After the publication of this report ([Supplement IV]), there was still some further discussion of the case in societies of various kinds and in the press, but no important objections were raised. A hippologist thought that men of his calling should have been consulted, a telepathist believed that telepathists should have been called in. There was also some further talk of suggestion, will-transference, thought-reading and the occult, but no attempt was made to elucidate these vague terms with reference to their application to the case in hand. Others adhered to the old cry of "fraud," for a share of which Mr. Pfungst now fell heir. There were a few who felt it incumbent upon themselves to preserve their 'priority,' and therefore stated with a show of satisfaction that I had finally 'confessed' myself to hold their respective points of view. As if there were anything like "confessions" in science! As if mere affirmations, even though sealed and deposited in treasure vaults, had any value with reference to a case in which every manner of supposition had been advanced in lieu of explanation. Why did they wait so long, if they had convincing proof for their position?
And finally there were disappointed Darwinists who expressed fear lest ecclesiastical and reactionary points of view should derive favorable material from the conclusions arrived at in my report. Needless fear. For lovers of truth it must always remain a matter of inconsequence whether anyone is pleased or displeased with the truth, and whether it is enunciated by Aristotle or Haeckel.
Mr. von Osten, however, continued to exhibit Hans, and is probably doing so still, but in what frame of mind, I dare not judge. The spectators continue to look on, they are doubly alert to catch movements, and many of them have learned from Mr. Schillings what kind of movements they are to expect. But these "initiated" ones regularly return and declare that there is nothing in the movements and that they simply could not discover any aids given to the horse. Nothing can so well show how difficult the case is, and how great the need of a thorough exposition of the whole matter, than the account given in the following pages of Mr. Pfungst. Its publication has been delayed on account of the additional tests made in the laboratory, but we have reason to suppose that through these additional tests the work has gained in permanent value. Experimental psychologists will perhaps be greatly interested in the graphic registration of the minute involuntary movements which accompany the thought process, and in the artificial association of a given involuntary movement with a given idea. Likewise the tests on sense-perception in horses, which have led to essential changes in hitherto current views, and the critical review of the comprehensive literature on similar achievements of other animals, will be welcomed by many.
Before closing these introductory remarks, I would make one more statement concerning Mr. von Osten. The reader will notice that the judgment passed upon him in this treatise is placed at the end, whereas in the report of the commission it came first. This was brought about by the change that was made in the way of stating the problem. Then the question discussed was whether 'tricks' were involved; now the question is: What is the mechanism of the process? The question of the good faith of the master was taken up once more only because the facts that were brought to light by the later experimentation seemingly brought forward new grounds for distrust. But by placing this discussion toward the end of our report we wished to indicate that everything that is said of the present status of facts, is quite independent of the view taken concerning Mr. von Osten. Even assuming that the horse had been purposely trained by him to respond to this kind of signal, the case would still deserve a place in the annals of science. For visual signs, planned and practiced so that they could not only be more readily perceived by the animal than by man, but could be transferred from their inventor to others without any betrayal of the secret,—this would be an extraordinary invention, and Mr. von Osten would then be a fraud, but also a genius of first rank.
In truth he probably was neither, but I was brief in my report, for otherwise I would have been obliged to go into more detail than the case warranted. And a judgment passed upon a human personality is quite a different matter from a judgment upon a horse. If it is unscientific to make unqualified statements concerning a horse after the performance of only a few experimental tests, it is certainly an unwarranted thing to pass a moral judgment upon a man upon the basis of meagre material. Anyone who would assume the rôle of judge should bear in mind that here too we have more than a hundredfold the material which they could bring forward, and among it some which, if taken alone, would be more unfavorable than any that they had. But here all things should be weighed together, and not in isolation. A former instructor of mathematics in a German gymnasium, a passionate horseman and hunter, extremely patient and at the same time highly irrascible, liberal in permitting the use of the horse for days at a time and again tyrannical in the insistence upon foolish conditions, clever in his method of instruction and yet at the same time possessing not even the slightest notion of the most elementary conditions of scientific procedure,—all this, and more, goes to make up the man. He is fanatic in his conviction, he has an eccentric mind which is crammed full of theories from the phrenology of Gall to the belief that the horse is capable of inner speech and thereby enunciates inwardly the number as it proceeds with the tapping. From theories such as these, and on the basis of all sorts of imagined emotional tendencies in the horse, he also managed to formulate an explanation for the failure of the tests in which none of the persons present knew the answer to the problem given the horse, and also for the failure of those tests in which the large blinders were applied. And he would often interfere with or hinder other tests which, according to his point of view, were likely to lead us astray. And yet, when the first tests with the blinders did turn out as unmistakably sheer failures, there was such genuine surprise, such tragi-comic rage directed against the horse, that we finally believed that his views in the matter would be changed beyond a doubt. "The gentlemen must admit," he said at the time, "that after seeing the objective success of my efforts at instruction, I was warranted in my belief in the horse's power of independent thought." Nevertheless, upon the following day he was as ardent an exponent of the belief in the horse's intelligence as he ever had been.
And finally, after I could no longer keep from him the results of our investigation, I received a letter from him in which he forbade further experimentation with the horse. The purpose of our inquiries, he said, had been to corroborate his theories. On account of his withdrawal of the horse a few experimental series unfortunately could not be completed, but happily the major portion of our task had been accomplished.