{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_36908/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_36908","id":"gutenberg_36908","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/36908","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Psychiatry/Psychology","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Personality disorders","Psychology, Pathological","Spiritualism"],"text":"</pre>\n\n\n\nProduced by Suzanne Shell, Mary Meehan and the Online\nDistributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This\nfile was produced from images generously made available\nby The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n                   SPIRITUALISM AND THE NEW PSYCHOLOGY\n\nAN EXPLANATION OF SPIRITUALIST PHENOMENA AND BELIEFS IN TERMS OF MODERN\nKNOWLEDGE\n\n                            BY MILLAIS CULPIN\n\n\n    WITH AN INTRODUCTION\n    BY PROFESSOR LEONARD HILL\n\n    LONDON\n\n    EDWARD ARNOLD\n\n    1920\n\n    [_All rights reserved_]\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\n\nMy object in writing this book is to present an explanation of so-called\noccult phenomena concerning which credulity is still as busy as in the\ndays of witchcraft. The producers of these phenomena have been exposed\nefficiently and often, but their supporters are as active as ever, and\nshow a simple faith which is more convincing than any argument.\nMoreover, the producers themselves--mediums, clairvoyants,\nwater-diviners, seers, or whatever they may be--are sometimes of such\napparent honesty and simplicity that disbelief seems almost a sacrilege;\ntherefore part of my aim is to show how a man believing firmly in his\nown honesty may yet practise elaborate trickery and deceit.\n\nAs the book is intended for readers presumably unacquainted with the\ntrend of modern psychology, it is necessary to point out how much of the\nopinions set forth are accepted by workers at the subject.\n\nThe theory of dissociation has, as far as I know, no opponents. It was\napplied by Pierre Janet to hysteria and water-divining, thought-reading,\netc., all of which he regarded as psychologically identical.[1]\n\n[Footnote 1: See _L'Automatisme Psychologique_. Alcan; Paris.]\n\nThe theory of the unconscious, which we owe to Freud, of Vienna, is\nstill strongly opposed, and the influence, or even the existence, of\nrepressions is disputed by those who have not looked for them,\nundoubted cases of loss of memory being regarded as something of quite\ndifferent nature. A growing number of workers, however, both here and in\nAmerica, appreciate the importance of these contributions to psychology.\n\nThe possible development of the hysteric from the malingerer by the\nrepression of the knowledge of deceit is an idea of my own, which is not\naccepted by any one of importance.\n\nThese explanations are necessary in fairness to the reader, but I regard\nappeals to authority on matters of opinion as pernicious, and try to\npresent my opinions in such a way as to allow them to be judged on their\nmerits.\n\nNevertheless, since I take for granted that supernatural phenomena are\nnot what their producers would have us believe, and at the same time\nmake no general attempt to prove their human origin, I must refer the\nreader to books on the subject, viz., _Studies in Psychical Research_,\nby the late Frank Podmore, which treats the spiritualists\nsympathetically and weakens occasionally in its unbelief; _Spiritualism\nand Sir Oliver Lodge_, by Dr. Charles Mercier, which is a direct and\nvigorous attack upon them; and _The Question_, by Edward Clodd, a book\ndealing with the subject historically from primitive man to 'Feda'.\nStuart Cumberland, in _Spiritualism--the Inside Truth_, records some of\nthe results of his vain search for spiritist phenomena that will bear\ninvestigation; and in _The Road to Endor_ the authors relate the story\nof a deliberate fraud that was accepted by their friends as a genuine\nmanifestation.\n\nM. C.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\nPREFACE\n\nINTRODUCTION\n\nI. THE UNCONSCIOUS\n\nII. COMPLEXES\n\nIII. FORGETTING AND REPRESSION\n\nIV. DISSOCIATION\n\nV. WATER-DIVINING\n\nVI. SUGGESTION\n\nVII. HYPNOTISM\n\nVIII. DREAMS\n\nIX. HYSTERIA\n\nX. EXPERIMENTS, DOMESTIC AND OTHER\n\nXI. ABOUT MEDIUMS\n\nXII. THE ACCOUNTS OF BELIEVERS\n\nXIII. THE EVOLUTION OF THE MEDIUM\n\nCONCLUSION\n\n\n\n\nINTRODUCTION\n\nBY PROFESSOR LEONARD HILL, F.R.S.\n\n\nThe body of man is made up of an infinite number of cells--minute masses\nof living substance--grouped into organs subserving particular\nfunctions, and held together by skeletal structures, bones and\ncontaining membranes such as the horny layer of the skin which are\nformed by the living cells. The whole is comparable to citizens grouped\nin farms and factories subserving one or other function necessary for\nthe commonweal; and just as the city has its transport connecting the\nwhole, distributing food and the various products of the factories, a\ndrainage and scavenger system taking away the waste material, and a\ntelephone system through which operations can be ordered and\nco-ordinated according to the needs of the commonweal, so has the body\nits blood circulation, digestive and excretive systems, and a\nco-ordinating nervous system. How small are the cells, how infinite\ntheir number is shown by the fact that each drop of blood the size of a\npin's head contains five million red corpuscles; there are five or six\npints of blood in the body!\n\nThe living substance, e.g. of a nerve cell, appears as a watery\nsubstance crowded with a countless number of granules, which are so\nsmall that only the light dispersed around each is visible under the\nhighest power of the microscope when illuminated by a beam of light\nagainst a dark ground, just as the halo of each dust particle in the air\nis made visible by a beam of light crossing a dark room, and just as\nthese dust particles are in dancing motion due to the currents of air,\nso are the particles in the living substance ceaselessly kept dancing by\nthe play of inter-molecular forces. From the dead substance of the cells\nthe chemist extracts various complex colloidal substances, e.g.\nproteins, fats, carbohydrates, and various salts, and these in their\nturn he can resolve into chemical elements. The interplay of energy\nbetween the multitude of electrically charged granules inside the cell,\nand the environment outside keeps up the dance of life, the radiant\nenergy of the sun, and the atomic energy of the elements being the\nultimate source of the energy transmutations exhibited by both living\nand non-living matter.\n\nIn the living cell there is an interplay of the energy of masses of\nmolecules forming the granules, of single molecules in watery solution,\nof atoms which compose the molecules, and of electrons, the various\ngroupings of which compose the atoms of the elements. The elements\nthemselves are now recognised to be transmutable through simplification\nand rearrangement of their electronic structure, and to be evolved out\nof one primordial electronic unit, a unit of energy, unknowable in\nnature, out of the groupings and transmutations of which arise all\nmanner of living and non-living forms, the apparently indestructible\nstable materials being no less in a state of flux and evolution than the\nmost unstable. The complexity of the transmutations of energy and\nultimate unknowableness and mystery of their cause are no less in the\ncase of a drop of water or a particle of dirt than in that of a living\ncell. The scientific conception of the universe, the very opposite of\nmaterialism, approaches pantheism.\n\nThe living substance of a uni-cellular organism, similarly the congery\nof cells forming the body of man, has evolved the power of sensing and\nof moving towards, or away from life-giving or destroying sources of\nenergy. Special sense-organs, receptive of one or other form of energy\nhave been evolved through the aeons of the struggle for existence,\ntogether with nervous and muscular systems, to enable him to preserve\nhis life in the midst of the shocks and thrills of his environment.\nThere are also evolved inner senses, and a sympathetic nervous system\nwhich knits all parts of the body in harmonious action; the community of\naction also being brought about by the circulating fluids of the body,\nthe blood and the lymph, to which each living cell gives and from which\neach cell takes. For communion with the environment, eyes for visual,\nand sense organs in the skin for thermal radiant energy have been\nperfected, ears for sound waves travelling through air, taste organs for\nsubstances in solution, smell organs for particles of substances\nfloating in the atmosphere, touch organs for sensing movements of\nmasses.\n\nThe receptive cells of the special sense organs are composed of watery,\ngranular, living substance and elaborate mechanisms have been evolved\nfor converting one or other form of energy into such a form that it can\nbe received by the living substance, e.g. the intricate structure of the\neye with its focussing lenses, retinal cells laden with pigment\nsensitive to light, the ear with its drum membrane vibrating in unison\nwith sound waves in the air, its chain of transmitting osicles, and\ncomplicated receiving organ placed in the spiral turns of the cochlea.\nBe it noted, the receptive cells of the sense organs are immersed in\nfluid, and each sense organ is specifically sensitive, i.e. only to that\nform of energy which it has been evolved to receive through countless\nages of evolution.\n\nThe nervous system is composed of myriads of nerve cells, and of nervous\nfibres, which are long and exceedingly slender processes of these cells\nformed of similar substance, each shielded and insulated by a double\ncoat. The nerve cells and the nerves are arranged in an ordered plan\nwhich has been unravelled by ingenious methods. They connect all parts\nof the body one with another. Think of the whole telephone system of\nBritain linked up together with millions of receivers, thousands of\nlocal exchanges, hundreds of central exchanges, etc., the nervous system\nwith its sense organs, sensory nerves, lower and higher nerve centres\nand motor nerves, is infinitely more intricate than that. The whole\nforms an interlacing feltwork formed of watery nerve cells and\nprocesses, and not only receives sensory stimuli and transmits them as\nmotor impulses, but is more or less permanently _modified_ by each\nsensory thrill which enters it, memorising each, more or less, for\nlonger or shorter time according to its character or intensity. Thus the\nresponse of the nervous system to sensory excitation changes with\neducation, habits form and character develops from birth to manhood, to\ndecay again from manhood to old age, ceaselessly changing, but becoming\ngraved on a certain plan. The making thereof depends on inborn qualities\nof the living substance--the conjugate product of the male and female\nparents, this moulded by environmental conditions, both in utero and\nafter birth, by food, and the ceaseless instreaming of sensations.\nDepending on the nutrition of the cortex of the great brain, abrogated\nby narcotics, absent in sleep, consciousness of our being flickers from\nmoment to moment, the product of the instreaming of sensations from the\nouter world and from our own body, and of memories of past sensations,\naroused, by some present sensation. Conscious judgement arises from the\nbalancing of present sensations with memorised sensations and leads to\npurposeful actions.\n\nBeneath the conscious world an infinite host of functions are carried\nout unconsciously, functions depending on the nervous connection of one\npart with another, just as the common people carry out a host of actions\nthrough the telephone system without the cognisance of the government\nwhich is seated at the highest central exchange.\n\nTo find food, satisfy the sexual instinct, escape enemies, gain shelter\nfrom excessive physical changes of environment, the special senses and\nnervous system have then been evolved and perfected in the intricacy of\ntheir mechanism through vast aeons of evolution. There is evidence that\nman has for some million years trod the earth; but the senses of sight,\nhearing, smell, taste, touch were evolved in the vast procession of\nlower animals which preceded him for those millions of years which reach\nback and ever back to the first generation of life.\n\nThe realisation of these facts saves the physiologist from being\ndeceived, either by fraudulent tricks or those natural chances of human\noccurrence which occasion the belief of the credulous in telepathy. He\nrecognises that the human nervous system is built on a common plan, and\nthat it is to be expected that the sensory stimuli received from a given\nenvironmental condition will often arouse the same train of thought in\ntwo or more people, standing together, especially in those who\nhabitually associate. Such coincidences of thought, which astonish the\nignorant, are due to natural law. Human experience shows that\njudgements of fundamental importance which would, if transmittable to\nanother at a distance by telepathy, win a fortune, save a defeat, etc.,\nare never so transmitted. The Stock Exchange and the army in the field\nmust have their telephone and telegraph systems and messengers. No more\nconcentrated will to send information, which might bring succour, say\nfrom the artillery, could be given than by men in peril of their lives\nin the trenches, when the enemy came swarming over the top, but we know\nthat with the wires cut and the human messengers killed no succour came.\nNeither does it come to the liner which, in full proud course with its\nfreight of thousands of souls strikes an iceberg, unless the wireless\nmechanism be installed and operated so that the S.O.S. signal is\ndespatched. Otherwise it sinks without trace, as the Germans advised\ntheir 'U' boats to let their victim merchant ships sink.\n\nThe phenomena of wireless telegraphy and of radio-active elements have\nled people to think that some direct means of communication of energy\nfrom one brain to another may be possible, that is without intervention\nof the special senses. There is not the least evidence in favour of this\nview; the evolution of the senses is wholly against it. It is true that\nall vital activity is accompanied by electrical change--by a flow of\nelectrons--in the living matter, the nervous impulse itself may be so\ntransmitted. Such electrical change by a special evolution of structure\nis magnified in the electric organ of certain fishes and used by them as\na weapon of offence. It is then sensed just as an electric shock from a\nbattery is sensed, and the intensity of the shock lessens inversely as\nthe square of the distance. There is no evidence that the minute\nelectrical changes accompanying nervous action in man are transmittable\nto a distance through space; the nerves are evolved to confine and\nconvey these as nerve impulses to suitable receivers within their body\nwhereby function is co-ordinated.\n\nA radio-active element enters into the composition of the living matter,\ne.g. potassium. A nutritive fluid can be prepared from a watery solution\nof sodium calcium and potassium salts capable of keeping the excised\nheart of the frog in action. The place of potassium in this fluid can be\ntaken by the energy radiated from radio-active material placed suitably\nnear the weak solution of the other two salts which contains the heart.\nToo strong a radiation kills the heart. Wonderful as this new discovery\nis it is comparable with the well-known fact that the radiant energy of\nthe sun--either heat rays or the cold ultraviolet rays of intense\nchemical action--while beneficent, when properly graded, kill the living\nsubstance which is over-exposed to them. Hence the evolution of the\ngreen colour of plants and the pigment in the skin of animals, which\nacts as screens.\n\nIt has recently been shown that trees pick up the long waves used in\nwireless telegraphy, and can be used as receivers, but there is no\nevidence that animals are sensitive to these waves. No one knew either\nof their existence or of that of magnetic storms until instruments were\ninvented suitably tuned to pick up the waves of energy and demonstrate\nthem to one or other of man's special senses--sight, hearing or touch.\n\nEvery invention of science goes to prove that knowledge enters only\nthrough the avenue of the senses, which are tuned to the receipt of\ncertain forms of energy. Other forms of energy to which the senses are\nnot tuned must be converted by instrumental means into a form of energy\nwhich can be sensed.\n\nContrary then to scientific evidence is the supposition that waves of\nenergy proceed directly through space from the watery granular living\nsubstance of one brain, confined within skull and skin, and passes into\nthe similar substance of another. If any such direct transmission and\nreception of energy were possible why were aeons spent in the evolution\nof sense organs, and why is the labour of men spent in perfecting the\nmeans of communication of his thoughts by observation of the movements\nof expression, by speech, writing, semaphore, heliograph, telegraph and\ntelephone and by waves of energy sent through wires or wireless space?\n\nIn _The Road to Endor_, we read how two clever officers, E. H. Jones and\nC. W. Hill, giving the whole time of a tedious captivity to evolving\ntricks of the business, successfully fooled a hundred of their\nfellow-officer prisoners, men of intelligence and education, into belief\nin telepathy. In the appendix of their book there is given a portion of\ntheir telepathy code to show the sort of system which may be worked, a\ncode which allowed the communication of the names of hundreds of common\narticles, numbers, the names of all the officers in the camp, etc. They\ncould use the code with, or without speaking; perfection in its use, the\nauthors say, involved a good deal of memory work and constant practice.\n'Nothing but the blankness of our days, and the necessity of keeping our\nminds from rusting could have excused the waste of time entailed by\npreparation for a thought-reading exhibition. It is hardly a fitting\noccupation for free men.' What these officers could do obviously the\nprofessional conjurer can do, no less the humbug and quack who swindles\nmoney out of the credulous and superstitious. Let no one give credence\nto telepathy till he or she has read this most amusing and educative\nbook. The authors no less humbugged the camp by planchette writing\nwhereby they transmitted messages supposed to come from disembodied\nspirits. They fooled not only their fellow-prisoners with these spirit\nmessages, but the Turkish interpreter and Commandant of the camp,\ngaining thereby important concessions. They planned a daring method of\nescape which depended on exciting the cupidity of the Commandant and on\na hunt for buried treasure, occupying many months of preparation, and\nonly failing at the last through the unwitting interference of a brother\nofficer. Some of their 'spirit' messages were actually transmitted\nthrough the Commandant to the War Office in Constantinople, so implicit\nbecame his obedience. What these two officers affected is unequalled by\nanything in Sir Oliver Lodge's evidence as set forth in _Raymond_. They\ngive details of how they used chance remarks and trivial facts heard and\nmemorised months beforehand, and of how they observed and were guided by\nthe slightest variation in tone of answer or movement of their victims,\nwhich expressed interest and excitement or the reverse, and so built up\na story of some past action which clinched belief. The hits were\nstriking and memorised, and the misses unnoticed, forgotten--for such is\nthe tendency of the human mind. Such are the methods of the professional\nmedium, and in _The Road to Endor_ they lie unravelled and fully\nexposed.\n\nThe physiologist recognises the tendency of those with unstable, nervous\ntemperaments--e.g. hysterical girls--to gain interest and cause\nexcitement at any cost of trouble in developing methods of deceit. Hence\nthe ghostly visitations of houses, the mysterious bell-ringings,\nrappings, spillings of water, etc. I, myself, have personally come\nacross and investigated two of these cases--one of a young, educated\nwoman who played pranks on the house of her hosts, pouring water into\ntheir beds, etc.; the other of a servant-maid who caused the\ndisappearance of meat from the larder, and dirtying the cat's feet made\nit make foot-marks on a perpendicular wall leading to the larder window,\nwho spirited away the gardener's firewood and wrote mysterious letters\nin a feigned hand, the imprint of which were found in her blotting-book,\nand who reported she saw a mysterious woman prowling round the house.\n\nThe few eminent scientists who have expressed their belief in\nspiritualism are mostly physicists, e.g. Crookes, Oliver Lodge and W.\nBarrett--men who have not made a life-study of physiology and nervous\ndisorders, who are not familiar with the attainments and methods of\nconjurers and professional impostors, and are shielded in their\nlaboratories and home life from close acquaintance with human deceit and\ncunning. Their familiarity with the transmission of waves of energy in\ndead material, and through space leads them to concepts which cannot\njustly be applied to living beings. To the physiologist, who recognises\nthe majestic unity of natural phenomena, belief in telepathy and\nspiritualism appear a form of materialism as gross as the ju-ju\nsuperstition of the Benin native.\n\nNothing can excite greater contempt than the mean trivialities which are\nserved as communications from that infinite, silent universe wherein the\nenergy of individual life sinks on death.\n\nThe belief in spiritualism works grave harm on ignorant, credulous\npeople of nervous temperament, and fills the pockets of rascally\nimpostors. Its practice should then be as sternly suppressed by the law\nas any other fraud and imposture. Dr. Culpin, in his valuable and\nthoughtful treatment of this subject, shows, _inter alia_, how the\nmedium requires no less to be protected from deception and ruin of his\nown soul than does his dupe.\n\n\n\n\nSPIRITUALISM AND THE NEW PSYCHOLOGY\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nTHE UNCONSCIOUS\n\n\nFrom the moment of waking till we fall asleep again our thoughts are\nbusy, one thought following another all day long without a break and\neach being in some way related to the preceding one. Memories come up\ninto the stream, the outer world is constantly affecting it through our\nsenses, and we tend to think that all our mind-work is done in this\n'stream of consciousness'.\n\nBut beneath our stream of consciousness lies a deep sea of memories,\nfeelings, and directive influences. All our previous experience is\nburied there, and no man knows how much he knows. Every one has\nexperienced the sudden recollections which come up unsought when a\nsight, a sound, or a scent makes association with something long past\nand apparently forgotten; and not only our memories of things, places,\nand people, but our past mental processes themselves lie in this deep\nsea of the _unconscious_, to help or hinder us in the present or\nfuture.\n\nI speak of the unconscious, though there are objections to the use of\nthe word, which may lead to such a contradiction of terms as\n'unconscious knowledge'. It is much more than a storehouse of memories:\nit is the seat of mental processes which take place unknown to us and\nare revealed at times in strange and unexpected ways. It comes into\ncontact with the stream of consciousness, and, as we so often find in\nattempting to classify natural phenomena, there are no well-marked lines\nof demarcation between one and the other, though the extremes are\ndefinite enough.\n\nThe unconscious is not always a willing servant and often refuses to\nobey the wishes of its owner. Every one has at some time vainly tried to\nrecall a name which is 'on the tip of the tongue', and one name after\nanother is tried till perhaps the right one comes up and leaves us\nwondering where the difficulty was. There is, according to the teaching\nof some psychologists, always a reason for this failure to remember,\nthough even an apparently ordinary example may need a skilful analysis\nto show how the failure arose and why the other names presented\nthemselves. Slips of the tongue are likewise dependent upon unconscious\ninfluences, and, although I was once sceptical, a few examinations of my\nown slips have convinced me of the truth of this little theory. Here is\nan example of one of them, such as occurs often enough and would\nordinarily be passed over without further examination:--\n\nSitting one evening with friends who were interested in this subject, I\nread aloud a paragraph from the book I was reading, and was asked the\nname of the author. My answer, after a slight pause, was 'Robert Brown';\nit was immediately corrected by one of my friends, who pointed out that\nthe author was Robert Smith (the names are fictitious), and called upon\nme for an explanation of the mistake. The first question was, 'Who is\nBrown?' and the only Brown I knew was a man concerning whom I had a few\ndays before received a letter with information about him which led me to\nregard him with strong dislike. The next point was that we had been\nrecently discussing the private life of Robert Smith, and I had\nmanifested dislike towards his actions. Then I remembered that when I\nwas asked the name of the author there had flashed into my consciousness\nthe feeling that he was not precisely the sort of man I liked. Although\nthe rest of the chain of thought was unknown to me at the time, yet it\nbecame plain, under my friends' cross-examination, that this feeling of\ndislike had called up the name of the other victim of my displeasure,\nthough questions from my friends were necessary before I could remember\nto whom the other name referred.\n\nThe last point is quite characteristic, for there seems to be a definite\nresistance in the mind of the perpetrator of the slip against piecing\ntogether his thought processes, and the aid of some one else is\nnecessary to enable, or force him, to do it; then he feels compelled to\nacknowledge the hidden thoughts. The difficulty in recognising and\nadmitting the cause of such slips is due to their being so often the\nexpression of feelings which the owner does not like to publish to the\nworld or perhaps even acknowledge to himself.\n\nBut the unconscious is not always, or even often, such a useless\nintruder upon our everyday life. It economises our energies, and often\ntakes us by short cuts to ends which would otherwise need continued\nreasoning. 'Intuition' is the product of previous experience, and rises\ninto the consciousness as a finished judgement without the owner of the\ngift being aware of the factors concerned in its formation. One kind of\nintuition is improperly called in my profession 'clinical instinct',\nbut, unlike instinct, it is a result of training and experience, and is\nnever seen without them. Here is an example which came under my notice:\nAn ophthalmic house-surgeon, busy with new patients, sees a man aged\nabout thirty-five, who complains of failing sight, and without further\ninvestigation he writes on the man's book, 'Tobacco amblyopia?' and\nsends him in to his chief. Later on his chief asks him, 'How did you\nspot this case?' and the house-surgeon answers, 'I don't know, but he\nlooked like it'. The chief agrees that there is something which can be\nseen but not described in the looks of a sufferer from this complaint.\nNow this house-surgeon, though keen on his work, had seen only a few\ncases of that disease, and I do not now accept his explanation of how he\n'spotted' it. A man of thirty-five may find his sight failing from\nvarious causes, but the common ones are not many. If the cause had been\n'long-sight', he would have complained that he could not see to read;\ncertain general diseases causing loss of sight at that age would perhaps\nhave visible symptoms; the man was too young for cataract, and his eyes\nlooked healthy. In short, tobacco amblyopia was a reasonable guess, and,\nwhen we remember that the disease is caused by smoking strong pipe\ntobacco, and that the man who smokes that tobacco generally smells of\nit, it is fair to suppose that it was not the evidence of his eyes alone\nthat guided the house-surgeon in his guess, though he was not conscious\nof any train of reasoning nor was he aware of the smell of stale\ntobacco.\n\nThis suggests that a stimulus may act upon our thoughts without our\nbeing conscious of the origin of the feeling produced, and this is what\nhappens in connection with that well-known sensation, felt on visiting a\nnew place, that one has been there before. If a close examination is\nmade it will be found that there is really something--a picture, a\nscent, or even so slight a stimulus as a puff of warm air--which has\nstirred a memory in the unconscious; this memory fails to reach the\nconsciousness in its entirety, or it would immediately be recognised as\ncaused by the particular stimulus, but in its incomplete form it appears\nas a memory of nothing in particular. Such a memory being inconceivable\nit is at once joined on to the whole scene, and one feels 'I've surely\nbeen here before'. This feeling may be regarded as an intuition in its\nmost useless and incomplete form, but its theoretical importance will be\nseen later.\n\nWomen exercise intuition more than do men, and up to a point this gives\nthem an advantage, though it may annoy the male who prefers to find his\nreasons on the surface and call them logical.\n\n    'The reason why I cannot tell,\n    But this I know and know full well,\n    I do not like thee, Dr. Fell',\n\nis a perfect example of intuition, and a full analysis of the\nunconscious of the poet would undoubtedly recall a wealth of reasons\nwhy. Still, intuition is likely to be a fallible guide, and the man who\nwishes to avoid trouble with his personal dislikes must always be\nprepared to check it by whatever conscious knowledge and reasoning power\nhe may possess. The lines quoted above would be a poor defence against a\ncharge of assault.\n\nThe person who is guided by intuition in some accustomed situation may\nbe incapable of understanding why another person has not that power. I\nsaw an example of this when I was making a short journey in the North\nQueensland bush with a white boy who had been reared in that district,\nbut was a stranger to the particular locality in which we then were. It\nwas a rainy day, and we were bound for a place which could be reached by\nfollowing a stream down to the main river and then travelling up the\nlatter, and this route I proposed to take. My companion showed\nastonishment at this, and said, pointing as it were along the other side\nof the triangle, 'But that's the way.' I agreed, but told him that I\ncouldn't find the way and should get 'bushed' if I tried. He could not\nunderstand, but we set off for a ride of some nine to ten miles through\nfairly dense timber with the boy as guide. In vain I asked him how he\nkept his course; in similar circumstances I should have marked a tree as\nfar ahead as possible and ridden towards it, marking another before I\nreached the first, and so on. All he could say was, 'That's the way',\nand I puzzled him by my questions more than he puzzled me by his ability\nto go straight to our destination.