramatic to suppose all the blessings of God bestowed 
 in the form of one man. Poets, artists, astrologers, 
 may favor specialism. A thousand varied charms hang 
 on the religious rosary of unreasoning mind. No 
 sage, however, can maintain in his inner consciousness 
 a permanent faith in an historical saviour. The deeper 
 the piety, the profounder one’s sense of the celestial in 
 man’s nature, the more superficial and untenable this 
 belief in the priestly doctrines of salvation. So I have 
 
42 
 
 THE DT ATTIC A 
 
 £ eliminated ’ tlie historical Jesus from true psychology 
 and religion. And while I was about it, I let the idea 
 of personal immortality go by the board ; regarding it 
 as a sentiment very sweet and fascinating in itself, but 
 hardly aesthetic, rather crude, utterly useless, except as 
 a subjective enchantment, and worthless to one wholly 
 born again in free religion.” 
 
 An expression of great pain and bitter grief covered 
 the face of a sage who sat to the left of the speaker. 
 His feelings were terribly macerated. He seemed to 
 choke and to swallow with difficulty like one stricken 
 with an Egyptian plague. Zadok the lhgh-priest could 
 not have shot harder looks at the prophet of Solomon’s 
 mother. And the prophet Nathan could not have vis¬ 
 ually stabbed Benaniah, the captain of the guards ; and 
 yet the distressed sage did nothing with his hands, but 
 widely opened his mouth, and asked : “ Pardon me, oh 
 minister and sage and the son of a minister, if you 
 swear by Almighty God, and in the presence of these 
 venerable sages here assembled (to say nothing of the 
 prophetesses who grace this meeting with their perfumed 
 presence), that you do not want to live after death?” 
 
 Timorously then the Great President replied : “ What 
 is the use of it? We have more talents than we can 
 justly use here. And of the many talents we have and 
 use here, most of them perish before we become old; 
 and, as for myself, I frankly confess that I do not see 
 progress ahead ; only decay of one’s powers, and pos- 
 Bibly imbecility at the end of life’s journey.” 
 
 At this remark, the sage who had before spoken 
 
AND THEIE VICTIMS. 
 
 43 
 
 seemed smitten with a more distressing plague than 
 before. Ilis mouth opened helplessly like one in a fit. 
 his hands tumbled down at his sides, his legs straight 
 ened out insomuch that his feet touched the brocade 
 garment of a spectacled prophetess seated before him, 
 and for all the world he resembled Hiram, who was of 
 the tribe of Naphtali, and who constructed for Solomon 
 two pillars of brass. This modern Hiram, of the tribe 
 of Notsobians, closed his mouth sufficiently to articulate 
 these words, addressed to the great and learned sage 
 yet standing: “ Sir, do you not know that communica¬ 
 tion with the inhabitants of the eternal world has been 
 going on all around you for twentv-five years ? And 
 can you, as an honest man, as a noble sage and a birth¬ 
 right minister of a free religion, deny that you have 
 any knowledge of these demonstrations ? ” 
 
 The Great President then advanced a step or two, 
 and holding his right hand over the old sage’s head, 
 which was bowed low with big thoughts, replied: 
 “ Still, again, must we come back to the use of it. The 
 main objection to communicating with spirits, so-called, 
 is that it tends to sap the foundation of personal char¬ 
 acter, and to beget loose habits of weak dependence upon 
 the feelings and judgments of others. It is wiser, in 
 the light of Free Religion, to obtain evolutions from 
 one’s own inner consciousness than to get messages 
 from spirits. It were better for the millions to rely 
 upon their own individual judgments than to depend 
 upon the guidance of any other being, human or angel, 
 finite or infinite.” 
 
44 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 Here a meek-eyed, aesthetic, Moses-looking guest in 
 terrupted with the question: “ Do you believe in 
 
 prayers, sir? Do you trust in a superintending and 
 protecting Providence ? What do you pray for at fu¬ 
 nerals ? What efficacy in praying for consolation when 
 in trouble? Petitions and supplications, seekings and 
 thanksgivings, I have heard from your lips in prayer¬ 
 time. What do you mean by such a service ? Do you 
 pray to and supplicate, and invoke the protection and 
 superintendence of, nothing but your own inner con¬ 
 sciousness ? ” 
 
 Many of the spectacled prophetesses seemed mightily 
 displeased at the impudent behavior of the interrogator. 
 They threw out their chins in a mood of defiance, min¬ 
 gled with a dogmatic freedom of conscience peculiar to 
 Hotsobians. Many seemed unjust towards man, and 
 unmindful of the eternal life they had received from 
 God; but they said not a word; although one, more 
 impressible than the rest, who resembled Lot’s wife in 
 the expression of her countenance, looked daggers at 
 the meek interrogator; then she suddenly turned red 
 in the face, as if about to die with choked utterance. 
 
 But the Great President stood bis ground like King 
 Pharaoh when the water of the Red Sea was up to his 
 armpits. To him the Spiritualists were nothing more 
 than a flying army running headlong out of the Egypt 
 of orthodoxy, and bound for a terrible life of wander¬ 
 ing in the great wilderness of graven images, golden 
 calves, jumping mediums, and tables of stone loaded 
 sumptuously with meats and viands from strange lands 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 45 
 
 beyond the sea. Yea, verily, the spiritualists (lie 
 thought) are indeed Israelites fleeing from bondage to 
 creeds; and for this reason he (the President) could 
 not and did not condemn them ; but he reproached 
 them because they insist upon going rashly after signs 
 and wonders, even rushing through the divided sea of 
 science, in order to evade the supreme authority of the 
 innpr consciousness. 
 
 An inward lamentation suddenly came to his deliv¬ 
 erance. He seemed like a husbandman who went forth 
 to sow in the winter time when the fields would not 
 receive the seed. So he was immediately determined 
 to utter no word more in that assemblage. Whereupon 
 a necromantic woman, who claimed the power to bring 
 up the souls of the dead, announced that at her house 
 the sages would find welcome, and that for such as 
 were of inquiring mind, who wished truth for the use 
 and benefit of humanity, she would gladly endeavor to 
 manifest indisputable signs that angels were once our 
 earthly friends. The narrator stealthily accepted the 
 necromantic woman’s invitation. But many who had 
 worn sacerdotal garments, and who had pitched their 
 camps over against the mountains of aesthetic culture 
 and popularity, refused even to thank the woman for 
 her voluntary kindness. So now, therefore, leaving 
 the sages of Notsob, we will listen to the story of the 
 necromantic woman. 
 
 CURIOUS SCENES IN NOTSOB. 
 
 Our way to the residence of the mysterious lady 
 
46 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 necessitated that our feet should pass by the shore of 
 the beautiful pond (called by the imaginative, “ lake- 
 let”) which lies tranquilly in the midst of the city. 
 There was a curiously decorated fountain which show¬ 
 ered its waters towards the rising sun ; the wind blow¬ 
 ing at that moment from the great West, which, at 
 this hour of the day, frequently happens in Notsob. 
 
 Now, although the narrator was abundantly absorbed 
 by the Phoenician-like embellishments of the fountain, 
 which the waters gracefully played over and around, he 
 failed not to hear mentally the voice of one just arrived 
 from the neighboring town, known as the city of the 
 Bunker Pyramid. In the language of persuasion pe¬ 
 culiar to citizens of that noted town of the renowned 
 Charles, he politely thus addressed the narrator: 
 
 “ Sir, if it be agreeable to you, this hour is appointed 
 by the authorities in charge to exhibit the great cymba- 
 lum mundi, which in Cambridgian dialect signifies the 
 biggest ‘ Drum of the World.’ ” 
 
 If this man had been the renowned son of Molo, 
 namely, Appolonius himself, his speech could not have 
 exerted greater seductive power. He was exceedingly 
 learned in philosophy, knowing well how to lay bare 
 the words spoken by enemies and simple fools; with 
 divine skill he exposed perfidiousness; and with the 
 fire of his wrath melted and solved the chains which 
 wicked calumnies had forged on every hand. This 
 man’s mind entertained a divine rage against facetious 
 trifling with truth; against current hypocrisy, super¬ 
 fooleries ; and against fashionable lies he was easily 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 47 
 
 roused to gigantic opposition ; so that in the provinces 
 of Notsob, and indeed throughout the whole country, 
 his reputation was established for rhythmical flow of 
 words, studded with adjectives which should be un¬ 
 speakable, and with expletives which did not add to the 
 strength and clearness of his argumentations. It is re¬ 
 markable, nevertheless, what power this man, when 
 speaking in public, sends through vast multitudes, like 
 unto a flash of lightning which at once fills a great tem¬ 
 ple with burning lamps. He had abstracted a cour¬ 
 ageous nature like a soldier, and an engine-like mind, 
 from his father ; hence he feared not to invite the nar¬ 
 rator to visit the great Drum of the World; neither did he 
 lack language wherewith to describe the instrument, 
 the volume of its sound, nor the remarkable ejections of 
 its noises among the inhabitants.* 
 
 When about to start for the immense house of sounds 
 that was built and set apart for the Drum, we were 
 accosted by another citizen—one like unto Marcus An- 
 tonius, a man who (in his own estimation) had never 
 gone astray from science and truth, but had faithfully 
 loved his neighbors’ wives more than riches or the 
 pleasures of religion. He opened his mouth smilingly, 
 and (without knowing it!) unto the narrator said:— 
 
 “ Am I mistaken, sir, in imagining that you dislike 
 pompous shows ? ” 
 
 The narrator (as is his wont), replied not a word, but 
 
 * The reader will keep in his memory all the time that a Diakka is 
 certain to consider himself “invited” to go with any one to any 
 place where there seems a good opening for tricks and fun. 
 
48 
 
 THE DIAREA 
 
 with his eves plainly said : “ Upon deliberation, O An¬ 
 tonins, I would infinitely rather sit by the fountain of 
 water that runs perpetually in the midst of the city.” 
 
 But the first man, who came from the town of the 
 narrow-waisted Pyramid, at this moment, felt uncom¬ 
 monly starved for a fight with the intruder.* A red¬ 
 ness of rage in a moment dishonored his commanding 
 features. “ By the gods of Adelphi! ” said lie, with 
 boldness and madness—“ Do you not know, sir, that 
 this traveller (the narrator) just from the city of the 
 Wilderness, is circumcised, and is therefore galled to 
 the quick by this uncalled-for interference ? ” 
 
 Antonius deserved to be admired for his self-control 
 and great prudence while smarting under this bitter as¬ 
 sault. His reply was : “ And has it then come to pass 
 that no person can enter our city of crookednesses with¬ 
 out being allured into houses consecrated to big Drums 
 and musical Monsters ? | Such barbarities,” he contin¬ 
 ued, “ would have made the gods of wisdom and good 
 manners blush even into the richest principalities of 
 Solomon.” 
 
 Fortunately, at this moment, a learned savan, who 
 had written the “ Bible of the Ages,” approached, and 
 magician-like, changed the conversation. He was just 
 come from the congregation of virtuous mothers and 
 matronly virgins, who were neither atheists nor man- 
 haters as the priests had perfidiously promulgated ; but 
 
 * This feeling to get np a fight with no provocation, is a trick of 
 the intermeddling Diakka. 
 
 f The Great Gilmore Jubilee was at this time held in Boston. 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 49 
 
 the truth was that they had assembled themselves on 
 the pinnacles of history, crying, with voices running 
 over with persuasions and threatenings, thus: “ A voice 
 
 from the east, a voice from the west, a voice from the 
 four winds, a voice against the Nation’s Capitol and the 
 Legislatures ; a voice against the Senators and Repre¬ 
 sentatives, and a voice against the whole male portion 
 of the world’s population!” The learned and just- 
 minded author of the Bible of the Ages related how the 
 lamentations of the beautiful women had a melancholy 
 refrain—“ Woe, woe to ourselves, unless the Senators give 
 us the sixteenth amendment!” Nor did they hesitate 
 to foreshadow the utter overthrow of the Republic, 
 if the law-givers did not repent and turn from their 
 loaves and fishes, and at. once give political liberties to 
 the virgins of Notsob; even to all living women whose 
 foremothers had originated the populations, working- 
 women wno bad fed and spanked the boys who, as men, 
 all now pompously assert their manhood and their ex¬ 
 clusive mastership—the same being a disgrace to the 
 asses which had the honor to be mentioned in the most 
 ancient of Scriptures, one of which was owned by Rev. 
 Dr. Baalam. 
 
