n project and objectify,
its own creations. Thus Gleditch saw the dead Maupertuis, with
perfect distinctness, in the salle of the Academy at Berlin. Had he
not known that Maupertuis was dead, he could have sworn to his
presence (p. 866). Yes: but how does that explain volatile pots
and pans? Well, there are _collective_ hallucinations, as when the
persecuted in the Cevennes, like the Covenanters, heard non-existent
psalmody. And all witches told much the same tale; apparently
because they were collectively hallucinated. Then were the
spectators of the agile crockery collectively hallucinated? M.
Littre does not say so explicitly, though this is a conceivable
theory. He alleges after all his scientific statements about
sensory troubles, that 'the whole chapter, a chapter most deserving
of study, which contains the series of demoniac affections
(affections demoniaques), has hardly been sketched out'.

Among accounts of 'demoniac affections,' descriptions of objects
moved without contact are of frequent occurrence. As M. Littre
says, it is always the same old story. But why is it always the
same old story? There were two theories before the world in 1856.
First there was the 'animistic-hypothesis,' 'spirits' move the
objects, spirits raise the medium in the air, spirits are the
performers of the airy music. Then there was the hypothesis of a
force or fluid, or faculty, inherent in mankind, and notable in some
rare examples of humanity. This force, fluid, agency, or what you
will, counteracts the laws of gravitation, and compels tables, or
pots, to move untouched.

To the spiritualists M. Littre says, 'Bah!' to the partisans of a
force or fluid, he says, 'Pooh!' 'If your spirits are spirits, why
do they let the world wag on in its old way, why do they confine
themselves to trivial effects?'

The spiritualist would probably answer that he did not understand
the nature and limits of spiritual powers.

To the friends of a force or faculty in our nature, M. Littre
remarks, in effect, 'Why don't you _use_ your force? why don't you
supply a new motor for locomotives? _Pooh_!' The answer would be
that it was not the volume and market value of the force, but the
_existence_ of the force, which interested the inquirer. When
amber, being rubbed, attracted straws, the force was as much a
force, as worthy of scientific study, as when electricity is
employed to bring bad news more rapidly from the ends of the ear