THE ORIGIN AND DESTINY OF THE HUMAN SOUL.

Thames Star, Volume X, Issue 3202, 24 May 1879, Page 4

THE ORIGIN AND DESTINY OF THE HUMAN SOUL.

IFrom a lecture delivered by Mrs Hardinge Britten in Dunedin we extract the following :—" Probably the oldest of all nations, of which there existed historical records, was that, of Hindostan. Here were to be found the earliest vestiges of a concrete civilisation, and in the dim recesses of the sacred banyan-grove the Hindu had awakened to the phenomena of moving Nature. The voice of the storm, the sighing of the breeze, and the boom of Heaven's artillery, had compelled the | thonghtful Hindu mind to question the whence of what,he saw and.heard. All the changing machinery of the universe had forced him tot the questions, Who? What ? Whence,? and Whither ? The only possible answer of Nature had been a pointing back to Nature's Architect, to the presence of rieVer-chang-ing, intelligent mind. And the Hindu had concluded there must be a soul ,in Nature—the same soul which,*hear3'of-in so many other forms, could best be termed God or Spirit. The foundation of his religious belief wa's thjas> ijie:: existeneWbf God. The next step was to question the destiny of the; creature, and in every vestige of the Hindu history came evidence that by inspiration ah arisweir to that question was received. The scriptures were full of evidences of revelations through the gates of the other world. A ngels made their footprints visible. The wisest men heard voices and beheld forms, had dreams and trances, and received'the truth by means, of what now:a.-days were called spiritual gifts. 1 Tu'rii to the history of ancient days and there were the same evidences that by inspiration men held communion with a higher and better world. It was the same in the case of Greece and Rome. .The noble-Socrates and wise Plato—-all the sages and philosophers of those mighty times,' of those mighty empires—were not only believers in, but faithful worshippers of, spiritual beings. We -were accustomed to speak of the Hindus, Babylonians, Syrians, Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans, as heaihens. But she asked that such a decisipfcfshjSuld reversed. $Vere they not the children of the same father as ourselves ? : For 1800 years the words of St. Paul had stoodbefore mankind, • Now, concerning spiritual gifts,, brethren; I would not have you ignorant; yet now when manifested who would believe them? i It watf&g'ain Said by- fsome, these spiritual powers,',ceased with the, apostles :' but the history of the early Church did not bear this out.l The history, of the lives of the early fathers disclosed a perpetual succession of; miracles. 'But as purple and fine linen entered the Church, miracles left it.—(Applause.)—.As splendor and wealth took possession of the Church', the'spirit of the htfmble Nazirene ;and the 12 fishermen left, it, and found a home among the laity. That spirit had never left the world, nor the footprints of angels left human history. In every age and every time the the same powers had been manifested, and the same phenomena had permeated the history of the race. She,would ask her free-thought friends, Whence camp, this uuiversal.idea of,an interference from on high in human affairs, of a ministry of angels^?,. All ages claimed some form of communion 1* with' another world. All history, was in harmony with the great outpottribg of the present day. Mrs Britten .t^hen closed with an eloquent peroration 1 regarding the coming of thi* new revelation, and of the future opened up < undem the i new■■* dispensation, i Ota. resuming'iher seat she was greeted withloud applause;