Introduction

Most people I know have never heard of Andrew Jackson Davis. If I mention his name they think I am referring to President Andrew Jackson or maybe one of Jefferson Davis' relatives.

I only came upon his name while researching the question of whether Abraham Lincoln was interested in Spiritualism. I found a reference that Abraham Lincoln met and received council from Andrew Jackson Davis.

So, I decided to buy some of his books and research this connection. I started reading his first and main work, The Principles of Nature, published in 1847, which is over 700 pages long. I could not put it down.

Here in front of me was the philosophy and spirituality that I have been searching for all my life and I found answers to some of the most significant spiritual questions that I have been asking. This book truly has meaning for people all over the world today.

What is so fascinating about Davis is the way he obtained this higher knowledge. He claimed to be able to enter into a higher consciousness, or dimension (he calls it a higher sphere), and observe the world and the universe with a higher awareness.

At the time he received this gift, he was about 19 years old and fairly uneducated. Up to this time he only had five months of education and never read more than six books.

His first book, The Principles of Nature, reveals new and prophetic information in the sciences that includes astronomy, physics, biology, metaphysics, medicine, philosophy, education, spirituality, government, and many other areas.

It has to be one of the most all encompassing books of knowledge and prophecy ever written. Some of his predictions in the sciences and astronomy have only recently been shown to be true.

My purpose in writing this book is to introduce you to the life and writings of Andrew Jackson Davis and encourage you to read his works. That is why I took the approach of using direct quotes whenever possible rather than rewriting what he had said.

Also, since he has written over 30 books, and his major work, The Principles of Nature, is over 700 pages, I wanted to give an overview for those who do not have the time or motivation to read his books in their entirety.

After I discovered Andrew Jackson Davis, I decided to postpone my book on Abraham Lincoln and just write one on this amazing Prophet. After my first draft, I realized that it would be more complete if I added a chapter on Abraham Lincoln's interest and involvement in Spiritualism.

I had spent much time researching this for my book and had most of the materials. I think this is very appropriate since it seems very probable that Lincoln did know and consult with Andrew Jackson Davis since Davis was also considered the most famous spiritualist at that time.

The Life of Andrew Jackson Davis

Andrew Jackson Davis was born on August 11, 1826, in Blooming Grove, a small hamlet located in Orange County along the Hudson River in New York. He was the child of an alcoholic father who made his living as a cobbler and weaver. His mother, who was illiterate, was religious and superstitious.

There are prophetic overtones to the story of how Andrew Jackson Davis came by his name. A good friend of the family, whom they called Uncle Maffet, visited the Davis' house when the boy was just four days old and yet unnamed. Uncle Maffet took it upon himself to do the honors.

He raised up the infant in his arms and said: "I am going to vote for "Old Hickory', the hero of New Orleans, the greatest man a-livin' in the world and I want this boy to bear that great man's name - ANDREW JACKSON." Then he added in a somber tone, "I know what I'm a-sayin' and I say that great man's name hasn't reached further than will the influence of this 'ere son of yourn."

How could Uncle Maffet have had an inkling as to the strange and unlikely path that this child would traverse in his lifetime? This was a bold statement to make about a child born in a very poor family in an obscure place. That Andrew Jackson Davis' name would be more widely known in the world than President Andrew Jackson at the time was preposterous!

The Davis family picked up and moved around frequently, due to his father's restlessness. As a consequence, the young Andrew Jackson Davis had very little schooling. He spent his days playing around the house and helping with chores.

In the spring of 1838, at the age of 11, he was hired out. Being quite handy with a hoe secured him employment working the fields in a neighboring farm. On a warm day, toiling in solitude in the middle of a corn field, he began to hear the sounds of sweet and strange music.

" It seemed to emanate from the airy space above me, and had a pathos like the sighing of autumnal winds. Being far away from trees and human habitations, its source was unaccountable. Unlike anything I had ever before heard, it appeared to be breathing in the very fibres of my brain... yea, through the substance of my inner being and throbbing heart... awakening there the tenderest emotions, and filling my juvenile mind with loving sympathies toward the unknown human world."

"There was born in me an inexpressible yearning to know and love everything human. I seemed to be lifted, as by a miracle, above the mists of selfishness. While I listened, confounded and transfixed with joy and wonderment combined, I seemed distinctly to hear, floating down upon the glistening solar ray, as it were, and indescribably blending with the Aeolian strains of the mysterious melody, these words:"

"You-may-desire-to-travel."

For about three days afterwards, this enchantment lingered. Davis had yet to discern the significance of the message or the music. Still, he spent hours trying to understand what these words meant for him. The only conclusion he could draw was that this experience was imaginary.

Much to his surprise his thoughts were interrupted abruptly by the sound of the same voice saying "to-Poughkeepsie." Why Poughkeepsie? He honestly had no idea, but he decided that it might be worth pursuing.

After continually suggesting to his mother and father that they should move there, they finally relented and later that year, the family moved to Poughkeepsie, New York. While there, Davis worked with his father as a shoemaker for about 18 months, and in a grocery store that his father owned.

On a chilly day in February of 1841, at the age of 14, Davis felt something like a black veil suddenly dropped over his face. He had entered some type of trance. This is how he described what happened next:

"All space seemed to be instantly filled with a golden radiance! The world was transformed! Winter snows and icy barriers had melted and glided away; warm breezes played with glowing sunbeams; fruit trees were blossoming in the garden before me; bright birds sent out their melodious songs upon the perfumed air."

"New and beautiful flowers decorated the margins of many paths that led to a gorgeous palace which stood where the tenant-house was just a few moments previous; a celestial bloom and an immortal loveliness shone forth everywhere; and I heard what, as on other occasions, sounded like my mother's voice calling as from an unseen window of the palatial superstructure, 'Come-here-child: I-want-to-show-you-my-new-house'!"

Davis was amazed at the sight of this spacious and magnificent house that his mother was now living in. Where did it come from? This was in stark contrast to the miserable little house they had been living in. He suddenly came out of this state and went home.

When he arrived there, he found his mother dying. He realized that she had given him a vision of what the afterlife would be like for her. Davis was comforted by this vision and now knew that life continued after death in a beautiful way.

When spring came (1841), he became an apprentice to Ira Armstrong, a local shoemaker. This apprenticeship lasted for about two years. It is important to emphasize that up to this time, his total schooling amounted to about five months.

" He learned to read imperfectly, to write a fair hand, and to do simple sums in arithmetic."

He was never known to visit public libraries and was seldom seen reading a book. In fact, up to this point in time, he never read more than a half-dozen books.

About the year 1843, Davis first became aware of slavery. Remember that this was just roughly 18 years before the Civil War. When he was told by a friend that there were millions of men, women, and children who were no different than him except for a black skin, and that they were dwelling in hopeless bondage, he said his heart throbbed with emotions of surprise, sympathy, and unutterable alarm.

" Jest think of it! S'pose I'd b'en born black down South with my ignorance, why, I'd b'en somebody's slave!"

The mere idea chilled him to the core.

Later that same year, when Davis was just 17 years old, he attended a lecture on Mesmerism right in his home town of Poughkeepsie. It was given by a traveling Doctor, J.S. Grimes, Professor of Jurisprudence at the Castleton Medical College.

Announcements stated that Professor Grimes would exhibit his wonderful experiments at the Village Hall. The excitement spread like an epidemic. His lectures and demonstrations were attended by almost everyone in town.

Let me take a moment to explain mesmerism. It is a word derived from Anton Mesmer, the eighteenth-century physician who applied animal magnetism or psychic influences in the treatment of disease. It was similar to what we know today as hypnosis.

