SCIENCE AN"D SPIRITUALISM. 251 



terious noises, and other phenomena so easily manipulated in the 

 presence of those who can see nothing and feel only the sympathetic 

 twitching of another pair of trembling hands, naturally excites very 

 powerfully the poor creatures who pay their half-crowns and half- 

 guineas with any degree of faith ; and this unnatural excitement, if 

 frequently repeated, goes on increasing till the brain becomes incur- 

 ably diseased. 



Present space will not permit me to enter upon another branch of 

 this subject, viz. the moral degradation and the perversion of natu- 

 ral, unsophisticated, and wholesome theology, which these spiritual 

 delusions are generating. 



I am no advocate for rectifying moral and intellectual evils by 

 police interference, or I should certainly recommend the bracing air 

 of Dartmoor for the mediums who publicly proclaim that their famil- 

 iar spirit " Katey" has lately translated a lady through a space of 

 three miles, and through the walls, doors, and ceiling of the house in 

 which a dark seance was being held, and placed her upon the table 

 in the midst of the circle so rapidly that the word " onions" she had 

 just written in her domestic inventory was not yet dried when the 

 lights were brought and she was found there. 



This " lady," which her name is Guppy, is, of course, another pro- 

 fessional medium, and yet there are people in London who gravely 

 believe this story, and also the appendix, viz. that another member 

 of the mediumistic firm, finding that Mrs. G. was very incompletely 

 dressed, and much abashed thereby, was translated by the same 

 spirit, Katey, to her house and back again through the door-panel, to 

 fetch proper garments. If I could justify the apprehension and im- 

 prisonment of poor gypsy fortune-tellers, I certainly shoiild advocate 

 the close confinement of Mrs. Guppy and her male associates, and 

 thus afford the potent spirit, Katey, an opportunity of further mani- 

 festation by translating them through the prison walls and back to 

 Lamb's Conduit Street. 



(T.te above letter appeared in the Birmingham Morning News of July 

 1.8th, 1871 ; the following on November 15th. It refers to an article in the 

 Quarterly Review of October, 1871.) 



The interest excited by Mr. Crookes's investigations on Psychic 

 Force is increasing ; the demand for the Quarterly Review and the 

 Quarterly Journal of Science is so great that Mudie and other proprie- 

 tors of lending libraries have largely increased their customary sup- 

 plies, and are still besieged with further excess of demand. Not only 

 borrowers, but purchasers also are supplied with difficulty. I yester- 

 day received a post-card from a bookseller, inscribed as follows : 

 " Cannot get a Quarterly Review in the city, so shall be unable to send 

 it to you until to-morrow." I have waited three days, and am now 

 obliged to go to the reading-room to make my quotations. 



There is good and sufficient reason for this, independently of the 

 absence of Parliamentary and war news, and the dearth of political 

 revolutions. Either a new and most extraordinary natural force has 

 been discovered, or some very eminent men especially trained in 

 rigid physical investigation have been the victims of a marvellous, 

 unprecedented, and inexplicable physical delusion. I say unprece- 

 dented, because, although we have records of many popular delu- 

 sions of similar kind and equal magnitude, and speculative delusions 

 among the learned, I can cite no instance of skilful experimental 



