“On Friday, December 1st, 1882, I was on a visit to my sister, at 21 Clarence Road, Kew, and about 9:30 P. M. I was going from my bedroom to get some water from the bath-room, when I distinctly saw Mr. S. B. whom I had only seen once before, two years ago, walk before me past the bath-room, toward the bedroom at the end of the landing.
“About 11 o’clock we retired for the night; about 12 o’clock I was still awake, and the door opened and Mr. S. B. came into the room and walked around to the bedside, and there stood with one foot on the ground, and the other knee resting on a chair. He then took my hair into his hand, after which he took my hand in his and looked very intently into the palm. ‘Ah,’ I said (speaking to him), ‘you need not look at the lines for I never had any trouble.’ I then awoke my sister; I was not nervous, but excited, and began to fear some serious illness would befall her, she being delicate at the time, but she is progressing more favorably now.
“H. L.”
(Full name signed.)
Miss Verity also corroborates this statement.
The following is still another case of one mind acting upon another mind at a distance and at least in a most unusual way. Call it mind-projection, making one’s self visible at a distance, sending out the subliminal self—call it what we may—it is a glimpse of a phenomenon, rare in its occurrence, but which nevertheless has been observed a sufficient number of times to claim serious attention, and calm and candid consideration. The case is from Phantasms of the Living, and is furnished by “Mrs. Russell of Belgaum, India, wife of Mr. H. R. Russell, Educational Inspector in the Bombay Presidency.” It differs from those already cited in the fact that it is unconnected with either sleep or hypnotism, but both agent and percipient were awake and in a perfectly normal condition.
Mrs. Russell writes:—
“June 8th, 1886.
“As desired I write down the following facts as well as I can recall them. I was living in Scotland, my mother and sisters in Germany. I lived with a very dear friend of mine, and went to Germany every year to see my people. It had so happened that I could not go home as usual for two years, when on a sudden I made up my mind to go and see my family. They knew nothing of my intention; I had never gone in early spring before; and I had no time to let them know by letter that I was going to set off. I did not like to send a telegram for fear of frightening my mother. The thought came to me to will with all my might to appear to one of my sisters, never mind which of them, in order to give them warning of my coming. I only thought most intensely for a few minutes of them, wishing with all my might to be seen by one of them—half present myself, in vision, at home. I did not take more than ten minutes, I think. I started by the Leith steamer on Saturday night, end of April, 1859. I wished to appear at home about 6 o’clock P. M. that same Saturday.
“I arrived at home at 6 o’clock on Tuesday morning following. I entered the house without any one seeing me, the hall being cleaned and the front door open. I walked into the room. One of my sisters stood with her back to the door; she turned round when she heard the door opening, and on seeing me, stared at me, turning deadly pale, and letting what she had in her hand fall. I had been silent. Then I spoke and said, ‘It is I. Why do you look so frightened?’ When she answered, ‘I thought I saw you again as Stinchen (another sister) saw you on Saturday.’
“When I inquired, she told me that on Saturday evening about 6 o’clock, my sister saw me quite clearly, entering the room in which she was, by one door, passing through it, opening the door of another room in which my mother was, and shutting the door behind me. She rushed after what she thought was I, calling out my name, and was quite stupefied when she did not find me with my mother. My mother could not understand my sister’s excitement. They looked everywhere for me, but of course did not find me. My mother was very miserable; she thought I might be dying.
“My sister who had seen me (i. e. my apparition) was out that morning when I arrived. I sat down on the stairs to watch, when she came in, the effect of my real appearance on her. When she looked up and saw me, sitting motionless, she called out my name and nearly fainted.
“My sister had never seen anything unearthly either before that or afterwards; and I have never made any such experiments since—nor will I, as the sister that saw me first when I really came home, had a very severe illness afterwards, caused by the shock to her nerves.
“J. M. Russell.”
Mrs. Russell’s sister, in answer to her inquiry whether she remembered the incident, replied: “Of course I remember the matter as well as though it had happened to-day. Pray don’t come appearing to me again!”
We started out with this proposition. Perceptions—those of the class denominated hallucinations—may have their origin telepathically. In proof and illustration of that proposition we have so far presented a single class of cases, namely, Those where the hallucination was produced with will and purpose on the part of the agent. The cases present the following conditions:—
(1) The agent being in a normal condition—the percipient hypnotized, the hypnotic condition having been produced at a distance of a hundred yards—and from a point from which the percipient could not be seen.
(2) The agent in the hypnotic condition; a definite hallucination strongly desired and decided upon beforehand was produced, the percipient being in a normal state.
