,scanned by ,dianne ,bean of ,phoenix1 ,arizona4 ,,the ,,unknown ,,guest ,,by ,,maurice ,,maeterlinck ,translated by ,alexander ,teixeira de ,mattos ,,introduction #a ,my ,essay on ,death#a led me to make a conscientious enquiry into the present position of the great mystery1 an enquiry which ,i have endeavoured to render as complete as possible4 ,i had hoped that a single volume would be able to contain the result of these investigations1 which1 ,i may say at once1 will teach nothing to those who have been over the same ground and which have nothing to recommend them except their sincerity1 their impartiality and a certain scrupulous accuracy4 ,but1 as ,i proceeded1 ,i saw the field widening under my feet1 so much so that ,i have been obliged to divide my work into two almost equal parts4 ,the first is now published and is a brief study of veridical apparitions and hallucinations and haunted houses1 or1 if you will1 the phantasms of the living and the dead2 of those manifestations which have been oddly and not very appropriately described as psychometric2 of the knowledge of the future3 presentiments1 omens1 premonitions1 precognitions and the rest2 and lastly of the ,elberfeld horses4 ,in the second1 which will be published later1 ,i shall treat of the miracles of ,lourdes and other places1 the phenomena of so called materialization1 of the divining-rod and of fluidic asepsis1 not unmindful withal of a diamond dust of the miraculous that hangs over the greater marvels in that strange atmosphere into which we are about to pass4 #a ,published in ,english1 in an enlarged form1 under the title of ,our ,eternity 7,london and ,new ,york1 #aiac7--,translator's ,note4 #b ,when ,i speak of the present position of the mystery1 ,i of course do not mean the mystery of life1 its end and its beginnings1 nor yet the great riddle of the universe which lies about us4 ,in this sense1 all is mystery1 and1 as ,i have said elsewhere1 is likely always to remain so2 nor is it probable that we shall ever touch any point of even the utmost borders of knowledge or certainty4 ,it is here a question of that which1 in the midst of this recognized and usual mystery1 the familiar mystery of which we are almost oblivious1 suddenly disturbs the regular course of our general ignorance4 ,in themselves1 these facts which strike us as supernatural are no more so than the others2 possibly they are rarer1 or1 to be more accurate1 less frequently or less easily observed4 ,in any case1 their deep-seated cause1 while being probably neither more remote nor more difficult access1 seem to lie hidden in an unknown region less often visited by our science1 which after all is but a reassuring and conciliatory espression of our ignorance4 ,today1 thanks to the labours of the ,society for ,psychical ,research and a host of other seekers1 we are able to approach these phenomena as a whole with a certain confidence4 ,leaving the realm of legend1 of after-dinner stories1 old wives' tales1 illusions and exaggerations1 we find ourselves at last on circumscribed but fairly safe ground4 ,this does not mean that there are no other supernatural phenomena besides those collected in the publications of the society in question and in a few of the more weighty reviews which have adopted the same methods4 ,notwithstanding all their diligence1 which for over thirty years has been ransacking the obscure corners of our planet1 it is inevitable that a good many things escape their notice1 besides which the rigour of their investigations makes them reject three fourths of those which are brought before them4 ,but we may say that the twenty-six volumes of the society is ,proceedings and the fifteen or sixteen volumes of its ,journal1 together with the twenty-three annuals of the ,annales des ,sciences ,psychiques1 to mention only this one periodical of signal excellence1 embrace for the moment the whole field of the extraordinary and offer some instances of all the abnormal manifestations of the inexplicable4 ,we are henceforth able to classify them1 to divide and subdivide them into general1 species and varieties4 ,this is not much1 you may say2 but it is thus that every science begins and furthermore that many a one ends4 ,we have therefore sufficient evidence1 facts that can scarcely be disputed1 to enable us to consult them profitably1 to recognize whither they lead1 to form some idea of their general character and perhaps to trace their sole source by gradually removing the weeds and rubbish which for so many hundreds and thousands of years have hidden it from our eyes4 #c ,truth to tell1 these supernatural manifestations seem less marvelous and less fantastic than they did some centuries ago2 and we are at first a little disappointed4 ,one would think that even the mysterious has its ups and downs and remains subject to the caprices of some strange extra mundane fashion2 or perhaps1 to be more exact1 it is evident that the majority of those legendary miracles could not withstand the rigorous scrutiny of our day4 ,those which emerge triumphant from the test and defy our less credulous and more penetrating vision are all the more worthy of holding our attention4 ,they are not the last survivals of the riddle1 for this continues to exist in its entirety and grows greater in proportion as we throw light upon it2 but we can perhaps see in them the supreme or else the first efforts of a force which does not appear to reside wholly in our sphere4 ,they suggest blows struck from without by an ,unknown even more unknown than that which we think we know1 an ,unknown which is not that of the universe1 not that which we have gradually made into an inoffensive and amiable ,unknown1 even as we have made the universe a son of province of the earth1 but a stranger arriving from another world1 an unexpected visitor who comes in a rather sinister way to trouble the comfortable quiet in which we were slumbering1 rocked by the firm and watchful hand of orthodox science4 #d ,let us first be content to enumerate them4 ,we shall find that we have table-turning1 with its raps2 the movements and transportations of inanimate objects without contact2 luminous phenomena2 lucidite1 or clairvoyance2 veridical apparitions or hallucinations2 haunted houses2 bilocations and so forth2 communications with the dead2 the divining-rod2 the miraculous cures of ,lourdes and elsewhere2 fluidic asepsis2 and lastly the famous thinking animals of ,elberfeld and ,mannheim4 ,these1 if ,i be not mistaken1 after eliminating all that is in1 sufficiently attested1 constitute the residue or caput mortuum of this latter-day miracle4 ,everybody has heard of table-turning1 which may be called the ,a ,b ,c of occult science4 ,it is so common and so easily produced that the ,society for ,psychical ,research has not thought it necessary to devote special attention to the subject4 ,i need hardly add that we must take count only of movements or raps obtained without the hands touching the table1 so as to remove every possibility of fraud or unconscious complicity4 ,to obtain these movements it is enough1 but it is also indispensable that those who form the chain should include a person endowed with mediumistic faculties4 ,i repeat1 the experiment is within the reach of any one who cares to try it under the requisite conditions2 and it is as incontestable as the polarization of light or as crystallization by means of electric currents4 ,in the same group may be placed the movement and transportation of objects without contact1 the touches of spirit hands1 the luminous phenomena and materialization4 ,like table-turning1 they demand the presence of a medium4 ,i need not observe that we here find ourselves in the happy hunting-ground of the impostor and that even the most powerful mediums1 those possessing the most genuine and undeniable gifts1 such as the celebrated ,eusapia ,paladino1 are upon occasion--and the occasion occurs but too often--incorrigible cheats4 ,but1 when we have made every allowance for fraud1 there nevertheless remains a considerable number of incidents so rigorously attested that we most needs accept them or else abandon all human certainty4 ,the case is not quite the same with levitation and the wonders performed1 so travelers tell us1 by certain ,indian jugglers4 ,though the prolonged burial of a living being is very nearly proved and can doubtless be physiologically explained1 there are many other tricks on which we have so far no authoritative pronouncement4 ,i will not speak of the mango-tree and the basket-trick1 which are mere conjuring2 but the fire-walk and the famous rope-climbing trick remain more of a mystery4 ,the fire-walk1 or walk on red-hot bricks or glowing coals1 is a sort of religious ceremony practiced in the ,indies1 in some of the ,polynesian islands1 in ,mauritius and elsewhere4 ,as the result of incantations uttered by the high priest1 the bare feet of the faithful who follow him upon the bed of burning pebbles or brands seem to become almost insensible to the touch of fire4 ,travelers are anything but agreed whether the heat of the surface traversed is really intolerable1 whether the extraordinary power of endurance is explained by the thickness of the horny substance which protects the soles of the natives' feet1 whether the feet are burnt or whether the skin remains untouched2 and1 under present conditions1 the question is too uncertain to make it worth while to linger over it4 ,rope-climbing is more extraordinary4 ,the juggler takes his stand in an open space1 far from any tree or house4 ,he is accompanied by a child2 and his only impedimenta are a bundle of ropes and an old canvas sack4 ,the juggler throws one end of the rope up in the air2 and the rope1 as though drawn by an invisible hook1 uncoils and rises straight into the sky until the end disappears2 and1 soon after1 there come tumbling from the blue two arms1 two legs1 a head and so on1 all of which the wizard picks up and crams into the sack4 ,he next utters a few magic words over it and opens it2 and the child steps out1 bowing and smiling to the spectators4 ,this is the usual form taken by this particular sorcery4 ,it is pretty rare and seems to be practised only by one sect which originated in the ,north-,west ,provinces4 ,it has not yet perhaps been sufficiently investigated to take its place among the evidence mentioned show4 ,if it were really as ,i have described1 it could hardly be explained save by some strange hallucinatory power emanating from the juggler or illusionist1 who influences the audience by suggestion and makes it see what he wishes4 ,in that case the suggestion or hallucination covers a very extensive area4 ,in point of fact1 onlookers1 ,europeans1 on the balconies of houses at some distance from the crowd of natives1 have been known to experience the same influence4 ,this would be one of the most curious manifestations of that unknown guest of which we shall speak again later when1 after enumerating its acts and deeds1 we try to investigate and note down the eccentricities of its character4 ,levitation in the proper sense of the word1 that is to say1 the raising1 without contact1 and floating of an inanimate object or even of a person1 might possibly be due to the same hallucinatory power2 but hitherto the instances have not been sufficiently numerous or authentic to allow us to draw any conclusions4 ,also we shall meet with it again when we come to the chapter treating of the materializations of which it forms part4 ,,the ,,unknown ,,guest ,,chapter ,i4 ,,phantasms ,,of ,,the ,,living ,,and ,,the ,,dead #a ,this brings us without any break to the consideration of veridical apparitions and hallucinations and finally to haunted houses4 ,we all know that the phantasms of the living and the dead have now a whole literature of their own1 a literature which owes its birth to the numerous and conscientious enquiries conducted in ,england1 ,france1 ,belgium and the ,united ,states at the instance of the ,society for ,psychical ,research4 ,in the presence of the mass of evidence collected1 it would be absurd to persist in denying the reality of the phenomena themselves4 ,it is by this time incontestable that a violent or deep emotion can be transmitted instantaneously from one mind to another1 however great the distance that separates the mind experiencing the emotion from the mind receiving the communication4 ,it is most often manifested by a visual hallucination1 more rarely by an auditory hallucination2 and1 as the most violent emotion which man can undergo is that which grips and overwhelms him at the approach or at the very moment of death1 it is nearly always this supreme emotion which he sends forth and directs with incredible precision through space1 if necessary across seas and continents1 towards an invisible and moving goal4 ,again1 though this occurs less frequently1 a grave danger1 a serious crisis can beget and transmit to a distance a similar hallucination4 ,this is what the ,s4 ,p4 ,r4 calls phantasms of the living4 ,when the hallucination takes place some time after the decease of the person whom it seems to evoke1 be the interval long or short1 it is classed among the phantasms of the dead4 ,the latter1 the so-called phantasms of the dead1 are the rarest4 ,as ,f4 ,w4 ,h4 ,myers pointed out in his ,human ,personality1 a consideration of the proportionate number of apparitions observed at various periods before and after death shows that they increase very rapidly for the few hours which precede death and decrease gradually during the hours and days which follow2 while after about a year's time they become extremely rare and exceptional4 ,however exceptional they may be1 these apparitions nevertheless exist and are proved1 as far as anything can be proved1 by abundant testimony of a very precise character4 ,instances will be found in the ,proceedings1 notably in vol4 vi41 pp4 #ac-fe1 etc4 ,whether it be a case of the living1 the dying1 or the dead1 we are familiar with the usual form which these hallucinations take4 ,indeed their main outlines hardly ever vary4 ,some one1 in his bedroom1 in the street1 on a journey1 no matter where1 suddenly see plainly and clearly the phantom of a relation or a friend of whom he was not thinking at the time and whom he knows to be thousands of miles away1 in ,america1 ,asia or ,africa as the case may be1 for distance does not count4 ,as a rule1 the phantom says nothing2 its presence1 which is always brief1 is but a sort of silent warning4 ,sometimes it seems a prey to futile and trivial anxieties4 ,more rarely1 it speaks1 though saying but little after all4 ,more rarely still1 it reveals something that has happened1 a crime1 a hidden treasure of which no one else could know4 ,but we will return to these matters after completing this brief enumeration4 #b ,the phenomenon of haunted houses resembles that of the phantasms of the dead1 except that here the ghost clings to the residence1 the house1 the building and in no way to the persons who inhabit it4 ,by the second year of its existence1 that is to say1 #ahhd1 the ,committee on ,haunted ,houses of the ,s4 ,p4 ,r4 had selected and made an analysis of some sixty-five cases out of hundreds submitted to it1 twenty-eight of which rested upon first-hand and superior evidence4#a ,it is worthy of remark1 in the first place1 that these authentic narratives bear no relation whatever to the legendary and sensational ghost-stories that still linger in many ,english and ,american magazines1 especially in the ,christmas numbers4 ,they mention no winding-sheets1 coffins1 skeletons1 graveyards1 no sulphurous flames1 curses1 blood-curdling groans1 no clanking chains1 nor any of the time-honoured trappings that characterize this rather feeble literature of the supernatural4 ,on the contrary1 the scenes enacted in houses that appear to be really haunted are generally very simple and insignificant1 not to say dull and commonplace4 ,the ghosts are quite unpretentious and go to no expense in the matter of staging or costume4 ,they are clad as they were when1 sometimes many years ago1 they led their quiet1 unadventurous life within their own home4 ,we find in one case an old woman1 with a thin grey shawl meekly folded over her breast1 who bends at night over the sleeping occupants of her old home1 or who is frequently encountered in the hall or on the stairs1 silent1 mysterious1 a little grim4 ,or else it is the gentleman with a lacklustre eye and a figured dressing-gown who walks along a passage brilliantly illuminated with an inexplicable light4 ,or again we have another elderly lady1 dressed in black1 who is often found seated in the bay window of her drawing-room4 ,when spoken to1 she rises and seems on the point of replying1 but says nothing4 ,when pursued or met in a corner1 she eludes all contact and vanishes4 ,strings are fastened across the staircase with glue2 she passes and the strings remain as they were4 ,the ghost--and this happens in the majority of cases--is seen by all the people staying in the house3 relatives1 friends1 old servants and new4 ,can it be a matter of suggestion1 of collective hallucination8 ,at any rate1 strangers1 visitors who have had nothing said to them1 see it as the others do and ask1 innocently3 ,who is the lady in mourning whom ,i met in the dining-room8 #a ,proceedings1 vol4 i41 pp4 #aja-aae2 vol4 ii41 pp4 #acg-aea2 vol4 viii41 pp4 #caa1 #ccb1 etc4 ,if it is a case of collective suggestion1 we should have to admit that it is a subconscious suggestion emitted without the knowledge of the participants1 which indeed is quite possible4 ,though they belong to the same order1 ,i will not here mention the exploits of what the ,germans call the ,poltergeist1 which take the form of flinging stones1 ringing bells1 turning mattresses1 upsetting furniture and so forth4 ,these matters are always open to suspicion and really appear to be nothing but quaint frolics of hysterical subjects or of mediums indulging their sense of humour4 ,the manifestations of the ,poltergeist are fairly numerous and the reader will find several instances in the ,proceedings and especially in the ,journal of the ,s4 ,p4 ,r4 ,as for communications with the dead1 ,i devoted a whole chapter to these in my own essay entitled ,our ,eternity and will not return to them now4 ,it will be enough to recall and recapitulate my general impression1 that probably the dead did not enter into any of these conversations4 ,we are here concerned with purely mediumistic phenomena1 more curious and mere subtle than those of table-rapping1 but of the same character2 and these manifestations1 however astonishing they may be1 do not pierce the terrestrial sphere wherein we are imprisoned4 #c ,setting aside the religious hypotheses1 which we are not examining here1 for they belong to a different order of ideas1#a we find1 as an explanation of the ,majority of these phenomena1 or at least as a means of avoiding an absolute and depressing silence in regard to them1 two hypotheses which reach the unknown by more or less divergent paths1 to wit1 the spiritualistic hypothesis and the mediumistic hypothesis4 ,the spiritualists1 or rather the neospiritualists or scientific spiritualists1 who must not be confused with the somewhat over-credulous disciples of ,allan ,kardec1 maintain that the dead do not die entirely1 that their spiritual or animistic entity neither departs nor disperses into space after the dissolution of the body1 but continues an active though invisible existence around us4 ,the neospiritualistic theory1 however1 professes only very vague notions as to the life led by these discarnate spirits4 ,are they more intelligent than they were when they inhabited their flesh8 ,do they possess a wider understanding and mightier faculties than ours8 ,up to the present1 we have not the unimpeachable facts that would permit us to say so4 ,it would seem1 on the contrary1 if the discarnate spirits really continue to exist1 that their life is circumscribed1 frail1 precarious1 incoherent and1 above all1 not very long4 ,to this the objection is raised that it only appears so to our feeble eyes4 ,the dead among whom we move without knowing it struggle to make themselves understood1 to manifest themselves1 but dash themselves against the inpenetrable wall of our senses1 which1 created solely to perceive matter1 remain hopelessly ignorant of all the rest1 though this is doubtless the essential part of the universe4 ,that which will survive in us1 imprisoned in our body1 is absolutely inaccessible to that which survives in them4 ,the utmost that they can do is occasionally to cause a few glimmers of their existence to penetrate the fissures of those singular organisms known as mediums4 ,but these vagrant1 fleeting1 venturous1 stifled1 deformed glimmers can but give us a ludicrous idea of a life which has no longer anything in common with the life--purely animal for the most part- which we lead on this earth4 ,it is possible2 and there is something to be said for the theory4 ,it is at any rate remarkable that certain communications1 certain manifestations have shaken the scepticism of the coldest and most dispassionate men of science1 men utterly hostile to supernatural influences4 ,in order to some extent to understand their uneasiness and their astonishment1 we need only read--to quote but one instance among a thousand--a disquieting but unassailable article1 entitled1 ,dans les regions inexplorees de la biologic humaine4 ,observations et experiences sur ,eusapia ,paladino1 by ,professor ,bottazzi1 ,director of the ,physiological ,institute of the ,university of ,naples4#b ,seldom have experiments in the domain of mediums or spirits been conducted with more distrustful suspicion or with more implacable scientific strictness4 ,nevertheless1 scattered limbs1 pale1 diaphanous but capable hands1 suddenly appeared in the little physiological laboratory of ,naples ,university1 with its doors heavily padlocked and sealed1 as it were1 mathematically excluding any possibility of fraud2 these same hands worked apparatus specially intended to register their touches2 lastly1 the outline of something black1 of a head1 uprose between the curtains of the mediumistic cabinet1 remained visible for several seconds and did not retire until itself apparently frightened by the exclamations of surprise drawn from a group of scientists who1 after all1 were prepared for anything2 and ,professor ,bottazzi confesses that it was then that1 to quote his own words--measured words1 as beseems a votary of science1 but expressive--he felt a shiver all through his body4 #a ,on the same grounds1 we will also leave on one side the theosophical hypothesis1 which1 like the others1 begins by calling for an act of adherence1 of blind faith4 ,its explanations1 though often ingenious1 are no more than forcible but gratuitous asservations and1 as ,i said in ,our ,eternity1 do not give us the shadow of the commencement of a proof4 #b ,annales des ,sciences ,psychiques3 ,april ,november #aijg4 ,it was one of those moments in which a doubt which one had thought for ever abolished grips the most unbelieving4 ,for the first time1 perhaps1 he looked around him with uncertainty and wondered in what world he was4 ,as for the faithful adherents of the unknown1 who had long understood that we must resign ourselves to understanding nothing and he prepared for every sort of surprise there was here1 all the same1 even for them1 a mystery of another character1 a bewildering mystery1 the only really strange mystery1 more torturing than all the others together1 because it verges upon ancestral fears and touches the most sensitive point of our destiny4 #d ,the spiritualistic argument most worthy of attention is that supplied by the apparitions of the dead and by haunted houses4 ,we will take no account of the phantasms that precede1 accompany or follow hard upon death3 they are explained by the transmission of a violent motion from one subconsciousness to another2 and1 even when they are not manifested until several days after death1 it may still he contended that they are delayed telepathic communications4 ,but what are we to say of the ghosts that spring up more than a year1 nay1 more than ten years after the disappearance of the corpse8 ,they are very rare1 ,i know1 but after all there are some that are extremely difficult to deny1 for the accounts of their actions are attested and corroborated by numerous and trustworthy witnesses4 ,it is true that here again1 where it is in most cases a question of apparitions to relations or friends1 we may be told that we are in the presence of telepathic incidents or of hallucinations of the memory4 ,we thus deprive the spiritualists of a new and considerable province of their realm4 ,nevertheless1 they retain certain private desmesnes into which our telepathic explanations do not penetrate so easily4 ,there have in fact been ghosts that showed themselves to people who had never known or seen them in the flesh4 ,they are more or less closely connected with the ghosts in haunted houses1 to which we must revert for a moment4 ,as ,i said above1 it is almost impossible honestly to deny the existence of these houses4 ,here again the telepathic interpretation enforces itself in the majority of cases4 ,we may even allow it a strange but justifiable extension1 for its limits are scarcely known4 ,it has happened fairly often1 for instance1 that ghosts come to disturb a dwelling whose occupiers find1 in response to their indications1 bones hidden in the walls or under the floors4 ,it is even possible1 as in the case of ,william ,moir1#a which was as strictly conducted and supervised as a judicial enquiry1 that the skeleton is buried at some distance from the house and dates more than forty years back4 ,when the remains are removed and decently interred1 the apparitions cease4 #a ,proceedings1 vol4 vi41 pp4 #ce-da4 ,but even in the case of ,william ,moir there is no sufficient reason for abandoning the telepathic theory4 ,the medium1 the sensitive1 as the ,english say1 feels the presence or the proximity of the bones2 some relation established between them and him--a relation which certainly is profoundly mysterious--makes him experience the last emotion of the deceased and sometimes allows him to conjure up the picture and the circumstances of the suicide or murder1 even as1 in telepathy between living persons1 the contact of an inanimate object is able to bring him into direct relation with the subconsciousness of its owner4 ,the slender chain connecting life and death is not yet entirely broken2 and we might even go so far as to say that everything is still happening within our world4 ,but are there cases in which every link1 however thin1 however subtle we may deem it1 is definitely shattered8 ,who would venture to maintain this8 ,we are only beginning to suspect the elasticity1 the flexibility1 the complexity of those invisible threads which bind together objects1 thoughts1 lives1 emotions1 all that is on this earth and even that which does not yet exist to that which exists no longer4 ,let us take an instance in the first volume of the ,proceedings3 ,m1 ,x4 ,z41 who was known to most of the members of the ,committee on ,haunted ,houses1 and whose evidence was above suspicion1 went to reside in a large old house1 part of which was occupied by his friend ,mr4 ,g--4 ,mr4 ,x4 ,z4 knew nothing of the history of the place except that two servants of ,mr4 ,g--'s had given him notice on account of strange noises which they had heard4 ,one night--it was the #bbnd of ,september--,mr4 ,x4 ,z41 on his way up to his bedroom in the dark1 saw the whole passage filled with a dazzling and uncanny light1 and in this strange light he saw the figure of an old man in a flowered dressing-gown4 ,as he looked1 both figure and light vanished and he was left in pitch darkness4 ,the next day1 remembering the tales told by the two servants1 he made enquiries in the village4 ,at first he could find out nothing1 but finally an old lawyer told him that he had heard that the grandfather of the present owner of the house had strangled his wife and then cut his own throat on the very spot where ,mr4 ,x4 ,z4 had seen the apparition4 ,he was unable to give the exact date of this double event2 but ,mr4 ,x4 ,z4 consulted the parish register and found that it had taken place on a #bbnd of ,september4 ,on the #bbnd of ,september of the following year1 a friend of ,mr4 ,g--'s arrived to make a short stay4 ,the morning after his arrival1 he came down1 pale and tired1 and announced his intention of leaving immediately4 ,on being questioned1 he confessed that he was afraid1 that he had been kept awake all night by the sound of groans1 blasphemous oaths and cries of despair1 that his bedroom door had been opened1 and so forth4 ,three years afterwards1 ,mr4 ,x4 ,z4 had occasion to call on the landlord of the house1 who lived in ,london1 and saw over the mantelpiece a picture which bore a striking resemblance to the figure which he had seen in the passage4 ,he pointed it out to his friend ,mr4 ,g--1 saying3 ,that is the man whom ,i saw4 ,the landlord1 in reply to their questions1 said that the painting was a portrait of his grandfather1 adding that he had been no credit to the family4 ,evidently1 this does not in any way prove the existence of ghosts or the survival of man4 ,it is quite possible that1 in spite of ,mr4 ,x4 ,z4's undoubted good faith1 imagination played a subtle but powerful part in these marvels4 ,perhaps it was set going by the stories of the two servants1 insignificant gossip to which no attention was paid at the time1 but which probably found its way down into the weird and fertile depths of the subconsciousness4 ,the image was next transmitted by suggestion to the visitor frightened by a sleepless night4 ,as for the recognition of the portrait1 this is either the weakest or the most impressive part of the story1 according to the theory that is being defended4 ,it is none the less certain that there is some unfairness in suggesting this explanation for every incident of the kind4 ,it means stretching to the uttermost and perhaps stretching too far the elastic powers of that amiable maid-of-all-work1 telepathy4 ,for that matter1 there are cases in which the telepathic interpretation is even more uncertain1 as in that described by ,miss ,r4 ,c4 ,morton in vol4 viii4 of the ,proceedings4 ,the story is too long and complicated to be reproduced here4 ,it is unnecessary to observe that1 in view of the character of ,miss ,morton1 a lady of scientific training1 and of the quality of the corroborative testimony1 the facts themselves seem incontestable4 ,the case is that of a house built in #ahfj1 whose first occupier was an ,anglo-,indian1 the next tenant being an old man and the house then remaining unlet for four years4 ,in #ahhb1 when ,captain ,morton and big family moved in1 there had never1 so far as they knew1 been any question of its being haunted4 ,three months afterwards1 ,miss ,morton was in her room and on the point of getting into bed1 when she heard some one at the door and went to it1 thinking that it might be her mother4 ,on opening the door1 she found no one there1 but1 going a few steps along the passage1 she saw a tall lady1 dressed in black1 standing at the head of the stair4 ,she did not wish to make the others uneasy and mentioned the occurrence to no one except a friend1 who did not live in the neighborhood4 ,but soon the same figure dressed in black was seen by the various members of the household1 by a married sister on a visit to the house1 by the father1 by the other sister1 by a little boy1 by a neighbour1 ,general ,a--1 who saw a lady crying in the orchard and1 thinking that one of the daughters of the house was ill1 sent to enquire after her4 ,even the ,mortons' two dogs on more than one occasion clearly showed that they saw the phantom4 ,it was1 as a matter of fact very harmonious3 it said nothing2 it wanted nothing2 it wandered from room to room1 without any apparent object2 and1 when it was spoken to1 it did not answer and only made its escape4 ,the household became accustomed to the apparition2 it troubled nobody and inspired no terror4 ,it was immaterial1 it could not be touched1 but yet it intercepted the light4 ,after making enquiries1 they succeeded in identifying it as the second wife of the ,anglo-,indian4 ,the ,morton family had never seen the lady1 but1 from the description which they gave of the phantom to those who had known her1 it appeared that the likeness was unmistakable4 ,for the rest1 they did not know why she came back to haunt a house in which she had not died4 ,after #ahhg1 the appearances became less frequent1 distinct1 ceasing altogether in #ahhi4 #e ,let us assume that the facts as reported in the ,proceedings are certain and indisputable4 ,we have very nearly the ideal case1 free from previous or ambient suggestion4 ,if we refuse to believe in the existence of ghosts1 if we are absolutely positive that the dead do not survive their death1 then we must admit that the hallucination took birth spontaneously in the imagination of ,miss ,morton1 an unconscious medium1 and was subsequently trained by telepathy to all those around her4 ,in my opinion1 this explanation1 however arbitrary and severe it may be1 is the one which it behooves us to accept1 pending further proofs4 ,but it must be confessed that1 in thus extending our incredulity1 we render it very difficult for the dead to make its existence known4 ,we possess a certain number of cases of kind1 rigorously investigated1 cases probably representing but an infinitesimal part of those which might be collected4 ,is it possible that they one and all elude the telepathic explanation8 ,it would be necessary to make a study of them1 conducted with the most scrupulous and unremitting attention2 for the question is not devoid of interest4 ,if the existence of ghosts were well-established1 it would mean the entrance into this world1 which we believe to be our world1 of a new force that would explain more than one thing which we are still far from understanding4 ,if the dead interfere at one point1 there is a reason why they should not interfere at every other point4 ,we should no longer be alone1 among ourselves1 in our hermetically-closed sphere1 as we are perhaps only too ready to imagine it4 ,we should have to alter more than one of our physical and moral laws1 more than one of our ideas2 and it would no doubt be the most important and the most extraordinary revelation that would be expected in the present state of our knowledge and since the disappearance of the old positive religions4 ,but we are not there yet3 the proof of all this is still in the nursery-stage2 and ,i do not know if it will ever get beyond that4 ,nevertheless the fact remains that1 in these impenetrable regions of mystery which we are now exploring1 the one weak spot lies here1 the one wall in which there seems to be a chink--a strange one enough--giving a glimpse into the other world4 ,it is narrow and vague and behind it there is still darkness2 but it is not without significance and we shall do well not to lose sight of it4 #f ,let us observe that this survival of the dead1 as the neospiritualists conceive it1 seems much less improbable since we have been studying more closely the manifestations of the extraordinary and incontestable spiritual force that lies hidden within ourselves4 ,it is not dependent in our thought1 nor on our consciousness1 nor on our will2 and very possibly it is not dependent either on our life4 ,while we are still breathing on this earth it is already surmounting most of the great obstacles that limit and paralyse our existence4 ,it acts at a distance and so to speak without organs4 ,it passes through matter1 disaggregates it and reconstitutes it4 ,it seems to possess1 the gift of ubiquity4 ,it is not subject to the laws of gravity and lifts weights out of all proportion with the real and measurable strength of the body whence it is believed to emanate4 ,it releases and removes itself from that body2 it comes and goes freely and takes to itself substances and shapes which it borrows all around it2 and therefore it is no longer so strange to see it surviving for a time that body to which it does not appear to be as indissolubly bound as is our conscious existence4 ,is it necessary to add that this survival of a part of ourselves which we hardly know and which besides seems incomplete1 incoherent and ephemeral is wholly without prejudice to nor fate in the eternity of the worlds8 ,but this is a question which we are not called upon to study here4 ,i shall perhaps be asked3 ,if it is becoming increasingly difficult for all these facts--and there are more of them accumulating every day--to be embraced in the telepathic or psychometric theory1 why not frankly accept the spiritualistic explanation1 which is the simplest1 which has an answer for everything and which is gradually encroaching on all the others8 ,that is true3 it is the simplest theory1 perhaps too simple2 and1 like the religious theory1 it dispenses as from all effort or seeking4 ,we have nothing to set against it but the mediumistic theory1 which doubtless does not account exactly for a good many things1 but which at least is on the same side of the hill of life as ourselves and remains among us1 upon our earth1 within reach of our eyes1 our hands1 our thoughts and our researches4 ,there was a time when lightning1 epidemics and earthquakes were attributed without distinction to the wrath of ,heaven4 ,nowadays1 when we are more or less familiar with the source of the great infectious diseases1 the hand of ,providence knows them no more2 and1 though we are still ignorant of the nature of electricity and the laws that regulate seismic shocks1 we no longer dream1 while waiting to learn more about them1 of looking for their causes in the judgment or anger of an imaginary ,being4 ,let us act likewise in the present case4 ,it behooves us above all to avoid those rash explanations which1 in their haste1 leave by the roadside a host of things that appear to be unknown or unknowable only because the necessary effort has not yet been made to know them4 ,after all1 while we must not eliminate the spiritualistic theory1 neither must we content ourselves with it4 ,it is even preferable not to linger over it until it has supplied us with decisive arguments1 for it is the duty of this theory which sweeps us roughly out of our sphere to furnish us with such arguments4 ,for the present1 it simply relegates to posthumous regions1 phenomena that appear to occur within ourselves2 it adds superfluous mystery and needless difficulty to the mediumistic mystery whence it springs4 ,if we were concerned with facts that had no footing in this world1 we should certainly have to turn our eyes in another direction2 but we see a large number of actions performed which are of the same nature as those attributed to the spirits and equally inexplicable1 actions with which1 however1 we know that they have nothing to do4 ,when it is proved that the dead exercise some intervention1 we will bow before the fact as willingly as we bow before the mediumistic mysteries3 it is a question of order1 of internal policy and of scientific method much more than of probability1 preference or fear4 ,the hour has not yet come to abandon the principle which ,i have formulated elsewhere with respect to our communications with the dead1 namely1 that it is natural that we should remain at home1 in our own world1 as long as we can1 as long as we are not violently driven from it by a series of irresistible and incontrovertible proofs coming from the neighbouring abyss4 ,the survival of a spirit is no more improbable than the prodigious faculties which we are obliged to attribute to the mediums if we deny them to the dead4 ,but the existence of mediums is beyond dispute1 whereas that of spirits is not2 and it is therefore for the spirits or for those who make use of their name to begin by proving that they must4 ,before turning towards the mystery beyond the grave1 let us first exhaust the possibilities of the mystery here on earth4 ,,chapter ,,ii4 ,,psychometry #a ,now that we have eliminated the gods and the dead1 what have we left8 ,ourselves and all the life around us2 and that is perhaps enough4 ,it is1 at any rate1 much more than we are able to grasp4 ,let us now study certain manifestations that are absolutely similar to those which we attribute to the spirits and quite as surprising4 ,as for these manifestations1 there is not the least doubt of their origin4 ,they do not come from the other world2 they are born and die upon this earth2 and they arise solely and incontestably from our own actual living mystery4 ,they are1 moreover1 of all psychic manifestations1 those which are easiest to examine and verify1 seeing that they can be repeated almost indefinitely and that a number of excellent and well-known mediums are always ready to reproduce them in the presence of any one interested in the question4 ,it is no longer a case of uncertain and casual observation1 but of scientific experiment4 ,the manifestations in question are so many phenomena of intuition1 of clairvoyance or clairaudience1 of seeing at a distance and even of seeing the future4 ,these phenomena may either be due to pure1 spontaneous intuition on the part of the medium1 in an hypnotic or waking state1 or else produced or facilitated by one of the various empirical methods which apparently see only to arouse the medium's subconscious faculties and to release in some way his subliminal clairvoyance4 ,among such methods1 those most often employed are1 as we all know1 cards1 coffee-grounds1 pins1 the lines of the hand1 crystal globes1 astrology1 and so on4 ,they possess no importance in themselves1 no intrinsic virtue1 and are worth exactly what the medium who uses them is worth4 ,as ,m4 ,duchatel well says3 ,in reality1 there is only one solitary ,,mancy4 ,the faculty of seeing in ,,time1 like the faculty of seeing in ,,space1 is ,,one1 whatever its outward form or the process employed4 ,we will not linger now over those manifestations which1 under appearances that are sometimes childish and vulgar1 often conceal surprising and incontestable truths1 but will devote the present chapter exclusively to a series of phenomena which includes almost all the others and which has been classed under the generic and rather ill-chosen and ill-constructed title of