Supposedly it produced a trance state when done successfully. Individuals skilled in mesmerism like Dr. Grimes would travel to different towns and lecture on mesmerism and then try to mesmerize volunteers from the audience.

The results were similar to what you would expect from hypnosis and were very entertaining at that time. Davis relates with humor his first experience with mesmerism.

"We joined some fifteen young men who, like ourselves, had arrived to present themselves as willing subjects of the new mystery. The party was seated in systematic order, each facing the operator, and thus we remained nearly two hours."

"The professor went through a series of motions resembling the "presto changeo" of legerdemain performers, and then imperiously said: "You can't open your eyes!' He was mistaken. I did open my eyes with perfect ease. Whereupon he passed to the next subject, then to the next, and so on, to the end of the line, without particularly affecting any."

A few days later (about December 1, 1843), Davis walked into the shop of a local tailor and friend, William Levingston, who was also experimenting with mesmerism. Levingston asked Davis if he had ever been mesmerized. Davis informed him of the unsuccessful experiment of Mr. Grimes.

Levingston told him to come to his house that night and he would try his hand at it. That night, Livingston was successful and threw Davis into a trance. The results were astonishing and not the typical response found in mesmerized subjects.

It was observed that in this trance Davis was clairvoyant and could do things that normal people could not. (Clairvoyance is defined as the power or ability of discerning objects not present to the senses and/or the ability to perceive matters beyond the range of ordinary perception.)

Davis was able to read closed books, diagnose illnesses, and prescribe treatments which usually worked. When Davis came out of the trance, he remembered nothing. This is what Davis asked and how Levingston responded.

Davis: "What's been done? Tell me all about it."

Levingston: "Why, after a little, you read from your forehead the large letters on a newspaper; told the time by our watches, and besides, you described where some of us are diseased; all to our perfect satisfaction."

Davis later said that, "It was impossible, without a qualified magnetizer to enter the sphere of wisdom which was necessary to enable me to relate these things." William Fishbough (the person who later wrote down what Davis saw in his trance state for his first book) said:

" The boy exhibited powers of clairvoyance which were truly surprising. He visited and described places which he had never seen, read from a closed volume with his eyes bandaged, etc. The result was to establish his power of interior insight beyond dispute. "

(His ability to diagnosis and prescribe treatments for patients is very similar to what Edgar Cayce did about 50 years later.)

The following is an explanation by Fishbough of how Davis diagnosed individuals: "We also at the same time heard him examine a
number of patients while in the clairvoyant state. While in the latter state he appeared as if metamorphosed into a totally different being."

"The human system seemed entirely transparent to him, and to our utter astonishment he employed the technical terms of anatomy, physiology, and material medica (medical terminology), as familiarly as household words!"

"Our surprise was equally excited by the exceeding clearness with which he described and reasoned upon the nature, origin, and progress of a disease, and concerning the appropriate means to employ for its removal."

Another acquaintance, James Flagler later said:

" His descriptions of various ailments, both mental and physical, as well as his prescriptions for cure, were truly wonderful and astonishing to all who knew him."

"Educated doctors would admit that his anatomical descriptions were correct, and that his remedies were curious and philosophical, displaying a knowledge of things of which he knew nothing when in his normal condition."

"At that time he had no power to remember what transpired in his clairvoyant state, while in his natural condition; but he has since attained that power, as well as that of self-magnetization. He does not therefore now need a manipulator. His experiences are still quite as astonishing to himself as to others."

Being in this superconscious state, he claimed that he could understand universal and divine laws, and the causes and effects of events. He said that he had reached what he called the Superior Condition. In this state, he claimed to be able to receive truths from higher spheres of consciousness. Davis also claimed to be able to visit the spiritual world at will.

From that time, Davis was frequently thrown into this abnormal state. After about three months of submitting himself to all kinds of tests and demonstrations, he informed his magnetizer, Mr. Levingston that the objects of his powers were not for demonstrations and for wonder seekers, but, "to enable him to examine, and prescribe for the diseased."

Levingston asked Davis, "Then how shall we convince the unbelieving?" He said he would convince the unbelieving by doing good. He would exclusively now examine and prescribe for the sick.

This he did and shortly afterwards, he left his apprenticeship with Mr. Armstrong and entered into a full time partnership with Mr. Levingston to treat patients. From the testimonies, it appears that he was surprisingly successful.

Flshbough states:
"Shortly after this, he left Mr. Armstrong, to whom he was an apprentice, and entered with his magnetizer Mr. Levingston into the exclusive employment of treating the diseased, in which employment, as it appears from all the testimonies we have received, he was surprisingly successful."

" Not long after this, and by progressive stages, his scientific powers became immensely unfolded; and there was no science the general principles and much of minutiae of which he did not seem to comprehend while in his abnormal state."

"He also from time to time presented many novel and highly-interesting ideas concerning the nature and powers of the human soul, seeming to demonstrate an intimate connection between the present and the spirit world."

A new development occurred in March of 1844. All of a sudden, he fell, without the assistance of a magnetizer, into a strange abnormal state. For two days, he was insensible to the external world and lived wholly in an interior state.

He traveled, or was mystically transported as some think, to the Catskill Mountains which were about 40 miles away. At this location, he received information of his "future and peculiar mission to the world."

He claimed to have met and communicated It that time with Galen, the Greek Physician and Philosopher, and Emanuel Swedenborg, the Swedish Seer. Both of them had been dead for some time. He also experienced a great mental illumination at that time.

Davis continued his work diagnosing and prescribing for patients with Mr. Levingston for about 18 months. He not only saw patients in his home town of Poughkeepsie, but traveled to several other cities in Connecticut in which he had patients.

When not traveling, Davis was thrown into this trance state on the average of twice a day. Again his sole purpose at this time was to diagnosis and prescribe remedies and treatment to the sick.

In August of 1845, Davis asked Dr. Silas Lyon, who he had met several months earlier, to be his new magnetizer. Dr. Lyon accepted and left his practice in Bridgeport and moved with Davis to New York.

They wanted to be in a large city where they could see many more patients than in a rural area. Davis, for three months, twice a day, for a total of 4 hours a day, went into his abnormal state and diagnosed and prescribed remedies for patients that came to him.

In November of 1845, Davis wrote to a William Fishbough, who was living in New Haven, Connecticut, and asked him to be a scribe (write down what he would say) for a series of lectures that were to commence immediately.

Fishbough was to write them down and prepare them for eventual publication in a book. He agreed and also moved to New York to be near Davis.

These lectures, which began in 1846, were the substance of his first and most famous book The Principles of Nature. The lectures lasted for 15 months and were published in 1847 when he was 21 years of age. It is best described in the introduction of the book by William Fishbough:

"A WORK of unprecedented character is here presented to the world. It consists of the consecutive reasonings and revelations of a spirit freed, by a certain physical process, the philosophy of which is explained, from the obstructing influence of the material organization, and exalted to a position which gave access to a knowledge of the structure and laws of the whole material and spiritual Universe. It treats upon subjects of the profoundest interest and of the most unspeakable importance to the human race."

He eventually wrote and published over 30 books in 45 editions. His spiritual writings included topics such as the seven planes of existence, mental and physical health, astronomy, physics, chemistry, philosophy, education, government, and many others.

In his writings about the human body and health, Davis described how the human body was transparent to him in this trance state. Each organ of the body stood out clearly with a special luminosity of its own which greatly diminished in cases of disease.

From 1850 to 1858, Davis wrote a large 5 volume set called, The Great Harmonia. It covers such broad areas as the origin of man, health and disease, psychology, marriage, immortality, the deity, clairvoyance, social reform, and education, just to name a few.

