From the Unconscious to the Conscious 



For my own part, if I may give a personal impression 

 of what I have observed in the domain of mediumship, 

 I should say that even if in a given case spiritist 

 intervention could not be affirmed as a scientific certainty, 

 one is obliged, willingly or unwillingly and on the aggre- 

 gate of cases, to admit the possibility of such interven- 

 tion. I think it probable that there is, in medium- 

 ship, an action of intelligent entities distinct from the 

 medium. I base this opinion not only on the alleged 

 proofs of identity given by the communicators, which 

 may be matters of controversy, but on the high and 

 complex phenomena of mediumship. These frequently 

 show direction and intention which cannot, unless very 

 arbitrarily, be referred to the medium or the experi- 

 menters. We do not find this direction and intelligence 

 either in the normal consciousness of the medium, nor in 

 his somnambulistic consciousness, nor in his impressions, 

 his desires, or his fears, whether direct, indirect, suggested, 

 or voluntary. We can neither produce the phenomena 

 nor modify them. All happens as though the directing 

 intelligence were independent and autonomous. 



Even this is not all. This directing intelligence 

 seems to be deeply aware of much that we do not know; 

 it can distinguish between the essence of things and their 

 representations; it knows these sufficiently to be able 

 to modify at its will the relations which normally govern 

 these representations in space and time. In a word 

 the higher phenomena of mediumship seem to indicate, 

 to necessitate, and to proclaim direction, knowledge, 

 and abilities which surpass the powers even the sub- 

 conscious powers of the mediums. 



Such is the deep impression resulting from my 

 own experiments as well as from the reports of experi- 

 ments by other metapsychologists. If my impressions 

 are correct it can readily be understood why certain 

 series of celebrated experiments (such as those of Crookes 

 and Richet), seem to have had but one outcome: to 



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