(Note: The information in this series of articles isn’t corroborated by ITC contacts that I consider to be accurate and reliable. So readers’ discretion is advised.)
This series of articles summarizes and explores the classic (1896) book, Wanderer in the Spirit Lands. I try to preserve the original meaning in the summary (which is regular type). My observations and comments are in italics. When I come across concepts in the book that I believe are key to better understanding the bigger picture of the grand plan, I put those key concepts in bold type.
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Ch25. Franchezzo and his faithful friend stand on a hilltop to observe one of the battles that erupt endlessly in the dark, bloody valley below. Many military leaders who loved the total carnage, terror, and rage of battle on Earth have been pulled into this darkest of hells by their cruelty and ambition. As on Earth, they divide into camps and forge armies of unhappy spirits too weak to resist their powerful will, aiming to win this barren expanse of low hills, with the ultimate pipe dream of somehow gaining supremacy over hell itself. In the valley below, two dark spirits in regal robes control vast armies that are divided into regiments, each led by a powerful spirit, each now maneuvering skillfully into position. Suddenly both armies swoop down on each other amid terrible shrieks and thunderclaps, the soldiers flying through the air or dragging themselves along the ground. They charge, clash, and charge again. Armed only with teeth and claws, the spirits fight like wild animals, their screeches degrading this hellish place even more. As their armies rage, the two regal generals ascend from the battle and fly at each other, wrestling, biting, and kickboxing silently… but with a ferocity that not even the most savage on Earth could imagine… their eyes stabbing fiery hatred at the other, their hands clutching the other’s throat… until one finally weakens and is thrown into a deep, rocky pit by the victor. By then the victor’s army below has also vanquished the enemy. Those who are able to hobble off the battlefield, take prisoners. The others, hundreds of them, lie on the ground, beaten, broken, and moaning. Franchezzo has witnessed the horrors of war on Earth, the streets littered with the dead and dying… but this is many times worse. Here there is no death, no end to the suffering. The victims with broken, deformed bodies will slowly heal from the agony to fight again. Horrified by it all, Frachezzo wants to leave this place forever, but his friend says this is their opportunity to find lost souls who’ve hit the bottom of their suffering and are ready to seek the refuge of lighter realms. Many of these battered souls are lying here only because they’ve grown sick and tired of harming others, and so they surrendered quickly to their violent enemies. These are the spirits to whom Franchezzo and his friend now offer healing assistance. As they calm the victims into deep sleep, the battlefield around them is suddenly alive with stars of light carried by their Brothers who also have been pulled to this mission of love and mercy. A mist rises above each of the sleeping victims and forms into a healthy, sleeping spirit body that is whisked away by teams of bright, ethereal spirits from the Brotherhood. Franchezzo learns that the spirits of all these soldiers, and even of the regal generals themselves at some distant time in the future, when ready, will become very important players in the Brotherhood. Their knowledge and experience in courageous fighting will someday be employed in the never-ending war against darkness.
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Ch26. Eventually the Brothers carrying little lights in their hands converge in the center of the battlefield, joined there by Franchezzo, his friend, and all the others who’d been on the mission… greetings and congratulations all around. Before exiting this horrid land through the wall of fire they stop on a mountaintop overlooking the cities, plains, and mountains in which they’d all been doing their rescue work. The leader wraps things up, telling them that this vast, broiling darkness below them is just a tiny fraction of the great sphere (the 7th level of hell) that goes by many names on Earth and is known to most religions. Some of those hellish communities trace back to the most ancient of times, and many will evolve to represent future civilizations, as long as savage conditions exist on Earth. All of the hellish places explored during this mission exist at the 7th level of hell and are associated with the cities and landscapes of Italy with its heritage of the Roman Empire and early Christianity. All cultures, nations, and cities on Earth have similar spiritual facsimilies that spin off the Earth into 7 higher levels and 7 lower levels. Each place is created by and for a particular class of mind, whose spirits are drawn together after death like magnets. As long as the savage side of humanity stirs fear, hatred, envy, selfishness and suffering among humans on Earth, this vast, level-7 hell will continue to expand. So Franchezzo realizes that his experiences, described in this book, are in some ways similar to, and in other ways quite different from, the experiences of other rescue workers busy elsewhere in the greater hell. And everywhere, even at this lowest level, there are noble seeds within the spirits who failed to atone for their mistakes on Earth. Once the seeds are awakened and the spirits begin to make amends here, then they can start rising to the lighter, nobler realms… finally arriving at the levels of heaven where love, trust, good will, and service are a way of life. Every life experience, whether pleasant or unpleasant, whether lasting eight decades on Earth or eight centuries in hell, is but a small stepping stone along a soul’s path back to the source, or central sun. There are many inhabited physical planets in the various (parallel) material universes, and whenever one of those planets rises to a nobler state that no longer supports these hellish spiritual realms that are described in Chapters 18-25, those dark spirit communities break away from the planet and are pulled like magnets to planets that do support them… planets like Earth.
