an indication that her life was nearing its end. In the dream that had so unnerved her through the years, she was walking past a theater where she met a dead brother-in-law. “I said to him, ‘Hi, Charlie, what are you doing here?’ He just smiled, and then in my dream it dawned on me that the dead come for the living. I said to him ‘Did you come for me?’ He said, ‘Yes.’ I said to him, ‘Did I die?’ He said, ‘Yes.’ I said, ‘I wasn’t sick. Was it my heart?’ He nodded, and I said, ‘I’m scared.’ He said, ‘There is nothing to be scared of, just hold onto me.’ I put my arms around him, and we sailed through the air of darkness. It was not a frightening feeling but a pleasant sensation. I could see the buildings beneath us. Then we came to a room where a woman was sitting at a desk. In the room were my brother-in-law, an old lady, and a mailman. She called me to her desk. I said, ‘Do we have to work here too?’ She said, ‘We are all assigned to duties. What is your name?’ I was christened Bernadine, but my mother never used the name. I was called Peggy. I told her ‘Peggy.’ She said, ‘No, your name is Bernadine.’ Then, my brother-in-law took me by the arms and we were going upstairs when I awakened. I saw my husband standing over me with his eyes wide open, but I could not move. I was thinking to myself, ‘Please shake me, I’m alive,’ but I could not move or talk. After a few minutes, my body jerked in bed, and I opened my eyes and began to cry.” The question is, did Mrs. C. have a near-death experience and return from it, or was her dream truly precognitive, indicative perhaps of things yet to come?
Doctor Karlis Osis published his findings concerning many deathbed experiences, wherein the dying recognize dead relatives in the room who have seemingly come to help them across the threshold into the next world. A lady in South Carolina, Mrs. M. C., reported one particularly interesting case to me. She herself has a fair degree of mediumship, which is a factor in the present case. “I stood behind my mother as she lay dying at the age of some seventy years. She had suffered a cerebral stroke, and was unable to speak. Her attendants claimed they had had no communication with her for over a week. As I let my mind go into her, she spoke clearly and flawlessly, ‘If only you could see how beautiful and perfect it all is,’ she said, then called out to her dead father, saying ‘Papa, Papa.’ I then spoke directly to her and asked her, did she see Papa? She answered as if she had come home, so to speak. ‘Yes, I see Papa.’ She passed over onto the other side shortly, in a matter of days. It was as if her father had indeed come after her, as if we saw him, and she spoke to me clearly, with paralyzed mouth and throat muscles.”
Sometimes the dead want the living to know how wonderful their newfound world is. Whether this is out of a need to make up for ignorance in one’s earth life, where such knowledge is either outside one’s ken or ignored, or whether this is in order to acquaint the surviving relative with what lies ahead, cases involving such excursions into the next world tend to confirm the near-death experiences of those who have gone into it on their own, propelled by accidents or unusual states of consciousness. One of the most remarkable reports of this kind came to me through the kindness of two sisters living in England. Mrs. Doreen B., a senior nursing administrator, had witnessed death on numerous occasions. Here is her report.
“In May 1968 my dear mother died. I had nursed her at home, during which time we had become extremely close. My mother was a quiet, shy woman who always wished to remain in the background. Her last weeks were ones of agony; she had terminal cancer with growths in many parts of her body. Towards the end of her life I had to heavily sedate her to alleviate the pain, and after saying good-bye to my daughter on the morning of the seventh of May, she lapsed into semiconsciousness and finally died in a coma, approximately 2:15 A.M.