Davis also predicted the coming age of Spiritualism and is sometimes referred to as the John the Baptist of Spiritualism. In his Principles of Nature (1847), he states:

"It is a truth that spirits commune with one another while one is in the body and the other in the higher spheres - and this, too, when the person in the body is unconscious of the influx, and hence cannot be convinced of the fact."

"And this truth will ere long present itself in the form of a living demonstration. And the world will hail with delight the ushering in of that era when the interiors of men will be opened, and the spiritual communion will be established."

Several years later, on March 31, 1848, the Fox sisters in Hydesville, NY began hearing spirit rappings and this event shook the world into the possibility of communications with spirits. Davis believed this was the event he prophesied about in 1847.

Davis had some conflict with the spiritualists at that time. He believed that Spiritualism had a limited purpose and was not an end into itself.

"I acknowledge that spirits can and do perform kindly offices for those on earth. I would not discourage any friend from obtaining all the benefit he reasonably can through the aid of spiritual beings."

"But this benefit can be secured only on the condition that we allow them to become our teachers, not our masters; that we accept them as companions, not as gods to be worshipped. Spiritualism is useful as a living demonstration of a future existence. It abundantly proves this; but nothing else with certainty."

He also warns us not to trust all spirits.

"All spirits are not wise, pure, and holy beings. There are untruthful, ignorant, immoral, selfish, impure, and un-spiritual spirits."

In 1857, Davis published his first autobiography, The Magic Staff. This was a very popular book of Davis' both in the United States and Europe.

From 1861-1864 the Civil War raged in the United States. Davis did not serve but was outspoken on the evils of slavery and the need for social reforms. He was a strong advocate of women's and children's rights and all kinds of progressive reforms.

It is thought that Davis met and advised Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War. It is known that Lincoln and his wife were interested in Spiritualism and had attended several seances. In fact, they even had some held in the White House.

A book [Interior Causes of the War, by David Quinn] about Lincoln written during the Civil War in 1863 mentions that Davis had visited the White House to meet with Lincoln and that Lincoln had visited him when he was in New York.

From 1860 to 1864 he [Davis] was editor in chief of the The Hearld of Progress journal, whose office was located in New York. This journal published a wide range of subjects from political questions, reforms, Spiritualism, pros and cons on the Bible rights of women and children, etc.

In 1873, Davis opened a Progressive Publishing House in New York City. It did not do well financially and it was closed ii 1876.

Davis was married three times. His first marriage was to Catherine De Wolf in 1848. Davis was 22 years old and Catherine was 42. She was sickly when she married Davis and died about 5 years later in 1853.

His second marriage was to Mary Fenn Robinson in 1855. She was only 2 years older than Davis. In 1885, after 30 years of marriage, they were divorced.

Davis' third and last marriage was to Delphine Elizabeth Markham. They met as medical students at the United States Medical College in New York in 1882.

Davis was 56 when he became a medical student. In 1883, Davis was awarded the M.D. degree and the degree of Doctor of Anthropology from the U.S. Medical College, and the M.D. was also conferred on 24 other graduates, among whom was his wife, Delphine.

He was probably the first person in the United States to talk about preventive medicine, and educated his patients on this He had always said: "For man to be well, he needs to be educated"

In 1885 he published the second book of his autobiography entitled, Beyond the Valley. This continued where the, Magic Staff, left off.

He eventually retired to Boston and opened a small book shop called the Progressive Bookstore. There he saw patients and prescribed herbal remedies. He died January 13, 1910 and his body was cremated.

I would like to end this chapter on his life by addressing a question that is frequently asked about Davis. If he was able to go at will into this higher sphere and access almost unlimited knowledge and wisdom, why didn't he give us more information regarding spiritual truths, natural laws, prophecies, etc.?

It is a very good question which Davis answers himself.

"In-as-much as the knowledge of this Sphere is entirely above the comprehension of the human race, I am not permitted to dwell upon it to any extent."

"For I perceive that all these relations are only permitted as a means to elevate the inhabitants of the earth, and to purify all their spiritual sentiments."

"But I am not permitted to do at all times, in-as-much as it would be revealing that which the human race should not know."

Basically, he can communicate to us only the knowledge that will help the human race and not the knowledge that we should not know at this time. So he gives us at this time only what is good for us.

Death is a beautiful and happy experience.

Artists drawing from Davis'
description (1857)

Davis makes it clear from the beginning that death is not an extinction of the individual person, but is just a change in the location of the person's consciousness and spirit. The spirit relocates from a physical body to a spiritual body. Instead of living in the physical world, it now lives in the spiritual world.

Most religions also teach that death is not the end of existence, but they do not know or can explain the actual process of what happens at death. Some have speculated but Davis explains from actual experience and being able to see what happens during death. He reveals the greatest mystery of all times.

Davis' view of death is so enlightening because the current theologies and religions are ignorant of and in error about what happens at death and offer little hope and encouragement to humanity. Davis gives words of encouragement to the dying.

" Fear not. Do not believe that death is a final termination of existence. Death is only an event in the eternal life of the experience of the human soul."

Death is just the birth of the spirit into a new and more perfect state of existence. Thus there is no extinction in death. Only the mode of existence has changed and is improved and elevated.

The Death Process:

"Death starts at the very center of vitality (The heart area)." You can see this emanation forming a small ribbon rising up from that area in the drawing. It becomes larger and forms a cloud about three feet above the person. This cloud is attached to the person by a psychical cord or ribbon as he calls it.

This emanation gets larger and ascends higher in the air until it maintains a higher position near the ceiling. Now as this process continues, the emanation starts to come out from the head area instead of the heart area.

That is why we see two ribbons coming off the person, one from the heart area, and later this ribbon moves up and starts coming off the head area. It is the same ribbon but shown at different times in the death process.

These are Davis' words explaining this process so far:
"There was, at first, a broad, ribbon-shaped current arising from the epigastrium [part of the abdominal wall above the umbilicus, navel]. As it ascended, it separated, and expanded into a sort of fleecy steam-cloud, about three feet above the bosom, in the air where the effulgent elements assumed the form of an inverted pyramid with a turbinate envelope, which was, by a strong psychical cord, attached to the solar ganglia, a sort of linea alba tube.

"The inverted pyramidal cloud gradually assumed an oval shape externally, amid, internally, a representation of the perfect ellipse, approximating to a globular form, with a throbbing sun-bright nucleus, which seemed like the germ-cell from which, in a few moments, the miracle would be wrought of an immediate incubation, rapidly resulting in the production of a full-formed and indescribably perfect angel man!"

The spirit of the person now passes through this cord from the body into the cloud above: "...through which flowed with lightning rapidity and vividness, the indestructible essences that were hastening to take their appropriate positions in the incorruptible body of the spirit."

He describes the motion of this cloud as the spirit moves into it. There are up-and-down and side-to-side movements of this cloud.

"Before the outline of the immortal head was visible, I observed that the cloud-like appearance of the emanations, as a whole, manifested several remarkable innate movements. There were vertical motions, upward and downward; lateral motions, like an anchored balloon, from side to side; then rotary or gyrating motions, like a spinning-top immediately before losing its momentum."

"These various graceful motions completely subsided, and the whole became absolutely still, when the formation had advanced sufficiently to unfold the head and bust."

Within this cloud, you can first see develop a head, the upper body, and then the entire spirit man. His form is perfect and beautiful. When this ribbon or thread snaps, the spiritual body is free and ready to leave to the hereafter which he calls the Summer-Land.

He now sums up this process in five steps:

"1st stage: The appearance of the linea alba [a fibrous structure that runs down the midline of the abdomen in humans], capped with a tremulous fleecy psychical cloud.

