Man is a spirit; a collection of spontaneous cases of dream, vision and ecstasy

Preface

FACTS differ in importance, but it is a fundamental article of the faith of science that all facts are important in some degree. The import of some of them may not be clear at first, but continued collection brings about the possibility of valuable inferences. An orbit cannot be computed from one or two points given ; many are necessary. Similarly a number of facts — the more the better — may be required before we see their meaning. But there is a meaning, and it is worth our while to amass details patiently. This is the modern spirit — to inquire of Nature instead of building philosophic wordstructures into the blue. Observation and record are the watchwords. "A large acquaintance with particulars often makes us wiser than the possession of abstract formulas, however deep," says William James in the preface to his "Varieties of Religious Experience.' , And "particulars" may be either subjective or objective. A dream is as much of a "fact" as a bomb is. It vi PREFACE

is a psychological fact; the other is a physical fact. Collection of psychological facts is a late development in science, and we have not got far yet, particularly as regards facts of "psychical research" kind. But they will turn out important, if we study them carefully.

The present volume, in the selection of its facts, may seem to start out from an assumption : namely, that human personality is more than a collection of material particles, or, crudely and popularly put, that there is a spirit in man. But it is not an assumption. It is an inference, cautiously made after years of observation, from another range of facts, some of which are described in an earlier volume called "Psychical Investigations." This present book, therefore, does not stand alone, even as regards its author. And its general tendency is supported by a huge mass of literature, of which the Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research furnish the best illustration from the scientific viewpoint. The Society, of course, has no creed. It exists for investigation. But in the opinion of most investigators its results are strongly suggestive of the scheme presented by F. W. H. Myers in his great work, "Human Personality and its

PREFACE vii

Survival of Bodily Death"; and that scheme my own researches have led me to accept.

It is difficult to give in few words any idea of such a large subject, but the following may help.

Telepathy, or transference of ideas from mind to mind through channels other than the known sensory ones, suggests but does not prove superphysical action.

Clairvoyance, automatic writing, and trance speech often produce true matter unknown to the sensitive and sometimes unknown to anyone present. The supposition of telepathy from distant people, who do not know and are not known to the sensitive, is a reasonable guess in default of anything better, but it does not seem likely and in some cases it is unacceptable. And a few cases are on record — one in the following pages — of information being given which was possessed by no living mind, but which was possessed by the person purporting to communicate. Swedenborg describes an experience of this kind, which was taken seriously even by the sceptical Kant.

Apparitions are sometimes seen by sane and healthy people, at or after the time of death of a person not known to be ill or in danger. Volviii PREFACE

ume X. of the Proceedings of the S.P.R. contains the result of many years' investigation of this phase, and the "chance" explanation is mathematically ruled out.

Many curious physical phenomena, such as movement of objects without contact, occur without the conscious will of those present, and information is given, sometimes going beyond the knowledge of the sitters.

Other phenomena occur or are alleged to occur. The scientific study of them has only just begun, and no certainty is yet attainable regarding some of them. Suspense of judgment is in many cases the correct attitude, but the result of an individual's experience may be sufficient to justify his acceptance of the spiritist explanation at least as a working hypothesis. As for me, I am always ready to change, if a more reasonable explanation can be given.

J. A. H.

Bradford.

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I What Constitutes Evidence? . 13

II Dreams 21

Chapter I What Constitutes Evidence?

IN the autumn of 1915, when the casualty lists were terribly lengthening, the Editor of the International Psychic Gazette asked a number of eminent men to send, if possible, "messages of comfort to the bereaved" for publication. Many helpful replies were received from men who, on one ground or another, believed in the survival of personality past death ; but the most striking, to me, was the response of Mr. Edward Clodd. He said: "As the evidence that we possess seems to me conclusive against survival after death, I can say nothing on the lines which you suggest." (October issue of the Gazette, p. 6.) We can hardly doubt that it must give pain to anyone to make a statement like that, for it would strike a chill to the heart of any mourner; and it is permissible to suppose that Mr. Clodd regretted his negative convictions. I wish to suggest that it is not necessary to hold them; that they are the result, not of evidence against, but of non-acquaintance with evidence for, or of materialistic prejudice. Hume said that miracles were contrary to experience; but he meant only that they were contrary to his own and that of those whose testimony he believed; which proves nothing, for there are others.

