Collected Works of Poe, Vol 2 (11 page)

P.
There seems to me an insurmountable objection to the idea of absolute coalescence; - and that is the very slight resistance experienced by the heavenly bodies in their revolutions through space - a resistance now ascertained, it is true, to exist in
some
degree, but which is, nevertheless, so slight as to have been quite overlooked by the sagacity even of Newton. We know that the resistance of bodies is, chiefly, in proportion to their density. Absolute coalescence is absolute density. Where there are no interspaces, there can be no yielding. An ether, absolutely dense, would put an infinitely more effectual stop to the progress of a star than would an ether of adamant or of iron.

V.
Your objection is answered with an ease which is nearly in the ratio of its apparent unanswerability. - As regards the progress of the star, it can make no difference whether the star passes through the ether
or the ether through it
. There is no astronomical error more unaccountable than that which reconciles the known retardation of the comets with the idea of their passage through an ether: for, however rare this ether be supposed, it would put a stop to all sidereal revolution in a very far briefer period than has been admitted by those astronomers who have endeavored to slur over a point which they found it impossible to comprehend. The retardation actually experienced is, on the other hand, about that which might be expected from the
friction
of the ether in the instantaneous passage through the orb. In the one case, the retarding force is momentary and complete within itself - in the other it is endlessly accumulative.

P.
But in all this - in this identification of mere matter with God - is there nothing of irreverence? [
I was forced to repeat this question before the sleep-waker fully comprehended my meaning
.]

V.
Can you say
why
matter should be less reverenced than mind? But you forget that the matter of which I speak is, in all respects, the very "mind" or "spirit" of the schools, so far as regards its high capacities, and is, moreover, the "matter" of these schools at the same time. God, with all the powers attributed to spirit, is but the perfection of matter.

P.
You assert, then, that the unparticled matter, in motion, is thought?

V.
In general, this motion is the universal thought of the universal mind. This thought creates. All created things are but the thoughts of God.

P.
You say, "in general."

V.
Yes. The universal mind is God. For new individualities,
matter
is necessary.

P.
But you now speak of "mind" and "matter" as do the metaphysicians.

V.
Yes - to avoid confusion. When I say "mind," I mean the unparticled or ultimate matter; by "matter," I intend all else.

P.
You were saying that "for new individualities matter is necessary."

V.
Yes; for mind, existing unincorporate, is merely God. To create individual, thinking beings, it was necessary to incarnate portions of the divine mind. Thus man is individualized. Divested of corporate investiture, he were God. Now, the particular motion of the incarnated portions of the unparticled matter is the thought of man; as the motion of the whole is that of God.

P.
You say that divested of the body man will be God?

V.
[
After much hesitation.
] I could not have said this; it is an absurdity.

P.
[
Referring to my notes.
] You
did
say that "divested of corporate investiture man were God."

V.
And this is true. Man thus divested
would be
God - would be unindividualized. But he can never be thus divested - at least never
will be
- else we must imagine an action of God returning upon itself - a purposeless and futile action. Man is a creature. Creatures are thoughts of God. It is the nature of thought to be irrevocable.

P.
I do not comprehend. You say that man will never put off the body?

V.
I say that he will never be bodiless.

P.
Explain.

V.
There are two bodies - the rudimental and the complete; corresponding with the two conditions of the worm and the butterfly. What we call "death," is but the painful metamorphosis. Our present incarnation is progressive, preparatory, temporary. Our future is perfected, ultimate, immortal. The ultimate life is the full design.

P.
But of the worm's metamorphosis we are palpably cognizant.

V.
We
, certainly - but not the worm. The matter of which our rudimental body is composed, is within the ken of the organs of that body; or, more distinctly, our rudimental organs are adapted to the matter of which is formed the rudimental body; but not to that of which the ultimate is composed. The ultimate body thus escapes our rudimental senses, and we perceive only the shell which falls, in decaying, from the inner form; not that inner form itself; but this inner form, as well as the shell, is appreciable by those who have already acquired the ultimate life.