2nd stage: A brilliant pyramidal mass, with lily-shaped flames breathing upward and all around from beneath.

3rd stage: The definite appearance of a bright sun-golden nucleus, within an elliptical or globular mass of inter-attractive emanations.

4th stage: A series of most graceful motions up and down from side to side, and round and round.

5th stage: After the cessation of the motions, the rapid progressive formation of the entire body celestial."

It appears below that the person is not conscious or aware of this process as it is going on. He says during this process the spiritual being is asleep and has no consciousness of its existence. It is an unconscious slumber. In many cases the sleep is long and in others very short.

"Death is but a door which opens into a new and more perfect existence. It is a triumphal arch through which man's immortal spirit passes at the moment of leaving the outer world to depart for a higher, a more sublime, and a more magnificent country."

The Hereafter or the Summer-Land

Much of this description of the hereafter of Summer-Land comes from Davis' book Death and the After-Life. The last stage we discussed in the death process was when the ribbon or thread that connected the physical body with the spiritual body snapped.

Now released, the spiritual body formed is perfect and beautiful. If the person had any disease or deformity in his physical body, it is not present in the spiritual body. It looks beautiful and radiant, nothing like we could imagine on earth.

At this point, the clairvoyant would see the spiritual body moving toward a thread of magnetic light which has penetrated the room. This golden shaft of celestial light contacts the spiritual body near the head.

This thread of light now draws the spirit to the outside door and once outside, the thread draws the body up into the air. The spirit is now surrounded by a beautiful assemblage of guardian friends. They throw their loving arms about the sleeping spirit as they move upwards towards the Summer-Land or hereafter.

Clairvoyants and mediums can see this process but the average person can not. He only sees a dead corpse in the room and not the beauty of this transition. If he could, the sting of death would be taken away and he would joyously celebrate the transition of this person he loved.

When the time comes for this spirit's awakening, celestial music, the melody of distant streams, or something like breathing causes the sleeping spirit to awake. He is now conscious of the Summer-Land.

The place or location that a spirit takes in the Summer-Land is in accordance with his moral character, and not with his intellectual or social status. Whether the person has been spiritually loyal to truth, justice, liberty, and the divine laws that regulate social relations on the higher planes of being determines the position and gravitation of the person in the Summer-Land.

Davis brings up something very interesting regarding people who have had strong religious beliefs. When they awake in the Summer-Land, they are astonished that they are not taken immediately into the presence of the great Jehovah, or cast down in some low places where they burn with brimstone.

Some souls, who have been in the Summer-Land for years, are still expecting to see the great Day of Judgment when they will either be caught up to a higher glory, or cast down to some lower depth.

If these souls communicate with mediums, they would talk about their religious beliefs they are still clinging to. That is why mediums tell contradictory things and not always what is true.

It depends on the level of the spirit they are communicating with. Some spirits are on higher levels and have higher knowledge, and some are lower spirits that still cling to their false beliefs that they had on earth.

In the Summer-Land, all souls learn and advance spiritually. They have the help of many advanced teachers who guide and instruct them. I think it would be fair to say that as there is spiritual growth in this physical world, there is a continuation of this growth in the Summer-Land, only on a higher level.

The ultimate goal is spiritual perfection. Some spirits who had violent deaths may sleep for longer times once they reach the Summer-Land, but once awakened are nurtured and comforted until they can continue on their path.

Infants that die continue to grow slowly and surely in the Spirit-World acquiring the personal growth that they would have attained had they lived in the body the full number of years. Keep in mind that this refers to the growth of the spiritual body and not of the physical body.

Now, the complete history of each person is written in the Summer-Land. Some enter with lower spiritual development than others. Death is a cleansing process and in the Summer-Land we continue to cleanse and purify our spirit.

We also tend to gravitate with spirits that are similar to us. Maybe this is not so much different than what we have on earth. We have all kinds of individuals in different levels of spiritual development and we tend to associate with people like ourselves.

This is important for us to know since we should not wait but begin at once to work on our spiritual development so we can continue in the Summer-Land and make better progress.

Our entire existence is one of spiritual development that started on planet Earth and will continue in the Summer-Land.

In Davis' book, Answers to Ever-Recurring Questions from the People, the following question is asked and answered: "What do you mean by the expression Summer-Land?

ANSWER: "There is a philosophical reason for the expression: 'Summer Land.' The difference between this world and the adjoining sphere is as wide and as marked as between the seasons of winter and summer. In this world we find, at best, nothing but time rudiments of the next. Sickness and death terminate man's career on earth."

"In the next world he can know, by experience, nothing of either death or sickness. The minutes of man's life on earth are counted by grains of iron and sand. In the next life his time is measured by time ripples of love and wisdom."

"Evil converts the present life into a stormy winter, and the darkness of ignorance and suffering flings sadness over the whole race; but in the next world there is a summery bloom on the cheek of every one, from the least to the greatest, and the song of the thronging millions is filled with the music of perpetual summer."

"But the time is coming on earth when the will of the Great Good 'will be done' as it is in the Summer World. The realities of the upper life will at last shine into this life, and the 'kingdom of heaven' will have come with its everlasting verdure, blending the two worlds so perfectly, that every part of earth will be supremely blest and beautiful."

"Until that holy day, with its omnipotent love and endless glory, dawns all over the earth, it will be naturally and truthfully expressive by way of contrast, to think and speak of the spirit world as the SUMMER- LAND."

Now Davis explains to us that the infallible history of each person is written in the Summer-Land. The good news is that we do not take all our bad things with us when we die.

"Death is a chemical screen... a strainer, a finely-woven sieve... through which, by the perpetual flow of the laws of Mother Nature, individuals are passed on to their true stations in the Summer-Land. The squares in the death-sieve are so exceedingly fine, that only finest particles and certain powers and principles can go through; while on the earth-side is peeled off and cast down a lifeless mass of bones and fleshly corruption."

"A process of refinement is this wondrous chemico-sieve death-experience. The spirit with the encasing soul, hidden centers of life, all the characteristics that have distinguished, and all the motives that have influenced the Person... all these easily pass through the death-strainer, the screen or sieve; while the physical body and its particles, which cannot pass through, are dropped and what is more gratifying, with the physical body are left behind many of those hereditary predispositions and abnormal conditions which gave rise to discordant passions and false appetites, called demons and unclean spirits."

"The causes of these demons and unclean spirits remain on the earth-side of the death-strainer, while the effects, which those causes exerted on the soul, being so fine and so mixed with the soul-substance, pass through, and remain with the individual long after he has attained to his social center in the Summer-Land."

" Persons, or, rather, individualities, are not therefore destroyed by death. Nothing is changed save the dense physical form and the low material world in which they live. This chemical screening , this extraordinary refining process and preparation, is one which all have to submit to at the end of the present life. The effect there is like the birth of each into the present world."

We are still left with our personality and individuality which we continue to work on and make spiritual progress in the Summer-Land, but many of the bad influences are removed by this screening process. We then become associated with social centers that our temperaments and characteristics are most closely aligned with.

" In the temperaments and characteristics of the individual are laid the foundations of the different 'Social Centers' that exist in the different mansions of the Father's house that was not built with hands.

"Those mansions, or, to continue the figure, the different rooms, are inhabited by classes of persons who have taken with them, through the death-strainer, different intellectual, spiritual, and social characteristics
... integral attributes and temperamental individualities of character... ruling affections, and the effects of propensities that have been generated and strengthened by long-continued practices in this world
before death."