The evidence, we are told, seems conclusive against survival. The obvious question at once arises: "What evidence?" Mr. Clodd gives none. And indeed for a very good reason; namely, that there is none to give. There can be no evidence that there is no such thing as a white crow; even if there is no record of anybody seeing one, this furnishes ground for a provisional judgment only, for at any moment a white crow may turn up. And in the matter of survival, there are a few millions of people in the world who have seen their white crow. Mrs. Piper was Professor James's. * One piece of positive

^'The Will to Believe," p. 319; Proceedings, S.P.R., vol. xxiii., pp. 35-6, 106, 120-1. Cf. "Memories and Studies," pp. 188, 198, 200.

WHAT CONSTITUTES EVIDENCE? 15

evidence shatters a negative presumption. One white crow disproves the proposition that all crows are black. One piece of spiritualistic evidence suffices at least to throw doubt on the negative presumption against survival. This presumption is based on ignorance or prejudice, not on knowledge ; as with a cleric known to me who "could see no evidence for evolution. ,, He did not want to see it. The ostrich was supposed to persuade itself that it had no pursuers byhiding its head in the sand. The existence of white crows can be disposed of if we decline to look at them. Spiritistic evidence can be ignored, as indeed it generally is. "It is magnificent, but it is not war," said the French General, watching the charge at Balaclava: the audacity of ignoring psychical evidence is similarly magnificent, but it is not science. It is not even fair-minded common sense. We cheerfully admit that it is possible to advance several different and more or less reasonable hypotheses in explanation of the phenomena, without invoking spirits ; but the existence and significance of these phenomena can hardly be ignored much longer. There is room for differing interpretations, but it will soon have to be recognized that there is something there to be interpreted. The negative dogmatizer is approaching extinction. Mr. Clodd belongs with von Helmholtz, whose words we now read with amusement. He once said to Sir William Barrett that ' 'neither the testimony of all the Fellows of the Royal Society nor the evidence of his own senses would lead him to believe even in thought-transference, as it was impossible." * The experts were once equally sure that it was impossible for trains to run at the appalling speed of thirty miles an hour. And I am pretty sure that my grandfather would never have believed in wireless telegraphy.

But, putting aside mere ignorant prejudice, we may well ask why psychical evidence, though now obtaining serious recognition, is still looked on with some distrust and doubt; and I thinkthere is a reasonable explanation and a reasonable cause of this. A large amount of evidence, particularly in recent publications, has been obtained through mediums, sometimes paid ones; and there is a natural tendency to regard such people as rogues until they are proved honest,

a Sir W. F. Barrett: "On the Threshold of a New World of Thought," p. 17.

WHAT CONSTITUTES EVIDENCE? 17

and even afterwards. I sympathize with this, though it is mistaken in its over-cautiousness. Palmists and fortune-tellers are mostly or entirely frauds; but such people are not mediums. Of this latter class I believe the majority to be perfectly honest, though there is much self-delusion and erratic faculty. But it is certainly very desirable that evidence of this character should be supplemented by other evidence which is above all suspicion of dishonesty. Of course many of us are acquainted with private sensitives or mediums through whom is often obtained evidence even stronger than the best given by professionals; but it is usually private matter, and the sensitive, moreover, is under no obligation to take the world into his or her confidence. Mr. Clodd's ignorance of the existence of such persons is shown in a letter of his, dated December 31, 1916, to the Yorkshire Post: "I am tempted to ask whether communications from the departed are to be had only by payments to professional mediums." Evidently he doesn't know, and the tone of the letter suggests that he considers his question a knock-out — which is rather amusing to those who do know. It is unfortunate that Mr. Clodd, by the vigorous "rationalist" writings which so plainly show his prejudice, should close up the channels through which information might come to him. People naturally will not tell him things which they know would be received with derision instead of scientific and open-minded consideration.

But apart from private mediums who get communications more or less regularly, there are many individuals who enjoy evidential but only occasional enlargements of perceptivity. From time to time during the last twelve years I have received from such persons accounts of spontaneous psychical experiences of many kinds, from dreams which only just touch the fringe of the supernormal up to full-blown apparitions seen by several people. Further, I have had the opportunity of studying other accounts of a similar kind which have been sent to friends of mine. In particular I have to thank Sir Oliver Lodge for his kind permission to use material which has been sent to him. I need hardly say that in all cases I have received the senders' permission to print, but all names and places are disguised, lest the narrators' reputation for sanity should suffer; for it is extremely unwise, if we regard the opinion of the man in the street

