There can be no doubt, however, that, in our minds or bodies, there are powers latent, or nearly latent, in the ordinary healthy man, which, in some peculiar constitutions, or under the influence of certain agents, or certain classes of disease, become active, and develope themselves in an extraordinary way. It is not very uncommon to find people who have acquired intuitive perception of each others' current thoughts, beyond what can be ascribed to community of interests, or comprehension of character.
Zschokke, the German writer and teacher, is a peculiarly honorable and unimpeachable witness. What he affirms, as of his own knowledge, we have no right to disbelieve. Many of us have read the marvellous account given by him, of his sudden discovery that he possessed the power in regard to a few people—by no means in regard to all—of knowing, when he came near to them, not only their present thoughts, but much of what was in their memories. The details will be found in his Autobiography, which, being translated, has become a common book among us. When, for the first time, while conversing with some person, he acquired a sense of power over the secrets of that person's past life, he gave, of course, but little heed to his sensation. Afterwards, as from time to time the sense recurred, he tested the accuracy of his impressions, and was alarmed to find that, at certain times, and in regard to certain persons, the mysterious knowledge was undoubtedly acquired. Once when a young man at the table with him was dismissing very flippantly all manner of unexplained phenomena as the gross food of ignorance and credulity, Zschokke requested to know what he would say if he, a stranger, by aid of an unexplained power, should be able to tell him secrets out of his past life. Zschokke was defied to do that; but he did it. Among other things he described a certain upper room, in which there was a certain strong box, and from which certain moneys, the property of his master, had been abstracted by that young man; who, overwhelmed with astonishment, confessed the theft.
Many glimmerings of intuition, which at certain times occur in the experience of all of us, and seem to be something more than shrewd or lucky guesses, may be referred to the same power which we find, in the case just quoted, more perfectly developed. Nothing supernatural, but a natural gift, imperceptible to us in its familiar, moderate, and healthy exercise, brought first under our notice when some deranged adjustment of the mind has suffered it to grow into excess—to be, if we may call it so, a mental tumor.
We may now come to a new class of mysteries—which are receiving for the first time, in our own day, a rational solution.
The blind poet, Pfeffel, had engaged, as amanuensis, a young Protestant clergyman, named Billing. When the blind poet walked abroad, Billing also acted as his guide. One day, as they were walking in the garden, which was situated at a distance from the town, Pfeffel observed a trembling of his guide's arm whenever they passed over a certain spot. He asked the cause of this, and extracted from his companion the unwilling confession, that over that spot he was attacked by certain uncontrollable sensations, which he always felt where human bodies had been buried. At night, he added, over such spots he saw uncanny things. "This is great folly," Pfeffel thought, "and I will cure him of it." The poet went, therefore, that very night, into the garden. When they approached the place of dread, Billing perceived a feeble light, which hovered over it. When they came nearer, he saw the delicate appearance of a fiery, ghost-like form. He described it as the figure of a female, with one arm across her body, and the other hanging down, hovering upright and motionless over the spot, her feet being a few hand-breadths above the soil. The young man would not approach the vision, but the poet beat about it with his stick, walked through it, and seemed to the eyes of Billing like a man who beats about a light flame, which always returns to its old shape. For months, experiments were continued, company was brought to the spot, the spectre remained visible always in the dark, but to the young man only, who adhered firmly to his statement, and to his conviction that a body lay beneath. Pfeffel at last had the place dug up, and, at a considerable depth, covered with lime, there was a skeleton discovered. The bones and the lime were dispersed, the hole was filled up, Billing was again brought to the spot by night, but never again saw the spectre.
This ghost story, being well attested, created a great sensation. In the curious book by Baron Reichenbach, translated by Dr. Gregory, it is quoted as an example of a large class of ghost stories which admit of explanation upon principles developed by his own experiments.
