THE MODERN OCCULT. 459 



sort of a scheme he invested money in, provided that it annoys the 

 English, so many persons do not care what they invest belief in, pro- 

 vided that it irritates men of science." Of such is the kingdom of 

 alchemists and their brethren. 



Astrology, phrenology, physiognomy and palmistry have in com- 

 mon a search for knowledge whereby to regulate the affairs of life, to 

 foretell the future, to comprehend one's destiny and capabilities. They 

 aim to secure success or at least to be forearmed against failure by be- 

 ing forewarned. This is a natural, a practical, and in no essential way, 

 an occult desire. It becomes occult, or better, superstitious, when it is 

 satisfied by appeals to relations and influences which do not exist, and 

 by false interpretation of what may be admitted as measurably and 

 vaguely true and about equally important. When not engaged in their 

 usual occupation of building most startling superstructures on the weak- 

 est foundations, practical occultists are like Dr. Holmes' katydid, "say- 

 ing an undisputed thing in such a solemn way." They will not hearken 

 to the experience of the ages that success cannot be secured nor char- 

 acter read by discovering their mystic stigmata; they will not learn 

 from physiology and psychology that the mental capabilities, the moral 

 and emotional endowment of an individual are not stamped on his body 

 so that they may be revealed by half an hour's use of the calipers and 

 tape-measure; they will not listen when science and common sense 

 unite in teaching that the knowledge of mental powers is not such as 

 may be applied by rule of thumb to individual cases, but that like much 

 other valuable knowledge, it proceeds by the exercise of sound judg- 

 ment, and must as a rule rest content with suggestive generalizations 

 and imperfectly established correlations. An educated man with whole- 

 some interests and a vigorous logical sense can consider a possible science 

 of character and the means of aiding its advance without danger and 

 with some profit. But this meat is sheer poison to those who are 

 usually attracted to such speculations, while it offers to the unscrupu- 

 lous charlatan a most convenient net to spread for the unwary. In so 

 far as these occult mariners, the astrologists and phrenologists and id 

 genus omne are sincere, and in so far represent superstition rather than 

 commercial fraud, they simply ignore through obstinacy or ignorance 

 the light -houses and charts and the other aids to modern navigation, 

 and persist in steering their craft by an occult compass. In some cases 

 they are professedly setting out, not for any harbor marked on terrestrial 

 maps, but their expedition is for the golden fleece or for the apples of the 

 Hesperides; and with loud-voiced advertisements of their skill as pilots, 

 they proceed to form stock companies for the promotion of the enter- 

 prise and to sell the shares to credulous speculators. 



It would be a profitless task to review the alleged data of astrology 

 or phrenology or palmistry except for the illustrations which they read- 