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Maybe an easy way to visualize these many spiritual realms around the Earth is to imagine our planet sitting inside a spherical prism. As thought-forms of Earth’s inhabitants spin off the planet, they are refracted in 14 different “directions” determined by how noble (light and subtle) they are or how savage (dark and dense) they are. The more noble thought-forms of love and generosity spin off to feed the 7 levels of heaven, while the more savage thought-forms of fear and selfishness spin off to feed the 7 levels of hell. The thought-forms don’t stream “out into space” in different directions. Rather, the noble thought-forms stream into 7 lighter, subtler heavenly dimensions, while the savage thought-forms stream into 7 darker, denser hellish dimensions. From our 3-dimensional perspective on Earth, all of these dimensions, along with the Earth itself, are superimposed over each other in the same “space”… like radio signals of different frequency.
It’s evident that people on Earth who follow the noble teachings (love, empathy….) of the Christ, the Buddha, the Prophet, and the other great spiritual teachers through the ages are watched closely and supported by finer beings who foster peace and order.
Others who follow their savage compulsions of hatred, intolerance, and vengeance get the attention of dark spirits from the lower realms who promote chaos and destruction.
Macy Afterlife: The Beacon 
I have just started to read the afterlife book “A Wanderer in the Spiritual Lands” by Franchezzo (A. Farnese) and his description of his beloved body decomposing in its grave, while his deceased spirit looks on, reminded me of Oscar Wilde’s classic “The Picture of Dorian Grey”. Without wanting to spoil the story for those who still intend reading the latter, the painting of Dorian Grey shows the reality of Dorian Grey’s soul, while his narcissistic physical body shows no aging, no physical change over the years, despite a life of self-indulgence and destitution . The painting however shows a horrifically different picture, it shows how Grey really looks. In Franchezzo’s story, he also led a totally narcissistic life, concentrating entirely upon physical delights while neglecting the spiritual advancement for which we incarnate on Earth. His knowledge of the corruption and hypocrisy of the Roman Catholic Church in his home land, Italy, distanced himself from anything related to religion and the love of God – he confused the love of the latter to the false teachings of a totally misdirected Church, disavowing both at the same time.
I can only highly recommend everybody interested in the afterlife to read Franchezzo’s excellent book (a link is provided here on this site) and would like to thank Mark Macy for providing it for us all to peruse and contemplate.
Stephen N. Prince
Hamburg, Germany
Stephen, excellent analogy!
I just looked up Oscar Wilde’s book (which I’d read in college), and see that it was published in 1890. Franchezzo’s book was published in 1897… all in the years leading up to the cataclysmic world wars.
Keith Clark suggested recently that I read “Mortal Translation,” a more recent (channeled) book about love between twin souls that spans several incarnations, and the frustrations of trying to hook up along the way as each dies and reincarnates at different times and of course has a tough time remembering their shared love… except during their dreams. I’m reading that book now.
One spirit in the book, Max, a fellow who’d died in one of those world wars, was a restless, earthbound soul until he got involved in a highly disciplined, military-type group whose mission was to receive the tormented souls of dead soldiers and to get them settled into the afterlife. Very insightful book so far.