"Regeneration is a spiritualizing process, the same after death as it sometimes is before. If the person starts from earth interiorly cleansed, he will arrive at the next sphere in a corresponding condition. If the persons start from their death-screener with the earth, the flesh, and the demoniac influences impressed upon their souls, they will arrive at and sojourn in appropriate "Social Centers," with the accumulated effects still influencing the inner life and the manifestations of the affections."

"Thus radical differences in men and women cause different societies in the next sphere. Are there not many persons about you, perhaps dwelling every day in your homes, who have 'no part or lot' in your cherished sentiments and happiest experiences?"

"You sit at the dining-table, you look into the eyes of a person on the opposite side, and to; you are strangers by leagues, perhaps you are whole ages asunder. Different sentiments, different attractions, and different social habits, give rise to different societies."

"Perhaps husband and wife, or brother and sister, though living in this world in the same house, eating at the same table, will become members of spiritual Societies as far apart as the poles asunder. Society would be everywhere monotonous, both on earth and in the succeeding sphere, if individuals were all alike, all cast with the same combination of temperaments."

" You begin plainly to comprehend, I think, that if these things are true on earth... about you and in you... death not destroying you, there must be great "diversities' among the inhabitants in the Summer-Land.

"These various super-mundane societies are predicated upon the continuation of the radical distinguishing characteristics of men and women. There are, consequently, societies embodying many of the effects of the immoral motives and degrading purposes by which women and men have been actuated and made miserable in this world."

" This is an important and momentous truth. The Summer-Land is a natural state of human existence-growing out of the universal system of causes and effects, laws and ultimates, just as logically and scientifically as to-day grew out of yesterday."

"Are you not to-day, in all parts of your being, the legitimate result of what the laws, conditions, and experiences of yesterday made you? You are dead to yesterday. Your life is here and now. All you know of yesterday is remembrance."

"No man or woman can live in any past hour, except in the chambers of intangible memory. You live Now, and thus it will be innumerable ages hence. The universal verdict of reason will be this ever-present consciousness of existence... the Past a ghost of the memory; the Future an unfinished picture, illuminated by the inextinguishable lights of eternal hope."

According to Andrew Jackson Davis, the Summer-Land is vastly more magnificent than the most beautiful landscape on earth. Celestial waters are clear and bright, like crystals; the atmosphere is softer and more vibrant; and the streams are musical.

Even the landscape is more varied and exotic. Davis describes much of the scenery in the Summer-Land as being composed of unimaginable colors, sounds, and fragrances.

I guess we could never explain those scenes in words. It is a heaven in the true sense, but it is not an end. We continue on our journey of spiritual advancement. We also have a reunion with those friends and family members that have died before us.

Thus, there is much rejoicing when a spirit reaches the Summer-Land and is awakened. Spirits can travel in the Summer-Land to various locations to see and learn about many different things.

Where is the Summer-Land located? Davis says there is an inhabitable zone, or circular belt of refined and stratified matter in the heavens. That is, the Summer-Land physically exists in our universe but the matter is refined or spiritual matter.

For meditation think upon these simple rules:

1. In the morning arise resolved to do nothing against, but everything for, the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth.

2. Happiness being the object, let every action during the day be preceded by. such well-conceived and well-developed thoughts as tend to its attainment.

3. At night retire at peace with yourself — at peace with all the world.''

Draw these axioms into your soul — I know them to be the first steps toward happiness and culture. Andrew Jackson Davis

Women in Our Society
BY
Andrew Jackson Davis

Women probably comprise the biggest half of the human race. Her position has been, and is even to-day, to some extent, one of dependence. Although many believe that Christianity gave woman her freedom, an investigation of that claim proves its utter falsity.

The fact that woman has had to fight so strenuously for her rights, and that she has been consistently opposed by the exponents of the Christian church, is in itself a refutation of the claim that Christianity liberated woman.

The constitution of the theological scheme of the Christian religion is against granting to her equal rights with man. According to this, she is, in the words of one of the Church Fathers, "the betrayer of the tree," she is even regarded as "the gate of hell," while Paul's declaration of woman's inferiority is definite enough.

And in the early days of the fight for woman's freedom, no clergyman was to be found in the ranks of the pioneers; all were Rationalists, Secularists, or Spiritualists. The church wherever possible has opposed the freedom which is woman's natural and legitimate right.

And it has needed a war (The American civil war 1861-1865) of tremendous magnitude to bring about the granting of the franchise to woman in this country, even in a limited form, a step we hope towards universal suffrage.

The influence of the old story of the Garden of Eden is still apparent in the world. If we wanted an example of the psychological influence of belief, we have it in this question. How many men, even today, regard woman as inferior, more as a toy than an intellectual equal.

They consistently shut out their womankind from all questions outside the home, saying they cannot understand them. Subconsciously what is in the minds of such men is this: woman was made from the rib of a man, and as there is no intelligence in a rib, there is none in a woman.

They forget, as most Christian theologians do also, that if sin and death came into the world through woman, according to their scheme, life did also, for they believe that God chose a woman for His mother in order to destroy the work of the devil.

It all sounds so puerile and savours of such infantile efforts to solve the problem of evil, that one wonders that any being claiming to be so superior could come to believe such absurd theories.

The Harmonial Philosophy is very clear and explicit in regards to women. It regards her as the embodiment of the Love Principle, as man is the
embodiment of the Wisdom Principle. Neither is complete alone. As an embodiment of the Love Principle she has definite rights and spheres of action.

Thus... "through the medium of childhood she moulds the individual; through the family medium, she influences and refines the husband: through the social medium, she influences and spiritualizes legislation and government.''

From these spheres of action she cannot be excluded by man though she may be limited in her action by him. We see at once that those three spheres of action are the normal and legitimate fields of activity for the Love Principle.

As is often said, "The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world," and this is more true than we are usually prepared to recognize. It will be clear from this, that woman is the most potent influence in human life.

According to the interior investigations of Dr. A. J. Davis he learned as he says, "with as much pleasure as astonishment, that woman exerts three-fifths of that influence which moves the human world." The right regulation of this is of supreme importance to all.

"Woman is a spirit of Love — she is a Revelation of Refinement, of grace, and of beauty. She possesses the power of rendering the local habitation of her husband and children a representation of paradise, and of illustrating to the world a beautiful Heaven upon earth."

"But it is said that woman is obstinate in her firmness, self-willed, determined to have her own way — that she breeds discord and disturbance in every part of the house — that she makes home, and all its constituents, unbeautiful and unhappy, and I must confess that, in too many cases, this is true; but there are causes for these anomalies and contradictions which the Rulers of Society would do well to heed."

"Woman has Rights which she should demand of society, because the family over which she presides is the foundation of the Social Structure, and she therefore needs, and may claim, to be educated in the duties of life, or rather in the nature and extent of the Mission which Deity designed her to perform."

"She needs to be disabused of the enslaving conviction that merely 'keeping house' and 'bringing up children,' are duties which the law compels her to, according to the letter of the 'marriage contract' ; she needs to be informed that her mission is a sublime and universal one — that she is to people, not only the Earth, but all the Spiritual Spheres and Heavens."

"She needs to be informed that firmness and determination are indispensable to the prompt and faithful discharge of her duties — that harmony may be established in the Childhood Sphere and in the Home, so that the husband and the children may reciprocate the same to her Soul and to Society; she needs to be in the possession of a permanent and Spirit-inspiring residence, and to be situated in the midst of good and elevating scenery."

"She needs, and may claim, to be enlightened upon these subjects, to be well and happily situated in marriage, in her maternal, and in her domestic relations; — let this justice be done her, and then woman will no longer be accused of the disposition to create disturbance; nor will she be considered deficient in any of those spiritualizing and irresistible influences which should constitute and pervade every department of the sacred household sphere, and cast a halo over the holiness of home."

