The Naturalisation of the Supernatural/Chapter 3
CHAPTER III
SPONTANEOUS THOUGHT TRANSFERENCE: MIND'S EYE VISIONS
BEFORE attempting to trace the operation of telepathy in a wider field it is necessary to utter a word of warning. The experimental evidence of which a few examples have been cited in the last chapter constitutes, and must continue to constitute, the main justification for the assumption of a new faculty. However calculated to impress the imagination may be the narratives which follow, they are indefinitely inferior in evidential cogency. It was these spontaneous occurrences, with their dramatic setting, which first drew attention to the subject and which, indeed, first suggested the possibility of a new mode of communication between mind and mind. But it is doubtful how far such occurrences could in themselves have justified the belief. The position may be illustrated from another field of research. So long as the exponents of the germ theory could support their position only by arguments derived from the observed distribution of certain diseases, their manner of propagation and development, their periodic character—phenomena which, though sufficiently striking, are not in themselves, perhaps, susceptible of exact interpretation—the doctrine remained a more or less plausible hypothesis. It was not until the germs, whose existence had been so long suspected, were actually isolated in the laboratory, and on being introduced into other animal bodies had reproduced the disease, that the association of certain maladies with the presence of specific micro-organisms in the body became an accepted conclusion of science. In both cases the reasons for the inferior cogency of the arguments derived from mere observation of spontaneous phenomena are the same. We cannot, in spontaneous phenomena, so control the conditions as to eliminate the operation of all possible causes but one; and we cannot rely so implicitly on the accuracy of the records. It is the latter circumstance which, for our present purpose, constitutes the most serious drawback. In most of the spontaneous cases here cited, even though it is difficult to satisfy ourselves in every case that some obscure association of ideas, some deception of the senses or other unrecognised cause, may not have contributed to the result, yet the central incident is as a rule sufficiently striking and unusual to make it practically certain that the coincidences, if we consider the cases as a whole, are not due to such "accidental" causes, provided that we can be sure that the incident is correctly described. That is really the crux of the question. The cases of intimation of death by dream, waking vision or apparition, cited in this volume, are in themselves sufficiently numerous, as a simple calculation will show, to preclude explanation by chance, if no serious error has vitiated the records.
When Miss Campbell and Miss Despard—to take an illustration from the preceding chapter—are occupied, the one in present sensation, the other in imagination with the same scene, the conditions, as said, can be effectively controlled. Further, the experimenters have some experience in recording their observations: the time of the experiment is of their own choosing, so that they are not taken unawares: the records are practically contemporaneous with the events; each is made before any knowledge of the other's experience is forthcoming. Lastly, both parties are necessarily concerned to be as accurate as possible in describing their own side of the experience, since any fanciful embellishment may impair the accuracy of the correspondence. But when, to take the strongest case, a man sees the vision of a friend at the time of his death, we have no such safeguards to ensure the accuracy of the record. The vision finds him unprepared and often unable to appreciate its significance. Even when the impression produced is such as to induce the percipient to make a note of the circumstance or to write a letter about it before the correspondence with the death is known, it is but rarely, as the following narratives will show, that the contemporary record is preserved. When no note is made, and we have to depend entirely on the memory of the narrator writing after the fact of the coincidence is known, there are many errors from which the most scrupulous of witnesses can scarcely hope to hold himself altogether free. Often the percipient's experience may be coloured in retrospection by the emotion roused by the news subsequently received. In any case with the lapse of time the picture preserved in the memory is liable to be unconsciously brought more and more into conformity with the narrator's conception of what ought to have happened. One by one irrelevant details drop out, and confirmatory touches are added to heighten the tints. As the years pass, any interval which may have existed between the vision and the death tends to disappear, and the two events coalesce, like a binary star, into one. The result actually presented to us will, in such cases, bear less resemblance to a photograph than to a finished picture, in which the crudity and inadequacy of the actual are fulfilled by the unconscious craftsmanship of the imagination. No process is more difficult to detect and guard against because it is, for the most part, instinctive, and involves no conscious departure from good faith. The ability to tell the exact truth can only, as a rule, be acquired by a severe process of mental discipline.
But it would be easy to exaggerate the importance of these considerations, so far as educated witnesses are concerned. Narratives written within a few years of the event, and corroborated by the testimony of others, may, it is thought, be relied upon so far as the central incident is concerned, even if the details are liable to unconscious embellishment. Moreover, the very nature of the emotion aroused by the incident—as when the death of a dear friend is concerned—may in itself prove the strongest incentive to accuracy. Taken as a whole the reader will probably agree that the narratives here quoted bear on their face the marks of their authenticity: the witnesses in most cases have obviously been restrained in narrating their experiences by a strong sense of responsibility and of reality. And a comparison of the first-hand narratives here quoted with each other, and with the second-hand ghost stories bandied from mouth to mouth in ordinary social intercourse, will suggest that the narrators in the former case are describing with fair accuracy facts of their own experience; and that those facts constitute a true natural group, distinguishable, alike by what they include and by what they do not include, from the mere figments of the story-teller's imagination, whether invented for amusement or for edification.
