Spirit Lights Visible at Dark Séances—Private Circle in Jersey City in 1857—Solid Granules of Phosphorus Appearing in Earth which I had Touched—Surprising and Distressing Letter—The Good Spirits and Daniel Underhill to the Rescue—Benjamin Franklin—Marriage to D. Underhill, November 2, 1858, and Close of my Public Mediumship—Analogous Phenomena in Private at Home.
Agreement for an Investigation by a Committee of Harvard Professors—Expulsion of a Student from the Divinity School for the Crime of Mediumship—Professor Felton—Agassiz—Varley, the Electrician of the Atlantic Telegraph Company.
Disinterested Judgments upon the Sham Investigation—Our Part in the Proceedings—More Fair Investigation by the Collective Representatives of the New England Press—Investigation by a Body of Unitarian Clergymen—Our Triumphant Return Home—Theodore Parker.
CHAPTER XXIII.
Robert Dale Owen and Professor Felton, President of Harvard College
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Masterly Letter from Mr. Owen.
CHAPTER XXIV.
Experiences of Robert Dale Owen through the Mediumship of the Author
Moving a Ledge of Rock on the Sea-shore—Raps on the Water, and in the Living Wood—Seeing the Raps—Moving Ponderable Bodies by Occult Agency—Crucial Test—A Heavy Dinner-table Suspended in the Air by Occult Agency.
CHAPTER XXV.
Experiences of the Author with Robert Dale Owen (Continued)
Mysteries of Mediumship—To Prove the Immortality of the Soul—Passivity and Harmony at Séances—Honest and Candid Scepticism—Imaginary and Self-induced Mediumship—Deceptive Communications—Cautions—Rappings—Spirits made Visible—Beware of Fraudulent Mediums—Not all Spirits Reliable—Cabinets.
Crowd of Spirits made Visible by Lightning—Scarcely Credible but True—A Game of Euchre—Margaret’s Dream—Mistaken Names Corrected by Spirits—An Unwilling Convert made Grateful and Happy—A Spirit Knows better than the Postmaster—Opening of a Combination Lock—A Visitor Magnetized into a Medium Himself—Curious Story about a Mutilated Limb—Disturbance in the Troup Street Cottage—A Caution against Cruelty to Orphan Children—Mrs. Hopper’s Mysterious End—“Touch Samantha”—“I felt my Handkercher Tied Tighter every Minit”—“No Brimstone yet”—Kitchen Work by Night—‘Sich a Gittin’ up Stairs’—The Death of Isaac T. Hopper—William M. Thackeray—“Witch Stories”—George Thompson—A Child’s Letter—Extracts from D. Underhill’s Minute Book—Practical Jokes Performed and Rebuked—A Prophetic Dream—James A. Garfield—“Incident” Related by the Editor.
CHAPTER XXXII.
Action of Spirits through the Mediumship of a Five-month’s-old Infant
It is not that the history of Spiritual Manifestations in this century and country has not again and again been written, nor that a library of the splendid literature of Spiritualism—narrative, philosophical, and religious—does not already exist, that I have deemed it a duty to give this history to the world.
It happens that nobody else possesses—both in vivid personal recollections and in stores of documentary material—the means and the data necessary for the task of giving a correct account of the initiation of the movement known as Modern Spiritualism; and the now hastening lapse of years gives warning that if to place it on record is a duty—as many friends have often urged—it is a duty not to be much longer delayed.
Many mistakes and material omissions have been made in former summary accounts from pens of friends, as well as misstatements