(3) The agent was in normal sleep. Hallucination decided upon before going to sleep was produced—the percipient awake and in normal condition.
(4) Both agent and percipient awake and normal—hallucination produced at a distance of four hundred miles. In one case the phantasm is seen by two percipients, and in another case the place only where the phantasm should appear was strongly in the agent’s mind; and while the sisters who usually occupied that room might naturally be expected to be the percipients, as a matter of fact another person, a married sister who happened to be visiting them—a comparative stranger to the agent—was occupying the room and became the percipient.
In each of these cases a definite purpose was formed by the agent to produce a certain hallucination or present a certain picture—generally a representation or phantasm of himself to the percipient. A picture or phantasm is seen by the intended percipient, and, on comparison, in each case it is found that it is the same phantasm that the agent had endeavored to project and make visible, and that it was perceived in the same place and at the same time that the agent had intended that it should be seen.
Can these statements be received as true and reliable? In reply we say, the evidence having been carefully examined is of such a character as to entitle it to belief, and the errors of observation and reporting are trifling, and not such as would injure the credibility of statements made regarding any event which was a matter of ordinary observation; moreover, these cases now have become so numerous and have been so carefully observed that they should be judged by the ordinary rules of evidence; and by that rule they should be received.
Having been received, how can they be explained?
It may be answered:—
(1) That these apparent sequences presenting the relation of cause and effect are merely chance coincidences. But on carefully applying the doctrine of chances, it is found that the probability that these coincidences of time and place, and the identity of the pictures presented and perceived, occurred by chance, would be only one in a number so large as to make it difficult to represent it in figures, and quite impossible for any mind to comprehend. And that such a coincidence should occur repeatedly in one person’s experience is absolutely incredible.
(2) The circumstances of distance and situation render it certain that the phantasms could not have been communicated or presented to the percipient through any of the usual channels of communication—by means of the physical organs of sense—even granting that they could be so transferred under favorable conditions.
If, then, these cases must be received as authentic and true, and if they cannot be disposed of as chance coincidences, nor explained by any ordinary method or law of production or transmission, then there must be some other method of mental interaction, and mental intercommunication not usually recognized, by means of which these pictures or phantasms are produced or transferred, and this unusual method of mental interaction and intercommunication we designate telepathy. What the exact method is by which this unusual interaction is accomplished is not fully demonstrated, any more than are the methods of the various interacting forces between the sun and the planets or amongst the planets themselves. The hypothesis of a universal or inter-stellar ether has never been demonstrated; it is only a hypothesis framed because it is necessary in order to explain and support another undemonstrated theory, namely, the vibratory or wave theory of light. We do not know what the substance or force which we call attraction really is. Light has one method of movement and action, sound another, heat another, and electricity another, but most of the propositions concerning these methods of action are only theories or hypotheses having a greater or less degree of probability as the case may be. They were invented to account for certain actual and undeniable phenomena, and they are respected by all men of science or other persons having sufficient knowledge of these different subjects to entitle them to an opinion. The same thing is true of telepathy; its facts must be known and its theories well considered by those who assume to sit in judgment upon them; and when known they are respected. The Copernican theory of the planetary movements was formulated three hundred and fifty years ago; it was one hundred and fifty years later when Newton proposed the first rational theory regarding a force which might explain these motions. For this he was ridiculed and even ostracized by the self-constituted judges of his day. Telepathy has been the subject of careful study and experiment comparatively only a few years, and it can hardly, at this early date, expect better treatment at the hands of its critics. Its facts, however, remain, and its explanatory theories are being duly considered.
What, then, are the theories or hypotheses which may aid us in forming an idea of the manner in which a thought, a conception, or a mental picture may pass between two persons so situated that no communication could pass between them through the ordinary channels of communication—sight, hearing, or touch? Let us suppose two persons A and B to be so situated. A is the agent or person having unusual ability to impress his own thought, or any conception or mental picture which he may form in his own mind, upon some other mind; and B is the percipient or a person having unusual ability to receive or perceive such thoughts or mental pictures. Suppose these two people to be in the country and engaged in farming. Upon a certain morning A takes his axe and goes to the woods, half a mile distant, and is engaged in cutting brush and trees for the purpose of clearing the land, and B goes into the garden to care for the growing vegetables. After an hour spent in these respective occupations, B becomes disquieted, even alarmed, oppressed with the feeling that some misfortune has happened and that A is needing his assistance. He is unable to continue his work and at once starts for the woods to seek for A. He finds that A has received a glancing blow from his axe which has deeply wounded his foot, disabled him, and put his life in immediate danger from hemorrhage. Here the thought of A in his extreme peril goes out intensely to B, desiring his presence; and B, by some unusual perceptive power, takes cognizance of this intense thought and wish. This is telepathy. Again, suppose B hears a voice which he recognizes as A’s calling his name and with a peculiar effect which B recognizes as distress or entreaty. Or, again, that B sees a picture or representation of A lying wounded and bleeding, still it is a telepathic impulse from A and taken cognizance of by B which constitutes the communication between them, whatever the exact nature or method of the communication may be.
