I AM HERE. G.H.B.

I am a spirit who cannot tell you of the joys of heaven, but I can describe the horrors of hell. For just as these other spirits described to you their homes of beauty and happiness, I can describe my home of ugliness and torment.

Do you wish me to do so?

(Yes, please do.)

Well, know then that, when I lived on earth, I was a man of very considerable intellectual powers and acquirements, and also of an intense animal nature-so much so that it overcame my judgment and what moral qualities I had; and I became, at last, a slave to my appetites, which were varied, especially my appetite for drink.

I had many friends of position, social and otherwise, and I was considered a brilliant newspaper writer, and had access to the inner political circles that were then in control of the government.

My weakness, or rather the effect of the strength of my animal nature, was known to many of my friends. And, in many ways, they tried to help me and rescue me from my evil and destructive course of living; and, it was not for any great length of time before I would again relapse into my deplorable habits and become the controlled victim of my destroying appetites.

Of course, human friendship and sympathy had their limits, and my friends finally gave me up as lost and past redemption. And I surely and quickly sunk lower and lower in my moral condition and, at last, died a drunkard, unwept and unsung except for the evil that I had done. It was undoubtedly a relief to my friends and acquaintances, when I passed over, to be forever relieved of the shadow of my presence and the ghost of what I had been.

But such was my end. And, when I came to the spirit world, I found that I still was deserted by friends who had become spirits before me, except not by some who liked the flowing bowl as I did on earth, and who were inhabitants of the unattractive place that I found myself in when my habitation became fixed.

When on earth, I never thought much of the future life, except to convince myself that there was no hell, and, if there was a God, that He was not bothered about me, a mere man of many millions.

But, oh, the fatal mistake, and the unexpected realization of the fact that there is a hell! Whether there is a God I don't know, for I have never seen Him or felt His Influence. But since I came to you tonight and heard the messages of those two spirits who described their wonderful homes and their condition of happiness, and ascribed them all to the Kindness and Care of God, I have commenced to think that there may be a God and that my mistake was greater than I have heretofore realized. But this is a digression from what I started out to write.

That there is a hell I know to my sorrow and sufferings, for I have been the occupant of one for, oh, these many years! And it is always the same place of horrors and darkness, except, sometimes, it is lighted by the flame of lurid light that comes from the anger and sufferings of some unfortunate like myself.

In this hell of mine, and there are many like it, instead of beautiful homes, as the other spirits described, we have dirty, rotten hovels, all crooked and decayed, with all the foul smells of a charnel house ten-times intensified. And instead of beautiful lawns and green meadows, and leafy woods filled with musical birds making the echoes ring with their songs, we have stagnant pools filled with all kinds of repulsive reptiles and vermin, and smells of inexpressible, nauseating stinks.

I tell you that these are all real, and not creatures of the imagination or the outflowing of bitter recollections. And, as for love, it has never shown its humanizing face in all the years that I have been here-only cursings and hatred and bitter scathings and imprecations, and grinning spirits with their witch-like cacklings. There is no rest, no hope, no kind words or ministering hand to wipe away the scalding tears which so often flow in mighty volumes. No, hell is real and hell is here!

We do not have any fire and brimstone, or grinning devils with pitchforks and hoofs and horns, as the churches teach. But what is the need or necessity for such accompaniments? They would not add to the horrors or to our torments. I tell you, my friend, that I have only faintly described our homes in these infernal regions, and I cannot picture them as they are.

But the horror and pity of it all is that hope does not come to us with one faint smile to encourage us that there may be an ending to all these torments at some time. And, in our hopeless despair, we realize that our doom is fixed for all eternity.

As the rich man in hell said, "If I could only send Lazarus to tell my poor, erring brothers on earth of what awaits them, how gladly I would do so and save their souls from the eternal torment."

Well, I have written you a long letter, and I am tired because it is the first time that I have attempted to write for many long years. I find some difficulty in gathering my thoughts so as to be able to write in an intelligent and collected manner. So, I must stop.

(My dear friend and brother, don't despair, for I will attempt to help you out of your condition of darkness and suffering if you will allow me to do so.)

Well, I will say that you are the best friend that I have had since I became an outcast while on earth, and that I will do whatever you may advise. But you must not expect me to have much hope-not doubting your desire to help me, by merely your ability.

(Well, first you must open your heart and mind to receiving help from the Celestial spirits-spirits who were once sinful mortals like yourself before they became fully redeemed children of God by receiving His Divine Love through prayer. In addition, while you reach out to them in this way, I too will ask that they come to you with their great love and solicitude to provide you with the help you need. And as we thus both call upon them, simply look about you. Very soon, they will appear to your vision.)