 Hearing of these things as related by the trustworthy 
 savan aforementioned, it was immediately proposed by 
 the first courageous man, who came from the town of 
 the Pyramid of Bunker (and it was also agreed by the 
 second person who was like Antonins of old), that we 
 four should turn aside from the gardens and fountains 
 in the midst of the city, and from the house of the 
 3 
 
50 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 Drum of the World, and from the super-barneous tern 
 pie dedicated to the magicians of song, and to the for¬ 
 eign demoniacs of instrumental sounds, and proceed 
 straightway to the forum of the three hills, called by 
 the Notsobians the Temple of Tremont; wherein, ac¬ 
 cording to the report of the writer of the Bible of the 
 Ages, the husbandless wives of the provinces, and the 
 virtuous mothers of ungrateful young men, and the cult¬ 
 ured virgins in spectacles, Avho wished all men in the 
 lake of Asphaltitis, were assembled on the prodigiously 
 high pinnacles of human history, crying—“ Woe, woe to 
 man —to man— to manKLN D ! ” The narrator politely 
 assured the three men, mentally, thus: “ Tour propo¬ 
 
 sition is most agreeable to me, I can assure you; but 
 are we not now on the straight way wdiich leadeth to 
 the necromantic woman, whose wonderful story we each 
 have promised to hear ? ” 
 
 Immediately each mind began to argue and to answei 
 the narrator that such a thing as “ a straight way ” was 
 not known to the oldest inhabitant of Hotsob ; and 
 they all affirmed, with much courtesy and more sidewise 
 laughter, that it would be quite as easy to find the wo¬ 
 man’s habitation if one should travel a mile or two in any 
 direction among the mysterious labyrinths of the city. 
 
 Being thus pei-suaded, the narrator committed his 
 soul to the keeping of the Virgin Son, who, according 
 to the traditions of eastern natives, was born of a 
 woman who had had several children before the idea of 
 being a virgin took full command of her religious as¬ 
 pirations. 
 
AND THEIK VICTIMS. 
 
 51 
 
 LAMENT OF THE WOMEN OF WOE. 
 
 On entering the forum of the three hills, called by 
 the populace, the Temple of Tremont, we saw seated in 
 the chair of Order, the white-haired and dignified 
 Epaphroditus, the renowned William—deliverer of the 
 Africans from generations of servitude and sorrow. 
 
 On his left sat a wedded virgin, of compact figure 
 and agreeable face, beaming with modesty and adorned 
 with a look ef intelligence, called, in the traditions of 
 Notsob, the “ Stone ” ; which embodiment many of the 
 learned assert is the identical relic of ancient days—the 
 stone hewn out of a huge mountain, celebrated for its 
 many Black-wells—the very granite rock and founda¬ 
 tion Stone which the builders at one time had the bound¬ 
 less folly to reject. On the right of the most excellent 
 and dignified Epaphroditus, whose duty was to keep 
 order and call time, sat the distinguished and graceful 
 Virgin Juliana; and in a crescent row beyond were a 
 number of extreme chronic feminine proprieties—chaste, 
 pure, immaculate—wearing spectacles and long hair, 
 and clothed in raiment as beautiful as were any robes 
 ever worn by Ceres, who, in the discharge of her celes¬ 
 tial duties and in the enjoyments of her equal rights, 
 gave birth and natural nourishment to that young scamp, 
 the perfidious Bacchus of the renowned Mysteries. 
 
 The male antiquities of Notsob occupied the seats in 
 the main body of the temple. Many of them appeared 
 to have been born prior to the period at which proud 
 
52 
 
 TIIE DIAKKA 
 
 mothers attain to the age of virtue.* It was remark¬ 
 able with what precision of speech and excellency of 
 manners the beautiful women on either side of the ven¬ 
 erable Epaphroditus conducted their discussions and, 
 likewise themselves. But there was one procurator 
 there, a male antiquity, who was given to very much 
 exhortation, and with determined ambition to direct 
 affairs for the women, who pulled the wires of trickery, 
 and rolled the logs of time-serving policy, wherefore he 
 was esteemed worthy to be called captain of the Mace¬ 
 donians of the great Occident. Swayed by this man, 
 the women committed themselves in speech to many 
 temporizing propositions. 
 
 “We have seen,” said they, “a meteor in the East, 
 claiming to be the star of this movement!” At which 
 speech all groaned aloud, as if in terrible pain, and as 
 with one voice they all added—“A virgin shall con¬ 
 ceive without sin, and bring forth without sin, and with¬ 
 out sin the child shall grow to manhood, and then he 
 shall become the deliverer of all women who shall be 
 born after the death of his mother! ” 
 
 Now, hearing this outcry, without discerning the bear¬ 
 ing thereof upon the question of woman’s enfranchise¬ 
 ment, the narrator stealthily pressed the courageous Sat- 
 urninus, of the town of the Pyramid, and asked him 
 politely if he could not address the throne (rostrum), and 
 thus get an outward eloquent explanation of so much 
 mysterious confusion concerning virtue, virgins, chastity, 
 
 * Aside the Diakka said: “ Some highly learned anthropologist! 
 assert this period to commence when childbearing is impossible.” 
 
AND TIIEIK VICTIMS. 
 
 53 
 
 etc. And immediately his voice broke forth upon the 
 congregation with a roaring magnificence. lie uttered 
 many red-hot words, with the strength of the lion, and 
 with the threatening crash of the thunderbolt; and yet 
 the pith of his speech may be condensed into this already 
 famous interrogation—“ Why is this thus? ” 
 
 Whereupon the valiant Captain of the Macedonians, 
 who might also be called the chief weaver of political 
 webs, rose to his feet and denied everything, from the 
 least to the greatest. lie said that “ there was (and the 
 narrator backed him) no confusion, no misunderstand¬ 
 ing, no differences, no nothing , but the sweetest and 
 loveliest harmony ”—all this, and no mistake ! 
 
 At this point, one of the male antiquities interrupted 
 and cried to “ make a statement.” He was ordered by 
 the just Epaphroditus to take his seat. 
 
 A woman of modest bearing then said : “Mr. Presi¬ 
 dent : there is a strange woman in a distant heathen 
 city who claims to have the lead of Suffrage for Woman. 
 She is a dangerous pillar of tire by day, and not a 
 model of moonshine by night. We have been driven 
 from the Eden of respectability, notwithstanding our 
 innocence, because the Social god of righteousness is 
 bound to punish transgression. Our burden is heavy, 
 and, owing to an original scantiness in the foundation 
 of our charity, and in the garments of our loving-kind¬ 
 ness, we are unable to bear up under this imputation of 
 sin. If we were men it would be different, although it 
 ought not to make any difference ; for the sin of vice 
 should not be confined to women any more than polit- 
 
54 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 ical privileges and immunities sliouid belong to men 
 exclusively. But the gods have otherwise decreed. 
 Therefore we want to be universally recognized as the 
 ‘ Virgins of Notsob, advocates of Woman’s Suffrage,’ 
 with no affinity for the afore-mentioned heathenish ad¬ 
 venturess, who, inspired by her devilish ambition for 
 position and power, is at once a disgrace to womankind 
 and the acknowledged Queen of Hades, although bear¬ 
 ing the first name of a great reigning Queen.” 
 
 The excitement in the congregation became immedi¬ 
 ately alarming. When he could be heard, the venera¬ 
 ble head man of Order—the Anti-Slavery Master Wil¬ 
 liam—the same who was for thirty years the Deliverer 
 of the exiled children of Africa, said: 
 
 “ All this touches not the question. Whether a man 
 is virtuous or not, or whether a man is sober or not, is a 
 matter not concerned in his recognition as a citizen, or 
 in his right to the ballot. Neither, therefore, ought 
 questions of a purely personal character be foisted upon 
 this meeting as bearing for or against the enfranchise¬ 
 ment of woman. Hence, in the honest opinion of the 
 chairman, all who attempt to speak concerning these 
 side-issues are out of order.” 
 
 The prudence and moderation of Epaphroditus, not 
 to speak of his righteousness and the wide humanity of 
 his decision, served to allay the general excitement and 
 apprehension. But the Notsobian virgins unhappily 
 manifested in their faces many vicious qualities. They 
 had stoned the heathen woman, whose Christian name 
 was Victoria, but she was not yet dead; wherefore the 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 55 
 
 sinless virgins yearned to inflict further public punish 
 ment, and it was exceedingly hard to restrain them. 
 
 Now, however, the hour had come for the narrator to 
 depart with the party for the house of the necromantic 
 woman. He was thus reluctantly obliged to turn his 
 back upon the white-robed, eloquent women of Notsob. 
 They had filled his heart of hearts with beauteous de¬ 
 sires to become holier than any other ; for then he could 
 in an instant detect sin in others, and feel himself au¬ 
 thorized to calumniate, vilify, stone, and destroy. 
 
 But hero we are already at the habitation of the mys¬ 
 terious medium woman. We will enter, make our 
 apologies for delay, and listen to her wonderful 6tory. 
 (The narrator will, now and then, slip in a word, to 
 touch up the items in her memory.) 
 
 STORY OF THE NEOROMANTIO WOMAN. 
 
 Arrived at the circumscribed porch, the narrator im¬ 
 pressed all present to give thanks for their deliverance 
 from the serpentine ways and labyrinthian courts of 
 the City of Notsob. After this solemn service, and not 
 wishing to rush rashly upon the retirement of the mar¬ 
 vellous woman, he influenced the party to linger and 
 meditate long and unprofitably in the reception room of 
 her own hired habitation. While waiting thus, many 
 guests, profound seekers for testy evidences, were 
 ushered in from the city of serpentine ways. Present 
 ly the necromantic lady herself, in simple garb, en¬ 
 tered. She welcomed all our party with much gentle 
 
56 
 
 THE D TAKKA 
 
 grace, and with great handsomeness of manner, which 
 was highly spoken of. 
 
 ISTow it vas incidentally manifested that each person 
 had come to her upon the same mysterious and undefin- 
 able errand. They had come to witness signs and to 
 procure testimony of their right to live forever! A 
 mysterious court of probate was thus organized, where¬ 
 in the “ Will of the Almighty ” was to be passed upon ; 
 and the guests present, being cultured ladies and gentle¬ 
 men, were both witnesses and" associate judges of the 
 validity of the last testament and bequest of the un¬ 
 known Testator. After the Notsobian burning gas¬ 
 light within the room was toned down to a mellow 
 haze, most congenial to lovers in the arms of enchant¬ 
 ment, the lady suddenly yielded herself limp and 
 thoughtless, and closed her eyes as in prayer. All 
 present kept the sacred silence profound for a little 
 time; which was terminated by the opening of the 
 lady’s mouth, from which mechanically flowed the fol¬ 
 lowing words: 
 
 You, each of you, seek to know of your immortality 
 through tests and addresses from persons in the spirit 
 world unknown to this medium. AY>u would know , 
 each for himself, whether departed spirits watch over 
 you, daily and hourly. [The Diakka ( i.e ., the 
 narrator) being invisible, enjoyed the scene and the 
 solving of this problem in the extreme.] We will give 
 you tests and addresses, although it is important to re¬ 
 member that the process of translation and transmission 
 from the spirit world to you necessarily modifies some- 
 
AND TH1SIE VICTIMS. 
 
