The spirit-rapper; an autobiography
refutation of Judge Edmands’s work on the same subject,—a great and
original thinker, and most profound philosopher,—in his own
estimation,—thought that they were all to be explained by
phreno-mesmerism, or electro-psychology. He had an original theory,
borrowed in part from Gall and Spurzheim, who might, to a certain
extent, have borrowed it from the Timeus of Plato, that the back part of
the brain is the seat of involuntary motion, instinct, and unconscious
consciousness, that the anterior part is the seat of voluntary motion
and reflection. The phenomena are artificially produced by
psychologizing the subject, or paralyzing the anterior lobe of the
brain, and leaving the posterior active, and, naturally, by a person’s
sitting down quietly and suppressing the activity of the frontal brain,
and giving free scope to the occipital. There was no devil, and no odic
agent in the case. It was all explained by phreno-mesmerism, or by the
passivity of some, and the increased activity of other portions of the
brain. But he was asked how this could enable a person to foretell
future events, to read the unexpressed thoughts of others, to manifest
extraordinary physical strength, to understand and speak languages never
learned, to tell what is passing in distant places, and to remain
suspended in the air in defiance of the laws of gravitation. He said all
these were psychological phenomena, or, as Dr. Corning called them,
hallucinations, nothing of the sort really taking place.
Mr. Sowerby would not listen to him, and there was almost a quarrel
between the two ex-ministers. But their rage being finally mollified by
a witticism from Jack, the conversation resumed its pacific character.
“You say, Mr. Sowerby,” said Dr. Corning, “that you have produced
phenomena analogous to those recorded in history?”
“Certainly,” answered Mr. Sowerby.
“And by the mesmeric or odic principle?”
“Undoubtedly.”
“What is your evidence of the existence of such a principle? or your
proof that such a principle exists?”
“The phenomena I produce or find produced by it.”
“So, you take the phenomena to prove the principle, and the principle to
explain the phenomena,” said Dr. Corning, who could reason as well as
anybody when it concerned the refutation of a theory not his own.
“I am not disposed to question the existence of such a principle,”
said Mr. Merton, “except in the form asserted by Mr. Dodson, or when
it is explained as the immediate action of the mind or will of the
mesmerizer upon the mesmerized. The fluid asserted by Mesmer, after
the animal magnetists of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, as
Wirdig, Fludd, Maxwell, Kircher, Van Helmont, simply revised by Baron
Reichenbach with a great show of demonstration, though denied by
Deleuze and some other mesmerists, I have no good reason for doubting.
I am willing to concede the fact, that this fluid or agent exists and
is employed by Mr. Sowerby in his experiments. I am willing to concede
that there is a fluid or agent, not electricity, not magnetism, but
analogous to them, contended for by Baron Reichenbach, that pervades a
numerous class of bodies, and may be artificially accumulated, or
stimulated to increased activity. But suppose this; suppose the
mesmerizer, wizard, sorcerer, witch, magician, actually uses it, I
must still ask Mr. Sowerby to tell me how he proves it to be the sole
principle of the phenomena produced? That in most of the cases
recorded, if not in all, there are proper mesmeric or odic phenomena,
naturally or artificially produced, is, I think, undeniable. The
flowers used by Grandier, in the case of the nuns of Loudun, and the
fumigations and sufflations of the old magicians, all prove the resort
to magnetism. The rod and tub of Mesmer, and the cumbrous machinery he
used, though not indispensable, every magnetizer knows are a useful
mean. But as these are only subsidiary, how is it to be demonstrated
that mesmerism itself is the sole efficient cause, not merely of some
of the accessory phenomena, but of them all? In the phenomena of
table-turning, so extensively witnessed, magnetism is not absolutely
essential. They began, as all the recent spirit-manifestations, in
mesmerism, and at first the table was mesmerized by a circle formed
round it, joining their hands and resting them on it.”
“The tables are turned,” said Dr. Corning, “by the involuntary and
unconscious muscular contraction of the hands pressing upon it. This has
been proved.”
“So says a French Academician, and so also says Professor Farraday, and
tables, very likely, may be turned in some such way; but the table is
frequently known to turn and cut up its capers without any circle being
formed, without any person being near it, or visible hand touching it.”
“That is true,” said I, “for I have myself seen the most extraordinary
phenomena of table-turning when it was certain no pressure, voluntary or
involuntary, had been applied to it by any person visible in the room. I
have seen a table turn in spite of the efforts of four strong men to
hold it still, rise up without any visible agency, fly over the heads of
the company, rush with violence from one end of the room to the other,
spin round like a top, balance itself on one leg and then on another,—in
fine, move along some inches on the floor with the weight of a dozen men
resting on it, raise itself from the floor with them, and remain
suspended a foot above it, for some minutes.”
