CHAPTER VIII
A SPIRIT GUIDE TALKS ON LOVE
"Love takes many forms, ranging from friendship founded on sympathetic attraction and mutual interest to the supreme heights where, without thought of self, it seeks to serve wherever it can,” said Silver Birch, in his reply to someone who asked for his definition of love. “Love is a word which is misused in your world,” the guide went on. “Very often those who use it do not mean love at all. It is mistaken for the activities of the senses when there is only the desire for gratification of certain instincts. But love as I understand it is a part of the spirit stirring within, seeking expression when it realises its kinship with its divine creator. The greatest love is the loye that has no trace of selfish-ness, that does not seek in any way to perform any action because it will bring some satisfaction to the individual. That is human love in its greatest aspect. It is the spirit that has enthused all who desire to uplift mankind, to help the needy, to sustain the weak, to fight the vested interests that prevent the unfortunate from extracting the beauty that life could offer them.
"All who, in their own land and in foreign lands, have sought with altruistic motive to raise the standard of mankind, to make it aware of its infinite potentialities, are exhibiting love in its finest form. There are degreesーwhen the same spirit animates a man or woman to serve the object of his or her affection. That need not be selfish; it can be unselfish. And there is the lowest
kind of love, the love that is restricted, that desires to protect and help only the ones to whom it feels an attraction and feels no pity, no mercy, no sympathy and no compassion for strangers. Divine love covers the universe, It is love that has shaped its course, it is love that has regulated its evolution, it is love which is part of the divine beneficence, it is love which actuates all those advanced spiritual beings who, forfeiting all that they have gained by their attainment, return to your cold, grey, unattractive world to give service to those who need it.''
Silver Birch was asked another question: "How would you explain the Great Spirit to children?"
"That is not a difficult task," said the guide, "if the one who is to do the explaining has a clear conception of the power which is behind all life. For myself, I would point to the divine artistry of nature's handiwork. I would point to the stars, the diamonds in the sky. I would point to the glory of the sun, to the pale reflection of the moon. I would point to the whispering, mur-muring breeze, to the nodding pines. I would point to the trickling stream and to the mighty ocean. I would touch every facet of nature showing how each is controlled by purpose, by law. I would add that where man has made any discovery in the field of natural life, he finds it comes within the orbit of law, that its growth is controlled and regulated, that it is part of one vast, intricate, yet harmonious pattern, that order reigns supreme throughout the vast universe, controlling planets and insects, storms and breezes, all life, no matter how variegated its ex-pressions may be.
"And then I would say, the mind behind all that, the power that sustains it all, the force that controls the whole vast panorama of the universe and many other worlds that, you have not yet seen, is what we call the Great Spirit.”
The next question was: “Are people responsible for all their own thoughts?"
"I would prefer to say that, generally speaking, where they are what your world regards as normal, they are responsible for all their actions and that is the acid test," answered the guide. “It is what they do that is of supreme importance. Whatever they are, they have opportunities for service, for increasing their spiritual stature, for advancing the growth of their spirit. These opportunities are not restricted to the virtuous or to saints. They come to all people, and according to the way that you take. advantage of these opportunities, or fail to do so, your spirit is strengthened or weakened."
This is an ever-recurring question in Spiritualism: “In the next world, we know that children grow up to become adults; but what about those guides who remain children for many years on earth, and also children who have been dead for 18 or 20 years who still return as children?"
Silver Birch replied: “I will come to the defence of the Topsies who never grow up. Your hard, bitter world condemns those who go on being children, and claims all the time that it loves the innocence of the child. Yet it objects to them when it chooses to persist in that form of evolution solely to help them. The advantages are very easy to understand. The child does not suffer from the inhibitions of the grown-up. It has a naturally fresh outlook on life. It is not beset by the many problems that perplex adults and therefore is the best channel for communication. The child can naturally perform this task because it has not so many of the intolerances and prejudices of the grown-up people to con-quer. It starts off as a fresh, radiant being, willing to help, and is not troubled by all the problems that belong to the adult life. Because it is not worried by them, it can quickly hold on to those elusive vibrations that make for the success of spirit commun-ication.
"But that child personality is only a personality voluntarily adopted in a large number of cases with a sole desire of aiding your world. If at any time it chooses to surrender its task, it can return to a higher sphere, there to take up its thread of the larger consciousness in which the child had lived. Do not condemn them; they are most lovable instruments of the Great: Spirit whose only desire is to serve, a service they give willingly and freely because they think they can help those who are hurt or crushed by your world.
