The Daily News SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 1909. SPIRIT MESSAGES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 233, 6 November 1909, Page 2

The Daily News SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 1909. SPIRIT MESSAGES.

Mr. W. T. Stead's latent enterprise, the opening of a bureau for communication between the dead and the living, is nalurallv provoking a good ileal of sarcastic comment. The institution "vvjis opened last April, but it is some year>. says an exchange, since Mr. Stead lir>t announced that lie could hold communication with the dead through ''.Julia's Bureau." The question whether the dead can in any way communicate with , their friends living on eflvth is one which people have been trying from time im memorial to answer. Spiritualists haw no doubt that it is possible to communicate with their departed friends, h»a their methods of communication are so peculiar, and so many spiritualistic frauds have bcon exposed, that it is 11" wonder the public are hard to convince. Still, it is a matter of extreme interest to the average man, who very often is s:> ready to believe what he thinks is true Iha I he allows himself to be imposed niM.n by arrant humbugs whoso real object is not the investigation of psychic phenomena, but the gratification of their greed for gold. The alleged methods of communication from the spirit world are familiar to most peopie. , Generally they are made, or said to be made, through some "medium," but ap- | pnrently a medium is not always neces- ! sary, for a frequent spiritualistic phono-1 j menon is the playing on musical instru-' ments without human agency, as on an accordion held by the medium by one ! hnml. Closed pianos are sometimes p!.iyed on while -accordion* or tambourines are apparently floated in the air and played upon al the same time. These and other things, such as writing and drawing, are accomplished without human agency, but a peculiar tiling about tliem all ]> that they are done in i the darkness and a great number of similar jierfortminees, if not all of them, can be accomplished by conjurer*. A Mr j F. \V. 11. Myers, a prominent KnglUh I spiriumli>t who di«'d a year or two ago F :isked some months before he died. "Why | should not every death-bed he made the

htniiing-poini of a long experiment." and he suggested thai everyone interested j» tile question should ]ea\e behind him Lhe materials for a sati-faeiory lesv of hi* future ability to communicate with hi* 1 surviving friends. His proposal was to write down snni" -entcmv which it w;i[i!"iiahle would be remembered after d"ntli. if anything could be remembered, j and then to seal this sentence up in an '•nvclope. without eomtmmicaling il io any p.-ison whatever. The envelope b(> labelled "Posthumous Letter." and sent, accompanied by a lel.ler givin» name and address, to the scretarv of the Society for Psychical Uescareh, London. The secretary would acknowledge receipt and store the letter safely, wiiii others of the kind. If. after death, the wiiter found himself capable of sending a, fuessage from the oilier world, let dim mention thU last sentence and try t- 1 reproduce it, Ihe sealed envelope coul l linn be opened; and if the spirit's message sliould be found to coincide with ll;t words therein written, there wotil i be as good a proof could be got that the message had at any rate not emanated from any living mind, and had emanated, therefore, from some unlimit. Ed source of knowledge, or from the surviving mind of tlic original writer. It is stated that Mr. Myers himself adopter! thirT suggestion before h e died, but lias not yet been able to reproduce his test message. If the spirit of a man wlio firmly believed in these phenomena can not communicate with the friends he has lift on earth, it looks very much as if the whole tiling le a delusion. Everybody has heard or read of alleged case, in which ti message has been receive,! f rom a deceased friend or relative, but as yet none of these messages has satisfied the test of science. A scientific con tii'mtor to an English magazine recently laid down two or three simple conditions which he considered these messages should fulfil. ,( lii the first place," he said, there must be a definite message, capable of permanent record. The mere' ■ apparition of a dead friend is not suffi-1 C 'nt, because we can never be sure that

it is not an hallucina; h.n iin . t 0 some J abnormal state of the witness's nervous Msteni. Secondly, tile nicissage thus re eciveil must state some which—; j is capable of proof, (2) was within 111 • knowledge of tlie alleged sender, (3) can I" 1 demonstrated not to have been known to (he receiver or to lie probably witli'n the scope of a fortunate guess." So filial! alleged communications from tlr ilriid have failed when tested under tll"-e ionditioiic, and Mr. Stead will find !iul tiic public will not be satisfied witli a incic statement that lie lias coinmna'e.ited with the spirit of Disraeli or of Cladstone. no matter how remarkable these statements may appear to lie. ,\ strong argument against these niiinicatioiis is that as a rule they con tain nothing of any value or help m |.he people who receive them, and frequently they are nonsensical. Mr. R(ead is i clever man and a successful joiirnalisi. and his opinions are generaliv worlhv of rc.-peet. On (illia question. however, h • ""'-'"is to lie the victim of an liallueinn lion.