Well, I have looked as you advised, and I see some spirits who are so beautiful and bright that I can scarcely look at them. Never before have I seen such spirits, or imagined that such could exist. They must be gods, or why all the great happiness and beauty and love which they have? Tell me, what does it all mean? Is it a star of hope that has come to me from afar, and bids me trust that these hells shall not be my home forever? Oh, tell me, I pray you, are they the spirits of real mortals who lived and died as I did?

Such love I have never seen! They look at me with such encouragement and almost human eyes of love, and they beckon me to come with them. I have asked if Mr. Riddle is there, and one spirit comes to me and says yes, and that he is glad to have me come with him, as he knew me on earth and is acquainted with my sad life. And now I remember him, for he was a friend who lived in the same city as I did.

He says, "Come G_____, and I will try to show you the Way to light and relief from your sufferings." And I am going; and, as I go, a beautiful, glorious spirit comes to me and lays her hand on my head and says, "God bless you, my brother, and may His Divine Mercy be yours." And she tells me that they all love me and will help me.
Oh, tell me, what does it all mean? Am I dreaming? Are you real and are they real, or am I in one of the deliriums that I used to have on earth? Oh, they are so beautiful and heavenly! But they say no-that they are real spirits and once lived on earth, and were sinful mortals like myself.

How can I ever thank you? I am overcome and cannot write more, but I will come again. So, my dear friend, good night, for I am going.

G.H.B.

I AM HERE. Nero, a former Roman emperor.

I am here, the spirit of one who lived the life of a wicked man of earth. I was a persecutor of the Christians, and a blasphemer of God and everything that was pure and holy. And when I had lived the life to its end, and had shuffled off the mortal coil and became a spirit, I also became a dweller in the lowest hells where all is darkness and torment, and where the abode of devils* and everything that tends to make the spirit unhappy exists and is at variance with the Loving God.

I introduce myself in this way in order to demonstrate to you the wonderful power of the Divine Love. For I am now an inhabitant of the Celestial Spheres, and know that this Love is not only real but is also capable of making the vilest sinner a partaker and owner of the Divine Essence of the Father.

My sufferings were beyond all description, and I was the most desecrated of mortals. And I was almost worshiped by the devils of hell because of the great injury I had done to the followers of Jesus who, in my time, were possessed of this Love, and a faith which even the terrors of the wild beasts of the arena, or the torches of my own evil design, could not cause them to renounce. It was at the time of this great religion of the New Birth that the Master had taught them, and that the disciples were still teaching, when I put so many of them to death. The devils loved me for the very evil that I had done.

But, strange to say, the spirits of those who I had sent into the spirit world before their time were not revengeful to me, and did not come to me with their imprecations or cursings. Then, when I had been in the spirit world a sufficient time to realize my surroundings and the nature of these evils, these spirits of the martyrs, which I had made, came to me in sympathy and pity, and, in fact, tried many times to help me out of my great sufferings and darkness. I did not understand all this unexpected kindness and evidence of love, and, for a long time, I would not believe that these spirits were sincere. And, so, I suffered for year after year, and century after century, and became convinced that my condition was fixed, that for me there was no hope, that the God that I had heard of was not my God, and that devils were the only companions that I was destined to have through all eternity.

And, so, I endured, wishing to die, but I could not. Oh, I tell you it was horrible and beyond all conception of mortals! The law was working and I was paying the penalty, and there seemed no end to the penalty.

I could find no consolation among those who surrounded me. The pleasures that I first enjoyed became mere things of mockery and derision to me, and my darkness and torment became the greater. How often I called upon God, if there was a God, to strike me dead! But the only answer to my call was the laughter of the grinning devils who told me to shout louder, as God might be asleep and may be deaf!

What to do, I knew not, and, so, I became isolated as best I could from these terrible associates. Many years of my living were spent in the darkness of lonesomeness, with never a ray of hope or the whisper of one word to tell me that there might be a fairer destiny for me. And, so, time went by and I waited in my misery for some kind power to come and annihilate me. But I waited in vain.

During all this time, the recollections of my earthly deeds were like hot irons scorching my soul and burning my body, as I thought, and the end came not.
Well, I suffered the tortures of the damned, and it seemed to me that I was paying the penalties for all the wicked kings and rulers and persecutors of earth. Many times, the shrieks of the Christian children and the groans of the men and women, as they were being torn asunder from limb to limb, or burned as living torches which I had made of them, came to me and increased my torment. I lived the life of centuries of torment in a few moments, as it seemed to me, and not one cooling drop of water was mine. It may seem impossible that I should have continued to live in this ever increasing suffering, but I did because I was compelled to. The law did its work and there was no one to say: "Enough!"

I might write a volume on this suffering of mine; yet you would not comprehend its meaning. And, so, I will pass it by.

