The Shadow World Part 28

"Furthermore, Dr. Venzano, as well as De Vesme, have taken up the same body of facts upon which Foa and Morselli base their theory, and arrive at a totally different conclusion. They call attention to a dozen events that can be explained only on the theory of discarnate intelligences.

Venzano observed that the forms occurred in several places at once, that they appeared in many shapes and many guises. Some were like children, some had curly hair, some had beards. In one case identification was made by introducing the finger of one of the sitters within the phantom mouth to prove the loss of a molar tooth. Sometimes the hair of these heads was plaited like that of a girl. Some of the hands were large and black, others fair and pink--like a child's. In short, he argues that the medium could not have determined the size, shape, or color of the phantoms."

"All that does not really militate against the ideoplastic theory," I retorted. "It is as easy to produce a phantom with hair plaited as it is to produce one with hair in curls. If it is a case of the modelling of the etheric vapor by the mind of the psychic, these differences would be produced naturally enough. The forcible handling of the medium by the invisible ones is a much more difficult thing for me to explain, for to imagine the psychic emitting a form of force which afterward proceeds to raise the psychic herself against her will--as Mrs. Smiley testifies happened again and again in her youth--is to do violence to all that we know of natural law. And yet it may be that the etheric double is able to take on part of the forces resident in the circle of sitters, and so become immensely more potent than the psychic himself, as in the case of the 'Man from Mars'--the Hercules I have just been telling you about.

Then, as to the content of these messages, they may be impulses, hints, fragments of sentences caught from the air as one wireless operator intercepts communications meant for other stations than his own. So that my interview with 'E. A.' may have been a compounding of the psychic, Blake, and myself, and fugitive natures afloat in the ether. In fact, I am not as near a belief in the return of the dead as I was when I began this last series of experiments. These Italian scientific observers, I confess, have profoundly affected my thought."

"Your idea is, then," said Miller, "that these apparitions are emanations of the medium's physical substance, moulded by his will and colored by the minds of his sitters?"

"That is the up-to-date theory, and everything that I have experienced seems capable of a biologic interpretation against it."

Fowler hastened to weaken the force of this statement. "Spiritists all admit that the forms of spirits are made up--partly, at least--of the psychic's material self, but that does not prove that the mind of the ghost is not a separate ent.i.ty from that of the psychic. I grant that the only difference between the psycho-dynamic theory and the spiritualistic theory lies in the question of the origin of the intelligences that direct the manifestation. Foa would say they spring from the subconscious self of the psychic. We say they come from the spirit world, and there we stand."

Miller's words were keen and without emotion. "Until all phenomena are explained there will be obscure happenings and things to be explained by some one who can, but it is no final explanation to say 'a man did it'

or 'an intelligence did it.' I have often been told that things cannot move in certain ways or certain things cannot be done except by intelligent action or guidance, but it may be remembered that Kepler thought guiding spirits were needful for making the planets move in their elliptical orbits."

"Your scientists are feeding millions of people stones," exclaimed Fowler. "They ask for bread, and you give them slices of granite."

"Better granite than slime," said Miller. "I am with the biologists in this campaign. Let us have the truth, no matter how unpalatable it may be. If these phenomena exist, they are in the domain of natural law and can be weighed and measured. If they are imaginary, they should be swept away, like other dreams of superst.i.tion and ignorance."

Fowler was not to be silenced. "I predict that you and your like will yet be forced, like Lombroso, to take your place with Aksakof, Lodge, Wallace, Du Prel, and Crookes, who have come to admit the intervention of discarnate intelligences. Lombroso says, 'We find, as I already foresaw some years ago, that these materialized bodies belong to the radiant state of matter, which has now a sure foothold in science. This is the only hypothesis that can reconcile the ancient and universal belief in the persistence of some manifestation of life after death with the results of science.' He adds: 'These beings, or remnants of beings, would not be able to obtain complete consistency to incarnate themselves, if they did not temporarily borrow a part of the medium.

