TWO REMARKABLE WOMEN.

Taranaki Daily News, 17 January 1910, Page 3

TWO REMARKABLE WOMEN.

THE "DEATH TREATMENT" OF A CHRISTIAN SCIEMIST.

j NEW \ORK AMAZED.

New York, November 15.

New York is accustomed to sensations, but it is not every day that there is such widespread amazement in the flifcy as there i 6 at the present time—actazement at the doings of two re■arkable women, the one Mrs. Augusta Stetson, a prominent leader in the First Ohirreh of Christ, scientist, the other Madame Falladino, the famous Italian medium, who has been brought here to be tested by scientific men. If we are to believe all that is told us regarding these two women it would seem that the dividing line between life and death is a very faint one, and that we are much nearer the spirit world than we tiuak. MRS. STETSON. Mrs. Stetson, who practises Christian Science in this city, and who, it is said, aims at succeeding Mrs. Mary Baker G. &ldy, the famous founder of the moveBent, is a tall, prepossessing woman, oredited with an unusual amount of animal magnetism; and during the past two weeks she has been the centre of a great storm in the Christian Scientist Church, the result of certain charges against her, and of all the stories that have been told there is none more amazing that that of Mrs. Maude Kissam Babcock. Tins woman, a student under Mrs. Stetson, is related to the Vanderbilts. She gave all her money to the Church, and is now working for her living, impoverished by the magnitude of her gifts. In 1003 Mrs. Babcock formally accused Mrs. Stetson of "attempted mental assassination," before the Board of Trustees of the mother Church in Boston, where Mrs. Eddy lives, and now die telU how she has since that time been subjected to the '•(loath treatment." It is an amazing story, but so are many others that are being treated of Mrs. Stetson, including those of persons who say they have been cured of various diseases by her treatment. Here is a part of the story told by Mrs. ilakoii.:—'"J returned to Cedarhurst. 1 knew that Mr. Babcock would not be home until very late. I went to bed and to sleep. At midnight I was awakened by an ivy blast sweeping through the open window from the direction of New York. Mv teeth chattered. My heart fluttered. Luminous waves rolled toward me covered with the faces of the dead. 1 felt just like a man being electrocuted. Jt seemed indeed that my soul went out from my lxxly, that 1 saw through the walls of my house. And in this hour of agony 1 saw Mrs.' Stetson's blue eye,' nil around the room. I tottered from, the bed, lighted all the lights, and went to a table where lay my Testament. Open ing it, I chanced upon the fifteenth chapter of St. John, beginning "!' am the vine and ye are the branches,"' and, falling on my knees, I began to read it aloud. Staggering to the bathroom, J drew a tub of steaming hot water and got into it, but I could not feel the temperature of the water. I was as oold in it as during the first moment roihen the icy blast of the death treatment enveloped me, I realised that no human arm or agenej could defend meI was 1 wrestling *not against flesh and Wood, but against principalities, powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness In high places." '"lmpersonal, ever-present, omnipotent Jove bore, me up oeyond the rath of the mental assassin, the the mad amai-