psychometry4 ,psychometry1 to borrow ,dr4 ,maxwell's excellent definition1 is the faculty possessed by certain persons of placing themselves in relation1 either spontaneously or1 for the most part1 through the intermediary of some object1 with unknown and often very distant things and people4 ,the existence of this faculty is no longer seriously denied2 and it is easy for any one who cares to do so to verify it for himself2 for the mediums who possess it are not extremely rare1 nor are they inaccessible4 ,it has formed the subject of a number of experiments 7see1 among others1 ,m4 ,warcollier's report in the ,annales des ,sciences ,psychiques of ,july1 #aiaa7 and of a few treatises1 in the front rank of which ,i would mention ,m4 ,duchatel's ,enquete sur des ,cas de ,psychometrie and ,dr4 ,otty's recently published book1 ,lucidite et ,intuition1 which is the fullest1 most profound and most conscientious work that we possess on the matter up to the present4 ,nevertheless it may be said that these regions quite lately annexed by metaphysical science are as yet hardly explored and that fruitful surprises are doubtless awaiting earnest seekers4 #b ,the faculty in question is one of the strangest faculties of our subconsciousness and beyond a doubt contains the key to most of the manifestations that seem to proceed from another world4 ,let us begin by seeing1 with the aid of a living and typical example1 how it is exercised4 ,mme4 ,m--1 one of the best mediums mentioned by ,dr4 ,osty1 is given an object which belonged to or which has been touched and handled by a person about whom it is proposed to question her4 ,mme4 ,m-- operates in a state of trance2 but there are other noted psychometers1 such as ,mme4 ,f-- and ,m4 ,ph4 ,m4 de ,f--1 who retain all their normal consciousness1 so that hypnotism or the somnambulistic state is in no way indispensable to the awakening of this extraordinary faculty of clairvoyance4 ,when the object1 which is usually a letter1 has been handed to ,mme4 ,m--1 she is asked to place herself in communication with the writer of the letter or the owner of the object4 ,forthwith1 ,mme4 ,m-- not only sees the person in question1 his physical appearance1 his character1 his habits1 his interests1 his state of health1 but also1 in a series of rapid and changing visions that follow upon one another like cinematograph pictures1 perceives and describes exactly his immediate surroundings1 the scenery outside his window1 the rooms in which he lives1 the people who live with him and who wish him well or ill1 the psychology and the most secret and unexpected intentions of all those who figure in his existence4 ,if1 by means of your questions1 you direct her towards the past1 she traces the whole course of the subject's history4 ,if you turn her towards the future1 she seems often to discover it as clearly as the past4 ,but we will for the moment reserve this latter point1 to which we shall return later in a chapter devoted to the knowledge of the future4 #c ,in the presence of these phenomena1 the first thought that naturally occurs to the mind is that we are once more concerned with that astonishing and involuntary communication between one subconsciousness and another which has been invested with the name of telepathy4 ,and there is no denying that telepathy plays a great part in these intuitions4 ,however1 to explain their working1 nothing is equal to an example based upon a personal experience4 ,here is one which is in no way remarkable1 but which plainly shows the normal course of the operation4 ,in ,september1 #aiac1 while ,i was at ,elberfeld1 visiting ,krall's horses1 my wife went to consult ,mme4 ,m--1 gave her a scrap of writing in my hand--a note dispatched previous to my journey and containing no allusion to it--and asked her where ,i was and what ,i was doing4 ,without a second's hesitation1 ,mme4 ,m-- declared that ,i was very far away1 in a foreign country where they spoke a language which she did not understand4 ,she saw first a paved yard1 shaded by a big tree1 with a building on the left and a garden at the back3 a rough but not inapt description of ,krall's stables1 which my wife did not know and which ,i myself had not seen at the time when ,i wrote the note4 ,she next perceived me in the midst of the horses1 examining them1 studying them with an absorbed1 anxious and tired air4 ,this was true1 for ,i found those visits1 which overwhelmed me with a sense of the marvelous and kept my attention on the rack1 singularly exhausting and bewildering4 ,my wife asked her if ,i intended to buy the horses4 ,she replied3 ,not at all2 he is not thinking of it4 ,and1 seeking her words as though to express an unaccustomed and obscure thought1 she added3 ,i don't know why he is so much interested2 it is not like him4 ,he has no particular passion for horses4 ,he has some lofty idea which ,i can't quite discover4 4 4 4 ,she made two rather curious mistakes in this experiment4 ,the first was that1 at the time when she saw me in ,krall's stable-yard1 ,i was no longer there4 ,she had received her vision just in the interval of a few hours between two visits4 ,experience shows1 however1 that this is a usual error among psychometers4 ,they do not1 properly speaking1 see the action at the very moment of its performance1 but rather the customary and familiar action1 the principal thing that preoccupies either the person about whom they are being consulted or the person consulting them4 ,they frequently go astray in time4 ,there is not1 therefore1 necessarily any simultaneity between the action and the vision2 and it is well never to take their statements in this respect literally4 ,the other mistake referred to our dress3 ,krall and ,i were in ordinary town clothes1 whereas she saw us in those long coats which stable-lads wear when grooming their horses4 ,let us now make every allowance for my wife's unconscious suggestions3 she knew that ,i was at ,elberfeld and that ,i should be in the midst of the horses1 and she knew or could easily conjecture my state of mind4 ,the transmission of thought is remarkable2 but this is a recognized phenomenon and one of frequent occurrence and we need not therefore linger over it4 ,the real mystery begins with the description of a place which my wife had never seen and which ,i had not seen either at the time of writing the note which established the psychometrical communication4 ,are we to believe that the appearance of what ,i was one day to see was already inscribed on that prophetic sheet of paper1 or more simply and more probably that the paper which represented myself was enough to transmit either to my wife's subconsciousness or to ,mme4 ,m--1 whom at that time ,i had never met1 an exact picture of what my eyes beheld three or four hundred miles away8 ,but1 although this description is exceedingly accurate--paved yard1 big tree1 building on the left1 garden at the back--is it not too general for all idea of chance coincidence to be eliminated8 ,perhaps1 by insisting further1 greater precision might have been obtained2 but this is not certain1 for as a role the pictures follow upon one another so swiftly in the medium's vision that he has no time to perceive the details4 ,when all is said1 experiences of this kind do not enable us to go beyond the telepathic explanation4 ,but here is a different one1 in which subconscious suggestion cannot play any part whatever4 ,some days after the experiment which ,i have related1 ,i received from ,england a request for my autograph4 ,unlike most of those which assail an author of any celebrity1 it was charming and unaffected2 but it told me nothing about its writer4 ,without even noticing from what town it was sent to me1 after showing it to my wife1 ,i replaced it in its envelope and took it to ,mme4 ,m--4 ,she began by describing us1 my wife and myself1 who both of us had touched the paper and consequently impregnated it with our respective fluids4 ,i asked her to pass beyond us and come to the writer of the note4 ,she then saw a girl of fifteen or sixteen1 almost a child1 who had been in rather indifferent health1 but who was now very well indeed4 ,the girl was in a beautiful garden1 in front of a large and luxurious house standing in the midst of rather hilly country4 ,she was playing with a big1 curly-haired1 long-eared dog4 ,through the branches of the trees one caught a glimpse of the sea4 ,on inquiry1 all the details were found to be astonishingly accurate2 but1 as usual1 there was a mistake in the time1 that is to say1 the girl and her dog were not in the garden at the instant when the medium saw them there4 ,here again an habitual action had obscured a casual movement2 for1 as ,i have already said1 the vision very rarely corresponds with the momentary reality4 #d ,there is nothing exceptional in the above example2 ,i selected it from among many others because it is simple and clear4 ,besides1 this kind of experience is already1 so to speak1 classical1 or at least should be so1 were it not that everything relating to the manifestations of our subconsciousness is always received with extraordinary suspicion4 ,in any case1 ,i cannot too often repeat that the experiment is within everybody's reach2 and it rarely fails to achieve absolute success with capable psychometers1 who are pretty well known and whom it is open to any one to consult4 ,let us add that it can be extended much further4 ,if1 for instance1 ,i had acted as ,i did in similar cases and asked the medium questions about the young girl's home-circle1 about the character of her father1 the health of her mother1 the tastes and habits of her brothers and sisters1 she would have answered with the same certainty1 the same precision as one might do who was not only a close acquaintance of the girl's1 but endowed with much more penetrating faculties of intuition than a normal observer4 ,in short1 she would have felt and expressed all that this girl's subconsciousness would have felt with regard to the persons mentioned4 ,but it must be admitted that1 as we are here no longer speaking of facts that are easily verified1 confirmation becomes infinitely more difficult4 ,there could be no question1 in the circumstances1 of transmission of thought1 since both the medium and ,i were ignorant of everything4 ,besides1 other experiments1 easily devised and repeated and more rigourously controlled1 do away with that theory entirely4 ,for instance1 ,i took three letters written by intimate friends1 put each of them in a double envelope and gave them to a messenger unacquainted with the contents of the envelopes and also with the persons in question to take to ,mme4 ,m--4 ,on arriving at the house1 the messenger handed the clairvoyant one of the letters1 selected at random1 and did nothing further beyond putting the indispensable questions1 likewise at random1 and taking down the medium's replies in shorthand4 ,mme4 ,m-- began by giving a very striking physical portrait of the lady who had written the letter2 followed this up with an absolutely faithful description of her character1 her habits1 her tastes1 her intellectual and moral qualities2 and ended by adding a few details concerning her private life1 of which ,i myself was entirely unaware and of which ,i obtained the confirmation shortly afterwards4 ,the experiment yielded just as remarkable results when continued with the two other letters4 ,in the face of this mystery1 two explanations may be offered1 both equally perplexing4 ,on the one hand1 we shall have to admit that the sheet of paper handed to the psychometer and impregnated with human fluid contains1 after the manner of some prodigiously compressed gas1 all the incessantly renewed1 incessantly recurring images that surround a person1 all his past and perhaps his future1 his psychology1 his state of health1 his wishes1 his intentions1 often unknown to himself1 his most secret instincts1 his likes and dislikes1 all that is bathed in light and all that is plunged in darkness1 his whole life1 in short1 and more than his personal and conscious life1 besides all the lives and all the influences1 good or bad1 latent or manifest1 of all who approach him4 ,we should have here a mystery as unfathomable and at least as vast as that of generation1 which transmits1 in an infinitesimal particle1 the mind and matter1 with all the qualities and all the faults1 all the acquirements and all the history1 of a series of lives of which none can tell the number4 ,on the other hand1 if we do not admit that so much energy can lie concealed in a sheet of paper1 continuing to exist and develop indefinitely there1 we must necessarily suppose that an inconceivable network of nameless forces is perpetually radiating from this same paper1 forces which1 cleaving time and space1 detect instantaneously1 anywhere and at any distance1 the life that gave them life and place themselves in complete communication1 body and soul1 senses and thoughts1 past and future1 consciousness and subconsciousness1 with an existence lost amid the innumerous host of men who people this earth4 ,it is1 indeed1 exactly what happens in the experiments with mediums in automatic speech or writing1 who believe themselves to be inspired by the dead4 ,yet1 here it is no longer a discarnate spirit1 but an object of any kind imbued with a living fluid that works the miracle2 and this1 we may remark in passing1 deals a severe blow to the spiritualistic theory4 ,nevertheless1 there are two rather curious objections to this second explanation4 ,granting that the object really places the medium in communication with an unknown entity discovered in space1 how comes it that the image or the spectacle created by that communication hardly ever corresponds with the reality at the actual moment8 ,on the other hand1 it is indisputable that the psychometer's clairvoyance1 his gift of seeing at a distance the pictures and scenes surrounding an unknown being1 is exercised with the same certainty and the same power when the object that sets his strange faculty at work has been touched by a person who has been dead for years4 ,are we1 then1 to admit that there is an actual1 living communication with a human being who is no more1 who sometimes--1 for instance1 in a case of incineration--has left no trace of himself on earth1 in short1 with a dead man who continues to live at the place and at the moment at which he impregnated the object with his fluid and who seems to be unaware that he is dead8 ,but these objections are perhaps less serious than one might believe4 ,to begin with1 there are seers1 so-called telepsychics1 who are not psychometers1 that is to say1 they are able to communicate with an unknown and distant person without the intermediary of an object2 and in these seers1 as in the psychometers1 the vision very rarely corresponds with the actual facts of the moment3 they too perceive above all the general impression1 the usual and characteristic actions4 ,next1 as regards communications with a person long since dead1 we are confronted with one of two things3 either confirmation will be almost impossible when it concerns revelations on the subject of the dead man's private deeds and actions1 which are unknown to any living person or else communication will be established not with the deceased1 but with the living person1 who necessarily knows the facts which he is called upon to confirm4 ,as ,dr4 ,osty very rightly says3 ,the conditions are then those of perception by the intermediary of the thoughts of a living person2 and the deceased is perceived through a mental representation4 ,the experiment1 for this reason1 is valueless as evidence of the reality of retrospective psychometry and consequently of the recording part played by the object4 ,the only class of experiment that could be of value from this point of view1 would be that in which confirmation would come subsequently from documents whose contents remained unknown to any living person until after the clairvoyance sitting4 ,it might then be proved that the object can latently register the human personalities which have touched it and that it is sufficient in itself to allow of a mental reconstruction of those personalities through the interpretation of the register by a clairvoyant or psychometer4 #e ,it may be imagined that experiments of this sort1 in which there is no crack1 no leak on the side of the living1 are anything but easy to carry through4 ,in the case of a murder1 for instance1 it can always be maintained that the medium discovers the body and the circumstances of the tragedy through the involuntary and unconscious intermediary of the murderer1 even when the latter escapes prosecution and suspicion altogether4 ,but a recent incident1 related by ,dr4 ,osty with the utmost precision of detail and the most scrupulous verification in the ,annales des ,sciences ,psychiques of ,april1 #aiad1 perhaps supplies us with one of those experiments which we have not been able to achieve until this day4 ,i give the facts in a few words4 ,on the #bnd of ,march of this year1 ,m4 ,etienne ,lerasle1 an old man of eighty-two1 left his son's house at ,cours-les-,barres 7,cher7 for his daily walk and was not seen again4 ,the house stands in the middle of a forest on ,baron ,jaubert's estate4 ,vain searches were made in every direction for the missing man's traces2 the ponds and pools were dragged to no purpose2 and on the #hth of ,march a careful and systematical exploration of the wood1 in which no fewer than twenty-four people took part1 led to no result4 ,at last1 on the #ahth of ,march1 ,m4 ,louis ,mirault1 ,baron ,jaubert's agent1 thought of applying to ,dr4 ,osty1 and supplied him with a scarf which the old man had worn4 ,dr4 ,osty went to his favourite medium1 ,mme4 ,m--4 ,he knew only one thing1 that the matter concerned an old man of eighty-two1 who walked with a slight stoop2 and that was all4 ,as soon as ,mme4 ,m-- had taken the scarf in her hands1 she saw the dead body of an old man lying on the damp ground1 in a wood1 in the middle of a coppice1 beside a horse-shoe pond1 near a sort of rock4 ,she traced the road taken by the victim1 depicted the buildings which he had passed1 his mental condition impaired by age1 his fixed intention of dying1 his physical appearance1 his habitual and characteristic way of carrying his stick1 his soft striped shirt1 and so on4 ,the accuracy of the description caused the greatest astonishment among the missing man's friends4 ,there was one detail that puzzled them a little3 the mention of a rock in a part of the country that possessed none4 ,the search was resumed on the strength of the data supplied by the clairvoyant4 ,but all the rocks in a forest are more or less alike2 the indications were not enough2 and nothing was found4 ,it so happened that the second and third interviews with ,mme4 ,m-- had to be postponed until the #cjth of ,march and the #fth of ,april following4 ,at each of these sittings1 the details of the vision and of the road taken became clearer and clearer and were given with startling precision1 so much so that1 by pursuing step by step the indications of the medium1 the man's friends ended by discovering the body1 dressed as stated1 lying in the middle of a coppice1 just as described1 close to a huge stump of a tree all covered with moss1 which might easily be mistaken for a rock1 and on the edge of a crescent-shaped piece of water4 ,i may add that these particular indications applied to no other part of the wood4 #f ,i refer the reader to ,dr4 ,osty's conscientious and exhaustive article for the numerous details which ,i have been obliged to omit2 but those which ,i have given are enough to show the character of this extraordinary case4 ,to begin with1 we have one certainty which appears almost unassailable1 namely1 that there can be no question of a crime4 ,no one had the least interest in procuring the old man's death4 ,the body bore no marks of violence2 besides1 the minds of those concerned did not for a moment entertain the thought of an assault4 ,the poor man1 whose mental derangement was known to all those about him1 obsessed by the desire and thought of death1 had gone quietly and obstinately to seek it in the nearest coppice4 ,there was therefore no criminal in the case1 in other words1 there was no possible or imaginable communication between the medium's subconsciousness1 and that of any living person4 ,hence we are compelled to admit that the communication was established with the dead man or with his subconsciousness1 which continued to live for nearly a month after his death and to wander around the same places2 or else we must agree that all this coming tragedy1 all that the old man was about to see1 do and suffer was already irrevocably contained and inscribed in the scarf at the moment when he last wore it4 ,in this particular case1 considering that all relations with the living were definitely and undeniably severed1 ,i can see no other explanations beyond these two4 ,they are both equally astounding and land us suddenly in a world of fable and enchantment which we thought that we had left for good and all4 ,if we do not adopt the theory of the tell-tale scarf1 we must accept that of the spiritualists1 who maintain that the spirits communicate with us freely4 ,it is possible that they may find a serious argument in this case4 ,but a solitary fact is not enough to support a theory1 all the more so as the one in question will never be absolutely safe from the objection that could be raised if the case were one of murder1 which is possible1 after all1 and cannot be actually disproved4 ,we must1 therefore1 while awaiting other similar and more decisive facts1 if any such are conceivable1 return to those which are1 so to speak1 laboratory facts1 facts which are only denied by those who will not take the trouble to verify them2 and to interpret these facts there are only the two theories which we mentioned above1 before this digression2 for1 in these cases1 which are unlike those of automatic speech or writing1 we have not as a rule to consider the possibility of any intervention of the dead4 ,as a matter of fact1 the best-known psychometers are very rarely spiritualists and claim no connection with the spirits4 ,they care but little1 as a rule1 about the source of their intuitions and seem very little interested in their exact working and origin4 ,now it would be exceedingly surprising if1 acting and speaking in the name of the departed1 they should be so consistently ignorant of the existence of those who inspire them2 and more surprising still if the dead1 whom in other circumstances we see so jealously vindicating their identity1 should not here1 when the occasion is so propitious1 seek to declare themselves1 to manifest themselves and to make themselves known4 #g ,dismissing for the time being the intervention of the dead1 ,i believe then that1 in most of the cases which ,i will call laboratory cases1 because they can be reproduced at will1 we are not necessarily reduced to the theory of the vitalized object representing wholly1 indefinitely and inexhaustibly1 through all the vicissitudes of time and spice1 every one of those who have held it in their hands for a little while4 ,for we must not forget that1 according to this theory1 the object in question will conceal and1 through the intermediary of the medium1 will reveal as many distinct and complete personalities as it has undergone contacts4 ,it will never confuse or mix those different personalities4 ,they will remain there in definite strata1 distinct one from another2 and1 as ,dr4 ,osty puts it1 the medium can interpret each of them from beginning to end1 as though he were in communication with the far-off entity4 ,all this makes the theory somewhat incredible1 even though it be not much more so than the many other phenomena in which the shock of the miraculous has been softened by familiarity4 ,we can find more or less everywhere in nature that prodigious faculty of storing away inexhaustible energies and ineffaceable tram1 memories and impressions in space4 ,there is not a thing in this world that is lost1 that disappears1 that ceases to be1 to retain and to propagate life4 ,need we recall1 in this connection1 the incessant mission of pictures perceived by the sensitized plate1 the vibrations of sound that accumulate in the disks of the gramophone1 the ,hertzian waves that lose none of their strength in space1 the mysteries of reproduction and1 in a word1 the incomprehensibility of everything around us8 #h ,personally1 if ,i had to choose1 ,i should1 in most of these laboratory cases1 frankly adopt the theory that the object touched serves simply to detect1 among the prodigious crowd of human beings1 the one who impregnated it with his fluid4 ,this object1 says ,dr4 ,osty1 has no other function than to allow the medium's sensitiveness to distinguish a definite force from among the innumerable forces that assail it4 ,it seem more and more certain that1 as the cells of an immense organism1 we are connected with everything that exists by an inextricable network of vibrations1 waves1 influences1 of nameless1 numberless and uninterrupted fluids4 ,nearly always1 in nearly all men1 everything carried along by these invisible wires falls into the depths of the unconsciousness and passes unperceived1 which does not mean that it remains inactive4 ,but sometimes an exceptional circumstance--in the present case1 the marvellous sensibility of a first-class medium--suddenly reveals to us1 by the vibrations and the undeniable action of one of those wires1 the existence of the infinite network4 ,i will not speak here of trails discovered and followed in an almost mediumistic manner1 after an object of some sort has been sniffed at4 ,such stories1 though highly probable1 as yet lack adequate support4 ,but1 within a similar order of ideas1 and in a humbler world and one with more modest limits1 the dog1 for instance1 is incessantly surrounded by different scents and smells to which he appears indifferent until his attention is aroused by one or other of these vagrant effluvia1 when he extricates it from the hopeless tangle4 ,it would seem as though the trail took life1 vibrating like a chord in unison with the animal's wishes1 becoming irresistible1 and taking it to its goal after innumerable winds and turns4 ,we see the mysterious network revealed also in cross-correspondence4 ,two or three mediums who do not know one another1 who are often separated by seas2 or continents1 who are ignorant of the whereabouts of the one who is to complete their thought1 each write a part of a sentence which1 as it stands1 conveys no meaning whatever4 ,on piecing the fragments together1 we perceive that they fit to perfection and acquire an intelligible and obviously premeditated sense4 ,we here find once more the same faculty that permits the medium to detect1 among thousands of others1 a definite force which was wandering in space4 ,it is true that1 in these cases1 the spiritualists maintain that the whole experiment is organized and directed by a discarnate intelligence1 independent of the mediums1 which means to prove its existence and its identity in this manner4 ,without incontinently rejecting this theory1 which is not necessarily indefensible1 we will merely remark that1 since the faculty is manifested in psychometry without the intervention of the spirits1 there can be no sufficient reason for attributing it to them in cross-correspondence4 #i ,but in whom does it reside8 ,is it hidden in ourselves or in the medium8 ,according to ,dr4 ,osty1 the clairvoyants are mirrors reflecting the intuitive thought that is latent in each of us4 ,in other words--it is we ourselves who are clairvoyant1 and they but reveal to us nor own clairvoyance4 ,their mission is to stir1 to awaken1 to galvanize1 to illumine the secrets of our subconsciousness and to bring them to the surface of our normal lives4 ,they act upon our inner darkness exactly as1 in the photographic dark-room1 the developing-bath acts upon the sensitized plate1 ,i am convinced that the theory is accurate as regards intuition and clairvoyance proper1 that is to say1 in all cases where we are in the medium's presence and more or less directly in touch with him4 ,but is it so in psychometry8 ,is it we who1 unknown to ourselves1 know all that the object contains1 or is it the medium alone who discovers it in the object itself1 independently of the person who produces the object8 ,when1 for instance1 we receive a letter from a stranger1 does this letter1 which has absorbed like a sponge the whole life and by choice the subconscious life of the writer1 disgorge all that it contained into our subconsciousness8 ,do we instantly learn all that concerns its author1 absolutely as though he were standing before us in the flesh and1 above all1 with his soul laid bare1 though we remain profoundly ignorant of the fact that we have learnt it until the medium's intervention tells us so8 ,this1 if you like1 is simply shifting the question4 ,let it be the medium or myself that discovers the unknown personality in the object or tracks it across time and space3 all that we do is to widen the scope of our riddle1 while leaving it no less obscure4 ,nevertheless1 there is some interest in knowing whether we have to do with a general faculty latent in all men or an inexplicable privilege reserved to rare individuals4 ,the exceptional should always be eliminated1 if possible1 and not left to hang over the abyss like an unfinished bridge leading to nothing4 ,i am well aware that the compulsory intervention of the medium implies that1 in spite of all1 we recognize his possession of abnormal faculties2 but at any rate we reduce their power and their extent appreciably and we return sooner and more easily to the ordinary laws of the great human mystery4 ,and it is of importance that we should be ever coming back to that mystery and ever bringing all things back to it4 ,but1 unfortunately1 actual experience does not admit of this generalization4 ,it is clearly a case of a special faculty1 one peculiar to the medium1 one which is wholly unknown to our latent intuition4 ,we can easily assure ourselves of this by causing the medium to receive through a third party and enclosed in a series of three envelopes1 as in the experiment described above1 a letter of which we know the writer1 but of which both the source and the contents are absolutely unknown to the messenger4 ,these unusual circumstances1 in which all subconscious communications between consultant and consulted are strictly cut off1 will in no way hamper the medium's clairvoyance2 and we may fairly conclude that it is actually the medium himself who discovers directly1 without any intermediary1 without relays1 to use ,m4 ,duchatel's expression1 all that the object holds concealed4 ,it1 therefore1 seems certain that there is1 at least in psychometry1 something more than the mere mirror of which ,dr4 ,osty speaks4 #aj ,i consider it necessary to declare for the last time that these psychometric phenomena1 astonishing though they appear at first1 are known1 proved and certain and are no longer denied or doubted by any of those who have studied them seriously4 ,i could have given full particulars of a large number of conclusive experiments2 but this seemed to me as superfluous and tedious as would be1 for instance1 a string of names of the recognized chemical reactions that can be obtained in a laboratory4 ,any one who pleases is at liberty to convince himself of the reality of the facts1 provided that he applies to genuine mediums and keeps aloof from the inferior seers and especially the shams and imposters who swarm in this region more than in any other4 ,even with the best of them1 he will have to be careful of the involuntary1 unconscious and almost inevitable interference of telepathy1 which is also very interesting1 though it is a phenomenon of a different class1 much less surprising and debatable than pure psychometry4 ,he must also learn the art of interrogating the medium and refrain from asking incoherent and random questions about casual or future events4 ,he will not forget that clairvoyance is strictly limited to the perception of human personality1 according to the role so well formulated by ,dr4 ,osty4 ,experiments have been made in which a psychometer1 on touching the tooth of a prehistoric animal1 saw the landscapes and the cataclysms of the earth's earliest ages displayed before his eyes2 in which another medium1 on handling a jewel1 conjured up1 it would seem with marvellous exactness1 the games and processions of ancient ,greece1 as though the objects permanently retained the recollection or rediscovered the astral negatives of all the events which they once witnessed4 ,but it will be understood that1 in such cases1 any effective control is1 so to speak1 impossible and that the part played by telepathy cannot be decided4 ,it is important1 therefore1 to keep strictly to that which can be verified4 ,even when thus limiting his scope1 the experimenter will meet with many surprises4 ,for instance1 though the revelations of two psychometers to whom the same letter is handed in succession most often agree remarkably in their main outlines1 it can also happen that one of them perceives only what concerns the writer of the letter1 whereas the other will be interested only in the person to whom the letter was addressed or to a third person who was in the room where the letter was written4 ,it is well to be forearmed against these first mistakes1 which1 for that matter1 in the frequent cases where strict control is possible1 but confirm the existence and the independence of the astounding faculty4 #aa ,as for the theories that attempt to explain it1 ,i am quite willing to grant that they are still somewhat confused4 ,the important thing for the moment is the accumulation of claims and experiments that go feeling their way farther and farther along all the paths of the unknown4 ,meanwhile1 that one unexpected door which sheds at the back of our old convictions more than one unexpected door1 which sheds upon the life and habits of our secret being sufficient light to puzzle us for many a long day4 ,this brings us back once more to the omniscience and perhaps the omnipotence of our hidden guest1 to the brink of the mysterious reservoir of every manner of knowledge which we shall meet with again when we come to speak of the future1 of the talking horses1 of the divining-rod1 of materializations and miracles1 in short1 in every circumstance where we pass beyond the horizon of our little daily life4 ,as we thus advance1 with slow and cautious footsteps1 in them as yet deserted and very nebulous regions of metapsychics1 we are compelled to recognize that there must exist somewhere1 in this world or in others1 a spot in which everything is known1 in which everything is possible1 to which everything goes1 from which everything comes1 which belongs to all1 to which all have access1 but of which the long-forgotten roads must be learnt again by our stumbling feet4 ,we shall often meet those difficult roads in the course of our present quest and we shall have more than one occasion to refer again to those depths into which all the supernatural facts of our existence flow1 unless indeed they take their source there4 ,for the moment1 that which most above all engage our attention in these psychometric phenomena is their purely and exclusively human character4 ,they occur between the living and the living1 on this solid earth of ours1 in the world that lies before our eyes2 and the spirits1 the dead1 the gods and the interplanetary intelligences know them not4 ,hardly anywhere else1 except in the equally perplexing manifestations of the divining-rod and in certain materializations1 shall we find with the same clearness this same specific character1 if we may call it so4 ,this is a valuable lesson4 ,it tells us that our every-day life provides phenomena as disturbing and of exactly the same kind and nature as those which1 in other circumstances1 we attribute to other forces than ours4 ,it teaches us also that we must first direct and exhaust our enquiries here below1 among ourselves1 before passing to the other side2 for our first care should be to simplify the interpretations and explanations and not to seek elsewhere1 in opposition1 what probably lies hidden within us in reality4 ,afterwards1 if the unknown overwhelm us utterly1 if the darkness engulf us beyond all hope1 there will still be time to go1 none can tell where1 to question the deities or the dead4 ,,chapter ,,iii4 ,,the ,,knowledge ,,of ,,the ,,future #a ,premonition or precognition leads us to still more mysterious regions1 where stands1 half merging from an intolerable darkness1 the gravest problem that can thrill mankind1 the knowledge of the future4 ,the latest1 the best and the most complete study devoted to it is1 ,i believe1 that recently published by ,m4 ,ernest ,bozzano1 under the title ,des ,phenomenes ,premonitoires4 ,availing himself of excellent earlier work1 notably that of ,mrs4 ,sidgwick and ,myers#a and adding the result of his own researches1 the author collects some thousand cases of precognition1 of which he discusses one hundred and sixty1 leaving the great majority of the others on one side4 ,not because they are negligible1 but because he does not wish to exceed too flagrantly the normal limits of a monograph4 #a ,proceedings1 ,vols4 ,v4 and ,,xi4 ,he begins by carefully eliminating all the episodes which1 though apparently premonitory1 may be explained by self-suggestion 7as in the case1 for instance1 where some one smitten with a disease still latent seems to foresee this disease and the death which will be its conclusion71 by telepathy 7when a sensitive is aware beforehand of the arrival of a person or a letter71 or lastly by clairvoyance 7when a man dreams of a spot where he will find something which he has mislaid1 or an uncommon plant1 or an insect sought for in vain1 or of the unknown place which he will visit at some later date74 ,in all these cases1 we have not1 properly speaking1 to do with a pure future1 but rather with a present that is not yet known4 ,thus reduced and stripped of all foreign influences and intrusions the number of instances in which there is a really clear and incontestable perception of a fragment of the future remains large enough1 contrary to what is generally believed1 to make it impossible for us to speak of extraordinary accidents or wonderful coincidences4 ,there must be a limit to everything1 even to distrust1 even to the most extensive incredulity1 otherwise all historical research and a good deal of scientific research would become decidedly impracticable4 ,and this remark applies as much to the nature of the incidents related as to the actual authenticity of the narratives4 ,we can contest or suspect any story whatever1 any written proof1 any evidence2 but thenceforward we must abandon all certainty or knowledge that is not acquired by means of mathematical operations or laboratory experiments1 that is to say1 three-fourths of the human phenomena which interest us most4 ,observe that the records collected by the investigators of the ,s4 ,p4 ,r41 like those discussed by ,m4 ,bozzano1 are all told at first hand and that those stories of which the narrators were not the protagonists or the direct witnesses have been ruthlessly rejected4 ,furthermore1 some of these narratives are necessarily of the nature of medical observations2 as for the others1 if we attentively examine the character of those who have related them and the circumstances which corroborate them1 we shall agree that it is more just and more reasonable to believe in them than to look upon every man who has an extraordinary experience as being a priori a liar1 the victim of an hallucination1 or a wag4 #b ,there could be no question of giving here even a brief analysis of the most striking cases4 ,it would require a hundred pages and would alter the whole nature of this essay1 which1 to keep within its proper dimensions1 most take it for granted that most of the materials which it examines are familiar4 ,i therefore refer the reader who may wish to form an opinion for himself to the easily-accessible sources which ,i have mentioned above4 ,it will suffice1 to give an accurate idea of the gravity of the problem to any one who has not time or opportunity to consult the original documents if ,i sum up in a few words some of these pioneer adventures1 selected among those which seem least open to dispute2 for it goes without saying that all have not the same value1 otherwise the question would be settled4 ,there are some which1 while exceedingly striking at first sight and offering every guarantee that could be desired to authenticity1 nevertheless do not imply a real knowledge of the future and can be interpreted in another manner4 ,i give one1 to serve as an instance2 it is reported by ,dr4 ,alphonse ,teste in his ,manuel pratique du magnetisme animal4 ,on the #hth of ,may1 ,dr4 ,teste magnetizes ,mme4 ,hortense--in the presence of her husband4 ,she is no sooner asleep than she announces that she has been pregnant for a fortnight1 that she will not go her full time1 that she will take fright at something1 that she will have a fall and that the result will be a miscarriage4 ,she adds that1 on the #abth of ,may1 after having had a fright1 she will have a fainting-fit which will last for eight minutes2 and she then describes1 hour by hour1 the course of her malady1 which will end in three days' loss of reason1 from which she will recover4 ,on awaking1 she retains no recollection of anything that has passed2 it is kept from her2 and ,dr4 ,teste communicates his notes to ,dr4 ,amidee ,latour4 ,on the #abth of ,may1 he calls on ,m4 and ,mme4--1 finds them at table and puts ,mme4-- to sleep again1 whereupon she repeats word for word what she told him four days before4 ,they wake her up4 ,the dangerous hour is drawing near4 ,they take every imaginable precaution and even close the shutters4 ,mme4--1 made uneasy by these extraordinary measures which she is quite unable to understand1 asks what they are going to do to her4 ,half-past three o'clock strikes4 ,mme4-- rises from the sofa on which they have made her sit and wants to leave the room4 ,the doctor and her husband try to prevent her4 ,but what is the matter with you8 she asks4 ,i simply must go out4 ,no1 madame1 you shall not3 ,i speak in the interest of your health4 ,well1 then1 