\n\nThe sense of direction is of course well known amongst animals, and I\nhave often in my bush-days confidently trusted my horse to take me to\nhis and my home on the darkest of nights. Although one talks of the\n'sense of direction', there is no need to assume anything more than\nordinary sense perceptions interpreted by the unconscious workings of\nthe mind. The man who is over-anxious about his capabilities cannot\nallow his unconscious to take charge of his thoughts in this way. I was\nalways afraid of being lost in the bush and always preoccupied with the\nneed for carefully watching my course; therefore, although I could find\nmy way, I never developed a 'sense of direction'.\n\nTo sum up, the unconscious is a collection of mental processes,\nmemories, desires, and influences of infinite variety which are not\nalways or even often perceived as such by our conscious mind, but the\npresence of which may and does influence our thoughts and actions. By\nits aid we obtain results the factors of which are unknown to us, and of\nwhich we fail to recognise the origin, and in it is stored not only what\nwe remember but also what we forget. It is in relation to our stream of\nconsciousness and normally blends with it, but the more independently we\ncan allow it to operate the more surely does it reach its end in certain\ncases.\n\nI must add that Freud introduces a _foreconscious_ to indicate the\nmind-contents which are accessible to the consciousness, but are not of\nit, but for the sake of simplicity I have avoided the use of that word.\nThe reader must bear in mind that such terms are used to describe not\nphenomena, but conceptions. Newspapers, the voices of men in the train\nor the street, marks on ballot-papers, are all phenomena, but 'public\nopinion' is only a conception useful to facilitate the expression of\nideas. If one asks, 'Where is this unconscious and what does it look\nlike?', I can only answer by asking, 'Where is this \"public opinion\" and\nwhat does it look like?'\n\nThe same caution is necessary in regard to other phrases. The stream of\nconsciousness and dissociation are conceptions only, and are not\nintended to indicate the existence of things having relation to each\nother in space; the words are used as convenient means to sum up\nprocesses which I hope to show really take place.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nCOMPLEXES\n\n\nEvery man likes to think that his creed, religious, political, or\nsocial, is founded upon reason; but let the reader consider the beliefs\nof his acquaintances and he will soon realise that they depend far more\nupon early training, social position, and the general influence of\nsurroundings than upon any reasoning process. After this exercise let\nhim turn his critical powers upon his own beliefs and examine closely\nhow far they are dependent upon reason or upon influences which he has\nnot recognised before.\n\nWho can say that, in the days when Home-Rulers and anti-Home-Rulers\nabounded, the average voter was swayed by a reasoned knowledge of the\nsubject? Yet he was quite sure that his side was right and the other\nwrong, and found it hard to understand how any sane man could own the\nopinions the other fellows held. Let us picture two neighbours of\nopposite political beliefs:--if they are both keen gardeners they may\nexchange views about methods and manures, and in case of difference of\nopinion one will possibly convince the other by argument. On other\nmatters, too, they will mutually be open to conviction. If one favours\nIlfracombe for a holiday and the other swears by Torquay, the latter may\ndecide to try Ilfracombe for a change. But let them discuss Home Rule\ntill the crack of doom and neither will convince the other by any\nprocess of reasoning; yet each will believe firmly that his opinions are\nthe results of reason, finding an infinity of argument to support them.\n\nOr let anyone start a discussion on a so-called moral question, such as\npolygamy. He will arouse the warmest expressions of opinion that\npolygamy is sinful, absurd, and unworkable, and may point in vain to\nsuch countries as China, where it apparently works with no more trouble\nthan occurs with our system. Reasons will be showered on him, but\nscarcely anyone will admit that he objects to polygamy because he has\nbeen taught to regard monogamy as the only proper state of marriage.\n\nA man, honestly believing that he is always actuated by certain moral\nprinciples, may do things which others regard as opposed to those\nprinciples, and if approached on the subject will be greatly annoyed and\nproduce a chain of argument to justify his actions.\n\nScarcely any of us are free from these failings; certain beliefs we keep\nstored away, allowing nothing to interfere with them. They are placed in\nlogic-tight compartments and carefully guarded by a pseudo-reasoning\nwhich satisfies our desire for logical explanation.\n\nTo this pseudo-reasoning is given the name of 'rationalisation', and,\nlest anyone may be offended by finding the same term applied to the\nprocess by which lunatics defend their delusions, I will add that there\nis no dividing line between health and disease, and the modes of thought\nof the insane are not so very different from those of the ordinary man.\n\nTo return now to the subject of 'logic-tight compartments'. Each\ncontains a collection of ideas which are treated by the owner in a\nspecial way, cherished and guarded carefully from those forces which may\ncause modification. At the same time he will probably refuse to admit\nthat they influence his consideration of certain questions related to\nthem. The more logic-tight the compartment is, the more warmly does its\nowner defend it; but where plain reasoning is concerned few men can be\nroused to enthusiasm. Even though there may be people who regard the\nreasonings of Euclid as purely appeals to the emotions, what\nmathematician could grow excited about a man who denied the truth of the\nFifth Proposition? But to run counter to a man's political or social\nbeliefs is a sure way to raise the controversial temperature.\n\nAs will be easily seen, rationalisation is of everyday occurrence with\nall of us, and the man who rationalises always believes he is reasoning.\n\nConsider now the business rogue who makes a success of his roguery and\nthen launches out as a philanthropist, still continuing his roguery as a\npermanent side-line. Such cases are not unknown, and the man seems able\nto carry on without any sense of conflict between his two activities.\nOr consider those not uncommon instances where a man prominent in\nreligious work is detected in some financial crime; it is usual to\nregard him as a hypocrite who has used religion as a cloak, but it is\nequally probable that he was honestly religious, that his earliest steps\ninto crime were reconciled to his principles by rationalisations, and,\nas he advanced, a logic-tight compartment was built up to prevent\nconflict between his wrong-doing and his self-respect.\n\nIn these examples we have a part of the stream which comes into contact\nwith the main stream of consciousness only by means of a process of\nrationalisation which allows the two to exist without great mental\nconflict, but this will never be admitted by the owner, though other\npeople may be acutely conscious of it.\n\nHere, to simplify explanation, I must introduce the word _complex_ as\nused to indicate a system of ideas having a common centre,[2] whether\nthe system is present in the consciousness or exists only in the\nunconscious.\n\n[Footnote 2: The word 'complex' was originally used by Freud only in\nregard to ideas existing in the unconscious, but the way in which I use\nit is convenient and follows the custom of some English writers.]\n\nOur ideas of morality, religion, or politics form complexes, as do our\ndesires and disappointments. An ardent photographer or naturalist is\npossessed of a complex concerning his hobby, and this complex tends to\nturn his thoughts in the corresponding direction. If a keen botanist\nand an equally keen amateur photographer are travelling by train each\nviews the scenery according to his complex: the one might note the trees\nand plants, their flowering or bursting into leaf, and how they vary\nwith the soil, and might speculate as to what finds a closer view might\nproduce; the other sees the same objects, but is busy composing\npictures, thinking out distances and exposures, or differences of light\nand shade.\n\nThe man with 'a bee in his bonnet' gives an example of a single powerful\ncomplex; but all our thinking is a matter of complexes except on those\nrare occasions when logic alone is concerned, such as the consideration\nof a problem of mathematics. Scientific men are prone to believe that\ntheir mind-work is purely logical; so it is, up to a certain point, and\nthe more exact the science the less room there is for thinking in\ncomplexes; but the reception of a new theory is always opposed by those\nwhose firmly established complexes are offended by it. The aim of\nscientific training is to eliminate complex thinking and substitute\nlogic, and in the exact sciences this is practically attained; but as\nsoon as the trained man forsakes his laboratory or workshop methods he\nis at the mercy of his complexes and becomes the ordinary rationalising\nhuman being.\n\nThere is a great difference between a complex, such as photography, of\nwhich the influence is recognised and admitted by its owner, and\nanother, such as a political one, where the influence is strongly\ndenied. The latter is kept in a logic-tight compartment and reconciled\nto the reason by rationalisations.\n\nInstincts have their abode in the unconscious and differ from acquired\ninfluences in being inborn and common to the race. It is difficult to\ndetermine what emotions and desires are truly inborn, as Benjamin Kidd\nshows in a valuable personal observation.[3]\n\n[Footnote 3: _The Science of Power_, p. 284. Methuen & Co., 1918.]\n\nHe found a wild duck's nest as the young birds had just emerged from the\negg, the mother-bird flying off at his approach. He took the young birds\nout of the nest and they showed no fear, nestling from time to time on\nhis feet. Then he moved away and saw the mother-bird return with 'the\ngreat terror of man' upon her; next he approached the group again, but\nthe mother-bird flew away with warning quacks and the little ones\nscattered to cover. He found one of them, but it was now 'a wild\ntransformed creature trembling in panic which could not be subdued'.\n\nMcDougall, whose work on Instinct holds high rank, places 'flight' with\nits emotion of 'fear' among the primary instincts. The apperception of\ndanger is necessary in order to call up this instinct, and Kidd shows\nthat when once the fear of danger from man is planted in the young birds\nit becomes integrated with the instinct and inseparable from it.\nAcquired tendencies associated with emotion can therefore share the\nstrength of instincts (the application of this fact is the theme of Mr.\nKidd's book), and we accordingly find the results of early training\naccepted by the consciousness as perfect and unquestionable. This same\ncharacteristic applies, in a modified degree, to all complex thinking.\nCarry on an argument with an intelligent man on any complex-governed\nsubject, and he will nearly always come down to the bed-rock foundation\nthat he believes his view to be right because he _feels it_. Then you\nmay cease the discussion.\n\nIt is by this reasoning that we can understand the attributes of the\nGerman mind. The German had certain complexes concerning the Right of\nMight so built into his unconscious that he gave them the obedience that\nis demanded by an instinct, and nothing short of national disaster could\ninduce him to relinquish them.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nFORGETTING AND REPRESSION\n\n\nHow we remember is an old and unsolved question, but few people think of\nasking how we forget: and yet one problem is as important as the other.\nI cannot answer either except by putting a new one, which is, 'Do we\never forget?'\n\nIf we specify the factors concerned in memory and say that it depends\nupon impression, retention, and recall, then what do we mean by\n'forgetting'? If an event makes no impression upon the mind there is\nneither remembering nor forgetting; if there is retention of a memory,\nbut one cannot recall it, it is nevertheless stored in the mind and may\nyet be revived by some association. So that the only certain factor in\nforgetting is the loss of power of recall, for what is apparently quite\nforgotten may still be retained in the unconscious.\n\nCan we voluntarily forget? If by that is meant, 'Can we voluntarily lose\nthe power of voluntary recall?' I must, strange as it seems at first\nsight, assert that we can, though I make the proviso that 'voluntarily'\nis a word with a very elastic meaning, and one whose definition would\nopen up the never-ended argument about Free-will. I will take refuge in\na quotation[4]:--\n\n     'We ought not to assume that a clear and full anticipation or idea\n     of the end is an essential condition of purposive action, and we\n     have no warrant for setting up the instances in which anticipation\n     is least incomplete as alone conforming to the purposive type, and\n     for setting apart all instances in which anticipation is less full\n     and definite as of a radically different nature.'\n\n[Footnote 4: McDougall, _Social Psychology_, p. 359.]\n\nExpressing this idea in the terms employed in the previous chapters, we\ncan picture an action as being produced by motives in consciousness, and\nthese motives as being influenced to a greater or less extent by the\ninstincts, emotions, and desires of the unconscious. Every action is\ninfluenced by the unconscious, however voluntary it may appear. The\nyoung man who seeks the society of a maiden may think he is acting\nvoluntarily and with full consciousness of the end in view, but the end\nis often visualised by the friends of the pair before the young man\nrealises where his instincts and emotions have led him.\n\nThe man who resolutely refuses to think of an unpleasant experience and\nshuts off the thought of it whenever it rises into his consciousness may\nnot have the intention of placing it beyond reach of voluntary recall,\nbut he may succeed in so doing, and the process by which the end was\nreached was voluntary. That we have this power is shown by the\ninvestigation of war-strained soldiers of the type said to be suffering\nfrom 'shell-shock'. These men are often stout fellows who have fought\nlong and bravely, and whose condition is a result of the emotions they\nhave suffered rather than of any particular shell explosion. Their\ntypical symptoms are depression, dreams of battle horrors, tremors and\nstammerings, and strange fears without apparent cause.\n\nIn an ordinary case there is great difficulty in persuading the man to\ntalk about his war experiences: he says plainly that he doesn't want to\ntalk about them, or may persistently avoid the subject, or he gives a\npoor account and shows difficulty in recall, or he claims to have\nforgotten and requires stimulating in order to remember, or he may have\nan absolute blank in his memory for certain periods.\n\nHere we see all grades of the result of trying to forget, and the more\nsuccessful the result the more difficult is the cure; for though the\nmemories are repressed their associated emotions cannot be so dealt\nwith, but remain in consciousness exaggerated and distorted. The\ndependence of an emotion upon a repressed memory prevents the sufferer\nfrom knowing its cause, and the sufferer from an apparently causeless\nemotion is to be pitied, for he can see no end to his trouble.\n\nA man who was afraid of walking in the dark for fear of falling into\nholes which he knew only existed as a product of his fancy, affords a\nsimple example of this condition. He said that his fear was absurd,\ntherefore it was useless to point out to him its absurdity; the proper\ncourse was to show that it was not absurd, that it had a cause, and\nthat the cause was something in the past which, when recognised, could\nbe reasoned away. Fortunately the cause was easily found by any one with\na knowledge of modern war: there was soon brought to light a 'forgotten'\nmemory of his mates being drowned in shell-holes at night, and the fear\ndisappeared as the patient learnt to look his memories in the face and\nnot sink them into his unconscious.\n\nMore striking, however, are those cases in which a man forgets all his\nwar experiences, and, though he is ready to believe that he has spent,\nsay, two years in France, has no recollection of them. Such cases are\nnot rare, the loss of memory often including part or all of the\npatient's previous life. One man could only remember the last three\nmonths of his life and failed to recognise his own father, though his\nmemory was subsequently restored; this loss, occurring suddenly, could\nhardly be in any degree voluntary, though it served the purpose of\nexcluding many horrible memories from his consciousness. Another nervous\nlad was so constituted that he forgot all incidents that frightened him,\nonly to be haunted by the emotions attached to them. Seeing a\nsteeple-jack fall was forgotten, and produced nightmares for years; a\npractical joke gave him a terror of the dark; his sister calling to him\nwhen burglars were in the house gave him hallucinations of voices; and\nminor incidents were equally forgotten, each producing its own symptoms.\nAs the individual memories were brought up from his unconscious he went\nthrough the fright again, but the associated symptoms soon disappeared.\n\nIn these pathological losses of memory, whether for one incident or for\na whole period, it is important to note that the patient does not\nnecessarily recognise the incident when he is told of it, just as the\nlad mentioned above failed to recognise his father when he met him. A\npatient may in a sleep-walking state act as if performing a definite\naction, such as bayoneting one of the enemy, and when awake deny all\nknowledge of such an incident; yet the memory of it may return later\nwith overwhelming emotion. This failure to recognise a personal\nexperience is of great importance in the consideration of some\nspiritualist phenomena.\n\nIt requires little thought to realise that the only memories we try to\nrepress are those that conflict with our other feelings or desires, and\ntheir repression is to some extent tolerated by a healthy man and may be\nregarded to that extent as a normal process.\n\nBut in addition to the repression of unpleasant memories there are other\nways of forgetting. It has been assumed that each individual has a limit\nto his capacity for remembering, and that when that limit is reached\nfresh memories can be stored up only by casting out old ones. Whether\nthat be so or not, it is certain that we can recall to consciousness\nonly a tiny fraction of our past experiences, and no one can say what\nproportion that fraction bears to the whole contents of the storehouse\nof the unconscious. Let two men meet and recall old school-days spent\ntogether: one memory brings up another, schoolboy phrases and terms of\nspeech appear as it were spontaneously, and by their united efforts the\ntwo recall far more than the sum of their recollections before the\nmeeting, and still neither knows how much is left untouched.\n\nThe ordinary man reads many books, and each one leaves some impression\nand has some influence upon his later thoughts, though in time the\nrecollection, not only of the contents of the book, but even of having\nread it, may fade away. This is the explanation of some cases of\nliterary plagiarism: a previously read phrase comes up from the\nunconscious, and all recognisable connections with memory having been\nlost it is greeted as a fresh creation and given rank accordingly.\n\nThere is still another type of forgetting: most of us know the man who\n'draws the long bow', who embellishes his story and embroiders it with\nimagined incidents, whilst we listen and wonder how much the narrator\nhimself believes. Fishermen's stories and snake yarns are examples, and\none explains the mental process of the story-teller by saying, 'He's\ntold the story so often that at last he believes it himself.' The\nprocess is really one of forgetting and is closely allied to the\nrepression of an unpleasant memory, for the man is the victim of a\nmental conflict: on the one side is his desire to tell a good story, and\non the other is his moral complex which forbids a lie, so he solves the\nconflict by forgetting that the embroideries are inventions. This type\nis an important one, and what I shall call the 'repression of the\nknowledge of deceit' plays an important part in the explanation of the\nabnormal phenomena with which this book deals. In tracing the\ndevelopment of the abnormal we must start with what is nearest the\nnormal, and the man who embroiders his story gives an illustration of\nthe simplest form of this particular repression.\n\nNow, just as memories are repressed because they were repugnant to the\nother contents of the consciousness, so other complexes may be repugnant\nand meet the same fate. To be torn by conflicting emotions is the fate\nof most people at some time or other, and the conflict between two\ncomplexes may be solved in various ways. The healthy way is to face the\ndifficulty, to reason it out, and reach a conclusion by which action may\nbe guided; another way, a common one, is to seclude one complex in a\nlogic-tight compartment and so avoid the conflict. The man who uses\nsharp or shady methods in the city and is a gentle-minded philanthropist\nin other walks of life is using the latter method, and will produce such\nrationalisations as 'business is business' when the contents of his\ndifferent compartments need protection from each other.\n\nBut for some people such methods are impossible: either they cannot\ndirectly solve the conflict or they are too self-critical to build a\nlogic-tight compartment, and in such cases a repression of one of the\nopposing complexes may result. In this way complexes concerning\nambitions and desires may be repressed, and so may those concerning\nfears and dislikes. The youth put to an uncongenial trade, the man or\nwoman married to an unsuitable partner, may find no escape from the\nposition and decide to bear it and forget its anxiety. How far this\nsucceeds depends upon the previously existing tendencies of the\nindividual: he may suffer no evil from the repression or, like the\nsoldier's repressed war memories, it may manifest itself by indirect\nmeans and the unfortunate sufferer becomes a victim of one of the varied\nforms of neurosis.\n\nThe day-dreams of youth are rarely openly expressed: no one can tell\nwhat fantasies a child may have, and many of us are familiar with the\nthoughtful child who sits lost in meditation and presents an\nimpenetrable barrier to the grown-up who would enter into the secrets of\nthe day-dream. These fancies may be, and probably are, completely\nforgotten, but they can still lie in the unconscious, and Freud and his\nfollowers claim that they influence us throughout life.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nDISSOCIATION\n\n\nAs you sit reading this book you perhaps cross your legs or move to an\neasier position. Did you think, 'My leg is beginning to feel tired, I'll\nshift it?' Did you even know you were shifting it? Watch a friend next\ntime he drives you in his car. If he is an expert driver he will talk to\nyou whilst his car slips through the traffic, and handle the various\ngears and controls as occasion arises without apparently giving any\nthought to the action; moreover, if you direct his attention to what he\nis doing he may do it with less accuracy than before--like the billiard\nplayer who carefully studies a shot and then makes a miss-cue. It is not\nsufficient to call the driving automatic, though that word is often used\nto describe actions of this type, for it is dependent upon innumerable\nstimuli that reach the driver's mind through all his senses and there\nproduce sensations and impulses which have to be translated into\nactions. There is much real mind-work involved, and we must regard the\ndriving as carried on by a part of his consciousness which is\ntemporarily apart from his main stream, the latter being devoted to your\nintellectual entertainment.\n\nSo far as it concerns this example the splitting-off is normal. Most of\nus develop such capability in some way or other: the skilful pianist\nwill talk while playing from sight a difficult passage, and the smoker\ncarries out puffing actions by his little split-off stream whilst the\nmain stream is solving the problem of the moment. All sorts of trivial\nactions are done unknown to the doer. For instance, a man whilst reading\nmay have the habit of turning a pencil over and over and if any one\ngently removes the pencil he will reach out for it and continue to turn\nit, whilst his main stream knows nothing of the little by-play.\n\nWe see that consciousness is not fully and evenly aware of all our\nactions; some actions with their accompanying mental process can be\ncarried on by an independent stream and, as in the case of the pianist,\nthe streams are of such balanced complexity that we can regard them as\nco-equal. Others, like turning over the pencil, are associated with such\na lack of awareness that they hardly seem conscious, and if they are\nregarded as due to a split-off stream the stream is a very minor one.\n\nThis loss of awareness can be carried further, and actions involving\ncomplicated processes can be performed without the main personality\nknowing of them. The easiest example by way of illustration is automatic\nwriting, often carried out by Planchette, which is a small platform\nmounted on wheels and bearing a pencil whose point touches a sheet of\npaper. If two people, sitting opposite each other, place their\nfinger-tips upon the platform it immediately begins to move, for unless\nthe muscular push of one operator is absolutely balanced by that of the\nother the apparatus moves away from one of them; the other person\nstraightway resists the movement and pushes in an opposite direction,\nand thus a see-saw motion is kept up which the operators cannot stop.\nThe resulting scrawls on the paper may be deciphered according to fancy,\nbut with practice a legible product is obtained; further, some people\nare able to concentrate the mind upon, or in other words fill the stream\nof consciousness with, another set of ideas by means of talking or\nreading, so that the automatic writing is carried on by a split-off\nstream of which the main stream is unaware. One person can use\nPlanchette alone, though the experiment is oftener carried out as\ndescribed above because unintended movements are more readily produced\nby two operators.\n\nBy this trick of splitting-off, or dissociation, the operator is able to\nallow ideas and memories from the unconscious to come to the surface\nunrestrained by the cramping control of the consciousness; hence the\nproduct of the automatism is usually fantastic and imaginative, though\nmemories are available which may be beyond the reach of the\nconsciousness.\n\nAn excellent example of this dissociation is given in _The Gate of\nRemembrance_, a book which I shall consider later.\n\nThe view might be held that the dissociated stream is really a part of\nthe unconscious whose results make themselves manifest in the\nconsciousness, as I described in the first chapter when writing about\nintuition; but in automatic writing the main personality is not aware of\nthe results: the dissociated writer does not know what he has written\nuntil he reads it, and it may be as much news to him as to a bystander.\n\nThe two streams of thought flowing side by side exemplify one kind of\ndissociation of consciousness, and others of this kind will be described\nlater; this type I shall call _continuous dissociation_, but there is\nanother which at first sight seems quite different and of which I will\ngive an example:--\n\nAn ex-soldier suffered from fears and depressions which made his life a\nmisery, and an endeavour was made to find the cause in a repressed\nmemory. His account of events was complete up to a certain time, but\nthere his recollections ceased; then one day something touched up the\nhidden memory and in the presence of his doctor he went through a most\ndramatic scene, showing horror at falling down a dark dug-out upon the\nbodies of dead Germans and at subsequent experiences which had strongly\naffected him and whose revival produced again the same emotions as the\noriginal events. At the next interview the following dialogue took\nplace:--\n\n'I want you to tell me about falling down the dug-out.'\n\n'What dug-out, sir?'\n\n'The one you told me about last time.'\n\n'I don't remember telling you about it.'\n\n'Yes you do, the dug-out at....'\n\n'No, I don't remember any dug-out at....'\n\nThere was no reason why the man should lie, and his expression of\nsurprise and absence of other emotion seemed indicative of truth. When\nthe doctor made the man close his eyes and thus shut out his present\nsurroundings the memory returned with strong emotional reaction, less\nintense, however, than on the former occasion.\n\nThis case can be explained by regarding his repressed complex as lying\nin the unconscious, held there by the repugnance he felt towards it;\nthen during the interview with the doctor it rose into consciousness and\nswept every other thought away. The stream of consciousness was suddenly\ncut off, its place being taken by this new stream with its recollections\nand emotions, and when the ordinary consciousness resumed its flow there\nwas no connection between it and the dramatic episode which had\ninterrupted, so that all memory of the episode was lost.