nd
we had only been sitting a very few minutes.

Of course the obvious explanation will be that the gentleman with the
diabolical theory and the evidently strong will-power (as evidenced in
the denouement at Mrs. Marshall's) produced the diabolical effects
consciously or unconsciously. I do not think the former was the case;
and if it is possible to get such results unconsciously, that phenomenon
is quite as curious as the spiritualistic explanation. In fact I am not
sure that the psychological is not more difficult than the
pneumatological theory. My own notion is that the "Psychic Force" people
are clearly on the right track, though their cause, as at present
elaborated, is not yet equal to cover all the effects.

Mr. Spurgeon and the "diabolists" concede the whole of the
spiritualistic position. They not only say that the effects are due to
spiritual causes, but they also identify the producing spirit. I have
never been able to get as far as that. I did not feel on the occasion in
question at all as though I had been in communication with his sable
Majesty. If I was, certainly my respect for that potentate is not
increased, for I should have fancied he would have done something much
"bigger" in reply to my challenge than smash up a small chess-table.
However, there was a sort of uncanny feeling about the experience, and
it seemed to me so far illustrative of Mr. Spurgeon's position as to be
worth committing to paper. If that gentleman, however, lends such a
doctrine the sanction of his approval, he will, let him be assured, do
more to confirm the claims of Spiritualism than all the sneers of
Professors Huxley and Tyndall, and the scorn of Mr. George Henry Lewes
can undo.

CHAPTER XXXIX.

SPIRITUAL ATHLETES.

I am about for once to depart from my usual custom of narrating only
personal experiences, and in this and the two following chapters print
the communications of a friend who shares my interest in these matters,
and has frequently accompanied me in my investigations into this
mysterious Borderland. In these cases, however, he investigated on his
own account, and I am not responsible for the conclusions at which he
arrives:--

"Attracted," he says, "by an article in a popular journal on the subject
of 'Spirit Faces,' I determined, if possible, to 'assist' at a seance. I
had not hitherto taken much interest in spiritualistic matters, because
in the first place, the cui bono question remained persist