The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries Part 35

Professor Freud detects other marked processes in the dream state, all of which help to ill.u.s.trate the part of the Fairy-Faith dependent upon dreaming experiences. (1) There is condensation of details frequently in a proportion so great as one for ten and one for twenty; (2) displacement of details, or 'a transvaluation of all values'; (3) much dramatization; (4) regression, a retrograde movement of abstract mental processes toward their primary conceptions; and (5) secondary elaboration, an attempt to rationalize all dream-material.[578] Also, Professor Freud discovered from his a.n.a.lysis of thousands of dreams that the subconsciousness makes use of a sort of symbolism:--'This symbolism in part varies with the individual, but in part is of a typical nature, and seems to be identical with the symbolism which we suppose to lie behind our myths and legends. It is not impossible that these latter creations of the people may find their explanation from the study of dreams.'[579] Such processes, taken as a whole, show that man possesses a twofold consciousness, the ordinary consciousness and the subconsciousness. And we have every reason to believe that subconscious activities go on continually, in waking and in sleeping.

By experiments on his own perfectly healthy children, Wienholt proved that there are natural forces existing whose stimulations are never perceived in waking life: he made pa.s.ses over the face and neck of his son with an iron key at the distance of half an inch without touching him, whereupon the boy began to rub those parts and manifested uneasiness. Wienholt likewise experimented on his other children with lead, zinc, gold, and other metals, and in most cases the children 'averted the parts so treated, rubbed them, or drew the clothes over them'.[580] Therefore, in sleep the consciousness perceives objects without physical contact; and this not inconceivably might suggest, inversely, that in sleep the human consciousness can affect objects without physical contact, as it is said fairies and the dead can, and in the way psychical researchers know that objects can be affected.

We have on record an account of a most remarkable dream quite the same in character as dreams wherein certain Celts believe they have met the dead or fairies. Professor Hilprecht had a broken a.s.syrian cylinder in cuneiform which he could not decipher; but in a dream an a.s.syrian priest in ancient garb appeared to him and deciphered the inscription. Of this dream Myers observed:--'We seem to have reached the utmost intensity of sleep faculty within the limits of our ordinary spectrum.'[581]

We may sum up the results of our examination of dreams by saying that scientific a.n.a.lysis of the dream life _in its higher ranges_ proves that our Ego is not wholly embraced in self-consciousness, that the Ego exceeds the self-consciousness. Instead of a continuity of consciousness which const.i.tutes self-consciousness we have parallel states of consciousness for the one subject, the Ego. Our study of the Celtic theory of re-birth, in the following chapter, will further explain this subtle aspect of the dream psychology.

When such a conclusion is applied to the Fairy-Faith, the various dream-like or trance-like states during which ancient and contemporary Celts testify to having been in Fairyland are seen to be scientifically plausible. In this aspect then, Fairyland, stripped of all its literary and imaginative glamour and of its social psychology, in the eyes of science resolves itself into a reality, because it is one of the states of consciousness co-ordinate with the ordinary consciousness. This statement will be confirmed by a brief examination of what is called 'supernatural lapse of time', and which is invariably connected with Fairyland.

_'Supernatural' Lapse of Time_

It has already been made clear that in the dream or somnambulic state there are invariably modifications of time and s.p.a.ce relations; and these give rise to what has been termed the 'supernatural lapse of time'. Two conditions are possible: either a few minutes of waking-state time equal long periods in the non-waking state; or else, as is usually the case in the Fairy-Faith, the reverse is true.

The first condition, which we shall examine first, occasionally appears in the Fairy-Faith through such a statement as this:--'Sometimes one may thus go to Faerie for an hour or two' (p. 39). Similarly, as physicians well know, patients under narcotics will experience events extending over long periods of time within a few minutes of normal time. De Quincey, the famous opium-eater, records dreams of ten to sixty years'

supernatural duration, and some quite beyond all limits of the waking experience. Fechner records a case of a woman who was nearly drowned and then resuscitated after two minutes of unconsciousness, and who in that time lived over again all her past life.[582] Another even more remarkable case than this last concerns Admiral Beaufort, who, having fallen into the water, was unconscious also for two minutes, and yet he says that not only during that short s.p.a.ce of time did he travel over every incident of his life with the details of 'every minute and collateral feature', but that there crowded into his imagination 'many trifling events which had long been forgotten'.[583]