\n\nWe can picture the repressed complex not as lying in the unconscious but\nas forming a dissociated stream flowing parallel with the main one, and\nshowing its presence by producing those apparently causeless fears and\ndepressions from which the patient suffered, till it suddenly swept\naside the main stream and took its place. This alternative view shows\nthe absence of any sharp division between the concept of the unconscious\nand of a dissociated consciousness, and at the same time brings this\n_abrupt dissociation_ into harmony with continuous dissociation. Such a\ndissociation, but with less emotional contents, can persist for a long\ntime, the subject living, as it were, the life of the dissociated\nstream. Then we have a man with no memory of his previous life, but\nwhose repressed memories, desires, or troubles, forming a complex in the\nunconscious, have finally broken across the stream of consciousness and\ntaken its place as a second personality. Such instances have been\ndescribed[5] as 'double personalities', and to this group belong those\ncases in which a man is found wandering with all memory of his name or\nassociations gone. In soldiers with repressed war memories the\nrepression may include the whole of their war experiences, and they can\ntell nothing of, say, a year spent in France; here, as long as the\nrepression continues, there is the potentiality of the outbreak of a\nsecond personality.\n\n[Footnote 5: See the _Psychology of Insanity_.]\n\nThe story of _Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde_, stripped of those portions which\nR. L. Stevenson introduced to make it suit his public--the bodily change\nand the drugs which produced it--can be read with interest as a study of\nthe development of a dissociation, the main personality being aware of\nthe dissociated stream but unable to control it when once the\nsplitting-off had been accomplished.\n\nA less fanciful story of a dissociation is given in _A Tale of Two\nCities_, where the unfortunate Dr. Manette, having learnt shoemaking\nwhilst a prisoner in the Bastille, insists on retaining his tools and\nmaterial after he is rescued and brought to England, in times of stress\nsecluding himself for a period and living his old life again, working at\nthe old employment and hardly aware of the real world around him.\n\nThe source of the story might be made a subject of research by the\nDickens Fellowship, for it is too accurate to be purely a fantasy of\nCharles Dickens, who, like all of his craft that live, was no mean\npsychologist. Even Dr. Manette's insistence upon retaining his tools,\nunaware as he was of his own reason for doing so, is consistent with\nwhat really happens when a dissociated stream influences the\npersonality.\n\nThe different degrees of dissociation can be represented\ndiagramatically. (See opposite page.)\n\nIt is to be noted that the dissociation may be the result of purposive\naction on the part of the subject, though, as will be seen in later\nchapters, an entirely wrong interpretation may be given to it by the\nperson most concerned and by other people as well; or it may be the\nresult of a repression, and in that case any interpretation given by the\nsubject must necessarily be a wrong one, for he is ignorant of its cause\non account of the mechanism of repression, or, to put it differently, if\nhe knows the cause it is no longer repressed.\n\n[Illustration: Two streams of equal value and under the same control.\nExamples: The pianist and the motor-car driver. _A normal phenomenon_,\nbut linked to the next class by cases of absent-mindedness.]\n\n[Illustration: Two streams, one being the ordinary stream of\nconsciousness and the other a stream not under the control of the main\npersonality, which is concerned only with the ordinary stream. Examples:\nautomatic writing, water-divining and hysteria (see Chapter VIII).\n_Continuous dissociation._]\n\n[Illustration: A continuous dissociation with a sudden irruption of the\ndissociated into the main stream, completely replacing it for a period.\nExamples: The case of the ex-soldier and those of double personality;\nalso somnambulisms and spiritualist trances. _Abrupt dissociation._]\n\nOnce again I will emphasise the difficulty of drawing a line between\nnormal and abnormal. My boy guide referred to in Chapter I was as near\nnormal as could be, though the means by which he kept his course might\nbe described as a product of dissociation. If he had been imaginative\nand I credulous he could have foisted upon me a supernatural explanation\nof his powers and taken his place with clairvoyants and water-diviners.\nBut there are manifestations of distinctly abnormal character to explain\nwhich is the object of this book, and for the people producing these\nmanifestations I propose the name of Dissociates, since dissociation is\nthe key to the understanding of the phenomena they present.\n\nThe logic-tight compartments previously described are to be regarded as\npartial dissociations to which we are all liable, the partitions being\nunrecognised by their owner and the contents kept apart from the\nmodifying influences of the main personality. Hence when the onlooker\nbecomes aware of the presence of such a dissociation he does not judge\nthe contents of the compartment by the same standard that he applies to\nthe person as a whole.\n\nThere is nothing fresh in this point of view, which is admitted when\nvirulent political opponents can be good friends by each ignoring the\ndissociated prejudices of the other, or in everyday life when in some\ncircles the discussion of political or religious subjects is avoided for\nthe sake of good fellowship.\n\nExtreme dissociation by reason of a logic-tight compartment is shown in\nthat kind of insanity in which the sufferer behaves as an ordinary\nbeing with ordinary actions and ideas except for the influence of a\nsystematised delusion (generally persecutory or grandiose) of most\nirrational type which is impregnable to explanation or argument. On all\nother points the man is sane, and the purely mental origin of the\ndisease is suggested by his remaining in good health and without mental\ndeterioration apart from the delusional system, in this respect\ndiffering greatly from the sufferers from most other forms of insanity.\nSome psychiatrists claim to have traced the delusions back to\nrepressions that took place in early life.[6]\n\n[Footnote 6: For a fuller account of dissociation I would refer the\nreader to _The Psychology of Insanity_, by Dr. Bernard Hart, to which I\nam indebted for the form of some of my ideas. (Cambridge University\nPress.)]\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nWATER-DIVINING\n\n\nWater-divining, or dowsing, is accepted in many parts of the world and\nused as a practical method of locating underground water. Official\nbodies as well as private individuals employ practitioners of the art,\nand among people generally there is a strong belief in its genuineness.\n\nIt is carried out by means of a forked twig, hazel by traditional\npreference, which is grasped in the dowser's two hands and is said to be\ntwisted upwards by an unknown force when there is water underground. As\nan addition it is sometimes claimed that the twig will indicate the\npresence of metals by being twisted downwards.\n\nBelievers in the twisting of the twig are generally ignorant that it was\nformerly used in the pursuit and detection of criminals and the finding\nof buried treasure[7] and that it was being used in the year 1918 to\nlocate a seam of coal. Going farther afield, we learn that the\nwitch-findings practised by African savages are sometimes carried out by\nmeans of a stick which points at the victim.\n\n[Footnote 7: See Janet, op. cit., p. 368, where he also says: 'Il est\nprobable que, dans quelques campagnes, subsiste encore la croyance aux\nrevelations de la baguette divinatoire.']\n\nSuch varied uses demand a new and complicated system of physics if the\nresults are due to any forces external to the diviner, but my own\nobservations satisfy me that we need not overturn our ordinary\nconceptions of cause and effect to explain the different properties of\nthe divining-rod.\n\nWhen a friend told me of the presence of a dowser in the neighbourhood\nand gave me a would-be convincing account of how he had seen him at\nwork, how the twig was twisted upwards with such force that my informant\nwas unable to depress it, and how the man was employed by engineers to\ntell them where to sink wells, I became interested and asked to see the\nmarvel. The resulting experiment, though conducted haphazard, was\ninstructive as regards both water-divining and credulity.\n\nThe man broke a forked twig from a bush, and, holding it in the way\ndescribed later, was directed down a path leading to a tennis-court.\nAlong this path no water was known to exist, but the twig rose twice.\nBeneath the tennis-court ran a water-pipe which had burst during the\nprevious winter, and of which the position was known to six at least of\nthose present. This pipe was located by the man, and he demonstrated it\nagain and again by walking across it, the twig rising each time. It rose\nagain when he was directed past a cook-house. Next he was sent along a\npath leading from the cook-house to the main building, and the twig rose\nseveral times. He said, 'There is water all along here', and was told\nthat there was a pipe running along the path. Here I intervened and\nasked him to try across one edge of the path, which was about six feet\nwide. The twig rose, and, just as on the tennis-court, he walked again\nand again across the indicated line, the twig rising every time, though\nas a fact the pipe lay on the other side of the path. He explained to us\nthat God gave 'the gift' to Moses, and that now only one man in ten\nthousand received the gift.\n\nWhen he left I took a twig and showed that I had the gift, or, at least,\nthat the twig performed in my hands exactly as it had done in his.\n'But', said my friends, 'he found the pipe on the tennis-court.' It\nmattered nothing that he had found water twice within a few yards where\nnone was known, or that at least six of the bystanders knew of the\nexistence of the water-pipe and were ready to show their anticipation as\nhe approached it and their delight when he located it, nor that he\nlocated the other pipe on the wrong side of the path. The movements of\nthe twig might be a fraud, his other finds might be failures or guesses,\nbut his one success was enough for them. Even the Padre, when I said\nthat the man had the face typical of a mystic, was moved to ask, 'But\nmay not a mystic have powers of which we know nothing?'\n\nIn short, the rising of the twig was produced by the man himself, and\nhis findings were guesses, aided by ordinary knowledge as to where\nwater-pipes are to be expected, and more especially aided by the\nattitude and expression of the bystanders.\n\nYet by his manner he showed that he plainly believed in his own powers:\notherwise his reference to the gift of God was simple blasphemy, and he\nseemed an earnest man.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nHow can we explain this belief on the one hand and the trickery on the\nother? First let us examine the mechanism involved in the upward\ntwisting of the twig. Suppose you take a tough and springy forked twig,\neach arm of the fork being about nine or ten inches long, hold it with\nthe apex away from you, and, with your palms facing together and your\nfinger-tips pointing upward, place the thumb and little finger of each\nhand inside the fork at the places marked T and F. Now close each hand,\nand you have each arm of the fork firmly gripped; next, keeping your\nelbows well in, bend the arms of the fork outward as in Fig. 2, with\nyour palms now looking upward. You will then find that a sort of trigger\naction tends to occur, and by a slight pressure of your ring-fingers\nagainst the twig you can make it rise. Still gripping firmly and\npressing your hands a little together you will find it continues to\nrise, and by bending your hands downwards at the wrists and pressing\nyour elbows to your side you can easily persuade an observer, and\nperhaps yourself, that you are trying to hold the twig down. You may\neven find that it leaves a pressure mark on your little finger, which\nyou can show as evidence of how you tried to restrain it. If one arm of\nthe fork is weaker than the other it may break, and that of course will\nbe conclusive proof of the working of a mysterious power. So we see\nthere is nothing very strange in the man believing that his muscular\naction was not responsible for the moving of the twig; but his two-sided\nmake-up--piety on one side and trickery on the other--can best be\nexplained by a dissociation, with repression of the knowledge of\ntrickery as far as the main personality is concerned. We might split up\nhis consciousness like this:--\n\n    Piety, and belief in      Knowledge of the means\n    water-divining            employed. Hypersensitive\n    as the gift of God.       mechanism for carrying it on.\n\nPerhaps it is unfair to talk of trickery; he may have deceived himself\nfrom the start and never known that he was deceiving any one.\n\nAt first I pictured him as learning the trick from some one else, trying\nit on with his friends--maybe across a bridge over a stream--and being\ntaken seriously, and then, when he could not escape from his reputation\nwithout owning up to the fraud, being compelled for his peace of mind to\nrepress the deceit complex and carry on as a Dissociate. The man himself\nwould be the last person to gain information from, for his repression,\nhowever it began, is now complete.\n\nThe discussion that followed the experiment was instructive: most of the\nbystanders appeared to believe in the existence of some unknown force of\nnature operating through a specially-gifted person, the mechanism of the\ntwig being unnoticed and the greatest emphasis placed upon the one\nsuccess. I have no doubt that in a short time the memory of that one\nsuccess would be the only part of the performance not forgotten.\nMoreover, if any one of the bystanders had told me the story, describing\nfully and fairly everything he had observed, I should have been unable\nto criticise the facts thus presented and denial of the miraculous\nwould have been ineffectual; yet these bystanders were all educated and\nintelligent men.\n\nWith the information gained from this experiment I was able to\nunderstand the next example. The subject was mentioned in a provincial\nnewspaper, and incidentally a story was told of how a dowser who also\nhad the power of locating metals was able by means of the twig to\nindicate the position of two sovereigns concealed under a carpet,\nshowing the relationship of water-divining to some forms of 'thought\nreading.' In the next number of the paper appeared 'some corroborative\ntestimony' from a well-known local gentleman, who was also a dowser, and\nsome of his testimony I will quote:--\n\n     'I have had twigs as thick as my little finger twist off and break\n     after scoring my hand until it was red. The muscles of the arm\n     become contracted when the bodily magnetism is affected by the\n     presence of water, and a strong spring will make my arms ache\n     badly. It is quite true that only running water affects me, and on\n     one occasion I had a curious example of this. It was on a Saturday\n     evening, and I quite accidentally found the presence of water close\n     to a house where my sister was living. The following day I told her\n     about the spring and tried the spot, when no effect was observable.\n     On enquiry she told me that there was a pipe underneath connected\n     with a ram which was always put out of action on Sunday.'\n\nFurther on, referring to another incident, he says:--\n\n     'I had dowsed the ground, and in addition had noted, with the help\n     of an eminent geologist, the geological strata. The dowsing\n     satisfied me that the ground was full of water: the geological\n     survey suggested the best place to collect it. I suppose the power\n     must have something to do with the composition of the blood and\n     nerve cells, but I have never yet come across a scientific\n     explanation of the power, which is certainly possessed by many\n     people.'\n\nHere we have a country gentleman of indisputable honesty and\nintelligence attributing to unknown forces such movements and sensations\nas any one can produce who follows the preceding instructions, water or\nno water being present. The 'bodily magnetism' is a pure rationalisation\nand beyond discussion, but the story of the pipe and the ram is\ndifferent: a ram is a pump worked by a stream of water and the noise of\nit is carried a long way, especially along any pipe connected with it,\nand if I told this gentleman that he had heard the noise of the ram he\nwould strenuously deny the possibility, and might challenge me to test\nwhether I could hear the noise; but I have no dissociated water-divining\npersonality unhampered by my conscious efforts and trained to pick up\nsuch indications. It would seem incredible to him that he heard the\nnoise of the ram on the Saturday, failed to hear it on the Sunday,\ndeduced that the water was no longer running, and then showed this\ndeduction by refraining from tilting up the twig; but with our knowledge\nof dissociation and repression, and of the working of the unconscious,\nwe can understand all this taking place without his main stream of\nconsciousness being aware of it.\n\nThe reference to geology is also instructive; he evidently has a\nknowledge of that subject, and he might perhaps admit that the\nindications of the twig coincided with the geological indications,\nthough he is unaware of and cannot admit any dependence of the former on\nthe knowledge of the latter.\n\nThus in both these cases the likelihood of the presence of water is only\na matter of observation--skilled and minute no doubt--and the movement\nof the twig is in no way caused by any physical forces except those\nexercised by the muscles of the dowser. That the second personality of\nthe dowser is able to deceive him is now explained, and his obvious\nhonesty so influences non-critical observers that their credulity is no\ncause for wonder.\n\nAn example of water-divining without dissociation was given me by Dr. W.\nH. Bryce, of Fifeshire, whose words are as follows:--\n\n     'There was an old Scot who was reputed to be very skilful in\n     finding water and who was so employed throughout his neighbourhood.\n     He was not above using the twigs, but told me they were no use, but\n     he judged entirely by the lie of the land. In his own language he\n     always looked for the \"rise of the metals\" in looking for water. A\n     diviner came to the neighbourhood and located water in two places.\n     In the one place the old countryman said, \"How can he get water\n     there? Now at the top of the den where the metals rise each way he\n     might get it.\" Bores were sunk at both places that the diviner\n     indicated, but no water was got.'\n\nThis man would probably have refused such a test as locating a\nwater-pipe, for his conclusions were based upon conscious reasoning and\nhe would be incapable of making guesses or picking up indications from\nthe behaviour of bystanders; therefore in the eyes of the credulous he\nwould be inferior to the wonder-working dowser.\n\nOne repeatedly hears stories of how the dowser has found water when\ngeologists have failed, but the man who is sufficiently uncritical to\naccept the working of the twig as due to some strange 'gift' is likely\nto be as credulous in observation and beliefs concerning the rest of the\nphenomena.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nSUGGESTION\n\n\n'The power of suggestion' is a plausible explanation of varied\nphenomena. By it the feelings of a crowd are swayed, fashions are\nspread, mistakes are made, and beliefs are imposed upon the multitude,\nand in the production of hypnotic and hysterical manifestation the words\n'power of suggestion' and 'personal magnetism' are sufficient\nexplanation of all things visible and invisible.\n\n'Personal magnetism' and its kindred phrases implying the existence of\nsome subtle physical force are, except when used figuratively, mere\nincoherences, but suggestion is an undoubted cause of certain effects\nand we must try to understand the meaning of the word.\n\nMcDougall defines suggestion as 'a process of communication resulting in\nthe acceptance with conviction of the communicated proposition in the\nabsence of logical grounds for its acceptance'.[8]\n\n[Footnote 8: _Social Psychology_, p. 97.]\n\nOur thinking (apart from the observation of cause and effect in the\nsmall affairs of ordinary life) is generally a matter of complexes,\nlogic being concerned only in rare cases; hence if we use the above\ndefinition the greater part of our accepted propositions owe their\nacceptance to suggestion. This is true as regards most of our political,\nreligious, and social beliefs, and, since children believe what they are\ntaught chiefly because the teacher says so, there does not seem much\nopinion or knowledge of the abstract for which suggestion is not\naccountable.\n\nIf a suggestion agrees with the complexes already existing in the mind\nof the hearer then acceptance is likely to follow; this partly explains\nthe psychology of crowds and the power of oratory, which appeals to\nemotions and prejudice rather than to reason. The knowledge that one's\nfellows believe is sufficient to convince the ordinary man, and often\nthe existence of widespread belief is used as an argument to prove the\ntruth of a proposition. One recognises this tendency at once in people\nof another race and other superstitions. An educated Chinese once\nassured me that blood from those nearly related would mix if dropped\ninto a bowl of water, and drops from the veins of strangers would remain\napart, and that this test was used to decide cases of disputed\nrelationship. When I showed incredulity my friend assured me, 'It's\ntrue, quite true, every one knows it.'\n\nWithin a day or two an Englishman, whilst discussing telegony, or the\ninfluence of a first mating upon the progeny of subsequent pairings,\nmaintained that the widespread belief among dog-breeders in the\nexistence of this influence proved its truth, and my recollection of\nthe argument of my Chinese friend showed me how alike are the causes of\nbelief among all mankind.\n\nMan tends to believe what his fellows believe and act as his fellows\nact, and this tendency has been erected into an instinct by Trotter, who\nshows how important the Herd Instinct is to all gregarious animals,\nincluding man.[9]\n\n[Footnote 9: _Instincts of the Herd in Peace and War._ T. Fisher Unwin.]\n\nBut if suggestion is to be made synonymous with the Herd Instinct it\nexplains too much, and we must seek to narrow its meaning or use another\nword. It is already used in a somewhat special sense to account for the\nacceptance of propositions which an ordinary man in his ordinary state\nof mind would not accept, and especially is it used in relation to\nabnormal states such as hypnosis and hysteria.\n\nAn authoritative and confident manner makes easy the acceptance of\nsuggestion, as every confidence-trick man knows; the writer of\nadvertisements or political articles knows it too, but in the last\nexample we see a new factor. The hardened Big-ender would be impervious\nto the most imposing suggestions from a Little-endian source, but would\naccept the saddest nonsense from a journal of his own party. We see here\nan active desire to accept propositions that accord with a powerful\ncomplex, and as complexes become more separated from the influence of\nreason so this desire increases.\n\nThis I shall call 'receptivity', and to the term I shall give a further\nmeaning in the sense not only of desiring to accept propositions but of\nanticipating or guessing them, of picking up hints as to what is in the\nminds of the other persons concerned and reflecting them as if they\noriginated in the mind of the receiver.\n\nIn some cases of hysteria the patient presents a weak or paralysed limb,\nand this limb is often so insensitive that pins may be pushed through\nthe skin without any manifestations of pain. This phenomenon, which\nresembles the insensitive patches that under the name of 'Devil's claws'\nwere found upon witches when witchcraft was fashionable, has been long\nknown as a sign of hysteria. There is now a tendency to ascribe it to\nsuggestibility or, as I should prefer, to receptivity.\n\nIn the early stage of the disease some one examines the arm, pricks it,\nand asks, 'Do you feel that?' It is my experience that the patient\nsometimes flinches at the first prick, but answers 'No', and until this\nnewly-implanted belief is removed he never flinches again when the limb\nis pricked.\n\nThe question is taken by the patient to mean that the doctor expects\nthat the prick will not be felt--or why should he ask? The hint is\naccepted and the insensibility established, though its unreal nature is\nshown by the fact that the patient is not especially disposed to burn or\ninjure the limb, unlike the sufferer from a true loss of sensation, who\nis always liable to such an accident owing to the lack of the protective\nsense of pain. I believe that this is the true explanation for many\ncases, and put it forward as a good example of receptivity.\n\nThe insensitiveness is similarly explained by Babinski,[10] who uses a\ndifferent method of examination. He blindfolds the patient, who must not\nhave been subjected to a previous test, and stimulating him variously in\ndifferent places asks what he feels. This avoids the suggestion of loss\nof sensation, and the result is that Babinski finds few examples of such\nloss in cases where the 'Do you feel that?' method would produce many\npositive results.\n\n[Footnote 10: _Hysteria or Pithiatism and Nervous Troubles of Reflex\nOrder._ London University Press.]\n\nIt may also be explained by a dissociation of consciousness, in which\nthe split-off stream deals with the paralysed limb and therefore the\nmain stream of consciousness knows nothing about the prick. The\ndifference between the two theories is not so great as appears, for the\ncontrol of the supposed loss of sensation, once it is established, finds\nits home in a split-off stream, and the process I describe is only a\nstage in the dissociation.\n\nI must admit, however, to seeing cases where a hysterical loss of voice\nof long duration is accompanied by a loss of sensation in the throat\nwhich is not explicable by receptivity, and it is possible for the\ndissociation to be directly responsible for the loss.\n\nJung expresses sound views when he writes:--\n\n     'It should long ago have been realised that a suggestion is only\n     accepted by one it suits.... This pseudo-scientific talk about\n     suggestion is based upon the unconscious superstition that\n     suggestion actually possesses some magic power. No one succumbs to\n     suggestion unless from the very bottom of his heart he be willing\n     to co-operate.'[11]\n\n[Footnote 11: _Analytical Psychology_, p. 469. Bailliere, Tindall & Cox,\n1917.]\n\nWhilst stripping suggestion of its magic I by no means deny its power.\nLet one person at a dinner suggest that the fish is tainted and he will\ngenerally have one or two supporters who would have eaten it without a\ndoubt of its freshness if no one had cast suspicion upon it; or let one\nof a class of medical students say with sufficient assurance that he\nhears a murmur over a patient's heart and, even if the heart sounds are\nquite ordinary, others will hear it too.\n\nThere are conditions, such as fatigue or sleep, in which the effort\nnecessary to examine the truth of a proposition seems too great, and\nsuggestions are accepted which would be rejected in a state of fuller\nconsciousness. For example, I was awakened one night, when a hospital\nresident, and told that one of my patients was very restless. I could\nnot remember the man, but asked a few questions about him and ordered a\nsoporific. Next morning on waking I became aware that I had no such\npatient, and on enquiry found that I had been mistaken for another\nresident whose slumbers had been undisturbed, thanks to my\nsuggestibility, for had I been fully awake I should have repudiated any\nconnection with the case. The confident manner of the messenger\nassisted the suggestion, and I like to think that had there been a trick\nintentionally played upon me even my sleepy consciousness might have\ndetected some warning change of tone.\n\nPsychologists regard hypnotic suggestibility as only a further stage of\nthis sleepy non-resistance, but I see in the former a more active desire\nto accept. Though suggestion might be further classified according to\nthe factors concerned in its acceptance, the class showing 'receptivity'\nis the important one for our consideration.\n\nThere remains auto-suggestion to be considered; it is as difficult to\ndefine as suggestion, but in the absence of any more precise term it\nmust be accepted as indicating certain mental processes.\n\nThe sensations felt in the arms and hands by the water-diviner or\ntable-turner are partly the result of auto-suggestion and partly of\nmuscular contractions, themselves produced by the same cause, and some\nof the varied sensations of the hysteric are of similar origin. Creepy\nfeelings at the mention of snakes, and unpleasant sensations at the\nthought of those 'minor horrors of war' that live in undergarments, are\nfurther examples.\n\nAs far as the persons concerned are able to judge, the sensations are\noften real enough, though it was long before I could believe that a\nconfirmed hysteric who complained of a severe pain really suffered from\nthat pain; the description of a water-diviner's sensations, given by\nhimself and quoted in another chapter, are such that one must believe in\nthe honesty of the writer.\n\nOne might say auto-suggestion arises from the unconscious or from a\ndissociated stream of consciousness, and this would make it account for\nhallucinations and obsessions, but here we must again take account of\nborderline cases. The person who feels a cold shiver at the mention of a\nsnake cannot tell us precisely to what extent the shiver is due to\nconscious thoughts, or whether he feels it just because he must; and the\nfeeling may be due to what he remembers being told about snakes, in\nwhich case it would not be due to pure auto-suggestion.\n\nThe explanation of the success of suggestion in particular cases is to\nbe sought in the emotional state of the subject. When I was the victim,\nas described above, my readiness to believe arose from my being\naccustomed to nocturnal interruptions when my patients were in trouble\nand also from my reliance on the hospital staff, my emotional state\nbeing one of expectation and confidence. If to these influences are\nadded stronger emotional forces, such as wonder or terror, acceptance of\nsuggestion is still easier, and when people assembled together are\nswayed by these feelings the Herd Instinct reaches its full strength and\nwe have the ingredients for the manufacture of a collective delusion.\nThere are many examples of strange and supernatural occurrences vouched\nfor by masses of observers, and I see no reason to doubt the good faith\nof the historians. We all know how infectious is emotion and how hard it\nis for one man to remain unmoved when around him are others all under\nthe influence of some excitement, and man always insists on finding\nreasons for his feelings or objects for his emotions. When wonder or\nterror are roused by the operation of the Herd Instinct, the individual,\nnot knowing their origin, projects them externally and seeks an object\nfor them. He is now ready to see or hear anything that will fit his\nemotions, and when an object is suggested he will speedily accept its\nexistence as a reality.