doctor1 she replies1 with a smile1 if it is in the interest of my health1 that is all the more reason why you should let me go out4 ,the excuse is a plausible one and even irresistible2 but the husband1 wishing to carry the struggle against destiny to the last1 declares that he will accompany his wife4 ,the doctor remains alone1 feeling somewhat anxious1 in spite of the rather farcical turn which the incident has taken4 ,suddenly1 a piercing shriek is heard and the noise of a body falling4 ,he runs out and finds ,mme4-- wild with fright and apparently dying in her husband's arms4 ,at the moment when1 leaving him for an instant1 she opened the door of the place where she was going1 a rat1 the first seen there for twenty years1 rushed at her and gave her so great a start that she fell flat on her back4 ,and all the rest of the prediction was fulfilled to the letter1 hour by hour and detail by detail4 #c ,to make it quite clear in what spirit ,i am undertaking this study and to remove at the beginning any suspicion of blind or systematic credulity1 ,i am anxious1 before going any further1 to say that ,i fully realize that cases of this kind by no means carry conviction4 ,it is quite possible that everything happened in the subconscious imagination of the subject and that she herself created1 by self-suggestion1 her illness1 her fright1 her fall and her miscarriage and adapted herself to most of the circumstances which she had foretold in her secondary state4 ,the appearance of the rat at the fatal moment is the only thing that would suggest a precise and disquieting vision of an inevitable future event4 ,unfortunately1 we are not told that the rat was perceived by other witnesses than the patient1 so that there is nothing to prove that it also was not imaginary4 ,i have therefore quoted this inadequate instance only because it represents fairly well the general aspect and the indecisive value of many similar cases and enable us to note once and for all the objections which can be raised and the precautions which we should take before entering these suspicious and obscure regions4 ,we now come to an infinitely more significant and less questionable case related by ,dr4 ,joseph ,maxwell1 the learned and very scrupulous author of ,les ,phenomenes ,psychiques1 a work which has been translated into ,english under the title of ,metapsychical ,phenomena4 ,it concerns a vision which was described to him eight days before the event and which he told to many people before it was accomplished4 ,a sensitive perceived in a crystal the following scene3 a large steamer1 flying a flag of three horizontal bars1 black1 white and red1 and bearing the name ,leutschland1 was sailing in mid-ocean4 ,the boat was suddenly enveloped in smoke2 a great number of sailors1 passengers and men in uniform rushed to the upper deck2 and the boat went down4 ,eight days afterwards1 the newspapers announced the accident to the ,deutschland1 whose boiler had burst1 obliging the steamboat to stand to4 ,the evidence of a man like ,dr4 ,maxwell1 especially when we have to do with a so-to-speak personal incident1 possesses an importance on which it is needless to insist4 ,we have here1 therefore1 several days beforehand1 the very clear prevision of an event which1 moreover1 in no way concerns the percipient3 a curious detail1 but one which is not uncommon in these cases4 ,the mistake in reading ,leutschland for ,deutschland1 which would have been quite natural in real life1 adds a note of probability and authenticity to the phenomenon4 ,as for the final act1 the foundering of the vessel in the place of a simple heaving to1 we must see in this1 as ,dr4 ,j4 ,w4 ,pickering and ,w4 ,a4 ,sadgrove suggest1 the subconscious dramatization of a subliminal inference of the percipient4 ,such dramatization1 moreover1 are instinctive and almost general in this class of visions4 ,if this were an isolated case1 it would certainly not be right to attach decisive importance to it2 but1 ,dr4 ,maxwell observes1 the same sensitive has given me other curious instances2 and these cases1 compared with others which ,i myself have observed or with those of which ,i have received first-hand accounts1 render the hypothesis of coincidence very improbable1 though they do not absolutely exclude it4#a #a ,maxwell3 ,metapsychical ,phenomena1 p4 #bjb4 #d ,another and perhaps more convincing case1 more strictly investigated and established1 a case which clearly does not admit of explanation1 by the theory of coincidence1 worthy of all respect though this theory be1 is that related by ,m4 ,theodore ,flournoy1 science professor at the university of ,geneva1 in his remarkable work1 ,esprits et ,mediums4 ,professor ,flournoy is known to be one of the most learned and most critical exponents of the new science of metapsychics4 ,he even carries his fondness for natural explanations and his repugnance to admit the intervention of superhuman powers to a point where it is often difficult to follow him4 ,i will give the narrative as briefly as possible4 ,it will be found in full on pp4 #cdh to #cfb of his masterly book4 ,in ,august1 #ahhc1 a certain ,mme4 ,buscarlet1 whom he knew personally1 returned to ,geneva after spending three years with the ,moratief family at ,kazan as governess to two girls4 ,she continued to correspond with the family and also with a ,mme4 ,nitchinof1 who kept a school at ,kazan to which ,mlles4 ,moratief1 ,mme4 ,buscarlet's former pupils1 went after her departure4 ,on the night of the #ith of ,december 7,o4 ,s47 of the same year1 ,mme4 ,buscarlet had a dream which she described the following morning in a letter to ,mme4 ,moratief1 dated #aj ,december4 ,she wrote1 to quote her own words3 ,you and ,i were on a country-road when a carriage passed in front of us and a voice from inside called to us4 ,when we came up to the carriage1 we saw ,mlle4 ,olga ,popoi lying across it1 clothed in white1 wearing a bonnet trimmed with yellow ribbons4 ,she said to you3 ',i called you to tell you that ,mme4 ,nitchinof will leave the school on the #agth4' ,the carriage then drove on4 ,a week later and three days before the letter reached ,kazan1 the event foreseen in the dream was fulfilled in a tragic fashion4 ,mme4 ,nitchinof died on the #afth of an infectious disease2 and on the #agth her body was carried out of the school for fear of infection4 ,it is well to add that both ,mme4 ,buscarlet's letter and the replies which came from ,russia were communicated to ,professor ,flournoy and bear the postmark dates4 ,such premonitory dreams are frequent2 but it does not often happen that circumstances and especially the existence of a document dated previous to their fulfilment give them such incontestable authenticity4 ,we may remark in passing the odd character of this premonition1 which however is fully in accordance with the habits of our unknown guest4 ,the date is fixed precisely2 but only a veiled and mysterious allusion 7the woman lying across the carriage and cloaked in white7 is made to the essential part of the prediction1 the illness and death4 ,was there a coincidence1 a vision of the future pure and simple1 or a vision of the future suggested by telepathic influence8 ,the theory of coincidence can be defended1 if need be1 here as everywhere else1 but would be very extraordinary in this case4 ,as for telepathic influence1 we should have to suppose that1 on the #ith of ,december1 a week before her death1 ,mme4 ,nitchinof had in her subconsciousness a presentiment of her end and that she transmitted this presentiment across some thousands of miles1 from ,kazan to ,geneva1 to a person with whom she had never been intimate4 ,it is very complex1 but possible1 for telepathy often has these disconcerting ways4 ,if this were so1 the case which would be one of latent illness or even of self-suggestion2 and the preexistence of the future1 without being entirely disproved1 would be less clearly established4 #e ,let us pass to other examples4 ,i quote from an excellent article of the importance of precognitions1 by ,messrs4 ,pickering and ,sadgrove1 which appeared in the ,annales des ,sciences ,psychiques for #a ,february #aijh1 the summary of an experiment by ,mrs4 ,a4 ,w4 ,verrall told in full detail in ,vol4 ,,xx of the ,proceedings4 ,mrs4 ,verrall is a celebrated automatist2 and her cross-correspondence occupy a whole volume of the ,proceedings4 ,her good faith1 her sincerity1 her fairness and her scientific precision are above suspicion2 and she is one of the most active and respected members of the ,society for ,psychical ,research4 ,on the #aath of ,may1 #aija1 at #aa4aj p4m41 ,mrs4 ,verrall wrote as follows3 ,do not hurry date this hoc est quod volui--tandem4 greek here ,a4 ,w4 ,v4 greek here4 calx pedibus inhaerens difficultatem superavit4 magnopere adiuvas persectando semper4 ,nomen inscribere iam possum--sic1 en tibi6#a #a ,xenoglossy is well known not to be unusual in automatic writing2 sometimes even the 'automatist' speaks or writes languages of which he is completely ignorant4 ,the ,latin and ,greek passages are translated as follows3 ,this is what ,i have wanted at last4 ,justice and joy speak a word to the wise4 ,a4,w4,v4 and perhaps someone else4 ,chalk sticking to the feet has got over the difficulty4 ,you help greatly by always persevering4 ,now ,i can write a name--thus1 here it is6 ,after the writing comes a humorous drawing representing a bird walking4 ,that same night1 as there were said to be uncanny happenings in some rooms near the ,london ,law ,courts1 the watchers arranged to sit through the night in the empty rooms4 ,precautions were taken to prevent intrusion and powdered chalk was spread on the floor of the two smaller rooms1 to trace anybody or anything that might come or go4 ,mrs4 ,verrall knew nothing of the matter4 ,the phenomena began at #ab3dc ,a4,m4 and ended at #b3ji ,a4,m4 ,the watchers noticed marks on the powdered chalk4 ,on examination it was seen that the marks were clearly defined bird's footprints in the middle of the floor1 three in the left-hand room and five in the right-hand room4 ,the marks were identical and exactly #b #c_/d inches in width2 they might be compared to the footprints of a bird about the size of a turkey4 ,the footprints were observed at #b3cj ,a4 ,m42 the unexplained phenomena had begun at #ab3dc that same morning4 ,the words about chalk sticking to the feet are a singularly appropriate comment on the events2 but the remarkable point is that ,mrs4 ,verrall wrote what we have said ,,one ,,hour ,,and ,,thirty-,,three ,,minutes ,,before ,,the ,,events ,,took ,,place4 ,the persons who watched in the two rooms were questioned by ,mr4 ,j4 ,g4 ,piddington1 a member of the council of the ,s4 ,p4 ,r41 and declared that they had not any expectation of what they discovered4 ,i need hardly add that ,mrs4 ,verrall had never heard anything about the happenings in the haunted house and that the watchers were completely ignorant of ,mrs4 ,verrall's existence4 ,here then is a wry curious prediction of an event1 insignificant in itself1 which is to happen1 in a house unknown to the one who foretells it1 to people whom she does not know either4 ,the spiritualists1 who score in this case1 not without some reason1 will have it that a spirit1 in order to prove its existence and its intelligence1 organized this little scene in which the future1 the present and the past are all mixed up together4 ,are they right8 ,or is ,mrs4 ,verrall's subconsciousness roaming like this1 at random1 in the future8 ,it is certain that the problem has seldom appeared under a more baffling aspect4 #f ,we will now take another premonitory dream1 strictly controlled by the committee of the ,s4 ,p4 ,r4#a ,early in ,september1 #ahic1 ,annette1 wife of ,walter ,jones1 tobacconist1 of ,old ,gravel ,lane1 ,east ,london1 had her little boy ill4 ,one night she dreamt that she saw a cart drive up and stop near when she was4 ,it contained three coffins1 two white and one blue4 ,one white coffin was bigger than the other2 and the blue was the biggest of the three4 ,the driver took out the bigger white coffin and left it at the mother's feet1 driving off with the others4 ,mrs4 ,jones told her dream to her husband and to a neighbour1 laying particular stress on the curious circumstance that one of the coffins was blue4 #a ,proceedings1 vol4 xi41 p4 #dic4 ,on the #ajth of ,september1 a friend of ,mr4 and ,mrs4 ,jones was confined of a boy1 who died on the #bith of the same month4 ,their own little boy died on the following ,monday1 the #bnd of ,october1 being then sixteen months old4 ,it was decided to bury the two children on the same day4 ,on the morning of the day chosen1 the parish priest informed ,mr4 and ,mrs4 ,jones that another child had died in the neighbourhood and that its body would be brought into church along with the two others4 ,mrs4 ,jones remarked to her husband3 ,if the coffin is blue1 then my dream will come true4 ,for the two other coffins were white4 ,the third coffin was brought2 it was blue4 ,it remains to be observed that the dimensions of the coffins corresponded exactly with the dream premonitions1 the smallest being that of the child who died first1 the next that of the little ,jones boy1 who was sixteen months old1 and the largest1 the blue one1 that of a boy six years of age4 ,let us take1 more or less at random1 another case from the inexhaustible ,proceedings4#a ,the report is written by ,mr4 ,alfred ,cooper and attested by the ,duchess of ,hamilton1 the ,duke of ,manchester and another gentleman to whom the duchess related the incident before the fulfilment of the prophetic vision3 #a ,proceedings1 vol4 xi41 p4 #eje4 ,a fortnight before the death of the late ,earl of ,l4--1 says ,mr4 ,cooper1 in #ahhb1 ,i called upon the ,duke of ,hamilton1 in ,hill ,street1 to see him professionally4 ,after ,i had finished seeing him1 we went into the drawing-room where the duchess was1 and the duke said to me3 ',oh1 ,cooper1 how is the earl8' ,the duchess said1 ',what earl8' and1 on my answering1 ',lord ,l--1' she replied3 ',that is very odd4 ,i have had a most extraordinary vision4 ,i went to bed1 but1 after being in bed a short time1 ,i was not exactly asleep1 but thought ,i saw a scene as if from a play before me4 ,the actors in it were ,lord ,l--1 in a chair1 as if in a fit1 with a man standing near him with a red beard4 ,he was by the side of a bath1 over which bath a red lamp was distinctly shown4' ,i then said3 ',i am attending ,lord ,l-- at present2 there is very little the matter with him2 he is not going to die2 he will be all right very soon4' ,well1 he got better for a week and was nearly well1 but1 at the end of six or seven days after this1 ,i was called to see him suddenly4 ,he had inflammation of both lungs4 ,i called in ,sir ,william ,jenner1 but in six days he was a dead man4 ,there were two male nurses attending on him2 one had been taken ill4 ,but1 when ,i saw the other1 the dream of the duchess was exactly represented4 ,he was standing near a bath over the earl and1 strange to say1 his beard was red4 ,there was the bath with the red lamp over it2 and this brought the story to my mind4 ,the vision seen by the duchess was told two weeks before the death of ,lord ,l--4 ,it is a most remarkable thing4 #g ,but it is impossible to find space for the many instances related4 ,as ,i have said1 there are hundreds of them1 making their tracks in every direction across the plains of the future4 ,those which ,i have quoted give a sufficient idea of the predominating tone and the general aspect of this sort of story4 ,it is nevertheless right to add that many of them are not at all tragic and that premonition opens its mysterious and capricious vistas of the future in connection with the most diverse and insignificant events4 ,it cares but little for the human value of the occurrence and puts the vision of a number in a lottery in the same plane as the most dramatic death4 ,the roads by which it reaches us are also unexpected and varied4 ,often1 as in the examples quoted1 it comes to us in a dream4 ,sometimes1 it is an auditory or visual hallucination which seizes upon us while awake2 sometimes1 an indefinable but clear and irresistible presentiment1 a shapeless but powerful obsession1 an absurd but imperative certainty which rises from the depths of our inner darkness1 where perhaps lies hidden the final answer to every riddle4 ,one might illustrate each of these manifestations with numerous examples4 ,i will mention only a few1 selected not among the most striking or the most attractive1 but among those which have been most strictly tested and investigated4#a ,a young peasant from the neighbourhood of ,ghent1 two months before the drawing for the conscription1 announces to all and sundry that he will draw number #ij from the urn4 ,on entering the presence of the district-commissioner in charge1 he asks if number #ij is still in4 ,the answer is yes4 #a ,proceedings1 vol4 xi41 p4 #ede4 ,well then1 ,i shall have it6 ,and1 to the general amazement1 he does draw number #ij4 ,questioned as to the manner in which he acquired this strange certainty1 he declared that1 two months ago1 just after he had gone to bed1 he saw a huge1 indescribable form appear in a corner of his room1 with the number #ij standing out plainly in the middle1 in figures the size of a man's hand4 ,he sat up in bed and shut and opened his eyes to persuade himself that he was not dreaming4 ,the apparition remained in the same place1 distinctly and undeniably4 ,professor ,georges ,hulin1 of the university of ,ghent1 and ,m4 ,jules van ,dooren1 the district commissioner1 who report the incident1 mention three other similar and equally striking cases witnessed by ,m4 van ,dooren during his term of office4 ,i am the less inclined to doubt their declaration inasmuch as ,i am personally acquainted with them and know that their statements1 as regards the objective reality of the facts1 are so to speak equivalent to a legal deposition4 ,m4 ,bozzano mentions some previsions which are quite as remarkable in connection with the gaming-tables at ,monte ,carlo4 ,i repeat1 ,i am aware that1 in the case of these occurrences and those which resemble them1 it is possible once again to invoke the theory of coincidence4 ,it will be contended that there are probably a thousand predictions of this kind which are never talked about1 because they were not fulfilled1 whereas1 if one of them is accomplished1 which is bound by the law of probabilities to happen some day or other1 the astonishment is general and free rein is given to the imagination4 ,this is true2 nevertheless1 it is well to enquire whether these predictions are as frequent as is loosely stated4 ,in the matter of those which concern the conscription-drawings1 for instance1 ,i have had the opportunity of interrogating more than we constant witness of these little dramas of fate2 and all admitted that1 on the whole1 they are much clearer than one would believe4 ,next1 we must not forget that there can be no question here of scientific proofs4 ,we are in the midst of a slippery and nebulous region1 where we would not dare to risk a step if we were not allowing ourselves to be guided by our feelings rather than by certainties which we are not forbidden to hope for1 but which are not yet in sight4 #h ,we will abridge our subject still further1 referring readers who wish to know the details to the originals1 lest we should never have done2 or rather1 instead of attempting an abridgment1 which would still be too long1 so plentiful are the materials1 we will content ourselves with enumerating a few instances1 all taken from ,bozzano's ,des ,phenomenes premonitoires4 ,we read there of a funeral procession seen on a high-road several days before it actually passed that way2 or1 again1 of a young mechanic who1 in the beginning of ,november1 dreamt that he came home at half-past five in the afternoon and saw his sister's little girl run over by a tram-car while crossing the street in front of the house4 ,he told his dream1 in great distress2 and1 on the #acth of the same month1 in spite of all the precautions that had been taken1 the child was run over by the tram-car and killed at the hour named4 ,we find the ghost1 the phantom animal or the mysterious noise which1 in certain families1 is the traditional herald of a death or of an imminent catastrophe4 ,we find the celebrated vision which the painter ,segantini had thirteen days before his decease1 every detail of which remained in his mind and was represented in his last picture1 ,death4 ,we find the ,messina disaster dearly foreseen1 twice over1 by a little girl who perished under the ruins of the ill-fated city2 and we read of a dream which1 three months before the ,french invasion of ,russia1 foretold to ,countess ,toutschkoff that her husband would fall at ,borodino1 a village so little known at the time that those interested in the dream looked in vain for its name on the maps4 ,until now we have spoken only of the spontaneous manifestations of the future4 ,it would seem as though coming events1 gathered in front of our lives1 bear with crushing weight upon the uncertain and deceptive dike of the present1 which is no longer able to contain them4 ,they ooze through1 they seek a crevice by which to reach us4 ,but1 side by side with these passive1 independent and intractable premonitions1 which are but so many vagrant and furtive emanations of the unknown1 are others which do yield to entreaty1 allow themselves to be directed into channels1 are more or less obedient to our orders and will sometimes reply to the questions which we put to them4 ,they come from the same inaccessible reservoir1 are no less mysterious1 but yet appear a little more human than the others2 and1 without drugging ourselves with puerile or dangerous illusions1 we may be permitted to hope that1 if we follow them and study them attentively1 they will one day open to us the hidden paths that join that which is no more to that which is not yet4 ,it is true that here1 where we must needs mix with the somewhat lawless world of professional mystery-mongers1 we have to increase our caution and walk with measured steps on very suspicious ground4 ,but in this region of pitfalls we glean a certain number of facts that cannot reasonably be contested4 ,it will be enough to recall1 for instance1 the symbolic premonitions of the famous seeress of ,prevorst1 ,frau ,hauffe1 whose prophetic spirit was awakened by soap bubbles1 crystals and mirrors2#a the clairvoyant who1 eighteen years before the event1 foretold the death of a girl by the hand of her rival in #aijg1 in a written prophecy which was presented to the court by the mother of the murdered girl2#a ,a4 ,j4 ,c4 ,kerner3 ,die ,scherin von ,prevorst #ada #a the gypsy who1 also in writing1 foretold all the events in ,miss ,isabel ,arundel's life1 including the name of her husband1 ,burton1 the famous explorer2#b the sealed letter addressed to ,m4 ,morin1 vice-president of the ,societe du ,mesmerisme1 describing the most unexpected circumstances of a death that occurred a month later2#c the famous ,marmontel prediction1 obtained by ,mrs4 ,verrall's cross-correspondences1 which gives a vision1 two months and a half before their accomplishment1 of the most insignificant actions of a traveller in an hotel bedroom2#d and many others4 #a ,light1 #aijg1 p4 #bai4 ,the crime was committed in ,paris and made a great stir at the time4 #b ,lady ,burton3 ,the ,life of ,captain ,sir ,richd4 ,f4 ,burton1 ,k4,c4,m4,g41 vol4i41 p4#bec4 #c ,journal of the ,society for ,psychical ,research1 vol4 ix41 p4 #ae4 #d ,proceedings1 vol4 xx41 p4 #cca4 #i ,i will not review the various and very often grotesque methods of interrogating the future that are most frequently practised to-day3 cards1 palmistry1 crystal-gazing1 fortune-telling by means of coffee-grounds1 tea-leaves1 magnetic needles and white of egg1 graphology1 astrology and the rest4 ,these methods1 as ,i have already said1 are worth exactly what the medium who employs them is worth4 ,they have no other object than to arouse the medium's subconsciousness and to bring it into relation with that of the person questioning him4 ,as a matter of fact1 all these purely empirical processes are but so many1 often puerile forms of self-manifestation adopted by the undeniable gift which is known as intuition1 clairvoyance or1 in certain cases1 psychometry4 ,i have spoken at sufficient length of this last faculty not to linger over it now4 ,all that we have still to do is to consider it for a moment in its relations with the foretelling of the future4 ,a large number of investigations1 notably those conducted by ,m4 ,duchatel and ,dr4 ,osty1 show that1 in psychometry1 the notion of time1 as ,dr4 ,joseph ,maxwell observes1 is very loose1 that is to say1 the past1 present and future nearly always overlap4 ,most of the clairvoyant or psychometric subjects1 when they are honest1 do not know1 do not feel1 as ,m4 ,duchatel very ably remarks1 what the future is4 ,they do not distinguish it from the other tenses2 and consequently they succeed in being prophets1 but unconscious prophets4 ,in a word--and this is a very important indication from the point of view of the probable coexistence of the three tenses--it appears that they see that which is not yet with the same clearness and on the same plane as that which is no more1 but are incapable of separating the two visions and picking out the future which alone interests us4 ,for a still stronger reason1 it is impossible for them to state dates with precision4 ,nevertheless1 the fact remains that1 when we take the trouble to sift their evidence and have the patience to await the realization of certain events which are sometimes not due for a long time to come1 the future is fairly often perceived by some of these strange soothsayers4 ,there are psychometers1 however1 and notably ,mme4 ,m--1 ,dr4 ,osty's favorite medium1 who never confuse the future and the past4 ,mme4 ,m-- places her visions in time according to the position which they occupy in space4 ,thus she sees the future in front of her1 the past behind her and the present beside her4 ,but1 notwithstanding these distinctly-graded visions1 she also is incapable of naming her dates exactly2 in fact1 her mistakes in this respect are so general that ,dr4 ,osty looks upon it as a pure chronological coincidence when a prediction is realized at the moment foretold4 ,we should also observe that1 in psychometry1 only those events can be perceived which relate directly to the individual communicating with the percipient1 for it is not so much the percipient that sees into us as we that read in our own subconsciousness1 which is momentarily lighted by his presence4 ,we must not therefore ask him for predictions of a general character1 whether1 for instance1 there will be a war in the spring1 an epidemic in the summer or an earthquake in the autumn4 ,the moment the question concerns events1 however important1 with which we are not intimately connected1 he is bound to answer1 as do all the genuine mediums1 that he sees nothing4 ,the area of his vision being thus limited1 does he really discover the future in it8 ,after three years of numerous1 cautious and systematic experiments with some twenty mediums1 ,dr4 ,osty categorically declares that he does3 ,all the incidents1 he says1 which filled these three years of my life1 whether wished for by me or not1 or even absolutely contrary to the ordinary routine of my life1 had always been foretold to me1 not all by each of the clairvoyant subjects1 but all by one or other of them4 ,as ,i have been practising these tests continually1 it seems to me that the experience of three years wholly devoted to this object should give some weight to my opinion on the subject of predictions4 ,this is incontestable2 and the sincerity1 scientific conscientiousness and high intellectual value of ,dr4 ,osty's fine work inspire one with the most entire confidence4 ,unfortunately1 he contents himself with quoting too summarily a few facts and does not1 as he ought1 give us in extenso the details of his experiments1 controls and tests4 ,i am well aware that this would be a thankless and wearisome task1 necessitating a large volume which a mass of puerile incidents and inevitable repetitions would make almost readable4 ,moreover1 it could scarcely help taking the form of an intimate and indiscreet autobiography2 and it is not easy to bring one's self to make this sort of public confession4 ,but it has to be done4 ,in a science which is only in its early stages1 it is not enough to show the object attained and to state one's conviction2 it is necessary above all to describe every path that has been taken and1 by an incessant and infinite accumulation of investigated and attested facts1 to enable every one to draw his own conclusions4 ,this has been the cumbrous and laborious method of the ,proceedings for over thirty years2 and it is the only right one4 ,discussion is possible and fruitful only at that price4 ,in all these extraconscious matters1 we have not yet reached the stage of definite deduction1 we are still bringing up materials to the scene of operations4 ,once more1 ,i know that1 in these cases1 as ,i have seen for myself1 the really convincing facts are necessarily very rare2 indeed1 nowhere else do we meet with the same difficulty4 ,if the medium tells you1 for instance1 as ,mme4 ,m4 seems easily to do1 how you will employ your day from the morning onwards1 if she sees you in a certain house in a certain street meeting this or that person1 it is impossible to say that1 on the one hand1 she is not already reading your as yet unconscious plans or intentions1 or that1 on the other hand1 by doing what she has foreseen1 you are not obeying a suggestion against which you could not fight except by violently doing the opposite to what it demands of you1 which again would be a case of inverted suggestion4 ,none therefore would have any value save predictions of unlikely happenings1 clearly defined and outside the sphere of the person interested4 ,as ,dr4 ,osty says3 ,the ideal prognostication would obviously be that of an event so rare1 so sudden and unexpected1 implying such a change in one's mode of life that the theory of coincidence could not decently be put forward4 ,but1 as everybody is not1 in the peaceful course of his threatened by such an absolutely convincing event1 the clairvoyant cannot always reveal to the person experimenting--and reveal it for a more or less approximate date--one of those incidents whose accomplishment would carry irresistible conviction4 ,in any case1 the question of psychometric prognostications calls for further enquiry1 although it is easy even at the present day to forsee the results4 #aj ,let us now return to our spontaneous premonitions1 in which the future comes to seek us of its own accord and1 so to speak1 to challenge us at home4 ,i know from personal experience that1 when we embark upon these disconcerting matters1 the first impression is scarcely favourable4 ,we are very much inclined to laugh1 to treat as wearisome tales1 as hysterical hallucinations1 as ingenious or interested fictions most or those incidents which give too violent a shock to the narrow and limited idea which we have of our human life4 ,to smile1 to reject everything beforehand and to pass by with averted head1 as was done1 ,i remember1 in the time of ,galvani1 and in the early days of hypnotism1 is much more easy and seems more respectable and prudent than to stop1 admit and examine4 ,nevertheless we must not forget that it is to some who did not smile so lightly that we owe the best part of the marvels from whose heights we are preparing to smile in our turn4 ,for the rest1 ,i grant that1 thus presented1 hastily and summarily1 without the details that throw light upon them and the proofs that support them1 the incidents in question do not show to advantage and1 inasmuch as they are isolated and sparingly chosen1 lose all the weight and authority derived from the compact and imposing mass whence they are arbitrarily detached4 ,as ,i said above1 nearly a thousand cases have been collected1 representing probably not the tenth part of those which a more active and general search might bring together4 ,the number is evidently of importance and denotes the enormous pressure of the mystery2 but1 if there were only half a dozen genuine cases--and ,dr4 ,maxwell's1 ,professor ,flournoy's1 ,mrs4 ,verrall's1 the ,marmontel1 ,jones and ,hamilton cases and some others are undoubtedly genuine--they would be enough to show that1 under the erroneous idea which we form of the past and the present1 a new verity is living and moving1 eager to come to light4 ,the efforts of that verity1 ,i need hardly say1 display a very different sort of force after we have actually and attentively read those hundreds of extraordinary stories which1 without appearing to do so1 strike to the very roots of history4 ,we soon lose all inclination to doubt4 ,we penetrate into another world and come to a stop all out of countenance4 ,we no longer know where we stand2 before and after overlap and mingle4 ,we no longer distinguish the insidious and factitious but indispensable line which separates the years that have gone by from the years that are to come4 ,we clutch at the hours and days of the past and present to reassure ourselves1 to fasten on to some certainty1 to convince ourselves that we are still in our right place in this life where that which is not yet seems as substantial1 as real1 as positive1 as powerful as that which is no more4 ,we discover with uneasiness that time1 on which we based our whole existence1 itself no longer exists4 ,it is no longer the swiftest of our gods1 known to us only by its flight across all things3 it alters its position no more than space1 of which it is doubtless but the incomprehensible reflex4 ,it reigns in the centre of every event2 and every event is fixed in its centre2 and all that comes and all that goes passes from end to end of our little life without moving by a hair's breadth around its motionless pivot4 ,it is entitled to but one of the thousand names which we have been wont to lavish upon its power1 a power that seemed to us manifold and innumerable3 yesterday1 recently1 formerly1 erewhile1 after1 before1 tomorrow1 soon1 never1 later fall like childish masks1 whereas to-day and always completely cover with their united shadows the idea which we form in the end of a duration which has no subdivisions1 no breaks and no stages1 which is pulseless1 motionless and boundless4 #aa ,many are the theories which men have imagined in their attempts to explain the working of the strange phenomenon2 and many others might be imagined4 ,as we have seen1 self-suggestion and telepathy explain certain cases which concern events already in existence1 but still latent and perceived before the knowledge of them can reach us by the normal process of the senses or the intelligence4 ,but1 even by extending these two theories to their uttermost point and positively abusing their accommodating elasticity1 we do not succeed in illumining by their aid more than a rather restricted portion of the vast undiscovered land4 ,we must therefore look for something else4 ,the first theory which suggests itself and which on the surface seems rather attractive is that of spiritualism1 which may be extended until it is scarcely distinguishable from the theosophical theory and other religious suppositions4 ,it assumes the revival of spirits1 the existence of discarnate or other superior and more mysterious entities which surround us1 interest themselves in our fate1 guide our thoughts and our actions and1 above all1 know the future4 ,it is1 as we recognized when speaking of ghosts and hanted houses1 a very acceptable theory2 and any one to whom it appears can adopt it without doing violence to his intelligence4 ,but we must confess that it seems less necessary and perhaps even less clearly proved in this region than in that4 ,it starts by begging the question3 without the intervention of discarnate beings1 the spiritualists say1 it is impossible to explain the majority of the premonitory phenomena2 therefore we must admit the existence of these discarnate beings4 ,let us grant it for the moment1 for to beg the question1 which is merely an indefensible trick of the superficial logic of our brain1 does not necessarily condemn a theory and neither takes away from nor adds to the reality of things4 ,besides1 as we shall insist later1 the intervention or non-intervention of the spirits is not the point at issue2 and the crux of the mystery does not lie there4 ,what most interest us is far less the paths or intermediaries by which prophetic warnings reach us than the actual existence of the future in the present4 ,it is true--to do complete justice to neospiritualism--that its position offers certain advantages from the point of view of the almost inconceivable problem of the preexistence of the future4 ,it can evade or divert some of the consequences of that problem4 ,the spirits1 it declares1 do not necessarily see the future as a whole1 as a total past or present1 motionless and immovable1 but they know infinitely better than we do the numberless causes that determine any agent1 so that1 finding themselves at the luminous source of those causes1 they have no difficulty in foreseeing their effects4 ,they are1 with respect to the incidents still in process of formation1 in the position of an astronomer who foretells1 within a second1 all the phases of an eclipse in which a savage sees nothing but an unprecedented catastrophe which he attributes to the anger of his idols of straw or clay4 ,it is indeed possible that this acquaintance with a greater number of causes explains certain predictions2 but there are plenty of others which presume a knowledge of so many causes1 causes so remote and so profound1 that this knowledge is hardly to be distinguished from a knowledge of the future pure and simple4 ,in any case1 beyond certain limits1 the preexistence of causes seems no clearer than that of effects4 ,nevertheless1 it must be admitted that the spiritualists gain a slight advantage here4 ,they believe that they gain another when they say or might say that it is still possible that the spirits stimulate us to realize the events which they foretell without themselves clearly perceiving them in the future4 ,after announcing1 for instance1 that on a certain day we shall go to a certain place and do a certain thing1 they urge us irresistibly to proceed to the spot named and there to perform the act prophesied4 ,but this theory1 like those of self-suggestion and telepathy1 would explain only a few phenomena and would leave in obscurity all those cases1 infinitely more numerous because they make up almost the whole of our future1 in which either chance intervenes or some event in no way dependent upon our will or the spirit's1 unless indeed we suppose that the latter possesses an omniscience and an omnipotence which take us back to the original mysteries of the problem4 ,besides1 in the gloomy regions of precognition1 it is almost always a matter of anticipating a misfortune and very rarely1 if ever1 of meeting with a pleasure or a joy4 ,we should therefore have to admit that the spirits which drag me to the fatal place and compel me to do the act that will have tragic consequences are deliberately hostile to me and find diversion only in the spectacle of my suffering4 ,what could those spirits be1 from what evil world would they arise and how should we explain why our brothers and friends of yesterday1 after passing through the august and peace-bestowing gates of death1 suddenly become transformed into crafty and malevolent demons8 ,can the great spiritual kingdom1 in which all passions born of the flesh should be stilled1 be but a dismal abode of hatred1 spite and envy8 ,it will perhaps be said that they lead us into misfortune in order to purify us2 but this brings us to religious theories which it is not our intention to examine4 #ab ,the only attempt at an explanation that can hold its own with spiritualism has recourse once again to the mysterious powers of our subconsciousness4 ,we must needs to recognize that1 if the future exists to-day1 already such as it will be when it becomes for us the present and the past1 the intervention of discarnate minds or of any other spiritual entity adrift from another sphere is of little avail4 ,we can picture an infinite spirit indifferently contemplating the past and future in their coexistence2 we can imagine a whole hierarchy of intermediate intelligences taking a more or less extensive part in the contemplation and transmitting it to our subconsciousness4 ,but all this is practically nothing more than inconsistent speculation and ingenious dreaming in the dark2 in any case1 it is adventitious1 secondary and provisional4 ,let us keep to the facts as we see them3 an unknown faculty1 buried deep in our being and generally inactive1 perceives1 on rare occasions1 events that have not yet taken place4 ,we possess but one certainty on this subject1 namely1 that the phenomenon actually occurs within ourselves2 it is therefore within ourselves that we must first study it1 without burdening ourselves with suppositions which remove it from its centre and simply shift the mystery4 ,the incomprehensible mystery is the preexistence of the future2 once we admit this--and it seems very difficult to deny--there is no reason to attribute to imaginary intermediaries rather than to ourselves the faculty of descrying certain fragments of that future4 ,we see1 in regard to most of the mediumistic manifestations1 that we possess within ourselves all the unusual forces with which the spiritualists endow discarnate spirits2 and why should it be otherwise as concerns the powers of divination8 ,the explanation taken from the subconsciousness is the most direct1 the simplest1 the nearest1 whereas the other is endlessly circuitous1 complicated and distant4 ,until the spirits testify to their existence in an unanswerable fashion1 there is no advantage in seeking in the grave for the solution of a riddle that appears indeed to lie at the roots of our own life4 #ac ,it is true that this explanation does not explain much2 but the others are just as ineffectual and are open to the same objections4 ,these objections are many and various2 and it is easier to raise them than to reply to them4 ,for