Conan Doyle Tells of Spiritualism, the Great Religion of the Future
Conan Doyle Tells of Spiritualism, the Great Religion of the Future is an interview of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle by Marguerite Mooers Marshall, published in The Evening World on 11 april 1922.
Conan Doyle Tells of Spiritualism
| "I have seen my dead son. I have talked to him. He has kissed me. AND I KNOW!" | "Heaven is to me as definite a world as Europe or the United States." | "It is like this world but devoid of the ugly, the unhappy, the evil things in this life." | "In heaven every person is at the zenith. The children grow up, the old go back to maturity." | "The truly mated preserve their union. The unhappily mated find their true mates in heaven." | "There are beautiful homes, flowers, lakes, woods, music, games and the work of love." | "If Spiritualism is of the Devil, it's a sign he's falling down on his job!" | "Spiritualism is the religion of the future, the answer to the modern world's curse of materialism." |
(11 april 1922, p. 3)
Conan Doyle Knows Heaven As We Know Europe; Talked To Those Who'd Been There
It Is a Place Where All Our Departed Are in Their Zenith, Where the Old Lose Their Infirmities, the Young Reach Perfect Maturity, the Deformed Made Whole — No Physical Love There, but a Spiritual Mating — And No Hell.
By Marguerite Mooers Marshall.
"What is the one proof of all others which has done most to convince you that the spirit survives?" I asked Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
"My son," he answered. simply. "I have seen him. I have talked to him. He has placed his hands on my shoulders. He has kissed me. AND I KNOW!"
Looking up into the broad, kindly, florid face, its Iris blue eyes suddenly misted — Sir Conan stands well over six feet and his broad shoulders are as unbowed as when he paid us his last visit just before the War, eight years ago — hearing the mellow Celtic voice grow still softer with the memory of a great love, I thought of the immortal cry of fatherhood:
"For this my son was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found."
And I felt glad that this father of one of the great war's toll of heroes, and many other fathers, other mothers, are finding some measure of consolation in their belief that their sons live and do not forget.
There is a frankly emotional background to Sir Conan Doyle's belief that the dead are alive and do communicate with us. He asserts that he has been studying psychic matters for more than thirty years. But it was only during the war, when all about him he saw Rachel mourning for her children, and when his own son, Kingsley, died as a result of exposure on the battlefield, that he made public confession of his faith in spiritualism. He wrote two ardent books on the subject, "The New Revelation" and "The Vital Message." Now he says candidly:
"I am giving my life to the spread of the truths that I believe vital. I am not interested any longer in Sherlock Holmes, or other literary work. This work for spiritualism seems so much more, important."
He will lecture on it here, as he has done in Australia, and will show on the screen his collection of spirit photographs.
That he has held personal communication with twenty of his own dead, that the dead not only live but can give proof of their existence through sensitive mediums, that spiritualism is to be the world's great religion of the future — these are among the truths Sir Conan Doyle holds to be self-evident.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of his psychic philosophy is his feeling about heaven. He believes in it quite as you or I believe in Europe, even though we have never been there. But we have seen people who have been in Europe, and we have heard or read what they had to say about it. The distinguished author of the Sherlock Holmes stories, "Sir Nigel," "The White Company" and a six-volume military history of the British campaign in France, has never been to heaven. But, in his opinion, he has seen dwellers in that happy clime: he has heard and read their descriptions of it:
"Heaven is to me as definite a world as Europe or Africa or the United States." Sir Conan told me, "It is very like this world, except that heaven is devoid of the ugly, the unhappy, the evil things we find in this life.
"In heaven, for example, every person is at the zenith of his or her powers. The spiritual body is like the earth body, except that the former is complete and beautiful. In heaven we lose all earthly deformities; the person with only one leg, one eye or a crooked spine is made whole. The little children grow up to perfect normal manhood or womanhood. The old lose their disabilities of old age, and go back to the period of their glorious maturity."
"And isn't it your belief," I suggested, "that in heaven each finds his or her perfect mate?"
"Yes," said Sir Conan, "There is no physical love, no childbirth, but the husband and wife truly mated preserve a wonderful union in the heavenly world, and of the unhappily mated on earth, each finds his or her complement. Each soul finds, sooner or later, the one other soul which is most sympathetic to it.
"There are beautiful homes in heaven, surrounded by gardens of wonderful flowers. I believe that one finds there one's favorite pets. There are woodlands, lakes. There are games and sports, glorious music, joy and laughter. The person who has work which he loves to do will find the opportunity in heaven to exercise his creative ability."
Or, as Kipling phrased it—
- "And each, in his separate star,
- Shall draw the thing as he see it—
- For the God of Things As They Are."
"The spirits work for others and to educate themselves for progress and advancement." summed up Sir Arthur.
In "The Vital Message," he says of the future life: "Every earthly thing has its equivalent. Scoffers have guffawed over alcohol and tobacco, but if all things are reproduced it would be a flaw if these were not reproduced also."
But he smilingly shook his head when I asked for more particulars about heavenly cigarettes and cocktails. "I personally am not ready to believe that these things are a part of the future life," he declared. "They are, it seems to me, human weaknesses and as such must be left behind."
I came near saying that without them heaven wouldn't be heaven, for some of us, but one doesn't feel like jesting with this big, gentle, leonine defender of the things he holds sacred. So I asked him why many churches and religious leaders are opposed to spiritualism.
"They do not understand it," he said, patiently. "Many of them close their minds and refuse to listen to new truths. I know that they have gone so far as to say these truths are of the devil. My answer is that if this were so, he never made a bigger mistake in his life. It's a sign that he's falling down on his job."
"But do you think that there is no danger in this widespread fumbling with unseen things?" I questioned.
"There is an element of danger — there is danger in everything." replied Sir Conan Doyle. "There is fraud thought that has been greatly exaggerated. There is self-deception, which is far more common and rather pitiable. I myself do not do not like to see some of the people going around as wonder-mongers."
"But," he added, characteristically, "there may be too much insistence on the scientific aspect of spiritualism. Real religion is an important element in it. There is much to be said for faith."
"And you believe," I put it to him, as we stood in the doorway of his apartment at the Hotel Ambassador, "that spiritualism is the new faith?"
"Spiritualism is the religion of the future, in my opinion," he answered.
"Men and women everywhere are taking it up, and even ministers of the churches that criticise us are tacitly spiritualist truth into their services. It vivifies the religion which has been decaying among us, and gives new assurance of New Testament truths.
"It removes the fear of death and consoles the bereaved with the promise of a reunion with their loved ones. It takes away the conception of a hell of eternal punishment — something I am convinced no benevolent Creator could tolerate.
"I believe the souls which need punishment receive it, and in what is, at worst, a sort of purgatory, not the traditional hell of everlasting fires.
"Finally, spiritualism is the answer to the curse of materialism which rests so heavily on our world."