P.
You have often said that the mesmeric state very nearly resembles death. How is this?

V.
When I say that it resembles death, I mean that it resembles the ultimate life; for when I am entranced the senses of my rudimental life are in abeyance, and I perceive external things directly, without organs, through a medium which I shall employ in the ultimate, unorganized life.

P.
Unorganized?

V.
Yes; organs are contrivances by which the individual is brought into sensible relation with particular classes and forms of matter, to the exclusion of other classes and forms. The organs of man are adapted to his rudimental condition, and to that only; his ultimate condition, being unorganized, is of unlimited comprehension in all points but one - the nature of the volition of God - that is to say, the motion of the unparticled matter. You will have a distinct idea of the ultimate body by conceiving it to be entire brain. This it is
not
; but a conception of this nature will bring you near a comprehension of what it
is
. A luminous body imparts vibration to the luminiferous ether. The vibrations generate similar ones within the retina; these again communicate similar ones to the optic nerve. The nerve conveys similar ones to the brain; the brain, also, similar ones to the unparticled matter which permeates it. The motion of this latter is thought, of which perception is the first undulation. This is the mode by which the mind of the rudimental life communicates with the external world; and this external world is, to the rudimental life, limited, through the idiosyncrasy of its organs. But in the ultimate, unorganized life, the external world reaches the whole body, (which is of a substance having affinity to brain, as I have said,) with no other intervention than that of an infinitely rarer ether than even the luminiferous; and to this ether - in unison with it - the whole body vibrates, setting in motion the unparticled matter which permeates it. It is to the absence of idiosyncratic organs, therefore, that we must attribute the nearly unlimited perception of the ultimate life. To rudimental beings, organs are the cages necessary to confine them until fledged.

P.
You speak of rudimental "beings." Are there other rudimental thinking beings than man?

V.
The multitudinous conglomeration of rare matter into nebulæ, planets, suns, and other bodies which are neither nebulæ, suns, nor planets, is for the sole purpose of supplying
pabulum
for the idiosyncrasy of the organs of an infinity of rudimental beings. But for the necessity of the rudimental, prior to the ultimate life, there would have been no bodies such as these. Each of these is tenanted by a distinct variety of organic, rudimental, thinking creatures. In all, the organs vary with the features of the place tenanted. At death, or metamorphosis, these creatures, enjoying the ultimate life - immortality - and cognizant of all secrets but
the one
, act all things and pass everywhere by mere volition: - indwelling, not the stars, which to us seem the sole palpabilities, and for the accommodation of which we blindly deem space created - but that SPACE itself - that infinity of which the truly substantive vastness swallows up the star-shadows -- blotting them out as non-entities from the perception of the angels.

P.
You say that "but for the
necessity
of the rudimental life" there would have been no stars. But why this necessity?

V.
In the inorganic life, as well as in the inorganic matter generally, there is nothing to impede the action of one simple
unique
law - the Divine Volition. With the view of producing impediment, the organic life and matter, (complex, substantial, and law-encumbered,) were contrived.

P.
But again - why need this impediment have been produced?

V.
The result of law inviolate is perfection - right - negative happiness. The result of law violate is imperfection, wrong, positive pain. Through the impediments afforded by the number, complexity, and substantiality of the laws of organic life and matter, the violation of law is rendered, to a certain extent, practicable. Thus pain, which in the inorganic life is impossible, is possible in the organic.

P.
But to what good end is pain thus rendered possible?

V.
All things are either good or bad by comparison. A sufficient analysis will show that pleasure, in all cases, is but the contrast of pain.
Positive
pleasure is a mere idea. To be happy at any one point we must have suffered at the same. Never to suffer would have been never to have been blessed. But it has been shown that, in the inorganic life, pain cannot be thus the necessity for the organic. The pain of the primitive life of Earth, is the sole basis of the bliss of the ultimate life in Heaven.

