Modern spiritism; its science and religion - SpiritArchive.org

INTRODUCTORY 5
that so frequently characterise their meetings, and
have so degraded the very name of Spiritism And
?
what has been the result ? What is the net outcome
of the Quest so far? Has one single noble, or lofty,
or divine thought been added to our previous concepts?
On the other hand, have we not been
brought into the closest and most undesired contact
with deception and fraud of an undoubted character ;
and too often, one regrets to say, with evil, malice,
and sometimes, as Mr. Sinnet has testified, of
unspeakable corruption One ? is brought into touch
in Modern Spiritism with a world of which one had
no previous concept, of a most undesirable nature,
which has perhaps been best described by Maeterlinck
in his "Unknown Guest."
'It is true that indirectly an unseen spirit world
has thus been revealed and demonstrated to many
who utterly denied it before; but the net result of
Spiritism so far is most disappointing, to say nothing
of its undoubted dangers to spirit, soul, and body;
which, to their honour, leading Spiritists are among
the first to point out.
Voices are
Often Objective
'Turning now to the immediate question of the
evening,
as to whether the communications received
by mediums, or other means, are subjective or purely
objective, my reply is that some are undoubtedly
objective, and that constantly at seances spirits other
than our own manifest their presence. *
'Setting on one side for a moment those supposed
* I say this in spite of what I shall advance later on of the part
played by our own unconscious mind.