The theories or hypotheses which have been put forward regarding the method by which this telepathic influence or impact is conveyed may be noted as follows:—
(1) That of a vibratory medium, always present and analogous to the atmosphere for propagating sound or the universal ether for propagating light.
(2) An effluence of some sort emanating from the persons concerned and acting as a medium for the time being.
(3) A sixth sense.
(4) A duplex personality or subliminal self.
First, then, as regards the vibratory hypothesis; it would demand a variety of media to convey separately something corresponding to the sense of sight, the sense of hearing, and to each of the other senses—touch, taste, and smell—as all these sensations have been telepathically transmitted, or else there must exist one single medium capable of transmitting these many widely different methods of sensation separately,—either of which suppositions are, to say the least, bewildering. Such a medium must also possess a power of penetrating or acting through intervening obstacles, such as no medium with which we are acquainted possesses; and, lastly, in addition to numerous apparently insurmountable difficulties and insufficiencies, there is no proof whatever that any such vibratory medium exists.
Second. Regarding a vital effluence or some physical emanation or aura belonging to each individual, and by means of which communication is possible between persons separated by too great a distance to permit communication through the ordinary channels; it is at least conceivable that such an aura or personal atmosphere exists, and by some it is claimed to be demonstrated; but admitting its existence, that it would be capable of fulfilling the numerous functions demanded of it in the premises is doubtful.
Third. That the telepathic intercommunication is accomplished by means of a sixth sense—a sort of compend of all the other senses, with added powers as regards distance and intervening obstacles—is a hypothesis which has been urged by some, and is at least intelligible; but, while it presents an intelligible explanation of such facts as clairvoyance and the hearing of voices, there is a large class of facts, as we shall see, which utterly refuse to fall into line or be explained by this hypothesis.
Fourth. The hypothesis of different strata of personality—or of a second or subliminal self—is the one which best fulfils the necessary conditions and also harmonizes the greatest number of facts when arranged with reference to this idea. There is also real, substantial evidence that such a second personality actually exists, some of the facts bearing upon this subject having been presented in former chapters.
Those of my readers who have carefully followed the cases of unusual mental action there presented—cases of thought-transference, of clairvoyance, of remarkable mind-action in the hypnotic trance and in natural somnambulism—in well marked examples of double consciousness as shown in the cases of Félida X., of Alma Z., of Ansel Bourne, and the hypnotic subject, Madame B., in her various personalities of Léonie, Léontine, and Léonore, in automatic action as displayed in Planchette-writing, in trance-speaking and in crystal-gazing, cannot have failed to observe, throughout the whole series, mind acting rationally and intelligently, quite independently of the ordinary consciousness, and even at times independently of the whole physical organization. We have considered the evidence which points to the fact, or at least to the theory of a subliminal self, or another personality, in some manner bound up in that complicated physical and mental mechanism which constitutes what we term an individual. We have seen that there are weighty proofs that such a secondary or subliminal, or, if you choose so to designate it, supranormal self, actually exists, and that it exhibits functions and powers far exceeding the functions and powers of the ordinary self. We have seen it expressing its own personal opinions, its own likes and dislikes, quite different and opposite to the opinions, likes, and dislikes of the ordinary self; having its own separate series of remembered actions or chain of memories, its own antecedent history, and its separate present interests; and especially performing actions altogether beyond the powers of the ordinary self. We have seen it going out to great distances, seeing and describing scenes and events there taking place—for example, Swedenborg at Gottenburg witnessing the conflagration at Stockholm; Dr. Gerault’s clairvoyant maid-servant, Marie, in France, seeing the sad death of her neighbor’s son, Limoges, the ropemaker, while serving in the Crimea; and also the serious illness of Dr. Gerault’s military friend in Algiers. Fitzgerald, at Brunswick, Me., seeing and describing the Fall River fire three hundred miles away, and Mrs. Porter, at Bridgeport, Conn., describing the burning of the steamer Henry Clay while it was occurring on the Hudson River near the village of Yonkers. We have seen this same subliminal self in the case of Mr. Stead, going out and acquiring desired knowledge relating to the location, occupation, and needs of persons from whom he desired such information, and bringing it back and reporting it by means of automatic writing. Again, we have seen this subliminal self in the case of Mrs. Newnham, perceiving the silently written and sometimes even the unwritten questions of her husband, and automatically writing the answers by means of Planchette; and we have seen it producing hallucinations of hearing as in the case of Léonore causing Léontine to hear a voice reproving her for her flippancy.