“There can be no doubt of that,” said Mr. Merton. “In Cochin China, we
are told on good authority, that in the time of the predecessors of
Gia-long, it was a custom in the province of Xu-Ngué, on certain
solemnities, to invite the most celebrated tutelar genii of the towns
and villages of the kingdom to games and a public trial of their
strength. A long and heavy bark, with eight benches of oars, was placed
dry in the centre of a large hall, and the trial consisted in seeing
which of these could move it farthest or with the greatest ease. The
judges and spectators took their stand at a little distance, and saw, as
they called the names and titles of the genii placed on the bark, the
huge machine tip one side and then the other, and finally advance and
then recede. Some of the genii would push it forward several feet,
others only a few inches. But one who made it come and go with the
greatest facility, was the tutelar genius of the maritime village of
Ke-Chan, worshipped under the name of Hon-Leo-Hanh, whose temple was in
consequence thronged with pilgrims, and enriched with votive offerings.”
“But conceding,” continued Mr. Merton, “that mesmerism plays its part, I
wish to know how Mr. Sowerby proves that it alone suffices for the
production of the phenomena? Is it not possible that another power steps
in, and, either alone or in concurrence, produces them? May it not be
that mesmerism only facilitates or prepares the way for the demonic
action, produces the state or condition of the human subject favorable
to Satanic invasion, and therefore is to be regarded rather as the
occasion than as the efficient cause of the phenomena?”
“But I admit no devil; I do not believe that there are any demons,” said
Mr. Sowerby.
“I am aware of that,” said Mr. Merton, “but I suppose that,
notwithstanding your disbelief, there may be a devil, the prince of this
world, as the Scriptures plainly teach. It is possible that there are
whole legions of devils, that the air swarms with them, and that they
have power to tempt and to vex and harass those they would seduce from
allegiance to the Most High. Their non-existence, at least their
non-intervention, must be proved before you are entitled to conclude
that your mesmeric or odic agent is the sole efficient cause of the
phenomena.”
“But that,” said Mr. Dodson, “would overthrow all the so-called
inductive sciences.”
“If so, I cannot help it,” replied Mr. Merton. “The inductive
philosophers have accumulated a mass of rich and valuable facts by their
observations and experiments, for which I am grateful to them; but I set
no great store by the ever-changing theories which they imagine or
invent to explain these facts. But let this pass. If Mr. Sowerby’s
mesmeric or odic force does not explain all the phenomena in the case, I
presume that he will concede that it is not the sole principle of their
production.”
“Certainly,” replied Mr. Sowerby.
“This odic agent, is it not a simple natural principle or force, and
without reason or intelligence?”
“It is in itself unintelligent, I admit.”
“But in the phenomena there are evident marks of intelligence, which
proceed neither from the mesmerizer nor the mesmerized. How do you
explain that?”
“The intelligence is the instinctive or involuntary intelligence
proceeding from the back part of the brain,” answered Mr. Dodson.
“Back part of whose brain?” asked Mr. Merton.
“The mesmerized or psychologized,” replied that philosophic gentleman.
“But there cannot proceed, voluntarily or involuntarily, instinctively
or rationally, from the back brain or the front brain, what is not in
it, or an intelligence which its owner does not possess. I do not now
speak of the intelligence of either the operator or the one operated
upon, but of an intelligence of a third party. In the recorded and
undeniable phenomena to be explained there appears a third party, which
acts intelligently, and gives information unknown to either of the other
parties. Take the case of the spectre that appeared to Brutus before the
battle of Pharsalia, or that which appeared to Julian on the eve of the
battle in which he fell mortally wounded, and hundreds of similar
cases.”
“They are mere hallucinations,” interposed Dr. Corning.
“What proves the contrary,” replied Mr. Merton, “is the fact that they
had accurate knowledge of future events, which hallucinations have not.
I place no stress on the fact that a prediction was uttered, or
seemingly uttered, for that might be a hallucination; the point to be
attended to is its literal fulfilment, showing a knowledge of the future
not possessed by the individual to whom the prediction was made, nor,
supposing mesmerism employed, by the mesmerizer. Here was an intelligent
third party.
“There is a very well authenticated case of a domestic in the German
village of Kleische, who, returning one evening from a place near by,
where she had been sent of an errand, saw a little gray man, not larger
than an infant, who, because she would neither go with him nor answer
him, threatened her, and told her, as she reached the threshold of her
master’s house, that she should be blind and dumb for four days. The
prediction was exactly fulfilled. Instances enough are on record of
persons afflicted, as they supposed, by evil spirits, who have foretold
the day and hour when they would be delivered. In the case of the
parsonage of Cideville, which in 1849 made so much noise in France, the
agent that rapped was intelligent, for the raps gave distinct and
intelligent answers to the questions addressed to it, and communicated
facts unknown to the questioner and to all the persons present.
“The ancient pagan oracles may be cited. They did not, I concede,
foretell what belongs exclusively to the supernatural providence of God,
but they did foretell, clearly and distinctly, events belonging to the
natural order, beyond the reach of ordinary human foresight. That many
of the responses were false, that many of them were ambiguous and suited
to the event, let it turn out which way it might, I by no means deny,
but this cannot be said of all of them. The contrary is evident from the
great reputation they enjoyed, and the long ages that they were
consulted, not by the vulgar only, but by kings, princes, nobles, and