We shall now present examples to ill.u.s.trate the second condition. Hohne was in an unbroken magnetic sleep from the first of January to the tenth of May, and when he came out of it he was overcome with surprise to see that spring had arrived, he having lain down--as he believed--only the day before.[584] Had Hohne been an Irishman, he might very reasonably have explained the situation by saying that he had been with the fairies for what seemed only a night. The Seeress of Prevorst, in a similar sleep, pa.s.sed through a period of six years and five months, and then awoke as from a one-night sleep with no memory of what she did during that time; but some time afterwards memory of the period came to her so completely that she recalled all its details.[585] Old people, and some young people too, among the Celts, who go to Fairyland for varying periods of time, sometimes extending over weeks (as in a case I knew in West Ireland), have just such dreams or trance-states as this. Another example follows:--Chardel, in fleeing from the Revolution, took ship from Brittany and was obliged to induce somnambulism on his wife in order to overcome her horror of the sea. When the couple landed in America and Chardel awakened his wife, she had no recollection whatever of the Atlantic voyage, and believed herself still in Brittany.[586]

Both Helmholtz and Fechner show[587] that the functions of the nervous system are a.s.sociated with a definite time-measure, so it follows that consciousness in an organic body like man's depends upon the nervous system; but, as these examples and similar ones in the Fairy-Faith show, certain conscious states exist independently of the human nerves, and they therefore set up a strong presumption that complete consciousness can exist independently of the physical nerve-apparatus.

And in proceeding to submit this presumption of a supersensuous consciousness to the further test of science we shall at the same time be testing the statements made by wholly reliable seer-witnesses, like the Irish mystic and seer (p. 65), that not only can men and women enter Fairyland during trance-states for a brief period, but that at death they can enter it for an unlimited period. Further, what is for our study the most important of all statements will likewise be tested, namely, that in Fairyland there are conscious non-human ent.i.ties like the _Sidhe_ races.

PSYCHICAL RESEARCH AND FAIRIES

Our present task, then, is to extend the examination beyond incarnate consciousness into the realm of the new psychology or physical research, where, as a working hypothesis, it is a.s.sumed that there is discarnate consciousness, which by the Celtic peoples is believed to exist and to exhibit itself in various individual aspects as fairies.

As to what science demands as proof of the survival of human consciousness after death, there has been no clear consensus of opinion.

To prove merely the existence of 'ghosts' would not do; it is necessary to show by a series of proofs (1) that discarnate intelligences exist, (2) that they possess complete and persistent personal energy wholly within themselves, (3) that they are the actual unit of consciousness and memory known to have manifested itself on this plane of existence through particular incarnate personalities now deceased. Various psychical researchers a.s.sert that they have already reached these proofs and are convinced, often in spite of their initial scientific att.i.tude of antagonism toward all psychic phenomena, of the survival of the human consciousness after the death of the human body; and we shall proceed to present the testimony of some of them.

In chapter vii, concerning _Phantasms of the Dead_, forming part of Frederick W. H. Myers's _Human Personality and its Survival of Bodily Death_, and in the two chapters which follow, on _Motor Automatism_, and on _Trance, Possession, and Ecstasy_, all the necessary proofs above noted have been adduced; and the author was thereby one of the very first psychical researchers to have recorded before the world his conversion from the non-animistic hypothesis to the ancient belief that Man is immortal; for he admits his conviction that the human consciousness does incontestably survive the decay of the physical body.

Types of some of these well-attested and proved cases offered as evidence by Myers may be briefly summarized as follows:--Repeated apparitions indicating intimate acquaintance with some post-mortem fact like the place of burial; single apparitions with knowledge of the affairs of surviving friends, or of the impending death of a survivor, or of spirits of persons dead after the apparition's decease; cases where professed spirits manifest knowledge of their earth-life, as of some secret compact made with survivors; cases of apparitional appearances near a corpse or a grave; occasional cases of the appearance of the dead to several persons collectively.[588] Under motor automatism, some of the most striking phenomena tending toward proof are cases where automatic writing has announced a death unknown to the persons present; knowledge communicated in a _seance_, not known to any person present, but afterwards proved to have been possessed by the deceased; automatic writing by a child in language unknown to her.