A remarkable series of facts are here pointed out, facts some of which are akin to those which have for ages been lying about in the lumber rooms of history or in out-of-the-way corners of men’s memories, neglected and discredited, because unexplained, unaccounted for, forming no part of any recognized system of mental action, and some only recently observed and even now looked at askance for the same reason. They have remained a mass of undigested and unarranged facts, without system, without any ascertained relation to each other, pointing to no definite principle, defined by no definite law. It is only within the past decade that these facts have been studied with reference to the action of a subliminal self.
But this new and startling idea being once admitted and brought to the front, it is found that not only in the whole series of observed automatic actions in the somnambulism of the hypnotic state, and that of ordinary sleep, are the organs of the unconscious body made use of by this subconscious or subliminal self, but also in dreams, in reverie, in moments of abstraction, of strong emotion or mental excitement, and even in the case of some peculiarly susceptible persons in the ordinary waking condition, this subliminal self can greatly influence and sometimes take entire control of the action of the body.
It will be seen then, how wide and important is the range of phenomena in which the subliminal self appears as an active agent, impressing its own special knowledge, however acquired, its ideas, pictures, and images upon the primary self, and causing them to be perceived, remembered, and expressed by it; and with this unusual power in view, evidently it is in this direction also that we must look for the key to that still more remarkable series of phenomena which are known as phantasms or apparitions.
CHAPTER XI.
PHANTASMS CONTINUED.
So far a single class of cases has been brought forward in proof and illustration of our proposition, that sensation may be produced telepathically, namely, the voluntary class; as for instance, when it has been resolved beforehand and strongly desired and willed that a representation or apparition of one’s self should be seen and recognized by another person at a specified time and place, and it has been so recognized. This class contains fewer recorded cases, but, on the other hand, they are specially valuable, because the element of error arising from chance coincidence is almost entirely excluded. In addition to these voluntary or prearranged cases there is, however, another and much larger class of cases which occur spontaneously, unthought of, and unexpected by the percipient as well as by the agent.
Passing over cases of an indefinite or undefined sense of danger or peril—or of a “presence”—we will proceed to notice some well authenticated cases of spontaneous impressions of a definite character made upon the senses, and especially upon the sense of sight. This definite impression may be made upon the senses of the percipient in dreams—especially those of a veridical character, where there is a definite reality corresponding in time and circumstances.
It may also be made when the percipient is in a condition of reverie, between sleeping and waking, and even when wide awake and in a perfectly normal condition.
This definite impression of seeing or hearing may be made upon a single percipient, or it may be perceived by several persons at once.
The following may serve as examples of veridical dreams. They were carefully examined by the editors of Phantasms of the Living, and especially by Mr. Gurney. Only initials in the first case were given for publication.
“In the year 1857, I had a brother in the very centre of the Indian Mutiny. I had been ill in the spring and taken from my lessons in the school-room, consequently, I heard more of what was going on from the newspapers than a girl of thirteen ordinarily would in those days. We were in the habit of hearing regularly from my brother, but in June and July of that year no letters came, and what arrived in August proved to have been written quite early in the spring, and were full of disturbances around his station.
“He was in the service of the East India Company—an officer in the 8th Native Infantry. I was always devoted to him, and I grieved and fretted far more than any of my elders knew at his danger. I cannot say that I dreamt constantly of him, but when I did the impressions were very vivid and abiding.
“On one occasion his personal appearance was being discussed and I remarked, ‘He is not like that now, he has no beard nor whiskers;’ and when asked why I said such a thing, I replied, ‘I know it, for I have seen him in my dreams;’ and this brought a severe reprimand from my governess, who never allowed ‘such nonsense’ to be talked of.
“On the morning of the 25th of September, quite early, I awoke from a dream, to find my sister holding me and much alarmed. I had screamed and struggled, crying out, ‘Is he really dead?’ When I fully awoke, I felt a burning sensation in my head. I could not speak for a moment or two; I knew my sister was there, but I neither saw nor felt her.
“In about a minute, during which she said my eyes were staring beyond her, I ceased struggling cried out, ‘Harry’s dead, they have shot him,’ and fainted. When I recovered I found my sister had been sent away, and an aunt who had always looked after me, was sitting by my bed.
