EXPLANATIONS AND OBJECTIONS

 IT has been clear in my treatment of the data that my own tendency is towards a spiritistic explanation. Indeed my attitude on the subject is so well known that I have not tried to conceal my bias when discussing explanations, nor to practice any obsequiousness when weighing evidence. I have been expounding a theory which has long appeared to me to be proved, and I have been trying to present the facts in a way to increase the difficulties of skepticism in rejecting that conclusion. It has been apparent throughout that I accept the spiritistic explanation of the facts, though I have endeavored to do justice to opposing views. But I have tried also to show that there are facts which the opposing theories cannot explain, and from these facts the argument gains its force.

 But while I have presented the spiritistic hypothesis as the only one that even approximates an explanation, readers must not misunderstand the conditions under which I maintain such a doctrine. The prejudices and the ignorance of a century are organized against even the use of the term; and all the illusions which that century of progress in physical science has produced, together with the barriers of all sorts of orthodoxy, scientific, literary, and esthetic, are resorted to in defence of a hostile attitude toward the doctrine, though religions and philosophies pretend to believe the same thing under another name. Whoever accepts the belief in spirits from scientific evidence has to face this situation; and, if he has any regard for the good will of his neighbors, he will let the subject entirely alone. But cowardice is no safe refuge from facts, and there are people who know that truth and virtue are not under the dominion of fashion and good taste. They insist on ignoring mere orthodoxies as such and on penetrating the disguises of ignorance and custom to explore the despised territories of hard facts. They accept the leadership of truth whithersoever it takes them. Those who remain behind must accept the penalty; but those who go forward must meet hosts of illusions about their beliefs. No one has more trouble in this respect than the believer in spirits, though his enemies want to believe in everything that the doctrine means!

 Most antagonists to spiritistic hypotheses, whether religious or skeptical, have much the same conception of what a spirit is. The only difference between the two classes is that one believes and the other does not believe in the reality of spirit so conceived. It is possible to show that both are under a delusion. The habits of thought prevailing in unscientific minds tend to make them trust in their imaginations, or in the interpretation of terms according to sense-experience. Hence most minds imagine spirits to be visible, tangible, audible beings, represented by apparitions, "materializations," ghosts that haunt houses and provoke unpleasant disturbances, or by angels with wings and flowing robes, with all the trappings of their physical state, including houses, occupations, clothes, and all the accessories of economic life.

 This conception is so incredible from the point of view of traditional philosophy, with its complete dualism or antithesis between matter and spirit, that it is no wonder that it excites ridicule. I shall say frankly, however, that there may be more truth in it than I know. I do not know enough to deny the doctrine that the spiritual world is but the, invisible side of the visible universe. For aught that I know it may be a complete ethereal replica of the physical universe, or if "ethereal" is too suggestive of something else than matter, for aught that I know, the spiritual world may be merely a sublimated condition of matter, effected by changes like those with which we are familiar in chemistry. We know that matter can be altered from the solid to the liquid and from the liquid to the gaseous condition, and that as a gas it may become wholly non-sensible and lose properties which it had in solid form. For aught that I know spirit may be some such sublimated condition of matter. But I do not contend for such a doctrine. I am indifferent to it at present. It is no part of our present problem to determine what spirit is, but that it is. All that we mean is that something survives death, whether we finally decide to call it matter, or spirit. The primary question is whether personal consciousness survives the body. So far as I am concerned here, spirit may be all that spiritualists claim, though it is hard to determine exactly what they claim. But when I defend the spiritistic hypothesis here, I am neither accepting popular spiritualism nor holding in reserve any system of metaphysics, material or spiritual.

 What I contend for is, that there is satisfactory evidence for the survival of personal consciousness. But there is a tendency in academic circles to insist that we must have a theory of philosophy to discuss, some metaphysical explanation of facts, before we admit the facts themselves. This is a delusion of the first order. We can never tell how anything happens until we prove that it does happen. We are not required to have explanations before we are assured of the facts. Indeed, science may not seek to go beyond the establishment of facts and may suspend explanations altogether. It must at least subordinate theoretical considerations to the proof of its facts.

 The only meaning that I give to the term "spirit" in the present stage of the work is, a stream of consciousness that may, in some way, subsist after the body has dissolved. How it subsists may be taken up in the later investigation of the subject, but it is not necessary to our problem that we shall define the nature of "spirit" in terms of its relation to matter. All that I contend for is, that certain facts are evidence of this continuity, not evidence of what it is. In other words our scientific problem is evidential rather than explanatory. When we have assured ourselves that personality survives, we may then take up the determination of the conditions under which it survives. At present we have only facts that indicate something supernormal, from which we infer the continuity of personal identity, though we do not know the conditions of that continued existence.

 This ought to make clear all that I mean by spirit. Indeed I have emphasized the conception in the introductory chapter and in the definition of the problem, so that it is repeated here only for the sake of laying stress on the limitations of our knowledge.

 The evidence I regard as scientifically proving survival, though it does not prove all that people believe under that name. There is no other rational explanation of the facts than the hypothesis of survival; and the cumulative evidence is so strong that I do not hesitate to say that the proof is even equal or superior to that for evolution. As a theory of the gradual as opposed to the catastrophic genesis of species, evolution is undoubtedly proved in every sense of the word scientific proof. To the same extent I think survival or the existence of spirit has been proved by the work of psychic research. The facts given in this volume are not sufficient evidence, and they are not given with the assumption that they constitute adequate proof. They are merely good illustrations of the nature of the evidence for supernormal knowledge of some kind. Indeed, the best evidence for survival can hardly be quoted, in many cases, without giving the entire record, with proper explanations of its psychological nature and its accuracy. The present volume is designed only to awaken interest; readers who are still doubtful must take the time and pains critically to study more elaborate reports. They will find it difficult to escape the conclusion that I have drawn.