 57 
 
 thing, possibly more or less everything , in the communi¬ 
 cation. Flowers and grain expand and ripen to perfec¬ 
 tion under the glorious white rays of the sun. And 
 yet every tiny petal of the flower, and every little part 
 of the expanding grain, in some degree modifies each 
 burning ray that is transmitted from the so-called all¬ 
 controlling sun.” 
 
 While the thoughtless and limp lady was thus speak¬ 
 ing, the room near the ceiling was suddenly enchanted 
 by many interesting colored lights! These brilliant 
 exhibitions, more dazzling to the imagination than the 
 flaming lights of the unknown North, (in which the 
 narrator had a finger!) were by the entranced lady re¬ 
 ferred to—thus: 
 
 “ Colors represent your spiritual development. Light, 
 love, truth, purity, sincerity, wisdom have leaves and 
 flowers of their own that spread forth with colors, dif¬ 
 fering in size and brilliancy, because they are repre¬ 
 sentations and types of your individual feelings and 
 conditions.” * 
 
 At this moment the lady, flooded with a dramatic 
 force and purpose, pointed toward a robust stranger in 
 the rear of the room. “ Captain Casey ! ” said she, 
 with a startling tragical emphasis. The gentleman re¬ 
 ferred to blushed a blazing red, and bowed his head in 
 alarmed silence. “ For six and twenty years,” she con¬ 
 tinued, still dramatically addressing him, “ your path¬ 
 way stretched across the broad ocean. Your vessel is 
 
 * The narrator declared to the author, in reply to a question, that 
 he had nothing to do whatever with the formation of her sentences. 
 
 3 * 
 
58 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 not swift, nor beautiful, but she is large and powerful, 
 otherwise she could not have encountered unharmed 
 the storms of your last vo} 7 age; nor could you have 
 outlived the dangerous icebergs and fields of floating 
 ice off the banks of New Foundland.” 
 
 “ Trut: tede ! ” exclaimed the gentleman, who 
 was a perfect stranger to the medium, and equally un¬ 
 known to every other person present. 
 
 “ When you were about a thousand miles from 
 Queenstown, captain,” she continued, “ and in great 
 anxiety because your vessel was leaking badly, did you 
 not seem to hear the voice of your old commander, Cap¬ 
 tain Coates, saying, ‘ Helm hard aport—never fear ’ % 
 And did you not obey the impression ? Then did you not 
 soon find and stop the leak between decks % And then 
 did you not sail out of all danger ? And were you not 
 successful to the end of your voyage ? ” 
 
 “Captain Coates!” exclaimed the gentleman with a 
 gleesome shout—“Captain Coates! my mother’s only 
 brother, who was my uncle, and best friend, commander 
 of the gallant craft Tripoli , the first vessel I took a 
 voyage in—why, Captain ! are you really here present ? ” 
 
 All listened for the medium’s reply. Not a word 
 from the mouth of the necromantic lady! Sybilline 
 silence prevailed for several minutes. At this point 
 the Diakka touched off some lights on the walls of the 
 room. Then she stretched forth her white hand, 
 tremblingly, and pointed towards a dark-complexioned, 
 Spanish-looking gentleman, (very like a Diakka!) who 
 Bat in front and very near her. “ Dr. Albert Morse 1 ” 
 
AND THEIK VICTIMS. 
 
 59 
 
 she said, addressing him familiarly, as though she had 
 always known and loved him intimately. 
 
 “ How do you like the tapestried divans in the pal¬ 
 aces of the Viceroy ? You did not know that your 
 guardian angel went with you, did you ? ” 
 
 In consequence of this speech the gentleman’s face 
 turned suddenly white, like one overcome with aston¬ 
 ishment ; but he quickly and firmly collected himself, 
 and asked: “ Will the controlling intelligence tender 
 me the true name of my guardian in the spirit world ?” 
 
 “ Fannie Galton ! ” immediately replied the limp lady. 
 And, lo! the stranger straightway acknowledged that in 
 his boyhood he did know a playmate bearing that name! 
 
 The lady of enchantment continued in these words: 
 “ Immense rooms ; gorgeous furniture; gold and silver 
 decorations; round silver tables trimmed with gems; 
 sweet sounds from constantly flowing fountains ; hun¬ 
 dreds of waiting women in many-colored costumes; 
 finest silk and glittering satin covering walls and win¬ 
 dows; magnificence surrounded by ignorance and pov¬ 
 erty; wealth and luxury, built upon a foundation of 
 public taxation and superstition.” 
 
 The dark-visaged gentleman, thus addressed, testified 
 his supreme astonishment. And he at once confessed 
 that the mouth of the necromantic lady (her eyes during 
 all this time remained closed) had spoken truly ; inas¬ 
 much as he had been for years a resident of the East; 
 vnd had many times been admitted to the palaces of 
 the Viceroy; the appearances and scenes in the rooms 
 of which she had correctly described. “ My conversion 
 
60 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 and delight,” he enthusiastically added, “would be 
 boundless, if the lady could but tell rue where Miss 
 Fannie Galton lived, and when she died.” 
 
 At this moment the lady again stretched forth her 
 hand, and, turning her perceptions interiorly towards 
 the narrator (invisible to every other pair of eyes), her 
 mouth said: “You are thinking, and you want me to 
 talk, concerning the mystery of sleep and dreaming.” 
 
 Whom she was addressing, no guest present could 
 form the least idea. Nothing could be more positive ! 
 She was reading somebody’s very thoughts! Strange 
 sybil! Thus they thought among themselves. 
 
 “Unthinking people” • • • • (she proceeded 
 dreamily and slowly to say) ■ • • • “ are fright¬ 
 ened • • • • ev p imaginations picture a burning, 
 
 blazing hell • • • • they go away • • • • or 
 rather • • • • consign their enemies • • • • 
 into everlasting punishment.” 
 
 The narrator enjoyed and listened ; he prompted her 
 a little more; then she made this reply: “The inhabit¬ 
 ants of hell • • • • (speaking with hesitation) • * 
 
 • • are ignorant, credulous, unhappy • • • • they 
 
 live in wretched discord, and amid dire uncertainty 
 
 • • • • They send confusion and falsities into 
 
 our spiritual manifestations • • • • they entertain 
 vicious opinions of human virtue ! ” * 
 
 * The narrator confessed to the author that he quailed and was 
 unhappy beneath this discourse; for it was the latest and freshest 
 revelation of a place (the wilderness of the Diakka) which now he 
 justly held in abhorrence. 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 61 
 
 “ Wrangling egotists flourish in hell' ” she energet* 
 ically said: “ Worldly minded people live in hell! Tha 
 hypocrites make believe they are contended ! Sleep is 
 as bad as hell to those whose brains float in unassimi¬ 
 lated gases! Wakefulness in sleep is a worse hell than 
 solid slumber during hours of apparent wakefulness. 
 If the crystalloidal substance of the Pantarchy be not 
 unity with the dialized water held in suspension await¬ 
 ing conversion, then the wakeful brain is dreaming of 
 hell, and at such moments ordinary external influences 
 communicate nothing worth reporting through the sen¬ 
 sory nerves to the hell that is blazing and boiling within. 
 You may yearn for the heaven of hydrate of chloral, 
 but the hell of deadly night-shade is your portion.” 
 
 The narrator began to fear greatly that the locality 
 named by the lady would seem to the audience to be 
 not far from the tranquil habitations of Notsob. The 
 language and the topic were exceedingly obscure; but 
 the place referred to, i.e., the country of the Diakka, 
 needed no further commentary or elucidation. The 
 narrator said he felt that the eyes of the whole company 
 were upon him, although he knew he was really invisi¬ 
 ble. With grave apprehensions, therefore, he influ¬ 
 enced the lady necromancer to say audibly whether she 
 could discern “ any of the friends of persons present in 
 the aforementioned place ?” 
 
 “O yes ! ” she replied, quite too promptly to be agree¬ 
 able to her listeners. “ A great uncounted multitude of 
 your friends reside in hell! And what is remarkable 
 is, that very many of those discordant characters fre- 
 
62 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 quently visit and make sad work among tlie inhabitants 
 of Notsob.” 
 
 Information of this alarming character was greatly 
 more entertaining to the company than flattering to the 
 feelings of the narrator. He now began to think of 
 Aristobolus, the same that was the first Jewish king 
 after the Babylonian bondage, who put a head on the 
 empire and a diadem upon his own head ; and he also 
 began to call to mind his old friend Epiphanes, who was 
 called Antiochus ; also to recall Asamoneus, the father 
 of his own son called Matthias, and of groups of others 
 yet more ancient; for he was of mind to know of a 
 certainty who of his multitude of old Notsobian friends 
 were recognized residents of the aforementioned place, 
 which in sacred Scriptures is with horrible gusto called 
 
 HELL. 
 
 While the narrator was thus thinking to himself, the 
 mysterious lady opened her mouth, whence the follow¬ 
 ing stream of pleasing words flowed playfully, like mu¬ 
 sical waters sparkling and dancing from an overcharged 
 fountain: “ Men lay up for themselves treasures on 
 earth, which are rich only in exceeding great suffering 
 and sorrow—the only teachers some minds will ever 
 attend to; whilst happiness and unalloyed delights sur¬ 
 round those who lay up treasures beyond the reach of 
 rust, corruption, and thieves.” (This last term reminded 
 the narrator painfully of his wilderness city of the poly- 
 roga and the Diakka, which he had left behind him 
 when he came upon this trip to Notsob.) “ The human 
 mind lives within the inner brain,” she meditatively 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 63 
 
 continued: “ and its bright visions point towards 
 heavenly happiness, which is in store for the forever 
 faithful.” 
 
 The audience listened in silence; many minds not a 
 little confused. Speaking of sleep, she went on : “ One 
 night (you remember it well) you were restless; sleep 
 would not come to your relief ; a grievous roar echoed 
 along the shore of time ; your head ached, with fa¬ 
 tigue, as you thought in your foolishness. What was the 
 cause ? ’Twas I, your unseen friend, who deprived you of 
 so many hours of sleep. You were thus saved from a 
 serious, almost diabolical, attack of the Diakka, with 
 which you were at that'time threatened. Yes /, your own 
 brother in heaven, your friend in spirit, in truth, and in 
 love.” This was addressed by another upper world 
 visitor, who stood near the right side of the medium, to 
 an open-countenanced auditor. After these words had 
 been plainly uttered, the lady turned her still closed 
 eyes toward others; giving each something far more 
 heavenly than was vouchsafed in her first discourse in¬ 
 spired by the narrator; although, possibly, to no person 
 presemt was the essential substance of the different 
 messages any more pertinent and convincing than to 
 the narrator himself. 
 
 At this point a distinguished citizen of Notsob 
 whispered to one of our party and proffered free ad¬ 
 mission to the Athenaeum—an opportunity of obtaining 
 serene and elevated enjoyment not commonly granted 
 to mundane guests, to say nothing of visitors from 
 foreign celestial cities—which terrestrial Athenaeum, be* 
 
64 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 ing more accessible than ancient temples of learning, 
 although known to the ancients by the same classic 
 title, the narrator influenced the party to agree to com 
 template the amusements of the Athenians on the even¬ 
 ing following. 
 
