In "Sketches of the Philosophy of Apparition, or an Attempt to Trace such Illusions to their Physical Causes, by Samuel Hibbert, M.D., F.R.S.E.," the author states his opinion to be that "Apparitions are nothing more than ideas or recollected images of the mind, which have been rendered more vivid than actual impressions," perhaps by morbid affections. It is also pointed out that "in ghost stories of a supposed supernatural character which by disease are rendered so unduly intense as to induce spectral illusions, may be traced to such fantastical objects of prior belief as are incorporated in the various systems of superstition which for ages have possessed the minds of the vulgar." "Spectral illusions arise from a highly excited state of the nervous irritability acting generally upon the system, or from inflammation of the brain."
"The effect induced on the brain by intoxication from ardent spirits, which have a strong tendency to inflame this organ, is attended with very remarkable effects. These have lately been described as symptoms of 'delirium tremens.' Many cases are recorded which show the liability of the patient to long-continued spectral impressions."
Sir David Brewster represents these phenomena as images projected on the retina—from the brain, and seen with the eyes open or shut.
Of the many causes assigned for spectral illusions the following may be enumerated:—Holy ecstasies, various diseases of the brain, diseases of the eye, extreme sensibility or nervous excitement from fright, various degrees of fever, effects of opium, delirium tremens, ignorance and superstition, catalepsy, and confused, indistinct, or uncomprehended natural causes. Now all persons who suppose they see ghosts are at liberty to select any of the foregoing causes for their being so deluded, for delusion it is, as I hope presently to prove; but they may rest assured that these supposed spectres are always produced either by disease or by over-excited imagination, which in some cases it may be said amounts to disease.
However, to return to the ghosts. A very common, or rather the common, idea of a ghost is generally a very thin and scraggy figure; but if there are such things there must be fat ghosts as well as thin ghosts; fat or thin people are equally eligible "to put in an appearance" of this sort if they can; and to carry out this idea and make it quite clear, I here introduce an old acquaintance of the public, Mr. Daniel Lambert, as he appeared to my un-excited imagination whilst engaged on this work. Now if Daniel came as an apparition, he must, according to the authorities in these matters, not only "come in his habits as he lived," that is, in the clothes he wore, but must also come in his fat, or he would not be recognized as the fattest man "and the heaviest man that ever lived," and although he weighed "52 stone 11 pounds" (14 lb. to the stone) in the flesh, in the spirit, he would, of course, be "as light as a feather," or rather an "air bubble;" and as he could not dance and jump about when alive, I thought if I brought him in as a ghost, I'd give him a bit of a treat, and let him dance upon the "tight rope."
Most persons will remember a story told by "Pliny the younger" of the apparition of "an old" man appearing to Athenadorous, a Greek scholar. This ghost was "lean, haggard, and dirty," with "dishevelled hair and a long beard." He had "chains on," and came "shaking his chains" at the Greek scholar, who heeded him not, but went on with his studies. The old ghost, however, "came close to him and shook his chains over his head as he sat at the table," whereupon Athenadorous arose and followed the dirty old man in his chains, who went into the courtyard and "stamped his foot upon a stone about the centre of it, and—disappeared." The Greek scholar marked the spot, and next day had the place dug up, when, lo and behold, they found there the skeleton of a human being.
Going back to the days of "Pliny the younger" is going back far enough into early history for my purpose, which is to show that the notions about apparitions which prevailed at that period are the same as those of the present day, that is, of their appearing in the dresses they wore in their life-time, in every minute particular, as to form, colour, and condition, new or old, as the case might be; but to prevent any mistake upon this head, I will just add some few words from that reliable authority, Defoe, who, you will have already remarked, is exceedingly particular as to the exactness of every article of dress; but in what follows he goes far beyond any other writer on this subject, for instance he says, "We see them dressed in the very clothes which we have cut to pieces, and given away, some to one body, some to another, or applied to this or that use, so that we can give an account of every rag of them. We can hear them speaking with the same voice and sound, though the organ which formed their former speech we are sure is perished and gone."
From the various instances of the appearance of apparitions which have been brought before the reader, it will, I presume, be admitted that abundant and sufficient proof has been given that the writers about ghosts, and all those who have professed to have seen ghosts, declare that they appear in the dresses which they wore in their lifetime; but from all I have been able to learn, it does not appear that from the days of Pliny the younger down to the days of Shakespeare, and from thence down to the present time, THAT ANY ONE HAS EVER THOUGHT OF THE GROSS ABSURDITY, AND IMPOSSIBILITY, OF THERE BEING SUCH THINGS AS GHOSTS OF WEARING APPAREL, IRON ARMOUR, WALKING STICKS, AND SHOVELS! NO, NOT ONE, except myself, and this I claim as my DISCOVERY CONCERNING GHOSTS, and that therefore it follows, as a matter of course, that as ghosts cannot, must not, dare not, for decency's sake, appear WITHOUT CLOTHES; and as there can be no such things AS GHOSTS OR SPIRITS OF CLOTHES, why, then, it appears that GHOSTS NEVER DID APPEAR, AND NEVER CAN APPEAR, at any rate not in the way in which they have been hitherto supposed to appear.
And now let us glance at the material question, or question of materialism.