_But to borrow force from the medium is not the same thing as to be identical with the medium._'"

"Well," said I, "of this I am certain: we cannot afford to ignore such experiments as those of Morselli and Bottazzi. I am aware that many investigators discountenance such experiments, but I believe with Venzano that the physical phenomena of mediumship cannot be, and ought not to be, considered trivial. It was the spasmodic movement of a decapitated frog that resulted in the discovery of the Voltaic Pile.

Furthermore, I intend to try every other conceivable hypothesis before accepting that of the spiritists."

"What is your reason for that?" asked Fowler.

"Because I am a scientist in my sympathies. I believe in the methods of the chemist and the electrician. I prefer the experimenter to the theorist. I like the calm, clear, concise statements of these European savans, who approach the subject, not as bereaved persons, but as biologists. I am ready to go wherever science leads, and I should be very glad to _know_ that our life here is but a link in the chain of existence. Others may have more convincing knowledge than I, but at this present moment the weight of evidence seems to me to be on the side of the theory that mediumship is, after all, a question of unexplored human biology."

"I don't see it that way," rejoined Fowler, calmly. "Suppose your biologists prove that the psychic can put forth a supernumerary arm, or maintain, for a short time, a complete double of herself. Would that necessarily make the spiritist theory untenable? Is it not fair to conclude that if the soul or 'astral' or 'etheric double' can act outside the living body, it can live and think and manifest after the dissolution of its material sh.e.l.l? Does not the experimental work of Bottazzi, Morselli, and De Rochas all make for a spiritual interpretation of life rather than for the position of the materialist?

I consider that they have strengthened rather than weakened the mystic side of the universe. They are bringing the wonder of the world back to the positivist. Let them go on. They will yet demonstrate, in spite of themselves, the immortality of the soul."

"I hope they will," I replied. "It would be glorious at this time, when tradition begins to fail of power, to have a demonstration of immortality come through the methods of experimental science. Certainly I would welcome a physical proof that my mother still thinks and lives, and that Ernest and other of my dearest friends are at work on other planes and surrounded by other conditions, no matter how different from the conventional idea of paradise these environments might be; but the proof must be ample and very definite."

Miller put in a last word of warning: "Because a phenomenon has not been explained, and no one knows how to explain it, is no reason for supposing there is anything extraphysical about it. No one has explained the first cause of the development of an embryo. No one knows what goes on in an active nerve, or why atoms are selective in their a.s.sociates.

Ignorance is not a proper basis for speculation, and if one must have a theory, let it be one having some obvious continuity with our best physical knowledge."

And at that point our argument rested. We separated, and each went his way, to be met by questions of business and politics, and to be once more blended to the all-enveloping mystery of life.

FOOTNOTE:

[2] Since this conversation I have had a letter from another well-authenticated psychic, a man making his living by honest labor as a carpenter, who gives very definitely his experience on emitting an etheric double. He says: "One evening, while sitting at the table, I began to feel as if I were swelling up. My thumb felt as big as my arm, and my arm as big as my leg. While I was perfectly aware that I was at the dinner-table, I also felt myself in the hall trying to enter the dining-room. I found the k.n.o.b, I opened the door. The others saw me traverse the room toward myself. My dual body came close beside me and vanished with a snap."

ADDENDUM

A CORROBORATIVE AND TECHNICAL ACCOUNT OF PSYCHICAL PHENOMENA, INVOLVING THE PRODUCTION OF A MUSICAL SCORE ON A SLATE, SECURED BY "BLAKE."[3]

This record was secured during three sittings, which took place on the forenoon and afternoon of Friday, March 13th, and on the forenoon of Sat.u.r.day, March 14, 1908. These sittings were held in a dwelling-house on a quiet street of ordinary character. They began in a second-story front room, and were transferred to a parlor just below, where there was a piano. The room, in either case, was fairly light; now and then the window-shades were lowered, but reading and writing were easy at all times. Three persons were present: the psychic, a robust, alert, intelligent woman of thirty-five; Hamlin Garland; and the writer, who combined the functions of amanuensis and editor.

