“I had every reason for thinking that the Morse alphabet was entirely unknown to all the other persons present, and I knew it only imperfectly myself.
“Immediately after I had said this the character of the raps changed and the message was continued in the manner I demanded. The letters were given too rapidly for me to catch but a word now and then, consequently I lost the message; but I had heard sufficient to convince me that there was a good Morse operator at the other extremity of the line, no matter what place it might be in.
“Another example: A lady wrote automatically by the aid of Planchette. I sought to discover the means to prove what she wrote was not due to unconscious cerebration. Planchette, as it always does, affirmed that, although the movements were made by the hands and arms of the operator, there was an intelligence coming from an invisible being, who played on her brain like an instrument of music and thus put her muscles in motion.
“I then remarked to this Intelligence, ‘Can you see what is contained in this chamber?’ And Planchette answered, ‘Yes.’ ‘Can you read this journal?‘ said I, placing my finger on a copy of the London Times that happened to be back of me on a table, but which I could not see. ‘Yes’ responded Planchette. ‘Very well,’ said I, ‘write the word now covered by my finger.’ Planchette commenced to move and the word ‘however’ was slowly written. I turned around and saw that the word ‘however’ was covered by the end of my finger. I had not looked at the paper when I attempted this experiment, and it was impossible for the lady, had she tried, to see any word in the journal, as she was seated at a table and the London Times lay on a table back of me with my body interposed.” (Crookes.)
In the experiments in typtology at which I have assisted, to all the demands addressed to psychic force the responses have always presented a particular character independent of that of the assistants.[92]
I have sometimes tried to concentrate my will upon the answer awaited, and have always failed in my attempts at mental pressure.
1 have likewise determined that these answers cannot be dictated by the mind of the medium, whose scientific and literary knowledge were not always equal to the message received. This observation coincides with the facts observed among pretended Demonomaniacs, who had in their attacks the gift of language, responding in Latin to the exorcists, making entire discourses in this language, of which they knew not the first elements.
Under the name of phenomena of ecstasy, Dr. Gibier described, after his experiments with the medium Slade, his displacement by a stronger spirit to that of his usual control. Says Gibier, the phenomena produced from thence were “a certain discoloration of the medium’s face, which became red, a sort of grin contracting the muscles of the visage, the eyes were convulsed upwards, and after some nystagmatic movements of the ball of the eye the eyelids closed tightly, gritting of the medium’s teeth was heard, and a convulsive sign, indicating the commencement of his possession by a strange spirit. After this short phase, which was painful to behold, the medium’s face fell into a smile and the voice, as well as the attitude, was completely modified to that of a different person. Slade thus transformed to his regular control, saluted all our party most graciously.”
Among the experiments made by Dr. Gibier to control this condition of incarnation (the English call it trance), we might cite that of a comparison of the dynamometric force of the medium in his natural condition and the trance state. In the first case, by reason of two previous attacks of hemiplegia, Slade’s muscular force gave 27 kilos to the right and 35 kilos to the left. In the second state there were 63 kilos to the right and 50 kilos to the left. Meantime, Dr. Gibier, no more than ourselves, deems it proper to consider the trance state other than a hypothesis, “a foreign element, introduced in the scene, and like it present in the experiences of suggestion and catalepsy.”
If we cannot give a scientific explanation of these phenomena, it is our duty to examine them as others and retrace their history, especially seeking those points of coincidence with the proofs furnished by the history of demonomania and diabolic possession of the Middle Ages; for we are convinced that these phenomena were dominated by the same unknown force, interpreted differently by reason of the philosophic and religious ideas of the epoch at which they were studied.