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go; we have then to decide how much they will explain. So with regard to the well-ascertained fact of physical duplication. Explanations of phenomena put forward by Dr. Wyld, Colonel Olcott, and Madame Blavatsky, as partially applicable, have been treated as wholly unverified phenomena. They are in truth founded on our most familiar experiences in Spiritualism—the fact of duplication both in the region of intelligence and physical organism. It is the foreign intelligence that has to be established in any case, as in many cases I think it is; but logical “economy” forbids the unnecessary multiplication of explanatory causes.
Temple, Dec. 4th, 1879.
Private Seances
Last Wednesday night, at a seance at the house of Mrs. Makdougall Gregory, 21, Green-street, Grosvenor-square, London, Mr. C. E. Williams was the medium, and the other sitters present were Mrs. Makdougall Gregory, Mr. Annesley Mayne (of the Junior Carlton Club), Miss Mattie Houghton, Mr. F. W. Percival, M.A., Mr. Ward, Mrs. Duncan, Miss Duncan, and Mr. Harrison.
In the dark, while all the other guests present sat with joined hands, one of the spirits took Mr. Ward’s music stool from him, and bumped it about the room, so that he had a chase after it and its invisible mover before he could take his seat at the harmonium. While Mr. Williams was held by the hands by Mr. Mayne on the one side, and by Mrs. Duncan on the other, the living face of the spirit John King, robed in white drapery, was seen four or five times by everybody present, floating over the table, illuminated by a flashing, phosphorescent-like light held in his hands. Lastly, while Mr. Williams was similarly held, a spirit hand grasped the hand of Mr. Percival, and quickly pulled him upwards, so that he had first to mount his chair, and then to stand with his feet on the top of the table, to follow the motions of the hand drawing him towards the ceiling. Mr. Williams was held in his seat and quietly talking at the time.
At this seance, and at two previous ones in the same room with Mrs. Hollis Billing, Mr. Serjeant Cox was stated to be present among the spirits, but he has not been able as yet to give evidence of identity. As, while in earth-life, he was to the last a constant member of the circle, and one deeply interested in its work, there is no question but that he must be earnestly striving to communicate with it if means exist.
<Untitled> (Mr. F. O. Matthews...)
Mu. F. O. Matthews, the test trance medium, has returned to Halifax to fulfil a few provincial engagements before settling permanently in London.
Subscriptions for the supply of The Spiritualist during 1880 are now due, price 10s. l0d. within the limits of Great Britain, and the British and Foreign Postal Union.
Dr. Robert Friese, who returned to Germany last Wednesday, after some weeks in England occupied in the observation of spiritual phenomena, was born in Elbing, Prussia, in 1817. Until eighteen months ago he was Doctor of Philosophy at one of the High Schools at Breslau. He says that owing to the promptings of spirits he then applied for and received his pension, thus gaining leisure to make himself more fully acquainted with Spiritualism, and to write his book, Voices from the Spirit Land recently published in Germany.
The Theosophists of India
Sir,—beg to forward a copy of The Pioneer (Allahabad) of October 11th. Should your space permit, you would oblige the Fellows of the Theosophical Society, and possibly interest some others of your readers, by copying into your paper the article on The Theosophist. It should be observed that the Pioneer, while fully maintaining its independent position in the Press of India, is (as I am informed) regarded as in a special sense the organ of the Viceroy. All the friends of the American party now resident in Bombay will read with satisfaction the concluding paragraph; and I think all who are interested in the higher and more recondite pursuits of Spiritualism will see reason to rejoice in the liberality and encouragement with which the literary undertaking of the Theosophical Society in India has been received by a leading and representative newspaper in that country.
Temple, Dec. 1st.
The Theosophist, a new magazine conducted by Madame Blavatsky, has just been published at Bombay. It is described on the cover as “a monthly journal devoted to Oriental philosophy, art, literature, and occultism, embracing mesmerism, spiritualism, and other secret sciences.” Many of our readers will have been aware that the branch of the Theosophical Society, established at Bombay, proposed to bling out this periodical, and will have looked forward with interest to its appearance. The magnitude and intelligence of the correspondence which has now for some time been going forward in our own columns in reference to one among the group of mystic subjects with which the new magazine proposes to deal, will have shown that for such a publication a considerable public will readily be found. And any one who has looked into Madame Blavatsky’s great work, Isis Unveiled, will be aware that the Theosophist is under the guidance of a lady whose mystic erudition is more than impressive — absolutely overwhelming. All languages, philosophies, and creeds, all lands and ages appear to have been strained to supply her with occult knowledge, and the only complaint of the ordinary reader will be that his faculties are dazzled by the coruscations of classic, Oriental, and mystic quotations and references, with which her pages abound. One cannot see the forest for the trees; one cannot tell, sometimes, what our instructress is driving at, so wonderful are the literary tours de force in which she indulges on the way. Indeed, one may spend much anxious thought over Isis Unveiled without being able to discover that the object of our adoration is any less veiled than before. But surviving the bewilderment superinduced by the book, there remains a clear impression that Madame Blavatsky knows more, has thought more, and, one is tempted to add, wrought more in connection with the supernatural side of things than any other person who has addressed the literary world on that extraordinary topic, and it is needless to point out that a monthly magazine under her auspices cannot but become a periodical of strong interest for the large and varied public lying between the two religious extremes—atheistic materialism on <... continues on page 10-131 >
Editor's notes
Sources
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London Spiritualist, No. 381, December 12, 1879, p. 278