 REMARKABLE SCENES AT THE ATHENjEOM. 
 
 In Notsob there lived a worldly wise and most trust¬ 
 worthy philosopher, distinguished for his many manly 
 deeds, and for manly methods in business circles, whose 
 name was Croesus, with the ancient prefix of Isaac.* 
 He it was who hospitably opened to our party, and 
 therefore to the narrator, the great door of the cele¬ 
 brated temple sacred to the goddess Athena; for, be it 
 known, the Notsobians are a peculiar people, resembling 
 the inhabitants of ancient Greece—in that they erect 
 sacred temples, which are dedicated sometimes to one 
 divinity and sometimes to many ; also they plume them¬ 
 selves commendably upon Hadranian universities, and 
 likewise they take high pleasure in high public schools ; 
 and especially, under the triumphant commander Croe¬ 
 sus, they have opened and endowed an establishment 
 where lawyers, orators, artists, philosophers, sophists, 
 poets, teachers, and unprincipled critics, may assemble 
 to witness proceedings, recite their pieces, sing, culti¬ 
 vate manners, promote literary and scientific tastes, and 
 
 * In reply to a direct question the Diakka confessed that he re¬ 
 ferred here to the business partner in the Banner of Light Publish 
 ing Company. 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 65 
 
 enjoy harmless association with congenial affinities for 
 mutual improvement and innoceut pastime. 
 
 With the proffered freedom of entrance to this 
 temple the narrator experienced delight. But, being 
 invisible to the party, he wanted a fellow-companion. 
 Wherefore he associated* unto himself one Benaiah, a 
 man of valor, a freeman by birth, uncircuincised, yet 
 quite popular as a constant inquisitor in the court of 
 Psyche. Now this man stationed himself alongside of 
 the narrator in the great Athenaeum of the Notsobians. 
 Together they conversed and interchanged sentiments 
 concerning the orations and other services prepared by 
 the before-mentioned Croesus for the entertainment of 
 the distinguished guests who had assembled. 
 
 Immediately a Babylonian bell was heard within the 
 forum; and, behold, as by enchantment, a scene curi¬ 
 ously constructed was exhibited; not exceedingly un¬ 
 like the pensile gardens arranged by Nebuchadnezzar, 
 who, it was reported, erected the wonderful walls of 
 Babylon. 
 
 Services and ceremonies at the Athenaeum continued 
 for two hours; consisting of short orations and imita¬ 
 tions of the slender affections, the gold insanities, the 
 meanness, and the baseness of some of the infamous 
 citizens of another terrestrial city. The exhibition closed 
 with a thrilling discourse on wild Indian life, accom¬ 
 panied with sounds of drums, the howling horns, and 
 scratching of stringed instruments—the whole teaching 
 the plain and wholesome moral that “ to be born an In¬ 
 dian is a great folly and an unpardonable crime.” But 
 
66 
 
 THE IMAKKA 
 
 not unto this day is it known what were the thoughts of 
 the narrator’s companion and inquisitor, Benaiah ; for, al¬ 
 though during the orations and imitation, his face shone 
 as did Noureddin’s, when that prince first beheld the 
 Beautiful Persian, yet when he departed for his own 
 lonely Diakka court, there was a mysterious *nd vin¬ 
 dictively determined look upon him like that which was 
 upon the countenance of Noureddin, at the moment 
 when Hajji Hassan sold the beautiful slave to the re¬ 
 pulsive Vizier Saouy. This same Vizier to this day is 
 known as “ The Hunter ” in the Diakka country. It 
 was very far otherwise with the narrator ; inasmuch as 
 he resolved to remember the hospitality of Croesus; 
 and during the entertainment, which he with others 
 witnessed, the narrator laughed with those who laughed, 
 and so did Benaiah ! 
 
 THANSFOKMATION SCENE IN THE VICINITY OF NOTSOB. 
 
 How it came to pass that one Jeremiah opened his 
 heart to the narrator; took pity upon him; lamented 
 that he was yet in bondage to the puzzling labyrinthine 
 ways of the Diakka; and, out of the fulness of his 
 kindness, invited him to his solemn and sacred suburban 
 retreat. This was situated upon the crown of what 
 the imaginative denominated a high hill ; with un¬ 
 bounded privileges of contemplating a free country on 
 every side; the air whereof is hourly distilling health¬ 
 ful breezes, inviting birds of song ; and, cooperating 
 with the visible sun, ripening roses up—and urging 
 fruit trees into beauty and sweetness. 
 
AN!) TI1EIR VICTIMS. 
 
 67 
 
 With rejoicing, being now freed from that solicitude 
 which is natural to strangers when unravelling the ways 
 of Notsob, the narrator participated in the tranquil pros¬ 
 perity and hospitalities of his friend Jeremiah. There 
 was music there ; and there were songs and games; and 
 best of all, there were transformations wonderful. 
 
 The tricky game (always delightful to a Diakka!) 
 consisted in deceiving the five senses and muddling the 
 judgment of the very elect! The spiritual test trick 
 was mysteriously causing small articles such as rings 
 and knives to appear when and where the bewildered 
 witnesses declared positively they were not and could not 
 be, “ by any known law of possibility.” 
 
 The sweet music of the great masters was also seem¬ 
 ingly interpreted in the dark on the piano by the gifted 
 invisible fingers of the narrator’s dimpled-faced wife. 
 
 For a moment silence ensued. Then she suddenly 
 retired from the presence of the guests. Presently a 
 mysterious knocking was heard without!—at that hour 
 of the night! According to ancient custom, the pro¬ 
 prietor hastened to the place and freely opened his door 
 to the stranger! The medium said “ give her welcome.” 
 The medium then described and said : “Stranger ap¬ 
 pears to be a female antiquity from some haunted habi¬ 
 tation.” 
 
 Now it is impossible to describe the scene that im¬ 
 mediately ensued. It was a case of materialization! 
 The antique spirit visitor was by every one recognized. 
 She was a profound curiosity in both her dress and ad¬ 
 dress. Insomuch was this eccentricity true, that had 
 
68 
 
 THE DIAKKA AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 she been seen at ancient Jerusalem, or at the gates of 
 Babylon of old, the people would have gathered by 
 millions about her, and each spectator would vociferate 
 upon the honor of his oath that he was about to lose his 
 life from excess of wonderment and laughter. 
 
 After she, (my dimpled-faced one!) had entertained 
 the pleasant company with her spontaneous materializa¬ 
 tions, and had supplied them with innocent inventions 
 and stories, peculiar to the age of candlesticks and 
 hand-looms, she immediately dropped her antiquated 
 appearance, and straightway prepared to depart for her 
 home—no more among the Diakka ! The next moment 
 the talented medium left the apartment at the opposite 
 end of the room; then, just for a moment, every one 
 present seemed to doubt what had happened ; and two 
 said it was the medium, and not a spirit, who had en¬ 
 tertained them all with the trick of fleeting materiality 
 and transformation! 
 
 Such perplexity of the five bodily senses, begetting 
 eccentricities of feelings and muddling up the reason¬ 
 ings of vain and high-prided minds, supply the Diakka 
 with a large measure of their pastime. 
 
 Here ends the story of the personage introduced to 
 the author by James Victor Wilson. 
 
REMARKABLE EFFECTS OF THE DIAKKA UPON THF 
 PASSIVE AND SUSCEPTIBLE. 
 
 The following letter, which is submitted as evidence that 
 wuch spirits as Diakka exist and affect mankind, teaches 
 the lesson, so much needed in these days, that the state 
 of mediumship, unless orderly and wisely regulated by 
 the person possessing it, is attended with peculiar trials 
 and painful annoyances: 
 
 Newport, July 10th, 1873. 
 
 Mr. A. J. Davis—Dear and kind instructor : Please 
 to pardon an old man sixtv-nine years of age. for taking 
 this liberty to ask you one question. 
 
 On the 18th of January, 1872, at one of Lizzie Keiz¬ 
 er’s private seances, the spirits took possession of me 
 physically, as though I was an infant, swinging my hand 
 and arms about with great velocity, and using my hand 
 for writing anything they wished to ask or say, and thus 
 making a conscious physical medium of me. I am not 
 in the least trance or visionary that I know of. Con¬ 
 stantly since, I have been visited both night and day by 
 an endless number of spirits, male and female. 
 
 I received them kindly till I became almost bewil¬ 
 dered to know how to accommodate them or stop them 
 from coming. The spirits took possession of my sleep¬ 
 ing hours. They had spread the news amongst their 
 associates that they “ had found out a medium easily 
 
70 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 controlled and kindly disposed—a man who would 
 write with a lead pencil on writing paper,” etc. I 
 prayed earnestly for powerful spirits to assist me in re 
 pelling at least a portion of the number. Single spirits 
 volunteered at times and helped me to repel. But the 
 others returned as quick as the purified spirits retired ; 
 so that the effort was of little use. The loss of sleep 
 soon became alarming to me. My visitors kept increas¬ 
 ing. But I wi^h you to understand that they, the spirits, 
 were all friendly ones. They showed no sign of wilful 
 annoyance. I pleaded with them for rest, physical and 
 mental; but the visiting fever ran high. They seemed 
 to think that if they missed this chance they might not 
 have another. 
 
 I did not know what to do. I had no one to instruct 
 me, and I did not remember anything in your writings 
 to aid me. I prayed to the God of Gods for immediate 
 help, and was “impressed” that I had all the help I 
 needed if I would make use of it. I hesitated, and 
 thought “ what can I do ? ” A great many of the spirits 
 were uneducated and impulsive. They did not like to 
 be repelled in an abrupt manner. So I commenced thus : 
 
 “ Have you, when in Earth life, heard tell of mad dogs 
 biting people who afterwards went mad in dreadful 
 spasms, convulsions, and horrible agonies before they 
 died ? ” answer, “ Yes.” “ You will be in the same con¬ 
 dition in fifteen seconds, if you do not retire immediately! 
 Will you go?” answer, “No.” You had better go! 
 Be subject to moral suasion this time, won’t you?” 
 answer, “ No.” “ You have left your own spirit home 
 and have invaded my peaceful home. Do you think 
 that is right?” answer, “ No.” “ Then you wish to re¬ 
 tain the power to visit me as often as it may please your 
 fancy, even in the dead hours of night?” answer, 
 “ Yes.” 
 
 Thus the tormentors would reply to my questions. 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 71 
 
 I have prayed for some protective influence. And I 
 have been put in possession of a most tremendc us 
 power. But my sufferings are too horrible to think of 
 —yes, Hydrophobia! The spirits dared me to make 
 use of my boasted power ; then in 5, 10, or 15 seconds 
 the horrible calamity will come upon me like a flash of 
 lightning, and no tongue can tell my misery and suffer¬ 
 ing. At first the spirits commence to plunge and jerk. 
 I bid them disconnect from close rapport and stand two 
 feet from me till I bid them take possession again. 
 But they keep up the same motion. Again 1 bid them 
 to be still; to stop their painful personal motions. 
 Then, perchance, they become quiet. I say to them: 
 “ Will you give me security that you trouble me no 
 more.” If they say, “No,” I plunge them with my 
 power into the same state again for about one minute. 
 If they continue to be stubborn, I double my power 
 every 5 or 10 seconds. One of them soon takes pos¬ 
 session of my hand, begging to be released, and taking 
 an oath that he will trouble me no more. I tell him if 
 he breaks his oath the same amount of suffering will 
 fall upon him like a flash of lightning. The moment 
 he approaches and touches me again, I say to him—“ I 
 am a servant and agent of God. hie holds the power. 
 ’Tis he that sets you free. You have trampled upon his 
 sacred gifts.—Do so no more. And when you become 
 a purified spirit pay me a visit and I will receive you as 
 a kind brother. Farewell, till then.” 
 