\n\nI will give some further examples of suggestion in varying degrees of\nstrength. During the arrival of recently wounded men at a hospital in\nFrance, I was in a ward with two eminent members of my profession and\nanother medical officer. As one man seemed bad the sister asked me to\nsee him at once; his left arm was paralysed, and he had a wound on the\nhead where in the brain beneath lies the 'motor area' of the left arm.\nLooking at the wound, which was obscured by hair and blood, I said,\n'That's pulsating'; the two consultants and the other officer agreed\nwith my observation, and appropriate treatment was recommended. The\nimportance of pulsation lies in the fact that it is a sign of the\nexposure of brain substance, which pulsates strongly, and in this case\nit signified the presence of a hole in the skull which allowed the\npulsation to appear; but in the operating theatre shortly afterwards the\nskull was found intact, and therefore pulsation had not been present.\n\nHow did this joint error of observation arise? The combination of a\ngunshot wound of the head with a paralysed limb may occur in connection\nwith a hole in the skull, and such penetrating wounds were common before\nthe introduction of helmets. My unconscious had worked out the\nprobabilities and led me to expect the signs of penetration; deceiving\nmyself, by my confident manner I imposed my belief upon my colleagues,\nwho had, I may assume, placed unjustified confidence in my reliability\nas an observer; and we all saw that which was not.\n\nAnother example shows how ghost stories arise: A man related to me how\nat the age of sixteen he was sleeping with his brother, and woke up to\nsee a ghostly face on the wall. So far we have an ordinary half-awake\nhallucinatory condition, which is not uncommon; but the lad became\nterrified and tried to cover his head to hide the sight, when the\nbrother woke up, and, being told of the face, promptly saw it too. The\nbrother's evidence is strongly corroborative, not of the presence of a\nghost, but of the power of suggestion when the way is prepared by strong\nemotion. It may be remarked that the man was one of those nervous people\nwho fear the dark or being alone; seeing a ghost was not the cause of\nhis condition, but resulted from the inculcation of a belief in ghosts\nin a person predisposed to fall a prey to his own unconscious.\n\nThe next example is a well-worn tale which has been quoted by Frank\nPodmore, W. H. Myers, Sir William Barrett, and probably many others. I\ntake it from pages 62 and 63 of _Human Personality_, vol. i.[12]\n\n[Footnote 12: Longmans & Co., London, 1903.]\n\nIt (the account) was given by Mr. Charles Lett on December 3, 1885, and\nreads as follows:--\n\n     'On the 5th of April, 1873, my wife's father, Captain Towns, died\n     at his residence, Cranbrook, Rose Bay, near Sydney, New South\n     Wales. About six weeks after his death my wife had occasion, one\n     evening about nine o'clock, to go to one of the bedrooms in the\n     house. She was accompanied by a young lady, Miss Britton, and as\n     they entered the room--the gas was burning all the time--they were\n     amazed to see, reflected as it were upon the polished surface of\n     the wardrobe, the image of Captain Towns. It was barely\n     half-figure, the head, shoulders, and part of the arms only\n     showing--in fact it was like an ordinary medallion portrait, but\n     life-size. The face appeared wan and pale, as it did before his\n     death; he wore a kind of grey flannel jacket, in which he had been\n     accustomed to sleep. Surprised and half alarmed at what they saw,\n     their first idea was that a portrait had been hung in the room, and\n     that what they saw was its reflection, but there was no picture of\n     the kind.\n\n     'Whilst they were looking and wondering, my wife's sister, Miss\n     Towns, came into the room, and before either of the others had time\n     to speak, she exclaimed, \"Good gracious! Do you see Papa?\" One of\n     the housemaids happened to be passing downstairs at the moment and\n     she was called in, and asked if she saw anything, and her reply was\n     \"Oh, Miss: the master.\" Graham--Captain Towns' old\n     body-servant--was then sent for, and he also exclaimed, \"Oh, Lord\n     save us! Mrs. Lett, it's the Captain!\" The butler was called, and\n     then Mrs. Crane, my wife's nurse, and they both said what they\n     saw. Finally Mrs. Towns was sent for, and, seeing the apparition,\n     she advanced towards it ... as she passed her hand over the panel\n     of the wardrobe the figure gradually faded away, and never again\n     appeared.\n\n     'These are the facts of the case, and they admit of no deceit; no\n     kind of intimation was given to any of the witnesses; the same\n     question was put to each one as they came into the room, and the\n     reply was given without hesitation by each.\n\n     'Mrs. Lett is positive that the recognition of the appearance on\n     the part of each of the later witnesses was _independent_, and not\n     due to any suggestion from the persons already in the room.'\n\nThen follows a statement by two of the witnesses that this account is\ncorrect.\n\nIn the lapse of twelve years between the incident and its narration a\nstory of this nature would have been re-told many times, and we know\nwhat happens under such conditions. As the tale is given, however, it\nreveals more than the narrator thinks it does.\n\nMost interesting is the denial of suggestion when we have present all\nthe factors necessary for suggestion of the most powerful kind. Picture\nMiss Towns coming into the room whilst the first two were 'looking and\nwondering' (and not in silence, we may be sure, in spite of the words\n'before either of the others had time to speak', which are interpolated\nto strengthen the story); she straightway experiences the same emotion\nas do the others and sees what they see. Now we have three emotional\npeople, and as each new witness is brought along the emotion increases\ntill it would require a very self-possessed and sceptical person to\nresist its influence. The butler and the nurse simply _had_ to see the\nghost, though the account is a little ambiguous at that point.\n\n'The same question was put to each one as they came into the room', but\nis it likely that under such a condition of excitement enough\nself-control was left to every individual to ensure that the same\nquestion, _and nothing else_, was put to each newcomer? Such a thing\ncould only happen by careful pre-arrangement, which was lacking here,\nand the writer's insistence shows that somewhere in his mind was present\nthe suspicion that suggestion had a hand in the production of the\nunanimous evidence.\n\nMrs. Lett is equally insistent that the recognition was not due to any\nsuggestion from the persons already in the room, but she was unaware\nthat suggestion can occur without intent and that the most powerful\nsuggestion is that which is unintentional. Can we suppose that there\nwere no signs of wonder and awe on the faces of those present, no\nexcited exclamations, no glances towards the wardrobe, no pointing of\nhands: only a few calm and self-possessed people asking each newcomer if\nhe or she saw anything? If two or three people tried by suggestion to\npersuade others to see a ghost they would not be able to reach the\nemotional state of the actors in this scene, and the intentional effort\nat suggestion would have a good chance of failure.\n\nThe minute account of the apparition, given by some one who was not\npresent, and told as if it were the result of the immediate observations\nof the first two witnesses, has been influenced by discussion after the\nincident and is itself another product of suggestion. The narrator has\nover-shot the mark in his protest against the possibility of suggestion,\nand has produced a story in which the apparition is not the only\nimprobability.\n\nI have given this analysis because the story is quoted repeatedly by\nwriters on the spiritualist side, and until one examines it critically\nit appears convincing.\n\nThe rumour of the Russian troops passing through England in September,\n1914, will go down in history as a proof that mass credulity was then as\npowerful as ever. The rumour, however it began, was aided by the usual\nforces: Herd Instinct (for what every one believed was felt to be true),\nthe desire to believe in what we wanted to happen, and the desire to be\npersonally connected with important events. The last factor was shown by\nthe number of people who claimed to have personal experience of the\ntransit of the Russian reinforcements; every one had seen the troops or\nknew some one who had. One of my friends, a man eminent in a profession\nwhich demands clear thinking, told me that his own brother-in-law was\nresponsible for arrangements for their railway transport.\n\nThe reader will see in this rumour a perfect example of the working of\nsuggestion in a case familiar to every one, and if the lesson is borne\nin mind a list of believers in some unnatural occurrence will not\nnecessarily carry conviction.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nHYPNOTISM\n\n\nThe history of hypnotism is closely associated with that of charlatanry,\nthough at some periods the practice has reached an honourable position\nin therapeutics. The 'temple sleep' of ancient Greek medicine was a\nhypnosis, but in later days hypnotism fell into oblivion till the time\nof Mesmer, when it was so mingled with quackery and theatrical display\nthat some disrepute is even to this day attached to its honest use in\ncurative medicine.\n\nThe common attitude to it is one of mistrust. Thanks to its exploitation\nby novelists, 'hypnotic power' is regarded as marvellous and uncanny,\nand the mysterious person who exercises it is able to lead his victims\nalong any path. The fashion for public shows of Mesmerism has apparently\ndied away, their place being taken by thought-reading performances which\ncater for the desire of man to believe that he is seeing a manifestation\nof the occult.\n\nThe 'mesmeric eye', whose pupil dilates or contracts at the will of its\nowner while its gaze remains fixed, has by imaginative writers been\nascribed alike to Lord Kitchener and the monk Rasputin, and presents a\nphenomenon unknown to physiologists. The 'will-power' of the hypnotist\nis as much a product of imagination, whilst the confident and willing\nco-operation of the subject is really the factor of most importance.\n\nNobody but a very credulous person can be hypnotised against his will,\nand at the beginning of the process the full co-operation of the subject\nis necessary, though with repeated sittings his suggestibility becomes\nincreased and to that extent his 'will-power' may be said to have\ndiminished.\n\nIn the induction of hypnosis the essentials are quiet surroundings and\nconfidence of success on the part of both operator and subject. The\nsubject is then led to think only of the operator and his remarks and\ndirections, whilst generally some mechanical method is used which by\ntiring the eyes produces a feeling of sleepiness. Success varies\naccording to the skill and confidence of the operator and their\npersuasive effect on the subject.\n\nSeveral sittings may be necessary before any depth of hypnosis is\nobtained. If the result is successful the stream of consciousness is\nthinned out and its place is taken by other thoughts and suggestions\nsupplied by the operator. In light hypnosis there is produced a\ncondition in which suggestions concerning, say, the cessation of bad\nhabits or modes of thought are more readily accepted than in the normal\nstate of consciousness, the subject having afterwards a complete memory\nof the sitting. In deeper stages hypnotic sleep is produced,\nsuggestions concerning the bodily functions--producing, for example,\ntemporary rigidity or paralysis or loss of feeling--may take effect, and\nthe memory of the sitting may not be recalled afterwards; the subject\nmay carry out various movements by direction of the operator, and may\nbelieve what his senses should contradict. In this deeper stage he is in\na condition to receive suggestions as to actions to be performed after\nthe hypnotic state has ceased.\n\nThe explanation of the increased suggestibility of the hypnotic subject\nlies in the abolition, total or partial, of his stream of consciousness.\nSuch critical powers as he possesses are suspended and he has no\nstandard by which to judge assertions presented to him, like a man in a\ndream who through a similar absence of standards of comparison sees no\nabsurdity in the suspension of the laws of gravity. The unconscious of\nthe subject is now accessible to suggestions which may be planted there\nand will bear fruit even if the subject is unaware of them. It is an\nexperimental commonplace for a subject, told in a hypnotic state to\nperform a simple but unnecessary action after waking, to invent a\nrationalisation to account for doing it, whilst having no suspicion that\nhe does it as a result of suggestion.\n\nBut throughout all the stages he still has a volition of his own and\nwill do nothing that seriously conflicts with his well-rooted ideas of\nconduct. If he is persuaded that an imaginary some one is sitting in a\nchair, and is directed to stab him with an imaginary knife, he will\nperhaps do so, for he would not object to doing so in his waking state;\nbut suggest to him that he should steal a real watch, and if he be a man\nof ordinary honesty he will find reasons for not stealing it, though\nperhaps the man of criminal tendencies would fall to the suggestion.\n\nA story in illustration of this resistance was told me by a doctor who\npractised hypnotism for the cure of the alcohol habit. Having\nsuccessfully suggested to a patient that whisky would produce nausea, he\ncongratulated himself on a cure, but to his annoyance the patient came\nhome one day cheerfully intoxicated with beer. Further hypnosis was\ntried and, although the hypnotic state was induced as before, suggestion\nhad no further effect on the drinking habit. It turned out that the\npatient had decided not to be cured of the beer habit, hence the\nfailure.\n\nIn hypnosis we have another example of dissociation; during the process\nof induction the stream of consciousness is thinned out or completely\nabolished according to the depth of hypnosis. The fact that there may or\nmay not be during the waking state a recollection of the events in a\nprevious hypnosis shows that the dissociation may be continuous or\nabrupt (see Chapter IV). The substituted stream is made up of\nsuggestions from the operator and of material from the unconscious, for\nthe hypnosis may be used to revive memories that have been lost to the\nconsciousness through repression. In this last use we see a relation to\nautomatic writing and other methods of bringing to light the contents of\nthe unconscious.\n\nIn my account of the water-diviner I suggested that his dissociated\nstream was especially trained to pick up indications that are not\nobserved by his ordinary self. The study of the hypnotic state shows\nthat our senses sometimes work better when freed from the control of the\nconsciousness, so that the subject is able to see or hear or feel what\nis unobserved by the ordinary man. He possesses a hyperaesthesia such as\nwe see in a sleeping dog who wakes at the approach of a footstep\ninaudible to the human ear and recognises whether it belongs to friend\nor stranger. A similar alertness and its opposite can be seen at work in\nordinary sleep. The mother is roused by the slightest whimper of her\nbabe, whilst louder noises pass unheard; but the person who, with the\nbest intention of breaking a bad habit, has an alarm clock by his\nbedside, may neglect its call for a few mornings and end by entirely\nfailing to hear it.\n\nThe hyperaesthesia belonging to the unconscious is shown in other\nconditions than hypnosis and ordinary sleep. Jung quotes experiments[13]\nof Binet, who says: 'According to the calculations I have been able to\nmake, the unconscious sensitiveness of a hysteric is on some occasions\nfifty times more acute than that of a normal person.'\n\n[Footnote 13: _Analytical Psychology_, p. 25.]\n\nDr. Hurst, writing on War Neuroses,[14] says: 'In one severe case true\nhyperacusis was present, and Captain E. A. Peters estimated that the\npatient heard sixteen times more acutely than the average normal\nindividual. It was possible to carry on a conversation with him by\nwhispering in one corner of the ward when he was lying in the opposite\ncorner, although men with normal hearing who were standing half-way\nbetween in the centre of the room could not hear a word of what was\nwhispered.'\n\n[Footnote 14: _British Medical Journal_, September 29, 1917.]\n\nI myself knew a war-strained patient who, as a result of terrifying\nexperiences, had a dread of aeroplanes and could not only hear a plane\nlong before his comrades but could tell at once by the hum of the engine\nwhether it was British or German. In other respects his hearing was no\nbetter than his neighbour's.\n\nAnother case under my observation was that of a nervous lady with a fear\nof draughts. Whilst secluded in her bedroom she claimed to be affected\nwhen far-away doors were open, and showed a most uncanny and accurate\nknowledge as to whether they were open or shut, though this knowledge\nwas probably derived from the sense of hearing and not from any\nsensitivity to heat or cold.\n\nThe word 'hyperaesthesia' is used to denote an excessive acuity of our\nsenses. The examples quoted above refer to the sense of hearing; but\nother senses, such as touch and sight, may be similarly sharpened.\nBinet's experiments were carried out on the sense of touch.\n\nThere is no question here of the development of any new sense; the\nhyperaesthesia is only an exaggeration of the senses we already possess.\nIts importance lies in its common alliance with a dissociated\nreceptivity which may lead it to be overlooked and cause its results to\nbe ascribed to something else.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nDREAMS\n\n\nThe mystery of dreams and their interpretation has occupied men's\nthoughts in all ages. The Jews paid great attention to them, as the Old\nTestament shows, and there is evidence that the prophet Daniel had a\nshrewd knowledge, based upon psychological facts, concerning dream\nmeanings.\n\nThere are probably 'Dream Books' still sold which purport to provide\ninterpretations for the enquiring dreamer, but it is only in recent\nyears that the scientific study of dreams has produced useful results.\n\nFreud laid the foundations of our modern knowledge, but unfortunately\ncertain parts of his theories have raised so much antagonism that the\nsound work he has done is still scorned and dream interpretation is\nregarded as fanciful; nevertheless I propose to show that in dreams we\nhave a key to the unconscious of the dreamer.\n\nBefore attempting an explanation of dreams we must first consider sleep,\nwhich is an interruption of consciousness, so that whatever mind work is\ncarried on in sleep is a product of dissociation. The interruption of\nconsciousness is more or less complete, the light sleeper reacting to\nexternal stimuli, turning away from a touch or making movements to\nprotect himself from heat or cold, whilst the heavy sleeper fails to\nreact to these minor disturbances. The memory of occurrences in the\noutside world during sleep may be vaguely present in the waking stage,\nand some sleepers will answer questions or obey orders without waking\nand have little or no recollection of them afterwards. Such observations\npoint to a resemblance between sleep and that form of dissociation\ncalled hypnosis.\n\nIn hypnosis the memories and emotions in the unconscious may be brought\nto the surface, and in sleep the unconscious, escaping from the control\nof the consciousness, sends up thoughts and feelings which manifest\nthemselves in dreams. How far external stimuli cause or influence dreams\nis uncertain, but the more one investigates the less importance does one\nattach to physical stimuli.\n\nThe dreams of adults are concerned largely with what I have described in\na previous chapter as repressions. These repressions are buried in the\nunconscious, and their efforts to come into consciousness cause our\napparently senseless and fantastic dreams. If we dreamed distinctly\nabout these forgotten episodes, and remembered the dream on waking, they\nwould come into consciousness and be recognised, but, being buried and\nrefused admission to the wide-awake world, before entering consciousness\nthey are so distorted as to be unrecognisable. To the mechanism that\nholds them down or distorts them is given the name of the 'censor', and\nthe interpreter of dreams must seek to evade the censor and resolve the\ndistorted story into its proper elements.\n\nThis method is of value in that treatment of the war-strained soldier\nwhich aims at making him face his memories and grow accustomed to them,\nfor if a memory is repressed it tends to appear in the sufferer's\ndreams, which give an opportunity for its recovery by dream analysis.\nThe opponents of this method picture the analyst, armed with a\ndictionary of dream meanings, listening to a patient's account of a\ndream, then giving him an explanation and persuading him to believe it;\nbut, though a shrewd guess may often be made as to the meaning of a\ndream, the interpretation, to be of any value, must come from the\npatient. He is made to close his eyes and, visualising the dream, to\ndescribe it carefully. If it is a terrifying dream the telling of it\nwill reproduce the feeling of terror, and appropriate questions will\nrecall the occasion on which the same feeling first occurred. If the\nreal incident is recalled there is an emotional outbreak which often\nstartles the observer, who has the satisfaction of knowing that the\ngreater the outbreak the greater will be the benefit.\n\nHere is an example of the practical use of a dream: The patient had lost\nall memory of his experience in France, and this loss spread to his life\nbefore the war so that he failed to recall even his former employment;\nhe slept badly and had terrifying dreams, one of which was as follows:--\n\n     'I was on a pleasure steamer with a lot of cheerful people; it went\n     to sea and then entered a dark cavern. On the floor of the cavern\n     were broken skeletons, and at the far end of the cavern was a hole\n     with light showing through. Two pirates with cocked hats came and\n     led seven of us up the cavern, where we saw some old men with\n     whiskers. The pirates were quite kind and led us through another\n     hole into a small cavern; the wall of the cavern began to fall\n     down, so I picked up a broken sword and began to bore into the\n     wall. Then something like a ball of fire came at me, and I woke up\n     frightened.'\n\nThough the reader could probably guess what the dream was about yet the\nman had no idea of the meaning, for the censor was still at work. He was\nmade to close his eyes and visualise the ball of fire till he became\nfrightened again, so frightened, indeed, that he was in a state of\ndissociation, his stream of consciousness being filled by the feeling of\nterror and only in relation to the outside world by means of the voice\nof the questioner. (The fact that memories restored by this method are\noften forgotten again as soon as the patient opens his eyes is proof of\na dissociation.) At this stage he was told, 'You felt like that in\nFrance, what was it?' The normal stream of consciousness being cut off,\nthe censor was now out of action, and the man, putting his hands to his\nhead, cried, 'It's a Minnewerfer', and when he became calmer told of a\ndug-out being blown in and several of his mates being killed. Then he\nwas taken over the dream and made to look at the various parts and tell\nwhat they 'turned to'. The pleasure steamer was the boat in which he\nwent to France, the cheery people on board being other soldiers; he now\nrecognised the place from which the boat started and the port where he\nlanded. The cavern was a tunnel up which a captain and a sergeant-major\n(the pirates) had led seven men; the cocked hats resolved into the\nsergeant-major having a piece torn from the cloth cover of his helmet\nwhich flapped in the wind; the broken skeletons were the bodies of his\nslain comrades; the second cavern was the dug-out; the broken sword a\nbayonet which broke when he tried to dig his way out with it; the old\nmen were German prisoners, and the ball of fire was the flash of the\nexplosion.\n\nAll this was explained by the patient. If he had been told the probable\nmeaning of the dream he might have believed it; but the result would\nhave been valueless--it was necessary that he should bring up the\nmemories himself. The dream is unusually coherent, but serves as a good\nexample of the modern methods of dream interpretation.\n\nHalf-conscious fears or desires are often represented by symbolisms\napparent to the analyst but unrecognised by the dreamer. A man told me\nof a dream in which he met some one whom he had defeated in a business\ndisagreement, and, to his surprise, he shook hands with his old\nopponent. I told him that he felt the pricking of conscience and was\ndesirous of making amends. This was little more than a guess, but its\ntruth was admitted though the dreamer said that he had hardly realised\nhis feelings before. It is characteristic of dreams, as of the slips of\nthe tongue discussed in Chapter I, that there is an obstacle to the\ndreamer's unaided understanding of them. A simple dream of my own will\nillustrate this: When going upstairs at a seaside hotel my wife,\nnoticing a stuffed bird, said to me, 'Is that a sea-gull?' and I\nanswered 'Yes'. The next morning I remembered a dream for which I could\ntrace no cause, and said to my wife, 'I wonder why I dreamed of my old\nschoolmaster last night?' At this she asked, 'Which one?' and when I\nanswered, 'Mr. Gull', the connection at once became obvious, though\nsomething had prevented my seeing the obvious without aid.\n\nSince a dream is a product of dissociation, we expect to find in it the\nsame qualities that belong to the product of other dissociations. The\nworld of the dream is pictured as something external to the dreamer and\nnot arising from his own mind, just as the revelations of automatic\nwriting or the movements of the divining-rod are accepted as coming from\nsome one or something other than the agent.\n\nThe dream taps the unconscious, the stories about poets and musicians\nwho rise in the night-watches to pen their elusive inspirations being\nparalleled by the poetic imagery in the automatic writings of the\nGlastonbury archaeologists.\n\nLost memories appear in the dream and the dreamer may deny the\nincidents, as mentioned in Chapter III. In the same way the apparently\nhonest medium may produce a memory, more or less distorted, as a\nrevelation, and deny that it is a memory.\n\nThe dissociated stream is hypersensitive and makes use of hints and\nfears that have passed unperceived by the consciousness. This use\naccounts for prophetic dreams, which are, like intuitions, the result of\nunconscious processes. In my own experience I have known but two\ncircumstantial accounts of dream prophecies which were claimed to be\nfulfilled: One concerned a railway accident, and the other the\ndestruction by fire of a distant house. Both the dreamers, who were of\nthe male sex, had suffered from gross hysterical manifestations, or, in\nother words, had been woefully led astray by the unconscious concerning\nsomething other than prophecy. Accounts of prophetic dreams must always\nbe suspect because of their origin in the unconscious and the inability\nof the dreamer either to interpret them or trace their origin. It is to\nbe noted that psychologists who work at dream analysis make no mention\nof dream prophecies, although the fact that 'the wish is father to the\nthought' explains why a dream sometimes expresses an unconscious desire\nthat later attains fulfilment in reality.\n\nThe Biblical account of Nebuchadnezzar's dream of the idol with feet of\nclay bears the stamp of genuine history. The king, like the neurotic\nsufferer of to-day, 'dreamed dreams, wherewith his spirit was troubled,\nand his sleep brake from him.' The magicians, called upon to interpret,\nasked that the king should first tell his dream; but the king answered,\n'The thing is gone from me; if ye will not make known unto me the dream,\nwith the interpretation thereof, ye shall be cut in pieces and your\nhouses shall be made a dunghill.' The magicians and astrologers, the\nsorcerers and the Chaldeans, failed, but the prophet Daniel took up the\ntask and told the king his forgotten dream. We can only imagine his\nmethod, but it is possible to revive a dream by using the emotion felt\non waking, and such a method, or even direct hypnosis, may have been\navailable to Daniel; and if we regard the interpretation, not as\nprophetic, but as revealing to the king his forebodings of future\ndisaster, then the chapter accords with modern conceptions of dream\nanalysis. Nebuchadnezzar was already a psycho-neurotic on the borderline\nof insanity, as his subsequent history shows, and would easily come to\nrely upon and reward a psychologist like Daniel, who convincingly laid\nbare to him the working of his unconscious. By tradition the old\ncivilisations of the East were the sources of occult knowledge, and this\nview of a scrap of Old Testament history gives a hint how the tradition\narose. If there existed an esoteric knowledge of psychological technique\nsuch as I ascribe to Daniel, then its possessors would easily obtain\nreputations for more than worldly wisdom.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nHYSTERIA\n\n\nThe word 'hysteria', like 'lunacy', is evidence of a belief now\ndiscarded. When the theory of demoniacal possession ceased to satisfy\nthe desire for reasons, and material explanations were sought for\ncertain conditions, it was supposed that the uterus (Greek, _hystera_)\ncame adrift from its position and wandered about the body, producing the\ncondition thenceforward known as hysteria. Advancing knowledge killed\nthis theory, but the influence of the word remained and the disease was\nattributed to some derangement or irritation of the uterus and its\nassociated organs. Charcot, of Paris, showed the mental origin of\nhysteria, but, becoming lost in a maze of hypnotism and suggestion, he\ndescribed as symptoms of the disease various manifestations which were\nreally called up by himself or his assistants. There are medical men who\nstill insist on a bodily cause, but such causes serve merely as pegs on\nwhich to hang the symptoms.