upplemented by a vast number of trance utterances,
and by the verbal messages of spirits, given through the lips of
mediums. Sometimes it has even come by direct voices, as in the
numerous cases detailed by Admiral Usborne Moore in his book The
Voices. Occasionally it has come through the family circle and
table-tilting, as, for example, in the two cases I have previously
detailed within my own experience. Sometimes, as in a case recorded by
Mrs. de Morgan, it has come through the hand of a child.

Now, of course, we are at once confronted with the obvious
objection--how do we know that these messages are really from beyond?
How do we know that the medium is not consciously writing, or if that
be improbable, that he or she is unconsciously writing them by his or
her own higher self? This is a perfectly just criticism, and it is one
which we must rigorously apply in every case, since if the whole world
is to become full of minor prophets, each of them stating their own
views of the religious state with no proof save their own assertion, we
should, indeed, be back in the dark ages of implicit faith. The answer
must be that we require signs which we can test before we accept
assertions which we cannot test. In old days they demanded a sign from
a prophet, and it was a perfectly reasonable request, and still holds
good. If a person comes to me with an account of life in some further
world, and has no credentials save his own assertion, I would rather
have it in my waste-paperbasket than on my study table. Life is too
short to weigh the merits of such productions. But if, as in the case
of Stainton Moses, with his Spirit Teachings, the doctrines which are
said to come from beyond are accompanied with a great number of
abnormal gifts--and Stainton Moses was one of the greatest mediums in
all ways that England has ever produced--then I look upon the matter in
a more serious light. Again, if Miss Julia Ames can tell Mr. Stead
things in her own earth life of which he could not have cognisance, and
if those things are shown, when tested, to be true, then one is more
inclined to think that those things which cannot be tested are true
also. Or once again, if Raymond can tell us of a photograph no copy of
which had reached England, and which proved to be exactly as he
described it, and if he can give us, through the lips of strangers, all
sorts of details of his home life, which his own relatives had to
verify before they