Book 7^ V

f>
COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT'
REINCARNATION
The weary pilgrim oft doth seek to know How fax he 's come, how far he has to go.
QuABLESi
Ghosts ! There are nigh a thousand million of them walking the earth openly at noontide ; some half hundred have vanished from it, some half hundred have arisen in it, ere thy watch tick one.
Cablyle.
Truth dwells in gulphs, whose deeps hide shades so rich That Night sits muffled there in clouds of pitch, More darke than Nature made her : and requires (To cleare her tough mists) heaven's great fire of fires To wrestle with those heaven-strong mysteries.
George Chapman.
I am : how little more I know I Whence came I ? Whither do I go ? A central self which feels and is ; A cry between the silences; A shadow-birth of clouds at strife With sunshine on the hills of life ; A shaft from Nature's quiver cast Into the future from the past.
Whittieb.
Where wert thou, Soul, ere yet my body born Became thy dwelling-place ? Didst thou on earth Or in the clouds, await this body's birth, Or by what chance upon that winter's morn Didst thou this body find, a babe forlorn ? Didst thou in sorrow enter, or in mirth ? Or for a jest, perchance, to try its worth Thou tookest flesh, ne'er from it to be torn.
Waddington.
REINCARNATION
A STUDY OF FORGOTTEN TRUTH
■J*
E. D. WALKER
" Ex oriente lux "
FEB 2r 1888
/
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY
(Cfie ifttoer#tie $re$'&
u
Copyright, 1888, By E. D. WALKER.
All rights reserved.
The Riverside Press, Cambridge : Electro typed and Printed by H. 0. Houghton & Co.
V
To THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH
AND TO THAT EMBODIMENT OF TRUTH, NAMED
ARIEL,
THIS LITTLE VOLUME PROMPTED BY THEM
3!£ jDc&icateb,
WITH THE HOPE THAT THEY ARE NOT HERE DISHONORED BY THEIR DISCIPLE,
THE AUTHOR.
Soul, dwelling oft in God's infinitude
And sometimes seeming no more part of me —
This me, worms' heritage — than that sun can be
Part of the earth he has with warmth imbued, —
Whence earnest thou ? Whither goest thou ? I, subdued
With awe of mine own being thus sit still,
Dumb, on the summit of this lonely hill.
WTiose dry November grasses dow-beiUe pod
Mirror a million suns. That sun so bright,
Passes as thou must pass. Bold, into eight
Art thou afraid who solitary hast trod
A path I know not, from a MNUOt to I l»ourn
Both which I know not '.' thoe to return
Alone, even as thou earnest alone, to God .'
1). M Mr lock.
Insect and reptile, fish and bird and 1
Cast their worn robes aside. I to don ;
Tree, flower, and moss, put nee '. incuts on ;
Booh natural type, the greatest as the IflMt,
Renews its vesture when its use hath ceased. How should man's spirit keep in unison With the world's law of outgrowth, sere it won
New robes and ampler as its girth inereooi
Quit shrunken creed, and dwarfed philosophy !
Let gently die an art's deoej ing tire ! Work on the ancient lines, but vet 1..
To leave and frame anew, if God infpfae ! The planets change their surface a The force that binds the spheres must hind the soul.
Henry G. Hewlett.
PREFACE.
M The idea remained a dream of th
eded in giving it ;i bigfaei moral significance for tin* order of the universe." Bo writes Barmann Lotze, the German philosopher, in bis maj " Microcosm," expn g of
Christendom, [f this little booh purpose
it, will sh«»w th. b and value dreamy
idea.
The preaenl perplexitj of all deepest problemi of life, the lenae <>f blind
ling mankind, the despaii limy
leading poem, the abeenoe of sublime ideale the prevalence of materialism and agnosticism i if n«»t in philosophy, in the most vital Conn of practical life), all feed a flood-tide of dissatisfaction which
Christianity tries in vain to resist, and mdicatfl that
the West deeply needs some new truth. V- only the wavering mansen of men. but many «>f th.«.> un- oompromising devotees of truth who dare surrender themselves, like St. Christopher, to the mightiest, are
yearning after a larger revelation. A portion of this
viii PREFACE,
is contained, we believe, in the doctrine variously termed as Reincarnation, Metempsychosis, Trmnnni- gration. By this we do not mean the cerning re-birth of men in broi . which are
attributed to oriental religions and philosophies be- cause popularly accepted \>y their followers. These are crude caricatures of the tin ption.
represent the reality as absurdly a^ ordinal.
