SPIRITUALISM.

Evening Star, Issue 4299, 6 December 1876, Page 4

SPIRITUALISM.

Spiritualism has found its way into a new arena—the British Association for the Advancement of Science. At the annual meeting of that body, held in Glasgow recently, the interesting topic was broached by Professor Barrett through the medium of a paper bearing the innocent-looking title, “On Some Phenomena Associated with Abnormal Conditions of Mind.” Orthodox science was of course deserted for the nonce and the lecture-room wherein this paper was to be read tilled to overflowing. The first portion of Professor Barrett’s remarks was directed to the phenomena of mesmerism, and he described the results of some remarkable experiments which he had made ; but it is needless to advert to these at length since mesmerism is now pretty generally accepted by. scientific men as true, and would doubtless have received earlier recognition but for the quackery to which it has given rise. In f«ct it was not the Professor’s observations upon mesmerism, but those upon Spiritualism which the large audience had assembled to hear. He declared himself a Spiritualist, and was backed up by Mr A. fl. Wallace, the President of the Ethnological section. Colonel Lane Fox, Lord Rayleigh, and Miss Lydia Becker, of “Woman’s Rights ” fame, also espoused the cause, but there were champions on the. other side, and things got very warm at last. The name of a certain Dr Slade ligured prominently in the discussion. The Doctor is an American gentleman, who has lately been giv.ug Spiritualistic manifestations in Loudon for a livelihood, and a very good livelihood the spirits appear to furnish him with. The Doctor produces the usual table rappings with the occasional spectacle of “a baud,” although the keen eye of faith seems to bo indispensable for a sight of the latter phenomenon ; but his principal manifestation is this : he sit; at a small table with his visitor, and taking a common slate, perfectly clean, puts on it a crumb of pencil which he has just bitten off a stick for the purpose. He then puts the slate under the table, and holds it (or the visitor may hold it if be pleases) close to the under side of the table, so that no buulUn hand could possibly pass between the two. Immediately a scratching noise is beard, and upon the slate being withdrawn, a few words are found to be clearly written upon it; sometimes in one style, sometimes in another. As is commonly the case in Spiritualistic manifestations, the sentences so written have no particular signiflcance. All this is not very wonderful, aud if a schoolboy did it while seated at his desk he would probably get his ears boxed; but circumstances alter cases, and the fact of spirits amusing themselves in this fashion has been sufficient inducement to lead large numbers of highly educated people to pay Dr Slade a guinea apiece for the purpose of witnessing the performance, so far as it can be witnessed. Dr Slade’s adherents bad it pretty well their own way at the meeting of the British Association, but the infidels have since made themselves unpleasant. Professor Ray Lankester, in company with Dr Donkin, of Westminster Hospital, laid a trap for the American medium, and reduced it to a moral certainty that the writing on the slate was done by the medium between the time of removing the slate from the top of the table and placing it against the under surface. Professor Lankester afterwards sent an account of the affair to the ‘Times,’ and still worse, laid an information against the Doctor for vagrancy, which resulted, as the last telegrams inform us, in his being sentenced to three months’ imprisonment. • Dr. Slade, like many of his brother madia, j fvo’uld appear to be a ijuack ; but it docs not

follow that Spiritualism is unworthy of consideration. It is unquestionable that hundreds of thousands of persons, numbers of them highly intelligent and well fitted to form an opinion, believe in it; and that, after making full allowance for imposture, there remains a residuum of phenomena unexplainable by any of the laws of nature known to us. What has tended, as much as anything, to prevent a general inquiry into these phenomena is the absurd character of .many of the so-called manifestations. In whatever way the matter may be viewed, to the human mind it does seem ridiculous that spiritual beings should employ themselves in rapping on tables, breaking crockery, and playing the banje. Then we have Plato’s ghost talking nonsense, and the spirit of Samuel Johnson spelling badly. Nor can the iSpiiitualists get over the hard fact that during ail the years which the spirits have, as is asserted, been in active communication, with mankind, they have never told us a single thing we did not know before. Nothing could be more useless than the manifestations. Strong attempts have been made in America to evolve a new religion out of Spiritualism, but the sole result has been the production of a silly and blasphemous literature, only fit for the fire. Then, too, Spiritualistic media have been convicted over and over again of fraud. The exposure of the Davenport Brothers is a striking instance in point; but the mere fact of a medium proffering his services for money —and most of the Spiritualistic media do trade upon their alleged powers—is a suspicious circumstance. if a man were able to summon disembodied spirits at his will he would, generally speaking, be too awestruck at their appearance, whether in a visible shape or by signs and tokens, to call them forth for money-making purposes. A further doubt is thrown upon the genuineness of the Spiritualistic manifestations by their usually taking place in the dark, or with the gas turned down Low, and the impossibility of getting the spirits to accept challenges. The eminent Dr Careen ter, at the British Association, pithily observed that he could not forget that Sir James Simpson had placed a £SOO-note in a case and offered it to any clairvoyant who could tell its number, but no clairvoyant hud claimed it. It is quite impossible to believe that the bulk of these manifestations, are aught but tricks of impostors or the delusions of diseased minds ; but stdi, as we have said, after all proper deductions have been made; singular phenomena arc left, whose cause requires investigation ; and for this reason, we are glad at the British Association taking up the subject, albeit the London Press sneers at it for doing so. Spiritualism lias acquired too strong a hold upon the world to be ignored, and the sooner its phenomena are subjected to a rigid criticism by minds trained to scientific investigation the better. But' whatever may be the cause of the residual phenomena already referred to, we feel convinced they will be found to have as little to do with ghosts as mesmerism has to do with them.