WCP1708

[1]¹

Broadstone, Wimborne

Dec^r. 23rd. 1906

Dear Sir Oliver Lodge²

As you ask for even "hostile comments" on your "Principles of Faith"³ I send you a lot of marginal notes giving my ideas. They are so divergent apparently, from yours that they will probably be of no use to you.

I am now reading a book which gives the materials for a religious teaching that will be, I believe, more effective than any doctoring up of modern theology & science. It is — "A Wanderer in Spirit Lands"⁴ — to which my attention was called by my friend E. D. Girdlestone⁵ of Sutton Coldfield. Though generally agreeing with the [2] many other accounts of the "Spirit World" already given us, it goes much further, in delineating with vivid lights & shades, the conditions passed through by the more degraded & sensual men & women — The extreme slowness of their advancement, — and ^{in the account} of the vast organisation of helpers, who assist those who wish to rise out of their horrible state, to do so. It seems to me that this work is, as it purports to be — a real record from that bourne from which it is so ignorantly said that "no traveller returns". This written in deadly earnest.

Another book I should like to call your attention to — is "Root Principles in Spiritual and Rational Things"⁶ — by Thomas Child[.] [3] This is, to me, a masterly work and it leads up to a conception and solution ^{(in Chap. XVIII)} of the problem of Free Will — that is by far the most satisfactory I have yet met with.

I do not know whether you know Girdlestone — He is a fine thinker — a Socialist first — & now a Spiritualist — but a great invalid.

With best wishes | yours very sincerely | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]