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Show THE CITIZEN 6 find any ennobling idea. Only a suffering and devoted relative could much of heart balm in messages so shallow and so insignificant when compared with the mystery and grandeur of the human quest for the divine. Nevertheless the devotees of spirit communication will thrust aside Christianity and its solutions of the problem of life. to accept the slightest intimations that a departed soul is communicating a message through a third person. The question arises as to whether Satan, if he is as able and cunning as he has been reputed to be by the best authorities, would waste his valuable time with such silly attempts to lead men astray? Would he not employ more comprehensive and more subtle means? The orthodoz teaching is that evil spirits lead men into evil by means of temptations stirred up in. the human soul. Of course, that, too, is a communication of some kind, but it is more believable because it has been eminently successful in obtaining that which every efficient demon ought to desire results. It might be argued, however, that evil spirits would neglect no means of ensnaring the minds of good men and women who were not susceptible to the appeals of the grosser temptations. For the most part the messages appear to be neither very good nor very bad. A spirit will remark insipidly, I am' here and father is with me ; we wish we could tell you how happy we are, or something equally innocuous uttered through the elevating mediumship, perhaps, of an English slavey with a hairlip and a breath strongly suggestive of onions. All religions, of course, teach the validity of spiritual or spiritualistic communications. Spiritualism, therefore, is not violating any of the teachings of the older theology when it declares the existence of communication between the human and the spirit world. One overwhelming fact strikes the observer who views the world as he finds it. This life is shut off from the life to come by a wall which effectually stops communication. The faith of all religions teaches, on the other hand, that sometimes that wall does not stop communication between the human world and the world on the other side. Practically all religions teach that death is the chief medium by which the human being comes into communication with other world. Spiritualism labors under the difficulty of proving that any of its communications are hypernatural, but those who yearn for some words of love and hope from the departed are eager to be persuaded. After many years of the modern seance the case for spiritistic communications remains unproved. If the devil is in the game he apparently makes himself a motley of foolishness. He is so poor a showman that almost any trick magician of the stage can put on a better entertainment, one more absorbing and quite as eerie. When we attend entertainments of this kind we wonder at the ingenuity and depths of these tricks until we run across one that has already been explained to us, and then we laugh at our own and the tricks simplicity. We are compelled to take the word of a Conan Doyle or a Sir Oliver Lodge that-onwho, to use the vernacular, puts on a poor show is a genuine medium, whereas a clever genius who dazzles us with his marvels is a mere trickster. THI HOME OF THE BIO Wliat about VOUll wife? other Doe she fret for diamond anddutlen? domestic hate lie Doe finery? Ia ambition luring her? See THEDA BARA In The Lure of Ambition together with aeven nappT eta of vaudeville: Starting Sunday far THE MOST PDR THE LEAST -- ALWAYS THE BEST tU . The big double bill Adolph Zukor presents IRENE CASTLE In an elaborate screen adaptation of Sophie Kerrs celebrated novel of married life The Invisible Bond Also The famous rotund comedian FATTY ARBUCKLE In his new Paramount two-re- el Hayseed One of the best comedies in which this Spasm big, jolly funster has been seen in for many months Thursday, Friday, Saturday Handsome and popular BRYANT WASHBURN In a screen portrayal of the big Broadway success It Pays To Advertise Someone suggests that a law be passed to prevent people from melting gold coins. Another attempt to deprive the poor of their few In an Ohio town they are giving away a cigar with every pair of shoes purchased. Cigars and shoes probably arc made out of the same material. O Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday e remaining pleasures. O SHOWS Why not help Mexico? been helping herself. Hank asks Edward Marshall. 7 Mexico has Severeid, catcher for the St. Louis Americans, caught appendicitis. If gowns of a thousand mirrors cause husbands to reflect. become the fashion it will If the Drys take the joy out of perfume it wont be worth scent. A Swedish countess is described as a court favorite. Perhaps divorce court. Better English Week revealed many American atrocities. Evidently a coal strike does not diminish the supply of hot air. The Reds are out to supply jobs for soldiers. a-- |