In chapter ix trance or possession is defined by Myers, in the same list of proofs, as 'a development of Motor Automatism resulting at last in a subst.i.tution of personality'; and this harmonizes with the theory of the control of a living organism by discarnate spirits, and is supported by an overwhelming ma.s.s of scientific experiment. Telepathy suggests the possibility of communication between the living and the living and between the living and the dead, and, we may add, between the dead and the dead--as in Fairyland--without the consideration of s.p.a.ce or time as known in the lower ranges of mental action; and that the communication does not depend upon vibrations from a material brain-ma.s.s. Telepathy in these first two aspects has been likewise accepted as a scientific fact by workers in psychical research like Sir William Crookes, Sir Oliver Lodge, William James, and by many others. All such phenomena as these, now being so carefully investigated and weighed by men thoroughly trained in science, are, so to speak, the protoplasmic background of all religions, philosophies, or systems of mystical thought yet evolved on this planet; and in all essentials they confirm the x-quant.i.ty presented in the evidence of the Fairy-Faith.

Dr. G. F. Stout, an able representative of the school of non-converts to the theories in psychology propounded by Myers and by psychical research, states his position thus:--'But, at least, my doubt is not dogmatic denial, and I agree with Mr. Myers that there is no sufficient reason for being peculiarly sceptical concerning communications from departed spirits. I also agree with him that the alleged cases of such communication cannot be with any approach to probability explained away as mere instances of telepathy.'[589] In addition, Dr. Stout says:--'The conception which has been really useful to him is that of telepathy.

Given that communication takes place between individual minds unmediated by ordinary physical conditions, we may regard intercourse with departed spirits as a special case of the same kind of process. And clairvoyance, precognition, &c., may perhaps be referred to telepathic communication either with departed spirits or with other intelligences superior to the human.'[589] In this last phrase, 'intelligences superior to the human', Dr. Stout a.s.sumes our own position, that hypothetically there is good reason for thinking that discarnate non-human intelligences--such as the Irish call the _Sidhe_--may exist and communicate with, or influence in some unknown way, the living, as during 'mediumship' and in 'seership'.

Mr. Andrew Lang points out, in his reply to Dr. Stout's criticism, that the only legitimate scientific resource for overthrowing Myers's position, since the evidence is 'mathematically incapable of explanation by chance coincidence', is to say that several people are deliberate forgers and liars. And he adds:--'To myself (but only to myself and a small circle) the evidence is irrefragable, from our lifetime knowledge of the percipient.'[590] But the animistic position does not by any means depend upon the evidence presented by Myers, no matter how incontestably reliable it is. We have only to examine the voluminous publications of the _Society for Psychical Research_ (London) to realize this, and especially the _Report on the Census of Hallucinations of Modern Spiritualism_, by Professor Sidgwick's Committee (_P. S. P. R._, London).

PSYCHICAL RESEARCH AND ANTHROPOLOGY IN RELATION TO THE FAIRY-FAITH

_According to a special contribution from Mr. Andrew Lang._

Mr. Andrew Lang, who has done a special service to science by showing that psychical research is inseparably related to anthropology, has favoured us with a statement of his own position toward this relationship and has made it directly applicable to the Fairy-Faith. In a general way, but not in some important details (as indicated in our annotations) we agree with Mr. Lang's position, which he states as follows:--

Mr. Evans Wentz has asked me to define my position towards psychical research in relation to anthropology. I have done so in my book, _The Making of Religion_. The alleged abnormal or supernormal occurrences which psychical research examines are, for the most part, 'universally human,' and, whether they happen or do not happen, whether they are the results of malobservation, or of fraud, or are merely mythical, as _human_ they cannot be wisely neglected by anthropology.