"Upon the individual rests the family, upon the family Society is based. The social sphere is the highest and widest circle of human life, in which the Love or female element or Principle is constitutionally qualified to move and exert a positive influence."

"The social life is the natural flowering of the influences shed around the child. In these three spheres of action, woman's influence is positive, beyond this it is negative. As we have seen, according to the Harmonial Philosophy, the sphere of national government is the natural domain of man."

Some may be disposed to contest this and will naturally point to the chaotic conditions prevailing in the world as evidence that man has mismanaged its affairs. No one will dispute this, but as I conceive it, our Seer would not shut woman out from the national sphere. [Davis is suggesting that women should be involved in national politics before the turn of the century (1900).]

He speaks of her as a balancing influence, and it is clear that for the exercise of this influence she has a right to a seat in the legislature. What we are suffering from today is a lopsided management of national affairs. The outlook has been too masculine.

This and the operation of economic forces, combined with the awakening of the proletariat to their rights, is responsible for the state of things in the world today. Woman's influence may not be a positive one in the national sphere, but I am confident it will be a refining and a restraining one, correcting the excesses of the more aggressive male.

The Rights of Woman.

Our Seer sums up the rights of woman thus, and this is a minimum demand: "1. A just representation of her interests. 2. A good matrimonial relation. 3. A complete education. 4. A harmonious local and social situation. 5. Counsel, not commands; admiration, not flattery. 6. Honour, not patronage; pure wisdom, not its semblance or counterfeit.''
From: Twelve Lectures of the Harmonial Philosophy by W. H. Evans

THE PRINCIPLES OF NATURE,
Her Divine Relations, and a Voice to Mankind
By and through
[while in trance state]
Andrew Jackson Davis
1847 Edition

INDEX

INDEX OF PART I.

GENERAL DIVISIONS:

Scribe's introduction, 1-4
Prefatory Remarks, pp. 5-22.
The true mode of Reasoning unfolded, 22.
Explanation of Animal Magnetism and Clairvoyance, and of the manner in which the author received his impressions, 30-56.
Matter and Motion, and the general principles which they involve, 57-85.
Experience of the true Mechanic appealed to, 85-93.
Experience of the true Artist appealed to, 93-98.
The first Cause and its Attributes, 104-120.

SUBJECTS DISCUSSED OR TOUCHED UPON IN PART I.

Anatomical structure of Man, 83-85.
Anatomy, Physiology, Geology, &c., deductions from, 77-85.
Animal Magnetism, exposition of, 29-37.
Animal Magnetism, summary recapitulation of argument on, 53-56.
Artist, the true, experience of, 93-98.
Atmosphere, stratification of, 79, 147, 296-298.
Author's magnetic metamorphosis analogous to death, 46, 645.
Cause, the Great, with its attributes as proved by Nature, 104-120.
Cause of life, 60, and elsewhere.
Clairvoyance, exposition of, and how the author received his impressions. 37-56.
Clairvoyance, independent, not to be induced voluntarily, 44.
Conclusion of the key, 118.
Demoralizing situations of men, 8, 687, et seq.
Ecclesiastical establishments, and their influences, 21.
Errors of investigators to be excused, 101.
Evils, past, and their causes, 18.
Focus of Truth, 41.
Great Positive Mind, the locus of concentric spheres, 40.
Great Positive Mind the Cause, Nature the Effect, Spirit the Ultimate, 72, 80, and elsewhere.
Inertia of matter, the question discussed, 57-60.
Interests, opposition of, 14, 691, et seq.
Interior philosophers and clairvoyants, former, 44, 45.
Internal and external, connexion of, 38, 39, and elsewhere.
Inventions mere imitations of Nature, 86.
Laws of Nature should be the rules of human government, 15.
Magnetism and Electricity, the vehicles of sensation and motion, 32.
Magnetism the sphere of man — universally connecting medium, 39.
Magnetizing, process of, 33-37.
Magnetic subjects, different states of, 33-37.
Matter and Motion, 57, et seq.
Matter in its progressive stages of refinement, 48, 49.
Matter, all, will pass through animal life, 118, 149.
Matter ultimates itself in Mind—Spirit, 50, 51.
Mechanic, the true, and his experiences, 85-93.
Motion, co-existent and co-eternal with Matter, 70,
and elsewhere. Motion, geometrical principles of, 69.
Motion, perpetual, can not be invented, 89 (note).
Nature's forces mechanical, 88. Organs of sense, remarks on, 30, 637.
Palsetiological sciences—the Infinite Circle, 72 -75.
Panorama of creation's progress, 69-64.
Progression — Correspondence91 - 93, and elsewhere.
Reformer, the true, and his persecutions, 17.
Reason, the office of, 5.
Reasoning, the true process of, 22-29.
Sensation, internal medium of proved by dreams, 31,
Series, degrees, and correspondences, 64-69, 594, 599.
Serous and mucous surfaces, 32.
Skeptics, honest and dishonest, 21.
Space and time, suggesting divine perfections, 116.
Spirit, individualization of, 76, 77, 593-622.
Spirit, its relations and powers, 42, 43.
Spirit, theories respecting, 99.
Spiritual forms and substances cognizable to spirit only, 47, 647.
Stellar system, immensity and reciprocal movements of, 107.
Tree or Knowledge and Tree of Evil, 15.
Truth and good must ultimately triumph, 16.
Uniformitarian and morphological theories, 81-83.
Universal generalization — Deity — Nature— Spirit, 70-85.
Vices and miseries of past ages, 12.
Vortex, the Universe a, 77, 122, and elsewhere.

INDEX PART II.

GENERAL DIVISIONS.

Origin and structure of the Univercoelum, 121-159.
The Solar System, 159, 214.
Origin and geological history of the Earth,214-328. Primary Formation, 223-232.
Transition Formation, 233-343. Carboniferous Formation, 242-259.
New Red Sandstone Formation, 259-268. Oolite and Cretaceous Formations, 289-289.
Tertiary and Diluvial Formations, 282-291. Alluvial Period, 291-328.
Early History of Man, 328-363.
Origin of Language, 368-373,
Origin of Mythological Theology, 377-414.
Ancient oracles and prophets, with a discussion of the probabilities and principles of true prophecy, 414-428.
Criticism on the Bible with its various books, with account of their authors, 434-559.
History of Jesus, with remarks on prophets and other teachers, &c., 559-580. Accounts of Revelators, ancient and modern, 581-592.
The material and spiritual constitution of Man, together with his relations to the Universe and the Spirit World, 593-643.
The spiritual worlds, with man's progress through them, described, 643-677.

SUBJECTS DISCUSSED OR TOUCHED UPON IN PART II.