WHAT CONSTITUTES EVIDENCE? 19

at all — and few of us can afford to disregard it entirely, — to let it be known that we have experienced anything approaching a hallucination. These accounts do not come up to what I conceive to be the evidential standard of the Society for Psychical Research, or I should have sent them there. But, though falling below the standard which the S.P.R. rightly keeps high, these cases seem to me good enough to print. In many of them the weakness of the evidence is due to accident or an unfortunate set of circumstances, as when important corroborative testimony is obtainable only from someone who is hostile to the subject and will not testify, or is away at the war and cannot be got at, or who has died. But a continued correspondence or, better, personal interviews which in some cases I have had, is often enough to give almost as much confidence in the narrator's reliability as would corroborative testimony by another person; and I have included no case without having been convinced by either such correspondence or interviews that the narrator is a person of sanity and integrity, whose word we should accept without hesitation in more ordinary matters. I do not expect readers to attach as much importance to the narra-

2o MAN IS A SPIRIT

tives as I do, for I cannot give all the data which go to make up my estimate in each case; I can only hope that they will be read with a sort of provisional acceptance of them as perhaps at least partly true.

Before or after each case I indicate my own attitude to the various possible explanations of it, but this is only tentative, and readers may skip my comments if they wish.

Chapter II

IT may be urged, quite legitimately, that some of these dream-coincidences now to be related may happen by accident. Out of the immense number of our dreams it is to be expected that some of them will represent some real fact not normally known to the dreamer, without any supernormal agency being concerned. The dreams which miss — it may be contended — are forgotten; those that hit are remembered, and consequently count for more than they ought. The point is obvious, and in various ways its logic has been recognized from antiquity. Cicero quotes, for instance, the remark of Diagoras the Atheist, when shown the votive tablets in the temple of Samothrace, placed there by those shipwrecked mariners who had been saved from drowning. He was bidden to note how many had been saved by the power of the gods. "Yea,"

said he, "but where are those commemorated who were drowned?" Like dreams which miss, there is no record of them.

But, even after giving due weight to this objection, all careful investigators are agreed that a chance explanation of all veridical (truth-telling) dreams is quite unacceptable. It sounds plausible in general, but it breaks down on examination. Most dreams are mere medleys, without any predicative or supernormal claim. Often they are absurd re-presentations of memory, as when Ben Jonson saw the Carthaginians and Romans fighting for a whole night on his great toe — a restricted battle-ground, Jonson's great size notwithstanding. We may ignore this kind, devoting our attention to those dreams that definitely state a fact not normally known or believed. And there is often a peculiarly vivid quality about supernormal dreams, differentiating them sharply from the vague romancings which are the ordinary product of our sleep mentation; a vividness and reality which lead the dreamer to write down an account, or to tell someone about the experience, before any verification comes. This feeling of reality often gives complete certitude that the dream has brought truth and that it is a unique or almost unique experience; for few people have many of them in a whole lifetime. This instinctive differentiation between the true and the "ordinary' ' dream seems akin to the instinctive power, which a genuine clairvoyant usually has, of distinguishing between the work of his own imagination and messages really coming supernormally. And whether the verdical dreams are few in any one person's experience or are fairly frequent, as with the percipient whose account I quote first, it is a fact that in many cases the correspondence between the dream details and the actual facts is too close to be reasonably attributable to chance. But it is very important, in view of the untrustworthiness of memory, that people who have these experiences should record them and place the record in some other hands before verification. It is mainly through lack of this precaution that my cases are not up to the evidential standard of the Society for Psychical Research, and have, therefore (as I have said), to be presented in my own more irresponsible pages.

"I venture to offer you a brief account of several psychic or telepathic experiences, one of my father, and the others of my own.

"I have frequent premonitions in dreams, but these which I relate are the most striking. I am a healthy, normal woman, of cheerful disposition, and have never dabbled in things psychic, but feel that if I once relinquished self-control I would be quite carried away.

"My father was a North of Ireland man of Scottish ancestry, totally devoid of superstition, and a rock of common sense. He was in charge of a large police district in Central Queensland many years ago, when he was thrown from his horse and received serious internal injuries. From these he made a partial recovery and was granted a lengthy term of leave of absence. He was strongly advised to go to Sydney and consult a famous doctor there. This, however, was not an easy matter for him to undertake, as in his weak state he could not travel alone, and my mother had five tiny children, one only a few weeks old, so could not accompany him.

"He was very worried, trying to plan for the best, and also for financial reasons. One night he woke my mother and told her that he had just seen his father, who had been dead for twenty years, and that he had said: 'Don't go to Sydney, George, for you will be dead before November.' This was early in July, and he died on September 8th following. My grandfather had been a medical student, but gave up his studies and entered the Army.

II

"I was once staying at the seaside and occupied the same bed as a girl friend on New Year's Eve. She woke me to ask why I was crying so bitterly. I told her that I dreamt I saw my brother Charles lying senseless on a rough bush track and a dead horse lying near him. Later she again woke me to ask the same question. I then told her that I dreamt I had received a newspaper by post and that my former dream appeared in it in a conspicuous paragraph, and that, on looking at the date of the paper, I found it was a month old.

