LECTURE ON SPIRITUALISM.

Southland Times, Issue 1300, 29 August 1870, Page 2 (Supplement)

LECTURE ON SPIRITUALISM.

Spiritualism — its history, character, and tendency, formed the subject of a lecture, delivered in the Exchange Hall, on Tuesday last, 16th, by Mr Thomas Perkins. His Honor the Deputy Superintendent occupied the chair, and the hall was respectably filled by a most attentive audience. The chairman took occasion, ■when introducing the lecturer, to declare his own perfect neutrality with regard to the subject ; only going so far as to regard it as one worthy of serious attention. Mr Perkins, after explaining that he had taken up the subject at the request of numerous friends, then entered upon his theme, and from copious and carefully arranged notes, delivered a somewhat lengthy and most interesting address. In dealing with the first head of his subject, Mr Perkins traced the history of spiritism from its origination in America in 1848, to the present day, commenting on the wonderful rapidity with which phase had succeeded phase in the development of the science, as it was called, and the remarkable multiplicity of phenomena and media. In the. comparatively short space of twenty years it had sprung from obscurity and ridicule to a vast organisation, with a system of schools j&nd literaturerof Us own, and with believers numbered r by the million. Under the second head the speaker dealt with, the different manifestations of spiritism and tne agencies by which they were produced; the sincerity of the "mediums "in their own professions, and the credibility to which the phenomena might be entitled. After making i a very liberal discount on what was said to be done by spiritual . agencies on account of what was no doubt accomplished by mechanical con- | trivances, and also making large allowances for the successful operations of trickery, sleight of hand, and various descriptions of imposture, he said there would still remain a considerable residuum of manifestations which could not be accounted for without admitting the intervention of supernatural powers. In support of this admission on his part, he quoted the authority of the late Mr Thackeray and others of equal and unimpeachable veracity, men who, although not spiritists, had felt themselves bound to acknowledge results witnessed by themselves, under circumstances which rendered deception impossible, to be producible only by some such agency as that claimed for them by spiritualists. The third head Mr Perkins cut short, much to the regret of the audience — he being suffering from indisposition. He, however, remarked that having admitted tho possibility of the existence of spiritual agencies, it became him at least to give his opinion as to their nature, and he had no doubt that they were of evil origin, and of necessity evil in their tendency. To prove tlu's he quoted from the spiritualist catechism, showing that their teaching was clearly opposed to tho bible, and subversive of religion. The lecture occupied an hour and a half in delivery, bat was listened to throughout with watchful attention, the audience frequently expressing . their approbation of the sentiments uttered by cordial applause.