“In order to soothe my excitement, she allowed me to tell my dream, trying all the time to persuade me to regard it as a natural consequence of my anxiety.
“When, in my narration, I said he was riding with another officer and mounted soldiers behind them, she exclaimed ‘My dear, that shows you it is only a dream, for your brother is in an infantry, not a cavalry, regiment.’
“Nothing, however, shook my feeling that I had seen a reality; and she was so much struck by my persistence that she privately made notes of the dates and of the incidents, even to the minutest details of my dream, and then for a few days the matter dropped, but I felt the truth was coming nearer and nearer to all. In a short time the news came in the papers:—‘Shot down on the morning of the 25th, when on his way to Lucknow.’ A few days later came one of his missing letters, telling how his own regiment had mutinied, and that he had been transferred to a command in the 12th Irregular Cavalry, bound to join Havelock’s force in the relief of Lucknow.
“Some eight years after, the officer who was riding by him when he fell, Captain or Major Grant, visited us and when, in compliance with my aunt’s request, he detailed the incidents of that sad hour, his narration tallied (even to the description of buildings on their left) with the notes she had taken the morning of my dream. I should also add that we heard my brother had made the alteration in his beard and whiskers, just about the time that I had spoken of him as wearing them differently.”
“L. A. W.”
The next case which I will present is from Dr. A. K. Young, F. R. C. S. I., of the Terrace, Monaghan, Ireland.
One Monday night, in December, 1836, Dr. Young had the following dream, or, as he would prefer to call it, revelation. He found himself suddenly at the gate of Major N. M.’s avenue, many miles from his home. Close to him was a group of persons, one of them a woman with a basket on her arm, the rest men, four of whom were tenants of his own, while the others were unknown to him. Some of the strangers seemed to be murderously assaulting H. W., one of his tenants, and he interfered. He goes on to say:
“I struck violently at the man on my left and then with greater violence at the man’s face to my right. Finding to my surprise that I did not knock him down either, I struck again and again with all the violence of a man frenzied at the sight of my poor friend’s murder. To my great amazement I saw that my arms, although visible to my eye, were without substance; and the bodies of the men I struck at and my own came close together after each blow through the shadowy arms I struck with. My blows were delivered with more extreme violence than I ever before exerted; but I became painfully convinced of my incompetency. I have no consciousness of what happened after this feeling of unsubstantiality came upon me.”
Next morning, Dr. Young experienced the stiffness and soreness of violent bodily exercise and was informed by his wife that in the course of the night he had much alarmed her by striking out again and again with his arms in a terrific manner, “as if fighting for his life.” He in turn informed her of his dream and begged her to remember the names of the actors in it who were known to him.
On the morning of the following day, Wednesday, he received a letter from his agent, who resided in the town close to the scene of his dream, informing him that his tenant, H. W., had been found on Tuesday morning at Major N. M.’s gate speechless and apparently dying from a fracture of the skull, and that there was no trace of the murderers. That night Dr. Young started for the town and arrived there on Thursday morning. On his way to a meeting of the magistrates he met the senior magistrate of that part of the country and requested him to give orders for the arrest of the three men whom, besides H. W., he had recognized in his dream, and to have them examined separately. This was done. The three men gave identical accounts of the occurrence, and all named the woman who was with them. She was then arrested and gave precisely similar testimony.
They said that between eleven and twelve on Monday night they had been walking homeward, all together along the road, when they were overtaken by three strangers, two of whom savagely assaulted H. W., while the other prevented his friends from interfering. The man H. W. did not die, and no clue was ever found to the assassins.
The Bishop of Clogher writes confirmatory of Dr. Young’s account.
“Borderland cases” are those in which the percipient, though seeming to himself to be awake, may be in bed, has perhaps been asleep, and is in that condition between sleeping and waking known as reverie and which we have seen is favorable for the action of the subliminal self, either as agent or percipient.
Passing, then, from dreams to “Borderland cases,” the first example under this head which I will present is from Mrs. Richardson, of Combe Down, Bath, England.
She writes:—
“August 26th, 1882.
“On September 9th, 1848, at the Siege of Mooltan, my husband, Major-General Richardson, C. B., then adjutant of his regiment, was most severely wounded, and supposing himself dying, asked one of the officers with him to take the ring off his finger and send it to his wife, who at that time was fully one hundred and fifty miles distant, at Ferozepore. On the night of September 9th, 1848, I was lying in my bed between sleeping and waking, when I distinctly saw my husband being carried off the field seriously wounded, and heard his voice saying, ‘Take this ring off my finger and send it to my wife.’
