246 SCIENCE IN SHORT CHAPTERS. 



injury, by superhuman power. The man of science merely 

 asks for a pendulum to be sent vibrating when it is in a glass- 

 case, and supported on solid masonary." " The Spiritualist, 

 tells of heavy articles of furniture moving from one room to 

 another without human agency. But the man of science 

 has made instruments which will divide an inch into a mil- 

 lion parts, and he is justified in doubting the accuracy of 

 the former observations, if the same force is powerless to 

 move the index of his instrument one poor. degree." " The 

 Spiritualist tells of flowers with the fresh dew on them, of 

 fruit, and living objects being carried through closed win- 

 dows, and even solid brick walls. The scientific investiga- 

 tor naturally asks that an additional weight (if it be only 

 the 1000th part of a grain) be deposited on one pan of his 

 balance when the case is locked. And the chemist asks for 

 the 1000th part of a grain of arsenic to be carried through 

 the sides of a gas tube in which pure water is hermetically 



These and other requirements are stated by Mr. Crookes, 

 together with further exposition of the principles of strict 

 inductive investigation, as it should be applied to such an 

 inquiry. A year after this he published an account of the 

 experiments, which I described in a former letter, and 

 added to his own testimony that of the eminent physicist 

 and astronomer, Dr. Huggins and Serjeant Cox. Subse- 

 quently, that is, in the last number of the " Quarterly Jour- 

 nal of Science," he has published the particulars of another 

 series of experiments. 



I will not now enter upon the details of these, but merely 

 state that the conclusions of Mr. Crookes are directly op- 

 posed to those of the Spiritualists. He positively, distinctly, 

 and repeatedly repudiates all belief in the operations of the 

 supposed spirits, or of any other supernatural agency what- 

 ever, and attributes the phenomena he witnessed to an en- 

 tirely different organ, viz.: to the direct agency of the me- 

 dium. He supposes that a force analogous to that which 

 the nerves convey from their ganglionic centres to the 

 muscles, in producing muscular contraction, may by an 

 effort of the will be transmitted to external inanimate 

 matter, in such a manner as to influence, in some degree, 



