Any one at all familiar with these séances cannot help seeing that there are some mediums and their controls who are largely responsible for the feeling of distrust more or less manifested toward the subject. When the question of a confederate is fairly settled (and no one can be certain of his position until it is done), and two forms appear at the same time; or when you can be taken into the cabinet by a form, and shown the entranced medium, it is self-evident that one of them is a materialized form, and not a personation by the medium. It needs no argument to settle this, no matter how much it may conflict with pre-conceived notions.
I have quoted from Chief Justice Jacolliot's work on Occult Science in India, to prove that there is no connection between these manifestations and what is called sleight-of-hand.
There is, however, a more important fact conveyed in his statements, corroborated by other writers upon this subject, showing the perfect fairness with which these mediums, or Fakirs, submit to tests, courting the most thorough and exhaustive investigation, even trusting themselves, while in a trance, without any protection, to the honor and good faith of those around them, repeating at request the experiments, again and again, to satisfy that there is no deception about them.
This is strangely in contrast with our mediums, who as a rule shrink from anything of the kind, and are disposed to regard any request of that nature as a direct imputation upon their honesty.
If materialization means anything besides dollars and cents—if it has a mission to perform—it is to enlighten and educate the people upon one of the most important subjects that has ever engrossed the mind.
The lack of openness and confidence on the part of many of the mediums, or their managers, creates a feeling of distrust which sometimes finds an expression in rudeness on the part of skeptics, and leads those who are confident of the genuineness of a part of the séance to be impressed with the idea that there are things connected with it that are dishonest.
There is no difficulty in tracing the source of this feeling. Everywhere like begets like, and as long as this state of feeling exists there will be a lack of harmony in the circle, with more or less disturbance.
It may be that these things are inseparable from the newness of the manifestations among us, and will disappear when mediums are more freely developed in our homes, and the séances assume less of a commercial character.
While no apology should be made for fraud in these séances, we have no right to make charges that cannot be sustained. Every medium is bound, in justice to the audience, to see that the cabinet and its surroundings are so arranged that the appearance of fraud is, as far as possible, avoided.
Lack of experience, want of perception, or ignorance of a subject, gives no authority to assume that it is a fraud. The eagerness with which the press circulates reports of imposture finds its excuse, not in a manly defence of the truth, but in a morbid disposition to cater to the whims and caprices of the public. Those who accept such statements without investigation may possibly become victims of a worse delusion than that which they fancy they are condemning in others—a delusion born of ignorance and self-conceit.