"Next day my brother George came to see me, and on relating the experiences of the previous night he warned me to say nothing about it to my mother. After returning home I received a letter from Charles telling me that, just a month ago, on New Year's Eve, he had a bad accident. He and a friend were spending the Christmas holidays on a cattle station when their horses got out of the stockyard and got away with some wild horses up a mountain. In galloping after them his horse fell and broke its neck, and he was found insensible, just at the time I dreamt it, and exactly the same length of time elasped before I was told of it as occurred in the dream.

Ill

"On another occasion I dreamt that an old friend who was in England with her husband would return a widow. This was verified within twelve months.

IV

"A very old friend, one hundred miles away, had an apoplectic seizure. We were all deeply attached to the old gentleman, and just at dusk I became very restless and anxious to know his condition. Sitting quietly in the gloom and thinking deeply of him, I felt everything seem to slip away from me. Presently the stars at which I was gazing became blotted out by a thin mist which rapidly became thicker and darker and began to take a rough human form. I came suddenly to myself with a feeling of terror and rushed into the house. Soon after came word that he had passed away."

We cannot lay much stress on the premonitory dream regarding Mrs. Elsworth's father's death, for various reasons. One is that a dream of that kind may act as a suggestion and may bring about its own fulfilment, if the person accepts it. Another reason is that our subconsciousness almost certainly knows more about the state of our health than our normal consciousness does, and consequently a premonitory dream of death may be due to subconscious inference from the known state of an organ. But, this notwithstanding, the form of the dream is rather significant. It was the dreamer's deceased father who gave the warning. Now I have had a good deal of evidence — of which some is given in my book "Psychical Investigations" — to show that relatives and friends come to meet dying people; and the form of this dream, therefore, fits in with what I have learnt by other methods. Consequently, while not regarding the dream as evidentially strong, its internal structure disposes me to look favourably on the face-value explanation.

In dream number two the brother seems to have informed his sister of his accident telepathically. He was insensible at the time, and there is reason to believe that such a state favours the production of telepathic phenomena, the spirit being partly liberated. And his sister, being asleep, was in a state specially good for reception. The predictive element introduces a more difficult question regarding the metaphysics of Time; but perhaps this part was just an accidental shot of the dreamer's subconsciousness, as dream number three may have been. The fourth experience, which cannot with certainty be called a dream, seems to have been an incipient phantasm of the dead, the freed spirit manifesting its presence to his friend.

Returning to the meeting idea, friends and relatives not only meet, but also stay with their loved ones a while after the crossing, helping to nurse them into consciousness on the higher plane; for there is reason to believe that we are born into the other life in a rather helpless state, somewhat as we are born into this; or that, at any rate, we need more or less attention, though usually only for a short time. My next case illustrates this idea. The father saw his daughter's grief, found the man who had been killed — had perhaps been with him from death — and could link them up again in his daughter's sleep when her spirit was partially free from the prison of the body.

" I lost a very dear friend at Neuve Chapelle. In my great distress I prayed that I might see where he was; and that night I dreamed that I saw him, in a kind of hospital, looking very ill and tired, like one recovering from an illness. But what to me is the strange thing is that my father, who died nine years ago, was with me and took me into this room to see my friend. Now I had not been thinking of my father at all. I was entirely absorbed in the great grief I felt on learning that my best friend had been killed. Do you think all this was just an ordinary dream? It seems far more to me."

Kathleen Connor.

The next case is long and curiously sequent. It was published in the Occult Review for February, 1917, and I have to thank the editor and publishers for permission to reprint. Mrs. Guthrie is a lady of position and education, and I regard her testimony as good and credible in any ordinary matter. Her psychic sensitiveness seems to have now nearly gone, for she has had no more experiences of the kind.

4 'In February, 1914, 1 became acquainted with a Captain Stuart, an Army man who had been through the Boer War. We saw little of each other, but each felt almost at once a strong sense of kinship and friendliness. As a matter of fact — though this may not be the cause — there is a very slight relationship, through a common ancestor several generations back. In July, 1914, before I had any idea of the European war-cloud which was soon to burst, I was presiding at a tea in camp, not far from my home. It was a bright, sunny day, and everybody was in high spirits except myself. I found myself inexplicably depressed. The thought, 'Oh, the pity of it, the pity of it!' filled my mind without any reason. Captain Stuart was there, but I did not specially associate my feelings with him or anyone else. I went home to bed and wept miserably without knowing why.

