CHAPTER FOURTEEN

 

THE OTHER SIDE OF THE STORY

 

In the pages you have read I have tried to give a picture of the life of a practicing medium. For reasons I have already explained - because I have no recollection of what transpired during trance séance, and because I deliberately try to erase from my mind after sittings for clairvoyance or psychometry and personal messages I have relayed - comparatively little of what I have written is founded only on memory. I am fortunate, however, in possessing, a vast number of newspaper reports, magazine articles, and bundles of private correspondence, dealing in details with my many psychic experiences and cases. I have drawn on these in writing this book.

 

It was not easy to decide which cases to include and which to omit. My first thought was to select only the most remarkable instances, wherever and whenever they occurred. It was, I suppose, a natural inclination. Then I was reminded that Spiritualism in the view of the general public is, to say the least, a subject of controversy, and that the inquiring layman, and more particularly the stubborn skeptic, would be satisfied with little less than positive proof of every claim I made. On reflection it seemed to me that this demand for proof was not unreasonable. After all, why should I expect anyone to accept unchallenged my personal assurances, however honestly and sincerely they may be offered?

 

I therefore gave preference in my selection to those cases where the facts have been vouched for by people drawn from all professions, occupations and varying strata of society - a cross­section, in fact, of humanity. For this reason many of the episodes described owe their inclusion as much to the names and integrity of the witnesses as to anything particularly out of the ordinary in the phenomena that occurred. Similarly I have introduced a number of striking incidents where the details were described in the national and psychic press at the time of their happening, many of them subsequently finding their way into other author's books. In some cases I have used these accounts only in part. In others I have reproduced them exactly as they were printed, because the written testimony of the independent witness is not lightly to be discarded.

 

It is on this note of the independent witness that I propose to close these pages. Some years ago a book was published entitled Why I Believe in Red Cloud. It comprised a series of brief essays by people from all walks of life. One of its chapters was written by Dr. A. G. Thompson, M.B., B.Ch. I reproduce part of it here, not because it makes an impassioned appeal, but because its reasoned and thoughtful phrases present the case for Spiritualism with both clarity and reverence. It also serves a further purpose in that it gives "the other side of the story" - not of Spiritualism as seen through the eyes of a medium, but as seen by a watchful member of one of my own circles. Here is Dr. Thompson's account:

 

My first meeting with Mrs. Estelle Roberts was some years ago when paying a professional visit to her house. Subsequently I had several very interesting conversations with her on the subject of the spirits that she claimed to see.

 

As a medical man, of course, one not infrequently comes across people who are the victims of hallucinations. No doubt I ought to have at once suspected some mental derangement. No such idea however entered my mind. Mrs. Roberts was altogether too sane and sensible a person and not in the least worried by her visions, which she took as a matter of course. Soon I began to realize that it had been my good fortune to meet, for the first time in my life, one of those strange people called mediums, about whom I had so often read in books dealing with psychical research and kindred subjects.

 

Mrs. Roberts seeing me genuinely interested, was kind enough to invite me to some séances with another medium, at which I had the opportunity of observing some very remarkable physical phenomena. Later on she informed me that her guide, Red Cloud, had given permission for me to attend one of her own direct-voice circles.

 

Naturally I jumped at the opportunity, and since then have attended many of these direct-voice circles as well as other sittings of a different nature. These other sittings are roughly of two kinds. In both, the medium goes into trance and Red Cloud speaks through her, no darkness being necessary. In the one the sitter is alone with Red Cloud, who talks to him and brings relatives and friends to communicate; whereas in the other Red Cloud gives discourses to an assembled audience.

 

In direct-voice séances the sitters form a rough circle with the medium, who reclines in an easy chair. An aluminum trumpet, decorated with spots of luminous paint, is placed in the middle.

 

After preliminary prayer the lights are extinguished; the room being thus in total darkness, with nothing to be seen but the spots of luminous paint on the trumpet.

