Harmonia, The.
A Monthly Magazine Devoted to Spiritualism.
Truth, Purity and Justice
1885--1886? Monthly
Waco, TX. Editor: P.A. Richards, editor and proprietor, Mrs. Alice Black, associate editor and Medium, Mrs. L.A. Craig, associate editor, Mrs. L.S. Gardner, Medium.
Succeeds: New Era (Grand Rapids, MI), absorbed November 1885
1/1, July 1885-1886(?) $1.00 a year, 24 pp. In November 1885, the journal agreed to fulfill the unexpired subscriptions of the failing New Era of Grand Rapids, but apparently expired itself late the following year. Advertised in Light in the West, January 1886, and in Moses Hull's New Thought and the Watchman, November 1886.

This was a reformist/spiritualist journal most notable for its place of publication, but also notable by its attempt to incorporate reincarnation on earth into spiritualism's doctrine of progress through celestial spheres -- displaying hints of Isis Unveiled and Mormonism.

"These facts, and well known ones they are, point-unerringly to the greater fact there are many kinds of souls inhabiting bodies in this world; and also, that there is method and purpose in this strange admixture of ‘brute changed to angel.' After a while, by and through successive reincarnations, the brute man reappears on earth to do unto others, in the way of personal sacrifices, what the angel man did for him eons of ages ago. The angel man of that long ago has in turn became the old brute man's God, and the old angel's God is now building another material world, and this latter God is now, with others, engaged in creating souls, to pass, in eons of ages to come, through a similar process of soul-evolution which they passed through."

The journal regularly defended mediums and denounced exposures of their tricks as displaying a complete misunderstanding of the nature of mediums and their ability to communicate with spirits. It had communications by the likes of a spirit who signed himself "Me am Chief Logan," and contributions by R.S. Woolford of Little Rock, Arkansas, J.W. Dennis of Buffalo, New York, Mary E. Van Horn, and by A.A. and Susan J. Finck of Galveston -- who also advertised their brand of Magnetized Paper in the journal, a fact that is illustrative of the journal's somewhat credulous approach to its subject. This conclusion is buttressed by its regular praise of James A. Bliss' Spirit Voices and its noting that Mrs. T.P. Allen of Gowanda, New York, had promised a free psychometric reading for every new subscriber to the journal. Not to be outdone, the journal advertised its own magnetized paper (five sheets for $1.00) for healing "suffering humanity." University of Louisville; University of Texas, Austin.

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