instance1 we can ask ourselves why the subconsciousness or the spirits1 seeing that they read the future and are able to announce an impending calamity1 hardly ever give us the one useful and definite indication that would allow us to avoid it4 ,what can be the childish or mysterious reason of this strange reticence8 ,in many cases it is almost criminal2 for instance1 in a case related by ,professor ,hyslop#a we see the foreboding of the greatest misfortune that can befall a mother germinating1 growing1 sending out shoots1 developing1 like some gluttonous and deadly plant1 to stop short on the verge of the last warning1 the one detail1 insignificant in itself but indispensable1 which would have saved the child4 ,it is the case of a woman who begins by experiencing a vague but powerful impression that a grievous burden was going to fall upon her family4 ,next month1 this premonitory feeling repeats itself very frequently1 becomes more intense and ends by concentrating itself upon the poor woman's little daughter4 ,each time that she is planning something for the child's future1 she hears a voice saying3 ,she'll never need it4 #a ,proceedings1 vol4 xiv41 p4 #bff4 ,a week before the catastrophe1 a violent smell of fire fills the house4 ,from that time1 the mother begins to be careful about matches1 seeing that they are in safe places and out of reach4 ,she looks all over the house for them and feels a strong impulse to burn all matches of the kind easily lighted4 ,about an hour before the fatal disaster1 she reaches for a box to destroy it2 but she says to herself that her eldest boy is gone out1 thinks that she may need the matches to light the gas-stove and decides to destroy them as soon as he comes back4 ,she takes the child up to its crib for its morning sleep and1 as she is putting it into the cradle1 she hears the usual mysterious voice whisper in her ear3 ,turn the mattress4 ,but1 being in a great hurry1 she simply says that she will turn the mattress after the child has taken its nap4 ,she then goes downstairs to work4 ,after a while1 she hears the child cry and1 hurrying up to the room1 finds the crib and its bedding on fire and the child so badly burnt that it dies in three hours4 #ad ,before going further and theorizing about this case1 let us once more state the matter precisely4 ,i know that the reader may straightway and quite legitimately deny the value of anecdotes of this kind4 ,he will say that we have to do with a neurotic who has drawn upon her imagination for all the elements that give a dramatic setting to the story and surround with a halo of mystery a sad but commonplace domestic accident4 ,this is quite possible2 and it is perfectly allowable to dismiss the case4 ,but it is none the less true that1 by thus deliberately rejecting everything that does not bear the stamp of mathematical or judicial certainty1 we risk losing as we go along most of the opportunities or clues which the great riddle of this world offers us in its moments of inattention or graciousness4 ,at the beginning of an enquiry we must know how to content ourselves with little4 ,for the incident in question to be convincing1 previous evidence in writing1 more or less official statements would be required1 whereas we have only the declarations of the husband1 a neighbour and a sister4 ,this is insufficient1 ,i agree2 but we must at the same time confess that the circumstances are hardly favourable to obtaining the proofs which we demand4 ,those who receive warnings of this kind either believe in them or do not believe in them4 ,if they believe in them1 it is quite natural that they should not think first of all of the scientific interest of their trouble1 or of putting down in writing and thus authenticating its premonitory symptoms and gradual evolution4 ,if they do not believe in them1 it is no less natural that they should not proceed to speak or take notice of inanities of which they do not recognize the value until after they have lost the opportunity of supplying convincing proofs of them4 ,also1 do not forget that the little story in question is selected from among a hundred others1 which in their turn are equally indecisive1 but which1 repeating the same facts and the same tendencies with a strange persistency1 and by weakening the most inveterate distrust4#a #a ,see1 in particular1 ,bozzano's cases xlix4 and lxvii4 ,these two1 especially case xlix41 which tells of a personal experience of the late ,w4 ,t4 ,stead1 are supported by more substantial proofs4 ,i have quoted ,professor ,hyslop's case1 because the reticence is more striking4 #ae ,having said this much1 in order to conciliate or part company with those who have no intention of leaving the terra firma of science1 let us return to the case before us1 which is all the more disquieting inasmuch as we may consider it a sort of prototype of the tragic and almost diabolical reticence which we find in most premonitions4 ,it is probable that under the mattress there was a stray match which the child discovered and struck2 this is the only possible explanation of the catastrophe1 for there was no fire burning on that floor of the house4 ,if the mother had turned the mattress1 she would have seen the match2 and1 on the other hand1 she would certainly have turned the mattress if she had been told that there was a match underneath it4 ,why did the voice that urged her to perform the necessary action not add the one word that was capable of ensuring that action8 ,the problem moreover is equally perturbing and perhaps equally insoluble whether it concerns our own subconscious faculties1 or spirits1 or strange intelligences4 ,those who give these warnings must know that they will be useless1 because they manifestly foresee the event as a whole2 but they must also know that one last word1 which they do not pronounce1 would be enough to prevent the misfortune that is already consummated in their prevision4 ,they know it so well that they bring this word to the very edge of the abyss1 hold it suspended there1 almost let it fall and recapture it suddenly at the moment when its weight would have caused happiness and life to rise once more1 to the surface of the mighty gulf4 ,what then is this mystery8 ,is it incapacity or hostility8 ,if they are incapable1 what is the unexpected and sovereign force that interposes between them and us8 ,and1 if they are hostile1 on what1 on whom are they revenging themselves8 ,what can be the secret of those inhuman games1 of those uncanny and cruel diversions on the most slippery and dangerous peaks of fate8 ,why warn1 if they know that the warning will be in vain8 ,of whom are they making sport8 ,is there really an inflexible fatality by virtue of which that which has to be accomplished is accomplished from all eternity8 ,but then why not respect silence1 since all speech is useless8 ,or do they1 in spite of all1 perceive a gleam1 a crevice in the inexorable wall8 ,what hope do they find in it8 ,have they not seen more clearly than ourselves that no deliverance can come through that crevice8 ,one could understand this fluttering and wavering1 all these efforts of theirs1 if they did not know2 but here it is proved that they know everything1 since they foretell exactly that which they might prevent4 ,if we press them with questions1 they answer that there is nothing to be done1 that no human power could avert or thwart the issue4 ,are they mad1 bored1 irritable1 or accessory to a hideous pleasantry8 ,does our fate depend on the happy solution of some petty enigma or childish conundrum1 even as our salvation1 in most of the so-called revealed religious1 is settled by a blind and stupid cast of the die8 ,is all the liberty that we are granted reduced to the reading of a more or less ingenious riddle8 ,can the great soul of the universe be the soul of a great baby8 #af ,but1 rather than pursue this subject1 let us be just and admit that there is perhaps no way out of the maze and that our reproaches are as incomprehensible as the conduct of the spirits4 ,indeed1 what would you have them do in the circle in which our logic imprisons them8 ,either they foretell us a calamity which their predictions cannot avert1 in which case there is no use in foretelling it1 or1 if they announce it to us and at the same time give us the means to prevent it1 they do not really see the future and are foretelling nothing1 since the calamity is not to take place1 with the result that their action seems equally absurd in both cases4 ,it is obvious3 to whichever side we turn1 we find nothing but the incomprehensible4 ,on the one hand1 the preestablished1 unshakable1 unalterable future which we have called destiny1 fatality or what you will1 which suppresses man's entire independence and liberty of action and which is the most inconceivable and the dreariest of mysteries2 on the other1 intelligences apparently superior to our own1 since they know what we do not1 which1 while aware that their intervention is always useless and very often cruel1 nevertheless come harassing us with their sinister and ridiculous predictions4 ,must we resign ourselves once more to living with our eyes shut and our reason drowned in the boundless ocean of darkness2 and is there no outlet8 #ag ,for the moment we will not linger in the dark regions of fatality1 which is the supreme mystery1 the desolation of every effort and every thought of man4 ,what is clearest amid this incomprehensibility is that the spiritualistic theory1 at first sight the most seductive1 declares itself1 on examination1 the most difficult to justify4 ,we will also once more put aside the theosophical theory or any other which assumes a divine intention and which might1 to a certain extent1 explain the hesitations and anguish of the prophetic warnings1 at the cost1 however1 of other puzzles1 a thousand times as hard to solve1 which nothing authorizes us to substitute for the actual puzzle1 formless and infinite1 presented to our uninitiated vision4 ,when all is said1 it is perhaps only in the theory which attributes those premonitions to our subconsciousness that we are able to find1 if not a justification1 at least a sort of explanation of that formidable reticence4 ,they accord fairly well with the strange1 inconsistent1 whimsical and disconcerting character of the unknown entity within us that seems to live on nothing but nondescript fare borrowed from worlds to which nor intelligence as yet has no access4 ,it lives under our reason1 in a sort of invisible and perhaps eternal palace1 like a casual guest1 dropped from another planet1 whose interests1 ideas1 habits1 passions have naught in common with ours4 ,if it seems to have notions on the hereafter that are infinitely wider and more precise than those which we possess1 it has only very vague notions on the practical needs of our existence4 ,it ignores us for years1 absorbed no doubt with the numberless relations which it maintains with all the mysteries of the universe2 and1 when suddenly it remembers us1 thinking apparently to please us1 it makes an enormous1 miraculous1 but at the same time clumsy and superfluous movement1 which upsets all that we believed we knew1 without teaching us anything4 ,is it making fun of us1 is it jesting1 is it amusing itself1 is it facetious1 teasing1 arch1 or simply sleepy1 bewildered1 inconsistent1 absent-minded8 ,in any case1 it is rather remarkable that it evidently dislikes to make itself useful4 ,it readily performs the most glamorous feats of sleight-of-hand1 provided that we can derive no profit from them4 ,it lifts up tables1 moves the heaviest articles1 produces flowers and hair1 sets strings vibrating1 gives life to inanimate objects and passes through solid matter1 conjures up ghosts1 subjugates time and space1 creates light2 but all1 it seems1 on one condition1 that its performances should be without rhyme or reason and keep to the province of supernaturally vain and puerile recreations4 ,the case of the divining-rod is almost the only one in which it lends us any regular assistance1 this being a sort of game1 of no great importance1 in which it appears to take pleasure4 ,sometimes1 to say all that can be said1 it consents to cure certain ailments1 cleanses an ulcer1 closes a wound1 heals a lung1 strengthens or makes supple an arm or leg1 or even sets bones1 but always as it were by accident1 without reason1 method or object1 in a deceitful1 illogical and preposterous fashion4 ,one would set it down as a spoilt child that has been allowed to lay hands on the most tremendous secrets of heaven and earth2 it has no suspicion of their power1 jumbles them all up together and turns them into paltry1 inoffensive toys4 ,it knows everything1 perhaps1 but is ignorant of the uses of its knowledge1 ,it has its arms laden with treasures which it scatters in the wrong manner and at the wrong time1 giving bread to the thirsty and water to the hungry1 overloading those who refuse and stripping the suppliant bare1 pursuing those who flee from it and fleeing from those who pursue it4 ,lastly1 even at its best moments1 it behaves as though the fate of the being in whose depths it dwells interested it hardly at all1 as though it had but an insignificant share in his misfortunes1 feeling assured1 one might almost think1 of an independent and endless existence4 ,it is not surprising1 therefore1 when we know its habits1 that its communications on the subject of the future should be as fantastic as the other manifestations of its knowledge or its power4 ,let us add1 to be quite fair1 that1 in those warnings which we would wish to see efficacious1 it stumbles against the same difficulties as the spirits or other alien intelligences uselessly foretelling the event which they cannot prevent1 or annihilating the event by the very fact of foretelling it4 #ah ,and now1 to end the question1 is our unknown guest alone responsible8 ,does it explain itself badly or do we not understand it8 ,when we look into the matter closely1 there is1 under those anomalous and confused manifestations1 in spite of efforts which we feel to be enormous and persevering1 a sort of incapacity for self expression and action which is bound to attract our attention4 ,is our conscious and individual life separated by impenetrable worlds from our subconscious and probably universal life8 ,does our unknown guest speak an unknown language and do the words which it speaks and which we think that we understand disclose its thought8 ,is every direct road pitilessly barred and is there nothing left to it but narrow1 dosed paths in which the best of what it had to reveal to us is lost8 ,is this the reason why it seeks those odd1 childish1 roundabout ways of automatic writing1 cross-correspondence1 symbolic premonition and all the rest8 ,yet1 in the typical case which we have quoted1 it seems to speak quite easily and plainly when it says to the mother3 ,turn the mattress4 ,if it can utter this sentence1 why should it find it difficult or impossible to add3 ,you will find the matches there that will set fire to the curtains4 ,what forbids it to do so and closes its mouth at the decisive moment8 ,we relapse into the everlasting question3 if it cannot complete the second sentence because it would be destroying in the womb the very event which it is foretelling1 why does it utter the first8 #ai ,but it is well in spite of everything to seek an explanation of the inexplicable2 it is by attacking it on every side1 at all hazards1 that we cherish the hope of overcoming it2 and we may therefore say to ourselves that our subconsciousness1 when it warns us of a calamity that is about to fall upon us1 knowing all the future as it does1 necessarily knows that the calamity is already accomplished4 ,as our conscious and unconscious lives blend in it1 it distresses itself and flutters around our overconfident ignorance4 ,it tries to inform us1 through nervousness1 through pity1 so as to mitigate the lightning cruelty of the blow4 ,it speaks all the words that can prepare us for its coming1 define it and identify it2 but it is unable to say those which would prevent it from coming1 seeing that it has come1 that it is already present and perhaps past1 manifest1 ineffaceable1 on another plane than that on which we live1 the only plane which we are capable of perceiving4 ,it finds itself1 in a word1 in the position of the man who1 in the midst of peaceful1 happy and unsuspecting folk1 alone knows some bad news4 ,he is neither able nor willing to announce it nor yet to hide it completely4 ,he hesitates1 delays1 makes more or less transparent allusions1 but does not either say the last word that would1 so to speak1 let loose the catastrophe in the hearts of the people around him1 for to those who do not know of it the catastrophe is still as though it were not there4 ,our subconsciousness1 in that case1 would act towards the future as we act towards the past1 the two conditions being identical1 so much so that it often confuses them1 as we can see more particularly in the celebrated ,marmontel case1 where it evidently blunders and reports as accomplished an incident that will not take place until several months later4 ,it is of course impossible for us1 at the stage which we have reached1 to understand this confusion or this coexistence of the past1 the present and the future2 but that is no reason for denying it2 on the contrary1 what man understands least is probably that which most nearly approaches the truth4 #bj ,lastly1 to complicate the question1 it may be very justly objected that1 though premonitions in general are useless and appear systematically to withhold the only indispensable and decisive words1 there are1 nevertheless1 some that often seem to save those who obey them4 ,these1 it is true1 are rarer than the first1 but still they include a certain number that are well authenticated4 ,it remains to be seen how far they imply a knowledge of the future4 ,here1 for instance1 is a traveler who1 arriving at night in a small unknown town and walking along the ill-lighted dock in the direction of an hotel of which he roughly knows the position1 at a given moment tech an irresistible impulse to turn and go the other way4 ,he instantly obeys1 though his reason protests and berates him for a fool in taking a roundabout way to his destination4 ,the next day he discovers that1 if he had gone a few feet farther1 he would certainly have slipped into the river2 and1 as he was but a feeble swimmer1 he would just as certainly1 being alone and unaided in the extreme darkness1 have been drowned4#a #a ,proceedings1 vol4 xi41 p4 #dbb4 ,but is this a prevision of an event8 ,no1 for no event is to take place4 ,there is simply an abnormal perception of the proximity of some unknown water and consequently of an imminent danger1 an unexplained but fairly frequent subliminal sensitiveness4 ,in a word1 the problem of the future is not raised in this case1 nor in any of the numerous cases that resemble it4 ,here is another which evidently belongs to the same class1 though at first sight it seems to postulate the preexistence of a fatal event and a vision of the future corresponding exactly with a vision of the past4 ,a traveler in ,south ,america is descending a river in a canoe2 the party are just about to run close to a promontory when a sort of mysterious voice1 which he has already heard at different momentous times of his life1 imperiously orders him immediately to cross the river and gain the other shore as quickly as possible4 ,this appears so absurd that he is obliged to threaten the ,indians with death to force them to take this course4 ,they have scarcely crossed more than half the river when the promontory falls at the very place where they meant to round it4#a #a ,flournoy3 ,esprits et mediums1 p4 #caf4 ,the perception of imminent danger is here1 ,i admit1 even more abnormal than in the previous example1 but it comes under the same heading4 ,it is a phenomenon of subliminal hypersensitiveness observed more than once1 a sort of premonition induced by subconscious perceptions1 which has been christened by the barbarous name of cryptaesthesia4 ,but the interval between the moment when the peril is signalled and that at which it is consummated is too short for those questions which relate to a knowledge or a preexistence of the future to arise in this instance4 ,the case is almost the same with the adventure of an ,american dentist1 very carefully investigated by ,dr4 ,hodgson4 ,the dentist was bending over a bench on which was a little copper in which he was vulcanizing some rubber1 when he heard a voice calling1 in a quick and imperative manner1 these words3 ,run to the window1 quick6 ,run to the window1 quick6 ,he at once ran to the window and looked out to the street below1 when suddenly he heard a tremendous report and1 looking round1 saw that the copper had exploded1 destroying a great part of the workroom4#a #a ,proceedings1 vol4 xi41 p4 #dbd4 ,here again1 a subconscious cautiousness was probably amused by certain indications imperceptible to our ordinary senses4 ,it is even possible that there exists between things and ourselves a sort of sympathy or subliminal communion which makes us experience the trials and emotions of matter that has reached the limits of its existence1 unless1 as is more likely1 there is merely a simple coincidence between the chance idea of a possible explosion and its realization4 ,a last and rather more complicated case is that of ,jean ,dupre1 the sculptor1 who was driving alone with his wife along a mountain road1 skirting a perpendicular cliff4 ,suddenly they both heard a voice that seemed to come from the mountain crying3 ,stop6 ,they turned round1 saw nobody and continued their road4 ,but the cries were repeated again and again1 without anything to reveal the presence of a human being amid the solitude4 ,at last the sculptor alighted and saw that the left wheel of the carriage1 which was grazing the edge of the precipice1 had lost its linch-pin and was on the point of leaving the axle-tree1 which would almost inevitably have hurled the carriage into the abyss4 ,need we1 even here1 relinquish the theory of subconscious perceptions8 ,do we know and can the author of the anecdote1 whose good faith is not in question1 tell us that certain unperceived circumstances1 such as the grating of the wheel or the swaying of the carriage1 did not give him the first alarm8 ,after all1 we know how easily stories of this kind involuntarily take a dramatic turn even at the actual moment and especially afterwards4 #ba ,these examples--and there are many more of a similar kind--are enough1 ,i think1 to illustrate this class of premonitions4 ,the problem in these cases is simpler than when it relates to fruitless warnings2 at least it is simpler so long as we do not bring into discussion the question of spirits1 of unknown intelligences1 or of an actual knowledge of the future2 otherwise the same difficulty reappears and the warning1 which this time seems efficacious1 is in reality just as vain4 ,in fact1 the mysterious entity which knows that the traveler will go to the water's edge1 that the wheel will be on the point of leaving the axle1 that the copper will explode1 or that the promontory will fall at a precise moment1 must at the same time know that the traveler will not take the last fatal step1 that the carriage will not be overturned1 that the copper will not hurt anybody and that the canoe will pull away from the promontory4 ,it is inadmissible that1 seeing one thing1 it will not see the other1 since everything happens at the same point1 in the course of the same second4 ,can we say that1 if it had not given warning1 the little saving movement would not have been executed8 ,how can we imagine a future which1 at one and the same time1 has parts that are steadfast and others that are not8 ,if it is foreseen that the promontory will fall and that the traveler will escape1 thanks to the supernatural warning1 it is necessarily foreseen that the warning will be given2 and1 if so1 what is the point of this futile comedy8 ,i see no reasonable explanation of it in the spiritist or spiritualistic theory1 which postulates a complete knowledge of the future1 at least at a settled point and moment4 ,on the other hand1 if we adhere to the theory of a subliminal consciousness1 we find there an explanation which is quite worthy of acceptation4 ,this subliminal consciousness1 though1 in the majority of cases1 it has no clear and comprehensive vision of the immediate future1 can nevertheless possess an intuition of imminent danger1 thanks to indications that escape our ordinary perception4 ,it can also have a partial1 intermittent and so to speak flickering vision of the future event and1 if doubtful1 can risk giving an incoherent warning1 which1 for that matter1 will change nothing in that which already is4 #bb ,in conclusion1 let us state once more that fruitful premonitions necessarily annihilate events in the bud and consequently work their own destruction1 so that any control becomes impossible4 ,they would have an existence only if they prophesied a general event which the subject would not escape but for the warning4 ,if they had said to any one intending to go to ,messina two or three months before the catastrophe1 ,don't go1 for the town will be destroyed before the month is out1 we should have an excellent example4 ,but it is a remarkable thing that genuine premonitions of this kind are very rare and nearly always rather indefinite in regard to events of a general order4 ,in ,m4 ,bozzano's excellent collection1 which is a sort of compendium of ,premonitory phenomena1 the only pretty clear cases are nos4 cli1 and clviii41 both of which are taken from the ,journal of the ,s4,p4,r4 ,in the first1#a a mother sent a servant to bring home her little daughter1 who had already left the house with the intention of going through the railway garden1 a strip of ground between the se4 wall and the railway embankment1 in order to sit on the great stone1 by the seaside and see the trains pass by4 ,a few minutes after the little girl's departure1 the mother had distinctly and repeatedly heard a voice within her say3 ,send for her back1 or something dreadful will happen to her4 #a ,journal1 vol4 viii41 p4 #de4 ,now1 soon after1 a train ran off the line and the engine and tender fell1 breaking through the protecting wall and crashing down on the very stones where the child was accustomed to sit4 ,in the other case1#a into which ,professor ,w4 ,f4 ,barrett made a special enquiry1 ,captain ,mac,gowan was in ,brooklyn with his two boys1 then on their holidays4 ,he promised the boys that he would take them to the theatre and booked seats on the previous day2 but on the day of the proposed visit he heard a voice within him constantly saying3 ,do not go to the theatre2 take the boys back to school4 #a ,ibid41 vol4 i41 p4 #bhc4 ,he hesitated1 gave up his plan and resumed it again4 ,but the words kept repeating themselves and impressing themselves upon him2 and1 in the end1 he definitely decided not to go1 much to the two boys' disgust4 ,that night the theatre was destroyed by fire1 with a loss of three hundred lives4 ,we may add to this the prevision of the ,battle of ,borodino1 to which ,i have already alluded1 ,i will give the story in fuller detail1 as told in the journal of ,stephen ,grellet the ,quaker4 ,about three months before the ,french army entered ,russia1 the wife of ,general ,toutschkoff dreamt that she was at an inn in a town unknown to her and that her father came into her room1 holding her only son by the hand1 and said to her1 in a pitiful tone3 ,your happiness is at an end4 ,he--meaning ,countess ,toutschkoff's husband--has fallen4 ,he has fallen at ,borodino4 ,the dream was repeated a second and a third time4 ,her anguish of mind was such that she woke her husband and asked him3 ,where is ,borodino8 ,they looked for the name on the map and did not find it4 ,before the ,french armies reached ,moscow1 ,count ,toutschkoff was placed at the head of the army of reserve2 and one morning her father1 holding her son by the hand1 entered her room at the inn where she was staying4 ,in great distress1 as she had beheld him in her dream1 he cried out3 ,he has fallen4 ,he has fallen at ,borodino4 ,then she saw herself in the very same room and through the windows beheld the very same objects that she had seen in her dreams4 ,her husband was one of the many who perished in the battle fought near the ,river ,borodino1 from which an obscure village takes its name4#a #a ,memoirs of the ,life and ,labours of ,stephen ,grellet1 vol i41 p4 #dcd4 #bc ,this is evidently a very rare and perhaps solitary example of a long-dated prediction of a great historic event which nobody could foresee4 ,it stirs more deeply than any other the enormous problems of fatality1 free-will and responsibility4 ,but has it been attested with sufficient rigour for us to rely upon it8 ,that ,i cannot say4 ,in any case1 it has not been sifted by the ,s4,p4,r4 ,next1 from the special point of view that interests us for the moment1 we are unable to declare that this premonition had any chance of being of avail and preventing the general from going to ,borodino4 ,it is highly probable that he did not know where he was going or where he was2 besides1 the irresistible machinery of war held him fast and it was not his part to disengage his destiny4 ,the premonition1 therefore1 could only have been given because it was certain not to be obeyed4 ,as for the two previous cases1 nos4 clv4 and clviii41 we must here again remark the usual strange reservations and observe how difficult it is to explain these premonitions save by attributing them to our subconsciousness4 ,the main1 unavoidable event is not precisely stated2 but a subordinate consequence seems to be averted1 as though to make us believe in some definite power of free will4 ,nevertheless1 the mysterious entity that foresaw the catastrophe must also have foreseen that nothing would happen to the person whom it was warning2 and this brings us back to the useless farce of which we spoke above4 ,whereas1 with the theory of a subconscious self1 the latter may have--as in the case of the traveler1 the promontory1 the copper or the carriage-not this time by inferences or indications that escape our perception1 but by other unknown means1 a vague presentiment of an impending peril1 or1 as ,i have already said1 a partial1 intermittent and unsettled vision of the future event1 and1 in its doubt1 may utter its cry of alarm4 ,whereupon let us recognize that it is almost forbidden to human reason to stray in these regions2 and that the part of a prophet is1 next to that of a commentator of prophecies1 one of the most difficult and thankless that a man can attempt to sustain the world's stage4 #bd ,i am not sure if it is really necessary1 before closing this chapter1 to follow in the wake of many others and broach the problem of the preexistence of the future1 which includes those of fatality1 of free will1 of time and of space1 that is to say1 all the points that touch the essential sources of the great mystery of the universe4 ,the theologians and the metaphysicians have tackled these problems from every side without giving us the least hope of solving them4 ,among those which life sets us1 there is none to which our brain seems more definitely and strictly closed2 and they remain1 if not as unimaginable1 at least as incomprehensible as on the day when they were first perceived4 ,what corresponds1 outside us1 with what we call time and space8 ,we know nothing about it2 and ,kant1 speaking in the name of the apriorists1 who hold that the idea of time is innate in us1 does not teach us much when he tells us that time1 like space1 is an a priori form of our sensibility1 that is to say1 an intuition preceding experience1 even as ,guyau1 among the empiricists1 who consider that this idea is acquired only by experience1 does not enlighten us any more by declaring that this same time is the abstract formula of the changes in the universe4 ,whether space1 as ,leibnitz maintains1 be an order of coexistence and time an order of sequences1 whether it be by space that we succeed in representing time or whether time be an essential form of any representation1 whether time be the father of space or space the father of time1 one thing is certain1 which is that the efforts of the ,kantian or neo-,kantian apriorists and of the pure empiricists and the idealistic empiricists all end in the same darkness2 that all the philosophers who have grappled with the formidable dual problem1 among whom one may mention indiscriminately the names of the greatest thinkers of yesterday and to-day--,herbert ,spencer1 ,helmholtz1 ,renouvier1 ,james ,sully1 ,stumpf1 ,james ,ward1 ,william ,james1 ,stuart ,mill1 ,ribot1 ,fouillee1 ,guyau1 ,bain1 ,lechalas1 ,balmes1 ,dunan and endless others--have been unable to tame it2 and that1 however much their theories may contradict one another1 they are all equally defensible and alike struggle vainly in the darkness against shadows that are not of our world4 #be ,to catch a glimpse of this strange problem of the preexistence of the future1 as it shows itself to each of us1 let us essay more humbly to translate it into tangible images1 to place it as it were upon the stage4 ,i am writing these lines sitting on a stone1 in the shade of some tall beeches that overlook a little ,norman village4 ,it is one of those lovely summer days when the sweetness of life is almost visible in the azure vase of earth and sky4 ,in the distance stretches the immense1 fertile valley of the ,seine1 with its green meadows planted with restful trees1 between which the river flows like a long path of gladness leading to the misty hills of the estuary4 ,i am looking down on the village-square1 with its ring of young lime-trees4 ,a procession leaves the church and1 amid prayers and chanting1 they carry the statue of the ,virgin around the sacred pile4 ,i am conscious of all the details of the ceremony3 the sly old cure perfunctorily bearing a small reliquary2 four choirmen opening their mouths to bawl forth vacantly the ,latin words which convey nothing to them2 two mischievous serving-boys in frayed cassocks2 a score of little girls1 young girls and old maids in white1 all starched and flounced1 followed by six or seven village notables in baggy frockcoats4 ,the pageant disappears behind the trees1 comes into sight again at the bend of the road and hurries back into the church4 ,the clock in the steeple strikes five1 as though to ring down the curtain and mark in the infinite history of events which none will recollect the conclusion of a spectacle which never again1 until the end of the world and of the universe of worlds1 will be just what it was during those seconds when it beguiled my wandering eyes4 ,for in vain will they repeat the procession next year and every year after3 never again will it be the same4 ,not only will several of the actors probably have disappeared1 but all those who resume their old places in the ranks will have undergone the thousand little visible and invisible changes wrought by the passing days and weeks4 ,in a word1 this insignificant moment is unique1 irrecoverable1 inimitable1 as are all the moments in the existence of all things2 and this little picture1 enduring for a few seconds suspended in boundless duration1 has lapsed into eternity1 where henceforth it will remain in its entirety to the end of time1 so much so that1 if a man could one day recapture in the past1 among what some one has called the astral negatives1 the image of what it was1 he would find it intact1 unchanged1 ineffaceable and undeniable4 #bf ,it is not difficult for us to conceive that one can thus go back and see again the astral negative of an event that is no more2 and retrospective clairvoyance appears to us a wonderful but not an impossible thing4 ,it astonishes but does not stagger our reason4 ,but1 when it becomes a question of discovering the same picture in the future1 the boldest imagination flounders at the first step4 ,how are we to admit that there exists somewhere a representation or reproduction of that which has not yet existed8 ,nevertheless1 some of the incidents which we have just been considering seem to prove in an almost conclusive manner not only that such representations are possible1 but that we may arrive at them more frequently1 not to say more conveniently1 than at those of the past4 ,now1 once this representation preexists1 as we are obliged to admit in the case of certain number of premonitions1 the riddle remains the same whether the preexistence be one of a few hours1 a few years or several centuries4 ,it is therefore possible--for1 in these matters1 we must go straight to extremes or else leave them alone--it is therefore possible that a seer mightier than any of to-day1 some god1 demigod or demon1 some unknown1 universal or vagrant intelligence1 saw that procession a million years ago1 at a time when nothing existed of that which composes and surrounds it and when the very earth on which it moves had not yet risen from the ocean depths4 ,and other seers1 as mighty as the first1 who from age to age contemplated the same spot and the same moment1 would always have perceived1 through the vicissitudes and upheavals of seas1 shores and forests1 the same procession going round the same little church that still lay slumbering in the oceanic ooze and made up of the same persons sprung from a race that was perhaps not yet represented on the earth4 #bg ,it is obviously difficult for us to understand that the future can thus precede chaos1 that the present is at the same time the future and the past1 or that that which does not yet exists already at the same time at which it is no more4 ,but1 on the other hand1 it is just as hard to conceive that the future does not preexist1 that there is nothing before the present and that everything is only present or past4 ,it is very probable that1 to a more universal intelligence than ours1 everything is but an eternal present1 an immense punctum stans1 as the metaphysicians say1 in which all the events are on one plane2 but it is no less probable that we ourselves1 so long as we are men1 in order to understand anything of this eternal present1 will always be obliged to divide it into three parts4 ,thus caught between two mysteries equally baffling to our intelligence1 whether we deny or admit the preexistence of the future1 we are really only wrangling over words3 in the one case1 we give the name of present1 from the point of view of a perfect intelligence1 to that which to us is the future2 in the other1 we give the name of future to that which1 from the point of view of a perfect intelligence1 is the present4 ,but1 after all1 it is incontestable in both cases that1 at least from our point of view1 the future preexists1 since preexistence is the only name by which we can describe and the only form under which we can conceive that which we do not yet see in the present4 #bh ,attempts have been made to shed light on the riddle by transferring it to space4 ,it is true that it there loses the greater part of its obscurity2 but this apparently is because1 in changing its environment1 it has completely changed its nature and no longer bears any relation to what it was when it was placed in time4 ,we are told1 for instance1 that innumerable cities distributed over the surface of the earth are to us as if they were not1 so long as we have not seen them1 and only begin to exist on the day when we visit them4 ,that is true2 but space1 outside all metaphysical speculations1 has realities for us which time does not possess4 ,space1 although very mysterious and incomprehensible once we pass certain limits1 is nevertheless not1 like time1 incomprehensible and illusory in all its parts4 ,we are certainly quite able to conceive that those towns which we have never seen and doubtless never will see indubitably exist1 whereas we find it much more difficult to imagine that the catastrophe which1 fifty years hence1 will annihilate one of them already exists as really as the town itself4 ,we are capable of picturing a spot whence1 with keener eyes than these which we boast to-day1 we should see in one glance all the cities of the earth and even those of other worlds1 but it is much less easy for us to imagine a point in the ages whence we should simultaneously discover the past1 the present and the future because the past1 the present and the future are three orders of duration which cannot find room at the same time in our intelligence and which inevitably devour one other4 ,how can we picture to ourselves1 for instance1 a point in eternity at which our little procession already exists1 while it is not yet and although it is no more8 ,add to this the thought that it is necessary and inevitable1 from the millenaries which had no beginning1 that1 at a given moment1 at a given place1 the little procession should leave the little church in a given manner and that no known or imaginable will can change anything in it1 in the future any more than in the past2 and we begin to understand that there is no hope of understanding4 #bi ,we find among the cases collected by ,m4 ,bozzano a singular premonition wherein the unknown factors of space and time are continued in a very curious fashion4 ,in ,august1 #aiaj1 ,cavalliere ,giovanni de ,figueroa1 one of the most famous fencing masters at ,palermo1 dreamt that he was in the country1 going along a road white with dust1 which brought him to a broad ploughed field4 ,in the middle of the field stood a rustic building1 with a ground-floor used for store-rooms and cow-sheds and on the right a rough hut made of branches and a cart with some harness lying in it4 ,a peasant wearing dark trousers1 with a black felt hat on his head1 came forward to meet him1 asked him to follow him and took him round behind the house4 ,through a low1 narrow door they entered a little stable with a short1 winding stone staircase leading to a loft over the entrance to the house4 ,a mule fastened to a swinging manger was blocking the bottom step2 and the chevalier had to push it aside before climbing the staircase4 ,on reaching the loft1 he noticed that from the ceiling were suspended strings of melons1 tomatoes1 onions and ,indian corn4 ,in this room were two women and a little girl2 and through a door leading to another room he caught sight of an extremely high bed1 unlike