Cui Bono?
The question is repeated every time there is a great robbery or a murder committed,—
“Why do not the clairvoyants tell who has committed this crime?”
Simply because those who consult them do not know. If a person knew where the stolen property was secreted, and he consulted a true clairvoyant, he or she might describe the property and the place where it is secreted. Not otherwise. The same with the murderer. Therefore, of what good is it?
In order to do justice to this subject, to present and explain it in all its various phases, we would require a volume, instead of the space allotted in this chapter. But whatever name one may apply to it,—animal magnetism, Mesmerism, clairvoyance, spiritual or trance mediumship,—its success depends mostly upon the credulity of the person.
During the five days preceding May 15, 1869, a reporter of the Boston Post visited seventeen of these clairvoyants, mediums, etc., and some curious facts and startling contradictions were revealed therein.
“Putting it together,” he says, “and carefully epitomizing the amount of fortune that we have in this way been able to purchase, we present our readers with the following balance sheet:” and this, he says, is from the “most experienced and trustworthy fortune-tellers in the good city of Boston, where everything like humbug is most scrupulously avoided.
“Four times we have been told that we were engaged in no business at all, and as many more that our affairs and prospects were never more flourishing. Repeatedly we have been told that we should speedily change our business and abode. On the other hand, we were destined to be a fixture in Boston, and were so well satisfied with our present calling that we should never change. We are not married, but a great many pretty maidens stood ready to help us out of that difficulty.” Again, “we were married, and the father of several roguish boys and bright-eyed girls. Thus far in life we had enjoyed good health, were free from all infirmities, and stood a good chance to reach fourscore and ten.”
“In less than twenty-four hours this sweet hope was buried, and we were advised that death would overtake us suddenly and soon.”
There are various grades of clairvoyants, as of everything else. Here is one class.