"In July, 1915, Captain Stuart's battalion sailed for Gallipoli. We corresponded regularly, and I sent him parcels. I felt no special apprehension. On the night of December 9th, 1915, I went to bed at 10 p.m., but could not sleep for some time. When I did, I had a horrid dream of muddy water and awoke in great discomfort and uneasiness. The room was in absolute darkness, the blinds down, and heavy curtains across the window. But presently I was surprised to see a big, bright light on the wall opposite my bed and moving very rapidly. It then disappeared, reappearing on the next wall, then on the wardrobe by my bed. I was frightened, and screamed for my friend next door. She was in almost instantly, white and trembling, and saying, 'The Light! the Light! What is it?' For she had seen the same light in her room also, on the door of communication. The blinds were down, and heavy curtains drawn, in both rooms; moreover, we were on the third floor, and no explanation by a light outside was possible. We spent the remainder of the night together.

"Four days later, on December 13th, came the news that Captain Stuart was wounded, but no details. And, since he was on the Staff, we hoped it was nothing serious. The absence of 'dangerously' or 'seriously' was reassuring.

"That night, Monday, December 13th, 1915, I dreamt that Captain Stuart was standing by my bedside. I saw him as plainly as I see the writing I am doing at this moment. His uniform looked very worn, and he had grey hairs in the black. His face looked wan, worried, harassed, troubled, lined, and he was very thin in the body, and his uniform was splashed. One hand was on my counterpane, the other was pointing to Heaven, and he was singing 'Jesus, Lover of my Soul.' Then I awoke. When my maid came in, the first thing in the morning, I said I felt sure that Captain Stuart had gone West, and told her my dream. The letters came in, and there was one from a relative of his saying that a wire had been received from the War Office announcing his death. He had been wounded on December 6th and died on December 9th. I went over to see the relative, and mentioned my dream and the hymn, asking if it was a favourite of his. She said she had never heard so.

"About a month after — during which time I constantly saw the light, only now always there was a second light close behind it — this relative wired for me over, and I went. On going into the room she greeted me with unusual gravity, saying immediately afterwards: 'What was the hymn you say Colin sang that night you saw him?' ' Jesus, Lover of my Soul,' I replied. She then gave me a letter which had arrived that morning from one of the senior Staff officers giving the details. Captain Stuart was rendered unconscious by a shell-wound on December 6th, and died at 2 a.m., December 9th, without recovering consciousness. He was buried, wrapped in the Union Jack, at 4.45 a.m., with full military honours; and the hymn sung was 'Jesus, Lover of my Soul.'

"I had never discussed religion or hymns with him. And I had never dreamt of him before.

"Some time afterwards I either had a dream or a vision — I don't know which — of my friend standing by my bedside. One hand had hold of one of my wrists, and he was urging me to go with him. He was in khaki, but it looked brighter and more cared for. I gave a cry, and woke or came to, to hear someone moving round the room to the door, which I distinctly heard open; footsteps (a man's, with jack boots and spurs clanking) going downstairs; the front door open and shut; and the clock struck five.

"Very early the next morning my friend came into my room very upset, and asked me if I had seen the light. I said 'No'; and she said that something had wakened her, and she had seen a large light on the communication door between our rooms, though the room was in pitch darkness; then it moved along the wall towards the door; as it did so she heard something moving in my room, then heard my door open, footsteps as of a man in jack boots with spurs clanking downstairs, the front door open and shut; and the clock struck five.

"A few weeks later I was at my mother's, where Captain Stuart had never been. My maid slept with me. She had never seen Captain Stuart. On the third night, January 7th, 1916, I dreamt that he had come into my room and was bending over me with a smile and looking awfully well; and he seemed to want me to go with him. Then a shriek woke me or brought me to, and I heard my maid crying: 'The man, the man! No, no; you must not goP It took me a long time to pacify her. She then told me that she had been awakened by hearing the door open, and, to her astonishment, in came a man in khaki. The extraordinary thing is that though the room was in absolute darkness she saw everything quite as plainly as if it had been broad daylight. The man, who she saw was an officer, eame to her side of the bed and looked down at her. She stared up at him, too astonished to be frightened just then. When he saw her he looked angry and turned on his heel to go round to my side of the bed, and she saw that when he leant over me a change came over his face, the angry look giving place to a smile. She thinks I then said, 'Coming!' Then she suddenly realized that there was something strange, and screamed (and she did scream) . Then I woke or came to. Some days afterwards I showed her a photo of Captain Stuart. She recognized it without hesitation as being the man she had seen that night.