Adam and Eve, 329.
Alluvial Period, 291-328.
Early vegetation of, 305.
Early animals of, 310-322.
Alps, Himalayah, and other mountains, when upheaved, 247.
Anastasis (resurrection), application of, 532.
Asteroids, their origin and constitution, 193-196.
Astronomical relations of many things recorded in the Old Testament, 455. Atmosphere, everything has its own peculiar, 147.
Atmosphere, original of the earth, 228,340.
Atmosphere, weight of during the New Red Sandstone Period, 262, 263. Atmosphere, constitution of with reference to vocal sounds, 331.
Attributes in the Great Chaotic Mass, 127.
Beginning of the Creation, 121.
Believers in the Shaster, the Koran, and the Bible, 486.
Bible, improbable accounts in, based on actual facts, 435.
Bible, origin of the, 420, 547, 554, 555.
Bible, remarks on interior origin of the, 540,541.
Bible, what respect is, and what is not, due to the, 431-434.
Bible, Notices of various books of with their authors, as follows:
Writings of Moses, 434-444; book of Joshua, 444; Judges, 444 ; Ruth, 446; books of Kings, 447; Chronicles, 448; Ezra, 448; Nehemiah, 449; Esther, 450 ;
Job, 450; Psalms, 457; Proverbs, 460; Ecclesiastes, 461; Songs of Solomon, 462; Isaiah, 463; Jeremiah, 463; Ezekiel, 471; Daniel, 472; Hosoa, 474;
Joel, 475; Obadiah, 476 ; Jonah, 476 ; Micah, 479; Nahum, 479; Habakknk, 480; Zephaniah, 480; Haggai, 480; Zechariah, 481; Malacbi 483; Matthew, 492; Mark, 524; Luke, 538; John, 535 ; Acts of the Apostles, 536; Epistles of Paul, 539; Epistle of James, Peter, John, and Jade, 544; Revelation of St. John, 544. Bimana, the first, 319.
" Breaths," or winds, first supposed Evil Principle, 378.
Buildings of stone first constructed in Central America, 338, 354, 355.
Cain and Abel, 333. Origin of the account of, 405.
Carboniferous Formation, 251-258.
Catastrophes, viz: at the close of the Old Red Sandstone period, 246; close of Coal period, 358; close of New Red Sandstone period, 267, at the Flood or Deluge, 346, 393.
Central America and China settled, 337,354.
Central American tribes, theology of, 343; same perpetuated among subsequent Egyptians, Jews, &c., 454.
Chalk beds, how formed, 379, 280.
Chinese records, antiquity of, 455.
Circumference of the Earth after formation of first coating, 232,
Coal, how formed, 251.
Coal period, vegetation of 355 Animals of, 256,257.
Communion of spirits with man on earth, 675.
Comparative anatomy, inductions from, 292.
Complexions (of men), origin of the dissimilarity of, 366-368.
Concentric spheres of Heavens, 123, 673.
Conception, conditions and laws of, 367.
Contractions of the earth, 243, 360, 868.
Correspondences, 309, and elsewhere.
Correspondences, law of, applied to an understanding of creation, 293, 296, 298.
Correspondential architecture, 330.
Creation, magnitude and order of, 136-143.
Crystallization, the law of, 331.
Day, completion of the first geological, 249; of the second, 261;
of the third, 869; of the fourth, 283; of the fifth. 291; of the sixth, 328
Death, natural, moral, spiritual, 413, 414.
Death, process of, 643.
Deluge or Flood, 345-347, 391-394.
Nations destroyed by the, 347, 394.
Traditions concerning the, 394-400.
Bible description of the, a spiritual correspondence, 348, 349.
Deterioration of species in our own day, 304.
Devil—Satan—origin of the idea o£ 411, 412, 518, 549.
Dia-magnetic principle, 227, 289.
Divinations by the flight of birds, &c., 415.
Divine Existence, nature and mode of the, 121-124, 377, 463, 618, 639, 673.
Divine Will—Progression—Harmony, 53-157.
Druids, 643.
Dry land appears and continents established, 248,249.
Dwellings (ancient) formed of trees, joined and thatched at top, 354.
Egypt, Jerusalem, Greece, Spain, &c., settled, 356-359.
Electricity, its connexion with the Great Sun and Great Positive Mind, 147.
Equilibrium, law of, 152.
Essence (internal) produces external form, 299, 305, 618, 639, and elsewhere.
Evening, a geological is approaching, 304.
Evil Principle, origin of the belief in, 342, 343, 378, 549.
Exterior creations unfold interior attributes, 294.
Fire the original substance, 121, 125, 145.
Foital development, its stages correspond to the geological, 303.
Forces of planetary motion, 143, 145.
Forms, progression of, 123, 593.
Forms, Series, and Degrees, 594, 599.
Forms, uses of, 616.
" Free will," the doctrine of, discussed. 463, 529, 530, 629, 633-636.
Frost and snow during the New Red Sand­stone Period, 286, 287.
Fucoides [lichenized fungi], how first formed, 237, 238.
Garden of Eden, 322. Correspondential signification of. 335.
Garden of Eden, fall of man, original sin, &c., origin of conceptions of, 549. Generalization only is aimed at, 145.
General resurrection and judgment, origin of the idea of, 550.
Genesis, book of, when and where written, 387, 388.
Origin of accounts in, 388-390, 399, 401, 403, 405, 408, 411, 412.
Geography of the Earth previous to the deluge, 344. 345; after the deluge, 347. Gravitation, philosophy of, 144, and elsewhere,
Great Internal and External of the Universe. 151.
Great truth essential for man to know, 639.
Heat, Light, and Electricity, 143, 144, 161, and elsewhere.
Hell of fire, origin of the idea of, 343, 550.
Herschel or Uranus. 168.
Hieroglyphics used after the deluge, 349.
History, early, of man, 328-377.
Ice-Mountains of Tertiary Period, 283, 286.
Indians, American, their origin, 345, 354. Period of their settlement, 362. Their theology, 362, 396.
Inner unfolds the outer, 640, and elsewhere.
Inundations with icebergs during Tertiary Period, 283, 289.
Jesus, very ancient prophecy concerning, 458. Prophecy concerning, by David, 459 ; by Isaiah, 465, 466; by Jeremiah, 469; by Ezekiel, 471;
by Zechariah, 481; by Malachi, 483.
Jesus, history of, 559-572. Origin of statements concerning him, 566. Josephus' account of him, 578.
John (Saint), personal account of, 535.
Joshua manipulated by Moses, 441, 443.
Jupiter, 184-187. Botany and Zoology of, 187-189. Human inhabitants of, 189-192.
Language, origin of, 368, 373.
Language, the first human, 330, 368.
Language, Chinese, source of. 371.
Language, Greek, origin of the orthography of, 371.
Language, Indian, 372.
Language, vocal, led to deception and disunity, 332, 369, 378.
Language, tradition of the origin of, 408.
Lessons of planetary creations, 210-214.
Light, analysis of, 288.
Lines of variation, and no variation, governing temperature, 282, 287-289.
Love, Will, and Wisdom, 633-636.
Low things not to be despised, 324, 325.
Luke, personal account of, 534.
Magnetism discovered by the ancients, 417, 441, 443, 469.
Man, the first, 322.
Man, where first located, 329.
Man a microcosm, 351, 598, 612.
Man, what is he materially ? 593-604.
Man, what is he spiritually ? 604-622.
Mankind, the animal types of, 314-322.
Mankind, two original tribes of, 352.
Mankind originally long united, 369, 378,
Mankind, classification of, 366.
Mark, personal account of, 532.
Mars, physical condition, botany, and inhabitants of, 196-202.
Marsupialia of the Oolite Period, 272.
Material Universe a representation of the Spiritual, 639.
Matter, constitution of, 597.
Matter, different grades of, 227.
Matter, its divisibility, &c., 225, 226.
Matter, the original condition of, 121.
Matthew, personal account of, 509, 523.
Mercury, physical condition, productions, and inhabitants of, 206-208.
Metals, segregation of, 254, 255.
Miracles—"supernatural," 507, 508.
Miracles of Mormons and Shakers, 528-530.
Miraculous conception, idea of examined, 492.
Misdirected thoughts of mankind, 375, 376
Moses and his writings, 434-443.
Moses's birth and its circumstances, 435, 436.
Moses's alleged miracles, 437, 445.
Mosaic law, the use of, 440.
Motion, its first ascension into life, 233-235, 238.
Mythological theology, origin of, 377—414.
Nations, original division of, 332, 333.
Nations before and after the deluge, 351-368.
Nature a Thought of the Divine' Mind, 326.
Nebulous Zones, the six great, 128-130.
New Beginning, Epoch of, 149.
New Bed Sandstone Formation, 261.
New R. Sand. Period, Animals of, 262-267.
New Testament, its relation to Old, 487-492.
Nice, council of, 547, 554.
Ninth and eighth planets, 161, 165-168.
Objections to this work anticipated, 642.
Old Red Sandstone Formation, 241.
Oolite [limestone] and Cretaceous Formations, 269-282.
Oolite beds, how formed, 269, 270, 273.
Oolite Period, fishes of, 270. Plants of, 271, 272, 278. Animals of, 277, 278.
Opinions concerning Christ's mission, 501.
Opposites do not exist, 212, and elsewhere.
Oracles and prophets, origin of the ideas concerning, 414-421.
Origin of Evil, 337.
Mythological theory of, 411.
Origin of the earth described, 219-221.
Original dimensions and mutations of the earth, 221--223.
Original coating of the earth, 223.
Original Sin, Atonement, Faith, and Regeneration—doctrines of, examined, 514-517.
Osseous fish development, 242.
Paul (Saint), personal account of, 536, 543.
Paul's philosophy, &c., 543.
Planetary and general motion, cause of, 163.
Planetary development, uniformity of; 170-172, 175.
Planets, eighth and ninth, 161, 165-168.
Positive and Negative of the Universe, 124.
Primary stratified rooks, formation of, 229.
Primitive elements and compounds, 230-232.
Progressive development of species, 236.
Prophecy (truthful), possibilities and probabilities of, 421-428.
Prophecy, its principles, 422, 423.
Prophecy, original application of the word. 550.
Prophets and prophecies, true, of the Bible, 426-128.
Prophets, who and what they were, 573.
Quadrumana [division of the Primates comprising the apes and monkeys], the first, 285.
Radiata, polyparia, and articulata, first formation of, 239.
Revelators, former notices of as follows : Isaiah — David—Jeremiah—Zechariah, 581; Malachi—Jesus, 582; Confucius—Drama—Zoroaster—Mohammed, 583 ; Galen—Seeresa of Prevorst—Luther— Calvin, 584 ; D'Holbach
— Fourier. 583 : Swedenborg, 587, Plato—
Xenoplion—Socrates—Cicero, 590.
Sacred books, ancient, multiplicity of, 420
Sacred writings of the Jews, 573.
Saturn, 172. Geography, botany ,and zoology of, If 7-180. Human inhabitants of, 180-183.
Scratches and grooves on rocks, cause of, 283, 284.
Seas, the first, their depth, 224.
Seasons, when first established, 282.
Senses, classification of, 637.
Seven days of creation, origin of the idea of, 405-407.
Sheol, Unties, Tartarus, and Gehenna, as used by the ancients, 417, 441, 443, 469.
Shinar, the valley of, settlement in, 383. Theology of its inhabitants, 384. Silurian Formation, 241.
Soul, the human, and its three general divisions 622-629.
Spiritual spheres revealed, 643-677.
Stomachs, Nature's, 309-616.
Substances in the original Chaotic Mass, 126.
Sun, the great central of Univercoelum, 121-131.
Sun of the Solar System, 159, 209. Sun feared as an angry deity, 343, 379. Sun, the Great Spiritual, 639, 672, 673, 674.
Suns, the six great circles of, 128-130; with their planets, 132-136.
Swedenborg, allusions to, 45, 349, 403, 449, 545, 087, 674, 776.
Telescopic (supposed) view of the Earth from Venus, 229.
Tertiary Formation, 283-291.
Tertiary Period, plants during:, 584. Animals during, 284, 285.
" The Lord spake," anciently a common expression, 438.
Theology, the future true system of, 339, 340.
Theories respecting the origin of the Earth, 214-218.
Tlieos and Deus, insignificance of, 377.
Tides during early periods very high, 243, 244.
Tides, theories of the cause of, 245.
Time, origin of ordinary divisions of, 406, 407.
Toledo, council of, 547, 554.
Tower of Babel, the account of, 451.
Tracks of animals on New Red Sandstone, 262, 266, 287.
Transmutation of species, 276.
Trinity, origin of the idea of, 402, 403, 552.
Truth, the divinity and unchangeableness of 428-431.
Univercoelum, 121, and elsewhere.
Universe, end of the present, 152.
Uranus or Herechel, 168.
Use of Nature. 323.
Utero-gestation, first exemplification of, 272, 274, 275, 278.
Vegetable and animal creations, general remarks on, 300-302.
Vegetation, the first terrestrial, 243, 251.
Vegetation (early) of the Alluvial Period, 305.
Venus, physical condition, productions, and inhabitants of, 202-205.
Vortex of the Great Positive Mind, 122.
Wars among primitive nations, 359-364.
Water (the original), its density—its composition, 224-229.
Water, gelatine, &c., generated by light, 237.
Winds and rains (violent) during chalk formation, 280.
Wisdom, the supremacy of, 631.
Zends, origin of the, 453.
Zoroaster, theology of, 385.

