Empire unusual suggested

CHAPTER FIVE
NURSLINGS OF IMMORTALITY
They are fairies; he that speaks
to them shall die:
I'll wink and couch: no man
their works must eye.
William Shakespeare, The Merry Wives of Windsor
"THEY SPEAK all the languages of the earth. They know all about
the past and future of the human race—of any human being."
This statement was made in 1968 by a Spanish clerk who claims
he has been in contact with extraterrestrials since 1954. "The
inhabitants of planet Wolf 424 [sic] are among us in human form
and with false identities. They are far superior to us and very
peace-loving. I am in permanent contact with them: they either
write to me or call me. We have meetings."
How did he contact these superior entities? It seems that in
1954 a saucer threw a stone covered with hieroglyphics into the
University Gardens, Madrid. Fernando Sesma copied the symbols
down, and soon two-way communication began.
In Great Britain also, fantastic rumors are spreading. British
scientists, some people claim, have been contacted by a mysterious
source through radio and have become involved in undercover
activities at the request of extraterrestrials. Some of these
scientists have disappeared. Through such contacts, so the story
goes, the extraterrestrials hope to control our history. For what
purpose? I myself have received letters from individuals claiming
to be members of secret organizations whose headquarters arc,
quite literally, "out of this world." These correspondents informed
me that the purpose of these groups is to prevent mankind
from reaching other worlds in space. Of course, other "con-
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NURSLINGS OF IMMORTALITY 131
tactees" make exactly opposite claims. The fact remains, however,
that belief in nonhuman control of terrestrial destinies is as old
as politics.
Thus a Madrid newsman, Armando Puente, claims that Sesma
warned him three months before Robert Kennedy was assassinated
that the senator would be killed, Sesma similarly "predicted"
the wave of UFO sightings in Argentina (a much easier
task!).
Moreover, the same power attributed to saucer people—
namely, that of influencing human events—was once the exclusive
property of fairies. This was true in the beliefs of ignorant
medieval peasants and of the scholars as well. Thus, one of the
first questions put to Joan of Arc by her inquisitors was "if she
had any knowledge or if she had not assisted at the assemblies
held at the fountain of the fairies, near Domremy, around which
dance malignant spirits." And another question and answer was
thus recorded: "Asked whether she did not believe—prior to the
present day—that fairies WCTC malignant spirits, [she] answered
she did not know." 1
To pursue this line further would involve reopening the entire
problem of witchcraft, which is obviously beyond the purpose
of this book. It is important, however, to note the continuum of
beliefs, for the continuum leads directly from primitive magic,
through mystical experience, the fairy-faith, and religion, to modern
flying saucers. The study of witchcraft has shown these subjects
to be closely interrelated, and from the point of view of
modern psychiatry, they must be treated together. And while
we are not concerned with individual beliefs in this chapter, we
are interested in the social implications of such rumors, which
have seldom been faced by the students of the phenomenon.
In the Soviet Union, not so long ago, a leading plasma physicist
died in strange circumstances: he was thrown under a Moscow
subway train by a mentally deranged woman. It is noteworthy
that she claimed a "voice from space" had given her
orders to kill that particular man—orders she could not resist.
Soviet criminologists, I have been reliably informed, are worried
by the increase of such cases in recent years. Madmen rushing
through the streets because they think the Martians arc after