July 19th, 1916
Received by James Padgett.
Washington D.C.
I am here, Edwin Forrest:
I come tonight to tell you that I am much better than I was when last I wrote you, and have gotten out of much of the darkness in which I was.
This is all so wonderful to me that I scarcely realize what it means, and when I think of how ignorant I was on earth and what a Godless life I led, I never cease thanking God for the great opportunities that I enjoy, and for the help of the beautiful, loving spirits who came to me to show me the way to Truth and this Love of the Father.
Your wife has been my angel of hope in all my darkness, and her tenderness and love have caused me to awaken from the miserable condition in which I found myself shortly after coming to the spirit world. How fortunate I am I cannot tell you, and never will I be able to tell anyone, for no spirit that has not experienced what I have can possibly convey the meaning of the great change from darkness and ignorance to some light and some of the Divine Love that has come to me.
I now pray to the Father almost continually and as I do so, I realize that there comes into my soul that which changes all its qualities, and makes me realize how dead I was. Oh, if I only had known of this wonderful love on earth how different my life would have been, and how many heartaches would have been saved to others, and among them I include yourself, for now I realize that I did you great wrong in our business affairs by my conduct and drunken escapades. But I know that you have forgiven me, and pray for me and want me to be happy; and your wife, who knows what happened, tells me not to think of these things but to think only of the Father's Love, and the fact that it can be mine in ever increasing abundance. I wanted to write this to you, and I now feel better, and you may rest assured that so far as I can in this spirit world help you and retrieve what injury I did you, I will do to the utmost of my power.
Well, I have written considerable tonight and must stop. So continue to pray for me, and I know that I shall be helped.
Good night, Edwin Forrest.