Even the voice is recognized, although the various organs that produced the original voice on earth have long since perished. We all seem to have a notion that ghosts should be light, thin and airy, but, it seems, there must be fat ghosts, too. I remember at least one fat ghost, for I yanked it into my lap in the middle of a highly interesting seance at Mrs. Calder's, a famous Ghost producer who once thrived in New York. The ghost was alleged to be a famous Plymouth church preacher whose name is too revered to be mentioned in this connection.
Some Ghosts have even appeared in iron armour, and some with walking sticks, swords or shovels. People have heard, seen and felt all these—the word felt might be used in a double sense here, because one vicious ghost is said to have delighted in thumping his hosts with a cane—so it can be assumed that such material things as clothing, armour and canes are to be had in the other world. And yet, ghosts are transparent! You can see right through them. They disappear through a stone wall, through a carpeted, oaken floor, and through a locked and bolted door. You can shoot at them, run them through with a sword, and you touch nothing.
Again, the same Ghost frequently appears in many places at one and the same time. DeFoe tells of the burglars who found the same ghost in a chair in every room in the house at the same moment. Still again, we have "well-authenticated" cases of beggar Ghosts in rags, of one-armed Ghosts, beheaded Ghosts, blind Ghosts, hungry Ghosts, thirsty Ghosts, worried, tormented and unhappy Ghosts, and wicked, revengeful Ghosts. Is, then, the spirit world (heaven), no improvement on our own world? Mr. Kardec once asserted that we are surrounded by "myriads of spirits—good, bad and indifferent," which quite alarmed the author of "Mary Jane," who feared accidents might happen among such a crowd of spirits. Mr. Baker, it was, who set the author at ease, by explaining that "the spirits can walk through one another and not feel it."
It is a wonder that, in a world so full of humbuggers, get-rich-quicksters, fakirs and delusionists, greater effort has been made to profit by the greatest of all passions. For every human weakness we have a gold seeker, be it a Barnum, Munyon, a Lydia Pinkham, a 520% Miller, a Dowie, a Dis de Bar, or a Sister Fox. Some want to be tall, some short, some fat, some thin, some rich, some healthy, some beautiful, etc., etc., and there is always an army of fakirs, honest, semi-honest and otherwise, ready to make them so for a monetary consideration payable in advance. But, the greatest distress, the greatest passion, the greatest longing and yearning, is for the dead. What a tremendous army is the army of the mourners! What a gold mine to the man who can bring the mourner and the departed together! Ghost makers do not necessarily mean to defraud, nor do they always perform for money. There are good and bad, as in all else, and they sometimes fool themselves in their efforts to fool others. The Imagination is a wonderful organism. It is the greatest machine on earth, because it can do the greatest things. But, beware of it—it is not to be trusted; it will expand your credulity, undermine your reason, and give you a taste of the delirium tremens—which makes you see things!
Strikes, Profiteering and the High
Cost of Living
Being an Argument in Favor of Industrialized Government
PART I.
THE A. B. C. OF POLITICAL ECONOMY.