A Distinguished Correspondent
To our brilliant corps of contributors may now be added the eminent English scholar who is universally known in Spiritualist circles as “M. A. (Oxon) —which, being translated, means a Master of Arts of the University of Oxford. Everything that comes from this gentleman s pen is worthy of attentive perusal, and his letter in this number of our journal will be found exceedingly interesting. M- A. (Oxon) is a Professor in one of the principal English universities, and for many years has made a special study of Psychology. We cordially greet his appearance in the Scientist.
Extremes Meet
There is a review of “The Unseen Universe” in the “London Fortnightly Review” for June, from the pen of Prof. Clifford, a positivist, and disbeliever in deity and spirit. He scolds like a maniac about Spiritualism, denounces all mediums as “vulgar cheats,” “tricksters,” and declares that the Spiritualism of our day is a mere survival of, or relapse into, the low cunning of savage times, none the less disgraceful to our generation because it may seem pardonable in more bestial and less human types.” Keep your temper, Professor! Such displays of rage are unbecoming a philosopher and a critic.
Mr. William White, in the “London Spiritualist,” comments as follows on Mr. Clifford’s unhappy state of mind: “Moody and Sankey, and Talmage of New York have recently been cursing Spiritualism, and here is Clifford, an avowed and rabid unbeliever, indulging in language which might have proceeded from these fiery revivalists. Extremes meet. As for Clifford, one need only say, He shuts his eyes and prophesies. He chooses to deny the survival of man beyond the grave, sumps and scolds, and slanders those who adduce evidence to the contrary. As tor us Spiritualists, we may congratulate ourselves on the extent of the influence that evokes such vituperation. It is not for nothing that we are abused. How indignant poor Clifford will be when he wakes up in the next world, and finds that the “babes and the sucklings” and the savages have been in the right, and he, the wise man, in the wrong!”
Card from M.Leymarie
We invite attention to the dignified appeal of M. Leymarie and his readers, which we translate from the Revue Spirite for July. The pamphlet which Madame Leymarie is about to publish will be heartily welcomed, and its contents will present in all its atrocity the malignity which animated the Paris judges in their recent sentence of their innocent victim. We rejoice to learn from high authority that the reaction prophesied by us has already net in. M. Millet, the infamous judge who consigned M. Leymarie to prison after refusing to receive the most important testimony offered in his behalf,—Buguet’s own letters, is afraid to stir out of his house in the country for fear of being mobbed by the officers and soldiers of a neighboring regiment, who know Leymarie, believe in Spiritualism, and are satisfied of the wrong done to this martyred gentleman at the bidding of the Jesuits.
Postcript.–Since the above was put in type, we have received a letter from M. Leymarie himself which we take pleasure in laying before the public. From what has been said in this and previous numbers of the Spiritual Scientist, it will be inferred that we are ready and anxious to do anything within our power to assist this latest victim of the clergy. The letter of Leymarie to his friend Mr. Agramonte, will appear next week:
Paris, July 13, 1875. Official of the Revue Spirite.
To the Editor of the Spiritual Scientist:—
Friend and Brother:—An incredible injustice awaits us; we are threatened with a prison, and they wish to place upon us the brand of infamy. All the reactionists of Europe are combined against us, and our sacred Cause.
M. Agramonte, of 406 W. 28th Street, New York, will send you a copy of a letter which I have sent him; and very shortly you will receive three volumes containing a verbatim report of the prosecution against myself, and an Appendix in which will be gathered selections from more than two hundred letters received by us.
I make an urgent appeal to you, for we are all included in the great Spiritualist family. Help us, friends; combine together to help us.
In the name and by authority of the Society. Yours, with all our heart and all our sympathy.
Editor-in-chief of Revue Spirite.
A Convincing "Test"
It has been often said, by those who are not believers in the Spiritualists’ theory of the possibility of the return of departed spirits, that if spirits can return we should get information of ships which have been lost, and of the crews who have perished; seeming to imply that such an occurrence would place beyond a possibility of doubt the truth of spiritual return.
