The wife of a respectable citizen, named Arnold, at Heilbronn, held constant communications with her protecting spirit, who warned her of impending dangers, approaching visiters, and so forth. He was only once visible to her, and it was in the form of an old man; but his presence was felt by others as well as herself, and they were sensible that the air was stirred, as by a breath.
Jung Stilling publishes a similar account, which was bequeathed to him by a very worthy and pious minister of the church. The subject of the guardianship was his own wife, and the spirit first appeared to her after her marriage, in the year 1799, as a child, attired in a white robe, while she was busy in her bed-chamber. She stretched out her hand to take hold of the figure, but it disappeared. It frequently visited her afterward, and in answer to her inquiries it said, “I died in my childhood!” It came to her at all hours, whether alone or in company, and not only at home, but elsewhere, and even when travelling, assisting her when in danger; it sometimes floated in the air, spake to her in its own language, which somehow, she says, she understood, and could speak, too; and it was once seen by another person. He bade her call him Immanuel. She earnestly begged him to show himself to her husband, but he alleged that it would make him ill, and cause his death. On asking him wherefore, he answered, “Few persons are able to see such things.”
Her two children, one six years old, and the other younger, saw this figure as well as herself.
Schubert, in his “Geschichte der Seele,” relates that the ecclesiastical councillor Schwartz, of Heidelberg, when about twelve years of age, and at a time that he was learning the Greek language, but knew very little about it, dreamed that his grandmother, a very pious woman, to whom he had been much attached, appeared to him, and unfolded a parchment inscribed with Greek characters which foretold the fortunes of his future life. He read it off with as much facility as if it had been in German, but being dissatisfied with some particulars of the prediction, he begged they might be changed. His grandmother answered him in Greek, whereupon he awoke, remembering the dream, but, in spite of all the efforts to arrest them, he was unable to recall the particulars the parchment had contained. The answer of his grandmother, however, he was able to grasp before it had fled his memory, and he wrote down the words; but the meaning of them he could not discover without the assistance of his grammar and lexicon. Being interpreted, they proved to be these: “As it is prophesied to me, so I prophesy to thee!” He had written the words in a volume of Gessner’s works, being the first thing he laid his hand on; and he often philosophized on them in later days, when they chanced to meet his eye. How, he says, should he have been able to read and produce that in his sleep, which, in his waking state, he would have been quite incapable of? “Even long after, when I left school,” he adds, “I could scarcely have put together such a sentence; and it is extremely remarkable that the feminine form was observed in conformity with the sex of the speaker.” The words were these: αῦτα Χρησμ῾ωδηθεισα Χρησμωδὲω σοι.
Grotius relates, that when Mr. de Saumaise was councillor of the parliament at Dijon, a person, who knew not a word of Greek, brought him a paper on which was written some words in that language, but not in the character. He said that a voice had uttered them to him in the night, and that he had written them down, imitating the sound as well as he could. Mons de Saumaise made out that the signification of the words was, “Begone! do you not see that death impends?” Without comprehending what danger was predicted, the person obeyed the mandate and departed. On that night the house that he had been lodging in fell to the ground.
The difficulty in these two cases is equally great, apply to it whatever explanation we may; for even if the admonitions proceeded from some friendly guardian, as we might be inclined to conclude, it is not easy to conceive why they should have been communicated in a language the persons did not understand.
After the death of Dante, it was discovered that the thirteenth canto of the “Paradiso” was missing; great search was made for it, but in vain; and to the regret of everybody concerned, it was at length concluded that it had either never been written, or had been destroyed. The quest was therefore given up, and some months had elapsed, when Pietro Allighieri, his son, dreamed that his father had appeared to him and told him that if he removed a certain panel near the window of the room in which he had been accustomed to write, the thirteenth canto would be found. Pietro told his dream, and was laughed at, of course; however, as the canto did not turn up, it was thought as well to examine the spot indicated in the dream. The panel was removed, and there lay the missing canto behind it; much mildewed, but, fortunately, still legible.
If it be true that the dead do return sometimes to solve our perplexities, here was not an unworthy occasion for the exercise of such a power. We can imagine the spirit of the great poet still clinging to the memory of his august work, immortal as himself—the record of those high thoughts which can never die.
There are numerous curious accounts extant of persons being awakened by the calling of a voice which announced some impending danger to them. Three boys are sleeping in the wing of a castle, and the eldest is awakened by what appears to him to be the voice of his father calling him by name. He rises and hastens to his parent’s chamber, situated in another part of the building, where he finds his father asleep, who, on being awakened, assures him that he had not called him, and the boy returns to bed. But he is scarcely asleep, before the circumstance recurs, and he goes again to his father with the same result. A third time he falls asleep, and a third time he is aroused by the voice, too distinctly heard for him to doubt his senses; and now, alarmed at he knows not what, he rises and takes his brothers with him to his father’s chamber; and while they are discussing the singularity of the circumstance, a crash is heard, and that wing of the castle in which the boys slept falls to the ground. This incident excited so much attention in Germany that it was recorded in a ballad.
It is related by Amyraldus, that Monsieur Calignan, chancellor of Navarre, dreamed three successive times in one night, at Berne, that a voice called to him and bade him quit the place, as the plague would soon break out in that town; that, in consequence, he removed his family, and the result justified his flight.
A German physician relates, that a patient of his told him, that he dreamed repeatedly, one night, that a voice bade him go to his hop-garden, as there were thieves there. He resisted the injunction some time, till at length he was told that if he delayed any longer he would lose all his produce. Thus urged, he went at last, and arrived just in time to see the thieves, loaded with sacks, making away from the opposite side of the hop-ground.
A Madame Von Militz found herself under the necessity of parting with a property which had long been in her family. When the bargain was concluded, and she was preparing to remove, she solicited permission of the new proprietor to carry away with her some little relic as a memento of former days—a request which he uncivilly denied. On one of the nights that preceded her departure from the home of her ancestors, she dreamed that a voice spoke to her, and bade her go to the cellar and open a certain part of the wall, where she would find something that nobody would dispute with her. Impressed with her dream, she sent for a bricklayer, who, after long seeking, discovered a place which appeared less solid than the rest. A hole was made, and in a niche was found a goblet, which contained something that looked like a pot pourri. On shaking out the contents, there lay at the bottom a small ring, on which was engraven the name Anna Von Militz.
A friend of mine, Mr. Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, has some coins that were found exactly in the same manner. The child of a Mr. Christison, in whose house his father was lodging, in the year 1781, dreamed that there was a treasure hid in the cellar. Her father had no faith in the dream; but Mr. Sharpe had the curiosity to have the place dug up, and a copper pot was found, full of coins.
A very singular circumstance was related to me by Mr. J——, as having occurred not