MR. CLEMENT WRAGGE.

Taranaki Daily News, 7 June 1916, Page 6

MR. CLEMENT WRAGGE.

"THE ETERNAL UNIVERSE AND THE WAR." Last night at the Good Templar Hall, Mr. Clement Wragge, the well-known astronomer, gave his pouplai lecture, "The Eternal Universe and the War." There was a good attendance, and at the close of the lecture a considerable number stayed behind to see the fine specimens of radium exhibited. Mr. Wragge claims that we are all radio-active sparks of God, and being such we cannot bo destroyed. 'He would like to see an astronomical observatory attached to every church, for there was no greatei book than the widespread scroll of the heavens, and the greatest of sermons could be read in the mighty heavenly bodies whirling in the vast immensities of space. . For some reason known only to the Infinite, they were now going through a period of destruction. But that must end, and then they would see that the war was hut opening up the way for a great and glorious period of construction. They all knew the fearful slaughter that was even then taking place in France and on the other battlefronts of the greatest of all wars; and they all talked aliout the vast numbers of men that were being killed. Tlie real men. whom they spoke of as killed, were ;ilive on the astral plane. .Many of those "killed" in this war had, lie said, come to him at Birkenhead on the astral plane, and some of them could not believe that they were "dead," so far as the earthplane was concerned. Two of bis own sons had gone to the front, and one of them had been "killed," but he had repeatedly come to him on the astral plane and told him that he was alive on that higher plane, and that all was well with him. Death was but the gate to another life, another day at school; and man bad to go to school till be had learned his lessons. They could not, blame God for the war. Tt was brought about by man's ineptitude and stupidity. The war had to come as n purge or medicine, to teach men a lesson which otherwise they stupidly refused to learn. It was not ,so much a war between one natiw, or one group of nations, and another, as a fight of democracy, evolution and freedom against bureaucracy, devolution and slavery. He believed that the war would be brought to an end in the present year: perhaps in a way that they dreamed not of, and tliat in very many ways the war would result in good. Unworthy class distinctions would ne abolished. Social absurdities would be obliterated and stupid Jaws would be repealed. The war would lead, he believed, to t.he nationalisation of wealth and the breaking down of monopolies and trade combinations, and would prove to be a step towards the federation of Europe and the ultimate federation of the world: and in tliat federation the British Empire, welded together as never before and standing for liberty and righteousness, would hold the plnce of honor and he recognised as its brightest jewel. The nations would learn thrift, and would lie taught to work out their industrial independence by utilising for food and other necessaries of life all Nature's gifts. Scientific research would be enormously stimulated. TO-NIGHT. A second lecture will be given by Mr. Wragge to-night, his subject being "The Majesty of Creation," including Ihe "Romance of the Earth," and it will be illustrated by a series of splendid lantern pictures. The subject is e&eptionallv interesting, and in Mr. Wragge's hands will he made particularly entertaining and instructive. There should certainly be a full house.