THE SPIRITUALISTIC AND PRACTICAL CHARACTER OF CLAIRVOYANCE
might be further illustrated by the well known case of Miss Eliza Hamilton, who became paralysed in her limbs and right arm, through severe injury to the spine. She had been in hospital for four months, on her return home frequently passed into the trance state, and on awakening described various people and places she had visited, and objects seen. These descriptions have been invariably verified subsequently. “She also at times,” says her physician, “speaks of having been in the company of persons with whom she was acquainted in this world, but who have passed away; and she tells her friends that they have become more beautiful, and have cut off their infirmities with which they were afflicted while here. She often describes events which are about to happen, and these are always fulfilled exactly as she predicts.”
“Her father,” says Mr. Hudson Tuttle, “read in her presence a letter he had received from a friend in Leeds, speaking of the loss of his daughter, about whose fate he was very unhappy, as she had disappeared nearly a month before, and left no trace. Eliza went into the trance state, and cried out, ‘Rejoice! I have found the lost girl! She is happy in the angel world.’ She said the girl had fallen into the dark water where dyers washed their cloths; that her friends could not have found her had they sought her there, but now the body had floated a few miles, and would be found in the River Aire. The body was found as described.
“Now, knowing that her eyes were closed, that she could not hear, that her bodily senses were in profound lethargy, how are we to account for the intensity and keenness of sight? Her mental powers were exceedingly exalted, and scarcely a question could be asked her but she correctly answered.
“In this case the independence of the mind of the physical body are shown in every instance of clairvoyance, is proven beyond cavil or doubt. If it is demonstrated that the mind sees without the aid of eyes, hears when the ears are deaf, feels when the nerves of sensation are at rest, it follows that it is independent of these outward avenues, and has other channels of communication with the external world essentially its own.”
CLAIRVOYANCE FROM DISEASE.
Miss Mollie Fancher, of Brooklyn Heights, fell off a tramway car when eighteen years of age, experienced very severe injuries to head and spine, her body being dragged a distance, through her dress catching on the step of the car. She became paralysed, lost all her senses, except touch. She gradually recovered hearing, taste, and ability to talk in time. She was also blind for nine years. Drs. Speir and Ormiston were her physicians, men of skill and marked probity. These, with a veritable host of medical men—ministers of the Gospel, educationists and specialists—have borne testimony to her remarkable endowments, from which we take two extracts. Mr. Charles Ewart, Principal of the Brooklyn Heights Seminary, where she was under special care, writes:—
“For many days together she has been to all appearances dead. The slightest pulse could not be detected; there was no evidence of respiration. Her limbs were as cold as ice, and had there not been some warmth about her heart, she would have been buried. When I first saw her she had but one sense—that of touch. By running her fingers over the printed page, she could read with equal facility in light or darkness. The most delicate work is done by her in the night.... Her power of clairvoyance, or second sight, is marvellously developed. Distance imposes no barriers, without the slightest error she dictates the contents of sealed letters which have never been in her hands. She discriminates in darkness the most delicate shades of colour. She writes with extraordinary rapidity.”
Mr. Henry M. Parkhurst, the astronomer (residing at 173 Gates Avenue, Brooklyn, N.Y.), writes:—
“From the waste-basket of a New York gentleman acquaintance he fished an unimportant business letter, without reading it, tore it into ribbons, and tore the ribbons into squares. He shook the pieces well together, put them into an envelope, and sealed it. This he subsequently handed to Miss Fancher. The blind girl took the envelope in her hand, and passed her hand over it several times, called for paper and pencil, and wrote it verbatim. The seal of the letter had not been broken. Mr. Parkhurst himself opened it, pasted the contents together, and compared the two. Miss Fancher’s was a literal copy of the original.”