CHAPTER II
THE MOVEMENT OF OBJECTS WITHOUT
ANY APPARENT PHYSICAL CAUSE
The Committee of the Dialectical Society
So far as I am aware, the first systematic or scientific attempt to investigate the alleged phenomenon of the movement of objects without any apparent physical cause was made by the London Dialectical Society in the year 1869. On the motion of Dr. James Edmunds, a Committee was appointed "to investigate the Phenomena alleged to be Spiritual Manifestations, and to report thereon." The names of twenty-eight members were proposed. Three of these declined to act. Eight more names were added, so that the Committee, as finally constituted, consisted of thirty-three, three of whom were ladies. Among the best-known names were H. G. Atkinson, F.G.S.; Charles Bradlaugh; E. W. Cox, serjeant-at-law; Rev. C. Maurice Davies, D.D.; Charles R. Drysdale, M.D.; James Edmunds, M.D.; Robert Hannah; H. D. Jencken, barrister-at-law; William Volckman; and Dr. Alfred Russel Wallace, F.R.S. It is believed that Robert Hannah and Dr. Alfred Russel Wallace are the only survivors.
In order to investigate the phenomena in question by personal experiment and test, the Committee resolved itself into six Sub-Committees. In May 1870 the Committee appointed an Editing Committee to prepare a joint report, based solely on the evidence that had been before it. A month later the Editing Committee presented a draft report, which with some trifling verbal alterations was adopted nem dis. A resolution was then carried that a copy be forwarded to the Council of the Dialectical Society, with a recommendation that it be printed and published. This the Council declined to do. Upon this the Committee met and passed the following resolution:—
"That the Report be referred to the Editing Committee, and that they be requested to prepare it for publication, together with any supplementary or counter reports that may be received from members of the Committee, and appending thereto the reports of the Sub-Committees, and the evidence, oral and verbal, that has been collected; the entire work, when ready for publication, to be submitted for approval to the Committee."[1]
Such is the origin of the volume from which the following extracts are made.[2] Considerations of space necessitate dealing with the work of one Sub-Committee only. The essential part of the Report of Sub-Committee No. 1 is as follows:—
"Since their appointment on the 16th of February 1869, your Sub-Committee have held forty meetings for the purpose of experiment and test.
"All of these meetings were held at the private residences of members of the Committee, purposely to preclude the possibility of pre-arranged mechanism or contrivance.
"The furniture of the room in which the experiments were conducted was on every occasion its accustomed furniture.
"The tables were in all cases heavy dining-tables, requiring a strong effort to move them. The smallest of them was 5 feet 9 inches long by 4 feet wide ... and of proportionate weight.