h the
matter in hand.

The theology of spirits, of course, is neither here nor there. A
'spirit' will say anything or everything. But Mr. C. C. Massey when
he saw a chair move at a word (and even without one), in the
presence of such a double-dyed impostor as Slade, had as much right
to believe his own eyes as M. de Gasparin, and what he saw does not
square with M. de Gasparin's private 'Trewth'. The chair in Mr.
Massey's experience, was 'unattached' to a piece of string; it fell,
and, at request, jumped up again, and approached Mr. Massey, 'just
as if some one had picked it up in order to take a seat beside me'.
{319a}

Such were the idola specus, the private personal prepossessions of
M. de Gasparin, undeniably an honourable man. Now, in 1877, his old
adversary, Dr. Carpenter, C.B., M.D., LL.D, F.R.S., F.G.S.,
V.P.L.S., corresponding member of the Institute of France, tout ce
qu'il y a de plus officiel, de plus decore, returned to the charge.
He published a work on Mesmerism, Spiritualism, etc. {319b} Perhaps
the unscientific reader supposes that Dr. Carpenter replied to the
arguments of M. de Gasparin? This would have been sportsmanlike,
but no, Dr. Carpenter firmly ignored them! He devoted three pages
to table-turning (pp. 96, 97, 98). He exhibited Mr. Faraday's
little machine for detecting muscular pressure, a machine which
would also detect pressure which is _not_ muscular. He explained
answers given by tilts, answers not consciously known to the
operators, as the results of unconscious cerebration. People may
thus get answers which they do expect, or answers which they do not
expect, as may happen. But not one word did Dr. Carpenter say to a
popular audience at the London Institution about M. de Gasparin's
assertion, and the assertion of M. de Gasparin's witnesses, that
motion had been observed without any contact at all. He might, if
he pleased, have alleged that M. de Gasparin and the others fabled;
or that they were self-hypnotised, or were cheated, but he
absolutely ignored the evidence altogether. Now this behaviour, if
scientific, was hardly quite _sportsmanlike_, to use a simple
British phrase which does credit to our language and national
character. Mr. Alfred Wallace stated a similar conclusion as to Dr.
Carpenter's method of argument, in language of some strength. 'Dr.
Carpenter,' he said, 'habitually gives only one side of the
question, and completely ignores all facts which tell aga