in the existence of spirits. In that sense every Christian or Mohammedan is a Spiritualist. Those who still use the term in that sense would call such men as Sir A. C. Doyle and Sir Oliver Lodge "Spirists"; and on the Continent many accept that name. But the word Spiritualist is now generally used to indicate a member of an organised body or religion which is essentially characterised by communication with the dead.
In this, the correct sense, there was no Spiritualism before 1848, There were students of the occult, and they at times had many followers. There were religions in which a certain amount of communication with the dead was incidentally claimed. There were "seers" who professed to hold communication with spirits, and, like Swedenborg, some of them founded religions. There were rare and isolated cases in which individuals, resembling the modern mediums, professed to receive messages from the dead, or even to see them. But there never was, before 1848, a movement organised for that specific purpose; and in most of the cases which are usually given as "Spiritualism" in earlier times there was no profession of communication with the dead. Even Swedenborg rarely claimed to be in touch with dead human beings. Like most of the older "seers," he said that his revelations came from non-human spirits.
On the contrary, most Spiritualists claim, and more plausibly claim, that their movement not only began in 1848, but was peculiarly opportune about