The narratives which follow are printed as samples, and as samples only, of the evidences accumulated by the Society for Psychical Research. I have as a rule refrained, lest I should weary the reader, from drawing attention to the evidential aspect of the case; and have, for the same reason, presented in most cases only a brief summary of the corroborative testimony. I have endeavoured, however, in all cases, to bring out any evidential defect in such corroborative testimony; and as the reference is always given to the Society's Journal or Proceedings, the reader can in every case, if he pleases, study for himself the full accounts there printed.
The following account was sent, in French, to the late F. W. H. Myers by a well-known man of science. Three years ago I myself had the opportunity of discussing the incident with the percipient. A fragment of a book cover, bearing the words mentioned, was enclosed with the account.
No. II. From Professor,
On Friday, December 10, 1897, at about 10.35 p.m., being alone and at work in my library, I began to think, without any reason, that there had been a fire at the Opera. My wife and daughter had gone off to the Opera at 8; I had not been able to accompany them. The impression was so strong that I wrote F (Feu!) on the cover of a book which lay near me. A few instants later, wishing to emphasise this presentiment, I wrote "Att" (for attention) "Fire!" I enclose what I wrote. I did not, however, feel anxious, but said to myself, "There has been no great fire at the Opera, only an alarm of fire."
At the same time, or rather ten or fifteen minutes later, at 10.55, my sister, Madame B., who lives in the same house, and whose bedroom is on the same floor with my study, had an idea that my study was on fire. She was at the moment on the point of getting into bed, but she came en désshablie to my study-door and put her hand on the handle to come in; but then, telling herself that her fear was absurd, she went back to bed. She tells me, however, that she would nevertheless have come in but that she was afraid that I had some one with me in the room.
At 12.10 my wife and daughter came back from the theatre. They instantly told me that there had been a sort of beginning of a conflagration. I said nothing, and they told me as follows: Between 8.45 and 9, at the end of the first act of Les Maître Chanteurs, a smell of burning and a light smoke were perceived in the auditorium. My wife said to my daughter: "I will go out and see what is the matter; if I make a sign to you follow me at once without saying a word or even waiting to put your cloak on." The attendant whom she asked said that nothing was wrong. Nevertheless there was some emotion among the audience, and five or six persons in the stalls got up and went away. The smoke came, no doubt, from a stove. Note that this is the first time that my wife ever left her seat in a theatre from alarm of fire. It is the first time that I have ever been anxious about fire in her absence, and I do not suppose that I jot down my possible presentiments more than five or six times in a year.
My sister has never before been anxious about fire in my room.[1]
It seems not improbable, especially as she connected the danger with her brother, that Madame B. was influenced through him, and not through her friends at the opera. It should be added that the narrator has had other experiences apparently of a telepathic character.
In this instance the transferred idea, though in itself of a sufficiently alarming character, was apparently almost without emotional accompaniment. In many cases, however, the profound emotional disturbance caused is the most characteristic feature of the impression. In the case which follows, whatever the nature of the emotion excited,—and it does not appear to have been consciously defined as fear or anxiety,—it was sufficiently strong to impel the percipient to a very unusual course of action.
No. 12. From Mr. T. B. Garrison
My mother, Nancy J. Garrison, died on Friday night, October 4, 1888, at her home three miles north-east of Ozark, Christian County, Missouri. She was 58 years old. I was then living at Fordland, in Webster County, Missouri, about 18 miles north-east of my mother's home. I had not seen my mother for two months at the time of her death, but had heard from [her] by letter from week to week.
On the night of my mother's death there was a meeting in Fordland, and myself and wife attended the preaching. We had then one child, a baby a year old. The meeting had been going on a week or more. About ten o'clock, just before the meeting closed, while the congregation was singing, I felt the first desire to see my mother. The thought of my mother was suggested by the sight of some of the penitents at the altar, who were very warm and sweating. My mother was subject to smothering spells, and while suffering from these attacks she would perspire freely and we had to fan her. In the faces of the mourners I seemed to see my mother's suffering. And then the impulse to go to her became so strong that I gave the baby to a neighbour-woman and left the church without telling my wife. She was in another part of the house.