In my loneliness and suffering, there came to me, on an occasion, a beautiful spirit, full of light and love, and all the beauty of early womanhood, as I thought. And with eyes of pity and longing, she said:

You are not alone. Only open your eyes and you will see the star of hope, which is the sign of the Father's Love and Desire to help you. I am a child of that Father and the possessor of His Great enveloping Love. And I love you, even though you took my young life from me when you threw me to the wild beasts to satisfy your desire to gratify your thirst for innocent blood, and to see the suffering and hear the groans of your victims. Yet, I love you not because I am a human with a kindly nature and forgiving disposition, but because I have in me this Divine Love of the Father which tells me that I am your sister, and that you are a child of His Love, just as I was the object of His Love.

You have suffered. And, while you suffered, His Great Love went out to you in sympathy and desire to help you. But you, yourself, prevented It from coming to you and leading you to light and surcease from sufferings. And, now, I come to you, your young and innocent victim, who had never done you any greater harm on earth than to pray for you and ask the Heavenly Father to take away the great wickedness from your heart that caused so many of my people to suffer persecutions and death. We all prayed for you and never asked our Father to curse you, or to do anything to you to make you suffer. And we have prayed for you often since we came to the spirit world; and we are now praying for you, and this because we love you and want you to be happy. Look into my eyes and you will see that love is there, and that what I tell you is true. And, now, can you not love us a little and open up your soul to our sympathy, and let your feelings of gloom and despondency leave you for a moment, and realize that, in this world of spirits, there are some who love you?

Well, to say that I was surprised does not express my feelings. As I looked into the love-lit eyes of that beautiful spirit, I felt the great sins of my earth life overwhelm me. And, in my anguish, I cried, "God be merciful to me, the greatest of sinners!" And, for the first time in all my life in the hells, tears came to my eyes, and my heart seemed to have a sense of living; and there came to me feelings of remorse and regret for all the evils that I had done.

It would take too long to tell what followed this breaking up of my soul, all shriveled and dead. Suffice it to say that, from time to time, I commenced to have hope come to me that I could get out of my awful condition of darkness. It took a long time but, at last, I got into the light. And this Love which the beautiful spirit first told me of gradually came into my soul, until, at last, I reached the condition of bliss in which I now am.

And during all the time of my progress, this radiant, loving spirit came to me very often with her words of love and encouragement. She prayed for me and never left me when I became, as I did at times, doubtful and discouraged. As my awakening continued, the Love came into my soul. And as she told me of the heavenly things that would be mine as I progressed and reached the soul spheres, where beautiful homes and pure, bright spirits are, I became more and more bound by my love to her. After a while, I got into the Third Sphere, and realized that what she had told me was true. Only I had not been able to comprehend the greatness of the Truth.

She then commenced to tell me of the happiness of the beautiful spirits of the two sexes that I so often saw together. She explained that they were soulmates, and that their love was the greatest of all the loves except the Divine Love, and that every spirit in all the spheres had its soulmate and, at the proper time, would find it.

My love for this loving spirit had then become so intense that, in the very depths of my soul, I wished and prayed that my soulmate might be such a one as she. And, at last, I became so filled with my love for her that I told her that the only thing in all the heavens that I needed to make my happiness full was she as my soulmate, but that I realized that that desire was hopeless, as I had destroyed her life, and, of course, she could not be my soulmate. And, oh, how I suffered when I realized that she could not be mine, but was another's!

As I told her of these longings and hopeless feelings of my soul, she came close to me and looked into my eyes with such burning love, and threw her arms around me and said:

I am your soulmate, and knew that fact a short time after you came to the spirit world and entered your hells of darkness. And, during all the long years, I prayed and prayed for the time to come when I could go to you with my love and awaken in your dead soul the response to my great love. And when the time came that I could go, I was so thankful to the Father that I almost flew to you-with some dread of disappointment, I confess-to tell you that you were not neglected or unthought of, but that there was some love in the spirit world that was going to you. Of course, I could not tell you of my soulmate love, for you would not then have understood. But, as your soul awakened and the Love of the Father came to you, I became happier and happier, and have waited anxiously for this moment when I could tell you that this love that had been consciously mine for so long is all yours!

Well, I will draw the veil here, but you can imagine what my happiness was. As I progressed from sphere to sphere, my happiness and love for her increased and increased.

Thus, I have told you the story of the life of the wickedest man in the spirit world that God ever permitted to live and gratify his feelings of hatred and revenge.

And I, who have passed through this experience and realized all that it means, say that the Divine Love of the Father is able to, and does, save the vilest sinner, and transforms the worst of all devils into a Celestial angel of His highest Spheres.

I have written long and you are tired.

