The Spiritualist newspaper > No.288, March 1st 1878

March 1, 1878.
THE SPIRITUALIST.
103
disasters of the Cromwellian civil war, and ended by a prediction of \)\
the Restoration, couched in these singular terms—“And after him f(j
shall come a dead man, and with him a royal C of the best blood in the j) j
world, and he shall have the crown, and set England on the right way.” j) j
The meaning of which was declared to be the restoration of Charles II., j (j
thus:—“Monkery being extinguished, and the Lord-General’s name ju
being Monk, is the dead man. The royal C (the gamma of the Greek j) j
answering to the C of the Roman alphabet) is Charles IT., who, from m
his extraction, may be said to be of the best blood in the world.” If nj
such interpretations as this were to be admitted, any sort of jargon !)!
might be made to foretell any imaginable events. Why might not the j (|
astrological prediction mean that after all the troubles of civil war, and j | j
the termination of the Stuart dynasty in the person of Queen Anne, j) j
the dead man—that is to say, the apparently dead branch of the old j (!
royal family in Hanover—should come, and with it a royal G (George I., | (|
of course), who came of the best blood in the world 1 Surely, one inter- j / j
pretation would be as good as the other.—The Monthly Illustrated j (j
Journal. j [ i
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL SOCIETY.
At a recent meeting of the Psychological Society of Great j I
Britain, held at 11, Chandos-street, Cavendish-square, jj
London, under the presidency of Mr. Serjeant Cox, the j j |
debate on Slate-writing Phenomena, as set forth in Mr. A. j j j
R. Wallace’s letter to The Spectator, was resumed. j 11
Mr. Munton, in resuming the debate on Mr. Wallace’s letter to the j) i
Spectator, addressed the society at considerable length. After alluding i j |
to the decisive character of the quoted example (that is to say, the writing ! (j
of Mr. Wallace’s own selected word between two closed slates which j / j
never left his sight), the speaker examined the variety of evidence adduced j [ j
by trustworthy witnesses, showing—1, that these direct writings were j (|
not due to imposture; 2, that the power, be it what it might, was guided ; ? j
by intelligence; 3, that, apart from physical impossibility, it could not j 11
be attributable to the involuntary action of the medium (some messages j j i
being in languages unfamiliar to him); and, 4, that it had apparently | / i
nothing to do with the mind of the sitter, the messages being frequently ! | j
inconsistent with that person’s own knowledge. Mr. Munton then j (!
referred to his professional association with the great Slade trial in 1876, j Jj
remarking that he had studiously abstained for more than a year from j (!
taking any part in public debates bearing upon that cause celebre, as he j /1
considered it was inexpedient for an advocate to do so. But, as those law j)!
proceedings had long since closed, and Dr. Slade was in a foreign land, j (j
never likely to revisit England, and all professional relationship had i)
terminated, there was no longer any reason why he (Mr. Munton) j) |
should refrain from stating honestly and candidly the result of his own j (j
investigation as a matter of psychological research. It was no part of in
the duty of an advocate (in fact, it was inconsistent with the very proper j (j
etiquette in the legal profession) to give any opinion in the open court j; j
on the innocence or guilt of his client, but now he was j r j
in a position to fearlessly assert that after numerous sittings I s j
with Slade (sometimes aided by skilled witnesses) the conclusion seemed j / j
inevitable that the magisterial charge, alleging all the phenomena to be ! (j
fraud and imposture, was erroneously made. Not that he (the speaker) j (j
was by any means disposed to agree that these manifestations were j) j
due to departed spirits; on the contrary, the more he examined into j (j
the matter the more he dissented from that conclusion. He, however, i (j
had great respect for those who had been able to satisfy themselves that ! ) j
the phenomena were attributable to such a cause. There could be little j r j
doubt that Slade was personally convinced on the subject; but it was j \ \
no crime to form a mistaken opinion, assuming it to be so, and but for j j j
the popular excitement which existed at the time of the trial, this ex- j) j
pression of belief would not have been treated, as it certainly was i \ j
treated, as more or less conclusive of guilt. Mr. Munton then explained j ) j
what took place in the shape of several manifestations which had j ) j
occurred in the presence of himself and friends. Among other things j \ j
he had induced Dr. Slade to reverse all the alleged favourable practices, i) j
that is to say, he made him sit with his face to the light, instead of to j (j
the dark; to wear gloves to exclude the finger nail theory, and use j j j
new slates to negative the alleged invisible prepared writing. The | J!
accusers of Dr. Slade had hastily assumed everything against him, and j (j
it must be confessed that, in the absence of explanation, the suspicious j \ i
manner and convulsive action, common to most so-called medial j) I
persons, created unfavourable appearances. He (Mr. Munton) was i (j
himself much struck with this at his early interviews with Dr. Slade ; j) j
but on patient inquiry he was convinced that there was an agency at j / j
work wholly beyond the medium, though what the exact nature of the j (j
power was he could not pretend to say. One of the main objects of the j | j
society was to endeavour by careful investigation to solve this problem. | JI
The prejudice on the question under discussion was very remarkable, j <!