\n\nAs usual, I shrink from a definition, but in this case I have good\nreason. Every writer who describes hysteria expresses his own ideas\nabout it, and as the ideas of no two writers are alike some definitions\nscarcely seem to refer to the same subject.\n\nHere is a definition by Babinski, a French writer of international\nreputation:--\n\n     'Hysteria is a peculiar psychical state capable of giving rise to\n     certain conditions which have features of their own. It manifests\n     itself in primary and secondary symptoms. The former can be exactly\n     reproduced by suggestion in certain subjects and can be made to\n     disappear under the sole influence of suggestion.'\n\nAnd here is one by Pierre Janet, a man of equal eminence:--\n\n     'Hysteria is a form of mental depression characterised by\n     retraction of the field of personal consciousness, and a tendency\n     to complete division of the personality, and subconscious mental\n     conditions grow and form a kind of second personality.'\n\nAnd here are a few words from Ernest Jones, the chief exponent of\nFreud's views in this country:--\n\n     'It is in the excessive tendency to displace affects by means of\n     superficial associations that the final key to the explanation of\n     abnormal suggestion is to be sought. Even if it were true, which it\n     certainly is not, that most hysterical symptoms are the product of\n     verbal suggestion, the observation would be of hardly any practical\n     or theoretical interest.'\n\nWhen the reader has finished this chapter he will perhaps return to\nthese definitions, and see how each represents one aspect, and how the\nbest understanding is reached by a consideration of all of them.\n\nThe Great War has provided plenty of material for the study of hysteria,\nand French and German writers have dealt extensively with it. The\npaucity of English writings on the subject may indicate a smaller amount\nof material, but there has been sufficient considerably to increase our\nknowledge. The common form of hysteria is a mimicry of bodily disease;\npains, paralyses, contractions and joint affections most often occur,\nthough fits and trances are typical and there are few diseases which are\nnot imitated. Hysteria therefore has a superficial resemblance to\nmalingering, or the conscious simulation of disease for a definite end,\nand many people find it hard to conceive any difference between the two.\nVarious criteria have been given to distinguish them, but, in my\nopinion, when the question arises the distinction can rarely be made\nupon physical grounds and is chiefly a matter of judgement concerning\nthe honesty of the patient; that is to say, the hysteric believes in his\ndisease as a reality, but the malingerer knows that it is fictitious. I\nbelieve there is no definite line between the groups, though some\nauthorities assert that they are quite distinct. Practical experience\nproves that in many cases there is an intense desire for cure which\ncannot be reconciled with any consciousness of simulation, and the\napparently heartfelt gratitude often shown by the patient on recovery is\nfurther proof of the reality of this desire.\n\nIt is a matter for regret that we have no word to take the place of\n'hysteria', which is a mark of superstition; the only excuse for its\nuse being that every one knows that it does not mean what it says.\nPopular and even professional ideas concerning hysteria are so far from\nthe truth that it is a pity a new word is not employed. If a man has\nfought bravely for years and at last succumbed in his effort to forget\nthe horrors he has seen, it sounds an insult to say he is suffering from\nhysteria. Yet the newer term of 'shell-shock' was worse, for it conveyed\na totally false idea of causation and treatment: to regard as due to the\nconcussion of a shell symptoms which are of purely mental origin led to\nmuddled thinking.\n\nA common history in these cases was that the man became 'unconscious'\nafter a shell explosion, and on returning to consciousness found himself\nmute, shaky, or paralysed. These facts led to the belief that the\ncondition was actually due to the physical effect of an explosion,\n'shell-shock' and 'concussion' being regarded as almost synonymous. But\nthe same symptoms occurred when there was no question of concussion,\nwhilst the recoveries, often sensationally reported in the press, after\naccidental or deliberate stimuli of various kinds were on all fours with\nthe cures wrought by Christian Science or the pilgrimage to Lourdes.\nHence the hysterical nature of the symptoms became evident and the\nconcussion theory faded away.\n\nWhen one of these patients is encouraged to talk he often tells how he\nhad felt himself overpowered by the horrors of his surroundings and\nforced to make increased efforts to keep going and avoid showing his\ncondition to his fellows--in other words, to repress his emotions. The\nstrain continuing, the shell-burst proved the last straw, and his\nrepressed feelings broke into consciousness and took possession of it;\nthis is what the man called being 'unconscious', but the condition is\nreally an abrupt dissociation. In course of time--hours, days, or even\nweeks--he comes to himself again, and once more his feelings are buried;\nbut now he is a hysteric, and his buried feelings--his dissociated\nstream--produce and maintain his symptoms.\n\nIn whatever way the hysteria arises the developed symptoms are the\nresult of a mental activity which is powerful enough to overcome for a\nlong time the desire for recovery. There are two streams of thought--the\none desirous of cure and the other engaged in keeping up the\nsymptoms--and we recognise an extreme example of continuous\ndissociation, in which the main stream is not only unaware of the\nexistence of the other and unable to control it, but in which the\nresults produced by the dissociated stream are antagonistic to the\ndesires of the main personality.\n\nThis conception accords fairly well with Janet's definition as given\nabove, but though it gives us a description of the disease and indicates\nits relation to other phenomena we have yet to understand why the\ndissociation occurs. This is a difficult problem, and one to which\nseveral answers can be given. I have suggested one above, and Freud\nsupplies another, which he applies not only to hysteria but to allied\nnervous conditions. What follows is not an exposition of his ideas, but\nrather my interpretation of such as are acceptable and useful to me. A\ncomplex, which according to Freud usually centres around an infantile\nsexual desire, is repugnant to the consciousness and becomes repressed\nas a result of conflict in just the same way as a memory is repressed.\nThe complex is kept thrust down in the unconscious, but always tends to\nproduce effects; it may do so in dreams or may obtain symbolic\nrepresentation in the form of a neurosis, especially in times of stress.\nBesides the primary aim of expressing repression by a symbolic\nrepresentation, Freud admits a 'secondary function' of the neurosis by\nwhich the patient may derive some advantage from the disease.\n\nHere is a case capable of explanation by the Freudian hypothesis: A man\nsaid he had fallen on to the blade of an aeroplane propeller and bruised\nhis neck; he complained of severe pain in one side of his neck, with\ntwitching of the arm on the same side, which continued for months. It\nwas found that the patient, who was apprenticed to engineering, had such\na deep-seated fear of making mistakes that he had sometimes stayed at\nthe workshop for hours after the day's work was over in order to\nfamiliarise himself with the use of tools; but in spite of this his fear\nincreased, until the handling of a file or spanner produced feelings of\nanxiety. Then he joined the army. Being put to work at aeroplanes he\ntried to do his duty and succeeded so far as to be made a corporal,\nsaying never a word about his fears and banishing them as far as\npossible from his thoughts. At last the repression broke forth and took\nsymbolic form in pain, the expression of his fear of the machinery which\nwas blamed as its material cause. No account can picture the emotion\nproduced by the recall of this complex, and it was evident that his\nfeelings were intense and of more importance to him than one unfamiliar\nwith such cases would suppose. His pains ceased when the cause had been\nrevealed, and, what is very important, when he was told that he could\nnot be expected to work at machinery. It must be added that the\nout-and-out Freudian would not be satisfied with this explanation; he\nwould trace the cause of the original fear of making mistakes, and would\nexpect to find it in some repression of infantile desires or fears.\nCertainly I have a feeling that the case had only been half\ninvestigated, but it will serve as a simple example of symbolic\nrepresentation.\n\nThe 'secondary function' of this neurosis is plain: the patient\nsucceeded in keeping away from machinery all the time the pain lasted,\nand his anxiety symptoms were powerful enough to lead to his removal to\nanother kind of work.\n\nThis leads on to Adler's theory,[15] which, like Freud's, is based upon\nconflict and repression, but regards the hysteria as derived from the\n'Will to Power'. The potential neurotic has a feeling of inferiority\ncombined with a desire to be master of his own fate, and, since direct\nattainment of this desire is impossible, the end is striven for by a\nfantasy or fiction produced by the unconscious. This view, thus baldly\nput, shows a relation between hysteria and malingering, and, returning\nto the case of the prentice engineer, we can see his work in the shop\nbecoming more and more distasteful whilst his anxiety tended to become a\nmeans of escape; then in the army the neurosis took a more determined\nform which might be confounded with malingering by an observer who\nassumed that all actions were the result of conscious motives.\n\n[Footnote 15: _The Neurotic Constitution._ Kegan Paul.]\n\nMy present opinion is that the theory of repression offers the only\nexplanation of many cases of hysteria. This applies particularly to\nthose cases where the symptoms represent a permanent state of\nembarrassment or fear, such as stammers and tremors, and to the\nunreasonable fears and impulses, the phobias and obsessions, of the\nwar-strained soldier. As an example I will quote a case of a soldier who\nhad an impulse to attack any single companion, which was cured by\nbringing into consciousness the repressed memory of a gruesome\nhand-to-hand fight in which he killed his opponent. The repression was\nso complete that after its first revival under hypnosis it was\n'forgotten' again and again at subsequent interviews in the waking\nstate. This example illustrates Freud's 'tendency to displace affects.'\nThe repressed complex contained within itself the impulse to fight;\nthis 'affect' reached consciousness and an object had to be found for\nit, the object being the single companion of the patient.\n\nAs regards those hysterias in which the secondary function is\nconspicuous, I incline to the 'Will to Power' theory, and add to it the\n'repression of the consciousness of deceit.' To illustrate this, let us\ntrace the growth of a case of hysteria. Imagine a girl who is\n'misunderstood', who has her round of daily tasks and feels that she was\nmeant for higher things, that she ought to be loved and obeyed instead\nof being subject to the will of others. To no one can she tell her\nthoughts and troubles, sympathy is denied her, and she sees no hope of\nsatisfying her desires or changing her position in the world.\n\nOr imagine another type, the pampered girl who has never had to face a\ntrouble or unpleasant task and has come to regard her own wishes as the\nsupreme law, until at last the time comes when some desire, some wish\nthat she cannot or will not face and conquer, remains ungratified. She\nfeels the need to express her feelings, to obtain that sympathy that she\nthinks she deserves.\n\nIn either case there comes the hysterical manifestation, and here I will\nquote from Jung[16]:--\n\n     'But, the astonished reader asks, what is supposed to be the use of\n     the neurosis? What does it effect? Whoever has had a pronounced\n     case of neurosis in his immediate environment knows all that can\n     be \"effected\" by a neurosis. In fact there is altogether no better\n     means of tyrannising over a whole household than by a striking\n     neurosis. Heart attacks, choking fits, convulsions of all kinds\n     achieve enormous effects, that can hardly be surpassed. Picture the\n     fountains of pity let loose, the sublime anxiety of the dear kind\n     parents, the hurried running to and fro of the servants, the\n     incessant sounding of the call of the telephone, the hasty arrival\n     of the physicians, the delicacy of the diagnosis, the detailed\n     examinations, the lengthy courses of treatment, the considerable\n     expense: and there in the midst of all the uproar, lies the\n     innocent sufferer to whom the household is even overflowingly\n     grateful, when he has recovered from the \"spasms\".'\n\n[Footnote 16: Loc. cit., p. 389.]\n\nBut the end is not always thus. There are victims of hysteria whose\nsymptoms continue for months or years, till cure seems impossible,\nalthough, as I have said before in this chapter, there is present in the\nconsciousness a strong desire for recovery. Let us imagine the patient\ncomplaining of severe pain in one foot: the sympathising friends tend\nher with care and affection, the doctor suspects the early stage of some\nbone disease, and, as is the fate of so many practitioners, he is urged\nby the friends to say 'what is the matter.' Then the supposed disease\nreceives a name, muscular action pulls the foot into an abnormal\nposition, deformity appears, and if the true nature of the disease is\nnow discovered not only the patient but the friends and family need the\nmost careful treatment.\n\nWhat has been happening all this time in the mind of the patient? We\nwill assume that she knew at the beginning that her pains were\nfictitious; what course is now open to her if she wishes to end the\ndeceit when her friends, by their pardonable credulity, have allowed\nthemselves to be deceived and her troubles have been accepted by the\ndoctor as real? Her pride or self-respect prevents open confession, and\nin her ignorance of the course of the supposed disease she thinks an\nunexpected recovery will reveal the fraud. Here are the materials for\nanother mental conflict, and her alternatives are:--\n\n1. To solve the conflict by confession or recovery, and I have shown the\ndifficulties of this course.\n\n2. To build a logic-tight compartment; to say, for example, 'They have\nnever given me a chance, and now I am quite right in imposing upon them\nas long as I can.' But her feelings concerning right and wrong are\nprobably too strong to maintain this attitude indefinitely.\n\n3. To repress the consciousness of deceit and maintain her symptoms as\nthe price of her peace of mind.\n\nThis last course is followed, and the patient is now a Dissociate. In\nthe dissociated stream are:--\n\n1. The original desires which led to the manifestation of disease--the\ndesire for sympathy, the desire to have her own way, the 'Will to\nPower.'\n\n2. The knowledge of deceit.\n\n3. The mechanism for maintaining the symptoms--the pains, the paralysis\nor contracture.\n\nThis stream is now independent of the main personality and out of its\ncontrol; as far as the patient knows her pains are real, her deformity\nis a disease, and whoever doubts it is not only ignorant but cruel. We\ncan now understand the capriciousness of the hysteric, her moods and\ncontrary ways. On the one side is a mind with ordinary motives, and on\nthe other is the split-off portion containing the complexes catalogued\nabove. If the reader thinks this conception brings us back to the old\none of demoniacal possession I will admit that the only difference lies\nin the definition of the demon.\n\nThe description of this imagined case will perhaps be acceptable to\nthose who believe in the connection between hysteria and malingering.\nThis connection I at one time emphasised, and I still believe that in\nsome cases the repression of a knowledge of deceit plays an important\npart in the development of the disease. But motives are derived more or\nless from the unconscious, and when the unconscious elements predominate\nwe approach the condition in which there has never existed any\nconsciousness of deceit. The case of the soldier with an obsession to\nattack his companion does not admit of the hypothesis of a stage in\nwhich the symptom was due to a conscious desire to any end: but his\nrepression might have shown itself, let us suppose, in a paralysis of\nhis legs as a symbol of exhaustion or terror. Then we should have a\nhysteria in which there had never been any deceit complex, though in the\nabsence of knowledge of the workings of the patient's mind a firm\nbeliever in the 'Will to Power' theory might attribute the origin of the\ncondition to a definite desire to escape the strain of war.\n\nI can now state that some of the results of conflict between desire and\nreality form a graduated series, beginning at cases of conscious\nsimulation, then passing on to those of hysteria with repression of the\nknowledge of deceit, and ending with cases where deceit has never\nexisted; but no one theory explains satisfactorily the origin of all\ncases of hysteria.\n\nIt is difficult to understand those cases in which the hysteric inflicts\ninjuries upon him or herself; the individual who thrusts needles into\nhis body and comes to hospital again and again to have them removed is a\ncurious but not very uncommon object. An ophthalmic surgeon of my\nacquaintance had a patient who placed irritants under the lid of one eye\ntill the sight was lost and the organ was removed, and the process was\nbegun on the remaining eye before the trick was discovered. Such things\noccur in the history of malingering, and what the consciousness can do\nthe dissociated stream is equally capable of doing: the only difficulty\nis the very practical one of believing that the patient can carry out\nthe necessary action without being fully aware of what is happening,\nunless we assume an abrupt dissociation with the main personality\ntemporarily abolished.\n\nCertain hypnotic experiments throw light upon this difficulty, which\nalso occurs in connection with some spiritualist phenomena. It has for\nlong been disputed whether mental processes can produce bleeding into\nthe skin or blisters upon it. Such bleedings were the 'stigmata'\nrepresenting the marks of the Crucifixion, that have been described as\nappearing upon the bodies of religious devotees, and they have been\nthought to be real and due in some way to auto-suggestion.\n\nHysterical subjects often show the production of raised wheals if the\nskin is lightly stroked with the finger-nail or the head of a needle;\none can write a word upon the skin and watch it become visible. This is\npurely a circulatory phenomenon, but experiments have been made under\nhypnosis in which the skin is touched with a pencil and the subject is\ntold that he is being burnt and that a blister will follow. Success has\nbeen claimed for this experiment, but one source of error is hard to\nexclude. If a blister appears the next day, and the subject is known to\nbe an honest man with no end to gain by cooking the experiment, an\nobserver might be inclined to accept the result as due to the direct\ninfluence of suggestion; but the subject is, by the terms of the\nexperiment, in a state of dissociation, and in the dissociated\npersonality exists the suggestion that a blister should appear. In\naddition there exists the desire to carry out the wishes of the\nhypnotist, and since this is out of the control of the main personality\nwhose honesty is accepted as sufficient guarantee against fraud he must\nnevertheless be regarded as willing and eager to produce a blister.\n\nMilne Bramwell[17] quotes a case in which suggestion, under stringent\nconditions, apparently produced blistering: the subject's arm was then\nenveloped in bandages in which sheets of paper were incorporated, and\nafter further suggestion and a night's rest it was found that, although\nthe subject had been watched continually, she had succeeded in\npenetrating the bandages with a hair-pin. A further experiment, in which\nthe arm was enveloped in plaster of Paris bandage, gave a negative\nresult. This experiment is very valuable; it does not disprove the\npossibility of producing blisters by suggestion, but it does prove that\nif we judge the Dissociate by ordinary standards we expose ourselves to\nvictimisation. If I were the subject of such an experiment I should\ncertainly require that every precaution should be taken to prevent me\nfrom producing a blister by mechanical means.\n\n[Footnote 17: _Hypnotism_, 3rd ed., 1913. Wm. Rider & Son.]\n\nNow let us consider the signs of the disease. In the chapter on\nsuggestion I showed that in a limb paralysed by hysteria the loss of\nsensitiveness, the so-called hysterical anaesthesia, resulted from a\ndesire on the part of the patient that the doctor should find what he\nwas looking for, and this desire I called receptivity. The receptivity\nis at first necessary to keep up the deception, for the patient does not\nknow the symptoms of the simulated disease, and must always be on the\nalert to pick up hints. When dissociation occurs, the receptivity finds\nits place in the split-off stream, forming part of the mechanism for\nkeeping up the symptoms; but having passed out of the control of the\nmain personality it tends to become exaggerated and misdirected.\n\nHence the hysteric becomes very suggestible and all kinds of fantastic\nsymptoms may be produced. If the resistance to recovery is not great\nthen suggestion may even remove symptoms, just as it created them; and\nif we now turn back to Babinski's definition we shall find that it fits\ninto our theories, although it concerns itself with only a restricted\nview of the subject.\n\nSince one object of the dissociated stream is to maintain the symptoms,\nit follows that any method that will remove them may abolish the\ndissociation, though still leaving the patient with those desires and\nconflicts, conscious or unconscious, which preceded their appearance and\nwhich form the so-called 'hysterical predisposition'. This explains the\nsuccess which has followed the employment of exorcism, Christian\nScience, nasty drugs, cold water, electric shocks, persuasion, or rest\ncures; and to this list, I hasten to admit, some people would add\ntreatment according to the method of bringing repressions into the light\nof consciousness.\n\nI have tried to make clear the subject of hysteria for the following\nreasons: There is at the present day no school of believers desirous of\nattributing supernatural causes to the disease, and therefore I am\nspared the task of attacking a mass of credulity; and, further, the\nmental processes are identical with those shown in other phenomena\nconcerning which credulity is still powerful. I can now proceed to show\nhow the theory of dissociation explains the production of the spuriously\nsupernatural by the apparently honest.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nEXPERIMENTS, DOMESTIC AND OTHER\n\n\nThere are certain parlour tricks which have an attractive flavour of the\noccult and sometimes form an introduction to it. Most of us have seen\nchildren mystified by a thought-reading performance depending upon a\nmore or less obvious code, but sometimes we are treated to one which is\nmore genuine.\n\nThe procedure is something like this: One person goes out of the room\nand the others decide that on his return he shall perform an action such\nas unlacing a shoe or pushing on the hands of a clock to a certain hour.\nThen he returns and, according to arrangement, may be blindfolded or\nnot, and one of the party may or may not place a hand upon his shoulder;\nthe audience next 'concentrate their minds' upon what the performer is\nto do, whilst he 'makes his mind a blank'.\n\nSometimes success follows, and the result is taken as proof of\n'thought-reading'.\n\nNow let us examine the process in the light of what we have assumed in\nprevious chapters. To make the mind a blank, if it means anything, means\nto cut off the stream of consciousness, and we straightway have our old\nfriend a dissociation. The performer is then in a state resembling\nhypnosis, and, as we have seen before, in hypnosis the senses may be\nabnormally sharpened. This sharpness, together with the receptivity of\nthe subject, makes him ready to pick up the faintest signs, and in the\ncase where the hand of a second person, also concentrating his mind on\nthe desired action and therefore to a certain extent dissociated, is\nplaced upon his shoulder, there are easily conveyed enough\npressure-signs to indicate when he is going right or wrong.\n\nWhen there is no actual contact other indications than touch are not\nlacking. The passing expressions of pleasure or disappointment on the\nfaces of the audience, the sigh of relief when a wrong step is retraced,\nthe glances at the object to be handled, are all picked up by the\ndissociated stream whilst the main personality of the subject is for the\ntime almost obliterated. We must bear in mind that all the audience are\nconcentrating their minds, that concentration of mind upon an action is\nlikely to be followed by movements corresponding to the action, and that\nno one is watching his neighbour or suspects any such unconscious\nindications.\n\nThe thought-reading is not performed without prolonged pauses, the\nsubject making several halting steps before the right one is taken. It\nreminds one of the manner in which the medium feels his way to the\nthoughts of his victims.\n\nDomestic blindfolding is not very efficient, and may be of use to the\nsubject by allowing him to look without the direction of his glances\nbeing noticed.\n\nSo this thought-reading is reduced to the children's game of 'Hot and\nCold', but instead of fully conscious people producing and receiving\nsounds we have a group of 'concentrated' (that is, partly dissociated)\nstreams sending out indications to be picked up by a hypersensitive\ndissociated stream.\n\nThe subject is often exhausted by his efforts, and the performance is\nnot likely to be of benefit to any one who misinterprets it. The human\nmind contains enough errors without producing a voluntary dissociation\nfurther to deceive its owner.\n\nThere is one well-known experiment the significance of which is\ngenerally missed. If the reader is not familiar with it let him follow\nthese directions and he will probably find that he is possessed of some\namount of so-called hypnotic power. Having procured a weight fastened to\na short cord (a heavy watch with its chain will serve), direct a friend\nto sit in a chair and, resting his elbows upon his knees, to hold the\ncord by the fingers of both hands so that the weight is suspended\nbetween his separated knees. Let him keep his eyes upon the weight and\nassure him that it will begin to swing from knee to knee. The weight, at\nfirst indecisively wobbling, will soon take on the swing you describe,\nwhich will gradually increase in amplitude. I have heard people ascribe\nthis motion to 'magnetic power'--blessed words that mean nothing, but\nserve to give an appearance of reason to an explanation that should\nsatisfy no one.\n\nThe real cause of the motion is shown if you experiment with a fresh\nsubject, who must know nothing of the first trial. Ask him to hold the\nweight in the same manner but, standing in front of him, tell him the\nweight will swing towards you (that is, at right angles to its swing in\nthe first experiment). If you show sufficient assurance you will\nprobably succeed in both experiments, but your chance of success is less\nthan that of the man who has seen the trick and accepts the 'magnetic'\nexplanation, for his belief in the physical cause of the phenomenon will\ngive him a natural assurance which is lacking in one who realises that\nthe weight swings in a certain direction because the agent is made to\nbelieve that it will.\n\nIt is plain that your friend swings the weight himself, but he is\nunaware of two factors: He knows nothing of his own muscular action and\nnothing of his own mental processes which have produced that action;\nhence this experiment must be placed among the automatisms like\ntable-turning and water-divining. One is prepared to find that the trick\nhas its place among the mechanical adjuncts of spiritualism: it was used\nin ancient times as a means of divination, and is used by mediums of\nto-day when they tap out spirit revelations with a gold ring suspended\nin a glass tumbler.\n\nIf intelligent people like your friends can be made to believe that the\nweight is moved by some extraneous force, it can be understood that the\ntrained medium, full of a belief in the supernatural, finds it an easy\ntask to let the unconscious have possession of his or her muscular\nactions and spell out memories and fantasies which one is asked to\naccept as evidence of spirit control.\n\nPlanchette (described in Chapter IV) finds a place in the family circle,\nsometimes with the result that a single hit becomes a tradition after\nall the other stuff has faded from memory. A friend, who told me that he\nsaw Planchette predict truly the month in which the Boer War ended,\nadmitted that his family had toyed with the instrument night after\nnight, but he failed to remember any other results. I must add that he\nnever believed in the thing, but, nevertheless, the one lucky shot was\nremembered.\n\nTable-turning is another half-way house between the parlour trick and\nthe full-blown occult. Several people sit round a light table with their\nhands placed upon it, and, after due 'concentration of mind', aided\noften by a dim light, the table begins to move and the spirits are at\nwork. Then a sort of Morse code is invented to communicate with the\nspirit entities, and the revelations begin.\n\nHere I will quote from page 219 of _Raymond_, that widely-circulated\nbook by Sir Oliver Lodge:--\n\n'During the half-hour ... I had felt every now and then a curious\ntingling in my hands and fingers, and then a much stronger drawing sort\nof feeling through my hands and arms, which caused the table to have a\nstrange intermittent trembling sort of feeling, though it was not a\nmovement of the _whole_ table.... Nearly every time I felt these queer\nmovements Lady Lodge asked, \"Did you move, Woodie?\" ... Lady Lodge said\nit must be due to nerves or muscles, or something of the sort.'\n\nCompare this with the feelings of the water-diviner (Chapter V):--\n\n'The muscles of the arm become contracted when the bodily magnetism is\naffected by the presence of water.... I suppose it must have something\nto do with the composition of the blood and nerve cells.'\n\nOr with those of a hysteric who, previously relieved from mutism, was\nagain struck dumb during a thunderstorm: ... 