Phantasms of the Living - Volume I.. Frank Podmore
of the party suggested “table-turning” as an amusement. Three ladies—Mrs. W. B. Richmond, Mrs. Perceval Clark, and another—were seated apart from the larger group; and a small table on which they laid their hands, and which was light enough to be easily moved by unconscious pressure, soon became lively. The alphabet being repeated, the sentence “Harriet knew me years ago,” was tilted out. The name of me was asked for. “Kate Gardiner” was the answer. These names conveyed nothing to the three ladies at the table, but they caught the attention of a member of the other group, Mr. R. L. Morant. This gentleman was acting as holiday-tutor to Mrs. Richmond’s boys, and had not before that been acquainted with any of the party; nor had Mrs. Richmond herself the slightest knowledge of his family-history. On hearing the names, he asked that “Harriet’s” surname should be given. The name “Morant” was tilted out. In reply to further questions, put of course in such a way as not to suggest the answers, and while Mr. Morant remained at the further end of the room, the tilts produced the information that Harriet and Kate met at Kingstown, and that Harriet was Mr. Morant’s great-aunt, his father “Robin” Morant being her nephew.
We have received in writing three independent and concordant accounts of this occurrence—from Mrs. Richmond, from the third lady at the table (who is hostile to the subject, but who was probably the unconscious percipient), and from Mr. Morant, who adds:—
“I felt distinctly and always rightly, when it would answer, and what it would answer. I found that it always answered the questions of which I knew the answer; and was silent when I did not: e.g., it would not say how many years ago [the meeting was]. I was quite ignorant of where they met; that was the only answer beyond my knowledge. [It is not known if this answer was correct.] All the names given are correct: my father’s name was Robert, but he was always called Robin. Kate Gardiner was a friend of my father; I believe she helped to arrange his marriage. Harriet Morant was his aunt. I am ignorant of much about this aunt; and from reading some old correspondence in June, I was particularly anxious to learn more about these names. No one at the table can possibly have known anything whatever about any one of the names given.”1
It is, of course, a matter of interest to know what indications of genuine telepathy may be afforded by these less systematic trials. For experiments with a comparatively small number of “subjects” (like those before described), however conclusive we may consider them as to the existence of a special faculty, afford no means of judging how common that faculty may be. If it exists, we have no reason to expect it to be extremely uncommon; on the contrary, we should rather expect to find an appreciable degree of it tolerably widely diffused. But (putting aside the results of § 7, above,) our only means, at present, for judging how far this is the case is by considering the evidence of persons who were, so to speak, amateur observers, and who in some cases were not even aware that the matter had any scientific importance. Such evidence must, of course, be received with due allowances, and, if it stood alone, might be wholly inadequate to establish the case for telepathic phenomena; but if these be otherwise established, it would be illogical to shut our eyes to alleged results which fall readily into the same class, provided the trials appear to have been conducted with intelligence and care.
It is unnecessary to say that this last proviso at once excludes the vast majority of the cases which one reads about in the newspapers, or hears discussed in private circles. We have already seen that the subject of “thought-reading” has obtained its vogue by dint of exhibitions which, however clever and interesting, have no sort of claim to the name. The prime requisite is that the conditions shall preclude the possibility of unconscious guidance; that contact between the agent and the percipient shall be avoided; or that the form of experiment shall not require movements, but the percipient shall give his notion of the transferred impression—card, number, taste, or whatever it may be—by word of mouth. That these conditions have been observed is itself an indication that experiments have been intelligently conducted; and the cases of this sort of which we have received records are at any rate numerous enough to dispel the disquieting sense that the possibility of accumulating evidence for our hypothesis depends on the transient endowment of a few most exceptional individuals. I have spoken above of the urgent importance of spreading the responsibility for the evidence as widely as possible—in other words, of largely increasing the number of persons, reputed honest and intelligent, who must be either knaves or idiots if the alleged transference of thought took place through any hitherto recognised channels. And our hopes in this direction are, of course, the better founded, in so far as the necessary material for experimentation is not of extreme rarity. If what has been here said induces a wider and more systematic search for this material, and increased perseverance in following up all indications of its existence, a very distinct step will have been taken towards the general acceptance of the facts.
1 I refer specially to the eminent group of hypnotists at Nancy—Dr. Liébeault, and Professors Keaunis, Bernheim, and Liégeois. Dr. Liébeault has, however, personally described to us several instances of apparently telepathic transference which he has encountered in the course of his professional experience; and some observations recorded by Professor Beam, is (in his admirable article on hypnotism in the Revue Philosophique for August, 1885, p. 126), at any rate point, as he admits, to a new mode of sensibility. And since the above remarks were written, both these gentlemen have made definite experiments in telepathy, some of the results of which will be found in Vol. ii., pp. 333-4 and 657-60.
1 Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, Vol. i., pp. 241-2.
1 Proceedings of the S.P.R., Vol. i, p. 291; Vol. ii., p. 11.
1 See the record of Mr. A. E. Outerbridge’s experiments, published by Dr. Beard in the American Popular Science Monthly for July, 1877.
1 In reference to the objection that the demand for quantity of evidence shows that we know the quality of each item to be bad, I may quote the following passage from a presidential address of Professor Sidgwick’s: “The quality of much of our evidence—when considered apart from the strangeness of the matters to which it refers—is not bad, but very good: it is such that one or two items of it would be held to establish the occurrence, at any particular time and place, of any phenomenon whose existence was generally accepted. Since, however, on this subject the best single testimony only yields an improbability of the testimony being false that is outweighed by the improbability of the fact being true, the only way to make the scale fall on the side of the testimony is to increase the quantity. If the testimony were not good, this increase of quantity would be of little value; but if it is such that the hypothesis of its falsity requires us to suppose abnormal motiveless deceit, or abnormal stupidity or carelessness, in a person hitherto reputed honest and intelligent, then an increase in the number of cases in which such a supposition is required adds importantly to the improbability of the general hypothesis. It is sometimes said by loose thinkers that the ‘moral factor’ ought not to come in at all. But the least reflection shows that the moral factor must come in in all the reasonings of experimental science, except for those who have personally repeated all the experiments on which their conclusions are based. Any one who accepts the report of the experiments of another must rely, not only on his intelligence, but on his honesty: only ordinarily his honesty is so completely assumed that the assumption is not noticed.”
1 See Mias Mason’s interesting paper on the subject in Macmillan’s Magazine for October, 1882.
1 The formula is adequate to prove that an inferior limit of the sought probability is ·9999.