298 MY LIFE 



my friends. It was called " The Scientific Aspect of the 

 Supernatural," a somewhat misleading title, as in the in- 

 troductory chapter I argued for all the phenomena, however 

 extraordinary, being really " natural " and involving no altera- 

 tion whatever in the ordinary laws of nature. Some years 

 later (1874) this was included in my volume on "Miracles 

 and Modern Spiritualism," with an additional chapter, " Notes 

 of Personal Evidence." 



The letters I received from those to whom I sent copies 

 of this little pamphlet were interesting though not instructive. 

 Huxley wrote : " I am neither shocked nor disposed to issue 

 a Commission of Lunacy against you. It may be all true, 

 for anything I know to the contrary, but really I cannot get 

 up any interest in the subject. I never cared for gossip in 

 my life, and disembodied gossip, such as these worthy ghosts 

 supply their friends with, is not more interesting to me than 

 any other. As for investigating the matter — I have half-a- 

 dozen investigations of infinitely greater interest to me — 

 to which any spare time I may have will be devoted. I 

 give it up for the same reason I abstain from chess — 

 it's too amusing to be fair work, and too hard work to be 

 amusing." 



To the latter part of this letter no objection can be made, 

 but the objection as to " gossip " was quite irrelevant as 

 regards a book which had not one line of " gossip ' in it, 

 but was wholly devoted to a summary of the evidence for 

 facts — physical and mental — of a most extraordinary charac- 

 ter, given on the testimony of twenty-two well-known men, 

 mathematicians, astronomers, chemists, physiologists, lawyers, 

 clerygmen, and authors, many of world-wide reputation. 



Tyndall read the book " with deep disappointment," be- 

 cause it contained no record of my own experiments. He 

 knew Baron Reichenbach, and had visited him, and had seen 

 all his apparatus and his methods. It was he who had re- 

 proached Thackeray for allowing the article about " Home ' 

 to appear in the Cornhill Magazine, and he added — 



" Poor Thackeray was staggered and abashed by the 

 earnestness of my remonstrance regarding the lending the 