Europe and America illui 'esns.
But we mean tin* inn
protean forms has UTOprossibly welled uj» in • great phase of thought, which is an open se
all around us and Dot simply a importat
and which Christendom cannot afford t<> lose.
For those who are content with the eeds
this Little work \sill have no attraction. They may
be pleased to regard it SS a heathen invasion i i tendom. Bat f<>r tmth-scrk.r> it m though it claims only to l>e an earnest inv of what Beems an nndemonstrable proposition, doctrine was first met as the declaration o! the foundest students of the mysteries enveloping hu- manity Doming With authority hut DO prod
weight to most western thinkers. It- violent antago- nism to current ideas oompelled the writer t-» d impose of it by independent methods, If true, th. be some confirmation of it such as ns ill impress candid mind. If false, nothing Can fnnc it to] This led to a careful study of the subject, which was summarized in a brief » ad and pub!
a small I Theoft
tint Some re.- 1
will regard it as a waste of enerj:
■ tin-in i>\ :i«. . I
iates t In- 'l.u b ' imseages in
veals cardinal \ t j nhended.
Iv the shaml
;-ii iin.'il.' : nil-
plendoi ai ti and thou ht I • i only seDsible kind, and n
rxpn ■ i
til." r\ Qfl Of I
oe aggr.i f the rti
I !
Tli. &kl of tli. •
; kind friends, whose assistance has larp 1 the oollection also t<> the anthon who hnti kind]
ran their p rifting*, ( in re iv
and v. i
Of all the theories respecting the origin of the soul, it (pre-exist- ence) seems to me the most plausible and therefore the one most like- ly to throw light on the question of a life to come. — Frederick H. Hedge.
It would be curious if we should find science and philosophy tak- ing up again the old theory of metempsychosis, remodelling it to suit our present modes of religious and scientific thought, and launch- ing it again on the wide ocean of human belief. But stranger things have happened in the history of human opinion. — James Freeman Clarke.
If we could legitimately determine any question of belief by the number of its adherents, the quod semper, quod ubique, quod ab omni- bus would apply to metempsychosis more fitly than to any other. I think it is quite as likely to be revived and to come to the front again as any rival theory. — Professor William Knight.
It seems to me, a firm and well-grounded faith in the doctrine of Christian metempsychosis might help to regenerate the world. For it would be a faith not hedged round with many of the difficulties and objections which beset other forms of doctrine, and it offers dis- tinct and pungent motives for trying to lead a more Christian life, and for loving and helping our brother-man. — Professor Francis Bowen.
CONTENTS.

PAGE
Introduction 3
I. What is Reincarnation ? 9
II.
Western Evidences of Reincarnation 15
1. Immortality demands it ; 2. Analogy suggests it ; 3. Science confirms it ; 4. The nature of the soul requires it ; 5. It answers the theological question of ' ' original sin ' ' and "future punishment;" 6. Many strange experiences are explained hy it ; 7. The problems of life and of Nemesis are solved best by it.
III.
Western Objections to Reincarnation 49
1. We have no memory of past lives ; 2. It is unjust for us to receive the results of forgotten deeds ; 3. Heredity op- poses it ; 4. It is an uncongenial doctrine.
IV.
Western Authors upon Reincarnation 63
Extracts : 1. Schopenhauer ; 2. Lessing ; 3. Fichte ; 4. Her- der ; 5. Henry More ; 6. Sir Thomas Browne ; 7. Cheva- lier Ramsay ; 8. Soame Jenyns ; 9. Joseph Glanvil ; 10. Dowden's Shelley; 11. Hume; 12. Southey; 13. Wil- liam Blake; 14. William Knight; 15. W.A.Butler; 16. Bulwer ; 17. Pezzani ; 18. Emerson ; 19. James Freeman Clarke ; 20. William R. Alger ; 21. Francis Bowen ; 22. Frederick A. Hedge.
xii CONTENTS.
V.
Western Poets upon Reincarnation 125