Hard blows on the table like those of a fist, contrasting with gentle taps, may have this origin, in spite of appearance.
It is the same with apparitions of the hands, of heads, of spectral forms. We cannot declare this origin of the phenomena to be impossible; and it is more simple than to assume that they are due to wandering spirits.
The conveying of objects over the heads of the experimenters in complete darkness, without touching either chandelier or heads, is scarcely comprehensible. But do we understand any better how a spirit can have hands? And if it did, might it not amuse itself thus? Spectacles are taken from a face without the act being perceived; a handkerchief is removed from the neck, then snatched from between the teeth that are holding it; a fan is transferred from one pocket to another. Do latent faculties of the human organism suffice to explain these intentional actions? It is right for us neither to affirm nor to deny.
I have thus passed in review the whole series of phenomena to be explained, at least all those within the limits of the plan of this work.
A first, and obviously safe, conclusion is that man has in himself a fluidic and psychic force whose nature is still unknown, but which is capable of acting at a distance upon matter and of moving the same.
This force is the expression of our will, of our desires; I mean as it appears in the first ten cases of the preceding classifications. For the other cases we must add the unconscious, the unforeseen, wills different from our conscious wills.
The force is at once physical and psychical. If the medium puts forth a force of twelve or fourteen pounds to lift a table, his weight undergoes a corresponding increase. The hand which we see forming near him is able to grasp an object. The hand really exists, and is then reabsorbed. Might we not compare the force which brings it into existence with that building-force of nature, which reproduces a claw for the lobster and a tail for the lizard? The intervention of spirits is not all indispensable.[84]
In mediumistic experiments things happen as if an invisible being were present, able to transport the different objects through the air, usually without striking against the heads of the persons who are sitting in various parts of the room in almost complete darkness; capable also of acting upon a curtain like a strong wind, pushing it far out, able to fling this curtain over your head, giving you a Capuchin hood or coiffure, and pressing strongly against your body, as if with two nervous arms, and touching you with a warm and living hand. I have perceived these hands in the most unmistakble way. The invisible being can condense itself sufficiently to become visible, and I have seen it passing in the air. To suppose that I, as well as other experimenters, was the dupe of an hallucination is an hypothesis which cannot be maintained for a single moment and would simply show that those who entertained the idea were far more likely to have an hallucination than we were, or else that they entertained the most inexcusable prepossession and prejudice. We were in the best possible condition for observing and analysizing any phenomena whatever and no sceptic will make us believe anything different on this point.
There is certainly an invisible prolongation of the organism of the medium. This prolongation may be compared to the radiation which leaps from the loadstone to reach a bit of iron and put it into movement.
We can also compare it with the effluvium which emanates from electrified bodies.[85]