 This is the way I receive communications: I take a 
 smooth board 3 feet long, 12 inches wide, put it on my 
 lap, lay my right hand upon it, and call for a spirit by 
 name. In a few seconds one takes possession, sliding 
 my hand backward and forward. I say, “ take this 
 alphabet, shake my hand foi ‘ Yes,’ and slide it on the 
 board about 8 inches for ‘ No ’—make two motions for 
 ‘ I don’t know.’ Do you understand them ? Only 
 
72 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 three simple signs! ” He replies, “ O, yes.” The rest 
 comes in writing. 
 
 These strange visitors take possession of me in bed 
 in the street, and while at my work. They give the 
 above signs on the bed, in the atmosphere, anywhere. 
 The spirits say their suffering is indescribably severe l 
 The question—is it (their suffering) real or imaginary? 
 If some trifling Table-tippers should put them in the 
 above condition and leave them, how long would they 
 be in that state of suffering? I am well acquainted 
 with the process of magnetizing. I have read your 
 ‘ Pandemonium * I thought it a cruel thing to leave 
 poor spirit in such a state of suffering for a month, 
 week, day, an hour, or even for 5 minutes. To me it 
 seems to be real suffering; not a psychological con¬ 
 dition. And this makes me fearful lest some earthly 
 malicious person may take advantage of some poor de¬ 
 fenceless spirit for past quarrels, etc. 
 
 I am a teetotaler. No liquor, beer, wine, or cider; 
 neither do I touch tea or coffee. Sugar and water is 
 my drink. Do not think me “ Insane.” I never was 
 more clear on mental subjects than at this present time 
 in all my life. But repelling and punishing spirits is 
 so new and so 6trange that I am tilled with fear! I 
 need advice from some one like yourself. 
 
 Joseph S. 
 
 P.S. I am well acquainted with the Galvanic bat¬ 
 tery, the Electro-magnetic machines, etc. I understand 
 you to teach the spirits are not always absolutely present 
 when communicating. But that fact does not affect the 
 
 Q uestion concerning their disposition and 'punishment. 
 
 write thus to let you know that a very short answer, 
 a few words, will be all that I may need : I stand upon 
 
 * See the author’s volume “ Spirit Mysteries Explained,” new 
 edition, containing a chapter, “ Revelation for Pandemonium.” 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 73 
 
 the precipice, very nigh the Border line, between the 
 two states of existence, and am certain soon to pass 
 away. I am well-known in Newport as an A. J. Davis 
 scholar. “Ruined!” say Old Orthodox professors. 
 But I leave them to the enjoyment of their cwn foolish 
 fossilized notions, ever and anon giving them a few new 
 thoughts to reflect upon. You will perceive that my 
 nerves are steady, not tremulous, which is common with 
 one of my age, 69 years. Make what use of this letter 
 you see will be for the best. ’Tis the last question I 
 shall ever trouble you with. 
 
 Please do not forget to send me a few words, in some 
 leisure moment, before I pass away. 
 
 Yours, etc., J. S. 
 
 DIAKKA MATERIALIZING THEMSELVES. 
 
 At Moravia, N. Y., in Stratford, Ct., many years 
 since, in New England, in every important dark circle 
 held in Europe and America, the wonderful tricks of 
 Diakka are fully manifested in what has been recently 
 styled “ Materialization.” A correspondent submits the 
 following slight alteration of a reporter’s sketch of 
 Gypsies as a correct picture of what his son, a clairvoy¬ 
 ant, witnessed when viewing the Summerland country 
 of the Diakka: 
 
 “Lying around in shady spots were a number of 
 young and rather pretty women, all of them appearing 
 to be slightly tanned , all of them with dark eyes full of 
 fire, and dark hair flowing in wild, clustering ringlets 
 over their shoulders. Some of them were bare-headed, 
 others were fantastic hats with what appeared like an 
 4 
 
74 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 abundance of gaudy ribbons. They were well dressed, 
 with bright sashes across their shoulders, wearing no shoes 
 or stockings. A few tall, powerful men lounged among 
 the trees and stretched themselves upon the grass. 
 They were so similar in appearance that they might 
 have been taken for the children of the same parents. 
 They had dark, shaggy, unkempt hair, full, bushy 
 beards, aquiline noses, and immense cheek bones. They 
 were dressed like ordinary workingmen, but wore no 
 coats. A multitude of children of all ages, from three 
 months to sixteen, all as thinly clad as possible, and 
 bare-legged, ran about at perfect liberty. With the ex¬ 
 ception of two or three the young were all rough, 
 sturdy, frolicsome vagabonds, with the flashing devil 
 in their eyes.” 
 
 THE IMAGE OF AN OLD LADY DIAKKA. 
 
 At Moravia, recently, an apparitional woman ap¬ 
 peared, dressed in a homely, substantial fashion. “ She 
 was tall and muscular in spite of her age, which must 
 have been close on fourscore. Her face was long and 
 thin, tawny as a mulatto’s, and adorned with high cheek 
 bones, and a nose like an eagle’s beak. The eyes were 
 black and flashing, and long gray ringlets hung down 
 upon her shoulders.” 
 
 Such representations are nothing but artistic fabrica¬ 
 tions by skilful Diakka. Ho intelligent investigate* 
 should accept these as literal facts. 
 
AND TIIEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 75 
 
 DIAKKA APPEARING TO REV. T. L. HARRIS. 
 
 In his appendix to “ The Arcana of Christianity,” Mr. 
 Harris describes with more or less extravagance of lan 
 guage natural to himself, a succession of besetments 
 arising from intellectual tempters. One of these he 
 reports (see p. 50) as saying : 
 
 “I am a great poet. I sometimes think that the 
 Universe was made by three Gods—the first was a poet, 
 the second a sculptor, and the third a painter. The 
 sculptor fashioned the forms, the painter tinged them, 
 and the poet animated them. The old Hebrew prophets 
 were pretty fair poets, Isaiah especially, but 1 am far 
 superior. Yet what good does it do me now? Why, 
 sir, there are many spirits here who rip out a huge oath, 
 and it bursts like a bombshell before their eyes, and 
 scatters a rain of living snakes. There are others, they 
 were murderers,—when they quarrel, knives dart from 
 their breasts. Sometimes their thoughts change into 
 winged centipedes. I have a mind to write in the stylo 
 of Ovid. I think that a book entitled the “ Metamor 
 phoses of Pandemonium ” would sell in your world 
 Think of a woman’s words changing into buzzing hor 
 nets as she speaks. Why, I kissed a woman the otliei 
 day, and a reddiot adder sprang from her open mouth. 
 The cream of the joke is that our sphere looks brilliant, 
 fascinating, and summery, except when we sink into our 
 interiors. At other times our phantasies and lusts 
 appear in images which correspond to fine clothes and 
 splendid palaces. It is no joke for a devil to eat his 
 own words: he has to swallow a peck of scorpions and 
 vipers, which is not, as you may well imagine, a very 
 appetizing diet. Think of a ragout of a stewed false¬ 
 hood ! That cursed law of correspondences! I am a 
 
76 
 
 THE DIAKKA AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 plain man myself, and should like once more to inhabit 
 a snug parsonage, and have now and then a quiet little 
 dinner, plenty of old port, and after it, a round game. 
 I’ll tell you why I disguise myself. It is because I hate 
 to be called a parson. ‘ Ha! ha! dean,’ a drunken 
 scoundrel will say now and then, ‘let’s drink together 
 to the good old times.’ Here he commenced snatches of 
 songs, as from an inexhaustible fountain of supply, and 
 passing from one to another with scarcely a moment’s 
 interval.” 
 
 Very much of the foregoing report, especially the 
 peculiar semi-Swedenborgian style, should be attributed 
 • o Mr. Harris himself, who was highly gifted in hyper- 
 nole of expression. Many Diakka, too, are given to 
 extravagant and purely romantic accounts of their situa¬ 
 tions, pursuits, and feelings. They tell big stories, even 
 at their own expense, just to see persons stand, and stare, 
 and wonder. 
 
TRICKS UPON THE PROPENSITIES OF MEDIUMS. 
 
 The Diakka delight themselves with flattering medi- 
 ums, and more especially in making magnificent prom¬ 
 ises to fortune-seekers, who, prompted by the evils of 
 their selfishness, interrogate mediums for private gain. 
 Benevolent persons become inflated with amazin gplans 
 for the universal redemption of mankind. Vain-minded 
 investigators receive most gorgeous promises of great 
 future personal prominence; for which, instigated by 
 the Diakka who may be a private friend of the medi¬ 
 um, the investigator will pay a large money fee. Some 
 of these amazing promises are accompanied with the 
 most satisfactory evidences of spiritual intercourse. 
 
 PLATING WITH THE PASSIONS AND APPETITES. 
 
 Diakka know when they have a susceptible subject in 
 the medium. They delight in pretending great suffer¬ 
 ing in consequence of some ungratified passion, taste, or 
 habit, for which they were noted before death. They 
 impress the medium, and, if possible, the well-meaning, 
 yet not over-intelligent investigator, that they would be 
 elevated and made happy if only they could partake of 
 
78 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 whiskey or tobacco, or gratify their burning free-love pro¬ 
 pensities. All such requests and suggestions on the 
 part of Diakka should be regarded as no compliment to 
 the actual disposition of the medium, and be repelled 
 as a too certain reflection of the proclivity of the inves¬ 
 tigator. As for the spirits ! With them (being unprin¬ 
 cipled intellectualists, and in all the fine sentiments 
 wholly undeveloped) the play is nothing but the mere 
 pastime amusement at the expense of those beneath 
 their influence. 
 
 THE TRICK OF PREACHING RE-INCARNATION. 
 
 Probably, in the entire range of modern spiritual spec¬ 
 ulations, no more philosophically romantic farce than 
 the sweet boon of being “ re-incarnated ” was ever 
 played upon human imagination by the sportive Diakka. 
 They puzzle spiritual philosophers by a mixture of 
 alarming doubts about immortality. The endless prog¬ 
 ress of the soul (say they), will end in an abyss of con¬ 
 glomerated annihilation. They want you returned a 
 few times to round you up, full-orbed, in the niches of 
 personal experience, in every possible phase of being. 
 You say “ Yes.” Diakka immediately give you oracu¬ 
 lar teachings in rhyme and prose. So they amuse them¬ 
 selves, and your seriousness in their sophistries greatly 
 enhances their mirth. These trifling freebooters of the 
 wilderness never molest persons whose minds are well- 
 balanced on any subject. 
 
AND TIIEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 79 
 
 THE MORAL OF IMMORALITIES. 
 
 There are some valuable lessons, in conclusion, to be 
 learned from the coarseness, ignorance, selfishness, and 
 moral insensibility of the Diakka. 
 
 It is this : They were once human beings, once sons 
 and daughters of human parents, once boys and girls 
 in human homes, once men and women living, eating, 
 sleeping, working, fretting, and moving about on earth 
 like ourselves. They, therefore, touch and taste and 
 illustrate whatsoever is tender and frail and imperfect 
 in genuine humanity. They died as we shall, and, be¬ 
 fore us, they entered the celestial community. But 
 they return! They seem to be mingled with crime, 
 with domestic tragedies, with large pretensions and de¬ 
 ception. Whence their origin ? They are derived from 
 private families in every tribe and nation under the 
 sun. Men and women make Diakka, and then they 
 molest men and women—“ chickens coming home to 
 roost”—imperfect, material, and shallow-minded spirits, 
 returning to reciprocate with their producing causes. 
 Men’s bad and brutal passions come out in their chil¬ 
 dren. These children, both before and after death, 
 shower back from the Wilderness of the Diakka the 
 effects upon susceptible persons, indiscriminately, the 
 innocent and the guilty suffering alike all disasters and 
 all penalties of ignorance and injustice. What timid 
 investigators in Spiritualism are shocked at—the false 
 and the disgusting among mediums—might, with more 
 
80 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 justice, arouse their attention to the cardinal immorali¬ 
 ties in society which generate what they abhor. 
 
