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“Seven Minutes in Eternity ” With Their Aftermath By William Dudley Pelley

THE AFTERMATH To “Seven Minutes in Eternity”

I submit that two persons, unknown to each other, traveling to Japan, and meeting in later years can each easily check as to whether the other has been to Japan, by a comparison of what they saw and experienced in that altogether charming country. It was so with me and my correspondents. In some cases they reminded me of details which had actually slipped my mind.

And here is a still more interesting “check-up’ —

In 95 percent of those testimonial letters, the technique of getting into the hyper-dimension and the scenes and experiences encountered there, were so closely similar as almost to postulate a Law of the process. A man in Oregon and a woman in Virginia would write me of similar visitations made by them, both recounting accurate details and specifications which I had not mentioned, and neither knowing of the other’s letter.

In a number of these letters too, this visitation came as mine came: unheralded and unexpected.

Neither did it come always in the aftermath of sickness, drug taking, or time of great trouble. But invariably it did come in the wake of a tremendous desire for spiritual truth and a hunger and thirst after things of the Spirit. And let me add, the writers of the letters in this class were not drawn from any one type of person, any one sect, cult, age or locality of residence.

The letters people wrote me came from a cleancut cross-section of Americans and Englishmen; from railroad and bank presidents; from stenographers and street-car conductors; from every age in years — octogenarians to boys and girls in high schools and colleges — men and women being equally represented.

And another startling fact to me was, that if any one class of writers and inquirers was particularly noticeable in this mass, it was composed of Protestant ministers, most eager of all to lead their flocks into clear understanding of the eternal verities. The article, I might say, was copied in innumerable religious and theological journals, and to date those of my own staff or that of The American Magazine have learned of 144 sermons preached by clergymen on the experience in question.

In only one instance was the position taken by these pastors skeptical. This one instance came from a minister who sincerely believed that the devil tampered with my soul that night, because I had not said anything in my article about encountering Jesus Christ when I found myself on the other side of the Veil.

I found, I say, that vast numbers of people had had that hyper-dimensional visitation, but had taken no trouble to convince others not so fortunate, because of the facetiousness with which they assumed that they would be greeted.

Going completely out of the body is a common experience among persons of all races, creeds, and strata of society. Only I caused a sensation by saying so in the lead article of a periodical having ten millions of readers. And in view of the fact that the great majority of those who from time to time so enter other planes of being report similar sights and experiences, it is not difficult to accept the thesis that here is a field which Science may well look over to its profit.