The train going west which would have taken me [to] Rogersville, seven miles of the distance to my mother's place, was due at 10.30 p.m., but before I got home and changed my clothes and returned to the depot, the cars had left the station. I still felt that I must see my mother and started down the railroad track alone, and walked to Rogersville. Here I left the railroad and walked down the waggon way leading from Marshfield to Ozark, Mo. It was about 3 o'clock a.m. when I reached my mother's house. I knocked at the door two or three times and got no response. Then I kicked the door, but still made no one hear me. At last I opened the door with my knife and walked in and lighted a lamp. Then my sister, Mrs. Billie Gilley, the only person who had been living with my mother, awoke and I asked her where mother was. She replied that she was in bed, and I said "She is dead," for by that time I felt that she could not be alive. She had never failed to wake before when I had entered the room at night.
I went to my mother's bed and put my hand on her forehead. It was cold. She had been dead about three hours the neighbours thought from the condition of her body. She had gone to bed about ten o'clock at night, feeling better than usual. She and my sister had talked awhile after going to bed. They were aiming to come to Ozark the next morning, and intended to get up early.
The above facts cover my experience as fully as I can tell the story. I have no explanation for the matter. It is as much a mystery to me now as ever. I could not believe such a strange affair if told by any one else, and yet I could swear to every fact stated. . . .
Corroboration of Mr. Garrison's account has been received from his wife, his wife's mother, to whom he announced his intention of going to Ozark just before he started on the journey, and from one of the neighbours who were called in to assist when the fact of the death was discovered.
With this may be compared a remarkable case, originally recorded by Mr. Andrew Lang in Longman's Magazine, in which two persons independently received a strong impression that something disastrous had happened in an Edinburgh flat. In one case the impression was sufficiently strong to induce a neighbour to leave his work and call to make enquiries. He found that the maid-servant had just been killed by an accident.[3]
There are one or two cases, resting on good evidence, which suggest the possibility of communication between the animal and the human intelligence. Thus Lady Carbery writes that one Sunday, having paid her usual visit after lunch to a favourite mare, she had returned to the garden a quarter of a mile distant, and sat herself down to read. Twenty minutes later, feeling an uncomfortable sensation that something was amiss with "Kitty," she returned to the stable, and found her "cast" and in need of help.[4]
In the following case the impression, though not referred to any particular sense, was of a much more definite character than those last cited:
No. 13. From Mr. J. F. Young
The following account of a presentiment I recently had may be interesting to you.
I was having my supper on the evening of February 15th last, when a message came from a customer requiring my services. I sent back a reply that I would come immediately I had my supper. It has always been a strong point with me to keep my appointments, and therefore, having hastily finished my meal, I was in the act of leaving the table when I suddenly exclaimed, "There!!! I have just had an initimation that Robert is dead": the Robert referred to is a Robert Hallett (a brother-in-law) who was residing near my sister (Mrs. Ponting) at Sturminster Newton, Dorset. He had been bed-ridden from paralysis for this last two years, but had recently been much worse.
I at once entered full particulars in my diary. Date, Feb. 15. Message, and time of message, 9.40 p.m. My sister-in-law was present the whole time, and can vouch for the circumstances. On the 17th I received a post-card from my sister at Sturminster Newton, bearing date Feb. 16th, stating, that "Robert had passed away, will write to-morrow."
In the meantime I had written to my sister Mrs. Ponting, mentioning my presentiment, and our letters crossed, for the following morning a letter came from her (I must mention here she had been assisting in nursing my brother-in-law), saying, "I was glad you had a presentiment of poor Robert's release, he passed away at 7.45 p.m., then Lottie [my niece Lottie Hallett] and I came home till 9.40, and that was the time you had the impression."
I wish to state two facts in connection with the foregoing case. (1) I was not thinking of him at the time, my mind being engrossed in my appointment, and the impression came so startlingly sudden, which caused me to hastily say. There!!! . . . as before stated; and (2) at the same moment, I had a sense of a presence at my left, so much so, that I looked sharply round, but found no one there.
This was my first and only impression during his long illness.
The note in the diary is as follows[5]:
Feb. 15. As I rose from supper, a message came, as if by spirit influence, to say, "Robert has passed away." Miss Bennett present. I said, "There, I have just had an intimation Robert is dead." Time, 9.40 p.m. Noted full particulars on my return: was called away. Had to see a customer on business.
Miss E. Bennett, who was present at the moment and Miss Lottie Young, a niece to whom Mr. Young related his experience on the following morning, have both confirmed the account. Mrs. Ponting has searched unsuccessfully for Mr. Young's original letter to her announcing his presentiment.[6]
Mr. Young, it should be added, has had several similar impressions which have coincided with external events.
Let us now pass on to visual impressions. The following case is interesting as showing the peculiar vividness with which these mind's eye visions occasionally present themselves.
No. 14. From Miss C. P. M. C.
(The account was written in the beginning of June, 1889.)