“All the next day I could not get the sight nor the voice out of my mind. In due time I heard of Gen. Richardson having been severely wounded in the assault on Mooltan. He survived, however, and is still living. It was not for some time after the siege that I heard from Colonel L., the officer who helped to carry Gen. Richardson off the field, that the request as to the ring was actually made to him, just as I had heard it at Ferozepore at that very time.
“M. A. Richardson.”
The following questions were addressed to Gen. Richardson.
1. “Does Gen. Richardson remember saying, when he was wounded at Mooltan, ‘Take this ring off my finger and send it to my wife,’ or words to that effect?”
Ans. “Most distinctly; I made the request to my commanding officer, Major E. S. Lloyd, who was supporting me while my man was gone for assistance.”
2. “Can you remember the time of the incident?”
Ans. “So far as my memory serves me, I was wounded about nine P. M., on Sunday, the 9th September, 1848.”
3. “Had Gen. Richardson, before he left home, promised or said anything to Mrs. R. as to sending his ring to her in case he should be wounded?”
Ans. “To the best of my recollection, never. Nor had I any kind of presentiment on the subject. I naturally felt that with such a fire as we were exposed to, I might get hurt.”
The next case is from Miss Hosmer, the celebrated sculptor. It was written out by Miss Balfour, from the account given by Lydia Maria Child, and corrected by Miss Hosmer, July 15th, 1885.
“An Italian girl named Rosa was in my employ for some time, but was finally obliged to return home to her sister on account of confirmed ill-health. When I took my customary exercise on horseback, I frequently called to see her. On one of these occasions I called about six o’clock P. M., and found her brighter than I had seen her for some time past. I had long relinquished hopes of her recovery, but there was nothing in her appearance that gave me the impression of immediate danger. I left her with the expectation of calling to see her again many times. She expressed a wish to have a bottle of a certain kind of wine, which I promised to bring her myself next morning.
“During the remainder of the evening I do not recollect that Rosa was in my thoughts after I parted with her. I retired to rest in good health and in a quiet frame of mind. But I woke from a sound sleep with an oppressive feeling that some one was in the room.
“I reflected that no one could get in except my maid, who had the key to one of the two doors of my room—both of which doors were locked. I was able dimly to distinguish the furniture in the room. My bed was in the middle of the room with a screen around the foot of it. Thinking some one might be behind the screen I said, ‘Who’s there?’ but got no answer. Just then the clock in the adjacent room struck five; and at that moment I saw the figure of Rosa standing by my bedside; and in some way, though I could not venture to say it was through the medium of speech, the impression was conveyed to me from her of these words: ‘Adesso son felice, son contenta.’ And with that the figure vanished.
“At the breakfast table I said to the friend who shared the apartment with me, ‘Rosa is dead.’ ‘What do you mean by that?’ she inquired; ‘you told me she seemed better yesterday.’ I related the occurrence of the morning and told her I had a strong impression Rosa was dead. She laughed and said I had dreamed it all. I assured her I was thoroughly awake. She continued to jest on the subject and slightly annoyed me by her persistence in believing it a dream when I was perfectly sure of having been wide awake. To settle the question I summoned a messenger, and sent him to inquire how Rosa did. He returned with the answer that she died that morning at five o’clock.
“H. G. Hosmer.”
I will also introduce here as a “Borderland case” an extract from The Life and Times of Lord Brougham, written by himself (1871), the extract being an entry in his journal during a journey in Sweden in December, 1799. It is as follows:—
“We set out for Gothenburg [apparently on December 18th], determined to make for Norway. About one in the morning, arriving at a decent inn, we decided to stop over night. Tired with the cold of yesterday, I was glad to take advantage of a hot bath before I turned in, and here a most remarkable thing happened to me—so remarkable that I must tell the story from the beginning.
“After I left the High School, I went with G., my most intimate friend, to attend the classes at the University. There was no divinity class, but we frequently in our walks discussed and speculated upon many grave subjects—among others, on the immortality of the soul, and a future state. This question, and the possibility, I will not say of ghosts walking, but of the dead appearing to the living, were subjects of much speculation; and we actually committed the folly of drawing up an agreement written with our blood, to the effect that which ever of us died first should appear to the other, and thus solve any doubts we had entertained of the ‘life after death.’ After we had finished our classes at college, G. went to India, having got an appointment there in the Civil Service.