 

A hymn is sung, during which the medium goes into trance. Soon after, the trumpet begins to move about - touching various members of the circle. Very soon, the voice of Red Cloud is heard issuing from the trumpet, greeting the sitters. This is usually the time for the singing to cease and the gramophone to be turned on for the rest of the séance.

 

Among the various minor points that are deemed requisite for a good sitting is a gramophone record. A little tune from Rose Marie, played with a specially soft needle, has been found the best. The voices that manifest can thus be heard easily. After Red Cloud has greeted the sitters and conversed for a short time, he will exclaim, "Hold on!" This means that he is going to get someone else to speak through the trumpet.

 

Another voice is soon heard, usually calling a name. Sitters are warned before the séance not to give away evidence, so the voice is encouraged to give further particulars until recognition is possible by the friend or relative he or she has come for. Often, however, especially if they have manifested before, the voices require no such encouragement, and they greet their friends without delay.

 

The voices are of all kinds, ranging from the ones capable of a loud whisper and a few fragmentary phrases, to others full of tone and character and able to converse quite readily.

 

Now as to my personal experiences:

At some of the direct-voice circles various relatives manifested of whose existence, to the best of my knowledge and belief, the medium could not possibly have been aware, and in various little ways they have proved their identity to me.

 

At a trance sitting, a sister, deceased over twenty years ago, was brought to me by Red Cloud. She gave her full name and many other particulars, and referred to a living sister in a certain way that was quite peculiar to herself. She mentioned a book of hers that she said was in my possession, the existence of which I had no conscious knowledge. Coming home after the sitting I found the book as described after a long search.

 

My own belief in the actuality of the direct voice is founded not only on my own personal experiences, but on the cumulative evidence provided by the other sitters, often newcomers and strangers to everyone, including the medium, who come to the circle and with whom one afterwards compares notes. Their relatives and friends manifest, often giving evidence of their identity in the most remarkable and particular way. I have listened to all sorts of voices - some speaking in the tone and manner of well­educated folk, and others who disregarded their aspirates and the rules of grammar. Others, again, possessed well­marked Scots or Irish accents.

 

I have heard a Scots sitter swapping reminiscences of the war with his erstwhile comrades in the trenches, the comrade reminding him of "what happened to old Ginger, the man with the long neck" and "how they greased the General's boots!" All this in broad Scots.

 

I have listened to the voices of old people and of children, and also of well-known public men, who have passed on, conversing in distinctive tones with their friends at the circle.

 

The popular explanation of these occurrences, as being due to fraud on the part of the medium and credulity on the part of the sitters, is obviously nonsense. It would invoke the ability of the medium, or possible confederates, to see in the dark - to be able to act all sorts of characters and ventriloquize in the dark, and at the same time to have a most prodigious memory for names and facts which would have to be collected by a sort of super-detective agency, the expense of which would be only equaled by the amount of blackmail paid to people from whom the information was obtained. Even this would fail to account for the phenomena, as many of the facts would be simply unobtainable.

 

I will pass on to something perhaps a little more reasonable; that is to the ideas of those critics, some of them men of high scientific standing, who while accepting the facts invoke the blessed words "telepathy, cryptaesthesia, and prosopopoiesis" to explain them. Roughly their theory is that the unconscious of the medium can be split up into any number of secondary personalities, each acting its own part and drawing its knowledge not only from the sitters at the circle, but from what may be described as a kind of impersonal cosmic consciousness, in which, while personalities vanish, their thoughts and memories persist.

 

It would be quite outside the scope of this chapter to enlarge on these theories and criticize them in detail. At any rate, their authors do not take the easy path followed by so many contemporary men of science and ignore facts that do not fit into their particular scheme of things. But I must point out that, in the first place, we have no proof that the unconscious of any individual can be extended in the amazing way required, and, secondly, that we have no knowledge of any form of consciousness in which personality does not have a share.

