that lead to it, so I
should say that I had been long sufficiently familiar with all
experiments that appertain to the Marvelous. I had witnessed many very
extraordinary phenomena in various parts of the world--phenomena that
would be either totally disbelieved if I stated them, or ascribed to
supernatural agencies. Now, my theory is that the Supernatural is the
Impossible, and that what is called supernatural is only a something in
the laws of nature of which we have been hitherto ignorant. Therefore,
if a ghost rise before me, I have not the right to say, "So, then, the
supernatural is possible," but rather, "So, then, the apparition of a
ghost is, contrary to received opinion, within the laws of
nature--_i.e._, not supernatural."

Now, in all that I had hitherto witnessed, and indeed in all the wonders
which the amateurs of mystery in our age record as facts, a material
living agency is always required. On the continent you will find still
magicians who assert that they can raise spirits. Assume for the moment
that they assert truly, still the living material form of the magician
is present; and he is the material agency by which, from some
constitutional peculiarities, certain strange phenomena are represented
to your natural senses.

Accept, again, as truthful, the tales of spirit Manifestation in
America--musical or other sounds--writings on paper, produced by no
discernible hand--articles of furniture moved without apparent human
agency--or the actual sight and touch of hands, to which no bodies seem
to belong--still there must be found the MEDIUM or living being, with
constitutional peculiarities capable of obtaining these signs. In fine,
in all such marvels, supposing even that there is no imposture, there
must be a human being like ourselves by whom, or through whom, the
effects presented to human beings are produced. It is so with the now
familiar phenomena of mesmerism or electro-biology; the mind of the
person operated on is affected through a material living agent. Nor,
supposing it true that a mesmerized patient can respond to the will or
passes of a mesmerizer a hundred miles distant, is the response less
occasioned by a material fluid--call it Electric, call it Odic, call it
what you will--which has the power of traversing space and passing
obstacles, that the material effect is communicated from one to the
other. Hence all that I had hitherto witnessed, or expected to witness,
in this strange house,