< Dr. Slade in Germany (continued from page 10-57) >
whether his beautiful inventions and discoveries, which have proved so fruitful of results in the exact sciences, are fancies. If to rebuke the boldness with which he draws conclusions, it is said he founds them upon bad observation of facts, and if his criticism (for which I will not stand up) is met by the proscription of his person, which would be returning a death-blow for a hit, then it must be remembered that his spiritual facts do not stand upon his authority alone. They stand also upon the authority of a man in whom, so to speak, the spirit of exact observation and modes of reasoning are embodied, viz., Professor Weber, whose fame in this respect was never attacked by any one until he stood up for the actuality of spiritual phenomena. If from that moment he is alleged to have become a bad observer, the dupe of a conjurer, or become a visionary, led away by a predilection for mysticism, it is a somewhat strong, or rather weak, excuse for the rejection of his testimony. Throughout a whole course of sittings, in company with Professor Zollner, and mostly also with Professor Scheibner, one of the keenest and most rigorous of mathematicians, Professor Weber has not been simply a looker-on of the experiments performed with Dr. Slade, but has himself taken them in hand, and has had all the apparatus and arrangements under his own control. One word of his testimony in favour of the reality of spiritual phenomena is to me of more weight than all that has been said and written against them on the part of those who have never seen them, or who have only seen them once, as if looking at a conjuring performance, and who afterwards felt themselves justified in describing them as conjuring tricks.
Yet Dr. Weber is but one among a number of estimable men of science who, after equally careful investigation, stand up for the reality of the phenomena in opposition to the mass of those who, so to speak, throw stones at them from a distance, who heap up against them all possible indefinite, imaginable, or unimaginable reasons for suspicion, and then think they have done something to the purpose.
Superficiality in this field of inquiry is much more on the side of the opponents of Spiritualism than on that of its supporters, among whom I, of course, only count those whose names are also of weight outside p Spiritualism.
In other matters inferences are drawn only from successful experiments, and unsuccessful ones are rejected because they are unsuccessful; as regards Spiritualism, anti-Spiritualists draw conclusions only from unsuccessful experiments, and they reject the successful ones just because they are successful. If Professor Zollner’s experiment with the knot in the rope, conducted in Leipzic and Breslau under the strictest test conditions, had been unsuccessful, importance would have been attached to it; but as it has proved successful it is valueless. Easily repeated conjuring tricks, not producible under our safeguarding conditions, are thought to be of value. The same rule is applied to all successful experiments in this department of inquiry. In all other matters when a new field of observation is opened up, the conditions under which the experiments succeed are searched for. But in this subject the conditions are prescribed beforehand; and if, for instance, an experiment conducted under careful arrangements for insuring safety has proved successful in darkness or semi-darkness,* it is of no value because it did not occur in the light; if, however, it also succeeds under more favourable conditions in the light, still no value attaches to it, simply on account of it having been successful at all. In other matters, ripeness of experience and ripeness of judgment are held to be favourable to any investigation; in this it is held to be weakness from old age whenever the results turn out favourable to Spiritualism, and upon this subject eggs believe themselves to be wiser than hens. In other matters, if people point their fingers at certain things, one looks to ascertain whether the objects are there; here the fingers which point at them are chopped off at once, thereby saving the trouble of looking, whilst treatises are written to prove that nothing at all was to be seen.
Why, instead of this, which only demonstrates impotence in dealing with Spiritualism, is not the method adopted which alone could be effectual, namely, to bring forward in opposition to the observations which are alleged in favour of Spiritualism, such as have been conducted with equal circumspection, care, conscientiousness, and impartiality under equally varied circumstances with the best professional as well as unprofessional mediums? And has there been nothing of this kind? There has. Only this road, whenever entered upon, has led to the compulsory recognition of the facts instead of the intended refutation of Spiritualism. Indeed, none of the physicists who, after a serious and searching investigation of Spiritualism have declared for it, were likely at the outset to have intended anything but its refutation.
The talk and the writing against Spiritualism go their way, and Spiritualism goes its way too. The former way does not run counter to the latter, but only by its side; the bawling against Spiritualism does not stop its progress; it has been so in the past, and it will be so in the future.
If in the foregoing I have advocated the reality of the facts of Spiritualism, I have done so not on account of my sympathy with them, as will appear from what I said before, but because the subject and the men must have justice done them. And however much we should like to get rid of Spiritualism at any price, the price of the sacrifice of truth is too costly. The Philosophy of Light can stand with Spiritualism and without it; but would rather stand without it than with it: for though the two meet at important points, and thereby might be led to seek mutual support, as they have done upon certain lines, yet Spiritualism disturbs by its abnormal phenomena not only the scientific aspect of the world, but the whole system of hitherto acquired knowledge; and the only way I can come to terms with its reality is that I recognize its abnormal character, in consequence of which it dovetails neither with healthy life nor with the science of healthy life.
It is no satisfaction to the supporter of the Philosophy of Light to have to deal with a dark side of the great world-problem. That I reluctantly submit to mystical phenomena my little work, On the, Last Day of the Od Theory, proves. Meanwhile, I count seventy-eight years; have written the book Zendavesta and the present work. What more is wanted. by opponents who combat Spiritualism in the manner described above?
* That darkness is favourable to the success of Spiritualist experiments ought not to appear so very strange, because thereby the disturbance caused by a stimulus is removed. Speaking generally it has, however, been shown that with more powerful medial action, those experiments succeed in the light which in the case of a weaker power would have required darkness or semi-darkness.