The fairy-folk, under many names, in many tongues, are everywhere objects of human belief, in Central Australia, in New Zealand, in the isles of the Pacific, as in the British Isles, Lowland or Highland, Celtic in the main, or English in the main, I conceive the various beings, fairies, brownies, _Iruntarinia_, _Djinns_, or what you will, _to be purely mythical_. I am incapable of believing that they are actual ent.i.ties, who carry off men and women; steal and hide objects (especially as the _Iruntarinia_ do); love or hate, persecute or kiss human beings; practise music, vocal and instrumental; and in short 'play the pliskies' with which they are universally credited by the identical workings of the human fancy.

They tend to shade away, on one side, into the denizens of the House of Hades--phantasms of the dead. The belief in such phantasms may be partially based on experience, whether hallucinatory or otherwise and inexplicably produced.[591]

As far as psychical research studies report of these phantasms it approaches the realm of 'the Fairy Queen Proserpine'. As far as such research examines the historical or contemporary stories of the _Poltergeist_, it touches on fairies: because the Irish, for example, attribute to the agency of fairies the modern _Poltergeist_ phenomena, whether these, in each case, be fraudulent or, up to now, be unexplained.

There are not more than two or three alleged visions of the traditional fairies in the annals of psychical research; and I have met with but few sane and educated persons who profess to have seen phantoms at all resembling the traditional fairy; while phantasms supposed to be of the dead, the dying, and the absent are frequently reported. On the whole, psychical research has very little concern with the fairy-belief in its typical forms, and if the researcher did find modern cases of fairy visions alleged by sane and educated percipients, he would be apt to explain them by suggestion acting on the subconscious self.[592]

1 MARLOES ROAD, LONDON, W.

_September_ 26, 1910.

Concerning phantasms of the dead into which, as above pointed out, the fairy-folk tend to shade away, Mr. Lang has elsewhere said:--'On the whole, if the evidence is worth anything, there are real objective ghosts, and there are also telepathic hallucinations: so that the scientific att.i.tude is to believe in both, if in either.'[593] And he shows that while anthropologists have explained all animistic beliefs as the results of primitive men's philosophizing 'on life, death, sleep, dreams, trances, shadows, the phenomena of epilepsy, and the illusions of starvation', 'normal phenomena, psychological and psychical, might suggest most of the animistic beliefs.'[593] In _The Making of Religion_, Mr. Lang has expanded this anthropological argument so as to make it even more fully embrace psychical research.

If we apply the brilliant results of Mr. Lang's investigations to our own, it is apparent that the background of the Fairy-Faith, like that of all religions, is animistic, as we have argued in chapter iii; that it must have grown up in ancient times into its traditional form out of a pre-Celtic followed by a pre-Christian Celtic religion; these latter due, in turn, to actual psychical experiences, such as hallucinations, visions of different sorts, clairvoyance, 'mediumship', and magical knowledge on the part of Druid priests and, probably, to some extent, on the part of the common people as well; and, finally, that the living Fairy-Faith depends not so much upon ancient traditions, oral and recorded, as upon recent and contemporary psychical experiences, vouched for by many 'seers' and other percipients among our witnesses, and now placed on record by us in chapter ii and elsewhere throughout this study.

THE PRESENT POSITION OF PSYCHICAL RESEARCH

Sir William Crookes, the well-known English authority in physical science, was almost the first scientist to become seriously interested in psychics, and in Part III of _Notes of an Enquiry into the Phenomena called Spiritual, during the Years 1870-1873_ (London), boldly affirms:--'It will be seen that the facts are of the most astounding character, and seem utterly irreconcilable with all known theories of modern science. Having satisfied myself of their _truth_, it would be moral cowardice to withhold my testimony because my previous publications were ridiculed by critics and others.' And this conclusion reached forty years ago has not been reversed, but has been confirmed by one after another of learned scientists on both sides of the Atlantic.