The psychic was not in a trance, and stated that she had never gone into one. She conversed throughout in ordinary voice and manner, save when, with a certain emphasis, she undertook to hasten the pace of her lagging "controls." The three sittings were attended by little noise, pounding, or violence; there was no breaking or crumpling up of slates, as had been the case during an earlier sitting on Thursday.

The psychic's princ.i.p.al "control"--to be known here as "Dr.

Cooke"--spoke in whispers, and his words were repeated aloud by the psychic herself. These whisperings were only occasionally audible to the writer, but they were plainly heard by Mr. Garland. It may be added that on at least two occasions, however, the writer heard and understood replies which the psychic declared had not been audible to her. During the latter portion of these sittings, especially that of Sat.u.r.day, the "control" seemed to withdraw altogether, and for two or three hours the circle was in apparent communication--direct, rapid, uninterrupted--with an intelligence that may conveniently be termed the "Composer."

The paraphernalia for these sittings comprised the following:

1. A small, light, walnut centre-table, which Mr. Garland himself had a.s.sisted in repairing before the proceedings began.

2. A silicon book-slate, eight inches by five inches. There were six pages--the insides of the covers and a double leaf. These leaves lay close and flat, like those of a book.

3. A few bits of slate-pencil, from one-quarter of an inch to three-eighths of an inch in length; also a longer slate-pencil used by the writer.

4. A small writing-pad and lead-pencil, for general memoranda and notations.

5. Certain fruits and flowers, such as roses, sweet-peas, pineapples, and grape-fruit. These met the psychic's needs or fancies, and were brought into close relation with pad or slate when the "forces" seemed inclined to weaken.

6. The piano.

Shortly after the opening of the Friday-morning sitting the Composer requested that the whole slate be ruled with staves for writing music.

Throughout the preceding Wednesday and Thursday attempts at the writing of music had been of constant occurrence; they had come on slates, on writing-pads, and on the leaves of closed books. These bits of musical notation had been very fragmentary and obscure; often they had consisted of less than half a dozen notes placed upon staves consisting of but three or four lines, instead of five. The most successful of these earlier efforts had been produced on a double school-slate, with a wooden, list-bound frame: two measures on a treble staff had been sprinkled with vague indications of musical script. No attempts had yet been made to bring even the best of these various writings to order and intelligibility. We were soon to learn that a sc.r.a.p of music set down within three or four minutes was to require as many hours for revision, emendation, elucidation--for editing, in brief. It is but fair, however, to state that some of this time was taken up by the registering of irrelevant messages from other quarters and by digressions toward the Composer's own private concerns.

The staff drawn on the wooden-framed slate had been ruled crosswise. The Composer now directed that the new staves to be drawn on the silicon slate should run lengthwise and should cover every page of it. This was done by the editor. Provision was asked for seven measures, to which an eighth was added later.

During the three minutes or so required for writing on the six pages of the slate, the position of the slate, in reference to the editor, was as follows: After considerable moving about beneath the top of the table, during which time it was princ.i.p.ally in the hands of the psychic, it approached the writer and remained with him. The under cover of the slate (with a bit of slate-pencil tightly enclosed) rested on his knee; the upper cover was pressed against the frame of the table. The editor's thumb rested rather lightly on the middle of the nearer half of the upper cover, and his fingers a.s.sisted in supporting the nearer half of the under cover. The psychic herself had surrendered the control of the slate to the editor, and could have had no contact with it beyond touching the edge farthest from him. On the second day, Sat.u.r.day, during which the ba.s.s for the last four measures was produced, the slate was in the exclusive control of the editor, the psychic not touching it at all.

The progress of the musical writing was both felt and heard; it was a combination of light and rapid scratching, pecking, and twitching, with an occasional slight waving motion up and down.

The score, as first revealed, consisted of open-headed notes with curved stems. They gave no indications of varying values; it was impossible to distinguish quarter-notes from eighth-notes, sixteenth-notes, or grace-notes; and no rests were set down. The notes were placed but approximately as regarded lines and s.p.a.ces. No stems, save in one or two instances, united the chords, the notes of which were written more or less above one another, yet detached. A few unsatisfactory attempts were made by the Composer to place the bars. These were mostly put in by the editor--sometimes by the direction or with the acquiescence of the Composer--and, when they were drawn in advance of the writing, their presence was always properly observed.