tion for personal place and power. Still Altering from that boiling bath, 1 groped about for the most elaborate pwwe of darning I could find, and. sitting up in bed, pushed the eeedte to and fro while my parched lips muttered "God is all ; God is good, nothing can harm me!' As I sat there my husband s&iggered up the stairs and into »y room. 'My God!' he exclaimed, 'what has happeiied to me? Coming out of the train I felt as if I were going to di«. ft am suffocating!' I "When some time afterwards I asked Mrs. Stetson why this dreadful thing I had happened to me. She said, 'God smote you because you lifted your yoice against the Holy One of Israel' (meaning Mrs. Eddy).' I have never done this. I reverence and love Mrs. Eddy beyond all human beings. I acknowledge her as the leader of the Christian (Science organisation and the mouthpiece of God to the age. I was' attacked at night when I was supposed to be off guard and defenceless. Before a number ot people in the Hotel Touraine Mrs. Stetson said, 'I had to knock Maudie's (Mrs. Eabcock's) head off to make her see truth, and she might have passed out, but God triumphed, and "slic is with ns to-day.'" There are others who tell of hating received the '-death treatment,' experiencing sensations somewhat similar to those described bv Mrs. Uabcock, and some of Mrs. Stetson's students who have now broken away from her say that she had a special' list prepared of people who were to he given this treatment because they had opposed her wislies in certain matters, ihey also tell how Mrs. .Stetson, in connection with a law case that came before the courts, stated that they might commit perjury without any harm coming to them, inasmuch as it would not be their ••real" selves that were talking, but their "material" selves. .She laid down the advantages of "mental reservation," and spoke to theiu about "dual personality." The whole story fftvors more of a page from some romantic notel than from real life. Mrs. .Stetson still has p larsre following, and, despite the wishes of 'the Mother Church authorities, she still remains a power in tic Church and practises the healing art. Hie latest development is a demand for the production of the Church accounts, and it is likely that the matter will get into the courts'. MADAME PALLADINO. The other woman I have referred to, Madame I'alladiuo, i« of a different type. Mrs. Stetson is a woman of rare intellectual attainments; the lltalian medium, about whom everybody is talking just now, is a poor and illiterate peasant woman. Hut she has remarkable qualities powers that have astonished Europe and bailed scientists—and all attempts to explain them except by attributing them to supernatural agencies have so far failed, liven Lombroso confessed himself converted; sceptie that lie was at 0«t. lie subjected Madame I'alladiuo to extraordinary tests, and was convinced that her "manifestations were the outcome of no trickery, but ot some inexplicable psychic phenomena. This woman, who speaks not a word of English, and has an interpreter with her,' is almost ugly in appearance. Her face is pallid and forbidding, and the expression of her eyes is almost unoannv. (She is short and fat, She lias teen" brought here by Mr. Hereward Carrington, who spends most of his time in investigating psychic phenomena, auk who recently formed one of a delegatiM from England to examine her and port upon her strange gifts. He to "expose" lier. Thi., woman is parently not of the type of Mrs. who mystified Sydney some years until she was "found out," and cided to bring her to New tested by the scientists of thisJ^^^H

eluding a university professor. Mr. Carrington's wife, [>y the way, is a medium; she has a-sister living in Wellington, New Zealand, which country she proposes to visit ai some future time with her husbancl. ■ Ih a book writtenjby Dr. Cesare Lombroso, aad just' published by Small, Mayaard and Co., of Boston, with ths title "After Death—What?", tie writer aay«: "If eter fhere was an individual in the world opposed to spiritism by tirfcae of scientilc education, and I may say by instinct, I was that person. 1 had made it tu< indefatigable pursuit of a lifetime to defend the thesis that •Terj force is * .property of matter and the soul an emanation of the brain, and for years and yews had laughed at the idea of centre tables .and chairs having I souls. But if 1 have always had a passionate devotion to my special science, my I have had a still more ardent of the truth. Now, although I hay suc< a n arersioa to spiritualism twt for years 1 refused even to be pi«ent at a test seance, I was fated to ■& wMess, in ISB2 4 as a neuropatholQgjß, of "certain tery singular psychic for which «o scientific explanation irliateyer had been found except that they occurred in kySteric or hypnotised iu'diriduals; and although the thing was repugnant to me, I ended by accepting, in March, I'SUI, an invitation to be present at a spiritualistic experiment ia full daylight hi a Naples hoi."! and, tete-a-tete with Eusapia Palladia And when I then and there saw extremely heaTy object* transferred through the air without eontact, from that time on I ! consented to make the phenonj-na the subject of investigation." Tk woman he wrote of i» the woman ,who is at present, at private and very exclusive seances', mystifying the people of New York. Lombroso tells of. many wonderful manifestations, but it is sufficient to confine ourselves to lrliat is now being seen here. Here are .some of the "miracles" skc performs:—She can emit from a scar on her forehead a peculiar cold breeze, which has been known to cause a thermometer to drop, several degrees'; a cold breeze comes also from her left knee, sometimes blowing her skirt out almost horizontally; she°causes strange faces, hands, and forms to api»ear about her: she makes any light article of furniture follow the movements of her handsj she causes faces to bp produced on clay that has lwen previously covered with netting; she can lift- a 'tabic without touching it; she caul make musical instruments play, wijthout touching them. Those who believe in her say that all t'ae niaiiilcsfjitions which she produces are caused hj her power to externalise her force, to project herself "astrally' outside her own body. She was' born ii» the Italian village'of Pouille, and is now .").» years old. The phenomena associated witl her began when she was at an early: a „ 0 but. it is only within the last fewycars that she has attracted the serit us attention of scientific men. It is mjd that among those converted to a, belief in iter spiritualistic powers are iprofessor .Schiaparelli, the alu i his wife, co-dis-coverers of radium; Richet, the physiologist; Sir Oliver lx>dge, England's famous scientist: and Cainille Flamniarion, the>Fren<-li astronomer. Coming over Acre on the German liner Prinzess Irene, Eus'apia Palladino ■ns of her about a cabin of rlino gave ription of »ened. "l m and a side,'' iie e of the