The experiments of Baron Reichenbach do not, indeed, establish a new science, though it is quite certain that they go far to point out a new line of investigation, which promises to yield valuable results. So much of them as concerns our subject, may be very briefly stated. It would appear that certain persons with disordered nervous systems, liable to catalepsy, or to such affections, and also some healthy persons who are of a peculiar nervous temperament, are more sensitive to magnetism than their neighbors. They are peculiarly acted upon by the magnet, and are, moreover, very much under the influence of the great magnetic currents of the earth. Such people sleep tranquilly when they are reposing with their bodies in the earth's magnetic line, and are restless, in some cases seriously affected, if they lie across that line, on beds with the head and foot turned east and west, matters of complete indifference to the healthy animal. These "sensitives" are not only affected by the magnet, but they are able to detect, by their sharpened sense, what we may reasonably suppose to exist, a faint magnetic light: they see it streaming from the poles of a magnet shown to them in a room absolutely dark; and if the sensibility be great, and the darkness perfect, they see it streaming also from the points of fingers, and bathing in a faint halo the whole magnet or the whole hand. Furthermore, it would appear that the affection by the magnet of these sensitives does not depend upon that quality by which iron filings are attracted; that, perfectly independent of the attractive force, there streams from magnets, from the poles of crystals, from the sun and moon, another influence, to which the discoverer assigns the name of Odyle. The manifestation of Odyle is accompanied by a light too faint for healthy vision, but perceptible at night by "sensitives." Odyle is generated, among other things, by heat and by chemical action. It is generated, therefore, in the decomposition of the human body. I may now quote from Reichenbach, who, having given a scientific explanation, upon his own principles, of the phenomena perceived by Billing, thus continues:—
"The desire to inflict a mortal wound on the monster, Superstition, which, from a similar origin, a few centuries ago, inflicted on European society so vast an amount of misery, and by whose influence, not hundreds, but thousands of innocent persons died in tortures, on the rack and at the stake;—this desire made me wish to make the experiment, if possible, of bringing a highly sensitive person, by night, to a churchyard. I thought it possible that they might see, over graves where mouldering bodies lay, something like that which Billing had seen. Mademoiselle Reichel had the courage, unusual in her sex, to agree to my request. She allowed me, on two very dark nights, to take her from the Castle of Reisenberg, where she was residing with my family, to the cemetery of the neighboring village of Grünzing.
"The result justified my expectation in the fullest measure. She saw, very soon, a light, and perceived, on one of the grave mounds, along its whole extent, a delicate, fiery, as it were a breathing flame. The same thing was seen on another grave, in a less degree. But she met neither witches nor ghosts. She described the flame as playing over the graves in the form of a luminous vapor, from one to two spans in height.
"Some time afterwards I took her to two great cemeteries, near Vienna, where several interments occur daily, and the grave mounds lie all about in thousands. Here she saw numerous graves, which exhibited the lights above described. Wherever she looked, she saw masses of fire lying about; but it was chiefly seen over all new graves, while there was no appearance of it over very old ones. She described it less as a clear flame than as a dense, vaporous mass of fire, holding a middle place between mist and flame. On many graves this light was about four feet high, so that when she stood on the grave it reached to her neck. When she thrust her hand into it, it was as if putting it into a dense, fiery cloud. She betrayed not the slightest uneasiness, as she was, from her childhood, accustomed to such emanations, and had seen, in my experiments, similar lights produced by natural means, and made to assume endless varieties of form. I am convinced that all who are, to a certain degree, sensitive, will see the same phenomena in cemeteries, and very abundantly in the crowded cemeteries of large cities; and that my observations may be easily repeated and confirmed." These experiments were tried in 1844. A postscript was added in 1847. Reichenbach had taken five other sensitive persons, in the dark, to cemeteries. Of these, two were sickly, three quite healthy. All of them confirmed the statements of Mademoiselle Reichel, and saw the lights over all new graves, more or less distinctly; "so that," says the philosopher, "the fact can no longer admit of the slightest doubt, and may be every where controlled.