PREDOMINANT DELUSIONS. 



475 



PREDOMINANT DELUSIONS. 



SEEING is believing! Such is an old saw, 

 not usually called in question, and yet it is 

 exceedingly fallacious. A great many phenomena 

 seemingly true by the eyesight are not true at all. 

 Ignorance and prejudice have led to very extraor- 

 dinary mistakes. We speak of the sun rising 

 and setting, because it appears to do so, but it 

 neither sets nor rises. The earth turns in front 

 of it like a roast turning before a fire. A conjurer 

 will clearly show you that he will bring any num- 

 ber of eggs out of an empty hat. He only brings 

 them out of his sleeve, where they were cunningly 

 concealed. And so on with a great many other 

 illusions, all seemingly fair and above-board, but 

 in which we are imposed on either by our senses, 

 or by some fallacy in reasoning. Less than two 

 hundred years ago, courts of justice were hang- 

 ing and burning thousands of old women for be- 

 ing witches — all on a sort of evidence which in 

 the present day would only be laughed at. The 

 world now knows better than believe such trash, 

 but it took a long time to learn ; and even yet 

 this highly-experienced and much-complimented 

 world occasionally falls into the most absurd 

 crazes ; or perhaps we should more correctly 

 say, there are large numbers of tolerably edu- 

 cated but credulous people, who, with a taste for 

 the wonderful, are ever ready to believe in any 

 kind of nonsense that turns up. These worthy 

 individuals are, of course, not without excuse. 

 Starting with the principle that there may be 

 forces in Nature which science has as yet failed 

 to disclose, we should be cautious in asserting 

 that any particular phenomenon that seems in- 

 comprehensible is a result of mere illusion or im- 

 posture. Let every mysterious demonstration, they 

 say, be impartially inquired into. Quite correct. 

 The misfortune, however, is, that before the mat- 

 ters in question have been examined impartially 

 by the light of science, the craze gets ahead, and 

 many persons, weakly allowing themselves to be 

 carried away by their feelings, get painfully com- 

 promised, and are by the more cool and cautious 

 part of mankind set down as little better than 

 — fools. Very hard ! But the warning offered is 

 useful. If people of good standing will believe 

 in absurdities without proper examination, they 

 must take the consequences. 



We have been led to make these remarks by 

 a perusal of the lately-issued work, " Mesmer- 

 ism, Spiritualism, etc., historically and scientifi- 



cally considered," by Dr. W. B. Carpenter. In 

 this ably-written and eminently readable small 

 volume, the author brings to bear a long experi- 

 ence in scientific inquiry into the popular crazes 

 and impostures of the last forty years, beginning 

 with mesmerism and table-turning, and ending 

 with spiritualism in the several shapes it has as- 

 sumed. We commend the book to the serious 

 consideration of the credulous. Tracing the his- 

 tory of marvels of different kinds, Dr. Carpenter 

 states that the whole has been " a long succession 

 of epidemic delusions, the form of which has 

 changed from time to time, while their essential 

 nature has remained the same throughout ; and 

 that the condition which underlies them all is the 

 subjection of the mind to a dominant idea. There 

 is a constitutional tendency in many minds to be 

 seized by some strange notion, which takes entire 

 possession of them ; so that all the actions of the 

 individual ' thus possessed ' are results of its oper- 

 ation." Placed on this footing, the predominant 

 delusion, be it a belief in witchcraft, mesmerism, 

 or spiritualism, is a kind of monomaniacal frenzy. 

 An absurd idea has got possession of the indi- 

 vidual, and no reasoning with him to the contrary 

 will have any effect in driving it out. He will ab- 

 solutely get out of temper if his fanciful notions 

 are so much as questioned. Usually the mono- 

 mania spreads ; and the more who suffer them- 

 selves to be affected the keener and more demon- 

 strative does the delusion become. Certain fran- 

 tic religious ferments in past and recent times 

 have been due to nothing else than strange con- 

 tagious influences, of which, after a time, when 

 passion has subsided, all are pretty well ashamed, 

 and fain to stifle out of disagreeable remem- 

 brance. We happen to have seen several of 

 these prevalent crazes, droll in some respects, but 

 very pitiable. After such mental disturbances, 

 things, happily, shake themselves right at last, 

 and all goes on as usual. The fever has sub- 

 sided. 



Often able and estimable men suffer them- 

 selves to be affected by the prevailing craze, and 

 lead on others as imitators. It is now about 

 forty years since, when, by invitation to a friend's 

 house, we were present at an evening seance, in 

 which an eminent professor at one of our univer- 

 sities entertained the company with what he con- 

 fidently believed to be mesmeric experiments, 

 such as sending persons to sleep, or rendering 