I distinctly saw a person whom I knew (M. T.) lying in bed, and the room and furniture exactly as I last saw it. I had the impression of hearing her voice. The impression was so vivid that for the time it stopped my reading, and I remember being surprised at it and wondering whether the woman were alive or dead. I had had a letter three days previously saying she was dying. She had been an invalid when I first saw her, so that I never knew her otherwise than in bed.
Place: probably in the Geological Museum. Date: May 14, 1889, Tuesday, in the morning.
I was reading geology [at the time]. I was not out of health, but I was in anxiety on quite a different subject.[7]
M. T., as we have ascertained from the Register at Somerset House, died at Heaton Norris on the 14th May, 1889. Miss C. heard of the death a day or two afterwards, and fixed the exact date of her vision by an entry in a diary, referring to an incident which she remembered to have occurred on the same day as the vision. She added that she had had no other experience which impressed her so much; she had, however, a faint impression of "something like it" having occurred when she was a schoolgirl, but she cannot remember details.
In the next case all the details given are trivial, but the amount of correspondence is sufficient to make it probable that the result was not a mere happy conjecture; and, as we have seen both the original notes made by the percipient and the letter from Rome, it is certain that the facts are accurately stated; in this respect the case stands almost on the evidential level of some of the experiments quoted in the last chapter. The following is a copy, made by Mr. Piddington, the Hon. Secretary of the Society for Psychical Research, of a note written by Mrs. D. on 27th January, 1900.
No. 15. From MRS. D.
Saturday, Jan. 27, 1900. This afternoon while I was sitting near the fire talking to L., I was holding a small photo of Mrs. H. and describing her. "Where is she now?" asked L. "In Rome," I answered, "settled for the winter." And as I spoke, suddenly I felt conscious of what she might be doing at the time. "Do you know," I went on, "I think she must be just coming out of her room on to a high terrace such as we have here, only that there is green over it." L. did not say "nonsense," but just asked quietly: "What is she wearing?" "A black skirt," I answered, "and a mauve blouse—she is looking out over many roofs and spires—and now she has gone back into the room and a maid is closing the shutters." "Can you see her room?" asked L. "I think it is small," I said; "there is a cottage-piano and a writing-table near it. I think the large head of Hermes stands on it and something silver." And then I felt nothing more and added: "What nonsense I have been talking!" L. thinks there may be some truth in the impression, and wants me to write and ask Mrs. H. what she remembers of this afternoon. It was about 6 o'clock.
I cannot say I saw anything; somehow I seemed to feel her surroundings were just so. I have never been to Rome, nor has she told me anything of where she lives beyond the address.
Copy of extracts selected by J. G. P. from a letter addressed by Mrs. II. to Mrs. D. Postmark of envelope: "6200 Rama"
. . . . You certainly have a power to visit your friends, and to see them, and to make them feel you. Your letter is absolutely startling and mysterious. And now I can answer it detail for detail, and item for item. [The writer then avows her belief in telepathy and clairvoyance.] . . . That you have peeped at me in my small Roman house is certainly a fact. As you state the facts, every small detail is not altogether exact, but the facts as a whole are true and exact and perfect, as you shall see. .........
Let me begin by answering bit by hit all you say. I have a dear little vine-covered terrace, looking out into the Piazza di Spagna, and looking also right up to the spires or rather towers of S. Trinita dei Monti, with the great obelisk in front. The afternoon of Jan. 27th I returned to my home after a walk and [after] making a few purchases, at 5 p. m. I took off my fur jacquette, and went at once into my dining-room to see about the dinner-table, as three friends came [or "come" at 7 p.m. to dine. I busied myself about the table for some time, then stepped on to the terrace (which is so pretty, but opens, unfortunately, from the kitchen). I went into the terrace at that time to see about our dessert for dinner, which I had put there to become cool. Then I went back into the dining-room, and as the hanging-lamp had just been lighted, I ordered the maid to drop the outside curtains. She did so. I remember that I looked just then at the clock, and it was 5.35 p.m. I had on a black skirt, a black silk blouse, and a mauve tie, which twisted about my neck and hung in two ends to my waist. It looked to you like a mauve blouse. Then I went into our small salon and took something from the table. I remember it distinctly. Our salon is very small; there is an upright piano and a writing-table, on which are photos and books too, and a lot of little silver things. Hermes (your photo to me) stands very near, on another little table, quite near, in fact. It is all quite mysterious. I believe you have really peeped into my house.[8] . . .