'I felt the electricity\npassing all over my body; it made all my muscles quiver and then went\nout at my finger-tips.'\n\nNo one can deny the reality of these feelings, as feelings, but in the\nfirst instance they are due to spirits, and in the next to water, and\nonly in the case of the man known to be sick in mind is the real\nexplanation likely to be accepted by the subject. They are all products\nof imagination, suggestion, self-deceit, or dissociation--call it what\nyou please if you understand that the feelings have their origin in the\nmind of the subject and are not due to any external cause.\n\nBut in the first two examples they are associated with muscular\nmovements which, we must believe, are carried out unknown to the doers\nand hence have their source in a dissociated stream. As usual, once the\ndissociation is established, there is no limit to its manifestations.\nPicture three or four Dissociates at work at a table, all bent upon\nproducing signs of the marvellous, all blind to the mechanism at work,\nand with the hypersensitiveness of the dissociated stream ready to draw\non the memories of the unconscious.\n\nMixed with this is the possibility of more elaborate deceit: when the\nhands of all are raised from the table their knees may still be under\nit; and if the knees are clear of it a blackened lath concealed up a\nsleeve can still work miracles.\n\nThis is taking us beyond the purely domestic, but there is no difference\nbetween the after-dinner tilting of the table for amusement and the same\nthing done at a seance--the mechanism is the same, but one is treated as\na jest whilst the other is something worse. We see again the typical\nseries with simple trickery at one end and reason-destroying\ndissociation at the other.\n\nPalmistry seems too absurd to be discussed, but it is another half-way\nhouse. That the lines of Life, or Love, or what-not, are to be found on\nthe palms of dead-born babies and of monkeys should be enough to stop\nthe cult; but handbooks of palmistry seem to profit their publishers,\nand the palmists and clairvoyants flourish. The girl who buys a handbook\nand amuses her friends by reading their hands is comparatively harmless,\nthough even she, becoming shrewd to note when she hits the mark, is\nlikely to develop an unconscious receptivity and drift into fraud.\n\nCrystal-gazing is a form of mediumism admirably fitted to give play\nboth to trickery and dissociation. Used by the medium to 'see as in a\nglass darkly' and gain time for the help of his or her receptivity, it\nalso allows of the induction of a self-hypnosis, the memories or fancies\nfrom the unconscious showing themselves as visions in the crystal.\n\nTable-turning is easily first among the ways of giving rein to the\nunconscious. It has the advantage of allowing several people to play the\nsame game at once, and further of allowing one Dissociate to work the\nmiracle, whilst no one, not even the Dissociate himself, knows who is\ndoing it. This is illustrated in _The New Revelation_, p. 19, where Sir\nArthur says: 'Some one, then, was moving the table; I thought it was\nthey. They probably thought that I did it.'\n\n_The Gate of Remembrance_[18] gives an illustration of tapping the\nunconscious and producing results that seem astonishing.\n\n[Footnote 18: By F. B. Bond; Blackwell, Oxford.]\n\nTwo gentlemen, Mr. F. B. Bond and his friend J. A. I., had devoted years\nof study to the archaeology of Glastonbury, exploring every available\nsource of information in history or tradition and thinking hard and\noften about the Edgar Chapel, a part of the Abbey whose site was\nundetermined. After this preparatory storing up of memories and thoughts\nin the unconscious, they proceeded to tap them. I quote from page 18:--\n\n'What was clear enough was the need of somehow switching off the mere\nlogical machinery of the brain which is for ever at work combining the\nmore superficial and obvious things written on the pages of memory, and\nby its dominant activity excluding that which a more contemplative\nelement in the mind would seek to revive from the half-obliterated\ntraces below.'\n\nRecognising an old friend, we are not surprised to find that automatic\nwriting was the means employed to switch off the main stream of\nconsciousness and produce a dissociation.\n\nI find myself more in accord with the writer than reviews had led me to\nexpect, for he disclaims 'the action of discarnate intelligences from\nthe outside upon the physical or nervous organisation of the sitters'\n(p. 19).\n\nThe automatic writing is apparently controlled by Richard Bere,\nJohannes, and other influences which would be welcomed by spiritualists\nas 'objective entities'; but the writer gives his opinion regarding\nJohannes (p. 50) as follows: 'Whether we are dealing with a singularly\nvivid imaginative picture or with the personality of a man no one can\nreally decide.'\n\nHere I must differ and claim to have decided, for myself at least, that\nno personality other than that of the actual writer was concerned. The\nrecord of hysterical phenomena contains so many similar 'personalities'\nthat I find no reason to call in the supernatural to account for this\none. If a natural explanation is available we must not appeal to the\nsupernatural; I am sure that F. B. B. is not unacquainted with Occam's\nrazor--miracles must not be unnecessarily multiplied.\n\nSince the writer does not stress the supernatural, and allows me to\ncredit to his unconscious the poetical imaginings produced in the script\nand the 'veridical passages' concerning the discoveries of the Edgar\nChapel, I have no need to criticise them, especially as he is scrupulous\nin giving credit to the conscious predictions of others when they hit\nthe mark.\n\nThe book is a record of an experiment--successful from the psychological\npoint of view--carried out by two Dissociates who _knew what they were\ndoing_; the dissociated streams were entirely out of their control, and\nalthough I must, from the psychological standpoint, class the experiment\nwith the other dissociations described in this book, yet it is far from\nmy purpose to class the experimenters with 'Feda' and others of her\nkind.\n\nThe earlier chapters of this book were written before I read _The Gate\nof Remembrance_, but whoever reads the conclusion in the latter book\nwill find many opinions in agreement with those in my chapter on the\nunconscious.\n\nTable-turning, water-divining, automatic writing, thought-reading, and\nthe use of the pendulum are examples of a psychological automatism in\nwhich the agent is conscious neither of the muscular movements concerned\nnor, what is more important, of the mental processes producing them.\n\nThey can be cultivated to provide amazing results in tapping the\nmemories of the unconscious, and if the agents remain in ignorance of\ntheir true mechanism a systematised delusion is built up and accepted as\nproof of the supernatural.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nABOUT MEDIUMS\n\n\nJust as any one believing all actions to be the result of fully\nconscious motives may regard the hysteric as a simple fraud, so he may\ndismiss the medium and the clairvoyant in the same easy way and consider\nthe matter settled. But we find men in positions which lend authority\nnot only vouching for the honesty of the medium but sometimes taking an\nactive part in the production of the phenomena for which the explanation\nof fraud is regarded as sufficient; as a result this explanation fails\nto convince and we meet many people who believe there must be 'something\nin it'. So there is: there is the same graduated series, from the simple\ncheat to the complete Dissociate, that we saw in the consideration of\nhysteria, but in addition there is a fervent desire to believe, and the\nDissociate, instead of being regarded as a victim of disease, is treated\nas a person gifted with supernatural powers.\n\nLet me describe my first experience of a medium. Friends had told me of\nhis gifts and had met my incredulity with 'How do you explain this?'\nfollowed by some story of supernatural revelation. I could not explain,\nbut accepted an invitation to meet the miracle-worker and, perhaps, be\nconverted. His method of demonstrating communication with the spirit\nworld was to sit in a meditative attitude with one hand before his eyes,\nwhilst watching between his slightly separated fingers the assembled\nbelievers so as to note the effect of his revelations, which were\napparently presented to him by the spirits in two forms. Descriptions of\nthe spirit world came through freely, one might call them fluent but\nincoherent, whilst revelations such as my friends had promised came in a\nhalting and uncertain trickle. The enthusiastic accounts had not\nprepared me for such a poor show. I had pictured him saying something\nlike--'Your grandmother's name was Georgina; she died at the age of\nseventy-two, after an illness lasting three days; she was a good\nhorsewoman and disliked Mr. Gladstone'. Instead of this the procedure\nwas: 'I hear a name, is it George? (No bite)--Georgina? (a look of\nintelligence)--you have a friend named Georgina--a young girl--no, not a\nyoung girl, she was older, a relative, yes, a relative'--and so on.\nFinally Georgina is discovered to be a grandmother of one of those\npresent, and is described sufficiently well to be recognised as the\ngrandmother on the father's side, though, curiously, Georgina was the\nname of the maternal grandmother. What could be more convincing? Of\ncourse spirit communication is difficult and such a mistake only proves\nthe genuineness of the article; but the description of the grandmother\nwas built up on certain characteristics of the father, who was present,\nand the source was obvious to any one not blinded by the desire to\nbelieve.\n\nOne incident shows that the medium had received some education in the\nsuperficial signs of disease. An elderly lady with a rather puffy face,\nwhich had raised in me a suspicion of kidney disease, was told by him:\n'It is strange, but I _must_ tell you for your own sake. You have\ntrouble with your kidneys.' He was wrong and so was I, but if events had\nproved us right the credit would have been his.\n\nThen my turn came and the spirits told about my own disposition, which I\nhad unfortunately revealed by a single observation before the real\nbusiness began, and the exulting glances of the audience told me the\nfirst score had gone to the medium. Then more intimate stuff came\nthrough; names were presented and I nibbled at one: 'Yes, I know him',\nwith a stress on the 'I'. More revelations--he was my enemy (here a nod\nfrom me), I had suspected it for a long time, but right would conquer,\nand I must not fear. Then a relative came into the play, and a look of\nsadness drew forth the surprising news that she was dead but her spirit\nwas watching over me. Next came the phrase, heard once before in the\nseance, 'I see a far-off land', and the believers brightened up again.\nQuick came the news, 'You have been abroad,' and I couldn't deny it.\n\nThus the game went on; when a hint could be picked up it was used at\nonce or later, to be cast back as a spirit revelation. As the game\ndeveloped I gave hints in plenty, whilst my friends showed their joy at\nseeing a sceptic receive convincing proofs of the spirit powers.\n\nThe seance being ended, my first task was to persuade the believers that\nthe revelations vouchsafed to me bore little relation to the truth; 'But\nyou said they were true.' 'Yes, and they were not.' 'Then you were\nreally telling lies.' 'Yes, and he believed them and so did the\nspirits.' 'Well, of course, if you deceive the spirits like that how can\nyou expect the truth in return?' So the rationalisations went on and the\nlogic-tight compartments were protected from injury.\n\nIn this show we see a fine example of receptivity, like that of the\nhysteric who watches the doctor to learn what symptoms he expects to\nfind; and just as the doctor may suggest absurd symptoms and find them\npresent, so I was able to suggest falsehoods and have them reflected as\nrevelations. But the believer would never do that; he is eager to fit\nevery phrase to some fact within his knowledge, those that cannot be so\nfitted being forgotten as soon as the next lucky shot occurs, and in his\neagerness he helps along the medium and provides him with more material.\n\nLest it may be thought that this experience is not typical, I will use\nthe light given by it to examine some of the spirit news given in\n_Raymond_.\n\nBut we must first understand who are the _dramatis personae_ of a seance.\nSince the time of the Witch of En-dor the expert medium has had a\nfamiliar spirit which speaks through him to this world and at the same\ntime is in contact with the spirit world. The psychological explanation,\nif the medium is a true Dissociate and not a conscious fraud, is that\nthe results of the dissociated stream are perceived by its owner as\nsomething of external origin. In the same way a lunatic whose\ndissociated stream produces voices will project them externally and\nbelieve them to be warnings or commands from an outside source; the\ntable-turners, water-diviners, and watch-swingers follow the same\nreasoning, though their results are purely motor; and when ideas come up\nfrom the cut-off stream the individual cannot recognise them as mental\nproducts of his own, but feels impelled to credit them to another\npersonality. I am reminded of a charming little girl whose one desire\nwas to please her parents but who often gave way to the mischievous\ntendencies of a healthy child; whenever that happened she produced an\nimaginary 'Naughty John' who broke toys and cut off little girls' hair.\nThat is how the dissociated medium proceeds: unable to rate at their\nproper value the ideas which present themselves, he invents a familiar\nspirit who serves as their ostensible origin. The familiar thus called\ninto being can draw upon the unconscious of the medium for the material\nto build up fantasies about another world. The spirits of the dead are\npart of these fantasies, so that we finally have the medium, the\nmedium's split-off personality, often with a name of its own, and the\nspirit that meets the demand of the moment.\n\nThe secondary personalities in Sir Oliver's mediums are Feda and\nMoonstone, and in the dialogue Feda tells what Raymond is doing or\nsaying, occasionally carrying on asides of her own. All this seems very\ncomplicated, but an explanation is necessary in order to understand what\nfollows.\n\nThe medium (or, in this case, Feda) tells Sir Oliver Lodge (see pp. 250\n_et seq._), 'It's a browny-coloured earth, not nice green, but\nsandy-coloured ground. As Feda looks at the land, the ground rises sharp\nat the back. Must have been made to rise, it sticks up in the air....\nThe raised up land is at the back of the tent, well set back. It doesn't\ngive an even sticking up, but it goes right along, with bits sticking up\nand bits lower down.' Of this the scientific Sir Oliver says: 'The\ndescription of the scenery showed plainly that it was Woolacombe sands\nthat was meant.' The reader will have no difficulty in fitting this\ndescription to any sands he likes, but the believer wants it to be\nWoolacombe, and Woolacombe it is.\n\nThen, the medium having discovered that O. J. L.'s family had a tent by\nthe water, O. J. L. asks: 'Is it all one chamber in the tent?' Answer:\n'He didn't say that. He was going to say no, and then he stopped to\nthink. No, I don't think it was, it was divided off.'\n\nNext a yacht appears out of the spirit world, and O. J. L. asks: 'What\nabout the yacht with sails, did it run on the water?' The medium needs\ntime to think, and the answer comes: 'No' (Feda (_sotto voce_): Oh,\nRaymond! don't be silly!) he says, 'No. (Feda: It must have done.) He is\nshowing Feda like a thing on land--yes, a land thing. It's standing up,\nlike edgeways. A narrow thing. No, it isn't water, but it has got nice\nwhite sails.'\n\nO. J. L. 'Did it go along?'\n\n'He says it _didn't_! He's laughing! When he said \"didn't\" he shouted\nit.' Feda should have said, 'He laid particular emphasis on it.'\n\nThe first question is capable of two interpretations and the answer is\nambiguous, though the ambiguity is further 'evidence' to Sir Oliver,\nbecause he remembers that a double-chamber tent had been turned into a\nsingle-chamber one.\n\nThe second question may be compared with 'Did you feel that?' in the\nproduction of hysterical anaesthesia (see Chapter VIII). The hysteric\nreasons, consciously or unconsciously:--It is natural to feel a pin\nprick, but the doctor is looking for signs of disease and he must expect\nto find a numbness or he wouldn't ask the question, so the answer is\n'no'.\n\nWhen Sir Oliver asks concerning a yacht, 'Did it run on the water?' the\nreasoning is similar, and the word 'run' helps, for no yacht runs on the\nwater; if the yacht sailed on the water the question would not be asked,\ntherefore the answer here was 'no', but the medium maintained a clever\nambiguity whilst feeling her way.\n\nThe third answer was a cleaner guess, but wrong.\n\nHe says: 'All this about the tent and boat is excellent, though not\noutside my knowledge'.... Then he adds, concerning the boat, 'I believe\nit went along the sands very fast occasionally, but it still wouldn't\nsail at right angles to the wind as they wanted it.... On the whole it\nwas regarded as a failure, the wheels were too small; and Raymond's\n\"didn't\" is quite accepted.'\n\nAnd Raymond's 'did' would have been as readily accepted and put in the\nsame chapter headed 'Two evidential sittings.'\n\nContrast these halting scraps to the following (p. 249): 'He wants to\ntell you that Mr. Myers says that in ten years from now the world will\nbe a different place. He says that about fifty per cent. of the\ncivilised portion of the globe will be either spiritualists or coming\ninto it.'\n\nNo hesitation here, but no possible verification either, nor any hint\nthat a hundred per cent. of the uncivilised people of the globe are\nalready spiritualists.\n\nSir Oliver's imagination does not keep pace with his readiness to fit\nrevelation to fact. After the tent, the water, and the yacht,\ncomes--'rods and things, long rods. Some have got little round things\nshaking on them like that. And he's got strings, some have got strings.\n\"Strings\" isn't the right word, but it will do. Smooth, strong,\nstring-like.'\n\nOf this Sir Oliver says: 'The rod and rings and strings mentioned after\nthe \"boat\", I don't at present understand. So far as I have ascertained\nthe boys don't understand either at present.' Surely an out-of-door\nfamily like this includes at least one fisherman; why not think out who\nhe is and score another bull's-eye to the medium?\n\nA delightful example of Sir Oliver's anxiety to help the medium occurs\non page 256:--\n\nO. J. L.: 'Do you remember a bird in our garden?'\n\n(Feda (_sotto voce_): 'Yes, hopping about').\n\nO. J. L.: 'No, Feda, a big bird.'\n\n'Of course not sparrows, he says. Yes he does.' (Feda (_sotto voce_):\nDid he hop, Raymond?)\n\n'No, he says you couldn't call it a hop.'\n\nThis book of Sir Oliver Lodge's shows an honesty which, together with\nthe circumstances under which it was written, makes critical examination\ndifficult; but there are similar circumstances in many a household\nto-day, and the honesty of the writer leads many people, who reason that\nwhat an eminent man honestly believes must be true, to turn to a\nmind-wrecking belief in mediums instead of finding consolation in a\nsaner philosophy or religion.\n\nAt my first seance it strained my belief in human intelligence to find\nrespected friends believing the romances and guesses of a trickster to\nbe spiritual manifestations, and I thought that there must at least be a\nmore elaborate type of deceit, since believers were to be found among\nour scientific aristocracy. My belief is no longer strained, but broken,\nfor I find in Sir Oliver's medium the same tricks, the receptivity, the\nhalting search for material, and the same easy flow of unverifiable\nrevelations that characterised the medium I first met.\n\nThanks to his honesty, one is able from the material supplied by this\nwriter to trace the source of many 'revelations', and in the rare\nexamples where the source is not manifest (as in the 'pedestal'\nincident, p. 257) it is scarcely unfair to presume some unintentional\nsuppression. I say unintentional because Sir Oliver, blind to the\nexplanations his own book offers, is plainly incapable of wilfully\nsuppressing facts that tell against himself.\n\nSpiritualism has its fashions, apparitions and materialisations having\nnow given place to communications with the dead, which is the 'New\nRevelation'. Its newness is not so apparent when we read the story of\nthe Witch of En-dor. Even the occasional deportation of undesirable\nmediums is not new, for Saul 'put away those that had familiar spirits,\nand the wizards, out of the land' (1 Samuel, chap. xxviii.). When he\ndisguised himself to visit the witch she recognised him just as the\nmediums recognise Sir Oliver; but the modern resemblance is best seen\nwhen we read that Saul, after asking for Samuel, 'said unto her, what\nform is he of? and she said, an old man cometh up, and he is covered\nwith a mantle. And Saul perceived that it was Samuel.'\n\nHere we see the medium giving to the credulous believer just what he\nwants, and the believer reaching out to accept the trivial guess as a\nspirit revelation. But the remoteness of the event (even at the time the\naccount was written) allowed of prophecies far more to the point than\nany modern medium's, though, as often happens nowadays, their fulfilment\nwas described by the same writer that reported them.\n\nIn one respect we have degenerated since the days of Saul; the Witch of\nEn-dor was not hailed as an instrument of divine power destined to\nprovide a new driving force for religion.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nTHE ACCOUNTS OF BELIEVERS\n\n\nOne is repeatedly faced with a story of the marvellous and invited to\nexplain it away or believe in the supernatural. My favourite way of\ndealing with such a proposition is to borrow a pack of cards, invite the\nstory-teller to take a card, and, without letting me see it, to think of\nit whilst holding my hand. After a silent pause I name the card and may\nbe told, 'of course that's a trick', and on assuring my friends that the\nspirits have told me the name of the card I am called a scoffer; somehow\na pack of cards is not spiritual enough.\n\nSome stories are hard to explain without full evidence, and here is one\nof them: A friend assured me that in _Raymond_ was an account of how one\nof Sir Oliver Lodge's family went to London to visit a medium, and how\nafter she had started some others of the family met in Birmingham, and,\ncalling up the spirit of Raymond, asked him to say 'Honolulu' at the\nLondon seance. Sure enough at the London seance held on the same day\n'Honolulu' came into the spirit talk. This account is substantially\ncorrect (see pp. 271 _et seq._) and the incident is inexplicable so\nfar; Sir Oliver Lodge says of the episode:--\n\n     '1. It establishes a reality about the home sittings.\n\n     2. It so entirely eliminates anything of the nature of collusion,\n     conscious or unconscious.\n\n     3. The whole circumstances of the test make it an exceedingly good\n     one.'\n\nThen, after suggesting Telepathy as an explanation, he writes: 'I\nventure to say there is no normal explanation, since in my judgement\nchance is out of the question.'\n\nIf the information had stopped at this no explanation on natural lines\nwould be possible, but so painfully honest is Sir Oliver that in the\nsame book he supplies full material for such an explanation. At a London\nseance on December 20th, 1915, with the same medium there occurs the\nfollowing:--\n\n     (Question): 'What used he to sing?'\n\n     (Answer): 'Hello-Hullolo, sounds like Hullulu-Hullulo, something\n     about \"Hottentot,\" but he is going back a long way he thinks.'\n\nOn April 11th, 1916, a song of Raymond's is found with the words written\nin pencil:--\n\n    'Any little flower from a tulip to a rose\n    If you'll be Mrs. John James Brown\n    Of Hon-o-lu-la-lu-la town.'\n\nThis song is fitted to the medium's revelations as given above, and the\nnext point of interest is whether the medium is informed of her success.\nThis we are not told, but we find on page 95 that when another medium\nhad hit the mark, with a sentence now interpreted as a warning of the\ndeath of Raymond before it took place, Sir Oliver wrote to the daughter\nof the medium: 'The reference to the Poet and Faunus in your mother's\nlast script is quite intelligible, and a good classical allusion; you\nmight tell the communicator sometime if there is opportunity.'\n\nPlainly he is desirous of letting his mediums know when they succeed and\nit is fair to suggest that the Hullulu medium found she had hit the\nmark, the interpretation of the gibberish being 'Honolulu', though\nHottentot failed to score. A medium will always follow up a lucky shot\nand it needs not even an appeal to chance to explain the repetition of\nthe word at the next sitting, after the verification, which was on May\n26th (the date of the simultaneous test), the following being the words\nused:--\n\n     (The medium says): 'You could play.'\n\n     (N. M. L. asks): 'Play what?'\n\n     (The medium): 'Not a game, a music.'\n\n     (N. M. L.): 'I'm afraid I can't, Raymond.'\n\n     (Feda (_sotto voce_): 'She can't do that'): 'He wanted to know\n     whether you could play Hulu-Honolulu.'\n\nOne of the strongest 'evidential' stories in the book being thus\nexplicable without calling upon the supernatural, any others lose their\nvalue even if no explanation can be based on the available facts; but\napart from this explanation the choice of the test word throws a light\nupon the little group tilting the table at Birmingham. With the whole\ndictionary and all geography from which to choose, they selected a\nsound which had occurred in a former revelation and therefore had a\nchance of repetition. If in his laboratory days Sir Oliver examined a\nsubstance for the presence of arsenic, he would first test his reagents\nfor the presence of that metal lest they might contain a trace of it and\nvitiate the experiment. In this test the experimenters did what was\nequivalent to selecting an arsenic-contaminated test-tube to use in an\nanalysis for that substance.\n\nHow did the word come to be selected? If the family of this\ndistinguished man had used ordinary caution in formulating the test,\nthey would certainly have chosen a word that had not occurred before,\nand I think that point must be clear to the reader. But, though they are\nprobably sensible people in ordinary life, when they turn to the spirit\nworld they fall a prey to their dissociated streams, in which was the\nknowledge that the word or something like it had been used before and\nwas likely to be used again, especially if, as I suggest, the medium\nknew it had scored. Hence these believers were, as far as concerned\ntheir dissociated streams, deliberately introducing a source of error\nor, in laboratory language, cooking the experiment.\n\nAmong my card tricks is included the elementary one (technically known\nas 'forcing a card') described at the beginning of this chapter, but I\nmay let some one choose a card from the pack on the table whilst my back\nis turned; then, the card being placed in the pack which I have now\ntaken in my hand, I do some other trick. It is common for these tricks\nto be confounded, and for one of my audience to assure friends that I\nlet him or her take a card from the pack on the table when my back was\nturned and then named it by 'thought-reading.' Such a performance is\nbeyond me, but a like garbled account is characteristic of what we hear\nconcerning seances: the story-tellers are in a state of mental\nconfusion, they add or subtract in order to make the result emphatic,\nany power of criticism they possess is suspended, and we are asked to\nswallow the final product and confess ourselves believers.\n\nAfter considering my own experiences and the evidence produced by Sir\nOliver Lodge, I have reached the conclusion that no one desirous of\nbelieving only the truth can accept anything 'supernormal' without the\nstrictest investigation on the spot, aided by a knowledge of trickery,\nverbal or material, as well as of the results produced by dissociation\nand logic-tight compartments in the minds of the would-be honest.\n\nSir Arthur Conan Doyle shows how convincing a twice-told tale becomes. I\nborrow from _The New Revelation_ (p. 64):--\n\n     'Or once again, if Raymond can tell us of a photograph no copy of\n     which had reached England, and which proved to be exactly as he\n     described it, and if he can give us, through the lips of strangers,\n     all sorts of details of his home life, which his own relatives had\n     to verify before they found them to be true, is it unreasonable to\n     suppose that he is fairly accurate in his description of his own\n     experiences and state of life at the moment at which he is\n     communicating?'\n\nThe words 'can tell us of a photograph no copy of which had reached\nEngland' would lead us to believe that information that the photograph\nexisted came from Raymond: fortunately the original account is\naccessible.\n\nHere is the photograph story, taken from _Raymond_ (p. 195). The medium\nspeaks, saying: 'You have several portraits of this boy. Before he went\naway you had got a good portrait of him--two--no three. Two where he is\nalone and one where he is in a group of other men. He is particular that\nI should tell you of this. In one you see his walking-stick'. (Moonstone\nhere put an imaginary stick under his arm.)\n\nThis is ordinary guess-work, and it would be true of the families of\nmost officers, even as to the stick; but it was not true in this case,\nfor we read that though they had 'single photographs of him of course,\nand in uniform', they had _not_ one of him in a group of other men; yet\nthis is the revelation referred to by Sir Arthur--the photograph\nincident that has impressed so many.\n\nLet us put the two statements side by side:--\n\n    Before he went away you           ... Raymond can tell us\n    had ... one where he is in a      of a photograph no copy of\n    group of other men. He is         which had reached England?\n    particular that I should tell\n    you of this.\n\nNot being able to explain the extraordinary identity of these\nphotographs, I must leave the problem to the creator of Sherlock Holmes;\nwe shall gain no help from Sir Oliver, for his ideas of identity, as we\nshall see in the next paragraph, are equally curious.\n\nNow for 'exactly as he described it': Sir Oliver Lodge, having been\ninformed in an ordinary letter that a group photograph containing\nRaymond is being sent to him from France, went to another medium and\ntold her, 'He said something about having a photograph taken with some\nother men' (this itself is a garbled statement); leading questions\nfollowed, and the medium fenced with them. Here are the important\nones:--\n\n     O. J. L.: 'Do you recollect the photograph at all?'