In 1908, Sir Oliver Lodge, Princ.i.p.al of the University of Birmingham, and at present one of the best known of scientists concerned with the study of spiritual phenomena, stated his position thus:--'On the whole, I am of those who, though they would like to see further and still stronger and more continued proofs, are of opinion that a good case has been made out, and that as the best working hypothesis at the present time it is legitimate to grant that lucid moments of intercourse with deceased persons may in the best cases supervene.... The boundary between the two states--the known and the unknown--is still substantial, but it is wearing thin in places; and like excavators engaged in boring a tunnel from opposite ends, amid the roar of water and other noises, we are beginning to hear now and again the strokes of the pickaxes of our comrades on the other side.'[594] In 1909, Sir Oliver Lodge published _The Survival of Man_, in which, after a careful exposition, covering over three hundred pages, of the definite results of much scientific experimentation by the best scientists of Europe and America, in such psychical phenomena as Telepathy or Thought Transference, Telepathy and Clairvoyance, Automatism and Lucidity, the following tentative conclusion is reached:--'The first thing we learn, perhaps the only thing we clearly learn in the first instance, is _continuity_. There is no such sudden break in the conditions of existence as may have been antic.i.p.ated; and no break at all in the continuous and conscious ident.i.ty of genuine character and personality.'[594] And his personal conviction is that 'Intelligent co-operation between other than embodied human minds than our own ... has become possible'.[595]

William James, who was one of the chief psychical researchers in the United States, published his conclusions in October 1909; and of psychical phenomena he wrote:--'As to there being such real natural types of phenomena ignored by orthodox science, I am not baffled at all, for I am fully convinced of it.' Of 'mediumship', he postulated the very interesting theory of a universally diffused 'soul-stuff', which elsewhere (p. 254) we have referred to as the scientific equivalent to the Polynesian _Mana_: 'My own dramatic sense tends instinctively to picture the situation as an interaction between slumbering faculties in the automatist's mind and a cosmic environment of _other consciousness_ of some sort which is able to work upon them. If there were in the universe a lot of diffuse soul-stuff, unable of itself to get into consistent personal form, or to take permanent possession of an organism, yet always craving to do so, it might get its head into the air, parasitically, so to speak, by profiting by weak spots in the armour of human minds, and slipping in and stirring up there the sleeping tendencies to personate.' Expanding this theory into a 'pan-psychic' view of the universe and a.s.suming a 'mother-sea' of consciousness, a bank upon which we all draw, James asked these questions about it, which educated Celtic seers ask themselves about the _Sidhe_ or Fairy-World and its also collective consciousness or life: 'What is its own structure? What is its inner topography?... What are the conditions of individuation or insulation in this mother-sea? To what tracts, to what active systems functioning separately in it, do personalities correspond? Are individual "spirits" const.i.tuted there?

How numerous, and of how many hierarchic orders may these then be? How permanent? How transient? And how confluent with one another may they become?'[596] We should ask the reader to compare this scientific att.i.tude with the almost identical att.i.tude taken up with respect to the _Sidhe_ Races and the const.i.tution of their world and life by the Irish mystic and seer (pp. 60 ff.).

M. Camille Flammarion, the well-known French astronomer, is another of the pioneer psychical researchers; and in his psychic studies, ent.i.tled, as translated in an English edition, _The Unknown_, recently announced these definite conclusions:--'(1) _The soul exists as a real ent.i.ty independent of the body._ (2) _It is endowed with faculties still unknown to science._ (3) _It is able to act at a distance, without the intervention of the senses._' And in his _Mysterious Psychic Forces_ (Boston, 1907, pp. 452-3), he says:--'The conclusions of the present work concord with those of the former (_The Unknown_).... I may sum up the whole matter with the single statement that there exists in nature, in myriad activity, a _psychic element_ the essential nature of which is still hidden from us.'

THE FINAL TESTING OF THE X-QUANt.i.tY

This chapter can now be brought to its logical conclusion by directly applying the results so far attained to our still vigorous x-quant.i.ty or residuum gathered out of the Fairy-Faith. We have, although hurriedly, blazed a rough pathway through the necessary parts of the jungle of scientific theories, and have arrived at a very considerable clearing made by the pioneers, the psychical researchers. We seem, in fact, to have arrived at a point in our long investigations where we can postulate scientifically, on the showing of the data of psychical research, the existence of such invisible intelligences as G.o.ds, genii, daemons, all kinds of true fairies, and disembodied men. It is not necessary to produce here, in addition to what already has been set forth, the very voluminous detailed evidence of psychical research as to the existence of such intelligences. The general statement may be made that there are hundreds of carefully proven cases of phenomena or apparitions precisely like many of those which the Celtic peoples attribute to fairies.[597]