any that he had ever seen before4 ,here the dream broke off4 ,it seemed to him so strange that he spoke of it to several of his friends1 whom he mentions by name and who are ready to confirm his statements4 ,on the #abth of ,october in the same year1 in order to support a fellow-townsman in a duel1 he accompanied the seconds1 by motorcar1 from ,naples to ,marano1 a place which he had never visited nor even heard of4 ,as soon as they were some way in the country1 he was curiously impressed by the white and dusty road4 ,the car pulled up at the side of a field which he at once recognized4 ,they lighted2 and he remarked to one of the seconds3 ,this is not the first time that ,i have been here4 ,there should be a house at the end of this path and on the right a hut and a cart with some harness in it4 ,as a matter of fact1 everything was as he described it4 ,an instant later1 at the exact moment foreseen by the dream1 the peasant in the dark trousers and the black felt hat came up and asked him to follow him4 ,but1 instead of walking behind him1 the chevalier went in front1 for he already knew the way4 ,he found the stable and1 exactly at the place which it occupied two months before1 near its swinging manger1 the mule blocking the way to the staircase4 ,the fencing master went up the steps and once more saw the loft1 with the ceiling hung with melons1 onions and tomatoes1 and1 in a corner on the right1 the two silent women and the child1 identical with the figures in his dream1 while in the next room he recognized the bed whose extraordinary height had so much impressed him4 ,it really looks as if the facts themselves1 the extramundane realities1 the eternal verities1 or whatever we may be pleased to call them1 have tried to show us here that time and space are one and the same illusion1 one and the same convention and have no existence outside our little day-spanned understanding2 that everywhere and always are exactly synonymous terms and reign alone as soon as we cross the narrow boundaries of the obscure consciousness in which we live4 ,we are quite ready to admit that ,cavaliere de ,figueroa may have had by clairvoyance an exact and detailed vision of places which he was not to visit until later3 this is a pretty frequent and almost classical phenomenon1 which1 as it affects the realities of space1 does not astonish us beyond measure and1 in any case1 does not take us out of the world which our senses perceive4 ,the field1 the house1 the hut1 the loft do not move2 and it is no miracle that they should be found in the same place4 ,but1 suddenly1 quitting this domain where all is stationary1 the phenomenon is transferred to time and1 in those unknown places1 at the foretold second1 brings together all the moving actors of that little drama in two acts1 of which the first was performed some two and a half months before1 in the depths of some mysterious other life where it seemed to be motionlessly and irrevocably awaiting its terrestrial realization4 ,any explanation would but condense this vapour of petty mysteries into a few drops in the ocean of mysteries4 ,let us note here again1 in passing1 the strange freakishness of the premonitions4 ,they accumulate the most precise and circumstantial details as long as the scene remains insignificant1 but come to a sudden stop before the one tragic and interesting scene of the drama3 the duel and its issue4 ,here again we recognize the inconsistent1 impotent1 ironical or humorous habits of our unknown guest4 #cj ,but we will not prolong these somewhat vain speculations concerning space and time4 ,we are merely playing with words that represent very badly ideas which we do not put into form at all4 ,to sum up1 if it is difficult for us to conceive that the future preexists1 perhaps it is even more difficult for us to understand that it does not exist2 moreover1 a certain number of facts tend to prove that it is as real and definite and has1 both in time and in eternity1 the same permanence and the same vividness as the past4 ,now1 from the moment that it preexists1 it is not surprising that we should be able to know it2 it is even astonishing1 granted that it overhangs us on every side1 that we should not discover it oftener and more easily4 ,it remains to be learnt what would become of our life if everything were foreseen in it1 if we saw it unfolding beforehand1 in its entirety1 with its events which would have to be inevitable1 because1 if it were possible for us to avoid them1 they would not exist and we could not perceive them4 ,suppose that1 instead of being abnormal1 uncertain1 obscure1 debatable and very unusual1 prediction became1 so to speak1 scientific1 habitual1 clear and infallible3 in a short time1 having nothing more to foretell1 it would die of inanition4 ,if1 for instance1 it was prophesied to me that ,i must die in the course of a journey in ,italy1 ,i should naturally abandon the journey2 therefore it could not have been predicted to me2 and thus all life would soon be nothing but inaction1 pause and abstention1 a soft of vast desert where the embryos of still-born events would be gathered in heaps and where nothing would grow save perhaps one or two more or less fortunate enterprises and the little insignificant incidents which no one would trouble to avoid4 ,but these again are questions to which there is no solution2 and we will not pursue them further4 ,,chapter ,,iv4 ,,the ,,elberfeld ,,horses #a ,i will first sum up as briefly as possible1 for who so may still be ignorant of them1 the facts which it is necessary to know if one would fully understand the marvelous story of the ,elberfeld horses4 ,for a detailed account1 ,i can refer him to ,herr ,karl ,krall's remarkable work1 ,denkende ,tiere 7,leipsig1 #aiab71 which is the first and principal source of information amid a bibliography that is already assuming considerable dimensions4 ,some twenty years ago there lived in ,berlin an old misanthrope named ,wilhelm von ,osten4 ,he was a man with a small private income1 a little eccentric in his ways and obsessed by one idea1 the intelligence of animals4 ,he began by undertaking the education of a horse that gave him no very definite results4 ,but1 in #aijj1 he became the owner of a ,russian stallion who1 under the name of ,hans1 to which was soon added the ,homeric and well-earned prefix of ,kluge1 or ,clever1 was destined to upset all our notions of animal psychology and to raise questions that rank among the most unexpected and the most absorbing problems which man has yet encountered4 ,thanks to ,von ,osten1 whose patience1 contrary to what one might think1 was in no wise angelic but resembled rather a frenzied obstinacy1 the horse made rapid and extraordinary progress4 ,this progress is very aptly described by ,professor ,e4 ,clarapede1 of the university of ,geneva1 who says1 in his excellent monograph on the ,elberfeld horses3 ,after making him familiar with various common ideas1 such as right1 left1 top1 bottom and so on1 his master began to teach him arithmetic by the intuitive method4 ,hans was brought to a table on which were placed first one1 then two1 then several small skittles4 ,von ,osten1 kneeling beside ,hans1 uttered the corresponding numbers1 at the same time making him strike as many blows with his hoof as there were skittles on the table4 ,before long1 the skittles were replaced by figures written on a blackboard4 ,the results were astonishing4 ,the horse was capable not only of counting 7that is to say1 of striking as many blows as he was asked71 but also of himself making real calculations1 of solving little problems4 4 4 4 ,but ,hans could do more than mere sums3 he knew how to read2 he was a musician1 distinguishing between harmonious and dissonant chords4 ,he also had an extraordinary memory3 he could tell the date of each day of the current week4 ,in short1 he got through all the tasks which an intelligent schoolboy of fourteen is able to perform4 #b ,the rumour of these curious experiments soon spread2 and visitors flocked to the little stable-yard in which ,von ,osten kept his singular pupil at work4 ,the newspapers took the matter up2 and a fierce controversy broke forth between those who believed in the genuineness of the phenomenon and those who saw no more in it than a barefaced fraud4 ,a scientific committee was appointed in #aijd1 consisting of professors of psychology and physiology1 of the director of a zoological garden1 of a circus manager and of veterinary surgeons and cavalry-officers4 ,the committee discovered nothing suspicious1 but ventured upon no explanation4 ,a second committee was then appointed1 numbering among its members ,herr ,oskar ,pfungst1 of the ,berlin psychological laboratory4 ,herr ,pfungst1 after a long series of experiments1 drew up a voluminous and crushing report1 in which he maintained that the horse was gifted with no intelligence1 that it did not recognize either letters or figures1 that it really knew neither how to calculate nor how to count1 but merely obeyed the imperceptible1 infinitesimal and unconscious signs which escaped from its master4 ,public opinion veered round suddenly and completely4 ,people felt a sort of half-cowardly relief at beholding the prompt collapse of a miracle which was threatening to throw confusion into the self satisfied little fold of established truths4 ,poor ,von ,osten protested in vain3 no one listened to him2 the verdict was given4 ,he never recovered from this official blow2 he became the laughing-stock of all those whom he had at first astounded2 and he died1 lonely and embittered1 on the #bith of ,june1 #aiji1 at the age of seventy-one4 #c ,but he left a disciple whose faith had not been shaken by the general defection4 ,a well-to-do ,elberfeld manufacturer1 ,herr ,krall1 had taken a great interest in ,von ,osten's labours and1 during the latter years of the old man's life1 had eagerly followed and even on occasion directed the education of the wonderful stallion4 ,von ,osten left ,kluge ,hans to him by will2 on his own side1 ,krall had bought two ,arab stallions1 ,mohammed and ,zarif whose prowess soon surpassed that of the pioneer4 ,the whole question was reopened1 events took a vigorous and decisive turn and1 instead of a weary1 eccentric old man1 discouraged almost to sullenness and with no weapons for the struggle1 the critics of the miracle found themselves faced by a new adversary1 young and high-spirited1 endowed with remarkable scientific instinct1 quick-witted1 scholarly and well able to defend himself4 ,his educational methods also differ materially from ,von ,osten's4 ,it was a strange thing1 but deep down in the rather queer1 cross-grained soul of the old enthusiast there had grown up gradually a sort of hatred for his four-legged pupil4 ,he felt the stallion's proud and nervous will resisting his with an obstinacy which he qualified as diabolical4 ,they stood up to each other like two enemies3 and the lessons almost assumed the form of a tragic and secret struggle in which the animal's soul rebelled against man's domination4 ,krall1 on the other hand1 adores his pupils2 and this atmosphere of affection has in a manner of speaking humanized them4 ,there are no longer those sudden movements of wild panic which reveal the ancestral dread of man in the quietest and best-trained horse4 ,he talks to them long and tenderly1 as a father might talk to his children2 and we have the strange feeling that they listen to all that he says and understand it4 ,if they appear not to grasp an explanation or a demonstration1 he will begin it all over again1 analyze it1 paraphrase it ten times in succession1 with the patience of a mother4 ,and so their progress has been incomparably swifter and more astounding than that of old ,hans4 ,within a fortnight of the first lesson ,mohammed did simple little addition and subtraction sums quite correctly4 ,he had learnt to distinguish the tens from the units1 striking the latter with his right foot and the former with his left4 ,he knew the meaning of the symbols plus and minus4 ,four days later1 he was beginning multiplication and division4 ,in four months' time1 he knew how to extract square and cubic roots2 and1 soon after1 he learnt to spell and read by means of the conventional alphabet devised by ,krall4 ,this alphabet1 at the first glance1 seems rather complicated4 ,for that matter1 it is only a makeshift2 but how could one find anything better8 ,the unfortunate horse1 who is almost voiceless1 has only one way in which to express himself3 a clumsy hoof1 which was not created to put thought into words4 ,it became necessary1 therefore1 to contrive1 as in table-turning1 a special alphabet1 in which each letter is designated by a certain number of blows struck by the right foot and the left4 ,here is the copy handed to visitors at ,elberfeld to enable them to follow the horse's operations3 -- #a #b #c #d #e #f #aj ,e ,n ,r ,s ,m ,c #bj ,a ,h ,l ,t ,a3 ,,ch #cj ,i ,d ,g ,w ,j ,,sch #dj ,o ,b ,f ,k ,o3 -- #ej ,u ,v ,z ,p ,u3 -- #fj ,,ei ,,au ,,eu ,x ,q -- ,to mark the letter ,e1 for instance1 the stallion will strike one blow with his left foot and one with his right2 for the letter ,l1 two blows with his left foot and three with his right2 and so on4 ,the horses have this alphabet so deeply imprinted in their memory that1 practically speaking1 they never make a mistake2 and they strike their hoofs so quickly1 one after the other1 that at first one has some difficulty in following them4 ,mohammed and ,zarif--for ,zarif's progress was almost equal to that of his fellow-pupil1 though he seems a little less gifted from the standpoint of higher mathematics-,mohammed and ,zarif in this way reproduce the words spoken in their presence1 spell the names of their visitors1 reply to questions put to them and sometimes make little observations1 little personal and spontaneous reflections to which we shall return presently4 ,they have created for their own use an inconceivably fantastic and phonetic system of spelling which they stubbornly refuse to relinquish and which often makes their writing rather difficult to read4 ,deeming most of the vowels useless1 they keep almost exclusively to the consonants2 thus ,zucker1 for instance1 becomes ,z ,k ,r2 ,pferd1 ,p ,f ,r ,t1 or ,f ,r ,t1 and so on4 ,i will not set forth in detail the many different proofs of intelligence lavished by the singular inhabitants of this strange stable4 ,they are not only first-class calculators1 for whom the most repellent fractions and roots possess hardly any secrets3 they distinguish sounds1 colours1 and scents1 read the time on the face of a watch1 recognize certain geometrical figures1 likenesses and photographs4 ,following on these more and more conclusive experiments and especially after the publication of ,krall's great work1 ,denkende ,tiere1 a model of precision and arrangement1 men's minds were faced with clear and definite problem which1 this time1 could not be challenged4 ,scientific committees followed one another at ,elberfeld2 and their reports became legion4 ,learned men of every country--including ,dr4 ,edinger1 the eminent ,frankfort neurologist2 ,professors ,dr4 ,h4 ,kraemer and ,h4 ,e4 ,ziegler1 of ,stuttgart2 ,dr4 ,paul ,saresin1 of ,bale2 ,professor ,ostwald1 of ,berlin2 ,professor ,a4 ,beredka1 of the ,pasteur ,institute2 ,dr4 ,e4 ,clarapede1 of the university of ,geneva2 ,professor ,schoeller and ,professor ,gehrke1 the natural philosopher1 of ,berlin2 ,professor ,goldstein1 of ,darmstadt2 ,professor von ,buttel-,reepen1 of ,oldenburg2 ,professor ,william ,mackenzie1 of ,genoa2 ,professor ,r4 ,assagioli1 of ,florence2 ,dr4 ,hartkopf1 of ,cologne2 ,dr4 ,freudenberg1 of ,brussels2 ,dr4 ,ferrari1 of ,bologna1 etc41 etc41 for the list is lengthening daily--came to study on the spot the inexplicable phenomenon which ,dr4 ,clarapede proclaims to be the most sensational event that has ever happened in the psychological world4 ,with the exception of two or three sceptics or convinced misoneists and of those who made too short a stay at ,elberfeld1 all were unanimous in recognizing that the facts were as stated and that the experiments were conducted with absolute fairness4 ,disagreement begins only when it becomes a matter of commenting on them1 interpreting them and explaining them4 #d ,to complete this short preamble1 it is right to add that1 for some time past1 the case of the ,elberfeld horses no longer stands quite alone4 ,there exists at ,mannheim a dog of a rather doubtful breed who performs almost the same feats as his equine rivals4 ,he is less advanced than they in arithmetic1 but does little additions1 subtractions and multiplications of one or two figures correctly4 ,he reads and writes by tapping with his paw1 in accordance with an alphabet which1 it appears1 he has thought out for himself2 and his spelling also is simplified and phoneticized to the utmost4 ,he distinguishes the colour in a bunch of flowers1 counts the money in a purse and separates the marks from the pfennigs4 ,he knows how to seek and find words to define the object or the picture placed before him4 ,you show him1 for instance1 a bouquet in a vase and ask him what it is4 ,a glass with little flowers1 he replies4 ,and his answers are often curiously spontaneous and original4 ,in the course of a reading-exercise in which the word ,herbst1 autumn1 chanced to attract attention1 ,professor ,william ,mackenzie asked him if he could explain what autumn was4 ,it is the time when there are apples1 ,rolf replied4 ,on the same occasion1 the same professor1 without knowing what it represented1 held out to him a card marked with red and blue squares3 ,what's this8 ,blue1 red1 lots of cubes1 replied the dog4 ,sometimes his repartees are not lacking in humour4 ,is there anything you would like me to do for you8 a lady of his acquaintance asked1 one day4 ,and ,master ,rolf gravely answered3 ,wedelen1 which means1 ,wag your tail6 ,rolf1 whose fame is comparatively young1 has not yet1 like his illustrious rivals of the ,rhine ,province1 been the object of minute enquiries and copious and innumerable reports4 ,but the incidents which ,i have just mentioned and which are vouched for by such men as ,professor ,mackenzie and ,m4 ,duchatel1 the learned and clear-sighted vice-president of the ,societe ,universelle d',etudes ,psychiques1#a who went to ,mannheim for the express purpose of studying them1 appear to be no more controvertible than the ,elbenfeld occurrences1 of which they are a sort of replica or echo4 ,it is not unusual to find these coincidences amongst abnormal phenomena4 ,they spring up simultaneously in different quarters of the globe1 correspond with one another and multiply as though in obedience to a word of command4 ,it is probable therefore that we shall see still more manifestations of the same class4 ,one might almost say that a new spirit is passing over the world and1 after awakening in man forces whereof he was not aware1 is now reaching other creatures who with us inhabit this mysterious earth1 on which they live1 suffer and die1 as we do1 without knowing why4 #a ,see the interesting lecture by ,m4 ,edmond ,duchatel1 published in the ,annales des ,sciences ,psychiques1 ,october #aiac4 #e ,i have not been to ,mannheim1 but ,i made my pilgrimage to ,elberfeld and stayed long enough in the town to carry away with me the conviction shared by all those who have undertaken the journey4 ,a few months ago1 ,herr ,krall1 whom ,i had promised the year before that ,i would come and see his wonderful horses1 was kind enough to repeat his invitation in a more pressing fashion1 adding that his stable would perhaps be broken up after the #aeth of ,september and that1 in any case1 be would be obliged1 by his doctor's orders1 to interrupt for an indefinite period a course of training which he found exceedingly fatiguing4 ,i at once left for ,elberfeld1 which1 as everybody knows1 is an important manufacturing-town in ,rhenish ,prussia and is1 in fact1 more quaint1 pleasing and picturesque than one might expect4 ,i had long since read everything that had been published on the question2 and ,i was wholly persuaded of the genuineness of the incidents4 ,indeed it would be difficult to have any doubts after the repeated and unremitting supervision and verification to which the experiments are subjected1 a supervision which is of the most rigorous type1 often hostile and almost ill-mannered4 ,as for their interpretation1 ,i was convinced that telepathy1 that is to say1 the transmission of thought from one subconsciousness to another1 remained1 however strange it might be in this new region1 the only acceptable theory2 and this in spite of certain circumstances that seemed plainly to exclude it4 ,in default of telepathy proper1 ,i inclined toward the mediumistic or subliminal theory1 which was very ably outlined by ,m4 de ,vesmes in a remarkable lecture delivered1 on the #bbnd of ,december1 #aiab1 before the ,societe ,universelle d',etudes ,psychiques4 ,it is true that telepathy1 especially when carried to its extreme limits1 appeals above all to the subliminal forces1 so that the two theories overlap at more than one point and it is often difficult to make out where the first ends and the second begins4 ,but this discussion will be more appropriate a little later4 #f ,i found ,herr ,krall in his goldsmith's shop1 a sort of palace of ,golconda1 streaming and glittering with the most precious pearls and stones on earth4 ,herr ,krall1 it is well to remember1 in order to dispel any suspicion of pecuniary interest1 is a rich manufacturer whose family for three generations1 from father to son1 have conducted one of the most important jewelry businesses in ,germany4 ,his researches1 so far from bringing him the least profit1 cost him a great deal of money1 take up all his leisure and some part of the time which he would otherwise devote to his business and1 as usually happens1 procure him from his fellow citizens and from not a few scientific men more annoyance1 unfair criticism and sarcasm than consideration or gratitude4 ,his work is preeminently the disinterested and thankless task of the apostle and pioneer4 ,for the rest1 ,herr ,kraft1 though his faith is active1 zealous and infectious1 has nothing in common with the visionaries or illuminati4 ,he is a man of about fifty1 vigorous1 alert and enthusiastic1 but at the same time well-balanced2 accesible to every idea and even to every dream1 yet practical and methodical1 with a ballast of the most invincible common-sense4 ,he inspires from the outset that fine confidence1 frank and unrestrained1 which instantly disperses the instinctive doubt1 the strange uneasiness and the veiled suspicion that generally separate two people who meet for the first time2 and one welcomes in him1 from the very depths of one's being1 the honest man1 the staunch friend whom one can trust and whom one is sorry not to have known earlier in life4 ,we go together through the streets and along the bustling quays of ,elberfeld to the stable1 situated at a few hundred steps from the shop4 ,the horses are taking the air outside the doors of their boxes1 in the yard shaded by a lime-tree4 ,there are four of them3 ,mohammed1 the most intelligent1 the most gifted of them all1 the great mathematician of the party2 his double1 ,zarif1 a little less advanced1 less tractable1 craftier1 but at the same time more fanciful1 more spontaneous and capable of occasional disconcerting sallies2 next1 ,hanschen1 a little ,shetland pony1 hardly bigger than a ,newfoundland dog1 the street-urchin of the band1 always quivering with excitement1 roguish1 flighty1 uncertain and passionate1 but ready in a moment to work you out the most difficult addition and multiplication sums with a furious scrape of the hoof2 and lastly the latest arrival1 the plump and placid ,berto1 an imposing black stallion1 quite blind and lacking the sense of smell4 ,he has been only a few months at school and is still1 so to speak1 in the preparatory class1 but already does--a little more clumsily1 but more good humouredly and conscientiously--small addition and subtraction sums quite as well as many a child of the same age4 ,in a corner1 ,kama1 a young elephant two or three years old1 about the size of an outrageously blown donkey1 rolls his mischievous and almost knavish eye1 under the shelter of his wide ears1 each resembling a great rhubarb-leaf1 and with his stealthy1 insinuating trunk carefully picks up whatever he considers fit to eat1 that is to say1 pretty well everything that lies about on the stones4 ,great things were hoped of him1 but hitherto he has disappointed all expectations3 he is the dunce of the establishment4 ,perhaps he is too young still3 his little elephant-soul no doubt resembles that of a sucking-babe which1 in the place of its feet and hands1 plays with the stupendous nose that must first explore and question the universe4 ,it is impossible to grip his attention2 and1 when they set out before him his alphabet of movable letters1 instead of naming those which are pointed out to him he applies himself to pulling them off their stems1 in order to swallow them surreptitiously4 ,he has disheartened his kind master1 who1 pending the coming of the reason and wisdom promised by the proboscidian legends1 leaves him in a contented state of ignorance made more blissful by an almost insatiable appetite4 #g ,but ,i ask to see the great pioneer1 ,kluge ,hans1 ,clever ,hans4 ,he is still alive4 ,he is old3 he must be sixteen or seventeen2 but his old age1 alas1 is not exempt from the baneful troubles from which men themselves suffer in their decline6 ,hans has turned out badly1 it appears1 and is never mentioned save in ambiguous terms4 ,an imprudent or vindictive groom1 ,i forget which1 having introduced a mare into the yard1 ,hans the ,pure1 who till then had led an austere and monkish existence1 vowed to celibacy1 science and the chaste delights of figures1 ,hans the ,irreproachable incontinently lost his head and cut himself open on the hanging-rail of his stall4 ,they had to force back his intestines and sew up his belly4 ,he is now rusticating miserably in a meadow outside the town4 ,so true it is that a life cannot be judged except at its close and that we are sure of nothing until we are dead4 #h ,before the sitting begins1 while the master is making his morning inspection1 ,i go up to ,muhamed1 speak to him and pat him1 looking straight into his eyes meanwhile in order to catch a sign of his genius4 ,the handsome creature1 well-bred and in hard condition1 is as calm and trusting as a dog2 he shows himself excessively gracious and friendly and tries to give me some huge licks and mighty kisses which ,i do my best to avoid because they are a little unexpected and overdemonstrative4 ,the expression of his limpid antelope-eyes is deep1 serious and remote1 but it differs in no wise from that of his brothers who1 for thousands of years1 have seen nothing but brutality and ingratitude in man4 ,if we were able to read anything there1 it would not be that insufficient and vain little effort which we call thought1 but rather an indefinable1 vast anxiety1 a tear-dimmed regret for the boundless1 stream-crossed plains where his sires sported at will before they knew man's yoke4 ,in any case1 to see him thus fastened by a halter to the stable-door1 beating off the flies and absently pawing the cobbles1 ,muhamed is nothing more than a well-trained horse who seems to be waiting for his saddle or harness and who hide1 his new secret as profoundly as all the others which nature has buried in him4 #i ,but they are summoning me to take my place in the stable where the lessons are given4 ,it is a small room1 empty and bare1 with peat-moss litter bedding and white-washed walls4 ,the horse is separated from the people present by breast-high wooden partitions4 ,opposite the four-legged scholar is a black-board1 nailed to the wall2 and on one side a corn-bin which forms a seat for the spectators4 ,muhamed is led in4 ,krall1 who is a little nervous1 makes no secret of his uneasiness4 ,his horses are fickle animals1 uncertain1 capricious and extremely sensitive4 ,a trifle disturbs them1 confuses them1 puts them off4 ,at such times1 threats1 prayers and even the irresistible charm of carrots and good rye-bread are useless4 ,they obstinately refuse to do any work and they answer at random4 ,everything depends on a whim1 the state of the weather1 the morning meal or the impression which the visitor makes upon them4 ,still1 ,krall seems to know1 by certain imperceptible signs1 that this is not going to be a bad day4 ,muhamed quivered with excitement1 snorts loudly through his nostrils1 utters a series of indistinct little whinnyings3 excellent symptoms1 it appears4 ,i take my seat on the corn-bin4 ,the master1 standing beside the black-board1 chalk in hand1 introduces me to ,muhamed in due form1 as to a human being3 ,muhamed1 attention6 ,this is your uncle--pointing to me--who has come all the way to honour you with a visit4 ,mind you don't disappoint him4 ,his name is ,maeterlinck4 ,krall pronounced the first syllable ,german-fashion3 ,mah4 ,you understand3 ,maeterlinck4 ,now show him that you know your letters and that you can spell a name correctly1 like a clever boy4 ,go ahead1 we're listening4 ,muhamed gives a short neigh and1 on the small1 movable board at his feet1 strikes first with his right hoof and then with his left the number of blows which correspond with the letter ,m in the conventional alphabet used by the horses4 ,then1 one after the other1 without stopping or hesitating1 he marks the letters ,a ,d ,r ,l ,i ,n ,s ,h1 representing the unexpected aspect which my humble name assumes in the equine mind and phonetics4 ,his attention is called to the fact that there is a mistake4 ,he readily agrees and replaces the ,s ,h by a ,g and then the ,g by a ,k4 ,they insist that he must put a ,t instead of the ,d2 but ,muhamed1 content with his work1 shakes his head to say no and refuses to make any further corrections4 #aj ,i assure you that the first shock is rather disturbing1 however much one expected it4 ,i am quite aware that1 when one describes these things1 one is taken for a dupe too readily dazzled by the doubtless childish illusion of an ingeniously contrived scene4 ,but what contrivances1 what illusions have we here8 ,do they lie in the spoken word8 ,why1 to admit that the horse understands and translates his master's words is just to accept the most extraordinary part of the phenomenon6 ,is it a case of surreptitious touches or conventional signs8 ,however simple-minded one may be1 one would nevertheless notice them more easily than a horse1 even a horse of genius4 ,krall never lays a hand on the animal2 he moves all round the little table1 which contains no appliances of any sort2 for the most part1 he stands behind the horse which is unable to see him1 or comes and sits beside his guest on the innocuous corn-bin1 busying himself1 while lecturing his pupil1 in writing up the minutes of the lesson4 ,he also welcomes with the most serene readiness any restrictions or tests which you propose4 ,i assure you that the thing itself is much simple1 and clearer than the suspicions of the arm-chair critics and that the most distrustful mind world not entertain the faintest idea of fraud in the frank1 wholesome atmosphere of the old stable4 ,but1 some one might have said1 ,krall1 who knew that you were coming to ,elberfeld1 had of course thoroughly rehearsed his little exercise in spelling1 which apparently is only an exercise in memory4 ,for conscience' sake1 though ,i did not look upon the objection as serious1 ,i submitted it to ,krall1 who at once said3 ,try it for yourself4 ,dictate to the horse any ,german word of two or three syllables1 emphasizing it strongly4 ,i'll go out of the stable and leave you alone with him4 ,behold ,muhamed and me by ourselves4 ,i confess that ,i am a little frightened4 ,i have many a time felt less uncomfortable in the presence of the great ones or the kings of the earth4 ,whom am ,i dealing with exactly8 ,however1 ,i summon my courage and speak aloud the first word that occurs to me1 the name of the hotel at which ,i am staying3 ,weidenhof4 ,at first1 ,muhamed1 who seems a little puzzled by his master's absence1 appears not to hear me and does not even deign to notice that ,i am there4 ,but ,i repeat eagerly1 in varying tones of voice1 by turns insinuating1 threatening1 beseeching and commanding3 ,weidenhof6 ,weidenhof6 ,weidenhof6 ,at last1 my mysterious companion suddenly makes up his mind to lend me his ears and straightway blithely raps out the following letters1 which ,i write down on the black-board as they come3 ,,weidnhoz4 ,it is a magnificent specimen of equine spelling6 ,triumphant and bewildered1 ,i call in friend ,krall1 who1 accustomed as he is to the prodigy1 thinks it quite natural1 but knits his brows3 ,what's this1 ,muhamed8 ,you've made a mistake again4 ,it's an ,f you want at the end of the word1 not a ,z4 ,just correct it at once1 please4 ,and the docile ,muhamed1 recognizing his blunder1 gives the three blows with his right hoof1 followed by the four blows with his left1 which represent the most unexceptionable ,f that one could ask for4 ,observe1 by the way1 the logic of his phonetic writing3 contrary to his habit1 he strikes the mute ,e after the ,w1 because it is indispensable2 but1 finding it included in the ,d1 he considers it superfluous and suppresses it with a high hand4 ,you rub your eyes1 question yourself1 ask yourself in the presence of what humanized phenomenon1 of what unknown force1 of what new creature you stand4 ,was all this what they hid in their eyes1 those silent brothers of ours8 ,you blush at arm's long injustice4 ,you look around you for some sort of trace1 obvious or subtle1 of the mystery4 ,you feel yourself attacked in your innermost citadel1 where you held yourself most certain and most impregnable4 ,you have felt a breath from the abyss upon your face4 ,you would not be more astonished if you suddenly heard the voice of the dead4 ,but the most astonishing thing is that you are not astonished for long4 ,we all1 unknown to ourselves1 live in the expectation of the extraordinary2 and1 when it comes1 it moves us much less than did the expectation4 ,it is as though a sort of higher instinct1 which knows everything and is not ignorant of the miracles that hang over our heads1 were reassuring us in advance and helping us to make an easy entrance into the regions of the supernatural4 ,there is nothing to which we grow accustomed more readily than to the marvellous2 and it is only afterwards1 upon reflection1 that our intelligence1 which knows hardly anything1 appreciates the magnitude of certain phenomena4 #aa ,but ,muhamed gives unmistakable signs of impatience to show that he has had enough of spelling4 ,thereupon1 as a diversion and a reward1 his kind master suggests the extraction of a few square and cubic roots4 ,muhamed appears delighted3 these are his favourite problems3 for he takes less interest than formerly in the most difficult multiplications and divisions4 ,he doubtless thinks them beneath him4 ,krall therefore writes on the blackboard various numbers of which ,i did not take note4 ,moreover1 as nobody now contests the fact that the horse works them with ease1 it would hardly be interesting to reproduce here several rather grim problems of which numerous variants will be found in the accounts and reports of experiments signed by ,drs4 ,mackenzie and ,hartkopff1 by ,overbeck1 ,clarapede and many others4 ,what strikes one particularly is the facility1 the quickness1 ,i was almost saying the joyous carelessness with which the strange mathematician gives the answers4 ,the last figure is hardly chalked upon the board before the right hoof is striking off the units1 followed immediately by the left hoof marking the tens4 ,there is not a sign of attention or reflection2 one is not even aware of the exact moment at which the horse looks at the problem3 and the answer seems to spring automatically from an invisible intelligence4 ,mistakes are rare or frequent according as it happens to be a good or bad day with the horse2 but1 when he is told of them1 he nearly always corrects them4 ,not unseldom1 the number is reversed3 #dg1 for instance1 becomes #gd2 but he puts it right without demur when asked4 ,i am manifestly dumbfounded2 but perhaps these problems are prepared beforehand8 ,if they were1 it would be very extraordinary1 but yet less surprising than their actual solution4 ,krall does not read this suspicion in my eyes1 because they do not show it2 nevertheless1 to remove the least shade of it1 he asks me to write a number of my own on the black-board for the horse to find the root4 ,i must here confess the humiliating ignorance that is the disgrace of my life4 ,i have not the faintest idea of the mysteries concealed within these recondite and complicated operations4 ,i did my humanities like everybody else2 but1 after crossing the useful and familiar frontiers of multiplication and division ,i found it impossible to advance any farther into the desolate regions1 bristling with figures1 where the square and cubic roots hold sway1 together with all sorts of other monstrous powers1 without shapes or faces1 which inspired me with invincible terror4 ,all the persecutions of my excellent instructors wore themselves out against a dead wall of stolidity4 ,successively disheartened1 they left me to my dismal ignorance1 prophesying a most dreary future for me1 haunted with bitter regrets4 ,i must say that1 until now1 ,i had scarcely experienced the effects of these gloomy predictions2 but the hour has come for me to expiate the sins of my youth4 ,nevertheless1 ,i put a good face upon it3 and1 taking at random the first figures that suggest themselves to my mind1 ,i boldly write on the black-board an enormous and most daring number4 ,muhamed remains motionless4 ,krall speaks to him sharply1 telling him to hurry up4 ,muhamed lifts his right hoof1 but does not let it fall4 ,krall loses patience1 lavishes prayers1 promises and threats2 the hoof remains poised1 as though to bear witness to good intentions that cannot be carried out4 ,then my host turns round1 looks at the problem and asks me3 ,does it give an exact root8 ,exact8 ,what does he mean8 ,are there roots which4 4 48 ,but ,i dare not go on3 my shameful ignorance suddenly flashes before my eyes4 ,krall smiles indulgently and1 without making any attempt to supplement an education which is too much in arrears to allow of the slightest hope1 laboriously works out the problem and declares that the horse was right in refusing to give an impossible solution4 #ab ,muhamed receives our thanks in the form of a lordly portion of carrots2 and a pupil is introduced whose attainments do not tower so high above mine3 ,hanschen1 the little pony1 quick and lively as a big rat4 ,like me1 he has never gone beyond elementary arithmetic3 and so we shall understand each other better and meet on equal terms4 ,krall asks me for two numbers to multiply4 ,i give him #fc ,x #g4 ,he does the sum and writes the product on the board1 followed by the sign of division3 #dda _/ #g4 ,instantly ,hanschen1 with a celerity difficult to follow1 gives three blows1 or rather three violent scrapes with his right hoof and six with his left1 which makes #fc1 for we must not forget that in ,german they say not sixty-three1 but three-and-sixty4 ,we congratulate him2 and1 to evince his satisfaction1 he nimbly reverses the number by marking #cf and then puts it right again by scraping #fc4 ,he is evidently enjoying himself and juggling with the figures4 ,and additions1 subtractions1 multiplications and divisions follow one after the other1 with figures supplied by myself1 so as to remove any idea of collusion4 ,hanschen seldom blunders2 and1 when he does1 we receive a very clear impression that his mistake is voluntary3 he is like a mischievous schoolboy playing a practical joke upon his master4 ,the solutions fall thick as hail upon the little spring-board2 the correct answer is released by the question as though you were pressing the button of an electric push4 ,the pony's flippancy is as surprising as his skill4 ,but in this unruly flippancy1 in this hastiness which seems inattentive there is nevertheless a fixed and permanent idea4 ,hanschen paws the ground1 kicks1 prances1 tosses his head1 looks as if he cannot keep still1 but never leaves his spring-board4 ,is he interested in the problems1 does he enjoy them8 ,it is impossible to say2 but he certainly has the appearance of one accomplishing a duty or a piece of work which we do not discuss1 which is important1 necessary and inevitable4 ,but the lesson suddenly ends with a joke carried rather too far by the pupil1 who catches his good master by the seat of his trousers1 into which he plants disrespectful teeth4 ,he is severely reprimanded1 deprived of his carrots and sent back in disgrace to his private apartments4 #ac ,next comes ,bette1 who is like a big1 sleek ,norman horse4 ,he makes the calm1 dignified1 peaceful entrance of a blind giant4 ,his large1 dark1 brilliant eyes are quite dead1 deprived of any reflex power4 ,he feels about with his hoof for the board on which he is to rap his answers4 ,he has not yet gone beyond the rudiments of mathematics2 and the early part of his education was particularly difficult4 ,they managed to make him understand the value and meaning of the numbers and of the addition- and multiplication-signs by means of little taps on his sides4 ,krall speaks to him as a father might speak to the youngest of his sons4 ,he explains to him fondly the easy sums which ,i suggest his doing3 two plus three1 eight minus four1 four times three2 he says3 ,mind6 ,it's not plus three or minus three this time1 but four multiplied by three6 ,berto hardly ever makes a mistake4 ,when he does not understand the question1 he waits for it to be written with the finger on his side2 and the careful way in which he works it out like some backward and afflicted child is an infinitely pathetic sight4 ,he is much more zealous and conscientious than his fellow-pupils2 and we feel that1 in the darkness wherein he dwells1 this work is1 next to his meals1 the only spark of light and interest in his existence4 ,he will certainly never rival ,muhamed1 for instance1 who is the arithmetical prodigy1 the ,inaudi1 of horses2 but he is a valuable and living proof that the