ersons
believed (so they thought) from demonstrative evidence? The mere
suggestion of the possibility of this of course awakened an inquisitive
and eager interest everywhere. It became the subject of universal
discussion and experiment in society. There was demand for other
"mediums" to satisfy curiosity or aid investigation; and the demand at
once produced a copious supply. The business of medium became a regular
profession, opening a career especially to enterprising women. They
began to draw together believers and doubters into "circles" and
"seances," and to organize permanent associations. At the end of ten
years the "Spiritual Register" for 1859, boasting great things,
estimated the actual spiritualists in America at 1,500,000, besides
4,000,000 more partly converted. The latest census gives the total
membership of their associations as 45,030. But this moderate figure
should not be taken as the measure of the influence of their leading
tenet. There are not a few honest Christians who are convinced that
communications do sometimes take place between the dead and the living;
there are a great multitude who are disposed, in a vague way, to think
there must be something in it. But there are few even of the earnest
devotees of the spiritualist cult who will deny that the whole business
is infested with fraud, whether of dishonest mediums or of lying
spirits. Of late years the general public has come into possession of
material for independent judgment on this point. An earnest
spiritualist, a man of wealth, named Seybert, dying, left to the
University of Pennsylvania a legacy of sixty thousand dollars, on
condition that the university should appoint a commission to investigate
the claims of spiritualism. A commission was appointed which left
nothing to be desired in point of ability, integrity, and impartiality.
Under the presidency of the renowned Professor Joseph Leidy, and with
the aid and advice of leading believers in spiritualism, they made a
long, patient, faithful investigation, the processes and results of
which are published in a most amusing little volume.[338:1] The gist of
their report may be briefly summed up. Every case of alleged
communication from the world of departed spirits that was investigated
by the commission (and they were guided in their selection of cases by
the advice of eminent and respectable believers in spiritualism) was
discovered and demonstrated to be a case of gross, willful attempte