Various explanations or theories are offered by our men of science as to what these invisible intelligences are, for none of our scientists would say that the dead alone are responsible, even in a majority of cases, for the observed phenomena and apparitions, but rather such beings as we call daemons, fairies, and elementals. M. Camille Flammarion says:--'The greater part of the phenomena observed--noises, movement of tables, confusions, disturbances, raps, replies to questions asked--are really childish, puerile, vulgar, often ridiculous, and rather resemble the pranks of mischievous boys than serious bona-fide actions. It is impossible not to notice this. Why should the souls of the dead amuse themselves in this way? The supposition seems almost absurd.'[598] There could be no better description of the pranks which house-haunting fairies like brownies and Robin Goodfellows and elementals enjoy than this; and to suppose that the dead perform such mischievous and playful acts is, in truth, absurd. M. Flammarion also says:--'Two inescapable hypotheses present themselves. Either it is we who produce these phenomena' (and this is not reasonable) 'or it is spirits. But mark this well: these spirits are not necessarily the souls of the dead; for other kinds of spiritual beings may exist, and s.p.a.ce may be full of them without our ever knowing anything about it, except under unusual circ.u.mstances. _Do we not find in the different ancient literatures, demons, angels, gnomes, goblins, sprites, spectres, elementals, &c.?

Perhaps these legends are not without some foundation in fact._'[598]

On 'the phenomena of percussive and allied sound'--such as fairies and the dead are said to produce--Sir William Crookes made this report:--'The intelligence governing the phenomena is sometimes manifestly below that of the medium. It is frequently in direct opposition to the wishes of the medium.... The intelligence is sometimes of such a character as to lead to the belief that it does not emanate from any person present.'[599] In the case of the 'medium' Mr.

Home, Sir William Crookes used mechanical tests and proved to his own satisfaction that physical objects moved without Mr. Home or any other person being in contact with them,[600] in the way that fairies are believed to move objects. These phenomena parallel remarkable ancient and modern examples of the same nature: e. g. in the affair at Cideville, France, brought before a magistrate, there is sworn evidence by reputable witnesses that pillows and coverlets floated away from a bed in which two children were asleep, and that furniture in the house moved without contact.[601] Mrs. Margaret Quinn, originally of Mullingar, but now of Howth, gave this remarkable testimony:--'When I was a little girl, I lived with my mother in West Meath, near Mullingar.

A _fort_ was at the back of our house, and mother used to hear music playing round our house all night, and she has seen _them_ (the _good people_). It often happened there at home that we would have clothes out on the line and they would float off like a balloon at a time when there would not be a bit of wind and in daylight. My mother would come out and say, "G.o.d bless _them_ (the _good people_). _They_ will bring them back." And then the clothes would slowly come floating back to the line.' And in our chapter ii there is other testimony concerning objects moved without contact with human beings, either through the agency of fairies or of the dead. After due investigation of such and various other phenomena, Sir William Crookes, among other theories to explain them, gives this theory:--'_The actions of a separate order of beings, living on this earth, but invisible and immaterial to us. Able, however, occasionally to manifest their presence. Known in almost all countries and ages as demons (not necessarily bad), gnomes, fairies, kobolds, elves, goblins, Puck, &c._'[602] Here we seem to have what ought to be, by this stage of our study, proof of the Psychological Theory of the nature and origin of the Fairy-Faith.

Let us now draw a few of the direct parallels thus suggested. Consider first how a fairy is said to appear, how it is described, and how it vanishes, and then compare the facts stated in the following case of a phantom reported by Sir William Crookes[603]:--'In the dusk of the evening' (just the time when fairies are most easily seen) 'during a _seance_ with Mr. Home at my house, the curtains of a window about eight feet from Mr. Home were seen to move. A dark, shadowy, semi-transparent form, like that of a man, was then seen by all present standing near the window, waving the curtain with his hand. As we looked, the form faded away and the curtain ceased to move.' The following--Mr. Home as in the former case being the 'medium'--is a still more striking instance:--'A phantom form came from a corner of the room, took an accordion in its hand, and then glided about the room playing the instrument. The form was visible to all present for many minutes, Mr. Home also being seen at the same time. On its coming rather close to a lady who was sitting apart from the rest of the company, she gave a slight cry, upon which it vanished.' Compare the following types of observed phenomena by the same authority with what our Welsh witness from the Pentre Evan country said about death-candles (p. 155):--'I have seen a luminous cloud floating upwards to a picture.' Or, 'I have more than once had a solid self-luminous body placed in my hand by a hand which did not belong to any person in the room. In the light I have seen a luminous cloud hover over a heliotrope on a side-table, break a sprig off, and carry the sprig to a lady; and on some occasions I have seen a similar luminous cloud visibly condense to the form of a hand and carry small objects about.' Similar lights, parallel to the death lights or death tokens observed by Celtic percipients in Wales and in Brittany, and to what in Ireland are called the 'lights' of the 'good people' or 'gentry'--all of which phenomena are traceable to no material causes as yet discovered--are reported by Iamblichus and others of his school.[604]