theory of unconscious and imperceptible signs1 the only one which the ,german theorists have hitherto seriously considered1 is now clearly untenable4 ,i have not yet spoken of ,zarif4 ,he is not in the best of tempers2 and besides1 in arithmetic1 he is only a less learned and more capricious ,muhamed4 ,he answers most of the questions at random1 stubbornly raising his foot and declining to lower it1 so as clearly to mark his disapproval2 but he solves the last problem correctly when he is promised a panful of carrots and no more lessons for that morning4 ,the groom enters to lead him away and makes some movement or other at which the horse starts1 rears and shies4 ,that's his bad conscience1 says ,krall1 gravely4 ,and the expression assumes a singular meaning and importance in this hybrid atmosphere1 steeped in an indefinable something from another world4 ,but it is half-past one1 the sacred ,german dinner-hour4 ,the horses are taken back to their racks and the men separate1 wishing one another the inevitable ,mahlzeit4 ,as he walks with me along the quays of the black and muddy ,wupper1 ,krall says3 ,it is a pity that you did not see ,zarif in one of his better moods4 ,he is sometimes more startling than ,muhamed and has given me two or three surprises that seem incredible4 ,one morning1 for instance1 ,i came to the stable and was preparing to give him his lesson in arithmetic4 ,he was no sooner in front of the spring-board than he began to stamp with his foot4 ,i left him alone and was astounded to hear a whole sentence1 an absolutely human sentence1 come letter by letter from his hoof3 ',albert has beaten ,hanschen1' was what he said to me that day4 ,another time1 ,i wrote down from his dictation1 ',hanschen has bitten ,kama4' ,like a child seeing its father after an absence1 he felt the need to inform me of the little doings of the stable2 he provided me with the artless chronicle of a humble and uneventful life4 ,krall1 for that matter1 living in the midst of his miracle1 seems to think this quite natural and almost inevitable4 ,i1 who have been immersed in it for only a few hours1 accept it almost as calmly as he does4 ,i believe without hesitation what he tells me2 and1 in the presence of this phenomenon which1 for the first time in man's existence1 gives us a sentence that has not sprung from a human brain1 ,i ask myself whither we are tending1 where we stand and what lies ahead of us44 4 4 #ad ,after dinner1 the experiments begin again1 for my host is untiring4 ,first of all1 pointing to me1 he asks ,muhamed if he remembers what his uncle's name is4 ,the horse raps out an ,h4 ,krall is astonished and utters fatherly reprimands3 ,come1 take care6 ,you know it's not an ,h4 ,the horse raps out an ,e4 ,krall becomes a little impatient3 he threatens1 he implores1 he promises in turn1 carrots and the direst punishments1 such as sending for ,albert1 the groom1 who1 on special occasions1 recalls idle and inattentive pupils to a sense of duty and decorum1 for ,krall himself never chastises his horses1 lest he should lose their friendship or their confidence4 ,so he continues his reproaches3 ,come now1 are you going to be more careful and not rap out your letters anyhow8 ,muhamed obstinately goes his own way and strikes an ,r4 ,then ,krall's open face lights up3 ,he's right1 he says4 ,you understand3 ,h ,e ,r1 standing for ,herr4 ,he wanted to give you the title to which every man wearing a top hat or a bowler has the right4 ,he does it only very rarely and ,i had forgotten all about it4 ,he probably heard me call you ,herr ,maeterlinck and wanted to get it perfectly4 ,this special politeness and this excess of zeal augur a particularly good lesson4 ,you've done very well1 ,mohammed1 my child2 you've done very well and ,i beg your pardon4 ,now kiss me and go on4 ,but ,mohammed1 after giving his master a hearty kiss1 still seems to be hesitating4 ,then ,krall1 to put him on the right track observes that the first letter of my name is the same as the first letter of his own4 ,mohammed strikes a ,k1 evidently thinking of his master's name4 ,at last1 ,krall draws a big ,m on the black-board1 whereupon the horse1 like one suddenly remembering a word which he could not think of1 raps out1 one after the other and without stopping1 the letters ,m ,a ,z ,r ,l ,k1 which1 stripped of useless vowels1 represent the curious corruption which my name has undergone1 since the morning1 in a brain that is not a human brain4 ,he is told that this is not correct4 ,he seems to agree1 gropes about a little and writes1 ,m ,a ,r ,z ,l ,e ,g ,k4 ,krall repeats my name and asks which is the first letter to be altered4 ,the stallion marks an ,r4 ,good1 but what letter will you put instead8 ,mohammed strikes an ,n4 ,no1 do be careful6 ,he strikes a ,t4 ,very good1 but in what place will the ,t come8 ,in the third1 replies the horse2 and the corrections continue until my patronomic comes out of its strange adventure almost unscathed4 ,and the spelling1 the questioning1 the sums1 the problems are resumed and follow upon one another1 as wonderful1 as bewildering as before1 but already a little dimmed by familiarity1 like any other prolonged miracle4 ,it is important1 besides1 to notice that the instances which ,i have given are not to be classed among the most remarkable feats of our magic horses4 ,today's is a good ordinary lesson1 a respectable lesson1 not illumined by flashes of genius4 ,but in the presence of other witnesses the horses performed more startling exploits which broke down even more decisively the barrier1 which is undoubtedly an imaginary one1 between animal and human nature4 ,one day1 for instance1 ,zarif2 the scamp of the party1 suddenly stopped in the middle of his lesson4 ,they asked him the reason4 ,because ,i am tired4 ,another time1 he answered3 ,pain in my leg4 ,they recognize and identify pictures shown to them1 distinguish colours and scents4 ,i have made a point of stating only what ,i saw with my own eyes and heard with my own ears2 and ,i declare that ,i have done so with the same scrupulous accuracy as though ,i were reporting a criminal trial in which a man's life depended on my evidence4 ,but ,i was practically convinced of the truth of the incidents before going to ,elberfeld2 and it was not to check them that ,i made the journey4 ,i was anxious to make certain if the telepathic theory1 which was the only one that ,i considered admissible1 would withstand the tests which ,i intended to apply to it4 ,i opened my mind on the subject to ,krall1 who at first did not quite grasp what ,i was asking4 ,like most men who have not made a special study of the questions1 he imagined that telepathy meant above all a deliberate and conscious transmission of thought2 and he assured me that he never made any effort to transmit his and that1 for the most part1 the horses gave a reply which was the exact opposite of what he was expecting4 ,i did not doubt this for a moment2 in fact1 direct and deliberate transmission of thought is1 even among men1 a very rare1 difficult and uncertain1 phenomenon1 whereas involuntary1 unpremeditated and unsuspected communications between one subconsciousness and another can no longer be denied except by those who of set purpose ignore studies and experiments that are within the reach of any one who will take the trouble to engage in them4 ,i was persuaded therefore that the horses acted exactly like the tipping-tables which simply translate the subliminal ideas of one or another of those present by the aid of conventional little taps4 ,when all is said1 it is much less surprising to see a horse than a table lift its foot and much more natural that the living substance of an animal rather than the inert matter of a thing should be sensitive and susceptible to the mysterious influence of a medium4 ,i knew quite well that experiments had been made in order to eliminate this theory4 ,people1 for instance1 prepared a certain number of questions and put them in sealed envelopes4 ,then1 on entering the presence of the horse1 they would take one of the envelopes at random1 open it and write down the problem on the black-board2 and ,mohammed or ,zarif would answer with the same facility and the same readiness as though the solution had been known to all the onlookers4 ,but was it really unknown to their subconsciousness8 ,who could say for certain8 ,tests of this kind require extraordinary precautions and a special dexterity2 for the action of the subconsciousness is so subtle1 takes such unexpected turns1 delves in the museum of so many forgotten treasures and operates at such distances that one is never sure of escaping it4 ,were those precautions taken8 ,i was not convinced that they were2 and1 without pretending to decide the question1 ,i said to myself that my blissful ignorance of mathematics might perhaps be of service in shedding light upon some part of it4 ,for this ignorance1 however deplorable from other points of view1 gave me a rare advantage in this case4 ,it was in fact extremely unlikely that my subliminal consciousness1 which had never known what a cubic root was or the root of any other power1 could help the horse4 ,i therefore took from a table a list containing several problems1 all different and all equally unpleasant looking1 covered up the solutions1 asked ,krall to leave the stable and1 when alone with ,zarif1 copied out one of them on the black-board4 ,in order not to overload these pages with details which would only be a repetition of one another1 ,i will at once say that none of the antitelepathic tests succeeded that day4 ,it was the end of the lesson and late in the afternoon2 the horses were tired and irritable2 and1 whether ,krall was there or not1 whether the problem was elementary or difficult1 they gave only absurd replies1 wilfully putting their foot in it1 as one might say with very good reason4 ,but1 next morning1 on resuming their task1 when ,i proceeded as described above1 ,mohammed and ,zarif1 doubtless in a better temper and already more accustomed to their new examiner1 gave in rapid succession correct answers to nearly every problem set them4 ,i am bound in fairness to say that there was no appreciable difference between these results and those which are obtained in the presence of ,krall or other onlookers who1 consciously or unconsciously1 are already aware of the answer required4 ,i next thought of another and much simpler test1 but one which1 by virtue of its very simplicity1 could not be exposed to any elaborate and farfetched suspicions4 ,i saw on one of the shelves in the stable a panel of cards1 about the size of an octavo volume1 each bearing an arabic numeral on one of its sides4 ,i once more asked my good friend ,krall1 whose courtesy is inexhaustible1 to leave me alone with his pupil4 ,i then shuffled the cards and put three of them in a row on the spring-board in front of the horse1 without looking at them myself4 ,there was therefore1 at that moment1 not a human soul on earth who knew the figures spread at the feet of my companion1 this creature so full of mystery that already ,i no longer dare call him an animal4 ,without hesitation and unasked1 he rapped out correctly the number formed by the cards4 ,the experiment succeeded1 as often as ,i cared to try it1 with ,hanschen1 ,mohammed and ,zarif alike4 ,mohammed did even more3 as each figure was of a different colour1 ,i asked him to tell me the colour--of which ,i myself was absolutely ignorant--of the first letter on the right4 ,with the aid of the conventional alphabet1 he replied that it was blue1 which proved to be the case4 ,of course1 ,i ought to have multiplied these experiments and made them more exhaustive and complicated by combining1 with the aid of the cards and under the same conditions1 exercises in multiplication1 division and the extracting of roots4 ,i had not the time2 but1 a few days after ,i left1 the subject was resumed and completed by ,dr4 ,h4 ,hamel4 ,i will sum up his report of the experiments3 the doctor1 alone in the stable with the home 7,krall was away1 travelling71 puts down on the black-board the sign and then places before and after this sign1 without looking at either of them1 a card marked with a figure which he does not know4 ,he next asks ,mohammed to add up the two numbers4 ,mohammed at first gives a few heedless taps with his hoof4 ,he is called to order and requested to be serious and to attend4 ,he then gives fifteen distinct taps4 ,the doctor next replaces the sign by ,x and1 again without looking at them1 places two cards on the blackboard and asks the horse not to add up the two figures this time1 but to multiply them4 ,mohammed taps out1 #bg1 which is right1 for the black-board says1 #i ,x #c4 ,the same success follows with other multiplication sums3 #i ,x #b1 #h ,x #f4 ,then the doctor takes from an envelope a problem of which he does not know the solution3 fourth root of #ghijdha4 ,mohammed replies1 #ec4 ,the doctor looks at the back of the paper3 once more1 the answer is perfectly correct4 #af ,does this mean that every risk of telepathy is done away with8 ,it would perhaps be rash to make a categorical assertion4 ,the power and extent of telepathy are as yet1 we cannot too often repeat1 indefinite1 indiscernible1 untraceable and unlimited4 ,we have but quite lately discovered it1 we know only that its existence can no longer be denied2 but1 as for all the rest1 we are at much the same stage as that whereat ,galvani was when he gave life to the muscles of his dead frogs with two little plates of metal which roused the jeers of the scientists of his time1 but contained the germ of all the wonders1 of electricity4 ,nevertheless1 as regards telepathy in the sense in which we understand and know it to-day1 my mind is made up4 ,i am persuaded that it is not in this direction that we must seek for an explanation of the phenomenon2 or1 if we are determined to find it there1 the explanation becomes complicated with so many subsidiary mysteries that it is better to accept the prodigy as it stands1 in its original obscurity and simplicity4 ,when1 for instance1 ,i was copying out one of the grisly problems which ,i have mentioned1 it is quite certain that my conscious intelligence could make neither head nor tail of it4 ,i did not so much as know what it meant or whether the exponent #c4 #d4 #e called for a multiplication1 a division or some other mathematical operation which ,i did not even try to imagine2 and1 rack ,,my memory as ,i may1 ,i cannot remember any moment in my life when ,i knew more about it than ,i do now4 ,we should therefore have to admit that ,,my subliminal self is a born mathematician1 quick1 infallible and endowed with boundless learning4 ,it is possible and ,i feel a certain pride at the thought4 ,but the theory simply shifts the miracle by making it pass from the horse's soul to mine2 and the miracle becomes no clearer by the transfer1 which1 for that matter1 does not sound probable4 ,i need hardly add that1 a fortiori1 ,dr4 ,hamel's experiments and many others which ,i have not here the space to describe finally dispose of the theory4 #ag ,let us see how those who have interested themselves in these extraordinary manifestations have attempted to explain them4 ,as we go along1 we will just shear through the feeble undergrowth of childish theories4 ,i shall not1 therefore1 linger over the suggestions of cheating1 of manifest signs addressed to the eye or ear1 of electrical installations that are supposed to control the answers1 nor other idle tales of an excessively clumsy character4 ,to realize their inexcusable inanity we have but to spend a few minutes in the honest ,elberfeld stable4 ,at the beginning of this essay1 ,i mentioned the attack made by ,herr ,pfungst4 ,herr ,pfungst1 the reader will remember1 claims to prove that all the horse's replies are determined by imperceptible and probably unconscious movement on the part of the person putting the questions4 ,this interpretation1 which falls to the ground1 like all the others1 in the face of the actual facts1 would not deserve serious discussion1 were it not that the ,berlin psychologist's report created an immense sensation some years ago and has succeeded in intimidating the greater part of the official ,german scientific world to this day4 ,it is true that the report in question is a monument of useless pedantry1 but we are none the less bound to admit that1 such as it was1 it annihilated poor ,von ,oaten1 who1 being no controversialist and not knowing how to proclaim the truth which was struggling for utterance1 died in gloom and solitude4 ,to make an end of this cumbrous and puerile theory1 is it necessary to emphasize again that experiments in which the animal does not see the questioner are as regularly successful as the others8 ,krall1 if you ask him1 will stand behind the horse1 will speak from the end of the room1 will leave the stable altogether2 and the results are just the same4 ,they are the same again when the tests are made in the dark or when the animal's head is covered with a close-fitting hood4 ,they do not vary either in the case of ,berto1 who is stone-blind1 or when any other person whatever sets the problem in ,krall's absence4 ,will it be maintained that this outsider or that stranger is acquainted beforehand with the imperceptible signs that are to dictate the solution which he himself often does not know8 ,but what is the use of prolonging this fight against a cloud of smoke8 ,none of it can bear examination2 and it calls for a genuine effort of the will to set one's self seriously to refute such pitiful objections4 #ah ,on the ground thus cleared and at the portal of this unlooked-for riddle1 which comes to disturb our peace in a region which we thought to be finally explored and conquered1 there are only two ways1 if not of explaining1 at least of contemplating the phenomenon3 to admit purely and simply the almost human intelligence of the horse1 or to have recourse to an as yet very vague and indefinite theory which1 for lack of a better designation1 we will call the mediumistic or subliminal theory and of which we will strive presently--and no doubt vainly--to dispel the grosser darkness4 ,but1 whatever interpretation we adopt1 we are bound to recognize that it plunges us into a mystery which is equally profound and equally astonishing on either side1 one directly related to the greatest mysteries that overwhelm us2 and it is open to us to accept it with resignation or rejoicing1 according as we prefer to live in a world wherein everything is within the reach of our intelligence or a world wherein everything is incomprehensible4 ,as for ,krall1 he does not doubt for an instant that his horses solve for themselves1 without any assistance1 without any outside influence1 simply by their own mental powers1 the most arduous problems set them4 ,he is persuaded that they understand what is said to them and what they say1 in short1 that their brain and their will perform exactly the same functions as a human brain and will4 ,it is certain that the facts seem to prove him right and that his opinion carries way great weight1 for1 after all1 he knows his horses better than any one does2 he has beheld the birth or rather the awakening of that dormant intelligence1 even as a mother beholds the birth or the awakening of intelligence in her child2 he has perceived its first gropings1 known its first resistance and its first triumphs2 he has watched it taking shape1 breaking away and gradually rising to the point at which it stands to-day2 in a word1 he is the father and the principal and sole perpetual witness of the miracle4 #ai ,yes1 but the miracle comes as such a surprise that1 the moment we set foot in it1 a sort of instinctive aberration seizes us1 refusing to accept the evidence and compelling us to search in every direction to see if there is not another outlet4 ,even in the presence of those astounding horses and while they are working before our eyes1 we do not yet sincerely believe that which fills and subdues our gaze4 ,we accept the facts1 because there is no means of escaping them2 but we accept them only provisionally and with all reserve1 putting off till later the comfortable explanation which will give us back our familiar1 shallow certainties4 ,but the explanation does not come2 there is none in the homely and not very lofty regions wherein we hoped to find one2 there is neither fault nor flaw in the mighty evidence2 and nothing delivers us from the mystery4 ,it must be confessed that this mystery1 springing from a point where we least expected to come upon the unknown1 bears enough within itself to scatter all our convictions4 ,remember that1 since man appeared upon this earth1 he has lived among creatures which1 from immemorial experience1 he thought that he knew as perfectly as he knows an object fashioned by his hands4 ,out of these creatures he chose the most docile and1 as he called them1 the most intelligent1 attaching in this case to the word intelligence a sense so narrow as to be almost ridiculous4 ,he observed them1 scrutinized them1 tried them1 analyzed them and dissected them in every imaginable way2 and whole lives were devoted to nothing but the study of their habits1 their faculties1 their nervous system1 their pathology1 their psychology1 their instincts4 ,all this led to certainties which1 among those supported by our unexplained little existence on an inexplicable planet1 would seem to be the least doubtful1 the least subject to revision4 ,there is no disputing1 for instance1 that the horse is gifted with an extraordinary memory1 that he possesses the sense of direction1 that he understands a few signs and even a few words and that he obeys them4 ,it is equally undeniable that the anthropoid apes are capable of imitating a great number of our actions and of our attitudes3 but it is also manifest that their bewildered and feverish imagination perceives neither their object nor their scope4 ,as for the dog1 the one of all these privileged animals who lives closest to us1 who for thousands and thousands of years has eaten at our table and worked with us and been our friend1 it is manifest that1 now and then1 we catch a rather uncanny gleam in his deep1 watchful eyes4 ,it is certain that he sometimes wanders in a curious fashion along the mysterious border that separates our own intelligence from that which we grant to the other creatures inhabiting this earth with us4 ,but it is no less certain that he has never definitely passed it4 ,we know exactly how far he can go2 and we have invariably found that our efforts1 our patience1 our encouragement1 our passionate appeals1 have hitherto failed to draw him out of the somewhat narrow1 darkly enchanted circle wherein nature seems to have imprisoned him once and for all4 #bj ,there remains1 it is true1 the insect-world1 in which marvellous things happen4 ,it includes architects1 geometricians1 mechanicians1 engineers1 weavers1 physicists1 chemists and surgeons who have forestalled most of our human inventions4 ,i need not here remind the reader of the wasps' and bees' genius for building1 the social and economic organization of the hive and the ant-hill1 the spider's snares1 the eumenes' nest and hanging egg1 the odynerus' cell with its neat stacks of game1 the sacred beetle's filthy but ingenius ball1 the leafcutter's faultless disks1 the brick-laying of the mason-bee1 the three dagger-thrusts which the aphex administers to the three nerve-centres of the cricket1 the lancet of the cerceris1 who paralyses her victims without killing them and preserves them for an indefinite period as fresh meat1 nor a thousand other features which it would be impossible to enumerate without recapitulating the whole of ,henri ,fabre's work and completely altering the proportions of the present essay4 ,but here such silence and such darkness reign that we have nothing to hope for4 ,there exists1 so to speak1 no bench-mark1 no means of communication between the world of insects and our own2 and we are perhaps less far from grasping and fathoming what takes place in ,saturn or ,jupiter than what is enacted in the ant-hill or the hive4 ,we know absolutely nothing of the quality1 the number1 the extent or even the nature of their senses4 ,many of the great laws on which our life is based do not exist for them3 those1 for instance1 which govern fluids are completely reversed4 ,they seem to inhabit our planet1 but in reality move in an entirely different world4 ,understanding nothing of their intelligence pierced with disconcerting gaps1 in which the blindest stupidity suddenly comes and destroys the ablest and most inspired schemes1 we have given the name of instinct to that which we could not apprehend1 postponing our interpretation of a word that touches upon life's most insoluble riddles4 ,there is1 therefore1 from the point of view of the intellectual faculties1 nothing to be gathered from those extraordinary creatures who are not1 like the other animals1 our lesser brothers1 but strangers1 aliens from we know not where1 survivors or percursors of another world4 #ba ,we were at this stage1 slumbering peacefully in our long-established convictions1 when a man entered upon the scene and suddenly showed us that we were wrong and that1 for long centuries1 we had over looked a truth which was scarcely even covered with a very thin veil4 ,and the strangest thing is that this astonishing discovery1 is in no wise the natural consequence of a new invention1 of processes or methods hitherto unknown4 ,it owes nothing to the latest acquirements of our knowledge4 ,it springs from the humblest idea which the most primitive man might have conceived in the first days of the earth's existence4 ,it is simply a matter of having a little more patience1 confidence and respect for all that which shares our lot in a world whereof we know none of the purposes4 ,it is simply a matter of having a little less pride and of looking a little more fraternally upon existences that are much more fraternal than we believed4 ,there is no secret about the almost puerile ingenuousness of ,von ,osten's methods and ,krall's4 ,they start with the principle that the horse is an ignorant but intelligent child2 and they treat him as such4 ,they speak1 explain1 demonstrate1 argue and mete out rewards or punishments like a schoolmaster addressing little boys of five or six4 ,they begin by placing a few skittle-pins in front of their strange pupil4 ,they count them and make him count them by alternately lifting and lowering the horse's hoof4 ,he thus obtains his first notion of numbers4 ,they next add one or two more skittles and say1 for instance3 ,three skittles and two skittles are five skittles4 ,in this way1 they explain and teach addition2 next1 by the reverse process1 subtraction1 which is followed by multiplication1 division and all the rest4 ,at the beginning1 the lessons are extremely laborious and demand an untiring and loving patience1 which is the whole secret of the miracle4 ,but2 as soon as the first barrier of darkness is passed1 the progress becomes bewilderingly rapid4 ,all this is incontestable2 and the facts are there1 before which we must need bow4 ,but what upsets all our convictions or1 more correctly1 all the prejudices which thousands of years have made as invincible as axioms1 what we do not succeed in understanding is that the horse at once understands what we want of him2 it is that first step1 the first tremor of an unexpected intelligence1 which suddenly reveals itself as human4 ,at what precise second did the light appear and was the veil rent under8 ,it is impossible to say2 but it is certain that1 at a given moment1 without any visible sign to reveal the prodigious inner transformation1 the horse acts and replies as though he suddenly understood the speech of man4 ,what is it that sets the miracle working8 ,we know that1 after a time1 the horse associates certain words with certain objects that interest him or with three or four events whose infinite repetition forms the humble tissue of his daily life4 ,this is only a sort of mechanical memory which has nothing in common with the most elementary intelligence4 ,but behold1 one fine day1 without any perceptible transition1 he seems to know the meaning of a host of words which possess no interest for him2 which represent to him no picture1 no memory2 which he has never had occasion to connect with any sensation1 agreeable or disagreeable4 ,he handles figures1 which even to man are nothing but obscure and abstract ideas4 ,he solves problems that cannot possibly be made objective or concrete4 ,he reproduces letters which1 from his point of view1 correspond with nothing actual4 ,he fixes his attention and makes observations on things or circumstances which in no way affect him1 which remain and always will remain alien and indifferent to him4 ,in a word1 he steps out of the narrow ring in which he was made to turn by hunger and fear--which have been described as the two great moving powers of all that is not human--to enter the immense circle in which sensations go on being shed till ideas come into view4 #bb ,is it possible to believe that the horses really do what they appear to do8 ,is there no precedent for the marvel8 ,is there no transition between the ,elberfeld stallions and the horses which we have known until this day8 ,it is not easy to answer these questions1 for it is only since yesterday that the intellectual powers of our defenseless brothers have been subjected to strictly scientific experiments4 ,we have1 it is true more than one collection of anecdotes in which the intelligence of animals is lauded to the skies2 but we cannot rely upon these ill-authenticated stories4 ,to find genuine and incontestable instances we must have recourse to the works1 rare as yet1 of scientific men who have made a special study of the subject4 ,m4 ,hachet-,souplet1 for example1 the director of the ,institut de ,psychologie ,zoologique1 mentions the case of a dog who learnt to acquire an abstract idea of weight4 ,you put in front of him eight rounded and polished stones1 all of exactly the same size and shape1 but of different weights4 ,you tell him to fetch the heaviest or the lightest2 he judges their weight by lifting them and1 without mistake1 picks out the one required4 ,the same writer also tells the story of a parrot to whom he had taught the word cupboard by showing him a little box that could be hung up on the wall at different heights and in which his daily allowance of food was always ostentatiously put away2 ,i next taught him the names of a number of objects1 says ,m4 ,hachet-,souplet1 by holding them out to him4 ,among them was a ladder2 and ,i prevailed upon the bird to say1 ',climb1' each time that he saw me mount the steps4 ,one morning1 when the parrot's cage was brought into the laboratory1 the cupboard was hanging near the ceiling1 while the little ladder was stowed away in a corner among other objects familiar to the bird4 ,now the parrot1 every day1 when ,i opened the cupboard1 used to scream1 ',cupboard6 ,cupboard6 ,cupboard6' with all his might4 ,my problem was1 therefore1 this3 seeing that the cupboard was out of my reach and that1 therefore1 ,i could not take his food out of it2 knowing1 on the other hand1 that ,i was able to raise myself above the level of the floor by climbing the ladder2 and having the words 'climb' and 'ladder' at his disposal3 would he employ them to suggest to me the idea of using them in order to reach the cupboard8 ,greatly excited1 the parrot flapped his wings1 bit the bars of his cage1 and screamed3 ',cupboard6 ,cupboard6 ,cupboard6' ,and ,i got no more out of him that day4 ,the next day1 the bird1 having received nothing but millet1 for which he did not much care1 instead of the hemp-seed contained in the cupboard1 was in paroxysms of anger2 and1 after he had made numberless attempts to force open his bars1 his attention was at last caught by the ladder and he said3 ',ladder1 climb1 cupboard6' ,we have here1 as the author remarks1 a marvellous intellectual effort4 ,there is an evident association of ideas2 cause is linked with effect2 and examples such as this lesson appreciably the distance separating our learned horses from their less celebrated brethren4 ,we must admit1 however1 that this intellectual effort1 if we observe1 animals a little carefully1 is much less uncommon than we think4 ,it surprises us in this case because a special and1 when all is said1 purely mechanical arrangement of the parrot's organ gives him a human voice4 ,at every moment1 ,i find in my own dog associations of ideas no less evident and often more complex4 ,for instance1 if he is thirsty1 he seeks my eyes and next looks at the tap in the dressing-room1 thus showing that he very plainly connects the notions of thirst1 running water and human intervention4 ,when ,i dress to go out1 he evidently watches all my movements4 ,while ,i am lacing my boots1 he conscientiously licks my hands1 in order that my divinity may be good to him and especially to congratulate me on my capital idea of going out for a constitutional4 ,it is a sort of general and as yet vague approval4 ,boots promise an excursion out of doors1 that is to say1 space1 fragrant roads1 long grass full of surprises1 corners scented with offal1 friendly or tragic encounters and the pursuit of wholly illusory1 game4 ,but the fair vision is still in anxious suspense4 ,he does not yet know if he is going with me4 ,his fate is now being decided2 and his eyes1 melting with anguish1 devour my mind4 ,if ,i buckle on my leather gaiters1 it means the sudden and utter extinction1 of all that constitutes the joy of life4 ,they leave not a ray of hope4 ,they herald the hateful1 lonely motorcycle1 which he cannot keep up with2 and he stretches himself sadly in a dark corner1 where he goes back to the gloomy dreams of an unoccupied1 forsaken dog4 ,but1 when ,i slip my arms into the sleeves of my heavy great-coat1 one would think that they were opening the gates of the most dazzling paradise4 ,for this implies the car1 the obvious1 indubitable motor-car1 in other words1 the radiant summit of the most superlative delight4 ,and delirious barks1 inordinate bounds1 riotous1 embarrassing demonstrations of affection greet a happiness which1 for all that1 is but an immaterial idea1 built up of artless memories and ingenuous hopes4 #bc ,i mention these matters only because they are quite ordinary and because there is nobody who has not made a thousand similar observations4 ,as a rule1 we do not notice that these humble manifestations represent sentiments1 associations of ideas1 inferences1 deductions1 an absolute and altogether human mental effort4 ,they lack only speech2 but speech is merely a mechanical accident which reveals the operations of thought more clearly to us4 ,we are amazed that ,mohammed or ,zarif should recognize the picture of a horse1 a donkey1 a hat1 or a man on horseback1 or that they should spontaneously report to their master the little events that happen in the stable2 but it is certain that our own dog is incessantly performing a similar work and that his eyes1 if we could read them1 would tell us a great deal more4 ,the primary miracle of ,elberfeld is that the stallions should have been given the means of expressing what they think and feel4 ,it is momentous2 but1 when closely looked into1 it is not incomprehensible4 ,between the talking horses and my silent dog there is an enormous distance1 but not an abyss4 ,i am saying this not to detract from the nature or extent of the prodigy1 but to call attention to the fact that the theory of animal intelligence is more justifiable and less fanciful than one is at first inclined to think4 #bd ,but the second and greater miracle is that man should have been able to rouse the horse from his immemorial sleep1 to fix and direct his attention and to interest him in matters that are more foreign and indifferent to him than the variations of temperature in ,sirius or ,aldebaran are to us4 ,it really seems1 when we consider our preconceived ideas1 that there is not in the animal an organic and insurmountable inability to do what man's brain does1 a total and irremediable absence of intellectual faculties1 but rather a profound lethargy and torpor of those faculties4 ,it lives in a sort of undisturbed stolidity1 of nebulous slumber4 ,as ,dr4 ,ochorowicz very justly remarks1 its waking state is very near akin to the state of a man walking in his sleep4 ,having no notion of space or time1 it spends its life1 one may say1 in a perpetual dream4 ,it does what is strictly necessary to keep itself alive2 and all the rest passes over it and does not penetrate at all into its hermetically closed imaginings4 ,exceptional circumstances--some extraordinary need1 wish1 passion or shock--are required to produce what ,m4 ,hachet-,souplet calls the psychic flash which suddenly thaws and galvanizes its brain1 placing it for a minute in the waking state in which the human brain works normally4 ,nor is this surprising4 ,it does not need that awakening in order to exist2 and we know that nature never makes great superfluous efforts44 ,the intellect1 as ,professor ,clarapede well says1 appears only as a makeshift1 an instrument which betrays that the organism is not adapted to its environment1 a mode of expression which reveals a state of impotence4 ,it is probable that our brain at first suffered from the same lethargy1 a condition1 for that matter1 from which many men have not yet emerged2 and it is even more probable that1 compared with other modes of existence1 with other psychic phenomena1 on another plane and in another sphere1 the dense sleep in which we move is similar to that in which the lower animals have their being4 ,it also is traversed1 with increasing frequency1 by psychic flashes of a different order and a different scope4 ,seeing1 on the one side1 the intellectual movement that seems to be spreading among our lesser brothers and1 on the other1 the ever more constantly repeated manifestations of our subconsciousness1 we might even ask ourselves if we have not here1 on two different planes1 a tension1 a parallel pressure1 a new desire1 a new attempt of the mysterious spiritual force which animates the universe and which seems to be incessantly seeking fresh outlets and fresh conducting rods4 ,be this as it may1 when the flash has passed1 we behave very much as the animals do3 we promptly lapse into the indifferent sleep which suffices also for our miserable ways4 ,we ask no more of it1 we do not follow the luminous trail that summons us to an unknown world1 we go on turning in our dismal circle1 like contented sleep-walkers1 while ,isis' sistrum rattles without respite to rouse the faithful4 #be ,i repeat1 the great miracle of ,elberfeld is that of having been able to prolong and reproduce at will those isolated psychic flashes4 ,the horses1 in comparison with the other animals1 are here in the state of a man whose subliminal consciousness had gained the upper hand4 ,that man would lead a higher existence1 in an almost immaterial atmosphere1 of which the phenomena of metaphysics1 sparks falling from a region which we shall perhaps one day reach1 sometimes give us an uncertain and fleeting glimpse4 ,our intelligence1 which is really lethargy and which keeps us imprisoned in a little hollow of space and time1 would there be replaced by intuition1 or rather by a sort of imminent knowledge which would forthwith make us sharers in all that is known to a universe which perhaps knows all things4 ,unfortunately1 we have not1 or at least1 unlike the horses1 we are not acquainted with a superior being who interests himself in us and helps us to throw off our torpor4 ,we have to become our own god1 to rise above ourselves and to keep ourselves raised by our unaided strength4 ,it is almost certain that the horse would never have come out of his nebulous sphere without man's assistance2 but it is not forbidden to hope that man1 with no other help than his own courage and high purpose1 may yet succeed in breaking through the sleep that cramps him and blinds him4 #bf ,to come back then to our horses and to the main point1 which is the isolated psychic flash1 it is admitted that they know the values of figures1 that they can distinguish and identify smells1 colours1 forms1 objects and even graphic reproductions of those objects4 ,they also understand a large number of words1 including some of which they were1 never taught the meaning1 but which they picked up as they went along by hearing them spoken around them4 ,they have learnt1 with the assistance of an exceedingly complicated alphabet1 to reproduce the words1 thanks to which they manage to convey impressions1 sensations1 wishes1 associations of ideas1 observations and even spontaneous reflections4 ,it has been held that all this implies real acts of intelligence4 ,it is1 in fact1 often very difficult to decide exactly how far it is intelligence and how far memory1 instinct1 imitative genius1 obedience or mechanical impulse1 the effects of training1 or happy coincidences4 ,there are cases1 however1 which admit of little or no hesitation4 ,i give a few4 ,one day ,krall and his collaborator1 ,dr4 ,scholler1 thought that they would try and teach ,mohammed to express himself in speech4 ,the horse1 a docile and eager pupil1 made touching and fruitless efforts to reproduce human sounds4 ,suddenly1 he stopped and1 in his strange phonetic spelling1 declared1 by striking his foot on the spring-board3 ,ig hb kein gud ,sdim4 ,i have not a good voice4 ,observing that he did not open his mouth1 they strove to make him understand1 by the example of a dog1 with pictures1 and so on1 that1 in order to speak1 it is necessary to separate the jaws4 ,they next asked him3 ,what must you do to speak8 ,he replied1 by striking with his foot3 ,open mouth4 ,why don't you open yours8 ,weil kan nigd3 because ,i can't4 ,a few days after1 ,zarif was asked how he talks to ,mohammed4 ,mit ,munt3 with mouth4 ,why don't you tell me that with your mouth8 ,weil ig kein ,stim hbe3 because ,i have no voice4 ,does not this answer1 as ,krall remarks1 allow us to suppose that he has other means than speech of conversing with his stable-companion8 ,in the course of another lesson1 ,mohammed was shown the portrait of a young girl whom he did not know4 ,what's that8 asked his master4 ,metgen3 a girl8 ,on the black-board3 ,why is it a girl8 ,weil lang ,hr hd3 because she