"In the case of the ordinary child who comes back after many years still as a child, this is done for recognition. When you are concerned with identification, you must remember that children would not be recognised unless they showed themselves in the form and with the characteristics and habits by which they will be known to their parents. But that is only a picture drawn for the medium to transmit. It is like the television thrown on the screen. The medium sees the picture that is thrown on to the screen of her mind and transmits it. With a voice medium, it is the same, except that instead of the process being a visual one, it is an oral one, moulded out of the ectoplasm. The voice which is moulded reproduces, as far as conditions allow, the voice the child had on earth.''
"How would a child who had been brought up to be cruel to animals be treated on the Other Side; would it be given animals to look after?" was the next question,
The guide replied: "We would have to undo the earthly teaching by showing how animals have rendered great service throughout many years. The child would be taken to the vary-ing animal spheres to see what they are really like when they are allowed to have contact with those who love them and under-stand them. Gradually, the false teaching would be shed as greater knowledge came to the child. And it would be shown that the effects of cruelty are not only to be observed on the animals, but on the one who performs the act."
Another member of the circle introduced a question by saying: "Many people when they pass on have no knowledge of the after-life. They are in a sort of daze and do not know that they have passed on. Does that apply to children, or do they accept the new life instinctively?”
"It depends on the child's knowledge,” Silver Birch replied. "If it has not been too tainted with the ignorance and superstition of your world, then its natural understanding, based on its natural psychic powers, will enable a natural appreciation to occur.
"Did the Great Spirit intend that some human beings should 'die' before they fulfilled their plan of life?" was the next question.
"The plan is always that you should enjoy a full expression on earth so that you shall be equipped for the greater life of the spirit,” said the guide. "If fruit drops from the tree before it is ripe it is sour. All life that is forced to quit its body before it has achieved its maturity on earth is unprepared for the world ofspirit.”
"If a child 'dies' of an accident, was that intended by the Great Spirit?" the guide was asked. “That is difficult to answer because always I have to say 'yes,' with qualifications," was the spirit answer. “The whole of life is controlled by law and the Great Spirit is responsible for law. But law works through human beings. Ultimately everything comes back to the responsibility of the Great Spirit. You can argue that if you do something wrong you are not responsible because the Great Spirit made you like that. But that is fallacious reasoning. It is true to an extent that He ultimately is responsible for the whole universe, because His power created it and His intelligence endowed it, but you have your intelligence. You have the power of reasoning. If you choose to put your head under a train it is no use blaming the Great Spirit."
Will you explain ‘infant prodigies?" was the next query.
"There are three kinds," said Silver Birch. “Some are incar-nated souls with a memory of past experience to help, others are mediums subject to spirit influence, albeit unconsciously, and therefore receptacles of much learning, wisdom, knowledge and truth from our world. In the third category are the geniuses who are the advance guards of evolution."
A critic of Spiritualism wrote this letter:
"There is one point about Spiritualism on which I have never been clear. What is the real object of it? Is it to make people believe in another world where their friends still exist, or is there any other object as well? From my own point of view I do not need anything to make me believe this as I have always known it, in fact, I cannot imagine how anyone could think otherwise.
"I cannot see that it serves any good purpose for, say, Mrs. Brown to receive a message (supposedly given through a genuine medium) that her son is well and happy, for example. I suppose it is comforting for her to know that, if she believes the message is genuine. If someone who means a lot to you is deadーwell they are dead. You cannot have their companionship, which is one of the most missed things. You cannot, for instance, spend a holiday together in Switzerland. You cannot go fishing with them or take a country walk on Sundays. Have you found from experience that these messages do give people lasting comfort?"
Quite candidly I consider Spiritualism is rather playing with a very dangerous fire,' except when handled by those who are sufficiently initiated. But I do not think it right to condemn something which means a lot to others without being sure of one's facts. Why do these spirit guides have such fantastic names, such as Silver Birch? Anything like this makes me shy away and be dubious. I suppose I have a very practical mind.”