Vivid and detailed visions of the kind given in the last two narratives are of rare occurrence with persons in a state of normal wakefulness. The early mesmerists, both in this country and in France and Germany, have recorded many cases where the subject in a state of trance purported to have visions of distant scenes and of the persons taking part in them: and these descriptions were in many cases subsequently verified. To the faculty supposed to be thus demonstrated the name of "travelling clairvoyance" was given by the English mesmerists, it being assumed that the spirit of the percipient left the body and was actually present in some fashion at the scene described. Even if we accept the facts, there is of course no need to adopt so fantastic an explanation. From our ignorance, however, of the attendant circumstances, and especially of the opportunities which may have offered for fraud, it is difficult to place much reliance on these older records. A few similar cases have, however, been recorded by competent observers in recent years: one or two examples are quoted in chapter xiv.
But outside of the hypnotic trance the most favourable conditions for clairvoyance of this kind appear to be found in crystal vision. It is not quite clear what part the crystal plays in facilitating the emergence of these dream-visions. The quietness and freedom from external distraction no doubt contribute to the result. But it seems probable that the mere act of fixing the gaze and the attention on a bright object is liable to induce slight dissociation of consciousness. Further it is likely that in some cases the crystal furnishes a point de repère —a nucleus of actual sensation—round which the imaginary scene is built up.
Mr. Andrew Lang has within the last few years collected amongst his acquaintances many instances of scrying or crystal vision, from which I select the following:
No. 16. From Miss Angus[9]
I had another successful scry on Tuesday evening, 21st December, 1897, when Mr. Mac asked me to look in the ball. He had never seen crystal gazing, so I told him to fix his mind on some scene, which I would endeavour to describe. Almost at once I saw a large room with a polished floor reflected, the lights being very bright and all round; but the room was empty, which I thought very uninteresting! Mr. Mac said how strange that was, as he had not, so far, been able to fix his mind on any particular face in the ballroom. However, he asked me to look again, and this time I saw a smaller room, very comfortably furnished, and at a small table under a bright light with a glass globe (no shade on the globe) sat a young girl, in a high-necked white blouse, apparently writing or reading. I could not see her face distinctly, but she was pale, with her hair drawn softly off her forehead (no fringe), and seemed to have rather small features.
Mr. Mac said my description quite tallied with the lady he was thinking of, a Miss , whom he had met for the first time at a ball a few nights before, but he had meant me to see her dressed as he met her in the ballroom.
We consulted our watches, and found that it was between 10.15 and 10.30 when we were scrying, and Mr. Mac said he would try to find out what Miss was doing at that hour. Fortunately I had not long to wait for his report, as he met her the next evening, and told her of my experiment. She was very much interested, I believe, and said it was all quite true! She had been wearing a white blouse, and, as far as she remembers, she was still reading at 10.30 under a bright incandescent light, with a glass globe on it.
Mr. Mac writes:
I was at Miss Angus's house on Tuesday, December 21st, 1897. Miss Angus said that if I thought of somebody she would look in her crystal ball and find out the personal appearance of the person of whom I was thinking, and what he or she was doing at that moment (10.25 p.m.). She told me to think of the surroundings and the place in which I had last seen the person of whom I was thinking. I thought of somebody that she did not know—Miss , whom I had met at a dance on December 20th. I thought of the ballroom where I had been introduced to her, but at first I could not centre my mind on her face. Then Miss A. said that she saw a big room with a polished floor, and which was brilliantly lit up, but that at present she could not make out any people there. Then I succeeded in fixing my mind on Miss 's face, when Miss A. said that she saw a girl with fair wavy hair either writing a letter or reading, but probably the former, under a lamp with a glass globe, and that she had a high-necked white blouse on. All this took about five minutes.
I saw Miss again at a dance on December 22d—the next night. I told her what had happened, and she said that, as far as she remembered, at 10.25 the night before she had been either writing a letter or reading, but probably writing, under an incandescent gas-light with a glass globe, and that she had been wearing a high-necked white blouse.
I had only known Miss Angus for a very short time, so she did not know what friends I had in I do not think that Miss Angus knows Miss There were three other people in the room all the time, one of whom was playing the piano. This is exactly what happened, as far as I can remember.
Sometimes the part of the crystal is taken by a glass of water, or other shining surface. We have a narrative from the wife of an engine-driver who, waking up at 3 a.m. one night, saw in a glass of water by her bedside a vision of a railway accident. At about that time her husband was actually passing near the scene of an accident, similar to the scene in the water vision, which had occurred a few hours previously.[10]
In the following case it may be conjectured that the conditions of a spiritualist'séance, the quietness, the freedom from preoccupation, and the partial darkness were favourable to the emergence of a clairvoyant vision.
For the evidence we are indebted to Mr. W. W. Baggally, of No. 23 Lower Phillimore Place, Kensington, W., a member of the Society, who is acquainted with the principal witnesses in the case and has full confidence in their integrity.
No. 17. From Mr. John Polley,[11]
London, N., June, 1901.