One might divide the community into three classes. Firstly, those who j)
had taken the trouble to see for themselves; secondly, people who, j)
being absolutely ignorant of even the facts, excluded from their belief j (
everything they were unable to comprehend; and, lastly, those who were j |
ready to accept the word of any public conjurer without further inquiry, j J
It was a singular circumstance in regard to Mr. Maskelyne, that that j (
person had not only never seen the manifestation he pretended to imi- j j
tate, but his performance had not the faintest resemblance to what i)
actually occurred at Slade’s. No one could object to an effort at imita- i (
tion; but even at the Egyptian Hall some reasonable approach to fact
might be expected. He (Mr. Munton) had had no experience of slate¬
writing phenomena with the medium referred to in Mr. Wallace’s pub¬
lished letter; but when a man with such a reputation as Mr. Wallace
(against whose honour and integrity his boldest assailant had never
dared to utter a word) came forward to testify to these things, it was
surely high time that they should, after every natural hypothesis had
been exhausted, be thoroughly, systematically, and scientifically inves¬
tigated. ^
A WARNING OF DANGER.
BY E. LOUISA S. NOSWORTHY.
An incident has just occurred in this household, suggestive
to me of the watchful care of unseen guardians. This
morning I sat in the dining-room soon after breakfast, read¬
ing aloud to my husband, my little boy writing at a table
near.
Suddenly the closed door was violently swung open to the
fullest limit its hinges allowed; such a style of opening a
door would justly be considered rude, unmannerly, and
worthy of rebuke; for an instant my feeling was annoyance
at the interruption, but seeing no entrance of a human
being, a strong impression seized me that it was a warning
of danger, and I flew rather than ran through the open
doorway to find no mortal on the other side, or indeed any¬
where else on the ground floor of the house, but to discover
that the drawing-room on the other side of the passage was
on fire. In an instant my cries brought all the household to
the work of rolling up and smothering the flames of burn¬
ing drapery, and the fire was quickly extinguished before it
had done much damage.
I am writing this with a burnt hand and scorched eye¬
brows and eyelashes, for I was the first to seize on a mass of
burning drapery. Some one had placed the drapery on a
chair so near the fire as to be within reach of sparks, or those
dangerous explosive pieces of coal which occasionally fly
beyond the limits of the fireplace.
Calmly contemplating this incident now that serenity is
restored to a temporarily terror-stricken household, I see
that but for that warning by the door opening in a few
moments a room, or perchance an entire house, would have
been in imminent peril of total destruction. When I
entered the room a chair was burning, a mass of drapery
burning and a hearthrug in the same condition. In close
proximity to these articles stood a large painted and
varnished screen of most combustible materials; if the flames
had caught it, their fury could not easily have been arrested.
I see also that no warning save that remarkable springing
open of the door would have had such a decisive effect in
causing my immediate exit from the room, as I had settled
myself to reading for an hour.
I assert that when the door opened in the manner I have
described, no human being save the persons inside the dining¬
room were on that floor of the house. The servant from
the kitchen rushed up from the floor beneath, and those
occupied in the bedrooms ran down on hearing the alarm.
Each person of the household has been closely questioned,
and the whereabouts of each ascertained at the time of the
mysterious door-opening, and there remains no hypothesis by
which to account for the occurrence but that of an unseen
agency kindly interfering to prevent trouble and damage.
To that unseen agency, as well as to the Supreme Power
ruling and directing all agencies, I desire publicly to testify
my gratitude for the deliverance.
New Leeds, Leeds, February 24th, 1878.
Mr. J. W. Fletcher writesArrangements are being made by
the Americans in London for a celebration of the Anniversary of Modern
Spiritualism. Announcements of time, place, and the speakers to
appear, will be made.”
Mr. Lawrence Oliphant.—Mr. Lawrence Oliphant, late M.P. for
the Stirling Boroughs, and Paris correspondent of the Times, has
rejoined the Spiritualistic community of Mr. Thomas Lake Harris, in
America, and is now there with his wife. Mr. Oliphant, tired of a
useless life in fashionable London, threw it up some years ago, to follow
an industrious career in Mr. Harris’s community, and to do some good
to the world as a consequence of his existence in it. In his excellent
novel, Piccadilly (Blackwood & Son), he gives a most truthful and
amusing picture of artificial life in the Metropolis, both among people of
refinement and people of vulgar wealth. It is a book which will exactly,
meet the taste of intelligent Spiritualists.