 THE TRICK OF APPEARING IN TWO OR MORE PLACES AT 
 THE SAME MOMENT. 
 
 Unprincipled Diakka take a gypsy-like pleasure in 
 travelling with stealthy celerity from place to place, 
 from circle to circle, and from medium to medium, 
 passing themselves off under assumed great names, and 
 by means of impartations in close imitation of the 
 minds they delight to misrepresent. Identification, 
 therefore, at a spirit circle, is, in the present stage of 
 our development, almost impossible. One day your 
 real friend or relative will communicate; next time 
 you meet the medium, perchance, the fun-loving Diakka 
 will simulate your friend’s character and do all the 
 honors. 
 
 FACES AND FORMS MANUFACTURED BY SPIRIT ARTISTS. 
 
 Diakka are perfect in all sleight-of-hand perform 
 ances; and in the representation of hands, flowers, 
 faces, spectacles, old ladies’ caps, hats, boots and spurs, 
 wild Indians, etc., they are perfect, from their extensive 
 knowledge, and complete manipulatory control over, 
 the subtlest elements and atoms and laws of exterior 
 chemistry. In circles for “ materialization,” as the 
 term is for these artful effects, the Diakka (some of 
 whom are Indians of every nationality' combine and 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 81 
 
 play “fantastic tricks” for the entertainment of the 
 credulous and susceptible. 
 
 But it is not to be inferred from the foregoing that 
 all the “ creations of art ” are false to their original; 
 on the contrary, most of these materializations by the 
 Diakka (great masters of the “ Black Art ”!) are 
 genuine representations of men and women actually 
 living in the Summerland ; or, more properly, by special 
 request, the Black Artists (if I may so term the 
 Diakka) gather up chemically and represent literally 
 the face, form, expression, and even in detail, the style 
 of clothing, by which the person was commonly known 
 and recognized before death. 
 
 In confirmation of these statements I submit as tes¬ 
 timony the following: 
 
 THE SYSTEMATIC APPEARANCE OF SPIRITS. 
 
 Full accounts were recently published in these pages* 
 of the systematic appearance by spirits in a good light, 
 to many persons at the same time at the seances of Mrs. 
 Andrews, of Moravia, New York State, U. S. Soon 
 afterwards, some of our London mediums began to sit 
 for the same kind of manifestations with more or less 
 success, the most remarkable results being obtained 
 through the mediumship of Miss Florence Cook, with 
 the circumstance that the first face which appeared, 
 
 * This account is taken from the Spiritualist , Sept. 12, 1872. 
 published in London, England. 
 
 4 * 
 
82 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 and which called itself “ Katie King,” was much like 
 her own, to her great annoyance. Dr. Purdon, of San- 
 down, like many inexperienced in Spiritualism, tried to 
 impose his own conditions on the manifestations, failure 
 and the weakening of Miss Cook’s mediumship being 
 the results. After her return home, by giving the 
 spii'its their own conditions, her mediumship gradually 
 grew strong again. The spirit Katie said she could 
 not help being like her medium, but she obligingly, on 
 several occasions, put her head out of the cabinet as 
 black as ink, sometimes chocolate color, and sometimes 
 white. Miss Cook sits in a cabinet now; it is a tall 
 narrow cupboard, with an opening in it a foot square, 
 high up near the ceiling. She sits sideways in a chair, 
 as the cupboard is not deep enough for her to sit facing 
 the door. In the darkness of this cupboard, to which 
 there is no entrance but through the front doors, the 
 spirits manufacture the faces, and when ready, put them 
 out through the opening into the light and talk to the 
 observers. 
 
 Gradually they have increased the test conditions 
 under which they do this. They now begin by lacing 
 and tying the medium most firmly with rope, especially 
 about the wrists and hands; then they ask one of the 
 observers to enter and seal the knots with wax. They 
 say that soon they shall be able to let the spectators do 
 the tying as well as the sealing. Under the present 
 conditions living faces of different color have been 
 shown at the opening, but last Saturday faces not like 
 that of the medium began to appear. 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 83 
 
 In the room outside a strong paraffin light is used, 
 with a polished tin surface behind, throwing the rays 
 directly upon the faces, which can now stand a far 
 stronger light than they did at first, though it pains 
 them. 
 
 Last Saturday week the first good view was obtained 
 of a fresh spirit face ; the upper part was a little like 
 that of the medium; the under part was half as big 
 again. Mrs. Cook and her sister, who were told to go 
 close up to the cabinet and examine it, recognized it as 
 their mother, and the spirit called attention to a black 
 hilk cap it had on, as worn by Mrs. Cook’s mother be¬ 
 fore her death. 
 
 Last Thursday Katie showed herself while the me¬ 
 dium was tied up and sealed; afterwards a Fellow of 
 the Royal Society took about seven or ten minutes to 
 untie her and set her free ; later in the evening another 
 face appeared in a good light; it had a painful expres¬ 
 sion of countenance, and some of its front teeth were 
 missing, whilst others were disarranged ; the spirit was 
 not recognized by anybody present. 
 
 The position of the observers outside the cabinet 
 influences the manifestations ; the spirits arrange the 
 order in which they sit, and singing is demanded of all 
 the members of the circle at particular stages of the 
 manifestations. The paraffin lamp consists of two con¬ 
 centric cylinders, with a large opening in each. One 
 of the cylinders can be turned by hand, so that when 
 the two openings face each other a strong light is thrown 
 on the faces. Thus, by turning one of the cylinders, a 
 
84 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 strong light, weak light, or total darkness can be ob¬ 
 tained expeditiously at will. 
 
 The splendid results thus obtained in the way of 
 spirit faces are due to the compliance by experienced 
 Spiritualists with those conditions which have been 
 found to most favor the manifestations. Jgjp’ The spirits 
 say they manufacture the faces more or less perfectly 
 and that the life in them is derived from the medium , 
 who is usually in a deep trance all the time. The sides, 
 tops, and backs of the heads are covered with white 
 bandages. The heads have been felt, but only in total 
 darkness at present; iu some cases they have been hol¬ 
 low at the back, just like a wax doll with the back of 
 its head pushed in. They are all living faces, with 
 sparkling eyes and mobile features. When the power 
 is weak the eyes are more fixed than at other times, and 
 the spirits say they cannot then see out of them. When a 
 spirit shows itself for the first time thus, it has more diffi¬ 
 culty in talking than when it has had experience in the 
 work. At first, their attempts to speak result in choking 
 sounds, and a few words may be brought out with diffi¬ 
 culty. They can usually bear the light from two to 
 four minutes. Katie can usually hear the light well, 
 and chat away saucily; she says that the light pains her, 
 and that the gaze of the observers hurts her still more. 
 “ Your eyes act on me like burning-glasses,” she said. 
 
 Little Edith Cook, aged three or four years, much 
 strengthens these manifestations by sitting near the cabi¬ 
 net, outside. The spirits say they get more power from 
 her than from the other outside members of the circle 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS, 
 
 85 
 
 ARTFUL MATERIALIZATION IN A LONDON CIRCLE. 
 
 From the “ Daybreak ” the following additional testi¬ 
 mony is submitted: 
 
 Dear Sir, —Last Friday I had the privilege of being 
 present, with eight others, at the reception of Mr. 
 Herne for an evening seance at my brother’s, Mr. 
 Thomas Dixon, 76 Hampstead Road. Our meeting was 
 not for purposes of an experimental kind, but solely for 
 the purpose of enabling some members of the family to 
 witness, if possible, the tangible presence of a spirit, to 
 whom such presence would remain otherwise uuwit- 
 nessed. We therefore declined Mr. Herne’s invitation 
 to apply ligatures, not regarding mechanical manifesta¬ 
 tions, but looking forward to those evidences of spiritual 
 presence so remarkable in their fourfold character of 
 visibility, tangibility, audibility, and mentality. So, 
 having carefully excluded the light of our lamp, from 
 an extemporized cabinet, formed by the doorway of a 
 small back room, we ensconced Mr. Herne within it in 
 an easy chair, and awaited phenomena, while some of our 
 young folks, by singing, completed our condition of har¬ 
 mony. We had prepared ourselves not to receive much, 
 for the medium had late in the afternoon given a cabi¬ 
 net seance with the object of enabling Mr. Burns to 
 lecture with experimental knowledge on the subject of 
 spirit-faces, and which seance naturally enfeebled the 
 power for the present one. But our singing had not 
 gone far when the phenomena we hoped for began to 
 present themselves. The corner of the upper division 
 of our cabinet screen was raised, and there appeared the 
 head and bust of a man, who spoke iu the well-known 
 voice of “ Peter ; ” he addressed those present by name, 
 taking most and particular notice of the host, whom hf 
 
86 
 
 TIITC DIAKKA 
 
 addressed as “ Quartermaster ” and “ Tom,” entering 
 freely into conversation with him, and calling him to 
 the cabinet, gave him his hand, took off his cap, and 
 put on as a head-covering a ladies’ cap-bag lie 
 found in the cabinet. The arm, being stretched out 
 from the opening, then pulled the host’s coat off easily 
 and gently, and then, coming through or under the 
 lower curtain, pulled off his boot, a high Wellington 
 reaching above the knee. “ Peter ” then retired to 
 make way for “ John King,” who spoke very audibly, 
 and showed his face very distinctly to those nearest him 
 by subdued candle-light, not by any light of or from 
 himself. The host, at his request, felt his hand and 
 beard, as also did one or two others of the party. 
 “ Peter ” then reappeared, holding up the curtain for 
 “ Katy ” to show herself. Some one said, “ Look at 
 Katy’s arm,” when “ Peter” shouted, “No, the arm is 
 mine ! ” while “ Katy ” exhibited herself very beauti¬ 
 fully and distinctly, and whispered her recognitions. 
 On “Katy’s” leaving, “ Peter” asked the host to give 
 him a piece of his beard to make a ring of, and with 
 his permission cut off two pieces—“ one for each side of 
 the ring”—which he said he would make and wear in 
 remembrance of him. I heard scissors snipping the 
 hair, and “ Peter ” said they were his own, and did not 
 cut material hair so easily as material scissors would. 
 During the seance he said he “ must go away for a bit 
 to Chumley Penner’s, and break a table for them,” when 
 Mr. Herne said Williams was not there, but at Brixton ; 
 but “Peter” said, “ You know nothing about it; he is 
 at Chumley Penner’s,” which has since been found to 
 be correct. “ Peter,” among other things, bit the host’s 
 finger hard enough to leave the mark for some hours. 
 He said he did this to let him feel that he could mate¬ 
 rialize his teeth. We all saw, heard, felt, and had men¬ 
 tal correspondence with three spiritual individuals of 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 87 
 
 distinctive appearance and dress, and palpably distinct 
 beings, and all were much pleased at this introduction 
 to Mr. Herne and his generally invisible friend. 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 H. Dixon. 
 
 112 Albany Street, London, Eng., December 11, 1872. 
 
 REMARKS ON THE QUESTION—“ WHAT GOOD ? ” 
 
 In developing the questions of “ What’s the use ? ” 
 and “ What’s the good ? ” of these Diakka and the gen¬ 
 uine literal manifestations, I cannot better meet the 
 minds of the general reader than by giving the sensible 
 words of a sensible man : Long, long ago (he says), 
 I made up my mind that the phenomenon commonly 
 called “ Spiritualism,” is just exactly what it purports to 
 be—-the work of what was once a human being living 
 upon this earth in the condition in which human beings 
 live after their state has ended. 
 
