July 27, 1888.] 



SCIENCE. 



47 



Revue Scientifiquc, contributes a full account of his varied and 

 elaborate researches in this new field. 



These experiments, coming from so eminent an experimenter, 

 made with a sound knowledge of the sources of error inherent in 

 such work, and presented with a pleasant modesty, are worth the 

 ■consideration equally of those who do not agree with the conclu- 

 sions of M. Richet' and of those whose views are strengthened by 

 these new experiments. M. Ricliet has been pursuing this investi- 

 gation for six years, and, if he has been deceived by his subjects, it 

 can only be that the topic presents an unusually puzzling and de- 

 ceptive aspect. 



After an introduction dealing with the precautions to be taken, 

 and emphasizing the fact that at bottom we must trust to the hon- 

 esty of our subjects, he can do no better than ask the reader to 

 take his word for the observed good faith of the subjects, and 

 equally well assure the reader that he has ever been on his guard 

 against that greatest of wonder-workers, ' unconscious self-decep- 

 tions.' Furthermore, we must require only such a degree of prob- 

 ability for our results as would be satisfactory in other sciences. 

 The slightest defect invalidates the whole observation, and a well- 

 established, not very wonderful result is to be preferred to a strik- 

 ing one less securely established. 



His subjects are four hysterical women between the ages of 

 twenty-one and forty-five, all subject to hypnotism, and some with 

 a tendency to natural somnambulism, and other signs of an unsta- 

 ble nervous constitution. The first test consisted in willing the pa- 

 tient to go to sleep, M. Richet being at a house five hundred and 

 fifty yards distant. On going to the house he puts the subject to 

 sleep, and she tells him that for a certain twenty minutes of the 

 morning he was trj'ing to put her to sleep, and that she went to 

 sleep. The time is approximately correct. The experiment is va- 

 ried, and the coincidence of the time of M. Richet's willing and of 

 the patient's sleeping varies from a remarkable exactness to quite 

 wide approximations. However, M. Richet is convinced that the 

 successes are more numerous than can possibly be explained as 

 due to chance. Between coincidence and telepathy, he chooses the 

 latter. 



Very many attempts were made to transfer a simple drawing 

 from M. Richet's mind to that of the subject. Many illustrations 

 of the result are figured, and without such illustrations it is useless 

 to describe the result. But the new fact that M. Richet records is 

 that the experiment succeeded nearly or quite as well when ha was 

 ignorant of the design contained in the envelope as when he knew 

 it. Here thought-transferrence is out of the question, and M. 

 Richet has recourse to the theory of a sort of clairvoyance to which 

 he gives the generic name of ' lucidity,' a vision in which the or- 

 dinary optical impediments no longer act as such. It must be 

 added, that as a rule the subject did not draw her reproduction, 

 but described it part by part, and it was drawn by M. Richet. Se- 

 lections from the most successful sixth of the results are alone de- 

 scribed. Moreover, the very admirable plan was adopted of ex- 

 perimenting with normal subjects by selecting sixty designs, and 

 recording the good results. For seven successes in two hundred 

 with these subjects, he can show twenty with his selected subjects, 

 so that the normal degree of success is to some extent ascertained. 



Another and very questionable form of test was to have the sub- 

 ject, either in a normal or hypnotic state, describe the disease of a 

 patient thought of, or a lock of whose hair was shown. The de- 

 scriptions are in vague terms, and the amount of success is by no 

 means remarkable. 



Experiments were made in which the letters of an alphabet are 

 moved over by one person, while a group of persons sit at a table, 

 and the letters are recorded at which the pen stopped when the ta- 

 ble moved under the more or less unconscious impulse of the sit- 

 ters. When these letters are put together, they form a more or less 

 close resemblance to what was thought of or asked for. The fact 

 that sentences thus emerge, if fact it is, is certainly extremely won- 

 derful. 



Experiments with cards were tried ; and the success in guessing 

 the color, the suit, and the grade, compared with the success by 



' The present writer counts himself among this number, and, inasmuch as it is im- 

 possible to eliminate individual opinion in so new a question^ will criticise the experi- 

 ments from this negative point of view. 



chance, yields the result that no evidence of ' lucidity ' is present. 

 The guessing of names was no more successful. Other observa- 

 tions of a miscellaneous character, and dealing with coincidence, 

 are recorded. These give one the feeling that a great many won- 

 derful things have been happening to M. Richet since he has be- 

 come interested in this study. 



M. Richet takes the position that chance or a new mode of men- 

 tal action is the only way of explaining the results. This is far 

 from self-evident. On the contrary, it is infinitely more probable 

 that a natural mode of explanation has escaped our observation, and 

 especially so in this unexplained region of mental phenomena. We 

 know, as M. Richet points out, how very shrewd subjects are in 

 anticipating results by unconscious suggestion, and the limits of 

 this power have by no means been reached. We ought, then, to 

 so arrange our experiments that this power finds no field for appli- 

 cation. It is not sufficient to refrain from all conscious intimation 

 of the expected result, but this result must not be capable of any 

 such intimation. It is in this point that M. Richet's experiments 

 are sadly deficient. Instead of finding when his subject went to 

 sleep by her account of it, let a schedule be arranged that five 

 times per day for a period of fifteen minutes he should will the dis- 

 tant subject to sleep ; then let the hours be determined by hazard, 

 and record the result. Everywhere we require simplicity of condi- 

 tions with the amount of success due to chance precisely calculable. 

 It is striking that the card experiments, which alone answer this 

 condition, are entirely negative in result. Again, the drawing e.x- 

 periments are useless until we have a system of calculating suc- 

 cesses. The designs are largely the combination of a few ele- 

 ments ; and if, as M. Richet at times does, we calculate the ap- 

 pearance of one of these elements as a partial success, it is easy to 

 prove telepathy. Finally (for objections could be indefinitely mul- 

 tiplied), the inference from the fact that success was obtained when 

 the operator did not do the drawing, is not that we must suppose lu- 

 cidity, but that this is excellent evidence against telepathy, and 

 strongly suggests that the percipient has some method of seeing 

 enough of the design to get three times as many as the normal 

 number of successes. The problem is by no means a simple one, 

 and theories of any kind are premature. In maintaining a scientific 

 interest in such phenomena the Psychic Research Society is per- 

 forming a very useful function. 



The Psychology of Spiritualism. — In the July number 

 of the American Magazine, Dr. Allan McLane Hamilton writes to 

 the point in reference to the delusion which has recently figured in 

 the law courts. He shows the relationship of this to other psychic 

 delusions, and describes the conditions under which false mental 

 images arise, and lead to the weakening of the judgment. 



BOOK -REVIEWS. 

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 The proprietors of the Old South Meeting House established in 

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