“He seldom wrote to me, and after the lapse of a few years I had almost forgotten him; moreover, his family having little connection with Edinburgh, I seldom saw or heard anything of them, or of him through them, so that all his school-boy intimacy had died out, and I had nearly forgotten his existence. I had taken, as I have said, a warm bath, and while lying in it and enjoying the comfort of the heat after the late freezing I had undergone, I turned my head round, looking towards the chair on which I had deposited my clothes, as I was about to get out of the bath. On the chair sat G., looking calmly at me.
“How I got out of the bath I know not, but on recovering my senses I found myself sprawling on the floor. The apparition, or whatever it was that had taken the likeness of G., had disappeared.
“This vision produced such a shock that I had no inclination to talk about it even to Stewart; but the impression it made upon me was too vivid to be easily forgotten; and so strongly was I affected by it that I have here written down the whole history, with the date, 19th December, and all the particulars, as they are now fresh before me.
“No doubt I had fallen asleep; and that the appearance presented so distinctly to my eyes was a dream, I cannot for a moment doubt; yet for years I had had no communication with G., nor had there been anything to recall him to my recollection; nothing had taken place during our Swedish travels either connected with G. or with India, or with anything relating to him, or to any member of his family. I could not discharge from my mind the impression that G. must have died, and that his appearance to me was to be received as a proof of a future state; yet all the while I felt convinced that the whole was a dream; and so painfully vivid, so unfading the impression, that I could not bring myself to talk of it or make the slightest allusion to it.”
In October, 1862, Lord Brougham added as a postscript:—
“I have just been copying out from my journal the account of this strange dream: Certissima mortis imago! And now to finish the story, begun about sixty years ago. Soon after my return to Edinburgh, there arrived a letter from India, announcing G.’s death, and stating that he had died on the 19th of December!
“Singular coincidence! Yet, when one reflects on the vast number of dreams which night after night pass through our brains, the number of coincidences between the vision and the event are perhaps fewer and less remarkable than a fair calculation of chances would warrant us to expect. Nor is it surprising, considering the variety of thoughts in sleep, and that they all bear some analogy to the affairs of life, that a dream should sometimes coincide with a contemporaneous, or even with a future, event. This is not much more wonderful than that a person whom we have had no reason to expect should appear to us at the very moment we have been thinking or speaking of him. So common is this, that it has for ages grown into the proverb, ‘Speak of the devil.’ I believe every such seeming miracle is, like every ghost story, capable of explanation.”
I have introduced in full Lord Brougham’s statement of the case and his method of reasoning upon it; let us for a moment analyze each.
I have also introduced Harriet Hosmer’s experience along with that of Lord Brougham, because they are both notable persons whose evidence regarding matters of fact could not be impugned, and whose strength of character, honesty of purpose, and knowledge of affairs enables us to throw out of account any idea of imposture or self-deception in either case. These cases, then, must be received as having actually occurred as related; and being so received they render all the more credible other cases reported by persons less well known.
What was the character of the apparitions or appearances which were presented; were they, properly speaking, dreams? In Miss Hosmer’s statement she stoutly affirms that she was awake, and she gives good reasons for so believing, namely, before she saw anything, but only felt that some one was in the room, she awoke from a sound sleep; she reasoned with herself regarding the possibility of any one getting into the room; she called out: “Who’s there?” She saw the furniture, heard the clock strike, and counted five; and in another account which I also have, she heard the familiar noises about the house of servants at their usual work, and she resolved to get up. All this before she saw anything unusual; then turning her head she saw Rosa. Clearly this was not a dream but a vision occurring possibly in a condition of reverie.
Taking up Lord Brougham’s case: in simply recording the facts in his diary he speaks of his experience as a vision and the idea that it was a dream was evidently an after-thought. He was enjoying the heat; he was about to get out of the bath; he turned his head. He describes the sensations and actions of a man who is awake, or certainly not in a condition to have dreams disconnected with his actual surroundings. After all this, looking toward the chair upon which he had deposited his clothes—still a part of his surroundings, of which he was perfectly conscious—he saw G. on the chair looking calmly at him.
Now to have dreamt of G., his old school-fellow and friend, looking calmly at him, would not have been anything shocking nor even surprising; it would not have been even uncommon among dreams—it would have been nothing out of the ordinary course of nature. Dreams seldom shock or even surprise us—surely not unless there is something intrinsically shocking represented by them; but when we see the phantasm of a person whom we know cannot be there—that is unusual, that is not in the ordinary course of nature, as we are accustomed to observe nature, and it surprises us, shocks us, perhaps frightens us; but it does so because we are awake and can reason about it and compare its strangeness with the usual order of things.
Lord Brougham was awake, he did so reason, and was accordingly shocked.