And this is the answer by Silver Birch: “At any stage of evolution it is preferable that you should walk in the light rather than the darkness; it is better that you should be armed with knowledge rather than that you should be swayed by ignorance. The pursuit of knowledge must always be one of the primary aims of all intelligent human beings. Otherwise, superstition, prejudice, intolerance, bigotry would become rife were there not the demand for knowledge to counter them and to force them to retreat. At no time can you halt and say: 'Thus far will I go and no farther.' Life is an endless adventure, an eternal quest, for its motive power, its driving force, is infinite. The infinite spirit requires an infinitude of time in order to accomplish its infinite destiny. There must always be the desire for education, for growth, for progress, for advancement, the attainment of the higher and the discarding of the lower.
"Knowledge is your priceless gift, for it enables you to survey your world with a compass to guide you. No ship sails without instruments to guide it. Human beings would be foolish to go through life without instruments to help them steer their proper course. Knowledge is always desirable; knowledge should always be desirable. The one who stops and says: 'I do not wish to know,' is in effect demanding that he should become stultified, decayed and rusty. You cannot stand still; you must either advance or go back. You are travellers on an eternal march. The life you are now living is but a small part of the life that you have yet to live. Ahead of you is a long, long road of progress.
"It is better that you shall be equipped, that you shall face the future armed with the knowledge that will help you to master its problems. Knowledge brings responsibilities; it is part of the law of compensation. You have added to your mental stock some-thing that you never before possessed, but, on the other side of the scale, there is the responsibility of what you do with that knowledge. All we can do is to offer you the information we have gleaned, based on the operation of spiritual laws as we have learned from our own experience. That is the chief purpose of those who, like myself, come to teach your world so that it may be rescued from the morass into which it has fallen.
"Some are not yet ready for this knowledge. Some think it unnecessary; others have to be treated like children, given toys with which to play until they can be led on to the paths where their minds will be instructed. I want you to get a compre-hensive picture of the plan that lies behind all spirit teaching. It seeks to dissipate the darkness which has surrounded your world for so long, that has caused all the horrors with which you are becoming painfully familiar. At the root of all your evils is to be found this ignorance of spiritual law. Do you not realise that, once the gospel of materialism and all the self-interest it teaches is exploded for ever, you have rid the world of its greatest curse? Look around your earth and see the signs—the misery, the sorrow the sadness, the bloodshed, the chaos, the bankruptcyーall due to false materialism, ignorance of the spiritual law.
"Men have built their lives upon false foundations. Nations have tried to organise their policies on the principle of national self-interest. Dictators have risen and have become tyrannical, only because they have been subservient to the gospel that might is right. Do you not see how necessary this knowledge is, not only to the individual, not only to the nation, but to the whole world?
"Examine your own lives and see how much richness this knowledge has brought you. You know that you can never go back to the days when you were ignorant of this great truth. Despite all the difficulties in your world, it has given you a stay, a foundation, a base on which you can stand with fortitude, no matter what you experience. You realise you are not creatures of chance, playthings of caprice, but part of the Infinite Spirit with an infinite power on which you can draw. Your world is very sick; it is suffering from a dread disease. I am enunciating a cure. Once this truth becomes universally accepted, once people fully realise that there is a world beyond the one of matter, that they are personally responsible for the lives that they live, that there is an eternal law which operates with perfect justice, then you will have a new foundation for life.”
Answering another question, Silver Birch said: “Spiritualism can teach you of your spiritual gifts, concerning which many people are profoundly ignorant, and help them to unfold them so that they can be used for service. There are walking about your land many who could heal, many who could give the evidence that means so much to aching hearts. When you remember that, you see how important it is for knowledge to be spread. Ignor-ance is our great enemy, because it encourages laziness of mind and spirit. There are sincere people who have been fed on ignorance, who have been taught that faith, blind faith, is desir-able to knowledge, who believe that we are really evil, who believe that all of you are misguided, that they are right because it says so in a book. That is the danger of ignorance. It creates a lazy, self-righteous, religious superiority based on a fallacy. It creates an inversion of the mind which makes the thinking so distorted that it cannot see truth even when it is presented to it."
Asked on another occasion what the Nazarene meant when he said: "Cast not your pearls before swine," Silver Birch replied: "What he had in mind was that you should not attempt to force great truth on unready souls. He did not mean that you should be afraid of rebuffs, because his mission was one long rebuff, but that where you find your efforts to spread knowledge, truth, wisdom, understanding, are treated with scorn and derision then you should withdraw and make no attempt to give beauty to those whose eyes are so holden that they cannot see it.”
