I have myself known several most worthy and reliable men and women who have solemnly testified that in times of prostration, when they were nigh unto death, yes when there was no apparent life in the body, the Spirit was taken away to view the city of the Great King, and that great and eternal truths were unfolded to them, and promises made that were afterwards fulfilled.

As one instance, I well remember one dear old sister in Plano, Illinois, whose funeral sermon I preached some fifteen years ago, —Sr. Heroine Randall. Her testimony I wrote down from her own lips, which was, that while young, soon after her marriage, while a member of the Baptist Church, she was stricken with a consuming fever and to all appearances died, so that her friends began preparations for her funeral. She related to others as well as to me, that at that time her spirit departed from her body, and rose above it, and that she looked down and saw her husband and friends weeping over it. Then a personage of beauty received her into his charge and conducted her beyond the confines of earth, even she realized to a great distance, until they came without the walls of a beautiful city, one that shone in splendor. The gates were open, and she looked within and saw its glory, and the throng of bright ones, a company of life, activity, and intelligence.

As she gazed upon the glorious scene, she desired to enter, but her guide said she could not go in, that she was not yet prepared to enter there. When she asked him why she was not, he answered: "You have not yet received and obeyed the gospel in its fullness, but if you return to the earth, to your mortal body, the time will some when you shall have opportunity to hear the gospel of Christ preached in it completeness, and if you accept it and live faithful to the commandments, you will have the right to enter into the city that you have seen."

He then conducted her to earth again. She entered the room where her body was lying, and her spirit entered into it. Then her astonished friends saw her move, and her eyes open, and she spoke and said that they should not weep, for she would get well and remain with them. And very soon she received strength and speedily recovered from her sickness.

This occurred in the state of New York, about the year 1830, and a few years later the elders of the latter-day work came into that neighborhood, preaching Christ's gospel restored with its full doctrines and blessings. For a time she would not attend the meetings, but finally wet;' and when she heard the plan of salvation unfolded as preached in New Testament times, when she considered its evidences, the words of her heavenly guide came to her memory, and as she listened her heart was filled with the divine Spirit, and she realized that the truth was being preached. She obeyed it; and all who knew her can truthfully say that she lived faithfully and reverently and bore as clear a testimony, sustained by as able arguments as very many of the elders can state in giving reasons for the hope that is within them when called to answer. And she continued ever in the hope of the promise made her by the bright attendant when her spirit was "caught away" to see the city of God and be instructed.