As the revision became more close and careful, the Composer directed that the work be continued down-stairs beside the piano. Here every bar of the treble was played separately as soon as edited, to be p.r.o.nounced satisfactory by the Composer, or to be modified under his direction. The treble, on its completion--eight measures--was then played over in its entirety and p.r.o.nounced by the Composer to be correct. (He made one or two further emendations, however, on the following day.) The eight bars of the ba.s.s were gone over in the same fashion. The attempt to play the entire composition, treble and ba.s.s, was not satisfactory, partly owing to mechanical difficulties occasioned by the distribution of the matter on the slate and the multiplicity of corrections, and partly from lack of skill in the performer. However, two or three very brief pa.s.sages were given by both hands and p.r.o.nounced correct by the Composer, who showed surprise that anything so "_simple_"--as he characterized it--should give so much trouble. In one instance he noted that, while the two parts, treble and ba.s.s, were correct separately, they were not played in correct time together. The Composer, throughout, was most patient, persevering, courteous, and encouraging, though toward the end--in the closing measures of the ba.s.s--he showed some confusion and uncertainty. "_Wait a moment_," he would say; and once the whisper asked that, as an aid to sight, the editor's hand be spread over that leaf of the slate on which work was in progress. The Composer had thought, earlier--and so said--that a trained musician could easily supply the ba.s.s from the melody. His amanuensis was obliged to acknowledge frankly an inability to cope successfully with so complicated and unusual a matter. The psychic herself, though expressing a fondness for the opera, disclaimed any knowledge of musical notation, and added that never before had she performed such a function as at present.

As the work of correction progressed, the Composer several times asked for opportunity to make the changes himself; whereupon the pencil-tip would be enclosed in the slate and satisfactory emendations be forthcoming. In cases where corrections were made by the writer, the Composer often watched the progress of the slate-pencil (a longer one than that which was used between the leaves) and gave directions: "_Not there_"; "_Yes, here_," and the like; and he would often acknowledge a correction with a "_Thank you_," or meet a suggestion with a "_Yes, if you please_." On these occasions the slate was some four feet distant from the psychic, and practically out of her sight.

Repeated attempts were made on both sides to get down the name of the composition. Various related versions of the word appeared, none of them quite satisfactory. The Composer seemed to acquiesce in our attempts to relate his t.i.tle to different Slavic and Italian words for "gypsy," but no importance can be attached, of course, to such a piece of direct suggestion.

The final version of this brief but laborious score has been preserved, and all the stages in its progress have been abundantly annotated. To follow it through in detail, however, would be but weariness. All the salient points in its production fall under one of three heads. There are, first, the pa.s.sages that seem to have been produced in co-operation with the sitters. There are, second, the pa.s.sages that seem to have been produced in independence of the sitters. And there are, third, the pa.s.sages that seem to have been produced in direct opposition to the sitters. Examples of all three cla.s.ses follow; perhaps only those of the third and last cla.s.s are really important.

1. The Composer in Co-operation. The piece, in three sharps, opened on the tonic, yet the very first note in the ba.s.s was a G-sharp. The following colloquy ensued: Editor: "Does the piece begin with the tonic chord of A?" Composer: "_Yes._" Editor: "Is the G-sharp, then, to be regarded as a suspension?" Composer: "_Of course. That makes it right.

How could it be correct otherwise?_"

Another example. In the second bar a note which the editor had taken for an eighth-note was explained by the Composer as being a grace-note. The editor pointed out that this left only five eighth-notes to fill a six-eight measure. The Composer directed the insertion of an eighth-rest at the beginning of the bar.

In the fourth bar there was a partial chord, E-B--a fifth. The Composer's attention was drawn to this blemish. He requested the insertion of a G-sharp between, thus completing his triad.

But the above examples, and others which might be related, are not without resemblances to thought transference.