Experimental investigation of the spirit manifestations, [electronic ...

276 ADDITIONAL CORROBORATIVK EVIDENCEfaithful, said to them :of the illustrious Dominican.'^My brothers, it is God who speaks with the mouth1407. ^' A very pious female, abandoned by her medical adviser, beingin a state of despair, was magnetized by one of her parents, and fellthe most complete trance. In one of her first sleeps, she said she saw aperson who, according to the description she gave of him, appeared to bethe clairvoyant's great-grandfather, deceased several years before theof his grand-daughter.intobirthThe latter was cured by the advice received duringher trance condition from the said great-grandfather. This fact appearedto me so grave in its nature, and so interesting to science and religion,that I thought proper to publish it in number nineteen of the MarjnctlsmeSj) I ritual istc, with an appeal to all those who, by their knowledge, mightbe able to explain this phenomenon.1408. '^ Among those to whom our appeal was made, figured the theologians,to whom, in speaking of the person who appeared to the clairvoyant,I said :^Should this not be considered the devil, who, assuming afantastic personation, took that of the great-grandfather of M. 11., andappearing thus to him, cured him of a disease which he himself hadoriginated ?'1409. " Some copies of the number of the journal in question weresent to the sovereign pontiff, through his apostolic nuncio at Paris, to Mgr.the archbishop of Paris, to the faculty of theology at Sorbonne, to PtR.PP. Jesuits of the Rue dcs Postcs, to R. P. Lacordaire, and to the CalvinisticConsistory of Paris, begging them to enlighten me on a fact ofsuch grave importance. But to the present time, a period of three years,not one of these great personages has informed me that the phenomenonto which I invited their attention is the work of the devil, which provesthat, in their opinion, the evil one is a stranger to this phenomenon ; forotherwise they would not have failed to answer my inquiry, if only frominterest for religion, or through charity to myself.Should M. de Mirvilledesire to know the clairvoyant I refer to, he can be conducted to hisdomicile.1410. '' Mgr. Sibour, on mesmerism, and La Grandeur, if interrogated,will tell you that the thoughts expressed by clairvoyants are only reflectionsfrom their magnetizers, without saying a single word to you aboutthe devil. But we have said enough on clairvoyants, and will pass to thetables.1411. ^^I have made a great many experiments in table-turning andtable-talking with pious laymen and with ecclesiastics, men of prayer andserious habits, and even with a venerable bishop, and always in a veryserious manner;desiring to know, for the sake of religion and our souls^if the devil is in reality the agent who conveys movement and languageto the tables. Besides exorcism, we have employed all the means taughtand prescribed in the Catholic Church to drive out the devil, and we have