defect. By analogy, therefore, there is
every reason to believe that proper names are hard to recall--every
reason for thinking that they should be--by "spirits" after the shock
and wrench of death. The necessary psychical mechanism would be so
shaken and disturbed that it would be impossible to recall names and
events, which seem quite straightforward and simple to the sitter. The
possibly pictorial method of presentation of proper names would greatly
add to the difficulty, as we have seen, and would be liable to lead to
misrepresentation and error.

19. Dr. Hyslop, in his second report on Mrs. Piper, (_Proceedings_,
Amer. S.P.R., pp. 1-812), calls attention to certain analogies which may
be drawn from everyday psychology, rendering the process of
communication far more intelligible, and the difficulties within the
process far clearer to our perception and appreciation. For example, he
calls attention to certain analogies with aphasia, which are most
instructive. He says, in part:

"The two traditional types of aphasia are motor and sensory.
Sensory aphasia is the inability to interpret the meaning of a
sensation ... motor aphasia is the inability to speak a word or
language, though the ideas and meaning of sensations may be as
clear as in normal life.... This latter difficulty is apparent in
several types of phenomena purporting to be associated with
communications from spirits. I have found them illustrated in four
different cases of mediumship, and they may be represented in three
types. They are: (_a_) The difficulties with proper names; (_b_)
The difficulties with unfamiliar words; and (_c_) The inability to
immediately answer a pertinent question....

"The analogies with aphasia, of which we are speaking, may comprise
various conditions affecting both medium and communicator. Thus the
abnormal physical and mental conditions involved in the trance may
affect the integrity of the normal motor action. Then the new
situation in which death places a communicator, in relation to any
nervous system, may establish conditions very much like aphasia.
Then there may be difficulties in the communicator's representing
his thoughts in the form necessary to transmit them to and through
a foreign organism."

Dr. Hyslop then offers the following diagram as a possible solution of
certain difficulties involved:

[Illustration]