I suspect that those shadowy realms around the Earth (the “hells”) get especially restless in times of war, and Oscar Wilde was “inspired” to write Dorian Gray for the same reason that Franchezzo was assigned his rescue-research-writing mission after he died… part of the never-ending quest of spirit to try to educate us humans on Earth about the influence our behavior has on the afterlife.
That happens to be the subject of the article I’m finishing up at the moment, and hope to post today or tomorrow.
So, thanks for your timely comment, 🙂
Mark
Hallo Mark !
I have just got around to reading your reply to my comment relating to “Dorian Grey”. I have nearly finished reading Franchezzo’s fascinating work and all the time I was reading it, I had a strong feeling in the back of my mind that this story was not completely new to me. It was while listening to some beautifully contemplative music that it struck me.
I rest assured that you are familiar with J.R.R. Tolkien’s epic ” The Lord of the Rings” (“LOTR” for short) trilogy and its precursor “The Hobbit”, if not the books themselves then most probably the iconic films produced by New Zealand film director Peter Jackson.
Everything Franchezzo describes in his story can be transfered to the LOTR story; Middle Earth is our mortal world, Mordor is hell, the Orks are evil spirits, Sauron is a powerful evil ruler, Rivendell is heaven, the Elves are immortal light spirits, Gandalf an enlightened spirit of light, Mirkwood Forest with its evil creatures a part of hell, just as Franchezzo describes….the list goes on and on !
It is a long time ago since I last read LOTR, but now I must do so again, considering the implications of the story in a totally different light.
I am now convinced that Tolkien must have had some influence from the spiritual side whilst writing these books, either through channeled information or inspiration through dreams etc. The similarities, the analogies and metaphors that come clear when considering these two very different – but so alike – stories are so stunning that I was literally confounded ! I have never read a biography of Tolkien’s life, but his position as a Professor at Oxford University would have had him meet many different and interesting people, who’s influence and knowledge of spiritual matters may have given him pause for thought and subtly guided him on his way to write his fantastic books. I am really looking forward to your reaction to my thesis.
I hope that you and your family had an nice Easter.
Bye for now.
Stephen
P.S.
The book you are reading seems fascinating, could you tell me where I can get a copy ?
Hey Stephen, I think you’re right that Tolkien’s books are probably “inspired”, which is similar to “channeled”… probably the same way that PJ Farmer came up with his “Riverworld” series, Dickens his “Christmas Carol,” maybe even PL Travers with her Mary Poppins book. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn someday that most if not all of the classic, timeless, heart-warming, and world-changing works of literature and art (and science and other fields) are “inspired” by finer spirit.
Pleasant springtime along the Elbe………
Mark
PS – I found my copy of “Mortal Translation” here:
https://www.amazon.com/Mortal-Translation-Love-Story-World/dp/146374501X
This morning I looked for places to download a pdf version of the book, but had trouble with that. No success.
If getting a paperback version of the book is impractical in Europe, let me know, and I can send you my copy when I finish it.
M
Hallo Mark !
Just a short message to ask you another question about Franchezzo, whose intruiging book I have been reading lately. Has it ever been established as to who Franchezzo actually was when he was alive on Earth ? He is very vague himself, only giving occasional hints. Even if his person is unknown, is the era he lived in known ? His references to the Inquisition in Venice could put him into the 17th – 18th centuries, but that is just my guess.
Thanks in advance,
Stephen
P.S.
Please have a quick look at my previous comment on this link, if you have time, I would really appreciate your thoughts on Tolkien and his works.
I’m not sure, Stephen.
Franchezzo hinted that his uncle-from-hell was some Machiavellian rich guy who was respected (but probably not loved) by his family members. I’m thinking his uncle lived around the time of Machiavelli himself (when selfishness was all the rage)… or maybe he WAS Machiavelli?…. Otherwise I found few hints as to Franchezzo’s actual identity. For a time I wondered if the channel for his writing was his girlfriend he’d left behind… but later concluded that the physical author/channel for the book was more likely an established, male medium/author contemporary of Franchezzo.
So… your guess is as good as mine. 🙂
Mark
(Will revisit the Tolkien comment now. Wife and I just got home from a trip, so I didn’t get the opportunity to reply to that one before.)