So vivid was the apparition that he tumbled out of the bath and fainted. It is only some time after this, when writing up his diary, that he has no doubt that he had fallen asleep. Preconceived theories about apparitions now come up in his mind and get him into trouble; he must explain his vision.
Now for the explanation. Lord Brougham finds, on returning to Scotland, that his former friend is dead, and that the time of his death corresponded with the time at which he had seen his apparition in Sweden, December 19th.
“Singular coincidence!” That is Lord Brougham’s explanation; and that is the usual explanation; but it is ill-considered—it is weak—it does not cover the ground.
Lord Brougham had but two theories from which to choose: namely, Chance and Supernaturalism; and of the two horns of the dilemma he chose the easier one.
Let us, however, place ourselves, for the moment, on his ground, namely, that (1) It was a dream; and (2) dreams are so numerous that it is not surprising that some of them coincide with contemporaneous events.
Evidently the more numerous the coincidences, or the dreams which correspond to contemporaneous events, the weaker becomes the theory of chance coincidences. Supposing, then, Lord Brougham’s case to have been unique, that not another similar case was known to have occurred, then we should have no particular hesitation in assigning it to the category of chance coincidences; but even then it would be out of the order of usual coincidences both in interest and the number of separate points involved; it would excite special interest, but the reference of it to chance would not be considered unreasonable: if, however, three or four such cases had been reported and discussed in a generation, thoughtful people would begin to inquire if there might not be some relation of sequence, or possibly of cause and effect; but when hundreds of cases have been reported, because they have been systematically sought for—veridical dreams connected with the moment of the death of the agent, with fainting, with trance, with moments of supreme excitement, or of extreme danger, so many different conditions in which by careful observation it is found that such hallucinations and symbols relating to actual contemporaneous occurrences originate and are telepathically transmitted—the matter is then quite removed from the category of chance coincidences, and any attempt to force these cases there to-day denotes either ignorance of established facts or inability to appreciate logical reasoning or even mathematical demonstration. This is all upon the supposition that the case in question was a dream. On the other hand, now place the case where it really belongs as a waking or Borderland vision—an event in a class a hundred-fold less numerous than dreams—and in which class corresponding events are at least tenfold more numerous, and we see how conspicuously weak is the coincidence theory.
Neither need the other horn of the dilemma, namely, Supernaturalism, any longer be taken. A newly recognized method of mental interaction is gradually coming into view; a new principle and law in psychology is being established; and under this law the erratic and discredited facts of history as well as the facts of present observation and experiment are falling into line and becoming intelligible.
The new principle or law, as we have seen, is this: Perceptions, of the class which have usually been known as hallucinations, may be originated and transferred telepathically; in other words, there is a subliminal self, which, under various conditions on the part of either agent or percipient, or both, may come to the surface and act, impressing the sensitive percipient through the senses, by dreams, visions, and apparitions, as well as through hallucinations of hearing and touch.
Returning to our well considered cases illustrating some of these various conditions: having presented examples of veridical or truth-telling dreams, and of waking or borderland visions also corresponding to actual events taking place at the same time, I will next present cases where the percipient was undoubtedly awake and in a normal condition. The following case is reported on the authority of Surgeon Harris of the Royal Artillery, who, with his two daughters, was a witness of the occurrence:
“A party of children, sons and daughters of the officers of artillery stationed at Woolwich, were playing in the garden. Suddenly a little girl screamed, and stood staring with an aspect of terror at a willow tree standing in the grounds. Her companions gathered round, asking what ailed her. ‘Oh!’ said she, ‘there—there. Don’t you see? There’s papa lying on the ground, and the blood running from a big wound.’ All assured her that they could see nothing of the kind. But she persisted, describing the wound and the position of the body, still expressing surprise that they did not see what she so plainly saw. Two of her companions were daughters of one of the surgeons of the regiment, whose house adjoined the garden. They called their father, who at once came to the spot. He found the child in a state of extreme terror and agony, took her into his house, assured her it was only a fancy, and having given her restoratives sent her home. The incident was treated by all as what the doctor had called it, a fancy, and no more was thought of it. News from India, where the child’s father was stationed, was in those days slow in coming, but the arrival of the mail in due course brought the information that the father of the child had been killed by a shot, and died under a tree. Making allowances for difference in time, it was found to have been about the moment when the daughter had the vision at Woolwich.”
The next case is from Mr. Francis Dart Fenton, formerly in the native department of the Government, Auckland, New Zealand. In 1852, when the incident occurred, Mr. Fenton was engaged in forming a settlement on the banks of the Waikato.
He writes:—