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

OP THE EXISTENCE OF SriRITS. 283times arc hallucinations. As I do not design here to make a critical analysisof M. dc Gaspariu's work, not considering myself capable, and leavingthis honour to those who arc in some scientific line, I design merelyoccupying myself with some facts which refer personally to me, and whichappear to me to oppose some points in the doctrine of IM. de Gasparin inhis table-turning, or Supernatural in Genrraly as already noticed in theintroduction to the monograph, and I commence with the subject ofecstasy.1431. ^' Speaking of ecstatics, M. de Gasparin explains himself as follows: 'As to their intellectual faculties, they are capable in those cases ofprodigious development. The ecstatics declare themselves that they havetwo souls ; that a voice foreign to their own causes them to speak ; thatthey suddenly receive ideas entirely unknown to them, and terms of expressionentirely strange to them. It happens even that the peasantaccustomed to patoh, speaks French, and that illiterate men express themselvesin Latin. Now, have we something here that is supernatural?Certainly not; it is a physiological state, or often the treasures of reminiscence,which the subject possessed, though in fact not aware of it. Thepeasant may have known how to speak French; she may not have knownit, and still it may all have been engraved on the deep recesses of thememor}^, where nothing is ever really effaced. Exalted or sick, she findsherself in possession of the French language. A merchant, who hasscarcely passed the first classes, and who never knew Latin, finds himselfthe possessor of the Latin language, and embarrasses his doctor, whom headdresses in that tongue.'1432. " According to this ecstatic theory of M. de Gasparin, it followsthat the ideas expressed by the subjects, and which were unknown tothem in their normal state, are nothing more than reminiscences.I admit,with M. de Gasparin, that reminiscence is only the return of the soul tothe recollection of a thing oran idea, which, though engraven on the memory,was forgotten.This return, however, does not happen without someremarks, which, from the recollection of some ideas or incidents, conductthe mind to the recollection of what was forgotten.1433. ^'I am a medium : according to the received opinion, a medium isa waking magnetic subject. Now, every magnetic subject is in a degreeecstatic; therefore I, being a medium, am ecstatic. Well, I being ecstatic,take a pencil, and concentrating myself in that state, request the occultpower that moves my hand without my volition to cause it to write, if itis possible, something on the creation. The last word is scarcely pronouncedwhen my hand proceeds to write, without interruption, somethingtrue or false,on the creation, which surprises mc.1434. ''This interview terminates, and desiring to know if these ideason the creation come from reminiscences, I seek to discover ifthey couldhave been engraven on my memory, either from reading or hearing them