889. It is of no small importance that this learned and subtle psychologist, should explain how my spiritoscope, or any other instrumental means of alphabetic indication, becomes necessary to effect the psychologization of a medium at a great distance, so as to convey to her mind the ideas which it is an object to impart. Why is it necessary that the index over a disk at Cape May, should revolve to the letters requisite to spell a message, in order that the index of another disk in Philadelphia, should revolve at a subsequent time? How does the mechanism in one place, acquire a power from the remote actuation of another? Will it be pretended that they are affected analogously to the sympathetic snails; whence, having kept each other’s company, this miracle ensued? But even this is not true, since they were not kept together, if ever they were in each other’s company.
890. Could any process be divined by which an instrument for supposed alphabetic communication with spirits, could be applied to transmit such messages as that for which I employed mine, according to this psychological hypothesis, it would be superior to the existing telegraphic process, since the ocean could be no barrier to messages which, although dependent on snail-like sympathy, would have nothing in it of the proverbial creeping attribute of the animal in question.
891. The following manifestations are of a nature, as it seems to me, to invalidate Dr. Bell’s notion that the communications received from the spirit are acquired from the minds of the bystanders:
892. Calling on Miss Ellis, it was found that her time was so pre-engaged, that she could not, as she said, sit for me till the day but one succeeding. My spirit sister manifested her desire to communicate, and conveyed the idea that Miss Ellis could give an hour named next day, if she would examine her list. This examination being made, the suggestion was verified.
893. Here was an idea not obtained from the mind of any person present. It could not exist in the minds of those who, like my friend and myself, had not seen the list, nor could it have been in Miss Ellis’s mind, as in that case she would not have had to consult the list, in order to determine the truth of the suggestion.
894. In this visit, Dr. W. F. Channing, who was my companion, said that possibly he had better not accompany me. It was left to my spirit sister to decide. No instrument being ready, as the quickest mode of communication, the medium was made to take up her pen, and began forthwith to make figures upon a sheet of paper. When the operation terminated, nothing but figures were seen to have been written. The medium said she did not know what to make of it. But under the letters it was written, “Select, from the alphabet, the letters corresponding, and you have my answer.” This being done, the following sentence was obtained: “My dear brother, come alone.”
895. It cannot be reasonably imagined that either Miss Ellis, my friend, or myself suggested this reply, as my friend and myself regretted the result, and it was not the interest of Miss Ellis to lessen the circle. But none of us had the ability to have perceived the numbers indicating the relative position of letters in the alphabetic row, so as to have selected them correctly. It would take some time to associate the letters with the numbers duly, and an unusual strength of memory to recollect them.
MODERN PROCESS FOR ALPHABETIC CONVERSE WITH SPIRITS, AS NEW TO MAN AS THE ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH.
896. In his instructive work on Spiritualism, the idea is advanced by Capron, that the species of modern spirit communication, of which his book mainly treats, dates back to a period of history so early that no age or country is exempt from accounts of them.