\n\n     'He thinks there were several others taken with him, not one or\n     two, but several.' (This is not even a guess.)\n\n     O. J. L.: 'Does he remember how he looked in the photograph?'\n\n     'No, he doesn't remember how he looked.'\n\n     O. J. L.: 'No, no. I mean was he standing up?'\n\n     'No, he doesn't seem to think so. Some were raised up round; he was\n     sitting down, and some were raised up at the back of him. Some were\n     standing, and some were sitting, he thinks.'\n\n(Here is a correct description, anyhow; it is an even chance whether he\nis sitting or standing, and, the sitting chance being taken, the rest is\npadding. We are told on page 279 that another photograph showed him\nstanding, so that a hit could have been scored if the other chance had\nbeen taken.)\n\n     O. J. L.: 'Did he have a stick?'\n\n     'He doesn't remember that.'\n\n(Yet the presence of a stick in the picture is hailed on page 110 as one\nof the strikingly correct peculiarities mentioned by Raymond. Be it\nnoted that the stick was spoken of in connection with one of the three\nphotographs that the family was said to have _before he went away_, and\nis used as 'evidence' concerning _the one sent home from France_.)\n\n     O. J. L.: 'Was it out of doors?'\n\n     'Yes, practically.'\n\n     Feda (_sotto voce_): 'What you mean, \"yes practically,\" must have\n     been out of doors or not out of doors. You mean yes, don't you?'\n\n     Feda thinks he means 'yes,' because he says 'practically'.\n\n     O. J. L.: 'It may have been a shelter.'\n\n     'It might have been. Try to show Feda. At the back he shows me\n     lines going down. It looks like a black background, with lines at\n     the back of them. (Feda here kept drawing vertical lines in the\n     air.)'\n\n(The shelter is suggested by O. J. L.; Feda takes the hint and\nvisualises the shelter. Most shelters have vertical lines in their\nstructure. Such lines occur in the photograph and are strong 'evidence.'\nThe background is not black except for two open windows.)\n\nThe only revelation worthy of attention is this: 'He remembers that some\none wanted to lean on him; but he is not sure if he was taken with some\none leaning on him.... The last what he gave you, what were a B, will be\nrather prominent in that photograph. It wasn't taken in a photographer's\nplace.' (Few out-door groups are.)\n\nIn the photograph he has some one's hand resting on his shoulder, and\nan ambiguous guess scores a hit. As for B, Sir Oliver writes: 'I have\nasked several people which member of the group seemed most prominent;\nand except as regards central position a well-lighted standing figure on\nthe right has usually been pointed to as the most prominent. This one is\n\"B\", as stated, namely, Captain S. T. Boast.'\n\nSome initials are guessed--C, B, R, and K. As there are twenty-one\npeople in the group, and the alphabet contains only twenty-four letters\n(excluding X and Z), it is hardly a mathematical surprise that\nseventy-five per cent. are correct.\n\nSo much for the photograph that proved to be 'exactly as he described\nit' (Sir Arthur) and 'one of the best pieces of evidence that has been\ngiven' (Sir Oliver).\n\n'All sorts of details of his home life' we must suppose refers to the\nscenery of Woolacombe, the tent, the boat that went (or didn't) on land,\nthe song about Hululu and the Hottentot, the fishing rods that are not\nunderstood at present, and so on.\n\nAs a test of unintentional garbling I asked a professional man, who had\nread _Raymond_ sympathetically, to give me a short account of what the\nmedium said about the photograph. Here is his version, and it must be\nunderstood that he knew I should criticise it:--\n\n     'Sir Oliver Lodge was told by a medium that Raymond wished to tell\n     him about a photograph taken in France. The medium said the\n     photograph was of a group of officers including Raymond--a photo\n     Sir Oliver had not seen. _There were lines running vertically in\n     the background. Raymond is seated._ Some one's knee was\n     preventing him from sitting comfortably and annoyed him. He was\n     holding a stick. _The photo was out of doors_, but in a sheltered\n     position.'\n\nThe only points in which this tallies with the book description of what\nthe medium (not Sir Oliver) said are those shown by the words in italic.\nThe rest is garbled, and for the garbling my friend and Sir Oliver are\nabout equally responsible.\n\nI have since asked other intelligent people to read the chapter and then\nwrite out the story; the result is generally similar to that just given.\nThe affair is such a to-do about nothing that the sympathetic and\nuncritical reader, deceived by the fuss, thinks there must be something\nin it and makes additions of his own to account for his belief. Had he\nread it critically he would have recognised the emptiness of the story,\nbut once he is impressed by it he must improve it or become aware of its\nflimsiness.\n\nOnce again I must emphasise the way in which a guess, wide of the truth,\nis wrenched into an application to something entirely irrelevant. The\nfirst medium says that before Raymond went away his family had a\nphotograph which showed him in a group of other men; _because this is\nnot true_, it is twisted into a reference to a photograph taken in\nFrance and not yet received. The revelations of this medium must be cut\nout of the story, and the whole incident is reduced to Sir Oliver Lodge\nbeing told in an ordinary letter that a group photograph is on its way\nto him; then he tells another medium about a group photograph, and in\nanswer to leading questions she makes the halting guesses reproduced\nabove.\n\nThis is the famous photograph story, stripped of exaggeration and\ngarbling. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle would lead us to believe that the\nmedium told Sir Oliver about the existence of the photograph, but the\ntrue account shows that, so far from this being the case, _Sir Oliver\ntold the medium_.\n\nIt is a commonplace of spiritualism that a medium may be guilty of\ntrickery at one time and genuinely gifted at another. We may freely\nadmit that mediums are peculiar people, but when Sir Arthur Conan Doyle\nwrites on a subject that needs careful observation and description and\ngives this distorted account of the photograph story, he can expect\nlittle credence when he writes in the same book equally convincing\nstories of the supernatural and puts them before the public as a\ncontribution to religious thought. He gives a list of eminent men who\nvouch for the genuineness of supernatural phenomena, and says that the\ndays are past when their opinions can be dismissed with the empty 'All\nrot' or 'Nauseating drivel' formula. I agree, and regard their opinions\nas interesting objects of psychological study. A little research could\nproduce a longer list of men, equally eminent in their day, who believed\nin witchcraft and were willing to execute people in accordance with that\nbelief. The belief may yet return with all its horrors if _The New\nRevelation_ is taken seriously. On page 168 we read concerning the\nCheriton poltergeist[19]:--\n\n'It is very probable that Mr. Rolfe is, unknown to himself, a physical\nmedium, and that when he was in the confined space of the cellar he\nturned it into a cabinet in which his magnetic powers could accumulate\nand be available for use.' (It is hard to believe that he who speaks\nlike this about 'magnetic powers' once had at least an elementary\nknowledge of physics.) On page 170 we read, concerning another\npoltergeist, that '... a clergyman, with some knowledge of occult\nmatters, has succeeded by sympathetic reasoning and prayer in obtaining\na promise from the entity that it will plague the household no more.'\n\n[Footnote 19: A poltergeist is a spirit that throws things about; its\nappearance is generally associated with the presence of some young\nperson, whose tricks may be detected to the discredit of the ghostly\ncause. If trickery is not detected the poltergeist is the manifestation\nof an evil spirit.]\n\nPoor Mr. Rolfe has had a narrow escape of being mixed up with an\n'entity' who, or which, might have led him to the stake in a\nthorough-going spiritualist age.\n\nThis relation between spiritualism and witchcraft is not a fantasy of my\nunconscious; listen to this from another believer:--\n\n     'The dangers of the spiritual world are greater because, bad as a\n     man living on our plane may be, he cannot compare in that respect\n     with a thoroughly wicked denizen of the fourth-dimensional space,\n     whose power is all the greater because his very existence is almost\n     universally denied. What little good was ever in him has been\n     blotted out in the course, perhaps, of centuries; his cunning\n     passes earthly comprehension; his experience of the ways and\n     foibles of humanity is profound; his malignity is dreadful. To be\n     fully under the influence of such an entity as this is to be at his\n     mercy, and, as no such word exists in his vocabulary, the end is a\n     foregone conclusion, unless another force of a contrary character\n     and at least as powerful is directed against him.'[20]\n\n[Footnote 20: _Problems of the Borderland_, p. 49, by J. Herbert Slater.\nWm. Rider & Sons, 1915.]\n\nIt is indeed fortunate that the existence of these entities is almost\nuniversally denied. Hangings and burnings would be soon in fashion again\nif any large proportion of us were influenced by such a horrible\ncomplex.\n\nSir Arthur Conan Doyle has given an account to the papers (see _Daily\nTelegraph_, February 18th, 1919) of a seance in Wales. Hymns were sung\nto produce a suitable emotional state, and 'the lights were turned down\nin order to obtain the proper conditions, because ether transmits light,\nand is also the source of all psychic phenomena.' Then, the medium being\ntied down, a tambourine rattled, and a coat and furniture flew about.\nThe bearing of this upon life in the hereafter, which Sir Arthur\ndiscusses in connection with the performance, is not clear, but the\neffects are identical with those produced by the Davenport Brothers, who\nwere exposed in 1868.[21]\n\n[Footnote 21: See _The Question_, p. 103.]\n\nThe list of witnesses, who numbered about twenty, leads me to remark\nthat though in a multitude of counsellors there may be wisdom yet in a\ncrowd of witnesses there is Herd Instinct. With a conspicuous member of\nthe Herd like Sir Arthur in the lead, the sway of emotion will dull any\ncriticism, and if a few are unconvinced they will remain silent.[22]\n\n[Footnote 22: In _Spiritualism--the inside Truth_ (chap. vi) Stuart\nCumberland tells how this medium refused to admit him to a seance.\nStringent precautions, however, were followed by a failure to produce\nspirit manifestations.]\n\nThe statement that ether is the source of all psychic phenomena is\nstartling, but unsupported. Another believer, Sir William Crookes, says,\nconcerning exhibitions of what he calls 'Psychic Force', that '...\neverything recorded has taken place _in the light_'.[23] So there seems\nto be some fundamental error about the observations of one of them. But\nSir William's results were obtained from the famous Daniel Home, whose\nyears of experience in credulity allowed him to take risks which the\nhumble beginners in Wales hardly dared.\n\n[Footnote 23: _Phenomena of Modern Spiritualism_, p. 25. 'Two Worlds'\nPublishing Co., 1903.]\n\nTo examine all the stories of the supernatural is impossible; many are,\nI frankly admit, inexplicable _on the evidence_; but it is fair to\nassert that when an observer, on a subject which requires the most\ncareful watching and closest reasoning, shows by his own account that he\nis ready to be deceived, then we cannot be convinced by his statements\nwhen they are unverifiable. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is thus ruled out of\ncourt, for his account of the photograph story shows, to put it gently,\na lack of clear writing, and his readiness to thrust upon the public a\nrepetition of the Davenport tricks, without a warning as to their\nhistory, is not what we should expect from a man who has studied the\nsubject for thirty years.\n\nSir William Crookes gives detailed accounts of marvellous happenings,\nbut two mediums in whom he had implicit trust were detected in\ndeliberate fraud by other people,[24] so that his critical powers failed\nhim.\n\n[Footnote 24: Miss Fox and Mrs. Cook; see _The Question_, pp. 84 and\n127.]\n\nSome of his accounts show curious lapses. In one experiment an accordion\nis placed in a cage under the table and Mr. Home puts his hand into the\ntop of the cage to do psychic things with the instrument. The\ntemperature of the room is carefully recorded (that doesn't matter, but\nimparts a scientific flavour to the observations) although we are not\ntold why the experiment was done under the table instead of in a more\nconvenient position on top of it, though 'my assistant went under the\ntable, and reported that the accordion was expanding and contracting,'\nand 'Dr. A. B. now looked under the table and said that Mr. Home's hand\nappeared quite still.' Sir William would never have made such an\nomission if he had been using the same reasoning powers that he used in\nhis scientific descriptions.\n\nIt is noticeable that the chief 'scientific' supporters of spiritualism\nare eminent in physical science; they have been trained in a world where\nhonesty is assumed to be a quality of all workers. A laboratory\nassistant who played a trick upon one of them would find his career at\nan end, and ordinary cunning is foreign to them. When they enter upon\nthe world of Dissociates, where deceit masquerades under the disguise of\ntransparent honesty, these eminent men are but as babes--country cousins\nin the hands of confidence-trick men--and their opinions are of less\nvalue than those of a smart schoolboy.\n\nSpirit photographs are useful to people who desire to show material\nevidence for their beliefs, and for more than fifty years the desire has\nbeen met by periodical outbreaks of this particular manifestation, with\noccasional exposures of fraud. The spirit effects can be produced by\ndouble exposure of one plate or by printing on one paper from two\nnegatives, so that the declaration that a photograph is that of a spirit\ncarries no proof with it and one must examine the circumstances under\nwhich the photograph is obtained.\n\nA friend of mine, with a decided tendency to belief in the reality of\nspirit photography, was good enough to show me photographs of himself\nwith spirit forms beside him, and undertook to repeat his visit to the\nphotographer--who is accepted as genuine by leading spiritualists and\nappears to be the chief exponent in the art of spirit photography in\nthis country--and take with him plates supplied by myself.\n\nThe photographer allows you to bring your own plates, goes with you into\nthe dark-room, and allows you to initial the plate before it is put in\nthe frame (whether it is your plate which you mark depends upon the will\nand dexterity of the artist, aided by the darkness and a preliminary\nhymn and prayer which should remove all doubts from your mind). Then the\nplate is put in the camera and, whilst attendant ladies pass into a\ntrance, an exposure is made with yourself as the sitter. Next the plate\nis developed under your eyes and perhaps a spirit form is revealed.\n\nI provided my friend with a packet of four plates, three of which had\nbeen exposed so that on being developed they would show a very\nconspicuous cross. At the seance two plates were first exposed and\ndeveloped; on one appeared a cross with the portrait of the sitter, on\nthe other appeared only the portrait.\n\nThe photographer now knew that one plate at least was marked, and when\nthe remaining two plates were exposed and developed the cross appeared\non both of them.[25] There had been no substitution, but no spirit\nphotographs either. Then the old excuse appeared--'one negative thought\nwill spoil a whole circle', or, in other words, 'if you are on the\nwatch for trickery we won't perform'.\n\n[Footnote 25: This is doubtful. My informant reported that he saw no\ncross on the last two plates, but when the four prints came to hand the\ncross appeared on three of them. Two prints were identical--though each\nwas supposed to be from its own negative. If the photographer aimed at\npuzzling me he has succeeded.]\n\nIt must be remembered that even in a 'good' seance only one or two\nspirit results may appear in several exposures, so the photographer can\nalways expose, develop, and examine any or all of your plates, and at\nthe least suspicion that yours are marked he may refrain from\nsubstituting his own prepared plates and blame the spirits for the lack\nof manifestations.\n\nOne may ask why a private mark (say a faint file scratch on the edge)\nwas not put on the plates so that the photographer himself could not\ndetect, even after development, that they were marked in any way? Such a\ncourse would at once reveal whether substitution had taken place--though\neven then the real believer could declare that the spirits had removed\nthe scratches.\n\nBut this test is frustrated by the photographer--simple honest man--who\nrefuses to part with the plates; he says they are now his property, but\nhe will let you have some prints!\n\nIn this example we find, as in so much 'evidential material', a point\nwhere investigation is blocked and credulity is demanded. Another piece\nof evidence is produced in this case, and I am shown a spirit photograph\nbeside a lady's. The lady claims that the spirit is that of a young man,\nnow deceased, to whom she was engaged. She was a stranger to the\nphotographer, so how could he produce the likeness even if he\nsubstituted his own plates? But when I showed this spirit photograph to\na friend, with a query as to sex, she answered, 'But it _is_ a woman,\nisn't it? It looks rather like N----.'\n\nNow N---- is a mature maiden lady, so that the sexless features of the\nspirit leave plenty of room for the play of fancy.\n\nWe are invited to accept or disprove stories of spirit photography\nreported from the Continent, but whilst leading spiritualists in this\ncountry accept the productions of the man whose methods I have described\nI must refuse attention to anything they vouch for farther afield.\n\nMr. Crawford, a mathematician and engineer of Belfast, has published\nreports of investigations of table-lifting seances, and builds up a\ntheory of spiritual cantilevers which he believes to explain his\nresults. The theory is pretty and the diagrams are impressive, but the\nfacts first call for examination.\n\nReading his accounts, I find that the experiments are carried out in a\ndim red light, for a sudden white light causes the immediate cessation\nof the phenomena. In addition there is a sacred line between the medium\nand the levitated table which must not be investigated on pain of\ndreadful results to the medium. This threat of physical evil to the\nmedium if the sceptic should investigate at a crucial point is a common\npretext, but though sceptics have often taken the risk, and seized a\nspirit to discover a disguised medium, there is no record of such\ndisastrous results as Mr. Crawford would have us fear.\n\nI suggest that this investigator should use his technical knowledge to\nshow how a simple but material cantilever, operated by the medium along\nthe sacred line, can produce levitation of the table.\n\nThe complaint is made that scientific men scoff at spiritualism and yet\nrefuse to investigate it; in the last two examples we see why this is\ninevitable. Investigation is prevented in each at the very point where\nfraud might be detected; so long as such obstruction is maintained the\nspiritualists are likely to continue their complaints, and one must be\ncontent to speculate on the mental state which allows a few men of\nscientific training to support their claims.\n\nThe reader must not think that my aim is to convert spiritualists from\ntheir belief. It is, as I have tried to show in earlier chapters,\nuseless to attack rationalisations in an effort to penetrate a\nlogic-tight compartment; as soon as one defence is broken down another\nis built up, and one can only take comfort from the history of other\nexamples of _Pseudodoxia Epidemica_, as Sir Thomas Browne (he himself\nbeing, strangely enough, an active believer in witchcraft) called them,\nand look forward to the fading away of this delusion. Just as the belief\nin witchcraft passed away from the educated and intelligent, lingering\nonly amongst the ignorant, so this delusion will pass and leave our\ndescendants to wonder how some of us came to be its victims.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\n\nTHE EVOLUTION OF THE MEDIUM\n\n\nAfter meeting my first medium I came away with the feeling that he was a\nrather artful liar; but now, whilst retaining that opinion, I am ready\nto admit that perhaps his lying was not a product of his consciousness.\nI know nothing of his history, but he was accepted by intelligent people\nas honest and respectable; moreover, records of spiritualism contain so\nmany examples of people whose belief in their own supernatural powers\nmust be accepted as real in spite of manifest deceit, that we must again\nfall back upon dissociation to explain their state of mind.\n\nI shall assume the existence of three groups just as in connection with\nhysteria, and classify mediums, clairvoyants, water-diviners and other\nproducers of the supernatural into--\n\n     1. The deceiver pure and simple.\n\n     2. The deceiver who has repressed the consciousness of deceit and\n     become a Dissociate.\n\n     3. The subject who has never been conscious of deceit, but, led\n     astray by his unconscious, has deceived himself from the beginning\n     and finished as a Dissociate.\n\nTo place any performer in the proper group is again a matter of\njudgement. Having a small repertory of tricks, including water-divining\nand a few manifestations with a pack of cards, I have sometimes put\nmyself in the first group with temporary success.\n\nThe development of a case of the second group is probably not a\nphenomenon that has ever been continuously observed, but Robert Browning\nhas formed such an excellent conception of it in _Mr. Sludge, the\nMedium_, that his description bears comparison with my theory of the\ndevelopment of some hysterics. David Sludge is a house-servant and his\nmaster is pictured discussing high finance with his guests when the boy\nbreaks in, saying, 'Sir, I've a five-dollar note.' The scorn of the\nguests is immediate:--'He stole it, then; shove him out'. And David is\ngiven the swift kick of ignominy.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n'But,' says the poet,\n\n    'Let the same lad hear you talk as grand\n    Of signs and wonders, the invisible world.\n    If he break in with \"Sir, I saw a ghost!\"\n    Ah, the ways change!'\n\nBrowning leaves us to imagine the boy's motive; perhaps his was just a\nboyish trick inspired by a desire for notoriety of which he himself was\nscarcely conscious, but, like the unfortunate hysteric who meets\ncredulity, David is led on to produce more manifestations.\n\n    'And, David, (is not that your Christian name?)\n    Of all things, should this happen twice--it may--\n    Be sure while fresh in mind, you let us know!'\n\nThen later:--\n\n                          '\"... came raps!\n    While a light whisked\" ... \"Shaped somewhat like a star?\n    Well, like some sort of stars, ma'am.\" \"So we thought!\n    And any voice? Not yet? Try hard, next time,\n    If you can't hear a voice; we think you may.\"\n\n           *       *       *       *       *\n\n    'So David holds the circle, rules the roast,\n    Narrates the vision, peeps in the glass ball,\n    Sets-to the spirit-writing, hears the raps,\n    As the case may be.'\n\nThen begins his conflict; like the patient who successfully feigns\nsymptoms, he finds withdrawal difficult:--\n\n    'You'd prove firmer in his place?\n    You'd find the courage--that first flurry over,\n    That mild bit of romancing-work at end, ...\n    To interpose with \"It gets serious, this;\n    Must stop here. Sir, I saw no ghost at all.\n    Inform your friends I made--well, fools of them,\n    And found you ready-made. I've lived in clover\n    These three weeks: take it out in kicks of me!\"\n    I doubt it. Ask your conscience!'\n\nSays poor David:--\n\n    'There's something in real truth (explain who can)\n    One casts a wistful eye at.'\n\nNow he faces the same dilemma that the developing hysteric has to meet,\nand as the hysteric reaches a false salvation by the repression of the\nknowledge of deceit so does David:--\n\n    'Why, when I cheat,\n    Mean to cheat, do cheat, and am caught in the act,\n    Are you, or, rather, am I sure o' the fact?\n    Well then I'm not sure! I may be, perhaps,\n    Free as a babe from cheating: how it began,\n    My gift ... no matter; what 'tis got to be\n    In the end now, that's the question; answer that!\n    Had I seen, perhaps, what hand was holding mine,\n    Leading me whither, I had died of fright.'\n\nNor does the poet omit the development of Receptivity:--\n\n    'I'm eyes, ears, mouth of me, one gaze and gape,\n    Nothing eludes me, everything's a hint,\n    Handle and help.'\n\nAt the last the youth, once an innocent jester, pours a stream of\nhalf-believed lies upon the man who, having caught him in his fraud,\nlets him go with a chance to start life afresh.\n\nBrowning does not carry the idea of repression as far as I do, Sludge\nproducing clouds of rationalisations to cover his inconsistencies. The\nidea of dissociation does not present itself, but the whole picture can\nbe taken to represent the evolution of many mediums with their mixture\nof belief and deception.\n\nJust as in the hysteric we meet with mechanical ways of deceit, shown by\nself-inflicted injuries, so in the medium we meet with mechanical tricks\nfor the production of spurious phenomena. In both cases fully-conscious\ndeceit, reconciled to the moral complexes by rationalisations, is the\neasiest explanation, but sometimes fully-conscious deceit is unlikely.\n\nThere is a disappointing lack of originality in spiritualist literature,\nfor the same stories of the marvellous are repeated in one book and\nanother. The Fox Sisters, Slade, Eglington, Eusapia Palladino and others\nappear according to the fancy of the writer, and their fraudulent tricks\nmay or may not be acknowledged. It is a peculiarity of spiritualist\nreasoning that if a medium is caught cheating it only proves that he was\ncheating when he was caught; if he is not caught next time, we must\naccept as genuine the phenomena then produced.\n\nBut no spiritualist writer can avoid the names of Home, Stainton Moses\nand Mrs. Piper, for _they were never caught cheating_; nevertheless, we\napparently need testimonials at great length to their honesty. Mr. J.\nArthur Hill gives two pages of testimonials to Stainton Moses, and\nrepeats a story telling how the Reverend medium made an automatic\ndrawing of a horse and truck and gave a spirit message concerning a man\nwho had been killed that day under a steamroller in Baker Street. Mr.\nHill says: 'Mr. Moses had passed through Baker Street in the afternoon,\nbut had heard nothing of any such incident.'[26]\n\n[Footnote 26: _Spiritualism_, p. 64. Cassell & Co., 1918.]\n\nIf Mr. Hill knew anything about dissociation he would not give us this\noft-quoted but flimsy story. Whence does he obtain his evidence that\nthe medium had heard nothing of the incident? Of course, from the honest\npersonality of Mr. Stainton Moses himself.\n\nBut a story of some terrifying episode is often, by psychological\ntechnique, extracted from a war-strained soldier only to be repressed\nand honestly denied by the man a little while later. If the dissociated\nsufferer can deny the truth of an incident which, when recalled again,\nfills him with horror, then the denial by another Dissociate that he has\nheard of a street accident does not carry weight, even if we read a\nbookful of testimony to his honesty.\n\nThe accounts of this famous medium, who is still held in awe by\nbelievers, are full of such happenings. On another occasion the spirit\nin possession of him gave the names of members of a family who had died\nin India and were unknown to him or any one present. The names were\nverified by reference to the obituary column of _The Times_ of a few\ndays before. We can assume that the honest Stainton Moses did not read\n_The Times_, but that the dissociated Stainton Moses read and\nremembered.\n\nWith this dissociation well established and having for its object the\nproduction of occult phenomena, we can understand the rest of the\nmanifestations that he produced for his circle of friends. He received\nnumerous communications from the dead, produced spirit lights,\ntransferred objects from one room to another through closed doors,\nfloated about, and, in short, went through all the spiritualist\nrepertory.\n\nThe ball is kept rolling by all sorts of people. The late Archdeacon\nWilberforce, who believed in 'objective entities that seem able to\nmanipulate or influence nerve currents, or magnetic ether, or whatever\nit is, of persons in the flesh',[27] wrote approvingly of him: 'The most\nremarkable medium I ever knew was the Reverend Stainton Moses, a\nclergyman in my father's diocese of Oxford'.[28]\n\n[Footnote 27: _There is no Death_, p. 14.]\n\n[Footnote 28: _Ibid._, p. 62.]\n\nOf the same medium Mr. Podmore says: 'Apart from the moral difficulties\ninvolved, there is little or nothing to forbid the supposition that the\nwhole of these messages were deliberately concocted by Mr. Moses himself\nand palmed off upon his unsuspecting friends.'[29]\n\n[Footnote 29: _Studies in Psychical Research_, p. 133.]\n\nThe moral difficulties disappear when we consider the case as one of\ndissociation. His spirit communications were psychologically identical\nwith the automatic writings of the Glastonbury archaeologists (see\nChapter IX); he read obituary notices, studied out-of-the-way stories of\nmen and women, and from the stores of his unconscious he produced this\ninformation as news from the spirit world. But, knowing nothing of the\nways of the unconscious and becoming a prey to his own dissociated\nstream, he fed this stream and drifted with it into something a little\nremoved from sanity.\n\nI know not how the manifestations began, and whether he belonged to my\nsecond or third group I do not attempt to discuss; I am satisfied if I\nhave made it clear that the work of this wonderful medium can be\nexplained otherwise than by one of the two alternatives of spiritualism\nor conscious deceit.