 

To one who has had the opportunity of observing the phenomena of the direct voice on many occasions, these theories seem as unconvincing as they are fantastic. The sitters, especially newcomers to the circle, are not disposed to be unduly credulous. They are ordinary folk whose attitude is apt to be more critical than the reverse. It seems to be inconceivable that a mother could be deceived as regards the identity of her son, or a husband as regards that of his wife, so readily and invariably by any such personifications.

 

These hypotheses fail to cover many other well-varified superphysical facts. Personally I feel that there is no other explanation for the phenomena of the direct voice than the plain and straightforward acceptance of the view that the spirit guide is what he claims to be, and the voices what they claim to be.

It is perfectly true, as a speaker said on the wireless the other day, "when people meet in ordinary circles in the dark they cannot really observe what is going on," but it is the content of the messages which is the crux of the matter, not the supernormal lifting of the trumpet or the mode of production of the voices.

 

As regard the supernormal lifting of the trumpet, anyone who has studied the evidence knows that telekinesis (the supernormal movement of objects) and materialization are facts no longer capable of refutation. The careful scientific experiments carried out with such physical mediums are Rudi Scheider and Kluski leave no room for doubt. Now in these direct-voice circles Red Cloud tells us that the trumpet is moved by means of an ectoplasmic rod, and the voices are produced within the trumpet. I personally am willing to accept his statements. It would be foolish to risk possible injury to the medium by trying to investigate too closely.

 

The nearest I have been to direct confirmation was on one occasion when the medium was suffering from a very distinctive and easily recognized cough. I was sitting close by her and could hear her coughing going on at the same time that a voice was speaking about eight feet away from her, as near as I could judge.

 

Of course the Red Cloud voice circle is but one of a number of which similar phenomena occur. From all over the world similar happenings to these are being reported. New books are constantly being published dealing with the subject and relating personal experiences. The facts can be no longer denied, and are now being admitted by quite a number of men of science who endeavor to explain them on the lines that I have mentioned. I cannot help thinking that those who support these theories have not had sufficient opportunities for observing the phenomena at their best. Mediums of the first rank are extremely rare, and are prone to limit their activities to those people who are inclined to be friendly and really need them, and to avoid the possibly hostile attitude of the scientific investigator, an attitude which in itself may tend to inhibit phenomena.

 

In this connection it is interesting to note how easily a circle is upset if the atmosphere is at all trained. Red Cloud is always urging us during the sittings not to get tense. As a matter of fact, he often uses a little dance with the trumpet instead of telling us this, and experienced sitters know what he means. A too highly emotional atmosphere, whether hostile or the reverse, also seems detrimental to the ease with which the communications can be effected. Furthermore, it does not do to press for information as this seems to impede the power. For instance, I have heard a rather skeptical wife repeatedly demanding from her husband, who had been giving quite a good evidence of his identity, that he should tell her the pet name by which he used to call her. The communicator began to falter in his speech and the trumpet dropped. She was warned no to be so insistent. Later, as the conversation picked up, the husband called her by the very name she wanted.

 

Of course, this incident could quite easily be accounted for by telepathy, but the point I wish to make clear is that for good results it is best to let the voices give their own evidence in their own way. To accomplish this the conversation should be a natural one and its thread not abruptly broken by sudden demands or queries.

 

One must remember the condition in which these entities are supposed to be - a superphysical state from which their vibrations are "tuned down" to enable them to communicate with us on earth. One of my own relatives, manifesting for the first time, said to me that he felt it was like "taking a dose of your ether," and when questioned as to what he meant said, "Your medical stuff, of course."

 

Many of the communicators are very excited on coming for the first time. It is easy to understand how difficult it must be for them in their confused condition to be able to answer every question hurled at them by an irresponsible sitter. We know ourselves how easy it is in everyday life when suddenly asked for a name or fact usually quite familiar, for it to prove temporarily quite inaccessible. It seems to me surprising that under these difficult conditions such wonderful evidence of survival of personality after death can be and is given.

