Tad, a Chimney-Sweep Boy, Talks of His Life in the Spirit World

Sitter: I hear you are there friend, and you are nearly through. Can you just come just a wee bit closer, and then we’ll be able to hear you properly?

Spirit: Don’t really want to. (Laughter)

Sitter: Oh but we’d like you to, because we like talking to you folk.

Spirit: Did you know I’m dead?

Sitter: Yes we thought you probably were. Would you like to tell us a little about yourself, or perhaps what it is like where you are?

Spirit: Oh it’s great where I am!

Sitter: Would you like to tell us about that? (Pause)

Perhaps first of all I should tell you that the gentleman on my far left is Hilton, and then we have Jenny, and my name’s Ken. Could we have your name?

Spirit: Tad.

Sitter: Thank you Tad. Have you been over there long? (Pause).

Well if you can’t remember don’t worry, just tell us about anything you like.

Spirit: Well for the likes of me it’s a grand place!

I shouldn’t say it but my life was awful. It was short, and my job was climbing chimneys. It wasn’t a job, as you know it. But here it’s rather wonderful, and you’d never guess why it’s wonderful for me…

Sitter: ‘Cause you don’t have to climb any more chimneys. (Mirth)

Spirit: True, but the other reason was, they said, “Because I loved animals”. They said that I was kind, opposite to the way I was treated, and for that reason they said, “I have earned my place”… and it’s a place that has fields.
There are buildings but no chimneys, don’t need them here! Your clothes are clean and you’re clean. You are what you would have liked to have been, had you had any choice, and there are people who will teach you, even the likes of me. You don’t have to live in a big house and have teachers like the rich did. Anyone can learn, and you can learn anything, and you can make use of it.

Like the birds, I know how to mend a bird’s leg I see the bird and I think about its leg and I can mend it by thought. That’s so wonderful, because before I couldn’t, so often they died. But now I think on the birds and I don’t know why, but they get better, and there’s usually someone behind me to say that I’ve done it, and I’ve done it well. That’s wonderful!

I cannot explain just how wonderful it all is, and I feel so sorry for those men who were my owners. I don’t think that any of them were my father, I never had a father. But I feel sorry for them, because they have not had the joy of helping the birds… but one mustn’t be single minded I’m told, one must love all things, all spirit, all life, whether it is animal of which we are part, or birds, or fish or plants. We must treat them all with compassion – so I am taught.

When I first came here, I really knew nothing, but I woke, (because I had slept for a long time), in what seemed like being a bird in a nest, it was so comfortable… and there were the sounds and the smells of ‘peace’, and a kind human being, a kind man laid his hand on my forehead and told me that all would be well, that I had done well. That was kind of him. I did my best but it was too hard – but I don’t dwell on that any more. That’s another thing that I was taught… don’t dwell on things that were bad for you or that you were forced to do and perhaps were not good. Always think on the good, the right, and the lovely.

So I do my best and I love being here, but they wanted me to try and talk to some people who were alive. That frightened me.

Sitter:You’ve done very well, and most interesting too.

Spirit: I’ve been helped… I’ve been helped. But I don’t think I can tell you any more, and they’re smiling and nodding their heads, so I think that they feel the same. So I will go now, and you may like to think of Tad, who loves to heal birds. When you are giving your healing Tad will do his best for the birds.

Sitter: Thank you very much Tad. That will be lovely. Goodnight.

Spirit: Goodnight.