Psychic Phenomena by Edward T. Bennett (historical books to read TXT) 📕

a large number of persons who were witnesses of the Home phenomena, carefully examined its evidential value, and summarised it in a Joint Report. This was printed in the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research for July 1889.[23] It is to be regretted that the Society has not seen its way to publish this Report in a form accessible to the general public. It is true that in his great work, "Human Personality, and its Survival of Bodily Death," Mr. Myers gives a brief summary of the Report; but he condenses the thirty-six pages of the original Report and its appendices into four pages of "Human Personality," which are quite insufficient to convey an adequate idea of the Report itself. Also, the cost of Mr. Myers' book debars from it the mass of readers. This Report was followed up a little later by a brief article by Mr. Myers, forming an important supplement.[24]

In the Report itself its joint authors say: "We propose the question—Have Home's phenomena ever been plausibly explained as conjuring tricks, or in accordance with known laws of nature? And we answer—No; they have not been so explained, nor can we so explain them."[25] In commenting on the Joint Report, by Professor Barrett and himself, Mr. Myers puts the problem as to Home in this form: "There is thus a considerable body of evidence as to Home, which enables us to discuss the three questions: (1) Was he ever convicted of fraud? (2) Did he satisfy any trained observer in a series of experiments selected by the observer and not by himself? (3) Were the phenomena entirely beyond the scope of the conjurer's art?"[26]

In the Joint Report the writers say—(1) As to fraud: "We have found no allegations of fraud on which we should be justified in laying much stress. Mr. Robert Browning has told to one of us the circumstances which mainly led to that opinion of Home which was expressed in 'Mr. Sludge, the Medium,' It appears that a lady (since dead) repeated to Mr. Browning a statement made to her by a lady and gentleman (since dead), as to their finding Home in the act of experimenting with phosphorus on the production of 'spirit lights,' which, so far as Mr. Browning remembers, were to be rubbed round the walls of the room, near the ceiling, so as to appear when the room was darkened. This piece of evidence powerfully impressed Mr. Browning; but it comes to us at third-hand, without written record, and at a distance of nearly forty years.

"We have received one other account from a gentleman of character and ability, of a seance in very poor light, when the 'spirit-hand' moved in such a way as to seem dependent on the action of Home's arms and legs. This account is subjoined [in the Report] as Appendix D. We may add that few, if any, of the lights seen at Home's seances could (as they are described to us) have been contrived by the aid of phosphorus.

"There is also a frequently repeated story that Home was found at the Tuilleries (or at Compiègne, or at Biarritz) to be using a stuffed hand, and was consequently forbidden the Imperial Court. We have tried in France to get at the fountain-head of this story, but without success."[27]

(2) "With regard to our second question—whether his powers were tested by competent observers"—Mr. Myers says: "Home in this respect stands pre-eminent; since we have the evidence of Sir William Crookes, corroborated by the testimony of the Master of Lindsay (now Earl of Crawford and Balcarres), himself a savant of some distinction, and the privately printed series of careful observations by the present and the late Lords Dunraven.[28]

(3) "As to our third question—whether the phenomena could have been produced by conjuring"—Mr. Myers says: "Many of them, especially the fire-tests, and the movements of large untouched objects in good light, seem inexplicable by this supposition. The hypothesis of collective hallucination on the part of the sitters seems very improbable, because, in most cases, all those present saw the same thing; and often without receiving from Home any audible suggestion as to what was about to happen."[29]

In the Joint Report by Professor Barrett and Mr. Myers, a considerable space is devoted to a discussion as to conjuring being the explanation of the Home manifestations. It is dismissed as utterly inadequate. In conclusion, the authors of the Report say: "And we find that experts in conjuring (several of whom we have consulted), however little they may believe in Home's pretensions, are disposed rather to reject wholesale than to explain in detail the more remarkable records."[30]

Professor Barrett and Mr. Myers proceed to quote thirty-five cases of the identification of alleged communicating spirits from Madame Home's book, entitled "D. D. Home, His Life and Mission." They remark, "This list of identifications is a long one, and quite unique in the history of Spiritualism."[31] After analysing this list of cases, they say near the conclusion of their Report, as implying their final verdict: "If our readers ask us—'Do you advise us to go on experimenting in these matters as though Home's phenomena were genuine?'—we answer, 'Yes.'"[32] In the supplementary article above referred to sixteen more cases of identification are added to the thirty-five.