I will now write the account of an incident which took place during my first investigations of this subject, which, to my mind, proved beyond a doubt the fact that a spirit can return, and that it can communicate with those who are living in the human form.
In the year 1853 I was in command of the clipper ship Whistler, then loading in Glidden & Williams’ line, and bound for San Francisco. The ship Wild Ranger was then on her way to the same port, having sailed two or three weeks previous to the time of which I write.
One day, having a leisure hour, I thought I would visit a medium, in order to see something of the then so-called delusion. I went to Miss Ellis, a young woman then living with her mother on Hanover Street. After sitting at the table for a few moments, she took up a pencil and wrote—upside down to her view, but right side up to mine—the name of a person I did not know. I asked for particulars. She wrote that this man who was controlling her had been a seaman on, board of the ship Wild Ranger, and had fallen overboard and was drowned.
When I arrived at San Francisco, the Wild Ranger had left; but I learned from the Custom House clerk who entered the Wild Ranger that a man had been lost from her during her passage to that port, thus corroborating the statement made to me by the spirit.
I have since seen the captain of the Wild Ranger, J. Henry Sears, Esq., of Boston, and he also confirmed the account of the loss of the seaman, also the time and circumstances of his death. I also asked Capt. Sears whether he spoke any homeward bound vessel by which the news could have reached port, and his answer was most emphatic that there was no vessel spoken.
The above is a plain statement of facts which can be proved by any one desirous of investigating the subject; and I would ask if there is anything in this incident that looks like fraud, or which can be explained by mind-reading, unconscious cerebration, odic force or mesmerism?
Here was a woman wholly unknown to me, who in a little room on Hanover Street gets a communication from a person unknown to either us, of an occurrence which took place off on the Atlantic Ocean, probably two or three thousand miles away, upon a single ship, which, solitary and alone, was plowing her way onward toward the equator.
Since the time this incident occurred I have received many remarkable manifestations of spiritual intelligence, but nothing in my experience so plain, so simple and conclusive as the one just narrated.
Respectfully yours,
52 Kilby Street, Boston.
Editorial Paragraphs
Prof. William Crookes has made one of the greatest discoveries in relation to the action of light which has come before the world since spectrum analysis was first made known. He has demonstrated that direct mechanical effect can be produced by light when luminous rays are allowed to-fall upon one end of a most delicately balanced lever arm. suspended in vacuo; the contrary has hitherto been assumed. This great discovery, fraught with unknown uses to society, may be fairly claimed as having been given to the world through Spiritualism. In endeavoring to obtain instrumental evidence of the existence of the assumed psychic force, and to test mediumistic power by causing it to move a few grains in a glass vacuum tube, he discovered a motion produced by an unknown cause, but finally traced to radiant heat, and in working further at the new discovery Mr. Crookes has been able to make fresh revelations to the world relating to light.
The Medium who is to sit with the Miracle Club, in New York, is the brother of a very prominent gentleman of that city.
Editor's notes
- ↑ A Distinguished Correspondent by unknown author, Spiritual Scientist, v. 2, No. 21, July 29, 1875, p. 247
- ↑ Extremes Meet by unknown author, Spiritual Scientist, v. 2, No. 21, July 29, 1875, p. 247
- ↑ Card from M.Leymarie by unknown author, Spiritual Scientist, v. 2, No. 21, July 29, 1875, p. 247
- ↑ A Convincing "Test" by unknown author, Spiritual Scientist, v. 2, No. 10, May 13, 1875, p. 118
- ↑ Editorial Paragraphs by unknown author, Spiritual Scientist, v. 2, No. 10, May 13, 1875, p. 118
Sources
Spiritual Scientist, v. 2, No. 21, July 29, 1875, p. 247
Spiritual Scientist, v. 2, No. 10, May 13, 1875, p. 118