r
less heavily.

This, indeed, happens very often, and is what discourages so many
inquirers.

There are conditions, however, in which fraud is not supposable. The
fact that phenomena can be counterfeited is no reason for concluding
they do not exist. In experiments with magnetism and hypnotic
suggestion, many delusions beset the experimenters, and there is more or
less intentional foolery on the part of the subjects. Thus have I seen,
at the prison-hospital of Salpetriere and elsewhere, young women
outrageously deceiving the most serious investigators, who did not in
the least suspect such insincerity. At market fairs there may often be
seen booths where sleepwalkers are exhibited, who simulate genuine
somnambulism more or less cleverly. Yet one would palpably err who
should deny the existence of real magnetism, somnambulism, or hypnotic
suggestion, because of these humbugs and mockeries.

Let us, therefore, pass by fraud, and examine cases where all the
experimenters knew one another, and did not knowingly deceive, and thus
let us consider a series of observed facts. Here are some communications
for which I can vouch. They are sentences, dictated by raps:

God does not enlighten the world with thunder and meteors. He
controls peacefully the stars which shine. Thus do divine
revelations follow one another, with order, reason, and harmony.

Religion and Friendship are two companions, who help us along
life's painful road.

My brother: in the Law [this communication was addressed to an
Israelite] revive thy memory! Saul came to the Pythoness of
Endor, and begged her to raise the spirit of Samuel; and the
spirit of Samuel appeared, announcing to the King the nation's
destiny and his own. (1 Samuel xxviii.) "The spirit [wind]
bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof,
but canst not tell whence it cometh, nor whither it goeth: so is
everyone that is born of the Spirit." (John iii. 8.)

This New Testament text was the more remarkable because it was written
in Latin. Here, therefore, are intelligible sentences and accurate
quotations. Could blind chance have composed them? Without forgetting
possible imposition, our hypotheses still await explication.

Here are other specimens which demand a certain astuteness and decided
mental struggle for their dictation. One paragraph begins thus: _Suov
imrap enger_. The other: _Arevele suov neib_. It is nece