Preface.

The Association of Progressive Spiritualists of Great Britain regards the publication of this Report as its first act after organisation. All who are interested in the movement of which it has assumed the defence and promotion, are earnestly invited to aid in the circulation of this little publication. Hitherto there has been no organisation of the kind in this country, or declaration of principles and opinions on which the distinctive teachings of Progressive Spiritualists are based. The Association, however, has no fixed creed. Each individual is responsible for his or her own statements, as herein given; and they may be renounced, changed, or enlarged at any time, according to the degree of light and truth that may dawn on the individual's mind tending to alter conviction. Nothing, therefore, put forth in the following pages is to be received as final or authoritative, except in so far as the reader may be conscious of its truth. The object of the Association is to set individual minds on the work of finding the truth for themselves, and the members merely give their experience and convictions as guides and landmarks to those who may follow them. The reader is therefore left at entire liberty to reject the whole, modify a part, or adopt as his or her mind shall be prepared.

The Association attaches not a little importance to the article in reference to the rights, capacities, and power of woman; and it was the pleasure of the members that she should take her place among the office-bearers as an equal.

This work has been commenced in faith, and thus far carried forward in love, with the hope that it may be conducted in wisdom. This Association demands no declaration of belief or conduct from any person desirous of co-operating with it. The central inspiration of its members is a Love of Truth and Humanity, with an undying determination to discover the former, and apply it to the development and happiness of the latter, which they consider is their duty to God. Surely this is a platform on which all good and true men and women can assemble and calmly discuss the great and momentous questions that underly all reform, and man's acknowledged need of it. Hatred or hostility is not entertained against individuals or bodies of men personally, but only towards the hereditary ignorance, blind and mistaken motives, that in so far constitute them the page VI enemies of human progress and happiness. This Association is, therefore, not the enemy of true religion, but the champion of it, desiring it to be disclosed from the clouds of ignorance and superstition that obscure it, and to place it on a firm and scientific basis, demonstrable to all, in proportion to their mental capacity.

This Association is impressed with the conviction, that the present is an opportune time for inaugurating a new dispensation of thought and action, when so many minds of the first rank in intelligence, morals, and religious feeling can no longer find companionship and instruction in popular forms and institutions.

Without pledging itself to any definite programme, this Association will be most happy to avail itself of all suggestions, from whatever quarter they may emanate, that will aid in the work before it. As circumstances favour them, all agencies will be put into operation that can be of use in disseminating the great truths it has embraced. The formation and holding of other conventions and meetings will be encouraged, and delegates may be secured who will attend and aid in carrying out the purposes of such meetings; agents may be employed; books and tracts produced and circulated, periodicals established, and mediums, lecturers, and teachers or missionaries encouraged. Association and encouragement is all that is wanted to secure the services of many gifted minds to the cause of humanity, and to all such the warm hand of fraternal affection and co-operation is offered.

This young Association wish it to be understood, that its efforts will not be local and sectional, but that it aims to rise above local prejudices and nationalisms, has nothing to do with partyism and sectism, but seeks to aid the cause of humanity not only throughout Great Britain, but in every part of the habitable globe.

Communications are freely invited from all who are interested in this work. Such will receive prompt and full acknowledgment from the Secretary, Dr M'Leod, Newcastle-on-Tyne, who will receive any subscriptions that may be at the disposal of friends; or they may be more properly forwarded to the Treasurers, Mr and Mrs Joseph Dixon, Broadgate, Darlington.

This Report of the Proceedings is not sent out with claims to literary merit, but as a simple statement of arguments and convictions; and is, with the consciousness of many imperfections, addressed to the heart and judgment of progressive philanthropists, and not to the conventional tastes and professional oddities of literary critics.