INDEX PART III. VOICE TO MANKIND.

GENERAL DIVISIONS.

Evils of present Society, 679-733.
The Remedy, 734, 745.
Mode of, applying the remedy, 745-778.

SUBJECTS DISCUSSED OH TOUCHED UPON IN PART III.

Antagonisms of interest, 684, 691, et seq.
Cause of human actions. 683.
Classification of mankind, 679-682.
Clergymen, their situation and influence, 699.
Concluding reflections, 778.
Each man an organ of the Social Body, 736.
Educational system, how to be changed, 771.
Family relations to be preserved, 771.
Form of society, 741.
Gravitation in society, 738.
General principles of organization, 741-744.
Interests and oppressions of the poor, 684-686.
Lawyers' interest, 694.
Mechanics' interest, 691.
Machinery, its relations to the interests of the laborer, 685.
Mercantile business to be changed, 775.
Order, law of, developed in society, 739.
Physicians' interest, 696.
Steps (initial) to be taken by Farmers, 745; by Mechanics, 755; by Manufacturers, 759 ; by Lawyers, 761; by Physicians, 764; by Clergymen, 766.
Tradesmen's interests, 692.
The Press. 774.
Universal affinities, 734.
Vice, misery, and degradation, resulting from present antagonisms, 687.
Violence to body and mind by false education, 773.
What interests do, and what should, exist, 730.
Woman, part of the education of, 774.

Spiritual e-books (Davis)...http://www.spiritwritings.com/library.html

Davis biography:
http://www.survivalafterdeath.org/mediums/davis.htm
http://www.anomalist.com/features/seer.html
http://www.spiritwritings.com/andrewjacksondavis.html

Autobiography:
The Magic Staff: (1857)
http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=moa;idno=ACA6254
Beyond the Valley: (1885)

The Principles of Nature:
1852 edition... http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=moa;idno=ACA6166
1871 edition... http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=moa;idno=ACA6173

Collection of digital ebooks on Spiritualism(Davis):
http://www.digitalbookindex.com/_search/search010histuschspiritualisma.asp

First Spiritual Temple
The oldest nondemonational Christian Spiritualist Church in
the world. The Churches founder, Marcellus Ayer, knew and
worked with Andrew Jackson Davis.
http://www.fst.org/

National Spiritualist Association of Churches
The oldest and largest organization for the Science,
Philosophy and Religion of Modern Spiritualism in the United
States of America.
http://www.nsac.org/