In Appendix E to the Report is given some striking testimony to the reality of the "fire-test." The following letter from Mr. W. M. Wilkinson, the well-known solicitor, is included:—

"As you ask me to write to you of what occurred at our house at Kilburn, where we were living in 1869, with reference to the handling of red-hot coal, I will merely say that one Sunday evening in the winter of that year, I saw Mr. Home take out of our drawing-room fire a red-hot coal a little less in size than a cricket ball, and carry it up and down the drawing-room. He said to Lord Adare, now Lord Dunraven, who was present, 'Will you take it from me? It will not hurt you.' Lord Adare took it from him, and held it in his hand for about half a minute, and before he threw it back in the fire I put my hand pretty close to it, and felt the heat to be like that of a live coal.—Yours very truly,

W. M. Wilkinson.[33]

44 Lincoln's Inn Fields,
London, W.C., February 7, 1869."

Appendix M to the Report consists of some particulars verbally given to Mr. Myers by Mrs. Honywood, of 52 Warwick Square, London, in further explanation of her printed testimony to phenomena she had witnessed in Home's presence. She was well acquainted with him for twenty-five years, attended many seances, and took notes of them at the time. In the early part of this chapter, a statement she sent to the Dialectical Society has already been quoted. She told Mr. Myers that most of her friends were complete disbelievers in Spiritualism, and that they frequently repeated to her rumours to the discredit of Home. But she never heard any first-hand account of any kind of trickery on his part. She considered him a man of open childlike nature, thoroughly honest and truthful, and that in her opinion his utterances in the trance state were much superior in thought and diction to his ordinary talk. She said she should like to give Mr. Myers a few additional details with regard to the fire phenomena reported in Madame Home's book, "D. D. Home, His Life and Mission," on her authority. Madame Home's secretary, she said, had slightly abbreviated her words in a way which made the occurrences seem rather less wonderful than they actually were. Mr. Myers gives the following, as having been signed "Barbara Honywood, June 1889."

"As to the burning coal placed in my hand. I saw Mr. Home take this coal from the fire, moving his hands freely among the coals. It was about the size of a coffee cup, blazing at the top, and red-hot at the bottom. While I held it in my hand the actual flame died down, but it continued to crackle, and to be partially red-hot. I felt it like an ordinary stone, neither hot nor cold. Mr. Home then pushed it off my hand with one finger on to a double sheet of cartridge paper, which it at once set on fire. I am quite certain that I was in my usual condition at the time....

"As to the hot lamp-chimney which I touched. There was a row of four or five persons sitting side by side, and Mr. Home asked us each in turn to touch the glass. When I touched it, I felt as though a wave of heat were receding before me....

"I have repeatedly taken Mr. Home in my own carriage to the houses of friends of mine who were strangers to him, and have there seen the furniture at once violently moved in rooms which I knew that he had never entered till that moment. I have seen heavy furniture moved; for instance, a heavy sofa in my own drawing-room, with myself upon it, and a heavy centre table, moved several feet away from Home, and then back again, in the light, while his hands and feet were visible. Not horse-hairs, but ropes, would often have been necessary to pull the furniture about as I have seen it pulled."[34]

A brief reference must now be made to what is perhaps the most sensational alleged event in Home's mediumistic career, the one which is most frequently spoken of by the general public, with more or less forcible expressions of scornful incredulity; his "levitation" out of the window of a room at a great height from the ground, and in at a window of the next room on the same story. In the Report by Professor Barrett and Mr. Myers, no detailed account of this is given. The Report says: "Lords Lindsay and Adare had printed a statement that Home floated out of the window and in at another in Ashley Place (Victoria Street), S.W., 16th December 1868."[35] At a meeting of the Committee of the Dialectical Society, held on 6th July 1869, a paper was read from Lord Lindsay, describing some of his personal experiences with Home. This paper makes no reference to the above case of levitation. But at the same meeting of the Committee, Lord Lindsay and others gave evidence as witnesses, and Lord Lindsay thus described this particular case:—

"I saw the levitations in Victoria Street, when Home floated out of the window; he first went into a trance, and walked about uneasily; he then went into the hall; while he was away, I heard a voice whisper in my ear, 'He will go out of one window and in at another.' I was alarmed and shocked at the idea of so dangerous an experiment. I told the company what I had heard, and we then waited for Home's return. Shortly after he entered the room, I heard the window go up, but I could not see it, for I sat with my back to it. I, however, saw his shadow on the opposite wall; he went out of the window in a horizontal position, and I saw him outside the other window (that in the next room) floating in the air. It was eighty-five feet from the ground. There was no balcony along the windows, merely a strong course an inch and a half wide; each window had