At a'séance held within the sound of Big Ben on May 8th, 1901, there were present Mrs. E. V. M., Mr. Thomas Atwood; and myself. As Mr. Atwood resumed his seat after delivering an invocation (about 8.30 p.m.), I became aware of a vision, which presented itself on the left of where I was seated. The scene appeared as being some 5 feet distant from me, and displayed part of the interior of a room, viz., that part where the stove stood. The fire in the stove was small and dull, and close beside it was an overturned chair. In front of the fire was something that looked like a fire-guard or clothes-horse, but this was not quite clear to me. Playing or climbing over this article was a child, who fell forward, and, when it regained its feet, I noticed that its dress was on fire.
I made no reference to the matter at the time, as I had an impression that the vision might be connected with some occurrence in the family of Mrs. M., and I was averse to mentioning it for fear of awaking sad memories. After some manifestations of movements of the table round which we were seated the whole vision was repeated, and this time I had an uncontrollable impulse to speak. Upon my describing what I had just seen for the second time, I was much relieved to hear that the matter was not recognised as being connected in any way with the sitters. I may mention here that the child appeared to be about three years old, and, judging from the style of dress, I described it as a girl, although the vision would apply equally well to a boy, as, at that early age, the short clothes worn by both sexes would be very similar.
Next Thursday morning, May 9th, 1901, upon awakening, I described to my wife the events of the previous evening's'séance. On the evening of the same day, viz., Thursday, May 9th, I was out with a friend, and upon my return home at 11.5 p.m. my sister, Mary Louisa Polley (who resided with me at that time), made the remark, "I have a piece of bad news for you, Jack." "Well," I replied, "what is it? let me know," and she answered, "Brother George's little son Jackie has been burned to death." Like a flash I realised the connection of the sad event with my vision of the previous night. I then asked her (my sister), "How did you know this, and when?" She replied, "Mr. Fred Sinnett told me, when he came over to see us this evening."Mr. Polley's statement is confirmed by the other sitters at the'séance. by his wife and sister, and by the father of the child. The accident happened on May 7th, and the child died before noon on the following day, the day of the'séance. Mr. Fred G. Policy, the father of the child, explained that he sent no intimation to his brother of the accident or death until Thursday, May 9th.
In the cases so far cited, where the impression has been sufficiently definite to evoke a specific sense-image, that image has been of a visual type. The percipient's experience has not indeed been of such a character as to lead him to mistake what he saw for external reality—he has not been the subject of a hallucination. Nevertheless he has seen something, if only, as we may say, with the mind's eye. This is the commonest and the most impressive form assumed by these messages, when they fall below the level of actual hallucination. More rarely, the telepathic impulse expresses itself as an inner voice, or other articulate sound. Impressions of this character are as a rule less evidentially conclusive than those affecting the sense of sight: they contain less detail; it is difficult to eliminate the possibility of an external cause; and even when it is certain that the impression was subjective, the words frequently consist only of the percipient's own name. In the following case, however, the correspondence appears to be sufficiently detailed to exclude the operation of chance: and the coincidence, it will be seen, is attested by a post-card written before the correspondence was known.
No. 18. From Frau U.,
On the evening of February 25, 1897, I was sitting alone, as I almost invariably did, and reading, when I suddenly thought of the Beethoven Trio, Op. 1, No. I, so vividly that I got up to look for the music, which I had not touched for nearly twenty years. It was just as if I could hear the 'cello and violin parts, and the bowing and expression seemed to me to be that of two gentlemen who had played with me often in C. so many years before. One of them, Kammermusiken L., first 'cellist of the Residenz Theatre in C., had been my eldest son's master, but had been called to H. in 1878. The other, who was employed by my husband at that time, as clerk of the works, had subsequently quitted C. also, and removed in the middle of the nineties to H. I had often seen him since he left C., and had also played duets with him, but never again in a trio. I got out the piano part and began to play. I must here admit that I had played with Z. and L. principally the Trio in B sharp, Op. 97, and the one in C flat, Op. 1, No. 3, and was myself surprised that this Op. 1, No. I, which we had hardly ever played, was ringing in my ears. At any rate I heard with my mental car this melody so exactly that I played the piece right through to the end.
About ten o'clock the bell rang and my house-mate, the daughter of Lieutenant-Colonel G., who lived over me, came in. She apologised for her late visit and assured me that she could not sleep until she had found out what I had been playing. I supplied the information, and she remarked, "Well, what brought that into your head?" "I don't know. I have n't opened the book for twenty years, but before I began I heard Z. and L. playing and I felt I must recall the full harmony."
The next day but one the enclosed card came; it had been written, as we established by subsequent correspondence, on the same evening and at the same time, and as the postmark shows, delivered [in Kiel] the following [should be "the next but one"] morning.