The guide was asked about his attitude to personal guidance from the spirit world. “Personal guidance is a truth," he said, "but you have to be careful how you explain to the interested but yet uninitiated how it happens. Otherwise it would seem to them that you gain an unfair advantage in life merely because you have access to spiritual power. After all, the foundation of this truth is not that it enriches you materially but that it enriches you spiritually, that it gives you a knowledge of laws and real-ities that provide a basis for a complete understanding of your-selves, the universe in which you dwell, and the Great Spirit, Who is the divine architect. 'Of course, the two states of life blend, merge and harmonise one into the other. It is not possible to draw a rigid line of separation between the things of matter and the things of spirit. There are, from time to time, constant reactions on both planes of life, for that which is spiritual is ex-pressed in a world of matter and that which is material restricts and conditions that which is spiritual."
"The object of living here, I suppose, is to do away with those things that limit the spiritual," commented a sitter,"so that we express more of our spiritual natures through our physical bodies.”
"Yes, that is the whole object of life on earth," said the guide, "so that you shall realise what you are. Those who vainly imagine that they are bodies of matter, and naught else, are living a great illusion, from which one day they will awake into a condition of stern reality. The awakening may come in your world or in mine. It is much better that it should come in yours, for there you have all the conditions which are easier for the growth, evolution and expression of your soul. You were meant, while living in your world, to give full expression to the body and to the spirit. It is equally as wrong to think only of spiritual things and neglect your physical obligations as it is to concentrate on the purely physical requirements and neglect your spiritual duties. There should be a perfect balance, so that you can be, as has been said before, in the world but not of the world; that your physical body should be cared for, watched over and tended, because it is the temple of the divine spirit, and that the spirit, which is in the process of growth and evolution, shall have opportunities for expressing growth and evolution through the body."
Here is a further selection from the hundreds of questions sent to Silver Birch, The questions are in italics and the answers in roman type:
"Would not it be best for all healers to be in perfect health themselves before they begin to heal others?"
"The answer is that of course it would be better if everybody enjoyed perfect health. But those who heal by the power of the spirit are like other kinds of mediumsーinstruments, that is, they transmit something which they receive, it passes through them. They are channels of distribution, they turn it outward, not inward. Their qualifications, their gifts, their powers, whatever form they be, allow them to act as intermediaries, mediums for the world of spirit, so that its vital, energising, dynamic, health-giving, sustaining influence can reach other beings. The fact that they themselves may be suffering from some bodily affliction does not necessarily restrict their ability to heal others. One is a psychic quality, the other is a physical defect."
"Does tranquillity and attunement to the inner force help us to main-tain health? Does this apply to all ills?”
"It would apply if all men lived their lives in accordance with the natural law, if they had done nothing to infringe those laws to bring about disharmony between mind, body and spirit. It would apply if they started equipped with healthy bodies and not subjected to the diseases of heredity. It is true that you, if you know how to tap the fountain of health within, could drive out the ailments which afflict the body, but since you have allowed disease and sickness to gain a supremacy, the task has become all the harder. There is a limit, for you have not the power to thwart death in its entirety. It is part of the natural law that when the body has served its purpose it shall be discarded, but unfor-tunately, in too many cases, the spirit has to pass unprepared, unripe and unequipped, because it has not enjoyed all the experi-ences which are necessary for it in its training. I can only expound the operation of the law. I do not say it is easy to accomplish what I have. set out, for the whole mode of earthly life has been based on the supremacy of matter over mind and not mind over matter. The mind is supreme, the spirit is king, but the kingdom depends on your activity.”
"What happens to the physical organism when this sense of tran-quillity is achieved?"
"It is as it should be, made subject to the domination of the reigning spirit. It is controlled in all its intricate processes by the mind which occupies that body. It is at the direction of the spirit which creates all life and which has moulded the body through which it is functioning. You are asserting your suprem-acy, you are consciously exercising your superiority over every particle of which your body is composed. When you are able to do that, you have achieved a complete harmony so that every part is in complete concert with the other, all the rhythm is perfect, and you are at peace with yourself. There is no discord, no clash. Tranquillity rules because the spirit is at one with the Great Spirit of all life.”
"How is it you are able to speak the English language so beauti-fully?"