 

When Mrs. Roberts goes into trance her own personality simply disappears and that of Red Cloud takes its place. The personality of Red Cloud is a marked one. He is dominating and, at the same time, a very attractive character. Not only does he take charge of proceedings at the voice circles, speaking and commenting between the voices in a most intelligent and often humorous way, but on the occasions when he speaks through the medium in trance, he gives addresses on all sorts of subjects. At these meetings there is no darkness, the lights being only lowered during the few minutes the medium takes to go into trance and again when she comes out of it. The going into trance is an interesting process to watch. Mrs. Roberts reclines in an easy chair, putting herself in as comfortable a position as possible, closes her eyes and soon begins to breath stertorously. After a few minutes she sits up with a start. The expression of her face has quite changed. Her head is bent forward and her eyes are still closed. Red Cloud is here. He utters one or two words in a strange language and greets us.

 

A few questions may be asked or messages given, and his lecture begins. In these discourses Red Cloud deals with many subjects, the meaning of life, the nature of our personalities, the survival of the soul and conditions in the spheres and their planes. He is never tired of exhorting us to do better. He insists that this life is a school for the soul and that each man must work out his own salvation. For the most part his teachings follow those of the great religions of humanity bereft of their dogmas. He emphasizes the great values of truth and love and our responsibilities to ourselves and our fellow men.

 

Difficult as it is sometimes to follow him as he attempts to convey his meaning, speaking with his quaint accent and a somewhat limited vocabulary, somehow there is always the feeling that one is in the presence of a great soul possessed of the inestimable gift of wisdom.

 

Some of his ideas, those that are concerned with the power of thought, for instance, appear to me to be quite original.

 

It is, of course, impossible to test many of these views of his. Some may appear fanciful or to clash with our preconceived scientific beliefs. But he is always ready to answer questions and is never at a loss for an answer. If one accepts him, as I do myself, as a genuine personality who speaks to us from a different sphere of existence, it is our duty at least to listen to his words. His ideals are very high ones and he is inclined at times to be dogmatic about them. Nevertheless he makes no claim to infallibility but to give us the truth as he sees it.

Take his view about free will, for instance. He insists that a man has complete freedom of will, this only being limited by state of mind to which he has risen, and that illumination as to what is right and which is wrong may come to him at any time. One is glad to have his support for our own intuition of the freedom of will, though psychologists mostly take the view that this freedom is very limited, and some are even now still wedded to the doctrines of strict determinism.

 

One very frequent criticism about these matters is that nothing of any importance comes through from so called guides. Now it seems to me that Red Cloud can, and does, discuss matters of importance that transcend the intelligence and abilities of his medium. He endeavors to convey to us ideas of conditions in the beyond, that of timelessness, for instance, which it is not possible perhaps for us to conceive. But at the same time he gives us the wealth of information about such matters as the nature and make-up of our personalities, and of other states of existence that we can at least grasp in some measure.

 

Professor Richet complains that no new idea in science has ever come through from the beyond. But surely it may be possible that science, as known to us which all philosophers agree is only an abstraction from reality, does not apply in the same way over there. Perhaps I am putting it rather crudely, but it may be as difficult for these super-physical beings to impart much of their knowledge to us as it is in our own world to convey to a person born blind any appreciation of the sense of sight.

 

In any case it behooves us to try and snatch at any fragments of other-world knowledge that such guides as Red Cloud may succeed in conveying to us. Such other-world knowledge, according to Red Cloud, was possessed by civilizations long since buried in oblivion. One is tempted to speculate that, if once again acquired, it might enormously widen, and possibly transform, our present scientific outlook, and we might begin to have some ideas as to our own place in the scheme of things. The study of transcendental problems is usually considered to lie solely in the province of theology and philosophy, but the one is so often weighed down by dogmas and the other by wordy obscurantism, that a direct method, such as we possess in physical investigations and communion with a being like Red Cloud, affords a welcome avenue of approach to the solution of some of those mysteries of life and death and the hereafter that have so long puzzled humanity.