 I have come to this conclusion from knowledge de- 
 rived from two sources—first, the evidence of many 
 people of undoubted veracity; second, from the evi¬ 
 dence of my own senses at times when I have been in 
 as perfect possession of them as at auy other times in 
 my whole life. I have seen, heard, and felt them 
 again and again—not only in the evening, but in open 
 daylight; not only at the rooms of mediums where 
 some machinery might possibly have been so ingeni¬ 
 ously arranged that I could not discover it, but in inj 
 own house where I know there was none. 
 
88 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 .Any other fact, except one relating to the ability of 
 the spirits of the dead, would be considered amply 
 proven on less positive evidence than there is of this ; 
 and any jury would convict a man of murder—and 
 have often done so—on much less positive evidence. 
 The day is past when any man of sound reason, who 
 will take the trouble to investigate to a moderate extent, 
 can rationally deny its truth. 
 
 Starting with these premises, of which I am sure 
 that you have had evidence enough to admit, let us ask 
 concerning it ,Qui bono ? ISTow if there is any truth in 
 Swedenborg’s statements, and I think a careful study 
 will convince us there is much, or if we can draw cor¬ 
 rect inferences from our experience, we cannot escape 
 from the conclusion “ that dead men are no better than 
 living ones; ” that men truthful in this life will be 
 truthful in that; or, in the words of the New Testa¬ 
 ment, “He that is unjust, let him be unjust still,” etc. 
 (see last chap. Revelations), and those that were un¬ 
 truthful in this life will be the same in the future 
 Death does not change the character of man, but simplj 
 strips off his masks and compels him to stand forth as 
 he is, and he becomes after death the image of his own 
 character. 
 
 Now, reasoning from this, we must conclude that 
 if we receive a communication from the spirit of one 
 whom we have known in this life to be truthful and 
 reliable, we may depend upon what such a spirit tells 
 us. From one known as a liar here, we can only ex¬ 
 pect lies. Hence it becomes necessary for us to devisa 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 89 
 
 a means of knowing that the spirits who communicate 
 are the persons whom they purport to be. Paul ad¬ 
 vised his hearers to prove the spirits—that is, to tes* 
 them or their identity. There are many instances in 
 the Bible where “lying spirits” entered into the 
 mouths of prophets and deceived the people. The 
 whole Bible is simply an account of past spirit-com¬ 
 munications, and is without doubt a truthful one. 
 When it is stripped of the coloring and erroneous 
 translations, the work of bigoted theologians to sustain 
 their long-cherished errors, it will show clearly that it 
 is a record of the spirit-communications of the past, 
 with their bearings upon the affairs of men. 
 
 SPIRITUALISM CONSIDERED IN RELATION TO RELIGION. 
 
 The author’s remarks at a recent Anniversary meet¬ 
 ing are here in order. 
 
 Concerning the dispensation of spiritual things: I 
 rejoice in this opportunity to celebrate the inauguration 
 of a universal agitation , which is emphatically the im¬ 
 port and mission of Spiritualism. Spiritual Manifesta¬ 
 tions are a demonstration that man, with respect to his 
 dignity and destiny, is pre-eminently and forever supe¬ 
 rior to the animals and vegetables about him. The 
 essence of that prophecy contained in “ Nature’s Divine 
 Revelations,” was that this living demonstration would 
 re-vive and re-state one of the great principles of the 
 natural religion of the universe—namely, the immor¬ 
 tality of individual man ! Consequently I am not her# 
 
90 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 to celebrate a religion first born twenty-five years ago 
 Spiritualism, taken at its best, is a “ living demonstra¬ 
 tion ” of man’s eternal continuation. Mankind naturally 
 rejoices in that sublime assurance, because however de¬ 
 pressed and gross and imperfect a man or a woman may 
 be, the sweet conviction of such an exalted and endless 
 destiny will exalt the heart to a feeling of capability 
 and dignity, and at last result in perfect redemption. 
 
 I came here to-day to rejoice with you because twenty- 
 five years ago the modern trumpet first sounded in 
 human ears, because then the bells of a new life were 
 rung, and because the rapping manifestations of a spirit 
 existence came plainly out to the senses of investigating 
 man. But I did not come here to-day to rejoice over 
 the birth of a new religion. I believe in the reign of 
 eternal ideas ! and I do not believe in the deification of 
 physical manifestations. Personal immortality, proven, 
 is but a single element in the great principle of natural 
 religion. And this distinction is the difference which 
 has always existed between Harmonial Philosophers 
 and those who pride themselves on being called Spirit¬ 
 ualists. 
 
 Some four years ago, in a small volume, I announced 
 the fact that we, Spiritualists, had a long series of 
 abuses charged against us by our departed friends be¬ 
 cause they had not been approached with respect, nor 
 treated with grateful consideration when they came; 
 and because, also, the good things which they said and 
 did had not taken root within us, which is the only true 
 foundation of spiritual growth among mankind. So 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 91 
 
 believing, I have never attended what are called “ Pub¬ 
 lic Exhibitions of Spirit Power.” Neither have I ever 
 published a protest, nor have I ever verbally uttered 
 one; and I do not now propose to do so. I have, per¬ 
 sonally, seldom sat at such tables and partaken of such 
 viands. Now you say “ that is because you have other 
 things to eat.” Well, I do not deny “ I have meat that 
 you know not of.” But it is just that wholesome species 
 of meat which any honest investigating man and woman 
 can have—the meat of Reason and Truth. The effect of 
 that publication (“ The Fountain”) issued four years ago, 
 was to excite a false sound all through our ranks that 
 “ Brother Davis had recanted ! ” My recantation con¬ 
 sisted, simply, in a wholesome “ caution,” nothing more. 
 And now I notice through the public press that these 
 spiritual “ counterfeiters ” have recently been very in¬ 
 dustrious. I have loi)£ entertained the conviction that 
 many manifestations, such as tying and untying ropes, 
 taking off vests without removing the coat, removing a 
 knife out of a gentleman’s pocket and mysteriously 
 putting it in a lady’s lap, etc., are essentially nothing 
 but ingenious and nefarious deeds of sleight-of-hand; 
 no matter whether such tricks be done by some skilful 
 legerdemain performer living in New York or in 
 another world. You do not touch my veneration when 
 you say to me with reference to such manifestations, “ Sir, 
 that was spiritual, and not human.” I behold spirits all 
 about me—these men and women here—and I always 
 venerate true human nature. It adds nothing to a per¬ 
 son’s excellence because he happens to live in th» 
 
92 
 
 THE DIAKKA AND THEIR VICTIMS 
 
 parlor; neither does it necessarily exalt a person—at 
 least not in my esteem—to tell me that he now resides 
 in the Spiritual world. I live in New York, which is 
 situated somewhere between Ilell Gate and the Elysian 
 Fields. (Laughter.) I am willing to call it “ purga¬ 
 tory,” and yet I meet men and women here who touch 
 my veneration, to whom I am fraternally attached. I 
 love New York City, with its Central Park and with 
 its other great central enterprises. In like manner 1 
 love certain portions and enterprises of our Summer- 
 land. You add nothing to my religious nature by say¬ 
 ing, “ Sir, the Davenport Brothers did not themselves 
 perform the trick.” By this you mean to say, “ The 
 trick was done by attendant spirits for them.” Now 
 what I say is this: I want no such manifestations to 
 form the basis of my religion. And I say to you, ladies 
 and gentlemen, that so long as you coutinue in these 
 trifling facts, so long will you be entitled to receive from 
 seventy-five to eighty per cent, of psychological and 
 wilful deception. Do you suppose that a dispensation 
 of “living demonstrations” which men call “ Spiritual¬ 
 ism ” is an essential part of the foundation of true re¬ 
 ligion ? Certainly not; no more than the ringing of a 
 good strong bell is an essential part of your dinner. 
 Men, working in the shop and field, gladly hear the 
 welcoming sound of the bell about one o’clock ! Gen¬ 
 erally it is rung by a stout and healthily incarnated girl. 
 To me, it is no more wonderful that a man lives after 
 death than that he lives after his birth. 
 
THE INFLUENCE AND STATISTICS OF SPIRIT¬ 
 UALISM. 
 
 An event in human affairs, measured by the flight of 
 time, is but a minute point of light shining into the 
 world of darkness. But the imperishable inmost spirit, 
 measured by the innumerable number of sensations and 
 ideas which it may experience and manifest, is nothing 
 less than a revelation of the hallowed harmonies of the 
 universe. By various instrumentalities, however, an 
 event, beginning as a prophetic star in the black sky of 
 ignorance, may be absorbed and assimilated by the life 
 of humanity, and multiplied and expanded and diversi¬ 
 fied by various individuals, until it shines forth as the 
 full-orbed sun of righteousness with healing in its in¬ 
 finitely extended and lovingly brooding wings. 
 
 Spiritualism, measured by its modern history, com¬ 
 menced in the very bosom of poverty and obscurity—a 
 point of light shining into the abounding gloom of 
 materialism. Twenty-four years ago this day, in the 
 Empire State which holds the metropolis of the Conti¬ 
 nent, a sound , breathing the approach of “ a new 
 heaven and a new earth,” floated down from multitudes 
 gathered upon the resounding shores of the Summer 
 
94 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 land. * And to-day we meet to commemorate that 
 event, and to review briefly those developments which, 
 unceasingly flowing and expanding from that point 
 throughout the civilized races, have destroyed both death 
 and hell, and brought immortality to light. 
 
 First , then, as to its Origin. Spiritualism is founded 
 upon the spiritual constitution of man. It is as natural 
 to the essence of his imperishable inmost as materialism 
 is natural to the instincts of his destructible physical 
 organization. The unceasing recurrence of the phe¬ 
 nomena of death in the universe of organs and bodies 
 is complemented in the world of essences and spirits by 
 the perpetual manifestations of limitless and deathless 
 powers. Hence, strictly speaking, the history of Spirit¬ 
 ualism is coeval with the life of humanity. Manifes¬ 
 tations of spirit commenced with the birth of mankind, 
 at which time also commenced the human fear of death. 
 
 But now we commemorate the origin of the modern 
 revival, after a comparative sleep of such phenomena, 
 following the law of tides in flooding and ebbing through 
 the world, and thus we begin with the external fact. 
 By way of definition, Spiritualism may be seen as—- 
 
 1st, A demonstration of a spiritual constitution within 
 man’s body. 
 
 2d, A demonstration that this organized spiritual man 
 triumphs over the death of the body. 
 
 3d, A demonstration that he can re-visit the earth and 
 bring testimonies to mankind. 
 
 * This discourse was delivered by the author on the occasion ol 
 the twenty-fourth Anniversary of Spiritualism. 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 95 
 
 Thus estimated, we assemble to unite our thanksgiv¬ 
 ings, and to mingle our benedictions over one of the most 
 memorable and illustrious events possible to the entire 
 life of mankind. It is nothing; less than a demonstration 
 to the materialized senses of another universe, with its 
 loftier harmonies and limitless possibilities freely opened 
 to each individual soul! 
 
