IN THE SPIRIT WORLD.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 2074, 28 December 1907, Page 1 (Supplement)

IN THE SPIRIT WORLD.

BEHIND THE SCENES WITH THE MEDIUMS.

A Flood-Light on the Table-Rapping Specialist.

(By Will Irwin, in “ Colliers’ Weekly.”) Onk must begin an article on the medium “graft” with apologies to the people of the dark. Ho who denies “ a priori ” that thero exists a sixth sense, by which so-called clairvoyants and clairaudionts see without eyes, hear without cars, and know without personal exporionces, proves himself as narrow in one direction as the most credulous spiritualist in the other. Mankind believed in this sixth souse, ravenced it into legend and tradition, for forty centuries bi-fore science accorded it the recogniiiou of investigation. Xlio body of scientific and scmiscicntilic investigators known as tiio “ ooioty for Phychical Research ” took it up, and out of their investigations came a conviotiou, ndw widely held by iho most intelligent people, that such a faculty—call it telepathy, spirit communication, higher space or what you will —does exist. Scienco gropes oil the border of this strango country, uncertain still whether it is a domain or only a mirago. fc'o much one liiust grant in the beginning. Beyond that all is fraud. Ninety-eight per cent, of tho professional “mediums” are impostors, gouging dollars out of tho public through an elaborato system of psychological deception, apparatus, and conjuring. These articles have nothing to do with roal clairvoyance—if it exists —or real spirit return —if that bo possible. They are concerned only with those humble, unsung adventurers who gain an easy living by playing upon the deep -pieties of tho human heart. Tho game demands talent, long study, and personality in tho playor.

11. PSYCHICS AN 1? CLAIRVOYANTS. For the free advertising that thero is in it, quacks of all hinds follow genuine discoveries and honest investigations in. science. No- sooner were the N-Rays announced than the "Old Doctors” of our boilerplate -advertisements began to put .ortli X-Uay treatment for cancer, "Liqnoznno”' followed the spread of popular knowledge on disease-bearing microbes. Liquid air, radium, and the Pasteur serums have much quackery to answer for. Not- otherwise has it been with the noble profession of mediumship. Twenty or thirty years ago, most mediums worked through ".physical demonstrations.” They moved tables, produced mysterious lappings, passed, “matter through matter”; hound in the cabinet, they caused bells to ring, trumpets to speak wonders, -ghostly hands to write messages. This fad in the demonstration of 1111--morta,iity followed the “scientific indorsement,” very widely advertised, of Slade and I). D. Home. The famous Zollner report, in -particular, gave •this -business a tremendous vogue. Zollner, a- German professor with theories aibout the fourth dimension, -gathered a committee of professors to investigate Slade. They “sat” with him for weeks under conditions which, they thought, eliminated fraud. Slade tied knots in ropes sealed at the ends; he passed an iron ring from his own ankle to the leg of a distant table; he caused furniture to rise up and follow his hand; he produced lights which threw shadows contrary to the laws of optics. The Zollner report, declaring that the Slade manifestations were inexplicable by any existing knowledge, caused a sensation. No less noise followed the “levitations” of D. D. Home, to which certain English noblemen of the highest integrity attested. Tilings happened afterward to shake faith in these reports. Zollner was sent to an insane asylum -a year after he published his .book; and it came out- that two of his committee were senile and halfiblind.—“and give us a college professor anyway; he is the easiest tha t there is,” say -the mediums. Slade was exposed again and again; in his later years, he was showing the -regular stock tricks at -twenty-live cents a sitting. Let us be fair -with him, and admit that a man that fakes such a tiling a t one time may, in. the law of possibilities, produce genuine phenomena at another. As for Homo, no one has ever given a satisfactory explanation of his performances. The fact that a woman sued him afterward for £33,000, extracted from her by means known to the profession ot mediumship, has a moral bearing on his case. When the Society for Psychical Resea.rch -went to work, it investigated first those “-physical” phenomena. Crookes, ATyers, Hodgson, Wallace, reputable men of at .mil mg in science, weighed -demonstrator alter demonstrator ill this kind of “mediumship” and' found them all -wanting. They discovered that these le-via-ted tables by ingenious mechanical devices, produced “independent writing” on slates through the methods of the conjurer, and brought ghosts from the cabinet with the aid of confederates, gauze veils, luminous paint, and artistic deception. These men of science were fooled now and then; for a long time, Eusa,pia Paladino—just now in the (public eye again—held an indorsement; but Hodgson exposed her. Finally, W. T. Stead, lover of peace and a firm spiritualist, announced that there was genuine materializing medium in England—a Mrs Mellon. This Mrs Mellon invaded Australia iu the early nineties. A violent skeptic got into her circle, seized little “Cissy,” the ghost of a Maori child, and found that he was clasping Mrs Mellon, down on* all fours, with a robe over her head and a black mask on her face. Also, the whiskers of other spirits lay on the floor of her cabinet. The . investigators •ran through the “physical” mediums one by one. The newspapers, following" their lead for .the story that was in it, began to raid cabinets; and hard times followed for those crowned 1 with the gift of physical mediumship. THE SOLEMN FAKERS WHO SPEAK. FOR THE DEAD. It was differentwiththe “psychics” —those who .see- and hear things remote in time and space, and who speak for the dead. From Mrs -Piper and others, the Society of Phsychical Research got results which, on paper, seem convincing. They tested Mrs Piper for years, and -found no deception in her. Finally, having searched her clothing and her. baggage, itliey took her from America to England.” There, .surrounded’ by ” strangers and a practical prisoner in a. country house, she sat with .peofde brought by chance from far lands—and showed 1 the same powers. The S. P. R. investigators all came to a -belief in this clairvoyant, claira.udient sense, differing only over the theories of telepathy, spirit communication and unmeasured power of the • subliminal mind. Their reports were published widely; Mrs Piper became ■famous. The spiritualist .papers, in especial, rang with acclaim of these “DLsc/averibs.” The 'rising gene-rar tion of fraudulent iirqfessionaL mediums went into the “test and clairvoyant phase,” and physical 'manifestation languished. The materializing mediums are still the aristocracy of the business and make the big graft; but there are now a hundred “psychics” to one physical medium. . Let us consider this flourishing i branch of the business. I find that most mediums begin as believers. Sometimes, they work .the fake out t-o its logical conclusion, .perceive the chance to make money, and, by studying the methods of <protes-, sionals, gain knowledge and confidence to sot up for themselves. Often, too, it happens like this: The fast resort for a refratory sitter, who cannot ho worked by ordinary moans, is the developing seance. The medium begins to Hatter her sitter bydiscovering great “•mediumistic” powers. “My dear, you have -a nature as delicate as a. flower- —the real psychic temperament. When you came in .here, there was a light over your head. Don’t you have dreams and intuitions that you can not -account for ? Listen; my control says that you have a wonderful phychic gift, and they’re trying to devti'.op you over there. Heed the call dear one.” If the sitter bites, the medium gives her developing sittings at two dollars mi hour. In these queer performances,, tile cunning medium sits -in silence and dim lights, trying to get the influences. If she keeps at- it long enough, she 'is -likely to imagine that she is developing true clairvoyance. Put when she sets up in business, she finds that the ordinary human intuitions and the coincidences of life which she lias taken for physic gifts, wil not work in practise. She liegins to put two and. two together, to use her wits, to fish for -information, and to guess. She is then launched. In the beginning I promised an agnostic attitude; and it is only fair therefore to state the attitude of the Society for Physical Research upon one (Hass of faking professional mediums. They say that certain people with real clairvoyant powers go into the thing as a business —and • lose