The following is a translation of the post-card:
After playing Beethoven Op. 1, No. I, we send you hearty greetings in remembrance of happy hours spent together in the past.
The card bears the postmark "H-26.2.97. 8–9 V" (V=a.m.) Fräulein G. writes that she remembers Frau U. playing the piece in question; and that Frau U. told her that she had not played it for many years. This incident is fully discussed in the Journal for May, 1903, and from the more detailed account there given it seems clear that the coincidence was not due to ordinary association of ideas or to any external suggestion.
We have a few examples of sensations of smell, touch, or pain which appear to have originated by thought transference.
One example of the last category may be quoted. The percipient's experience, it may be thought, was, as described, sufficiently vivid and lifelike to be reckoned as an actual sensation; and the fact that she employed physical remedies for it would seem to confirm this view. It is here classed, however, with mental impressions, because with sensations of a tactile or a painful nature we have not the same criterion as we possess in the case of affections of the higher senses to distinguish between what is due to an external cause, and what is purely subjective. The feeling of pain, especially, is so frequently excited by causes within the organism that in many cases it must remain a matter of doubt whether to seek for the origin of the discomfort within or without.
No. 19.
Mrs. Castle writes from Minneapolis in May, 1896[13]:
On the first day of last July (1895), while resting late in the afternoon, I suddenly experienced a constrictive sensation in my throat, accompanied by a numbness, which increased for some time, and finally became so distressing that I bathed and rubbed my throat several times—while dressing, soon after it began,—using also a mental treatment (in which I am a firm believer). I could discover no cause within myself for such a sensation, which was unlike anything I had ever experienced before. It occurred to me that it might be due to some influence outside of myself, and I thought of my husband with some anxiety, but I remember that the fear for his safety was dissipated by the ludicrous thought that nothing but a "hanging" would be an excuse for such symptoms. I thought also of a friend (Mrs. Baldwin) who was stopping with me at the time. She had gone out that afternoon, and was not in the house when this occurred.
A stiff collar had been a source of annoyance to her frequently, and I thought of that as a possible cause for my discomfort, knowing that she was wearing a freshly laundried shirt-waist at the time. She came in for a few moments to announce her intention of dining out, and I asked her if her collar had made her uncomfortable that afternoon. She assured me to the contrary, and I told her of my strange experience. We discussed it while she was in, and soon after she left Mr. Castle (my husband) came home to dinner.
Mr. Castle's account of his experience is as follows:
On the afternoon of the first day of July, 1895, I unexpectedly had an operation performed on my throat by Dr. Bell.
To allow for the passing off of the effects of anaesthetic used in my throat he told me to remain quiet awhile after the operation. But I thought I could save time by sitting in the barber's chair, and so walked about—yards to a barber's shop. There I was soon seized with a terrible choking sensation which frightened the barber and myself very greatly. I remained sitting there nearly an hour before I could go on. On arriving home about 6 p.m. I told Mrs. Castle that I came near getting in a bad fix. On her asking "When?" I said "About an hour and a half ago." She then described her sudden constricted sensation about that same time, and her telling Mrs. Baldwin of it.
This is the only time I have had such a sensation in my throat.
Mr. Castle adds that there have been other apparent instances of thought transference between himself and Mrs. Castle.
Mrs. Baldwin writes to say that she remembers the incident described.
The narrative recalls the experimental cases of "community of sensation" referred to in the last chapter. But here agent and percipient instead of being in the same room were several miles apart. It is to be noted that in the present case, as in our own experiments, the discomfort caused appears to have been by no means of an ideal character. In another case of the kind Mr. E. E. Robinson tells us that lying in bed one Sunday morning he experienced an acute pain in his thumb, and held up the hand to see if it had actually been injured. At the moment Mrs. Robinson, who was dressing, exclaimed that her thumb hurt her so much as to cause difficulty in dressing.[14]
It occasionally happens that the influence of a distant friend appears to be reflected, not in the percipient's consciousness, but in his actions. The cases are too numerous to allow us to dismiss them as merely chance correspondence. But we are not bound to conclude that the telepathic impulse has power directly to affect the muscular system. In accordance with the view already suggested, that telepathy operates more readily on the subconsciousness, or, if we prefer so to phrase it, on the lower cerebral centres, we may suppose that so far as the agent is concerned the process of transmission is alike in all cases; and that it is the percipient's organism which is responsible for translating the transmitted impulse now into an idea, now into an action. The most striking illustrations of this kind of thought transference are to be found in automatic writing. The subject of automatic writing however, is complicated with other considerations, and it will probably be better to defer dealing with it until a later chapter. The following case, however, may be cited in this connection, since it appears clear that the news communicated did not rise to consciousness until in the act of utterance.