"Your Western world adopts a curious attitude. It imposes as a spiritual test the ability to speak its language. It does not follow that, because anyone can speak English well, he is of necessity an evolved soul. It may well be that the one who addresses them in faltering language is far more evolved than they are. I have spent many years in learning your language, your habits, your customs. It is part of the principle of co-operation which is our natural life in the world of spirit. We give and take.
"If we wish to help your world we must learn its methods. Some of them are indicative of the heights to which man can reach. Some of them are revolting and indicate the depths to which children of the Great Spirit can sink. As I had to address myself to the people who speak English, I had, after years of practice, to master its many difficulties. You have helped me and I have been also helped in my own world by those whom you have considered to be its masters. I am still helped now by many who achieved prominence in your history because of their beauty and simplicity of expression.''
"Do our spirit friends hear us at all times when we mentally speak to them?"
"No, they do not. It depends on whether they are attuned to them or not. They can hear them if they are in tune. It depends on the vibrations. I am attuned to all of you. I can receive your requests whenever I desire to do so, for automatically when you send out a request the spirit vibration that it creates, the very ripple that it makes in the atmosphere, forms a pattern which is known to me. Wherever there is that kinship between souls in two states of life, then all the thoughts, all the requests, are immediately known."
"When people pass on, are there spirit doctors to care for them, both before the event and after it?"
"Yes, because they have to help the spirit body to release itself and to be prepared, as much as is possible, for its greater life. That is why, frequently, before death takes place, the ones who are to make the transition become aware of loved ones and strangers who are gathered around the bedside, helping the soul
to free itself.”
"In view of the conditions prevailing today, is it wise to bring fresh children into the world?"
"We teach personal responsibility. Though the world is filled with chaos, anxiety, and strife, though the world is filled with bitterness, antagonism, and hatred, there is a new world which is to be fashioned out of all the strivings and miseries which are being endured. Some there must be who are to become its standard-bearers. The race must go on.
"The spirit must perfect itself through struggle, through difficulty, through labour. Humanity marches onward, not because it treads an easy path, but because it conquers all difficulty and emerges triumphant. Fear is always the worst enemy, for fear is born in the darkness of man's ignorance."
★ ★ ★
In this prayer, Silver Birch sums up his simple teaching. It is one of hundreds of prayers which he has offered spontaneously and without hesitation:
"OH Great White Spirit, Thine is the infinite intelligence which has conceived the mighty universe. Thine are the laws which control and regulate the ceaseless panorama of daily events. Thine is the power which sustains all that is contained within it. Thine is the spirit which has given life to forms of matter and raised man up out of the animal kingdom into the divine awareness'which he now possesses.
"We represent Thee as the supreme law, unchangeable, unalterable immutable, omnipotent, for naught happens outside the confines of Thy law. Every phase of being throughout the whole world pays silent tribute to the inflexibility of its working; We who have had the larger experience in Thy spiritual domain, add our meed of praise to the per-fection with which the whole of life is directed and governed by that power which some call God and we the Great Spirit.
"It is a knowledge of Thy law in all its ramifications that we seek to spread, so that understanding it Thy children everywhere may reap, that fullness of life and enjoy all that Thou hast so plentifully provided, andalso fashion those systems which will enable the world of matter to live in paace.
"We seek to drive out all the fear that belongs to the darkness of men's ignorance, to make them understand the true place of death in the scheme of life, to awaken them to their own potentialities, that they may realise the infinite spirit that exists within their own natures. We strive to teach them of this so that they may know of the tie of spiritual kinship that exists between them and Thee and between all Thy children everywhere.
"Thy spirit girdles the whole world. The thread of Thy divinity runs through every being, and all who live, no matter who they are, what they are, or where they are, are for ever bound to Thee by an enduring divine relationship that can never be destroyed. There is no necessity for any man to stand between Thy children and Thee. Because of their natural heritage they have complete access to all the infinite storehouse of wisdom, love, knowledge and truth that Thou hast
provided.
"Our task is to quicken the spirit within man, so that finding full expression all Thy children will live lives that Thou intended should be their portion. Thus will they fulfil their destiny in the world in which they live. Thus will they discharge all their divine obligations. Thus will they render that service of enabling a broken world to be healed and love and good will to reign among Thy children everywhere, Thus will they live in the light of understanding, having for ever turned their backs on the darkness which prevented them from seeing Thee in all Thy full radiance.
"This is the prayer of Thy Indian servant, who seeks to serve."