< Alleged Magician at Their Work (continued from page 12-22) >
occasions he saw a man who was a foreigner and a cabalist, by the burning of certain gums and the muttering of certain words, cause the clear face of a moon-lit sky to be covered with dense clouds within the space of ten minutes, and in as brief a time cleared away again; and this when not a breath of air was stirring the trees. It would be useless to ask how it was done; suffice it to say, he was a magician. Col. Olcott declared that what he had stated was the exact truth. He said that he could testify to having writing instantly appear and disappear on blank sheets held in his own hands. He had had as many as two dozen letters come to him by post, from Europe and all parts of America, with unbroken seals, and upon opening them had found comments upon what his correspondents had said, written across the pages in the hand-writing of a certain spirit of his acquaintance.
He said that he had laid a sealed letter upon the mantel-piece, addressed to a correspondent in India, a living occultist, and after the lapse of an hour, after opening the envelope, which, had never left his sight, found a reply in his correspondent’s handwriting inside, written on a separate sheet of paper. He declared that Spiritualism is simply unconscious magic, and magic conscious Spiritualism. He said that he knows now why physical mediums are so low in morals and feeble to resist evil. It is because their phenomena are mostly produced, and their personal conduct controlled, by a race of beings that occupy in the scale of nature the middle place between men and matter. These beings are in the air about us, in the water, the fire, the earth, the vegetable kingdom. The alchemists call them sylphs, ondines, salamanders, gnomes and fairies. Col. Olcott declared that he himself had seen the spirits of the four elements, and he described in detail the manner in which that had been shown him by a Hindoo whom he met in New York.
The lecturer said that, in reply to the frequent demands which have been made upon him for names, dates and places in connection with what he might have to say concerning various magical experiences, he would answer that he would do nothing of the kind, and for several reasons. First, he had no intention of setting himself up as an authority. In the second place, he was under promise to withhold those very particulars; and, thirdly, he had already brought trouble upon others by telling simple facts. Col. Olcott said, in concluding, that he wished to set the public right upon two or three subjects. First, he had nothing to do with the work known as Art Magic; secondly, neither he nor any other Theosophist had the slightest intention to work in antagonism with Spiritualists, if Spiritualists were disposed to work with them.
In the evening Col. Olcott lectured on “Eastern Magic and Western Spiritualism.”
Spiritualism in India
Mr. Eglinton’s arrival in India has been but incidentally announced in one psychological journal in that country, nevertheless the phenomena through his mediumship have aroused so much interest in Calcutta that the project is entertained of starting a Spiritualistic journal in that city, and if those who have sent us this information have entire control of the contemplated journal, it will be an excellent one. The following article is from The Indian Mirror of December 10th last:—
While Theosophy is engaging the attention of our countrymen in the Western Presidency, Spiritualism has begun to stir up the minds of a portion of the most respectable and intelligent classes of the citizens of Calcutta, with unquestionable manifestations of a power, the mystery of which is still unfathomable. Some leading native gentlemen, who take a deep interest in Spiritualism, have, at some expense brought J over Mr. Eglinton, who has already acquired a world-wide reputation as a physical and materialising medium. This gentleman who has recently arrived at Calcutta from England, has already held several seances, during which he has given undoubted proofs that he really possesses the powers he professes to be gifted with. The first seance was held at the house of the Hon. Maharajah Jotendro Mohuu Tagore, C. S. I. We are told it was a decided success. Two other seances were held at the residence of Babu Denonath Mullick. At the first of them, with a view to prepare the minds of his sitters gradually to the mysterious wonders he is capable of exhibiting, Mr. Eglinton, though his hands were held on either side by two gentlemen of the highest respectability and intelligence, caused, through some agency which certainly could not have been material, a luminous cross on a dark ground, as of black velvet or broadcloth, to appear in the air; then a harmonium, which, when the sitters took their places in the light, was some ten or twelve feet apart from them, to be brought by the same means to within two feet of them, <... continues on page 12-25 >
Editor's notes
- ↑ Spiritualism in India by unknown author, London Spiritualist, No. 489, January 6, 1882, pp. 4-5
Sources
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London Spiritualist, No. 489, January 6, 1882, pp. 4-5