their powers thereby. Clairvoyance is beyond tho medium’s control. In tho host of them, liko Mrs Riper, tho thing comes by fits and starts; and tho messages, while true, oro aftou trivial. That willyuoti work with tiio casual sitter. She who pays two dollars to hoar from her dead friends and to learn her own past, present, and future, wants something definite for her money. Therefore, the professional, driven by the exigencies of business, begins to seek -information mul to make deductions; and this ill the end spoils real ci’.airvoyniit powers. In the language of spiritualism, such people “water the milk of mediumship.”

Tho medium is launched now. What lias she learned an her preliminary studies? Simply that shrewd guessing, combined with systematic observation, will turn the tirck in four cases out of five. It is wonderful how the mere amateur can learn through systematic /observation to uncover secrets. If you do not believe, try 'it some time—at dinner, say. Listen as you never listened before, to the table talk. Try to remember it all]; to combine some little tiling which you have just heard with something that you heard three minutes ago. Study small pecularities in dress, appearance, manner. If you do not discover luidden facts about mere acquaintances, you are a dull person. Last spring 1 went to a professional clairvoyant in Warren Avenue, Boston. Sho had a sitter; I was asked to turn. I had three Boston papers witli mo; and after I had glanced them over I cut from each the news items concerning a woman suffrage-banquet. Having done this I folded up the papers and left them on the hat rack. The medium was a long time about it, and I had an appointment; I called her out of tho trance state to tell her that I would bo back that afternoon. When, at (last, I got ray sitting. Merry Eyes, tho Indian control. sparred a minute for an opening. and then asked : “Your business has to do with woman suffrage, hasn’t it Chieftain?” Of course, she hail examined those papers, compared them with whole- copies, and made her deduction.

