THE PSYCHOLOGY OF BELIEF. 227 



state of samhdhi, which they themselves liken to the hybernation 

 of animals, and in which the respiratory movements are suspended, 

 is regarded as that of absolute mental tranquillity, which, according 

 to these mystics, is the highest state which man can attain ; the 

 individual being absolutely incapable of committing sin in thought, 

 act, or speech, and having his thoughts completely occupied with 

 the idea of Brahma, or the Supreme Soul, without any effort of 

 his own mind. 



From this point of view, then, the history of the buried fakeers 

 presents a new significance ; for so far from being an exceptional 

 phenomenon, this self-induced state of suspended animation is 

 one towards which the whole of their system of religious 

 philosophy tends, and for which it provides, as it were, both the 

 physical and the mental education. And the evidence thus 

 derived from an entirely independent source, of the inherent 

 probability of occurrences whose narration first called forth 

 nothing but incredulity, seems now, in my judgment, sufficient 

 to give a very decided preponderance to the scale of positive 

 belief. 



Now it is obvious that the state of belief of each one of 

 yourselves, to whom the subjects of the three cases I have now 

 discussed may be entirely new, will be mainly determined by the 

 confidence you may be severally predisposed to place in my 

 scientific knowledge. You may reasonably conclude that, 

 although not a professed physicist, I should not declare to you 

 my conviction that a man may hold his hand unharmed in a 

 stream of molten iron, without having the strongest grounds for 

 that assurance which the confirmation of a priori scientific proba 

 bility can furnish to the testimony of competent and unpre 

 judiced witnesses. And those of you who may know me not 

 only as a physiologist, but as one who has for thirty years made 

 a special study of the border-ground between physiology and 

 psychology, will perhaps be disposed to think that I should not, 

 without adequate reason, speak to you of the stigm.iti/.ation of 

 Louise Lateau, and of the buried life of the Hindoo Yogi, as not 

 to be lightly put aside as cheats, but to be entertained as matters 

 of serious investigation. In each of these cases, however, the 

 question is obviously one as to which the decision between 