P.
Still, there is one of your expressions which I find it impossible to comprehend - "the truly
substantive
vastness of infinity."

V.
This, probably, is because you have no sufficiently generic conception of the term "
substance
" itself. We must not regard it as a quality, but as a sentiment: - it is the perception, in thinking beings, of the adaptation of matter to their organization. There are many things on the Earth, which would be nihility to the inhabitants of Venus - many things visible and tangible in Venus, which we could not be brought to appreciate as existing at all. But to the inorganic beings - to the angels - the whole of the unparticled matter is substance - that is to say, the whole of what we term "space" is to them the truest substantiality; - the stars, meantime, through what we consider their materiality, escaping the angelic sense, just in proportion as the unparticled matter, through what we consider its immateriality, eludes the organic.

As the sleep-waker pronounced these latter words, in a feeble tone, I observed on his countenance a singular expression, which somewhat alarmed me, and induced me to awake him at once. No sooner had I done this, than, with a bright smile irradiating all his features, he fell back upon his pillow and expired. I noticed that in less than a minute afterward his corpse had all the stern rigidity of stone. His brow was of the coldness of ice. Thus, ordinarily, should it have appeared, only after long pressure from Azrael's hand. Had the sleep-waker, indeed, during the latter portion of his discourse, been addressing me from out the region of the shadows?

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THE FACTS IN THE CASE OF M. VALDEMAR

OF course I shall not pretend to consider it any matter for wonder, that the extraordinary case of M. Valdemar has excited discussion. It would have been a miracle had it not-especially under the circumstances. Through the desire of all parties concerned, to keep the affair from the public, at least for the present, or until we had farther opportunities for investigation -- through our endeavors to effect this -- a garbled or exaggerated account made its way into society, and became the source of many unpleasant misrepresentations, and, very naturally, of a great deal of disbelief.

It is now rendered necessary that I give the facts -- as far as I comprehend them myself. They are, succinctly, these:

My attention, for the last three years, had been repeatedly drawn to the subject of Mesmerism; and, about nine months ago it occurred to me, quite suddenly, that in the series of experiments made hitherto, there had been a very remarkable and most unaccountable omission: -- no person had as yet been mesmerized in articulo mortis. It remained to be seen, first, whether, in such condition, there existed in the patient any susceptibility to the magnetic influence; secondly, whether, if any existed, it was impaired or increased by the condition; thirdly, to what extent, or for how long a period, the encroachments of Death might be arrested by the process. There were other points to be ascertained, but these most excited my curiosity -- the last in especial, from the immensely important character of its consequences.

In looking around me for some subject by whose means I might test these particulars, I was brought to think of my friend, M. Ernest Valdemar, the well-known compiler of the "Bibliotheca Forensica," and author (under the nom de plume of Issachar Marx) of the Polish versions of "Wallenstein" and "Gargantua." M. Valdemar, who has resided principally at Harlaem, N.Y., since the year 1839, is (or was) particularly noticeable for the extreme spareness of his person -- his lower limbs much resembling those of John Randolph; and, also, for the whiteness of his whiskers, in violent contrast to the blackness of his hair -- the latter, in consequence, being very generally mistaken for a wig. His temperament was markedly nervous, and rendered him a good subject for mesmeric experiment. On two or three occasions I had put him to sleep with little difficulty, but was disappointed in other results which his peculiar constitution had naturally led me to anticipate. His will was at no period positively, or thoroughly, under my control, and in regard to clairvoyance, I could accomplish with him nothing to be relied upon. I always attributed my failure at these points to the disordered state of his health. For some months previous to my becoming acquainted with him, his physicians had declared him in a confirmed phthisis. It was his custom, indeed, to speak calmly of his approaching dissolution, as of a matter neither to be avoided nor regretted.