\n\nWe meet with the same rush to testify to the honesty of Mrs. Piper. Sir\nOliver Lodge of course guarantees her, and the late Professor William\nJames, the Harvard psychologist, wrote of her: 'Practically I should be\nwilling now to stake as much money on Mrs. Piper's honesty as on that of\nany one I know, and am quite satisfied to leave my reputation for wisdom\nor folly so far as human nature is concerned to stand or fall by this\ndeclaration.'[30]\n\n[Footnote 30: Re-quoted from _Spiritualism_, p. 75.]\n\nThis honesty of the main personality of the Dissociate leads astray\nprofessors of physics or of the old psychology.[31] It is the honest but\nmistaken man who misleads his fellows. We are on our guard against the\nrogue, and the conscious deceiver must needs be a good actor if he would\nsucceed. The best actor knows he is acting, but the Reverend Moses\nneeded no effort to preserve for years the appearance of\nstraightforwardness and honesty. As far as he knew, he _was_\nstraightforward and honest, though beneath his consciousness lay\nfathomless possibilities of deceit, ever ready to take advantage of the\nexternals of an honest man.\n\n[Footnote 31: I may owe an apology here to the memory of Professor\nJames, for the original quotation is given without its context.]\n\nAs I said in Chapter VI, an authoritative and confident manner makes\neasy the acceptance of suggestion. What can be more authoritative and\nconfident than the manner of a man who believes what he says and knows\nthat his hearers are willing to believe? If what he says are lies and\ndelusions, that makes no difference in his manner, and his unsuspicious\nhearers are still ready to stake their reputations upon his honesty.\nThat readiness only makes them the more suggestible and renders\nvalueless their opinion as to the truth of what he says.\n\nSpiritualist writers are glib concerning 'subliminal consciousness',\nand, knowing not what they mean, attribute to it powers of communication\nwith the spirit world. The only one worthy of study is the late F. H.\nMyers, and though his stories of the marvellous are largely repetitions\nof old material yet his treatment of the psychology of double\npersonality is illuminating. His work on _Human Personality_, if free\nfrom the spiritualist complex, would probably rank well in advance of\nits period. He has a good grasp of the subject of hysterical double\npersonality, giving some excellent examples, but postulates a transition\nfrom the imaginings of the hysteric to the revelations of the spirit\nworld. That the mind should pass through disease on its way to divine\nrevelation, the boundary between the two being only a matter of\njudgement, is a necessary part of his explanation of mediumism. Just as\nspiritualists will maintain their belief in a medium after fraud has\nbeen detected, placing upon unbelievers the onus of proving fraud in\nevery case, so Myers, knowing the workings of hysterical double\npersonality, claims the right to exclude hysteria whenever he pleases\nand to attribute a divine origin to the material then produced. This\ndemand appeals neither to the religious man nor to the sceptic.\n\nI take the liberty of borrowing a story from Mr. Hereward Carrington, a\nspiritualist of some critical power.[32]\n\n[Footnote 32: _Personal Experiences in Spiritualism_, pp. 59-61. T.\nWerner Laurie, Ltd.]\n\n     'One of the most interesting cases that I have ever encountered is\n     the following, which I consider of remarkable psychological\n     interest from various points of view.\n\n     During the early summer of 1911, a gentleman called upon me,\n     stating that he knew a wonderful physical medium, of the same type\n     as Palladino. He himself was a lawyer; his friend, the medium, was\n     also a lawyer, and had \"a scientific interest in these things,\" and\n     in \"having the remarkable manifestations which occurred in his\n     presence solved,\" etc. For three years and a half, I was told, this\n     case had been under private observation, and the manifestations had\n     grown more and more numerous and bewildering as time went on. This,\n     and much more of like nature, I heard by way of preliminary to the\n     investigation of what appeared to be a very promising case.\n\n     An evening having been arranged, the two gentlemen called at my\n     house, and, after a chat, the demonstrations were undertaken.\n\n     A broom was placed on the floor, and then, the medium kneeling over\n     the object (or, rather, squatting on the ground), he placed his\n     fingers on either side of the broom-handle, and then gradually\n     took them away. As he did so the broom was seen to rise into the\n     air. It remained suspended in space for a few seconds, then fell to\n     the floor. The effect was most striking, while the phenomenon was\n     of that simple order which one would naturally expect to discover\n     in a simple undeveloped medium.\n\n     The first two or three experiments interested me immensely, I must\n     confess. But I noted one particular thing about the movements of\n     the medium, which was that every time he placed an object on the\n     floor, he placed it very close to his knees; this caused me to look\n     between his knees intently instead of at the object during the next\n     few trials. The result was that I distinctly saw _a fine black\n     thread_ stretched from leg to leg, forming a loop, into which the\n     various objects were slipped in the act of placing them on the\n     floor. The rest was only a matter of balance.\n\n     In spite of the fact that I had discovered the _modus operandi_, I\n     did not wish to act hastily, having been accused so often in the\n     past of condemning too hastily upon discovering the fraud.\n     Accordingly I asked the medium to meet me a few evenings later at\n     the office of my friend, Dr. Gustave Sayer, and here we witnessed a\n     second demonstration. It would be useless to repeat the details of\n     this performance, which was simply a repetition of the first.\n     Suffice it to say that not only was the medium seen using the loop\n     of thread throughout, but this loop broke twice during the\n     evening--once in the middle of the experiment--the thread being\n     heard to break, and the object at once falling to the ground.\n\n     On the first occasion the medium made an excuse, retired upstairs,\n     and evidently arranged the thread, for he came down again in a few\n     minutes and proceeded to give us a further test. Upon the thread\n     (audibly) breaking a second time, however, he said that he \"did not\n     think he could do any more for us that evening,\" and sat down,\n     apparently exhausted.\n\n     It was the most flagrant and bare-faced swindle I ever came across,\n     and in this Dr. Sayer agrees with me.\n\n     And yet here was a young lawyer practising these tricks,\n     apparently for no motive, and constantly lying about them in a most\n     astonishing manner; and this was a case from which much was to be\n     hoped, apparently.'\n\nThis story hardly needs comment; but the writer's attitude towards\nanother and more famous medium, Eusapia Palladino, is very different.\n\nUntil I read the book from which these passages are quoted I thought no\none regarded this lady as anything but an exposed fraud; even Sir Oliver\nLodge has written concerning her, 'my only regret is that I allowed\nmyself to make a report, although only a private report, to the Society\nfor Psychical Research, on the strength of a few exceptionally good\nsittings, instead of waiting until I had likewise experienced some of\nthe bad or tricky sittings to which all the Continental observers had\nborne frequent witness.'[33]\n\n[Footnote 33: Quoted from _The Question_, p. 118.]\n\nMr. Carrington says of this lady[34]:--\n\n     'In any event, it appears to me obvious that, even assuming that\n     fraud was intended on this occasion, it proves nothing more than\n     the fact that Eusapia will resort to clever trickery whenever the\n     occasion is given her to do so--a fact which all students of her\n     phenomena know full well already; and it does not in the least\n     prove that the whole seance was fraudulent--which is what is\n     implied in Professor Munsterberg's article. Every one knows well\n     enough that scores of phenomena have been observed in the past\n     which could not possibly have been accounted for, even assuming\n     that the medium had both her feet free--a fact I have previously\n     pointed out. The difference between Eusapia and the other mediums\n     spoken of in this volume is this, that in their case they\n     invariably fail whenever \"test conditions\" are imposed, whereas\n     Eusapia generally succeeds; further, the whole tenor and setting of\n     the seance, so to speak, is entirely different. Lastly, we have the\n     unanimity of opinion amongst scientific men as to Eusapia's powers,\n     whereas we have nothing of the sort in the case of any other\n     medium. On the contrary, whenever they are investigated along these\n     lines, they either fail altogether or are detected in fraud.'\n\n[Footnote 34: _Personal Experiences_, p. 174.]\n\nThis gentleman has reason for pride in his powers of observation, but\nhis spiritualist complexes are so firmly enclosed in their logic-tight\ncompartment that his own critical powers beat in vain against the door.\nIt was unfortunate for the young lawyer, but at the same time\ninexplicable, that Mr. Carrington pitted his observations, made at two\nsittings only, against those of the people who had had the case under\nprivate observation for three and a half years. Surely this respectable\nyoung man deserved the laurels of mediumism as much as did Eusapia. What\nare two failures against three and a half years' manifestations that\n'had grown more and more numerous and bewildering as time went on'? I am\nsure that, if Mr. Hereward Carrington had given his blessing, this young\nman might have become a famous medium instead of being blighted after\nhis years of successful effort.\n\nBut Mr. Carrington cannot conceive an alternative between a bare-faced\nswindle and a spirit manifestation, and in this he is harsher than I. It\nis plain that this young lawyer had the respect of his friends and was\nbelieved to be honest, just like Mrs. Piper and Stainton Moses, and Mr.\nCarrington missed a chance of useful psychological investigation when he\ndismissed the case so curtly. The chance cannot be recalled, but a talk\nwith this medium might have helped in the understanding of his\ndistinctly disordered mind. I once had the chance of a frank talk with\nthe accomplice of a professional medium, but, though he had some belief\nin the occult, he was so fully conscious of his roguery that I learned\nno more psychology than I have picked up from a three-card trickster.\nAnyhow, Mr. Carrington gives us an example of a medium in the making who\nwe can only guess was a man whose disappointed ambitions and neurotic\n'Will to Power' had led him astray.\n\nI wonder how Mr. Carrington explains the failure of previous observers\nto detect the trickery? The man's apparent honesty of course helped, but\nthe Herd Instinct was also at work and converts would be unlikely to\ncriticise when a few reputable people had expressed their belief.\nCertain card-tricks are safer from detection by a large audience than by\na small one. If three people are present and one thinks he detects the\ntrick he may speak, for he is only in a minority of one to two; but if\nfive out of fifteen detect it, each one, feeling he is in a minority of\none to fourteen, is over-ruled by his sense of insignificance and\nremains silent accordingly. It is easier to sway a crowd than to\npersuade an individual.\n\nLet me make it clear that I do not merely compare the medium with the\nhysteric, I regard them as identical except in those cases where the\nmedium is a conscious deceiver. The attitude of the believers in the\nhonesty of the medium is the same as that of the sympathising friends of\nthe hysteric patient, and it is often as difficult and thankless a task\nto explain the patient's condition to his or her friends as it is to\nsave the credulous from falling a prey to the fortune-teller. But such\ndifference as there may be is in favour of the unfortunate hysteric, who\nis the victim of forces that are too powerful to be resisted without\nhelp and who often anxiously desires recovery.\n\nI have seen in a man suffering from war-strain the spontaneous\ndevelopment of what would be accepted as clairvoyance; the identity of\nhis performance with that of the medium is of great importance. The\npatient was in that condition of dissociation or partial hypnosis into\nwhich these men easily pass, and was apparently 'seeing' some of the\nhorrors he had experienced. As a rule such revivals of war episodes can\nbe relied upon as a true reproduction of actual events, but in this case\nthere were inconsistencies in the story. For example, describing how\nUhlans drove their lances into Belgian babies, he said: 'If I had my\nrevolver I'd let them have it,' but gave no indication of what he, a\nBritish soldier, was doing unarmed and under such circumstances.\nMoreover, though the account was given with due emphasis, there was a\nlack of the emotion characteristic of the revival of actual horrors.\n\nThen a break came in the story, and he went on to describe a tragedy\nwhich had recently roused public interest. He saw the murderer walking\nwith his victim, described how she handed over certain articles to him,\nand then how the man shot her and hurried off.\n\nAll this was graphically related as if he were actually witnessing the\ntragedy, and as I listened I realised how any one ignorant of the\nworkings of a disordered mind would feel compelled to believe in the\nreality of clairvoyance and might be impelled to act upon the belief,\nfor the description of the murder, if true, could only have been derived\nfrom something like second-sight.\n\nThe cause at work in producing these fantasies was fairly clear. The man\nhad seen three years of fighting, and had resolutely tried to forget all\nthat he had passed through; he had the usual symptoms of 'shell-shock',\nand in addition complained bitterly of being haunted by dreams of\nmurder. I know not what particular happening had so impressed him, but\nin his unconscious were the memories of many horrors which, refused\nadmission to his consciousness, insisted on manifesting themselves by\ndreams and waking fears.\n\nEvery horrible thing he read or heard was joined on to his dissociated\nstream of memories and emotions, to be reproduced in dreams and\nfantasies.\n\nIn his imaginings there was a mixture of truth and fancy; the figure of\nthe murderer, for example, proved to be associated in his mind with the\nfigure of an officer who was present at a time of great emotional\nstrain, and the articles handed over by the victim were identical with\narticles familiar to the patient and of emotional importance to him. The\nother reproductions proved to be of incidents which had been related to\nhim and to which he had given an intimate personal interest whilst\nelaborating them; his own experiences were more deeply repressed.\n\nHis condition was identical with that of the honest medium--whether\nStainton Moses or more recently advertised seers--but fortunately his\nfriends recognised the true nature of his disorder and, instead of\ncultivating it as a 'gift', took steps to have it treated as a disease.\n\nIn the description of mediums we often find hints of hysterical\nsymptoms. Sir Oliver Lodge tells of the sighings and writhings of one of\nhis performers, but it is not often that a definite diagnosis is made as\nin the following extract[35]:--\n\n     'I do not think that any one who has seen the effects of a _good_\n     seance upon Eusapia could doubt its reality. She has been known to\n     suffer from partial paralysis, from hysteria, nausea, amnesia, loss\n     of vision, as well as great weakness, prostration, etc., after the\n     seance. I have seen her actively nauseated--excessively ill--after\n     a good seance of this character, a symptom which is unlikely to be\n     simulated, even if it could be. It is only after a _good_ seance\n     that such things occur, however. After a poor seance at which,\n     perhaps, much fraud has occurred ... I think that Eusapia often\n     simulates exhaustion when, as a matter of fact, there is little or\n     none, but this would not deceive one who has carefully watched her\n     for weeks and months together, and has observed the effects of a\n     genuine seance upon her.'\n\n[Footnote 35: _Personal Experiences_, p. 242.]\n\nThe behaviour described by Mr. Carrington is precisely that of the\nhysteric, but it is not clear what he means when he says that her being\nactively nauseated is a symptom unlikely to be simulated, even if it\ncould be. Hysterical vomiting--resulting from mental processes, and not\nfrom any physical cause--is very common, and is a simulation of bodily\ndisease, though I do not imply that the patient is aware of the\nsimulation. Perhaps being nauseated was, in this case, a symbol of the\ndisgust which one personality felt towards the frauds and lies of the\nother. Eusapia, having reached a condition of hysterical dissociation,\npresents the material symptoms of such a condition, for the nausea,\nparalysis, amnesia, loss of vision, prostration, etc., are classical\nsymptoms of hysteria. The spiritualist actually holds them forth as\nproofs of the reality of spirit communication! Let the reader bear in\nmind that they show Eusapia to have been not merely a cheat, but\nmentally diseased.\n\nThere is a sad list of books purporting to instruct beginners how to\ncommunicate with the dead, and the instructions are such as to induce\ndissociation--a mental condition with possibilities of self-deception\nand hysterical manifestations like those shown by Eusapia Palladino.\n\nBad enough it is to believe the fantasies of a diseased mind to be\nrevelations from beyond the grave, but how can one sufficiently condemn\nmen of learning and position who would lead along the pathway of disease\nthose who mourn their lost ones?\n\nA few extracts from _How to Speak with the Dead_[36] will illustrate\nthese pernicious attempts.\n\n[Footnote 36: By Sciens: Kegan Paul, Trench, Truebner & Co.]\n\n     (Page 88) 'By sitting in some place quite alone and free from\n     interruption, and by adopting a mental attitude of passive\n     receptivity and expectancy, the soul becomes ready to perceive and\n     be affected by any spirits that may be in its vicinity and that may\n     attempt to open up communications.... The manifestations ... may\n     vary from thought-suggestion to positive physical phenomena ...\n     such as the hearing of a voice or even the visual appearance of\n     some supernormal object. All depends upon whether the sitter is or\n     is not susceptible to psychical influence, and also upon whether\n     the locality or the sitter personally is or is not haunted.'\n\nThen (page 91) when the Dissociation has developed:--\n\n'In cases where the sitter is markedly \"psychic\" it frequently happens\nthat normal control over the body is lost. A condition of trance\nsupervenes, and while this continues the spirit--which may be either a\n\"second personality\" or a soul from the outside--that has gained the\nupper hand makes use to a greater or less extent of the brain and other\norgans subject to its mastery. The hand may write: the mouth may speak:\nthe whole body may be engaged in some impersonation; and all this may\ntake place beyond the scope of the sitter's normal consciousness.'\n\nLest the hysterical dissociation is not yet enough developed, the victim\nreceives, on page 98, another thrust along the road to disease:--\n\n     'If it be found on trial that psychic powers exist to an\n     appreciable extent it may be taken for granted that they are\n     capable of very great increase by persevering effort and systematic\n     employment.'\n\nA warning is both given and stultified on page 107:--\n\n     'Self-deception and the imaginations bred of wishes and emotions\n     are to be guarded against;' ... 'in solitary Expectancy fraud and\n     trickery are completely absent, and all manifestations are matters\n     of the most simple personal observation, the accuracy of which can\n     be confirmed--as in an ordinary scientific laboratory--by the test\n     of repetition.'\n\nThese directions are sufficient to start victims along the path taken by\nEusapia, and, though we do not know how this woman reached the condition\ndescribed by Mr. Carrington, yet the men who fostered her deception\ncertainly helped the unfortunate creature in her development of a second\npersonality compounded of delusion and fraud. The description of the\nother case of Mr. Carrington's contains a significant phrase: 'the\nphenomenon was of that simple order which one would naturally expect to\ndiscover in a simple undeveloped medium.' Just so: the game was only\nbeginning, but, if the medium had developed, the split-off personality\nwould have taken charge and limitless cheating and fraud could have been\ncarried on by a medium who was to all seeming an honest man.\n\nBut as I showed that the causes of hysteria are to be found in conflict\nand repression, only taking the 'Will to Power' and 'repression of the\nknowledge of deceit' as particular forms applying to a few cases, so I\nmust allow that the medium may not always be influenced by the last two\nfactors. The hysteric is the prey of emotions and experiences which\ncannot be faced unaided, and the strivings and desires that arise from\nthe unconscious, which in one individual may find expression in social\nwork, may find vent by a neurosis in another, or by mysticism in a\nthird.\n\nThe desires may be of the noblest kind, and, failing to find legitimate\nexpression, may show themselves in fantasies. I am not the first to draw\nattention to the psychology of Joan of Arc, and we can picture her urged\nby the noblest emotions to seek in a dissociated stream powers beyond\nthe reach of consciousness; her visions were real to her, and tradition\nmay be believed when it relates the story of her detection of King\nCharles disguised as one of his own courtiers. 'Be not amazed, nothing\nis hid from me', are the words attributed to her, and the incident well\nexemplifies the hypersensitivity of a dissociated stream.\n\nI cannot picture a modern medium actuated by high motives, but am ready\nto admit that even in our days there may be mystics whose dissociations\narose from commendable origins. Theosophy is bound up with the story of\ntwo women, Madame Blavatsky and Mrs. Besant; the former was a\nself-confessed deceiver, but the latter is a very different kind of\nwoman. Brought up in strict religious surroundings, she found herself\ncompelled to cast aside her religious beliefs and, at great personal\nsacrifice, take up a public attitude directly opposite to them; but her\nold beliefs still lay in the unconscious, and when the opportunity\narose she found relief from her conflict in a fantastic creed of the\nsupernatural. No one who has studied her life can deny her honesty, but\nhonesty does not make her beliefs easier of acceptance.\n\nBefore leaving the subject of mediums I must allude again to witchcraft.\nTo those who believe in spirits, good or evil, which can take possession\nof us and make us do their will, and can throw about bricks and sand and\nfurniture in our material world, there is nothing remarkable in\nepidemics of bewitchery, especially as the witch-finders were more\nfortunate than our spiritualists in having the unanimous support of the\nmost eminent authorities of their day.\n\nTo explain the psychology of witchcraft is beyond the scope of this\nbook, but it is not hard to conceive that when the belief in witchcraft\nwas strong certain unfortunate people who set out to play tricks, maybe\nfor notoriety or temporary gain, became ensnared by credulity and\nfinding escape difficult came to believe in their own powers. Thus\ndissociation would be set up and on the side of the witch-finders Herd\nInstinct (or suggestion) and logic-tight compartments did the rest.\n\nThe fact that confessions of witchcraft were apparently common makes\nthis explanation more probable.\n\nFor a career ending at the stake to have such a trivial origin as a\ndesire for notoriety is in agreement with the history of Sludge, whose\ndownfall began with a desire to draw attention to himself. Call them\nambitions and the desires seem less trivial, nor do I shrink from\nsuggesting that the 'gifts' of the water-diviner and the most\nfinancially disinterested medium, even of Mr. Stainton Moses himself,\nhave origin in a desire to shine before one's fellows--a neurotic 'Will\nto Power'.\n\n\n\n\nCONCLUSION\n\n\nAlthough I have emphasised the part that dissociation plays in the\nproduction of beliefs and actions, yet dissociation is only a particular\nmanifestation of the unconscious and it is the latter which is becoming\nthe field of research as to the causes of human action.\n\nFrom the evolutionary standpoint consciousness is a late development.\nMan sacrificed many advantages when he rose above the beast; in every\nmere bodily endowment he has superiors in the animal world, and as the\ninfluence of consciousness has become more and more important so the\nsphere of his unconscious actions has diminished.\n\nThe bird needs no foresight for the building of her nest: the impulse to\nbuild comes and must be obeyed. When migration time arrives there is no\nreasoned plan of going to a distant land, no scheming of routes or\ndestinations: she just goes.\n\nSo it is with the intricate instincts of other creatures, of the wasp\nthat builds her brood-cell, fills it with living victims, and places\nthere an egg of whose future she can know nothing.\n\nSeeing these things we marvel at the intelligence of the agent, but the\nchild who ties a rag round a stick and gives it a name uses more\ninitiative than any other animal possesses.\n\nHere, rather late, I will introduce McDougall's definition of an\ninstinct:--\n\n     'Instinct is an innate psycho-physical tendency to pay attention to\n     objects of a certain class, to experience emotional excitement of\n     peculiar quality on such perceptions, and to act or have an impulse\n     to act in a particular way with regard to that object.'\n\nWe can see that instinct suffices for the bird or insect, living almost\nentirely in the unconscious, to carry on the important affairs of life.\nEven in regard to what looks like the exercise of reason or memory we\ncan find a parallel in the human unconscious.\n\nThe unreasonable fears and obsessions of the 'shell-shocked' soldier\nrest upon causes of which he is unaware, and the burnt child dreads the\nfire even if he were too young to remember the burning. The chicken that\nhas once tasted a nauseous caterpillar will ever after avoid its like,\nbut we only know that a certain emotion is called up by the sight of the\ncaterpillar which causes the chicken to abstain; it is an unnecessary\nassumption that memory, as we know it, is concerned. The obsession of\nthe soldier who felt that he must attack his companion (see Chapter\nVIII) arose from the unconscious, and those animal actions which we\nattribute to memory can similarly have their origins apart from\nconsciousness.\n\nMcDougall's definition of instinct applies very well to obsessions,\nexcept that the latter are not innate but acquired; that one definition\nshould apply to both groups is due to them all having their origin in\nthe unconscious.\n\nMan, though urged by the instincts and memories of his unconscious, yet\nlives in his stream of consciousness and tends to believe that there is\nno other mind-work involved in his thoughts and actions; but as the\nlatest evolved function is the most variable and unstable so man's\nconsciousness is his most uncertain function, its chief variability\nbeing in the extent to which it controls or is controlled by the\nunconscious.\n\nThe ideal human mind would be perfectly integrated, there would be no\nlogic-tight compartments, all its complexes would be apparent to the\nconsciousness, all memories available when needed, all emotions assigned\nto their proper cause and all instincts recognised and well-directed;\nand the owner of it would find life in our world intolerable.\n\nRemote from this ideal is the mind whose unconscious has taken the\nplace, wholly or in part, of the stream of consciousness. Perhaps the\nconsciousness has not developed--then we find idiocy or imbecility;\nperhaps some distorted emotion from the unconscious has been the source\nof a dissociated stream of ideas which becomes predominant and brings\nits owner within the legal definition of a lunatic.\n\nBetween the extremes are the rest of mankind, the matter-of-fact man who\nreconciles himself to his world by a few serviceable logic-tight\ncompartments, the man of temperament--artist, poet, or tramp--who counts\nthe emotions arising from the unconscious as among the real things of\nlife, and the other people of temperament who, finding their emotions\nand desires in discord with their surroundings, misdirect them and join\nthe sufferers whom we call neurotic.\n\nThen there are those who build up from the unconscious a fantastic world\nof imaginings, and, knowing nothing of the source, attribute them to\noutside intelligences or beings like themselves. To these belong the\nseers and mystics and their present-day representatives, the mediums,\nclairvoyants, and other believers in their own fantasies.\n\nThe counterpart of the medium is the ready believer, and each is\nreciprocally the victim of the other.\n\nThe medium has his dissociated stream with its hyperaesthesia and\nreceptivity--alert to pick up the slightest hint and cast it back as a\nspirit revelation, and ready, moreover, to use more material trickery if\nneedful. On the side of the believer is a logic-tight compartment\ncontaining his readiness to seize upon the feeblest evidence of the\nsupernatural. How far he progresses into a dissociation one cannot tell,\nbut when two Dissociates apparently bearing the stamp of honesty--one\nthe medium and one the believer--work into each other's hands results\nmay well be such as to defy explanation.\n\nThe study of the unconscious is legitimate, and if one chooses knowingly\nto tap its stores by a method of dissociation some increase of\nknowledge (not about the supernatural, but about the ways of the human\nmind) may be expected.\n\nBut whoever hands himself over to a belief that the products of a\ndissociation--whether of his own consciousness or of another's--are\nmanifestations of the Spirit World, may come to say--\n\n    'Had I seen, perhaps, what hand was holding mine,\n    Leading me whither, I had died of fright.'\n\n\n\n_Printed in Great Britain by_\n\nUNWIN BROTHERS, LIMITED\n\nWOKING AND LONDON\n\n\n\n\n\n<pre id=\"pg-footer\">","title":"Spiritualism and the New Psychology: An Explanation of Spiritualist Phenomena and Beliefs in Terms of Modern Knowledge","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":41675}