I thank you and will say good night, and subscribe myself,

Your brother in Christ,

NERO, the Roman emperor, and,
at one time, a persecutor.

* "Devils" refers to former mortals, now spirits, who are undeveloped and who have yet to have progressed to higher spheres of light and happiness.

I AM HERE. Swedenborg.

Let me write a few lines, as I desire to write to you some truths about what you and your friend were discussing; namely, are there any such hells as are described in the messages contained in the book (Dr. Peeble's Immortality) that you have been reading tonight.

Well, you must know that, in the spirit planes, hell is a place as well as a condition, and that, as a place, it has all the accompaniments that make it a reality to the spirits who inhabit it. Of course, the conditions of the spirits who are in these hells are determined by their recollections, worked upon by their consciences. But, notwithstanding that these recollections are the things that cause their sufferings, yet, the appearances of the locations in which they live are due to something more than these mere recollections. For, as you have been informed, all these spirits are in darkness, the degree of which is determined by their recollections. I mean that when the spirit has recollections of deeds done or not done, which are not so bad as the recollections of another, the former spirit is in a place where there is less darkness than the latter.

These places have their own fixed condition of darkness and of gloom, and many other attachments which increase the sufferings that spirits have to endure.

Of course, there are no fires and brimstone lakes, and devils with pitchforks adding to the sufferings of the spirits. But, yet, there are certain conditions and appearances which are outside of the spirits themselves, and which cause their recollections to become more acute and to work in a manner to produce a greater degree of suffering.

These hells may be places of caverns and rocks and barren wastes and dark holes, and other such things as have been written about. And mortals must know that evil spirits do not live in pleasant places, and that they suffer from this and from the punishments which their recollections bring to them.

While the hells of the orthodox are greatly exaggerated in their descriptions, yet, there is some truth in the ideas which these descriptions convey as to the fact that the hells are places in which there is darkness and many accompanying appearances that add to the tortures of the spirits of evil.

I tell you this because I see you want to know the truth, and for the further reason that you do not believe that there are such distinctive places as the hells, and that the darkness which the spirits speak to you of in their communications is produced, in your opinion, by the conditions of the minds and souls of the spirits who write.

But such opinion is not altogether correct, and it is best for men to know that the mere recollections do not include all of what the hells are.

You say you have your hells on earth sometimes, and that is true to a limited extent. Many men suffer very much from their consciences and remorse. But when they come into the spirit world, if they have not gotten out of the condition which these recollections and remorse place them in, they will find that there is that place or location waiting for them which will add to their sufferings that arise from the recollections of evil deeds committed while on earth.

The evil spirits live in communities, for the Law of Attraction operates in these dark and lower planes just as it does in the higher spheres; and it causes spirits of like or similar conditions to congregate together and find consolation (or what they may think at times to be consolation) in one another's company.

These hells are on the planes nearest the earth. And these spirits are not confined all the time to any particular hell. They have the privilege of moving at will along this plane. But, wherever they go, they find that they are in these hells, and they cannot escape from them unless they accept the help from spirits who can instruct them in what they must do.

When they come to you to write, they are not very far from these hells, because the plane in which they live is a part of the plane in which the inhabitants of earth live.

Of course, I don't mean to say that that portion of the earth plane that surrounds your earth is composed entirely of these hells, for that is not true. The earth sphere has considerable light in it and some happiness. And you must further remember that there are many planes in this earth plane.

While their habitations are in these hells, those spirits have the privilege of leaving these particular localities and wandering for a short time in and over other parts of this earth plane, but this is only for a short time. They have to return to the places where they have been placed, and which this Law of Attraction, that I speak of, draws them to.

There are thousands of millions of evil spirits, and there is never a time when some of them-thousands of them-are not surrounding and trying to use their bad influences on mortals. We do not know why this is permitted, but only know that it is so. And here, again, the great Law of Attraction operates, for many mortals are in similar conditions of development and evil thoughts of what these evil spirits are in. And, naturally, these evil spirits are drawn to them and do come to them. And, frequently, it happens that, while visiting these mortals of similar conditions to their own, they attempt to influence mortals who are in a better state of moral and spiritual condition, and sometimes succeed in doing them harm.

But the great fact is that these evil spirits have a place of living where they have to remain until, by the operation of the Law of Compensation, they are relieved from some of their evil tendencies and desires and are permitted to progress.

My principal reason in writing to you is to have you know that there are hells of places as well as of conditions, and that these places and their appearances add to the suffering of the spirits by reason of what they contain.

As I have written a long time, I will stop and say that I am a Christian and an inhabitant of the Celestial Spheres, and one of the spirit band that is helping you in the great work of the Master. So, in leaving you, I will subscribe myself,

Your brother in Christ,

SWEDENBORG, the seer.