After an interval I dreamt that, wishing to see what A. would do in case I appeared to him after my death, I went to him as a spirit and called him by his name.  Upon hearing my voice he rose and went to the window and looked out uneasily.  On my going close to him and speaking in his ear, he was much disturbed, and ran his hand through his hair and rubbed his head in a puzzled and by no means pleased manner.  At the third attempt to attract his attention he rushed to the door, and, calling for a glass, poured out some wine, which he drank.  On seeing this, and finding him inaccessible, I desisted, thinking it must often happen to the departed to be distressed by the inability or unwillingness of those they love to receive and recognise them.

—­Paris, Jan. 1878

XIII.  The Perfect Way with Animals

I saw in my sleep a cart-horse who, coming to me, conversed with me in what seemed a perfectly simple and natural manner, for it caused me no surprise that he should speak.  And this is what he said:—­

“Kindness to animals of the gentler orders is the very foundation of civilisation.  For it is the cruelty and harshness of men towards the animals under their protection which is the cause of the present low standard of humanity itself.  Brutal usage creates brutes; and the ranks of mankind are constantly recruited from spirits already hardened and depraved by a long course of ill-treatment.  Nothing developes the spirit so much as sympathy.  Nothing cultivates, refines, and aids it in its progress towards perfection so much as kind and gentle treatment.  On the contrary, the brutal usage and want of sympathy with which we meet at the hands of men, stunt our development and reverse all the currents of a our nature.  We grow coarse with coarseness, vile with reviling, and brutal with the brutality of those who surround us.  And when we pass out of this stage we enter on the next depraved and hardened, and with the bent of our dispositions such that we are ready by our nature to do in our turn that which has been done to us.  The greater number of us, indeed, know no other or better way.  For the spirit learns by experience and imitation, and inclines necessarily to do those things which it has been in the habit of seeing done.  Humanity will never become perfected until this doctrine is understood and received and made the rule of conduct.”

—­Paris, Oct. 28, 1879

XIV.  The Laboratory Underground