nevertheless facts. Though they are jeered at when they are first
brought to the attention of the scientific world, subsequent
investigation has only served to confirm them.... It is on record that
no physician over forty years of age at the time of his great discovery
ever accepted Harvey's proof of the circulation of the blood--so great
was the force of tradition and orthodoxy.... And today the facts of
"psychical research" are laughed at, and its investigators held up to
ridicule, because of this same spirit of prejudice and intolerance, and
the desire to mock at what we do not understand. "But," as Professor
James so well remarked _a propos_ of this subject, "whenever a debate
between the mystics and the scientists has been once for all decided,
it is the mystics who have usually proved to be right about the _facts_,
while the scientists had the better of it in respect to _theories_." But
inasmuch as only the "facts" are now in dispute, and no one cares as yet
what theory shall be adopted in order to explain them, is it not time at
least to investigate them, and to see whether or not such facts
exist--quite irrespective of whether they are explainable, when found?

The facts, then; are they true or are they not? It is a question quite
open to discussion, one quite capable of being solved by scientific
methods. It is useless to say beforehand whether or not such and such
things are or are not possible; the question is: Do they exist? We must
not question their utility either, even if true, for this never enters
into any scientific question of fact. Like the celebrated French
philosopher whose friend had proved to him the "impossibility" of a
certain happening, he replied: "My dear sir, I never said it was
_possible_; I said it was a _fact_!"

So, then, we come to the evidence for this wonderful power of telepathy
or thought-transference. Here I must be very brief, indicating merely a
fraction of the evidence which has been accumulated in proof of this
startling scientific truth.

When the Society for Psychical Research was founded, in 1882, its main
energies were directed toward the investigation of this faculty, and of
the reality of thought-transference. The various Committees who were
engaged in this investigation soon came to the conclusion that its
reality was beyond doubt. Some of the most interesting and conclusive
experiments were those conducted by Mr. Guthrie, a gentleman living in
Liverpool, and two of