 They still may not feel satisfied, if they are under the delusion that their preconceived ideas of spirit and its behavior must be substantiated before they believe in its existence. But they are not entitled to draw from the facts any conclusion except what they indicate; and most, if not all, evidence for personal identity does not hold any hint of what the life is like or what spirits are like. Unless readers master that simple fact they are not qualified to study the subject. We are not upholding any preconceptions of spirit. We have to assume the materialistic point of view that there is no such thing, and then see whether our supernormal facts can be explained as functions of the brain. If we cannot give a materialistic explanation, which implies annihilation, we have to suppose that the phenomena imply the extension or continuance of the particular consciousness whose identity is established by the messages. All further questions as to the mode of existence must be determined by other methods and other evidence.

The phenomena do not establish survival or the existence of spirit because they are "wonderful." The popular idea is that, if a phenomenon is "wonderful" or inexplicable by ordinary causes, it must be evidence for spirits. It is not mystery that establishes the conclusion, but the perfect intelligibility of the facts. Supernormal experiences which do not indicate the continued personal identity of the dead might be explained by hypotheses as indefinite as the facts themselves; but when the circumstances are exactly what we should expect if a given person were communicating with us, the conclusion can hardly be escaped. The only circumstance that will give rise to resistance is prejudice based on the dogmatism of science about "matter" and on the lack of respectability among the advocates of spiritistic theories. These are, in reality, more powerful influences than any logic or proved facts. But the phenomena have so accumulated that it will soon be the mark of extreme ignorance to reject the conclusion.

 When we consider objections to the spiritistic hypothesis, I think we may say to-day that none are valid. Twenty-five years ago we might have entertained objections, but the work done in the interim has effectively removed them. While chance coincidence and guessing may account for many occurrences advanced as evidence for the supernormal, they have long been thrown out of court as explanations of vast masses of phenomena, and those quoted in this volume as evidence of the supernormal exhibit their own exemption from such suspicion. Secondary personality fares no better. While it limits evidence and excludes spirits as the explanation of certain types of facts, the contents of its phenomena can be traced to normal experience, while genuinely supernormal knowledge can be explained only by a source external to the subconscious.

 Telepathy is not a legitimate rival. I shall not discuss it here, after the exhaustive discussion given it in earlier chapters. I mention it as a whilom objection no longer cogent nor relevant. It has been eliminated for all who know anything about the facts and is pressed only by those who are too bewildered by the phenomena to make up their minds. It is noticeable, however, that telepathy, though probably a fact and a very limited fact, no longer plays its former role in the controversy, and represents an agency so little known that the burden of proof now rests on the believer in it rather than on the believer in spirits. The more rational theory must have the preference and telepathy has no rationality to commend it.

 But if there are no longer any real objections to the spiritistic hypothesis, there are certain difficulties or perplexities for all of us. They are not objections to, but puzzles in the theory. They must be recognized despite the fact that the hypothesis has to be accepted. They may be summarized under two heads: (1) The mistakes and confusions in the communications and (2) the contradictions in the statements about the nature of the life after death. This latter question should be taken up in a later discussion of the nature of the spiritual life. Suffice it to say that no amount of contradiction in statement can be construed as an objection to a spiritistic theory. Spirits, like living people, may contradict each other, but the contradiction is no evidence against their existence.

 The confusions and mistakes in the communications, though they no more than contradictory statements militate against the existence of spirits, do require explication if the phenomena are to be made intelligible. The difficulties which these mistakes involve are based solely on the assumption that, if spirits can communicate as they often appear to do, they ought not to make manifest errors in statement. This assumption, however, is wholly unwarranted and is founded on a superficial interpretation of the facts. The analogies of normal intercourse offer no standard for judging these phenomena. Careful students will detect the existence of conditions for communication between the spiritual and the physical worlds, very different from the conditions existing between living people. These conditions are so complex that the slightest knowledge of them will render intelligible the fragmentary nature of the messages and the mistakes and confusion. Indeed the wonder is that any communication whatever is possible.

 If we know the conditions under which messages come, we cannot wonder at the confusions and mistakes. There is first the conscious mind of the psychic, whether normal or in a trance. This mind has to report the messages and must color them in the same way that any second person would color a message sent to a friend. Then there is the subconscious of the medium, which will also modify messages, with greater liability to confusion and mistake than exists in the normal consciousness. Add to this again the influence of the control's mind. All messages either come through the control's mind or are affected by it, in addition to the modifications which communications must undergo in the psychic's mind. An additional source of confusion is the fact that many messages are involuntary; that is, unintentional on the part of the communicator. There is also interfusion of the communicator's thoughts with those of others near by as well as with those of the medium and the control. All these are still further complicated by the pictographic process, which represents the communicator's thoughts to the control and the psychic in a panorama of mental imagery, subject to interpretation by either or both. If the pictures are symbolic they may represent in the mind of the communicator an association of ideas which are not connected in the mind of the living receiver or medium. Imagine what different accounts two persons would give of an ordinary panorama or procession! The psychic may hit upon incidents in the series of pictures, not intended by the communicator, and yet quite as good evidence, if verifiable, as any intentional picture. But the whole complex phantasmagoria exhibits incalculable opportunities for mistake.