 Four and twenty years, through every conceivable 
 agency, this demonstration has been constructing a 
 ladder of thought and affection—a means of ascent and 
 descent between the world of things and the realm of 
 eternal life. Looking through the lens of time, we 
 behold bright messengers of love from the Summer- 
 land, bearing the torch of philosophic truth, marching 
 through the habitations of men, pouring a new light over 
 science, developing into usefulness and beauty, intellect¬ 
 ual and moral powers till then sleeping in many honest 
 souls, victoriously attacking the strongholds of oppres¬ 
 sion, overcoming pride and ignorance in high stations, 
 and crowning and filling the whole humanity with joys 
 unspeakable and full of glory. 
 
 Yet the great outside world is only vexed and per¬ 
 turbed by this uncontrollable demonstration. Although 
 hundreds of thousands, yea, millions upon millions 
 of minds have been reached and influenced, yet the 
 present aspect of the movement is far from satisfac¬ 
 tory. 
 
 Second , then , as to its Influence. In surveying the 
 field, in all candor I am enabled to number the great 
 multitude of four millions of persons interested in, but 
 
96 
 
 T1IIC DIAKKA 
 
 not yet liberalized by, modern Spiritualism. These 
 minds are both within and without church organiza¬ 
 tions. With these the initial phenomena have not been 
 excelled, nor yet sufficiently multiplied and defined to 
 convey them beyond the simple fascination of the super¬ 
 natural and wonderful. 
 
 Another multitude approach the sounding shore; 
 with expectant breathing they inhale the atmosphere of 
 this new dispensation ; they become liberalized , but not 
 convinced ; and they number above one million of the 
 world’s brightest and bravest intellects. These are 
 women and men of thought and action ; in walks of lit¬ 
 erature, music, and art; they take part as universal edu¬ 
 cators and inspirers in colleges and lesser institutions 
 for the advancement of both sexes and all races. 
 
 There is yet to be counted another host, about four 
 hundred thousand in this country, who are convinced, 
 but not improved by the influential revelation of mod¬ 
 ern Spiritualism. These investigators have breathed 
 the air of physical phenomena, but their social and 
 moral faculties do not feed at the reservoir of princi¬ 
 ples, in which our Heavenly Parents hide the nourish¬ 
 ment of the best life for mind and for the wholesome 
 growth of character. These Spiritualists, being per¬ 
 fectly convinced of the facts, are energetic both as writ¬ 
 ers and public advocates. Their thoughts are eloquent, 
 and their discourses bright as stars. With unclouded 
 intellects, and lifted somewhat by the under-flood of 
 common inspiration, they proclaim the truth. They 
 effectively aid in establishing among men a knowledge 
 
ANT) THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 97 
 
 of the facts, yet threaten to overthrow our temple of 
 truth, erected in sincere and thoughtful minds, by dis¬ 
 orderly conduct of their external lives. And yet, im¬ 
 mortal laurels bloom on the heights of Spiritualism, and 
 what was called “ evil, and that continually,” is trans 
 formed to stepping-stones fo: the approaching feet of 
 the faithful. 
 
 Another army is marching this way, numbering one 
 million and six hundred thousand adult women and men. 
 These shine with the light of regeneration; they are each 
 individually improved, but not inspired; they receive the 
 exalted harmonies of the New Dispensation into their 
 private lives ; by experience, reason, and cultivation they 
 absorb and assimilate the essentials of our principles; 
 and thus, without immediate inspiration or angel-help, 
 these sixteen hundred thousand in our ranks interpret 
 and exemplify the enrichments and exaltations flowing 
 from the fountain around which we this day meet to 
 rejoice. 
 
 A bright procession, numbering quite two millions, 
 approach through the golden gates of Spiritualism, with 
 freedom and knowledge emanating from them like 
 effulgence from the sun, proclaiming that the world’s 
 second birth is at hand, prophesying of bloody strug¬ 
 gles yet to come, when despots and bigots shall combine 
 against Progress to their own destruction—this throng 
 in Spiritualism are inspired but not organized—individ¬ 
 ualism in its first fruition, a mighty movement sweeping 
 across the Continent from sea to sea, terrible as a dark 
 barbarian mob marching with ever-increasing power 
 5 
 
98 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 against the strongholds of ignorance, error, bigotry, and 
 superstition. The glory and beauty of free-religion, 
 and the victorious development of a higher civilization, 
 waving and expanding like a golden harvest beneath the 
 heavens of the Summerland, are promised by the ef¬ 
 forts of this unorganized mob of inspired women and 
 men, to the number of twenty hundred thousand ! 
 
 Here is a summary of the vast hosts to which I have 
 briefly called your attention : 
 
 Of adnlt persons interested in Spiritualism, but not 
 
 mentally liberalized by it. 4,000,000 
 
 Of adult persons liberalized , but not yet fully convinced 
 
 of Spiritualism. . 1,000,000 
 
 Of adult persons convinced , but not improved in life and 
 
 character. 400,000 
 
 Of adult persons improved by Spiritualism, but not in¬ 
 spired.... . 1,600,000 
 
 Of adult persons inspired by Spiritualism, but not regu¬ 
 lated by it. 2,000,000 
 
 Grand total. 9,000,000 
 
 A somewhat different recapitulation of the modern 
 achievements might illustrate and exhibit the situation 
 and effects in a more intelligible light; thus: 
 
 1. Spiritualism has converted four hundred thousand 
 (400,000) from dark scepticism to a full knowledge of 
 the soul’s individual existence after death. 
 
 2. Spiritualism has attracted the serious attention and 
 interested four million (4,000,000) minds who were in¬ 
 different to the vital interests of humanity. 
 
 3. Spiritualism has rescued from the barren doctrines 
 of orthodoxy and liberalized at least one million 
 (1,000,000) of thoughtful, earnest men and women, and 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 99 
 
 prepared then, for the reception and comprehension of 
 higher ideas of truth and justice. 
 
 4. Spiritualism has awakened from dumb slumber, 
 and manifestly developed into nobler characters, at least 
 one million and six hundred thousand (1,600,000) souls, 
 fortifying their interior faculties with rational concep¬ 
 tions of our Heavenly Parents, bringing to light the har¬ 
 monies of the universe, by and through the Harmonial 
 Philosophy, which is at once a science, a theology, a re¬ 
 ligion, and a revelation of nature, reason, and intuition. 
 
 5. Spiritualism has lifted out of ignorance, poverty, 
 and obscurity, and filled with an unorganized (because 
 unorganizable) inspiration not less than two millions 
 (2,000,000) of the earth’s present inhabitants. It has 
 confounded the wise out of the mouths of the world's 
 unschooled babes and unwashed simpletons! 
 
 These are some of the achievements of the new joy- 
 inspiring dispensation, which has dawned upon the old 
 dead world of theological fossils and bigots. 
 
 We have said nothing of our active efforts in healing 
 the sick, and in lifting up the down-trodden in ever) 
 department of society. The chief manifestations of the 
 mission and powers of Spiritualism are exhibited in 
 mental rather than in physical regeneration, although it 
 is popularly and erroneously believed that angel minis¬ 
 trations are directed for the most part to the augmen¬ 
 tation of the worldly comforts of true believers. 
 
 Notwithstanding the truthful array of figures here 
 presented, the fact remains that human communication 
 with the inhabitants of celestial lands is exceeding!)- 
 
100 
 
 THE DIAKKA 
 
 rare, mixed, and frequently unreliable. Not more than 
 one hundred and fifty test mediums devote their time 
 exclusively to the demands of the public.' In private 
 home retreats, whither the cautious and cowardly gather 
 for investigation and the gratification of insatiable curi¬ 
 osity, we can number at least three thousand (3,000) on 
 both sides of the Atlantic, whose names have not yet 
 been catalogued among professional and publicly acces¬ 
 sible mediums. The proportion is only one medium 
 conscious of an experience in Spiritualism to hundreds of 
 thousands of adult persons as yet both unconscious and 
 unmindful of what we this day assemble to celebrate. 
 
 Of speakers and ministers of Spiritualism, including 
 editors and publicly avowed advocates, continually in 
 the field, either settled or travelling, the number is ex¬ 
 ceedingly limited, compared with the ministerial force 
 of any prominent denomination of Christians. So far 
 in our history the public demand for abnormal speakers 
 is greatly in excess of the supply. Inspirational dis¬ 
 courses, especially if developed successful]} 7 by questions 
 sent to the rostrum by the audience—thus conveying at 
 once a test and instruction, both through prose and 
 spontaneous verse—possess undiminished charms for 
 those who take deep interest in the claims and ideas of 
 Spiritualism. This popular want has been and is being 
 met by about forty men and sixty women, whose ranks 
 are continually recruited from circles, in which speak¬ 
 ers receive their first lessons under psychological con¬ 
 trol, and out of which they graduate to the conference- 
 room and public rostrum. This widespread demand of 
 
AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 101 
 
 the popular appetite for spontaneous prose and inspired 
 verse, has shut like an iron door against the approaching 
 ministry of cultivated normal teachers, who write under 
 the inspiration of great principles, and deliver their 
 productions, from manuscript. These, consequently, 
 believing in subjective mental industry and involuntary 
 spirit culture, retire into other fields of usefulness, in 
 politics, religion, social reforms, etc., surrendering the 
 spiritualistic platform almost wholly to trance, psycho¬ 
 logical, and inspirational advocates. By this means 
 converts are multiplied, while the standard of individual 
 and self-responsible spiritual culture is being steadily 
 lowered to a level with popular Methodism. The socie¬ 
 ties and corporations of Universalists, Unitarians, and 
 free religionists reap large crops out of our harvest 
 fields from this cause alone. Spiritualism fails to 
 utilize normal talents freely offered from the ranks of 
 scholastic and self-educated women and men. They are 
 compelled to find employment and adequate remunera¬ 
 tion in liberal, but less congenial associations. Spirit¬ 
 ualism will accomplish nothing more than an ordinary 
 victory over superstition until its enlightened friends 
 raise the standard of social, moral, and intellectual cult¬ 
 ure. Then, and not till then, will our immortal prin¬ 
 ciples interest leading minds, and lift mankind toward 
 unity and happiness. 
 
 Four and twenty years find us with only the sem¬ 
 blance of organizational existence. The form does not 
 exist because there is among us no formative soul. We 
 are like grains of sparkling sand, which will not unite; 
 
102 
 
 THE DIAKKA AND THEIR VICTIMS. 
 
 not like drops of water, which inevitably flow into co¬ 
 operative fellowship. In this feature our movement is 
 as original as are the most of our cardinal propositions. 
 
 Moreover, Spiritualism has not (excepting the Chil¬ 
 dren’s Lyceum) made its name one with any important 
 public enterprise or great effective labor of beneficence. 
 It is also exceedingly poor in real estate, owning no 
 grand structures adapted to any purpose, and contenting 
 itself with meeting in crude halls and out-of-the-way 
 rooms, unworthy of ideas and believers so magnanimous. 
 
 And yet, in view of the vast and grand develop¬ 
 ments in the philosophical and spiritual domain of this 
 twenty-four year old movement, we hail and invite the 
 coming multitudes of earth ; we offer them drink at our 
 flowing fountains, and we set before them a feast of 
 wholesome things; we give them joy that the Star of 
 Truth, heralded by the choral angels, has so brilliantly 
 arisen above the horizon of our new modern Bethlehem ! 
 The sacred fires of universal liberty, justice, and love 
 burn upon the altars of our Western civilization. An 
 intense fervid spiritual emotion stirs the great heart of 
 the nineteenth century. A boundlessly free religion, 
 based upon a universal recognition of human equal 
 rights, and promoted by a perpetual expansion of equal 
 principles through human souls, is this day the demand 
 of the entire world. And we behold in the manifesta¬ 
 tions and unorganizable inspirations of modern Spirit¬ 
 ualism the preparation for the establishment of a nobler 
 and happier life on earth, for which all living sinners 
 and saints unceasingly pray. 
 

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