Four sittei-s out of overy five are women, and four women out of every five want to tell their troubles and rehearse their griefs. The medium does not hold them back. A small hint here, a slight reference there, the app'ication of a little practical shrewdness in combining the two—and behold, a wonderful reveflation. The hopes of the sitter to are always with tho medium. She is ready and eager to grasp at the slightest semblance of truth. The medium adds a sauce that makes it all go down—an optimistic prophecy of a bright future. Conditions are always 'going to improve. The sick child will get well, the lover will come back. The sitter goes away desiring, with all the hope in her foolish heart, to believe. This Sherlock Holmes method of observation and deduction is the basis of the medium’s art. It is not enough, however, for a real success. The confirmed sitter usually visits more mediums than one—the thing is a habit. Her steady patronago goes to that medium who shows the most acurate and minute knowledge of past relatives and present troubles. Our rising young medium, therefore, begins to revise her methods, and to take in confederates either from inside or‘outside the profession. Here as a typical way: the medium is established near a llarge factory, employing many girls. Next to bereaved old women, working girls are the steadiest patrons of clairvoyants, fortune tellers, and palmists. Attracted by the sign, one or two girls from the factory drop in. One of them, the medium finds, 'is morally corruptible. The medium does (her best at this “fishing seance” and gives a pretty good reading. “How much?” asks the girl when the control’ has passed. “Nothing for you, my dear,” says the medium. “I want you to help me. I’ve proved my power to you this evening because my magnetism and yours are tied up, like. 'We’re affinities. But I can’t always count on it, and when it fails, people go away disbelieving and ready to knock. If you’ll help me. there’s money in it for both of us —” and she lays out her plan. T-he girl is to tell wonderful things of this medium an the factory, and to furnish information about every giril who bites. In return, the medium is to give her a quarter of tho fees. When the confederate has sent full unmista'kablo personal descriptions in advance, tho medium may give even the sitter’s name, cold from tho world of spirit. If this cofederato shows ability, sho may pick up a -lit'.to extra money by gossiping with the circle before public sittings, and parsing the information along. Will the confederate “peach”? Not if the medium knows her business. Tins girl has rcveefled -in tho “fishing sitting” ‘ certain secrets which no woman wants known of her. Such blackmail is a sure defence agannt exposure by -confederates or awakened dupes. The best and surest confederates, however, come from tho craft itself, fern mediums alter the early beginning work alone. They combine constantly to exchange information and to trade those text-hooks which all good craftsmen keep, A test book ’s not a hook at all, blit, a classified list of sitters, giving then; .personal appearance, the spirits which they have recognized, and such additional and convincing facts as the medium lias -been able t-o learn about them. For example, I quote from the “Revelations of a Spirit Medium’ an entry—with names changed—in tho author’s own test book; John Cordra.y (publisher) Medium size—wears black clothing always—silk liat —dark complexion—brown eyes and hair —index finger off the rght hand at first joint, and noddle linger of the same hand is rigid. Skeptical, but inclined to believe. (Solitaire diamond ring on right hand. —Spt. Path. John W. Cord ray. -Died in -Baltimore, ’67, bilious fever. Manufacturing chemist-. Age 51 at death. Gave his son John his diamond ring and his brother Charles his watch and chain. They are wearing them. Charles lives in St. Louis and is iu the drug business. Spt. Moth. Mary J. Died in Cincinnati. ’74. Was living with John. Aged 66. Had been blonde. Spt. Dan. Mary. Died 1 ’37. Croup. Three years of age. Blonde. Remarks.—-lias a son living four years of age. His wife affected with rheumatism. Mediums all tell him lie will make a materialising “medium.” Such records are traded continually in any given group Their uses become manifold. I showed in describing Madame August how these fakers emulate green-goods men, bunco-steerers, and wire tappers by “passing the sucker along.’’Madame August recommends Mrs Haywood—“her controls can tell you . things which are hidden from mine, my dear”—and ahe id of the sitter goes a personal description and an entry

from the test book. TH E U N BET, LEVER’S FIN A L “AND YET—”

Find some hard-bonded, stern materialist, and discuss gliosst, -spirit communication, and clairvoyancowith him. For tho sake of tho experiment, take tiio believing attitude; declare that there must ho an undiscovered force in the universe which produces apparitions -at the mqiuena of death and which speaks hidden tilings through entranced clairvoyants. In four cases out of five, your antagonist, after he has battered you down with liis arguments, will stop, look into the distances, begin: “And yet” —and go on to tell you about something in his own experience which is inexplicable' through any known laws of mind and matter.

In this inquiry, I, who know the game of old renewed my recollections by making the rounds of mediums -n three cities. I found tho same oul game—guesses, shrewd deductions, the following of leads, botli false and true. >Bv a great silence. I made two or three “psychics’ sweat blood for their two dollars.

Anil yet—l walked in upon a fat, ■PS-eyed* old Il'ish-woman in a humble street in New York, sat with her, taking all precautions against throwing out leads —and heard the truth. She did not spar for openings nor try to extract information. Nether diil she hand out names and dales, which she -might have.got from o.cher mediums 1 had visited. No, site found those hidden places of the soul which one does not tell. Circumstantially. she described my l’aintiy and the other people close about me, and told me—with incidents —of n.v relations to them. Perhaps ,t r. »s faking; but- if so, her deductions were far better than my observation. In the face of this memory, it is Hard for me to keep the agnostic attitude. (To b° Continued.)