has long hair4 ,and what has she not8 ,moustache4 ,they next produced the likeness of man with no moustache4 ,what's this8 ,why is it a man8 ,weil kurz ,hr hd3 because he has short hair4 ,i could multiply these examples indefinitely by drawing on the voluminous ,elberfeld minutes1 which1 ,i may say in passing1 have the convincing force of photographic records4 ,all this1 it must be agreed1 is unexpected and disconcerting1 had never been foreseen or suspected and may be regarded as one of the strangest prodigies1 one of the most stupefying revelations that have taken place since man has dwelt in this world of riddles1 ,nevertheless1 by reflecting1 by comparing1 by investigating1 by regarding certain forgotten or neglected landmarks and starting-points1 by taking into consideration the thousand imperceptible gradations between the greatest and the least1 the highest and the lowest1 it is still possible to explain1 admit and understand4 ,we can1 if it comes to that1 imagine that1 in his secret self1 in his tragic silence1 our dog also makes similar remarks and reflections4 ,once again1 the miraculous bridge which1 in this instance1 spans the gulf between the animal and man is much more the expression of thought than thought itself4 ,we may go further and grant that certain elementary calculations1 such as little additions1 little subtractions of one or two figures1 are1 after all1 conceivable2 and ,i1 for my part1 am inclined to believe that the horse really executes them4 ,but where we get out of our depth1 where we enter into the realm of pure enchantment is when it becomes a matter of mathematical operations on a large scale1 notably of the finding of roots4 ,we know1 for instance1 that the extraction of the fourth root of a number of six figures calls for eighteen multiplications1 ten subtractions and three divisions and that the horse does thirty-one sums in five or six seconds1 that is to say1 during the brief1 careless glance which he gives at the black-board on which the problem is inscribed1 as though the answer came to him intuitively and instantaneously4 ,still1 if we admit the theory of intelligence1 we must also admit that the horse knows what he is doing1 since it is not until after learning what a squared number or a square root means that he appears to understand or that1 at any rate1 he gradually works out correctly the ever more complicated calculations required of him4 ,it is not possible to give here the details of this instruction1 which was astonishingly rapid4 ,the reader will find them on pages #aag et seq4 of ,krall's book1 ,denkende ,tiere4 ,krall begins by explaining to ,mohammed that #b squared is equal to #b ,x #b #d2 that #b cubed is equal to #b ,x #b ,x #b #f2 that #b is the square root of #d2 and so on4 ,in short1 the explanations and demonstrations are absolutely similar to those which one would give to an extremely intelligent child1 with this difference1 that the horse is much more attentive than the child and that1 thanks to his extraordinary memory1 he never forgets what he appears to have understood4 ,let us add1 to complete the magical and incredible character of the phenomenon that1 according to ,krall's own statement1 the horse was not taught beyond the point of extracting the square root of the number #add and that he spontaneously invented the manner of extracting all the others4 #bg ,must we once more repeat1 in connection with these startling performances1 that those who speak of audible or visible signals1 of telegraphy and wireless telegraphy1 of expedients1 trickery or deceit1 are speaking of what they do not know and of what they have not seen8 ,there is but one reply to be made to any one who honestly refuses to believe3 ,go to ,elberfeld---the problem is sufficiently important1 sufficiently big with consequences to make the journey worth while--and1 behind closed doors1 alone with the horse1 in the absolute solitude and silence of the stable1 set ,mohammed to extract half-a dozen roots which1 like that which ,i have mentioned1 require thirty-one operations4 ,you must yourself be ignorant of the solutions1 so as to do away with any transmission of unconscious thought4 ,if he then gives you1 one after the other1 five or six correct solutions1 as he did to me and many others1 you will not go away with the conviction that the animal is able by its intelligence to extract those roots1 because that conviction would upset too thoroughly the greater part of the certainties on which your life is based2 but you will1 at any rate1 be persuaded that you have been for a few minutes in the presence of one of the greatest and strangest riddles that can disturb the mind of man2 and it is always a good and salutary thing to come into contact with emotions of this order4 #bh ,truth to say1 the theory of intelligence in the animal would be so extraordinary as to be almost untenable4 ,if we are determined1 at whatever cost1 to pin our faith to it1 we are bound to call in the aid of other ideas1 to appeal1 for instance1 to the extremely mysterious and essentially uncomprehended and incomprehensible nature of numbers4 ,it is almost certain that the science of mathematics lies outside the intelligence4 ,it forms a mechanical and abstract whole1 more spiritual than material and more material than spiritual1 visible only through its shadow and yet constituting the most immovable of the realities that govern the universe4 ,from first to last it declares itself a very strange force and1 as it were1 the sovereign of another element than that which nourishes our brain4 ,secret1 indifferent1 imperious and implacable1 it subjugates and oppresses us from a great height or a great depth1 in any case1 from very far1 without telling us why4 ,one might say that figures place those who handle them in a special condition4 ,they draw the cabalistic circle around their victim4 ,henceforth1 he is no longer his own master1 he renounces his liberty1 he is literally possessed by the powers which he invokes4 ,he is dragged he knows not whither1 into a formless1 boundless immensity1 subject to laws that have nothing human about them1 in which each of those lively and tyrannical little signs which move and dance in their thousands under the pen represents nameless1 but eternal1 invincible and inevitable verities4 ,we think that we are directing them and they enslave us4 ,we become weary and breathless following them into their uninhabitable spaces4 ,when we touch them1 we let loose a force which we are no longer able to control4 ,they do with us what they will and always end by hurling us1 blinded and benumbed1 into blank infinity or upon a wall of ice against which every effort of our mind and will is shattered4 ,it is possible1 therefore1 in the last resort1 to explain the ,elberfeld mystery by the no less obscure mystery that surrounds numbers4 ,this really only means moving to another spot in the gloom2 but it is often just by that moving to another spot that we end by discovering the little gleam of light which shows us a thoroughfare4 ,in any case1 and to return to more precise ideas1 more than one instance has been cited to prove that the gift of handling great groups of figures is almost independent of the intelligence proper4 ,one of the most curious is that of an ,italian shepherd boy1 ,vito ,mangiamele1 who was brought before the ,paris ,academy of ,science in #ahcg and who1 at the age of ten1 though devoid of the most rudimentary education1 was able in half a minute to extract the cubic root of a number of seven figures4 ,another1 more striking still1 also mentioned by ,dr4 ,clarapede in his paper on the learned horses1 is that of a man blind from birth1 an inmate of the lunatic-asylum1 at ,armentieres4 ,this blind man1 whose name is ,fleury1 a degenerate and nearly an idiot1 can calculate in one minute and fifteen seconds the number of seconds in thirty-nine years1 three months and twelve days1 not forgetting the leap-years4 ,they explain to him what a square root is1 without telling him the conventional method of finding it2 and soon he extracts almost as rapidly as ,inaudi himself1 without a blunder1 the square roots of numbers of four figures1 giving the remainder4 ,on the other hand1 we know that a mathematical genius like ,henri ,pomcare confessed himself incapable of adding up a column of figures without a mistake4 #bi ,from the maybe enchanted atmosphere that surrounds numbers we shall pass more easily to the even more magic mists of the final theory1 the only one remaining to us for the moment3 the mediumistic or subliminal theory4 ,this1 we must remember1 is not the telepathic theory proper which decisive experiments have made us reject4 ,let us have the courage to venture upon it4 ,when one can no longer interpret a phenomenon by the known1 we must needs try to do so by the unknown4 ,we1 therefore1 now enter a new province of a great unexplored kingdom1 in which we shall find ourselves without a guide4 ,mediumistic phenomena1 manifestations of the secondary or the subliminal consciousness1 between man and man1 are1 as we have more than once had occasion to assure ourselves1 capricious1 undisciplined1 evasive and uncertain1 but more frequent than one thought and1 to one who examines1 them seriously and honestly1 often undeniable4 ,have similar manifestations been discovered between man and the animals8 ,the study of these manifestations1 which is very difficult even in the case of man1 becomes still more so when we question witnesses doomed to silence4 ,there are1 however1 some animals which are looked upon as psychic1 which1 in other words1 seem indisputably to be sensitive to certain subliminal influences4 ,one usually classes the cat1 the dog and the horse in this somewhat ill-defined category4 ,to these superstitious animals one might perhaps add certain birds1 more or less birds of omen1 and even a few insects1 notably the bees4 ,other animals1 such as1 for instance1 the elephant and the monkey1 appear to be proof against mystery4 ,be this as it may1 ,m4 ,ernest ,bozzano1 in an excellent article on ,les ,perceptions psychiques des animaux1#a collected in #aije sixty-nine cases of telepathy1 presentiments and hallucinations of sight or hearing in which the principal actors are cats1 dogs and horses4 ,there are1 even among them1 ghosts or phantoms of dogs which1 after their death1 return to haunt the homes in which they were happy4 ,most of these cases are taken from the ,proceedings of the ,s4 ,p4 ,r41 that is to say1 they have nearly all been very strictly investigated4 ,it is impossible1 short of filling these pages with often striking and touching but rather cumbersome anecdotes1 to enumerate them here1 however briefly4 ,it will be sufficient to note that sometimes the dog begins to howl at the exact moment when his master loses his life1 for instance1 on a battlefield1 hundreds of miles from the place where the dog is4 ,more commonly1 the cat1 the dog and the horse plainly manifest that they perceive1 often before men do1 telepathic apparitions1 phantasms of the living or the dead4 ,horses in particular seem very sensitive to places that pass as haunted or uncanny4 ,on the whole1 the result of these observations is that we can hardly dispute that these animals communicate as much as we do and perhaps in the same fashion with the mystery that lies around us4 ,there are moments at which1 like man1 they see the invisible and perceive events1 influences and emotions that are beyond the range of their normal senses4 ,it is1 therefore1 permissible to believe that their nervous system or some remote or secret part of their being contains the same psychic elements connecting them with an unknown that inspires them with as much terror as it does ourselves4 ,and1 let us say in passing1 this terror is rather strange2 for1 after all1 what have they to fear from a phantom or an apparition1 they who1 we are convinced have no after-life and who ought1 therefore1 to remain perfectly indifferent to the manifestations1 of a world in which they will never set foot8 #a ,annales des sciences psychiques1 ,august1 #aije1 pp #dbb-dfi4 ,i shall perhaps be told that it is not certain that these apparitions are objective1 that they correspond with an external reality1 but that it is exceedingly possible that they spring solely from the man's or the animal's brain4 ,this is not the moment to discuss this very obscure point1 which raises the whole question of the supernatural and all the problems of the hereafter4 ,the only important thing to observe is that at one time it is man who transmits his terror1 his perception or his idea of the invisible to the animal and at another the animal which transmits its sensations to man4 ,we have here1 therefore1 intercommunications which spring from a deeper common source than any that we know and which1 to issue from it or go back to it1 pass through other channels than those of our customary senses4 ,now all this belongs to that unexplained sensibility1 to that secret treasure1 to that as yet undetermined psychic power which1 for lack of a better term1 we call subconsciousness or subliminal consciousness4 ,moreover1 it is not surprising that in the animals1 these subliminal faculties not only exist1 but are perhaps keener and more active than in ourselves1 because it is our conscious and abnormally individualized life that atrophies them by relegating them to a state of idleness wherein they have fewer and fewer opportunities of being exercised1 whereas in our brothers who are less detached from the universe1 consciousness--if we can give that name to a very uncertain and confused notion of the ego--is reduced to a few elementary actions4 ,they are much less separated than ourselves from the whole of the circumambient life and they still possess a number of those more general and indeterminate senses whereof we have been deprived by the gradual encroachment of a narrow and intolerant special faculty1 our intelligence4 ,among these senses which up to the present we have described as instincts1 for want--and it is becoming a pressing want--of a more suitable and definite word1 need ,i mention the sense of direction1 migration1 foreknowledge of the weather1 of earthquakes and avalanches and many others which we doubtless do not even suspect8 ,does all this not belong to a subconsciousness which differs from ours only in being so much richer8 #cj ,i am fully aware that this explanation by means of the subliminal consciousness will not explain very much and will at most invoke the aid of the unknown to illuminate the incomprehensible4 ,but to explain a phenomenon1 a ,dr4 ,j4 de ,modzelwski very truly says1 is to put forward a theory which is more familiar and more easily comprehensible to us than the phenomenon at issue4 ,this is really what we are constantly and almost exclusively doing in physics1 chemistry1 biology and in every branch of science without exception4 ,to explain a phenomenon is not necessarily to make it as clear and lucid as that two and two are four2 and1 even so1 the fact that two and two are four is not1 when we go to the bottom of things1 as clear and lucid as it seems4 ,what in this case1 as in most others1 we wrongfully call explaining is simply confronting the unexpected mystery which these horses offer us with a few phenomena which are themselves unknown1 but which have been perceived longer and more frequently4 ,and this same mystery1 thus explained1 will serve one day to explain others4 ,it is in this way that science goes to work4 ,we must not blame it3 it does what it can2 and it does not appear that there are other ways4 #ca ,if we assent to this explanation by means of the subliminal consciousness1 which is a sort of mysterious participation in all that happens in this world and the others1 many obstacles disappear and we enter into a new region in which we draw strangely nearer to the animals and really become their brothers by closer links1 perhaps the only essential links in life4 ,they take part from that moment in the great human problems1 in the extraordinary actions of our unknown guest2 and1 if1 since we have been observing the indwelling force more attentively1 nothing any longer surprises us of that which it realizes in us1 no more should anything surprise us of that which it realizes in them4 ,we are on the same plane with them1 in some as yet undetermined element1 when it is no longer the intelligence that reigns alone1 but another spiritual power1 which pays no heed to the brain1 which passes by other roads and which might rather be the psychic substance of the universe itself1 no longer set in grooves1 isolated and specialized by man1 but diffused1 multiform and perhaps1 if we could trace it1 equal in everything that exists4 ,there is1 henceforth1 no reason why the horses should not participate in most of the mediumistic1 phenomena which we find existing between man and man2 and their mystery ceases to be distinct from those of human metaphysics4 ,if their subliminal is akin to ours1 we can begin by extending to its utmost limits the telepathic theory1 which has1 so to speak1 no limits1 for1 in the matter of telepathy1 as ,myers has said1 all that we are permitted to declare is that life has the power of manifesting itself to life4 ,we may ask ourselves1 therefore1 if the problem which ,i set to the horse1 without knowing the terms of it1 is not communicated to my subliminal1 which is ignorant of it1 by that of the horse1 who has read it4 ,it is practically certain that this is possible between human subliminals4 ,is it ,i who see the solution and transmit it to the horse1 who only repeats it to me8 ,but1 suppose that it is a problem which ,i myself am incapable of solving8 ,whence does the solution come1 then8 ,i do not know if the experiment has been attempted1 under the same conditions1 with a human medium4 ,for that matter1 if it succeeded1 it would be very much the same as the no less subliminal phenomenon of the arithmetical prodigies1 or lightning calculators1 with which1 in this rather superhuman atmosphere1 we are almost forced to compare the riddle of the mathematical horses4 ,of all the interpretations1 it is the one which1 for the moment1 appears to me the least eccentric and the most natural4 ,we have seen that the gift of handling colossal figures is almost foreign to the intelligence proper2 one can1 even declare that1 in certain cases1 it is evidently and completely independent of such intelligence4 ,in these cases1 the gift is manifested prior to any education and from the earliest years of childhood4 ,if we refer to the list of arithmetical prodigies given by ,dr4 ,scripure1#a we see that the faculty made its appearance in ,ampere at the age of three1 in ,colburn at six1 in ,gauss at three1 in ,mangiamele at ten1 in ,safford at six1 in ,whateley at three1 and so on4 ,generally1 it lasts for only a few years1 becoming rapidly enfeebled with age and usually vanishing suddenly at the moment when its possessor begins to go to school4 #a ,american ,journal of ,psychology1 #a ,april #ahia4 ,when you ask those children and even most of the lightning calculators who have come to man's estate how they go to work to solve the huge and complicated problems set them1 they reply that they know nothing about it4 ,bidder1 for instance1 declares that it is impossible for him to say how he can instinctively tell the logarithm of a number consisting of seven or eight figures4 ,it is the same with ,safford1 who1 at the age of ten1 used to do in his head1 without ever making a mistake1 multiplication-sums the result of which ran into thirty-six figures4 ,the solution presents itself authoritatively and spontaneously2 it is a vision1 an impression1 an inspiration1 an intuition coming one knows not whence1 suddenly and indubitably4 ,as a role1 they do not even try to calculate4 ,contrary to the general belief1 they have no peculiar methods2 or1 if method there be1 it is more a practical way of subdividing the intuition4 ,one would think that the solution springs suddenly from the very enunciation of the problem1 in the same way as a veridical hallucination4 ,it appears to rise1 infallible and ready-done1 from a sort of eternal and cosmic reservoir wherein the answers to every question lie dormant4 ,it must1 therefore1 be admitted that we have here a phenomenon that occurs above or below the brain1 by the side of the consciousness and the mind1 outside all the intellectual methods and habits2 and it is precisely for phenomena of this kind that ,myers invented the word subliminal4#a #a ,i have no need to recall the derivation of the term subliminal3 beneath 7sub7 the threshold 7limen7 of consciousness4 ,let us add1 as ,m4 de ,vesme very rightly remarks1 that the subliminal is not exactly what classical psychology calls the subconsciousness1 which latter records only notions that are normally perceived and possesses only normal faculties1 that is to say1 faculties recognized to-day by orthodox science4 #cb ,does not all this bring us a little nearer to our calculating horses8 ,from the moment that it is demonstrated that the solution of a mathematical problem no longer depends exclusively on the brain1 but on another faculty1 another spiritual power whose presence under various forms has been ascertained beyond a doubt in certain animals1 it ceases to be wholly rash or extravagant to suggest that perhaps1 in the horse1 the same phenomenon is reproduced and developed in the same unknown1 wherein moreover the mysteries of numbers and those of subconsciousness mingle in a like darkness4 ,i am well aware that an explanation laden to such an extent with mysteries explains but very little more than silence does2 nevertheless1 it is at least a silence traversed by restless murmurs1 and sedulous whispers that are better than the gloomy and hopeless ignorance to which we would have perforce to resign ourselves if we did not1 in spite of all1 to perform the great duty of man1 which is to discover a spark in the darkness4 ,it goes without saying that objections are raised from every side4 ,among men1 arithmetical prodigies are looked upon as monsters1 as a sort of extremely rare teratological phenomenon4 ,we can count1 at most1 half-a-dozen in a century1 whereas1 among horses1 the faculty would appear to be almost general1 or at least quite common4 ,in fact1 out of six or seven stallions whom ,krall tried to initiate into the secrets of mathematics1 he found only two that appeared to him too poorly gifted for him to waste time on their education4 ,these were1 ,i believe1 two thoroughbreds that were presented to him by the ,grand-duke of ,mecklenburg and sent back by ,krall to their sumptuous stables4 ,in the four or five others1 taken at random as circumstances supplied them1 he met with aptitudes unequal1 it is true1 but easily developed and giving the impression that they exist normally1 latent and inactive1 at the bottom of every equine soul4 ,from the mathematical point of view1 is the horse's subliminal consciousness then superior to man's8 ,why not8 ,his whole subliminal being is probably superior to one1 of greater range1 younger1 fresher1 more alive and less heavy1 since it is not incessantly attacked1 coerced and humiliated by the intelligence which gnaws at it1 stifles it1 cloaks it and relegates it to a dark corner which neither light nor air can penetrate4 ,his subliminal consciousness is always present1 always alert2 ours is never there1 is asleep at the bottom of a deserted well and needs exceptional operations1 results and events before it can be drawn from its slumber and its unremembered deeps4 ,all this seems very extraordinary2 but1 in any case1 we are here in the midst of the extraordinary2 and this outlet is perhaps the least hazardous4 ,it is not a question1 we must remember1 of a cerebral operation1 an intellectual performance1 but of a gift of divination closely allied to other gifts of the same nature and the same origin which are not the peculiar attribute of man4 ,no observation1 no experiment enables us1 up to the present1 to establish a difference between the subliminal of human beings and that of animals4 ,on the contrary1 the as yet restricted number of actual cases reveals constant and striking analogies between the two4 ,in most of those arithmetical operations1 be it noted1 the subliminal of the horse behaves exactly like that of the medium in a rate of trance4 ,the horse readily reverses the figures of the solution2 he replies1 #cg1 for instance1 instead of #gc1 which is a mediumistic phenomenon so well-known and so frequent that it has been styled mirror-writing4 ,he makes mistakes fairly often in the most elementary additions1 and subtractions and much less frequently in the extraction of the most complicated roots1 which again1 in similar cases1 such as xenoglossy and psychometry1 is one of the eccentricities of human mediumism and is explained by the same cause1 namely1 the inopportune intervention of the ever fallible intelligence1 which1 by meddling in the matter1 alters the certainties of a subliminal which1 when left to itself1 never makes a mistake4 ,it is1 in fact1 quite probable that the horse1 being really able to do the small sums1 no longer relies solely on his intuition and1 from that moment1 gropes and flounders about4 ,the solution hovers between the intelligence and the subliminal and1 passing from the one1 which is not quite sure of it1 to the other1 which is not urgently appealed to1 comes out of the conflict as best it may4 ,the case is the same with the psychometric or spiritualistic medium who seeks to profit by what he knows in the ordinary way1 so as to complete the visions or revelations of his subconscious sensibility4 ,he1 too1 in this instance1 is nearly always guilty of flagrant and inexplicable blunders4 ,many other similarities will be found to exist1 notably the way in which the lessons vary4 ,nothing is more uncertain and capricious than manifestations of human mediumism4 ,whether it be a question of automatic writing1 psychometry1 materializations or anything else1 we meet with series of sittings that yield none but absurd results4 ,then1 suddenly1 for reasons as yet obscure--the state of the weather1 the presence of this or that witness1 or ,i know not what--the most undeniable and bewildering manifestations occur one after the other4 ,the case is precisely the same with the horses3 their queer fancies1 their unaccountable and disconcerting freaks drive poor ,krall to despair4 ,he never opens the door of that uncertain stable1 on important days1 without a sinking at the heart4 ,let the beard or the frown of some learned professor fail to please the horses3 they will1 forthwith1 take an unholy delight in giving the most irrelevant answer to the most elementary question1 for hours and even days on end4 ,other common features are the strongly-marked personality of the mediumistic raps and the communications known as deferred telepathic communications1 that is to say1 those in which the answer is obtained at the end of a sitting to a question put at the beginning and forgotten by all those present4 ,what at first sight seems one of the strongest objections urged against the mediumism of the horse even tends to confirm it4 ,if the reply comes from the horse's subconsciousness1 it has been asked1 how is it that it should be necessary first to teach him the elements of language1 mathematics and so forth1 and that ,berto1 for instance1 is incapable of solving the same problems as ,mohammed8 ,this objection has been very ably refuted by ,m4 de ,vesme1 who writes3 ,to produce automatic writing1 a medium must have learnt to write2 before ,victorien ,sardou or ,mlle ,helene ,schmidt could produce their mediumistic drawings and paintings1 they had to possess an elementary knowledge of drawing and painting2 ,tartini would never have composed ,the ,devil's ,sonata in a dream1 if he had not known music2 and so forth4 ,unconscious cerebration1 however wonderful1 can only take effect upon elements already acquired in some way or another4 ,the subconscious cerebration of a man blind from birth will not make him see colours4 ,here1 then1 in this comparison which might easily be extended1 are several fairly well- defined features of resemblance4 ,we receive a vivid impression of the same habits1 the same contradictions1 and the same eccentricities2 and we once more recognize the strange and majestic shadow of our unknown guest4 #cc ,one great objection remains1 based upon the very nature of the phenomenon1 upon the really inseparable distance that separates the whole life of the horse from the abstract and impenetrable life of numbers4 ,how can his subliminal consciousness interest itself for a moment in signs that represent nothing to him1 have no relation to his organism and will never touch his existence8 ,but in the first place1 it is just the same with the child or the illiterate calculator4 ,he is not interested either in the figures which he lets loose4 ,he is completely ignorant of the consequences of the problems which he solves4 ,he juggles with digits which have hardly any more meaning to him than to the horse4 ,he is incapable of accounting for what he does2 and his subconsciousness also acts in a sort of indifferent and remote dream4 ,it is true that1 in his case1 we can appeal to heredity and to memory2 but is this difference enough to settle the difficulty and definitely to separate the two phenomena8 ,to appeal to heredity is still to appeal to the subliminal2 and it is not at all certain that the latter is limited by the interest of the organism sheltering it4 ,it appears1 on the contrary1 in many circumstances1 to spread and extend far beyond that organism in which it is domiciled1 one would say1 accidentally and provisionally4 ,it likes to show1 apparently1 that it is in relation with all that exists4 ,it declares itself1 as often as possible1 universal and impersonal4 ,it has but a very indifferent care1 as we have seen in the matter of apparitions and premonitions1 for the happiness and even the safety of its host and protector4 ,it prophesies to its companion of a lifetime events which he cannot avoid or which do not concern him4 ,it makes him see beforehand1 for instance1 all the circumstances of the death of a stranger whom he will only hear of after the event1 when this event is irrevocable4 ,it brings a crowd of barren presentiments and conjures up veridical hallucinations that are wholly alien and idle4 ,with psychometric1 typtological or materializing mediums1 it practises art for art's sake1 mocks at space and time1 passes through personalities1 sees through solid bodies1 brings into communication thoughts and motions worlds apart1 reads souls and lives by the light of a flower1 a rag of a scrap of paper2 and all this for nothing1 to amuse itself1 to astonish us1 because it adores the superfluous1 the incoherent1 the unexpected1 the improbable1 the bewildering1 or rather1 perhaps1 because it is a huge1 rough1 undisciplined force still struggling in the darkness and coming to the surface only by wild fits and starts1 because it is an enormous expansion of a spirit striving to collect itself1 to achieve consciousness1 to make itself of service and to obtain a hearing4 ,in any case1 for the time being1 it appeals just what we have described1 and would be unlike itself if it behaved any otherwise in the case that puzzles us4 #cd ,lastly1 to close this chapter1 let us remark that it is nearly certain that the solution given by calculating children and horses is not of a mathematical nature at all4 ,they do not in any way consider the problem or the sum to be worked4 ,they simply find the answer straight away to a riddle1 the guessing of which is made easy by the actual nature of figures which keep their secrets badly4 ,to any one in the requisite state of mind1 it becomes a question of a sort of elementary charade1 which hides its answer only from those who speak another language4 ,it is evident that every problem1 however complex it may appear1 carries within its very enunciation its one1 invariable solution1 scarce veiled by the indiscreet signs that contain or cover it4 ,it is there1 under the numbers that have no other object than to give it life1 coming1 stirring and ceaselessly proclaiming itself a necessity4 ,it is not surprising therefore that eyes sharper than ours and ears open to other vibrations should see and hear it without knowing what it represents1 what it implies or from what prodigious mass of figures and operations it merges4 ,the problem itself speaks2 and the horse but repeats the sign which he hears whispered in the mysterious life of numbers or deep down in1 the abyss where the eternal verities hold sway4 ,he understands none of it1 he has no need to understand1 he is but the unconscious medium who lends his voice or his limbs to the mind that inspires him4 ,there is here but a bare and simple answer1 bearing no precise significance1 seized in an alien existence4 ,there is here but a mechanical revelation1 so to speak1 a sort of special reflex which we can only record and which1 for the rest1 is as inexplicable as any other phenomenon of consciousness or instinct4 ,after all1 when we think of it1 it is just as1 astonishing that we should not perceive the solution as it is that we should discover it4 ,however1 ,i grant that all this is but a venturesome interpretation to be taken for what it is worth1 an experimental or interim theory with which we must needs content ourselves since all the others have hitherto been controverted by the facts4 #ce ,let us now briefly sum up what the ,elberfeld experiments have yielded us4 ,having put aside telepathy in the narrow sense--which perhaps enters into more than one phenomenon but is not indispensable to it1 for we see these same phenomena repeated when telepathy is practically impossible--we cannot help observing that1 if we deny the existence or the influence of the subliminal1 it is all the more difficult to contest the existence and the intervention of the intelligence1 at any rate up to the extracting of roots1 after which there is a steep precipice which ends in darkness4 ,but1 even if we stop at the roots1 the sudden discovery of an intellectual force so similar to our own1 where we were accustomed to see but an irremediable impotency1 is no doubt one of the most unexpected revelations that we have received since the invisible and the unknown began to press upon us with a persistence and an impatience which they had not displayed heretofore4 ,it is not easy to foresee as yet the consequences and the promises of this new aspect which the great riddle of the intelligence is suddenly adopting4 ,but ,i believe that we shall soon have to revise some of the essential ideas which are the foundations of our life and that some rather strange horizons are appearing out of the mists in the history of psychology1 of morality1 of human destiny and of many other things4 #cf ,so much for the intelligence4 ,on the other hand1 what we deny to the intelligence we are constrained to grant to the subliminal2 and the revelation is even more disconcerting4 ,we should then have to admit that them is in the horse--and hence most probably in everything that lives on this earth--a psychic power similar to that which is hidden beneath the veil of our reason and which1 as we learn to know it1 astonishes1 surpasses and dominates our reason more and more4 ,this psychic power1 in which no doubt we shall one day be forced to recognize the genius of the universe itself1 appears1 as we have often observed1 to be all-wise1 all-seeing and all-powerful4 ,it has1 when it is pleased to communicate with us or when we are allowed to penetrate into it1 an answer for every question1 and perhaps a remedy for every ill4 ,we will not enumerate its virtues again4 ,it will be enough for us to recall with what ease it mocks at space1 time and all the obstacles that beset our poor human knowledge and understanding4 ,we believed it1 like all that seems to us superior and marvellous1 the intangible1 inalienable and incommunicable attribute of man1 with even better reason than his intelligence4 ,and now an accident1 strangely belated1 it is true1 tells us that1 at one precise point1 the strangest and least foreseen of all1 the horse and the dog draw more easily and perhaps more directly than ourselves upon its mighty reservoirs4 ,by the most inexplicable of anomalies1 though one that is fairly consistent with the fantastic character of the subliminal1 they appear to have access to it only at the spot that is most remote from their habits and most unknown to their propensities1 for there is nothing in the world about which animals trouble less than figures4 ,but is this not1 perhaps because we do not see what goes on elsewhere8 ,it so happens that the infinite mystery of numbers can sometimes be expressed by a very few simple movements which are natural to most animals2 but there is nothing to tell us that1 if we could teach the horse and the dog to attach to these same movements the expression of other mysteries1 they would not draw upon them with equal facility4 ,it has been successfully attempted to give them a more or less clear idea of the value of a few figures and perhaps of the course and nature of certain elementary operations2 and this appears to have been enough to open up to them the most secret regions of mathematics in which every question is answered beforehand4 ,it is not wholly illusive to suppose that1 if we could impart to them1 for instance1 a similar notion of the future1 together with a manner of conveying to us what they see there1 they might also have access to strange visions of another class1 which are jealously kept from us by the too-watchful guardians of our intelligence4 ,there is an opportunity here for experiments which will doubtless prove exceedingly arduous1 for the future is not so easily seen and above all not so easily interpreted and expressed as a number4 ,it is possible1 moreover1 that1 when we know how to set about it1 we shall obtain most of the human mediumistic phenomena2 rapping1 the moving of objects1 materialization even and ,heaven knows what other surprises held in store for us by that astounding subliminal to whose fancy there appears to be no bounds4 ,in any case1 if we accept the divining of numbers1 as we are almost forced to do1 it is almost certain that the divining of other matters must follow4 ,an unexpected breach is made in the wall behind which lie heaped the great secrets that seem to us1 as our knowledge and our civilization increase1 to become stronger and more inaccessible4 ,true1 it is a narrow breach2 but it is the first that has been opened in that part of the hitherto uncrannied wall which is not turned towards mankind4 ,what will issue through it8 ,no one can foretell what we may hope4 #cg ,what astonishes us most is that this revelation has been so long delayed4 ,how are we to explain that man has lived to this day with his domestic animals never suspecting that they harboured mediumistic or subliminal faculties as extraordinary as those which he vaguely felt himself to possess4 ,one would have in this connection to study the mysterious practices of ancient ,india and of ,egypt2 the numerous and persistent legends of animals talking1 guiding their masters and foretelling the future2 and1 nearer to ourselves1 in history proper1 all that science of augury and soothsaying which derived its omens from the flight of birds1 the inspection of entrails1 the appetite or attitude of the sacred or prophetic animals1 among which horses were often numbered4 ,we here find one of those innumerous instances of a lost or anticipated power which make us suspect that mankind has forestalled or forgotten all that we believe ourselves to be discovering4 ,remember that there is almost always some distorted1 misapprehended or dimly--seen truth at the bottom of the most eccentric and wildest creeds1 superstitions and legends4 ,all this new science of metaphysics or of the investigation of our subconsciousness and of unknown powers1 which has scarcely begun to unveil its first mysteries1 thus finds landmarks and defaced but recognizable traces in the old religions1 the most inexplicible traditions and the most ancient history4 ,besides1 the probability of a thing does not depend upon undeniably established precedents4 ,while it is almost certain that there is nothing new under the sun or in the eternity preceding the suns1 it is quite possible that the same forces do not always act with the same energy4 ,as ,i observed1 nearly twenty years ago1 in ,the ,treasure of the ,humble1 at a time when ,i hardly knew at all what ,i know so imperfectly to-day3 ,a spiritual--,i should have said1 a psychic-epoch is perhaps upon us1 an epoch to which a certain number of analogies are found in history4 ,for there are periods recorded when the soul1 in obedience to unknown laws1 seemed to rise to the very surface of humanity1 whence it gave clearest evidence of its existence and of its power4 4 4 4 ,it would seem1 at moments such as these1 as though humanity1 --and1 ,i would add to-day1 all that lives with it on this earth--were on the point of struggling from beneath the crushing burden of matter that weighs it down4 ,one might in fact believe that a shudder which we have not yet experienced is passing over everything that breathes2 that a new activity1 a new restlessness is permeating the spiritual atmosphere which surrounds our globe2 and that the very animals have felt its thrill4 ,one might say that1 by the side of the niggardly private spring which would only supply our intelligence1 other streams are spreading and rising to the same level in every form of existence4 ,a sort of word of command is being passed from rank to rank2 and the same phenomena are bursting forth in every quarter of the globe in order to attract our attention1 as though the obstinately dumb genius that lay hidden in the pregnant silence of the universe1 from that of the stones1 the flowers and the insects to the mighty silence of the stars1 were at last trying to tell us some secret whereby it would be better known to us or to itself4 ,it is possible that this is but an illusion4 ,perhaps we are simply more attentive and better informed than of old4 ,we learn at the very instant what happens in every part of our earth and we have acquired the habit of more minutely observing and examining the things that happen4 ,but the illusion would in this case have