And such lights are among phenomena best attested by modern psychical researchers. Supernormally produced music, said to have been produced by daemons, which is parallel to that called by several of our own percipients 'fairy' music, was also known to the Neo-Platonists;[604]

and in the scientific investigations to which Mr. Home was subjected, musical sounds were heard which could not be attributed to any known agency. In haunted houses, as psychical research discovers, the rustling of dresses, movements of objects, and sounds, often occur spontaneously without and with the occurrence of apparitions;[604] and these phenomena are parallel to certain ones which we have had cited by Celtic percipients as due to fairies. Mr. Lang, too, has set forth clearly the probability of real 'haunts' or spirits possessing particular places--just as fairies are said to possess particular localities or buildings in Celtic lands.

_The Report on the Census of Hallucination_ by Professor Sidgwick's Committee has furnished data sufficiently good to convince many scientists that phantoms (comparable in a way with Irish banshees and the Breton _Ankou_) do appear to the living directly before a death as though announcing it.[605] According to other equally reliable data, sometimes a phantasmal voice--like certain 'fairy' voices--has given news of a death.[606] Myers and others have studied and recorded many cases of the dead appearing, as the Celtic dead appear when they have been _taken_ to Fairyland.[606]

In _Phantasms of the Living_, by Gurney, Myers, and Podmore, the explanation of apparitions which are coincident with a death as being generated by a telepathic influence exerted upon the percipient by the dying friend, suggests the most rational interpretation of certain parallel kinds of apparitions, of the dead or of fairies, who, as in these last examples, appear dressed in garments. It is that all such apparitional appearances, coincident with a death or not, are equally due to a telepathic force exerted by an agency independent of the percipient. This outside force acts as a stimulus upon the nervous apparatus of the person to whom it is thus transmitted, and causes him to project out of some part of his own consciousness (which part may have pa.s.sed over into the subconsciousness) a visualized image already impressed there. The image has natural affinity or correspondence with the outside stimulus which arouses it.

Such an hypothesis curiously agrees in part with the one put forth by our seer-witness, the Irish mystic (p. 60 ff.). He would probably agree as to the visualization process in most types of ordinary apparitions.

In addition, he holds that Nature herself has a memory: there is some indefinable psychic element in the earth's atmosphere upon which all human and physical actions or phenomena are photographed or impressed.

These records in Nature's mind correspond to mental impressions in us.

Under certain inexplicable conditions, normal persons who are not seers may observe Nature's mental records like pictures cast upon a screen--often like moving pictures. Seers can always see them if they wish; and uncritical seers frequently mistake these phantom records or pictures existing on the psychical envelope of the planet for actual events now occurring, and for actual beings--fairies of various kinds and the dead. A recent book ent.i.tled _An Adventure_, by Elizabeth Morison and Frances Lamont (pseudonyms), adequately ill.u.s.trates what we mean by such phantom pictures. During the year 1901 these two cultured ladies saw at _le pet.i.t Trianon_ of Marie Antoinette records in the mind of Nature of past historical events dating from about 1789. Of this there seems not to be the slightest doubt. The fairy boat-race on Lough Gur, as described by Count John de Salis (p. 80), and the procession seen on Tara Hill of fairies 'like soldiers of ancient Ireland in review' (p. 33), probably ill.u.s.trate the same kind of phenomena (cf. pp.

55-7, 68, 74, 123, 126, &c.).