into what seemed a sleep. From time to time she groaned. I felt three knocks on the hack of my chair. "I felt a touch On my neck and another in the middle of my back. The girl on-the other side ot Madame iMuaumo said, 'Someone touched me.' I felt the' jar of others who had been touched.' Then what. seemed a hand gripped me round the ankle. We all heard one" of the yoHng women gasp, and, following the direction of her eyes, saw an arm and hand oome out from behind the curtain ot the berth. It was white and ghastly. At the same time we saw a filmy something at the ceiling and a black mask. There fc'eemed to be a cold draught in the room, and the curtains oi the berth bulged with wind from the inside. The mask disappeared, but the arm came down from the cartam and seemed to caress Dr. Jelten, who came near going into spasms, "'ls that the spirit of my father?' asked Dr. Jelten. Three Knocks announced an affirmative answer. 'Are you glad to meet your 6on?' asked Dr. Jelten." Then came three more knocks on the side of the table most distant from the medium. At this Dr. Jelten jumped up and would sit down no more. Dr. Oreti then took kis place in the circle. He asked for his father, and a ghastly half of a head came out of nothingness. o*ie of the wlomen screamed. The head seemed to drift down across the right shoulder of Dr. Oreti. 'Are you contented with the career your son is following?" asked Dr. Oreti. Threo affirmatire knocks ■ounded upon the table." i

Let Dr. Oreti tell the mat of the story. "Salute me with a kiss," I asked- "!• felt a light but there was no kiss. 'My fathor,. is there a spirit world i' 1 asked. Three knocks said there was. 'ls there a future lite'-' i asked, and again there were three knocks. At this point Madame Palladino began to moan; there came v iive knocks on the table, and someone suggested that there was too much light. One of the two electric light globes were blanketed, and I then said I would like to speak to a departed daughter. I felt something touch me on my lorehead, breast, and right and left shoulders} and' then I felt a kiss nnd tf.vo slight, pressures ou my cheeks and' a pair of lips brushing me. Then a appeared over my shoulder, and one ot the women fainted and iiad to be earned from the room.

"Madame Palladino began to moan more loudly than ever. She wrenched lmr right hand loose, waved it over the table, and though she did not touch it the table was raised two feet from the lloor. After hovering there for a second it fell with a crash."

It is not to be wondered at that when eminent scientists like those that have been mentioned and men like Mr. Carrington, who has made a lifelong study of these things—before he took to investigating spiritualistic mediums he was' a professional prestidigitator on the stage—declare that there is no possibility for fraud in the tests they have conducted, the ordinary mortal is ready to believe'that there rt're more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy. The whole matter is to be the subject of a special report to the Society of Physical Research, and among those who ore conducting the tests here are Professor William dames, of Harvard, Dr. James H. Hyslop, Dr. Isaac Punk, and oth'er —By W. Farmer WliytejaMßj^^H