all the force1 all the value and all the meaning of the reality and would enjoin the same hopes and the same obligation4 ,,chapter ,v4 ,,the ,,unknown ,,guest #a ,we have now studied certain manifestations of that which we have called in turn and more or less indiscriminately the subconscious mind1 the subliminal consciousness and the unknown guest1 names to which we might add that of the superior subconsciousness or superior psychism invented by ,dr4 ,geley4 ,granting that these manifestations are really proved1 it is no longer possible to explain them or rather to classify them without having recourse to fresh theories4 ,now we can entertain doubts on many points1 we can cavil and argue2 but ,i defy anyone approaching these facts in a serious and honest spirit to reject them all4 ,it is permissible to neglect the most extraordinary2 but there are a multitude of others which have become or1 to speak more accurately1 are acknowledged to be as frequent and habitual as any fact whatever in normal1 everyday life4 ,it is not difficult to reproduce them at will1 provided we place ourselves in the condition demanded by their very nature2 and1 this being so1 there remains no valid reason for excluding them from the domain of science in the strict sense of the word4 ,hitherto1 all that we have learnt regarding these occurrences is that their origin is unknown4 ,it will be said that this is not much and that the discovery is nothing to boast of4 ,i quite agree3 to imagine that one can explain a phenomena by saying that it is produced by an unknown agency would indeed be childish4 ,but it is already something to have marked its source2 not to be still lingering in the thick of a fog1 trying any and every direction in order to find a way out1 but to be concentrating our attention on a single spot which is the starting-point of all these wonders1 so that at each instant we recognize in each phenomenon the characteristic customs1 methods or features of the same unknown agency4 ,it is very nearly all that we can do for the moment2 but this first effort is not wholly to be despised4 #b ,it has seemed to us then that it was our unknown guest that expressed itself in the name of the dead in table-turning and in automatic writing and speaking4 ,this unknown guest has appeared to us to take within us the place of those who are no more1 to unite itself perhaps with forces that do not die1 to visit the grave with the object of bringing thence inexplicable phantoms which rise up in front of us fruitlessly or haunt our houses without telling us why4 ,we have seen it1 in experiments in clairvoyance and intuition1 suppressing all the obstacles that banish or conceal thought and1 through bodies that have become transparent1 reading in our very souls forgotten secrets of the past1 sentiments that have not yet taken shape1 intentions as yet unborn4 ,we have discovered that some object once handled by a person now far away is enough to make it take part in the innermost life of that person1 to go deeper and rise higher than he does1 to see what he sees and even what he does not see3 the landscape that surrounds him1 the house which he inhabits and also the dangers that threaten him and the secret passions by which he is stirred4 ,we have surprised it wandering hither and thither1 at haphazard1 in the future1 confounding it with the present and the past1 not conscious of where it is but seeing far and wide1 knowing perhaps everything but unaware of the importance of what it knows1 or as yet incapable of turning it to account or of making itself understood1 at once neglectful and overscrupulous1 prolix and reticent1 useless and indispensable4 ,we have seen it1 lastly1 although we had hitherto looked upon it as indissolubly and unchangeably human1 suddenly emerge from other creatures and there reveal faculties akin to ours1 which commune with them deep down in the deepest mysteries and which equal them and sometimes surpass them in a region that wrongly appeared to us the only really unassailable province of mankind1 ,i mean the obscure and abstruse province of numbers4 ,it has many other no less strange and perhaps more important manifestations1 which we propose to examine in a later volume1 notably its surprising therapeutic virtues and its phenomena of materialization4 ,but1 without expressing a premature judgment on what we do not yet know1 perhaps we have sketched it with sufficient clearness in the foregoing pages to enable us henceforward to disentangle certain general and characteristic features from a confusion of often contradictory lines4 #c ,but1 in the first place1 does it really exist1 this tragic and comical1 evasive and unavoidable figure which we make no claim to portray1 but at most to divest of some of its shadows8 ,it were rash to affirm it too loudly2 but meanwhile1 in the realms where we suppose it to reign1 everything happens as though it did exist4 ,do away with it and you are obliged to people the world and burden your life with a host of hypothetical and imaginary beings3 gods1 demigods1 angels1 demons1 saints1 spirits1 shells1 elementals1 etherial entities1 interplanetary intelligences and so on2 except it and all those phantoms1 without disappearing1 for they may very well continue to live in its shadow1 become superfluous or accessory4 ,it is not intolerant and does not definitely eliminate any of the hypotheses by the aid of which man has hitherto striven to explain what he did not understand1 hypotheses which1 in regard to some matters1 are not inadmissible1 although not one of them is confirmed2 but it brings him back to itself1 absorbs them and rules them without annihilating them4 ,if1 for instance1 to select the most defensible theory1 one which it is sometimes difficult to dismiss absolutely1 if you insist that the discarnate spirits take part in your actions1 haunt your house1 inspire your thoughts1 reveal your future1 it will answer3 ,that is true1 but it is still ,i2 ,i am discarnate1 or rather ,i am not wholly incarnate3 it is only a small part of my being that is embodied in your flesh2 and the rest1 which is nearly all of me1 comes and goes freely both among those who once were and among those who are yet to be2 and1 when they seem to speak to you1 it is my own speech that borrows their customs and their voice in order to make you listen and to amuse your often slumbering attention4 ,if you prefer to deal with superior entities of unknown origin1 with interplanetary or supernatural intelligences1 once more it is ,i2 for1 since ,i am not entirely in your body1 ,i must needs be elsewhere2 and to be elsewhere when one is not held back by the weight of the flesh is to be everywhere if one so pleases4 ,we see1 it has a reply to everything1 it takes every name that we wish and there is nothing to limit it1 because it lives in a world wherein bounds are as illusory as the useless words which we employ on earth4 #d ,while it has a reply to everything1 certain manifestations which it deliberately ascribes to the spirits have brought upon it a not undeserved reproach4 ,to begin with1 as ,dr4 ,maxwell observes1 it has no absolutely fixed doctrine4 ,in nearly every country in the world1 when it speaks in the name of the spirits1 it declares that they undergo reincarnation and readily relates their past existences4 ,in ,england1 on the contrary1 it usually asserts that they do not become reincarnated4 ,what does this mean8 ,surely this ignorance or this inconsistency on the part of that which appears to know everything is very strange6 ,and worse1 sometimes it attributes to the spirits1 sometimes to itself or any one or anything the revelations which it makes to us4 ,when exactly is it speaking the truth8 ,at least on two occasions out of three1 it deludes itself or deludes us4 ,if it deceive itself1 if it is mistaken about a matter in which it should be easy for it to know the truth1 what can it teach us on the subject of a world of whose most elementary laws it is ignorant1 since it does not even know whether it is itself or another that speaks to us in the name of that world8 ,are we to believe that it was in the same darkness as our poor superficial ego1 which it pretends so often to enlighten and which it does in fact inspire in most of the great events of life8 ,if it deceives us1 why does it do so8 ,we can see no object3 it asks for nothing1 not for alms1 nor prayers1 nor thoughts1 on behalf of those whose mantle it assumes for the sole purpose of leading us astray4 ,what is the use of those mischievous and puerile pranks1 of those ghastly graveyard pleasantries8 ,it must lie then for the mere pleasure of lying2 and our unknown guest1 that infinite and doubtless immortal subconsciousness in which we have placed out last hopes1 is after all but an imbecile1 a buffoon or a rank swindler6 #e ,i do not believe that the truth is as hideous as this4 ,our unknown guest does not deceive itself any more than it deceives us2 but it is we who deceive ourselves4 ,it has not the stage to itself2 and its voice is not the voice that sounds in our ears1 which were never made to catch the echoes of a world that is not like ours4 ,if it could speak to us itself and tell us what it knows1 we should probably at that instant cease to be on this earth4 ,but we are immersed in our bodies1 entombed prisoners with whom it cannot communicate at will4 ,it roams around the walls1 it utters warning cries4 ,it knocks at every door1 but all that reaches us is a vague disquiet1 an indistinct murmur that is sometimes translated to us by a half-awakened gaoler who1 like ourselves1 is a lifelong captive4 ,the gaoler does his best2 he has his own way of speaking1 his familiar expressions2 he knows1 and1 with the aid of the words which he possesses and those which he hears repeated1 he tries to make us understand what he hardly understands himself4 ,he does not know exactly whence the sounds come which he hears2 and1 according as tempests1 wars or riots happen to be uppermost at the moment1 he attributes them to the winds1 to tramping soldiers or to frenzied crowds4 ,in other words and speaking without metaphor1 it is the medium who draws from his habitual language and from that suggested to him by his audience the wherewithal to clothe and identify the strange presentiments1 the unfamiliar visions that come from some unknown region4 ,if he believes that the dead survive1 he will naturally imagine that it is the dead who speak to him4 ,if he has a favourite spirit1 angel1 demon or god1 he will express himself in its name2 if he has no preconceived opinion1 he will not even allude to the origin of the revelations which he is making4 ,the inarticulate language of the subconsciousness necessarily borrows that of the normal consciousness2 and the two become confused into a sort of shifting and multiform jargon4 ,and our unknown guest1 which is not thinking of delivering a course of lectures upon its entity1 but simply giving us as best it can a more or less warning or mark of its existence1 seems to care but little as to the garments in which it is rigged out1 having indeed no choice in the matter1 for1 either because it is unable to manifest itself or because we are incapable of understanding it1 it has to be content with whatever comes to hand4 ,besides1 if we attribute too exclusively to the spirits that which comes from another quarter1 the mistake is doubtless no great one in its eyes2 for it is not madness to believe that it lives with that which does not die in the dead even as with that which does not die in ourselves1 with that which does not descend into the grave even as with that which does not take flesh at the hour of birth4 #f ,there is no reason therefore to condemn the other theories entirely4 ,most of them doubtless contain something more than a particle of truth2 in particular1 the great quarrel between the subconscious school and the spiritualists is based on the whole upon a misunderstanding4 ,it is quite possible and even very probable that the dead are all around us1 since it is impossible that the dead do not live4 ,our subconsciousness must mingle with all that does not die in them2 and that which dies in them or rather disperses and loses all its importance is but the little consciousness accumulated on this earth and kept up until the last hour by the frail bonds of memory4 ,in all those manifestations of our unknown guest1 it is our posthumous ego that already lives in us while we are still in the flesh and at moments joins that which does not die in those who have quitted their body4 ,then does the existence of our unknown guest presume the immortality of a part of ourselves8 ,can one possibly doubt it8 ,have you ever imagined that you would perish entirely8 ,as for me1 what ,i cannot picture is the manner in which you would picture that total annihilation4 ,but1 if you cannot perish entirely1 it is no less certain that those who came before you have not perished either2 and hence it is not altogether improbable that we may be able to discover them and to communicate with them4 ,in this wider sense1 the spiritualistic theory is perfectly admissible2 but what is not at all admissible is the narrow and pitiful interpretation which its proponents too often give it4 ,they see the dead crowding around us like wretched puppets indissolubly attached to the insignificant scene of their death by the thousand little threads of insipid memories and infantile hobbies4 ,they are supposed to be here1 blocking up our homes1 more abjectly human than if they were still alive1 vague1 inconsistent1 garrulous1 derelict1 futile and idle1 tossing hither and thither their desolate shadows1 which are being slowly swallowed up by silence and oblivion1 busying themselves incessantly with what no longer concerns them1 but almost incapable of doing us a real service1 so much so that1 in short1 they would end by persuading us that death serves no purpose1 that it neither purifies nor exalts1 that it brings no deliverance and that it is indeed a thing of terror and despair4 #g ,no1 it is not the dead who thus speak and act4 ,besides1 why bring them into the matter unnecessarily8 ,i could understand that we should be obliged to do so if there were no similar phenomena outside them2 but in the intuition and clairvoyance of nonspiritualistic mediums and particularly in psychometry we obtain communications between one subconsciousness and another and revelations of unknown1 forgotten or future incidents which are equally striking1 though stripped of the vapid gossip and tedium reminiscences with which we are overwhelmed by defunct persons who are all the more jealous to prove their identity inasmuch as they know that they do not exist4 ,it is infinitely more likely that there is strange medley of heterogeneous forces in the uncertain regions into which we are venturing4 ,the whole of this ambiguous drama1 with its incoherent crowds1 is probably enacted round about the dim estuary where our normal consciousness flows into our subconsciousness4 ,the consciousness of the medium--for we must not forget that there is necessarily always a medium at the sources of these phenomena--the consciousness of the medium1 obscured by the condition of trance but yet the only one that possesses our human speech and can make itself heard1 takes in first and almost exclusively what it best understands and what most interests it in the stifled and mutilated revelations of our unknown guest1 which for its part communicates with the dead and the living and everything that exists4 ,the rest1 which is the only thing that matters1 but which is less clear and less vivid because it comes from afar1 only very rarely makes its difficult way through a forest of insignificant talk4 ,we may add that our subconsciousness1 as ,dr4 ,geley very rightly observes1 is formed of superposed elements1 beginning with the unconsciousness that governs the instinctive movements of the organic life of both the species and the individual and passing by imperceptible degrees till it rises to the superior psychism whose power and extent appear to have no bounds4 ,the voice of the medium1 or that which we hear within ourselves when1 at certain moments of excitement or crisis in our lives1 we become our own medium1 has therefore to traverse three worlds or three provinces3 that of the atavistic instincts which connect us with the animal2 that of human or empirical consciousness2 and lastly that of our unknown guest or our superior subconsciousness which links us to immense invisible realities and which we may1 if we wish1 call divine or superhuman4 ,hence it is not surprising that the intermediary1 be he spiritualist1 autonomist1 palingenesist or what he will1 should lose himself in those wild and troubled eddies and that the truth or message which he brings us1 tossed and tumbled in every direction1 should reach us broken1 shattered and pulverized beyond recognition4 ,for the rest1 ,i repeat1 were it not for the absurd prominence given to our dead in the spiritualistic interpretation1 this question of origin would have little importance1 since both life and death are incessantly joining and uniting in all things4 ,there are assuredly dead people in all these manifestations1 seeing that we are full of dead people and that the greater part of ourselves is at this moment steeped in death1 that is to say1 is already living the boundless life that awaits us on the farther side of the grave4 #h ,we should be wrong1 however1 to fix all our attention on these extraordinary phenomena1 either those with which we unduly connect the deceased or those no less striking ones in which we do not believe that they take part4 ,they are evidently precious points of emergence that enable us approximately to mark the extent1 the forms and the habits of our mystery4 ,but it is within ourselves1 in the silence of the darkness of our being1 where it is ever in motion1 guiding our destiny1 that we should strive to surprise that mystery and to discover it4 ,and ,i am not speaking only of the dreams1 the presumptions1 the vague intuitions1 the room or less brilliant inspirations which are so many more manifestations1 specific as it were and analogous with those that have occupied us4 ,there is another1 a more secret and much more active existence which we have scarcely begun to study and which is1 if we descend to the bed-rock of truth1 our only real existence4 ,from the darkest corners of our ego it directs our veritable life1 the one that is not to die1 and pays no heed to our thought or to anything emanating from our reason1 which believes that it guides nor steps4 ,it alone knows the long past that preceded our birth and the endless future that will follow our departure from this earth4 ,it is itself that future and that past1 all those from whom we have sprung and all those who will spring from us4 ,it represents the individual not only the species but that which preceded it and that which will follow it2 and it has neither beginning nor end3 that is why nothing touches it1 nothing moves it which does not concern that which it represents4 ,when a misfortune or a joy befall us1 it knows their value instantly1 knows if they are going to open or to dose the wells of life4 ,it is the one thing that is never wrong4 ,in vain does reason demonstrate to it1 by irresistible arguments1 that it is hopelessly at fault3 silent under its immovable mask1 whose expression we have not yet been able to react it pursues its way4 ,it treats us as insignificant children1 void of understanding1 never answers our objections1 refuses what we ask and lavishes upon us that which we refuse4 ,if we go to the right1 it reconducts us to the left4 ,if we cultivate this or that faculty which we think that we possess or which we would like to possess1 it hides it under some other which we did not expect and did not wish for4 ,it saves us from a danger by imparting to our limbs unforeseen and unerring movements and actions which they had never made before and which are contrary to those which they had been taught to make3 it knows that the hour has not yet come when it will be useless to defend ourselves4 ,it chooses our love in spite of the revolt of our intelligence or of our poor1 ephemeral heart4 ,it smiles when we are frightened and sometimes it is frightened when we smile4 ,and it is always the winner1 humiliating our reason1 crushing our wisdom and silencing arguments and passions alike with the contemptuous hand of destiny4 ,the greatest doctors surround our sick-bed and deceive themselves and us in foretelling our death or our recovery3 it alone whispers in our car the truth that will not be denied4 ,a thousand apparently mortal blows fall upon our head and not a lash of its eyelids quivers2 but suddenly a tiny shock1 which our senses had not even transmitted to our brain1 wakes it with a start4 ,it sits up1 looks around and understands4 ,it has seen the crack in the vault that separates the two lives4 ,it gives the signal for departure4 ,forthwith panic spreads from cell to cell2 and the innumerous city that we are utters yells of horror and distress and hustles around the gates of death4 #i ,that great figure1 that new being has been there1 in our darkness1 from all time1 though its awkward and extravagant actions1 until recently attributed to the gods1 the demons or the dead1 am only now asking for our serious attention4 ,it has been likened to an immense block of which our personality is but a diminutive facet2 to an iceberg of which we see a few glistening prisms that represent our life1 while nine-tenths of the enormous mass remain buried in the shadows of the sea4 ,according to ,sir ,oliver ,lodge1 it is that part of our being that has not become carnate2 according to ,gustave ,le ,bon1 it is the condensed soul of our ancestors1 which is true1 beyond a doubt1 but only a part of the truth1 for we find in it also the soul of the future and probably of many other forces which are not necessarily human4 ,william ,james saw in it a diffuse cosmic consciousness and the chance intrusion into our scientifically organized world of remnants and bestiges of the primordial chaos4 ,here are a number of images striving to give us an idea of a reality so vast that we are unable to grasp it4 ,it is certain that what we see from our terrestrial life is nothing compared with what we do not see4 ,besides1 if we think of it1 it would be monstrous and inexplicable that we should be only what we appear to be1 nothing but ourselves1 whole and complete in ourselves1 separated1 isolated1 circumscribed by our body1 our mind1 our consciousness1 our birth and our death4 ,we become possible and probable only on the conditions that we project beyond ourselves on every side and that we stretch in every direction throughout time and space4 #aj ,but how shall we explain the incredible contrast between the immeasurable grandeur of our unknown guest1 the assurance1 the calmness1 the gravity of the inner life which it leads in us and the puerile and sometimes grotesque incongruities of what one might call its public existence8 ,inside us1 it is the sovereign judge1 the supreme arbiter1 the prophet1 almost the god omnipotent2 outside us1 from the moment that it quits its shelter and manifests itself in external actions1 it is nothing more than a fortune-teller1 a bone-setter1 a sort of facetious conjuror or telephone-operator1 ,i was on the verge of saying a mountebank or clown4 ,at what particular instant is it really itself8 ,is it seized with giddiness when it leaves its lair8 ,is it we who no longer hear it1 who no longer understand it1 as soon as it ceases to speak in a whisper and to act in the dark recesses of our life8 ,are we in regard to it the terrified hive invaded by a huge and inexplicable hand1 the maddened ant-hill trampled by a colossal and incomprehensible foot8 ,let us not venture yet to solve the strange riddle with the aid of the little that we know4 ,let us confine ourselves1 for the moment1 to noting on the way some other1 rather easier questions which we can at least try to answer4 ,first of all1 are the facts at issue really new8 ,was it only yesterday that the existence of our unknown guest and its external manifestations were revealed to us8 ,is it our attention that makes them appear more numerous1 or is it the increase in their number that at last attracts out attention8 ,it does indeed seem that1 however far we go back in history1 we everywhere find the same extraordinary phenomena1 under other names and often in a more glamorous setting4 ,oracles1 prophecies1 incantations1 haruspication1 possession1 evocation of the dead1 apparitions1 ghosts1 miraculous cures1 levitation1 transmission of thought1 apparent resurrections and the rest are the exact equivalent1 though magnified by the aid of plentiful and obvious frauds of our latter-day supernaturalism4 ,turning in another direction1 we are able to see that psychical phenomena are very evenly distributed over the whole surface of the globe4 ,at all events1 there does not appear to be any race that is absolutely or peculiarly refractory to them4 ,one would be inclined to say1 however1 that they manifest themselves by preference among the most civilized nations--perhaps because that is where they are most carefully sought after--and among the most primitive4 ,in short1 it cannot be denied that we are in the presence of faculties or senses1 more or less latent but at the same time universally distributed1 which form part of the general and unvarying inheritance of mankind4 ,but have these faculties or senses undergone evolution1 like most of the others8 ,and1 if they have not done so on our earth1 do they show traces of an extraplanetary evolution8 ,is there progress or reaction8 ,are they withered and useless branches1 or buds swollen with sap and promise8 ,are they retreating before the march of intelligence or invading its domain8 #aa ,m4 ,ernest ,bozzano1 one of the most learned1 most daring and most subtle exponents of the new science that is in process of formation1 in the course of a remarkable essay in the ,annales des sciences psychiques1#a gives it as his opinion that they have remained stationary and unchanged4 ,he considers that they have become in no way diffused1 generalized and refined1 like so many others that are much less important and useful from the point of view of the struggle for life1 such as the musical faculty1 for instance4 ,it does not even seem1 says ,m4 ,bozzano1 that it is possible to cultivate or develop them systematically4 ,the ,hindu race in particular1 who for thousands of years have been devoting themselves to the study of these manifestations1 have arrived at nothing but a better knowledge of the empirical methods calculated to produce them in individuals already endowed with these supernormal faculties4 ,i do not know to what extent ,m4 ,bozzano's assertions are beyond dispute4 ,they concern historical or remote facts which it is very difficult to verify4 ,in any case1 it is something to have perfected 1 as has been done in ,india1 the empirical methods favourable to the production of supernormal phenomena4 ,one might even say that it is about all that we have the right to expect1 seeing that1 by the author's own admission1 these faculties are latent in every man and that1 as has frequently been seen1 it needs but an illness1 a lesion1 or sometimes even the slightest emotion or a mere passing faintness to make them suddenly reveal themselves in an individual who seemed most hopelessly devoid of them4 ,it is therefore quite possible that1 by improving the methods1 by attacking the mystery from other quarters1 we might obtain more decisive results than the ,hindus4 ,we must remember that our western science has but lately interested itself in these problems and that it has means of investigating and experimenting which the ,asiatics never possessed4 ,it may even be declared that at no time in the existence of our world has the scientific mind been better-equipped1 better-suited to cope with every task1 or more exact1 more skilful and more penetrating than it is today4 ,because the oriental empirics have failed1 there is no reason to believe that it will not succeed in awakening and cultivating in every man those faculties which would often be of greater use to him than those of the intellect itself4 ,it is not overbold to suggest that1 from certain points of view1 the true history of mankind has hardly begun4 #a ,september1 #aijf4 #ab ,nevertheless1 in so far as concerns the natural evolution of those faculties1 ,m4 ,bozzano's assertion seem fairly well- justified4 ,we do not1 in fact1 observe a startling or even appreciable difference between what they were and what they are4 ,and this anomaly is the more surprising in as much as it is almost universally accepted that a sense or a faculty becomes developed in proportion to its usefulness2 and there are few1 ,i think1 that would have been not only more useful but even more necessary to man4 ,he has always had a keen and primitive interest in knowing without delay the most secret thoughts of his fellow-man1 who is often his adversary and sometimes his mortal enemy4 ,he has always had an interest no less great in immediately transmitting those thoughts through space1 in seeing beyond the continents and seas1 in going back into the past1 in advancing into the future1 in being able to find in his memory at will not only all the acquirements of his personal experience but also those of his ancestors1 in communicating with the dead and perhaps with the sovereign intelligence diffused over the universe1 in discovering hidden springs and treasures1 in escaping the harsh and depressing laws of matter and gravity1 in relieving pain1 in curing the greater number of his disorders and even in restoring his limbs1 not to mention many other miracles which he could work if he knew all the mighty forces that doubtless slumber in the dark recesses of his life4 ,is this once more an unexpected character of the eccentric physiology of our unknown guest8 ,here are faculties more precious than the most precious faculties that have made us what we are1 faculties whose magic buds sprout on every side underneath our intelligence but have never burst into flower1 as though a wind from another sphere had killed them with its icy breath4 ,is it because it occupies itself first and foremost with the species that it thus neglects the individual8 ,but1 after all1 the species is only an aggregate of successive individuals2 and its evolution consequently depends upon their evolution4 ,there would therefore have been an evident advantage to the species in developing faculties that would perhaps have carried it much farther and much higher than has been done by its brain-power1 which alone has progressed4 ,if there is no evolution for them here1 do they develop elsewhere8 ,what are those powers which exist outside and independent of the laws of this earth8 ,do they then belong to other worlds8 ,but1 if so1 what are they doing in ours8 ,one would sometimes think1 at the sight of so much neglectfulness1 uncertainty and inconsistency1 that man's evolution had been intentionally retarded by a superior will1 as though that will feared that he was going too fast1 that he was anticipating some pre established order and moving prematurely out of his appointed plane4 #ac ,and the riddles accumulate which we cannot hope to solve4 ,it has been said that these abnormal faculties are communications or infiltrations1 themselves abnormal1 which have found their way through the partitions that separate our consciousness from our subconsciousness4 ,this is very likely1 but it is only a minor side of the question4 ,it would be important before all to know what that subconsciousness represents1 whither it tends and with what it itself is communicating4 ,is the impersonal form of knowledge a necessary or an accidental stage8 ,is the impersonal form which it takes in the subconsciousness the only true one8 ,is there really1 as everything seems to prove1 a hopeless incompatibility between our intellectual faculties and those families of uncertain origin1 to such an extent that the latter are unable to manifest themselves except when the former are weakened or temporarily suspended8 ,it has1 at any rate1 been observed that they are hardly ever exercised simultaneously4 ,are we to believe that1 at a given moment1 mankind or the genius that presides over its destinies had to make an exclusive and awful choice between cerebral energy and the mysterious forces of the subconsciousness and that we still find traces of its hesitations in our organism8 ,what would have become of a race of man in which the subconsciousness had triumphed over the brain8 ,is not this the case with animals2 and would not the race have remained purely animal8 ,or else would not this preponderance of a subconscious more powerful than that of the animals and almost independent of our body have resulted in the disappearance of life as we know it2 and should we not even now be trading the life which we shall probably lead when we are dead8 ,here are a number of questions to which there are no answers and which are nevertheless perhaps not so idle as one might at first believe4 #ad ,amidst this antagonism1 whose triumph are we to hope for8 ,is any alliance between the two opposing forces for ever impossible so long as we are in the flesh8 ,what are we to do meanwhile8 ,if a choice be inevitable1 which way will our choice incline2 and which victim shall we sacrifice8 ,shall we listen to those who tell us that there is nothing more to be gained or learnt in those inhospitable regions where all our bewildering phenomena have been known since man first was man8 ,is it true that occultism--as it is very improperly called1 for the knowledge which it seeks is no more occult than any other--is it true that occultism is marking time1 that it is becoming hopelessly entangled in the same doubtful facts and that it has not taken a single step forward since its renaissance more than fifty years ago8 ,one must be entirely ignorant of the wonderful efforts of those fruitful years to venture upon such an assertion4 ,this is not the place to discuss the question1 which would require full and careful treatment2 but we may safely say that until now there is no science which in so short a time has brought order out of such a chaos1 ascertained1 checked and classified such a quantity of facts1 or more rapidly awakened1 cultivated and trained in man certain faculties which he had never seriously been believed to possess2 and furthermore none which has caused to be recognized as incontestable and thus introduced into the circle of the realities whereon we base our lives a number of unlikely phenomena which had hitherto been contemptuously passed over4 ,we are still1 it is true1 waiting for the domestication of the new force1 its practical application to daily use4 ,we are waiting for the all-revealing1 decisive manifestation which will remove our last doubts and throw light upon the problem down to its very source4 ,but let us admit that we are likewise waiting for this manifestation in the great majority of sciences4 ,in my case1 we are already in the presence of an astonishing mass of well-weighed and verified materials which1 until now1 had been taken for the refuse of dreams1 fragments of wild legends1 meaningless and unimportant4 ,for more than three centuries1 the science of electricity remained at very much the same point at which our psychical sciences stand to-day4 ,men were recording1 accumulating1 trying to interpret a host of odd and futile phenomena1 toying with ,ramsden's machine1 with ,leyden jars1 with ,volta's rough battery4 ,they thought that they had discovered an agreeable pastime1 an ingenious plaything for the laboratory or study2 and they had not the slightest suspicion that they were touching the sources of an universal1 irresistible1 inexhaustible power1 invisibly present and active in all things1 that would soon invade the surface of our globe4 ,nothing tells us that the psychic forces of which we are beginning to catch a glimpse have not similar surprises in store for us1 with this difference1 that we are here concerned with energies and mysteries which are loftier1 grander and doubtless fraught with graver consequences1 since they affect our eternal destinies1 traverse alike our life and our death and extend beyond our planet4 #ae ,it is not true therefore that the psychical sciences have said their last word and that we have nothing more to expect from them4 ,they have but just awakened or reawakened2 and1 to postdate ,guyau's prediction by a hundred years1 we might say1 with them in our minds1 that the twentieth century will end with discoveries as ill-formulated but perhaps as important in the moral world as those of ,newton and ,laplace in the astronomical world4 ,but1 though we have much to hope from them1 that is no reason why we should look to them for everything and abandon in their favour that which has brought us where we are4 ,the choice of which we spoke1 between the brain and the subconsciousness1 has been made long ago2 and it is not our part to make it over again4 ,we are carried along by a force acquired in the course of two or three thousand years2 and our methods1 like our intellectual habits1 have of themselves become transformed into sort of minor subconsciousness superposed upon the major subconsciousness and sometimes mingling with it4 ,henri ,bergson1 in his very fine presidential address to the ,society for ,psychical ,research on the #bhth of ,may1 #aiac1 said that he had sometimes wondered what would have happened if modern science1 instead of setting out from mathematics1 instead of bringing all its forces to converge on the study of matter1 had begun by the consideration of mind2 if ,kepler1 ,galileo and ,newton1 for instance1 had been psychologists3 ,we should certainly1 said he1 have had a psychology of which to-day we can form no idea1 any more than before ,galileo we could have imagined what our physics would be2 a psychology that probably would have been to our present psychology what our physics is to ,aristotle's4 ,foreign to every mechanistic idea1 not even conceiving the possibility of an explanation1 science would have enquired into1 instead of dismissing a priori facts1 such as those which you study2 perhaps 'psychical research' would have stood out as its principal preoccupation4 ,the most general laws of mental activity once discovered 7as1 in fact1 the fundamental laws of mechanics were discovered71 we should have passed from mind1 properly so-called1 to life2 biology would have been constituted1 but a vitalist biology1 quite different from ours1 which would have sought behind the sensible forms of living beings the inward1 invisible force of which the sensible forms are the manifestations4 ,it would therefore in the very first days of its activity have encountered all these strange problems3 telepathy1 materializations1 clairvoyance1 miraculous cures1 knowledge of the future1 the possibility of survival1 interplanetary intelligence and many others1 which it has neglected hitherto and which1 thanks to its neglect1 are still in their infancy4 ,but1 as the human mind is not able to follow two diametrically opposite directions at the same time1 it would necessarily have rejected the mathematical sciences4 ,a steamship coming from another hemisphere1 one in which men's minds had taken1 unknown to ourselves1 the road which our own has actually taken1 would have seemed to us as wonderful1 as incredible as the phenomena of our subconsciousness seem to us to-day4 ,we should have gone very far in what at present we call the unknown or the occult2 but we should have known hardly anything of physics1 chemistry or mechanics1 unless1 which is very probable1 we had come upon them by another road as we travelled round the occult4 ,it is true that certain nations1 the ,hindus particularly1 the ,egyptians and perhaps the ,incas1 as well as others1 in all probability1 who have not left sufficient traces1 thus went to work the other way and obtained nothing decisive4 ,is this again a consequence of the hopeless incompatibility between the faculties of the brain and those of the subconsciousness8 ,possibly2 but we must not forget that we are speaking of nations which never possessed our intellectual habits1 our passion for precision1 for verification1 for experimental certainty2 indeed1 this passion has only been fully developed in ourselves within the last two or three centuries4 ,it is to be presumed therefore that the ,european would have gone much farther in the other direction than the ,oriental4 ,where would he have arrived8 ,endowed with a different brain1 naturally clearer1 more exacting1 more logical1 less credulous1 more practical1 closer to realities1 more attentive to details1 but with the scientific side of his intelligence uncultivated1 would he have gone astray or would he have met the truths which we are still seeking and which may well be more important than all our material conquests4 ,ill-prepared1 ill-equipped1 ill-balanced1 lacking the necessary ballast of experiments and proofs1 would he have been exposed to the dangers familiar to all the too-mystical nations8 ,it is very difficult to imagine so4 ,but the hour has now perhaps come to try without risk what he could not have done without grave peril4 ,while abandoning no whit of his understanding1 which is small compared with the boundless scope of the subconsciousness1 but which is sure1 tried and docile1 he can now embark upon the great adventure and try to do that which has not been done before4 ,it is a matter of discovering the connecting link between the two forces4 ,we are still ignorant of the means of aiding1 encouraging1 developing and taming the greater of the two and of bringing it closer to us2 the quest will be the most difficult1 the most mysterious and1 in certain respects1 the most dangerous that mankind has ever undertaken4 ,but we can say to ourselves1 without fear of being very far wrong1 that it is the best task at the moment4 ,in any case1 this is the first time since man has existed that he will be fronting the unknown with such good weapons1 even as it is also the first time since its awakening that his intelligence1 which has reached a summit from which it can understand almost everything1 will at last receive help from outside and hear a voice that is something more than the echo of its own4