No. 20. From Archdeacon Bruce[15]
Monmouthshire, July 6th, 1892.
On April 19th, Easter Tuesday, I went to Ebbw Vale to preach at the opening of a new iron church in Beaufort parish.
I had arranged that Mrs. Bruce and my daughter should drive in the afternoon.
The morning service and public luncheon over, I walked up to the Vicarage at Ebbw Vale to call on the Vicar. As I went there I heard the bell of the new church at Beaufort ringing for afternoon service at 3. It had stopped some little time before I reached the Vicarage (of Ebbw Vale). The Vicar was out, and it struck me that I might get back to the Beaufort new church in time to hear some of the sermon before my train left (at 4.35). On my way back through Ebbw Vale, and not far from the bottom of the hill on which the Ebbw Vale Vicarage is placed, I saw over a provision shop one of those huge, staring Bovril advertisements—the familiar large ox-head. I had seen fifty of them before, but something fascinated me in connection with this particular one. I turned to it, and was moved to address it in these, my ipissima verba: "You ugly brute, don't stare at me like that: has some accident happened to the wife?" Just the faintest tinge of uneasiness passed through me as I spoke, but it vanished at once. This must have been as nearly as possible 3.20. I reached home at 6 to find the vet. in my stable-yard tending my poor horse, and Mrs. Bruce and my daughter in a condition of collapse in the house. The accident had happened—so Mrs. Bruce thinks—precisely at 3. 30, but she is not confident of the moment. My own times I can fix precisely.
I had no reason to fear any accident, as my coachman had driven them with the same horse frequently, and save a little freshness at starting, the horse was always quiet on the road, even to sluggishness. A most unusual occurrence set it off. A telegraph operator, at the top of a telegraph post, hauled up a long flashing coil of wire under the horse's nose. Any horse in the world, except the Troy horse, would have bolted under the circumstances.
My wife's estimate of the precise time can only be taken as approximate. She saw the time when she got home, and took that as her zero, but the confusion and excitement of the walk home from the scene of the accident leaves room for doubt as to her power of settling the time accurately. The accident happened about 2¼ miles from home, and she was home by 4.10; but she was some time on the ground waiting until the horse was disengaged, etc.
Archdeacon Bruce adds later:
I think I stated the fact that the impression of danger to Mrs. Bruce was only momentary—it passed at once—and it was only when I heard of the accident that I recalled the impression. I did not therefore go home expecting to find that anything had happened.
Mrs. Bruce writes:
The first thought that flashed across me as the accident happened was, "What will W. say?" My ruling idea then was to get home before my husband, so as to save him alarm.
In this case, it will be noticed, the pictorial advertisement appears to have played an analogous part to the crystal in a crystal vision.
We have a few other examples in which the impulse has led directly to action—prayer, the taking of a journey, etc. M. Flammarion in his book, L' Inconnu et les problémes psychiques, quotes a curious case. The narrator, after explaining that in childhood he was "encore un peu dévot," and in the habit of saying his prayers nightly, relates that one evening, when twelve years of age, he prayed for his grandmother with unusual fervour, and on closing his eyes had a vision of that relative. The next day he learned that his grandmother had died at that hour, The effect of that experience on its subject offers a curious example of perverted logic.
"Depuis ce moment," he concludes, "comme je m'étais adressé a Dieu pour me conserver ma grand'mére longtemps, et qu'il ne m'a pas exaucé, j'ai cessé avec raison de croire en lui."
- ↑ Journal, S. P. R., November, 1898.
- ↑ Journal, S. P. R., October, 1897.
- ↑ The case is given in full in Journal, S. P. R., June, 1895.
- ↑ Journal, S. P. R., February, 1905.
- ↑ The note occurs, not on the dated pages, but on some blank sheets at the end of the diary, amongst other memoranda. The previous memo. is dated 12th Feb.. the two following entries are dated, in this order, Feb. 28th and Feb. 19th. The entry of the 15th contains therefore no internal evidence of having been written at the time.
- ↑ Journal, S. P. R., May, 1901.
- ↑ Proceedings. S. P. R., vol. 3., p. 83. Miss C.'s narrative. it should be explained, was given in answer to set questions contained on one of on: "Census" forms. See below. chapter v.
- ↑ Journal, S. P. R., October, 1906.
- ↑ Journal. S. P. R., May, 1899.
- ↑ Journal, S. P. R., December, 1903.
- ↑ Journal, S. P. R., January, 1902.
- ↑ Journal, S. P. R., May, 1903. The account in the text is translated from the original German.
- ↑ Journal, S. P. R., October, 1898.
- ↑ Journal, S. P. R., May, 1907.
- ↑ Journal, S. P. R., December, 1893.