  Title: Second Sight A study of Natural and Induced Clairvoyance Author: Sepharial Language: English Character set encoding: Windows-1252
E-text prepared by Ruth Hart
SECOND SIGHT A STUDY OF NATURAL AND INDUCED CLAIRVOYANCE BY SEPHARIAL AUTHOR OF "A MANUAL OF ASTROLOGY," "PROGNOSTIC ASTRONOMY," "A MANUAL OF OCCULTISM," "KABALISTIC ASTROLOGY," "THE KABALA OF NUMBERS," ETC., ETC. LONDON Richard Clay & Sons, Limited, CONTENTS
Few words will be necessary by way of preface to this book, which is designed as an introduction to a little understood and much misrepresented subject. I have not here written anything which is intended to displace the observations of other authors on this subject, nor will it be found that anything has been said subversive of the conclusions arrived at by experimentalists who have essayed the study of clairvoyant phenomena in a manner that is altogether commendable, and who have sought to place the subject on a demonstrable and scientific basis. I refer to the proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research. In the following pages I have endeavoured to indicate the nature of the faculty of Second Sight or Clairvoyance, the means of its development, the use of suitable media or agents for this purpose, and the kind of results that may be expected to follow a regulated effort in this direction. I have also sought to show that the development of the psychic faculties may form an orderly step in the process of human unfoldment and perfectibility. As far as the nature and scope of this little work will allow, I have sought to treat the subject on a broad and general basis rather than pursue more particular and possibly more attractive scientific lines. What I have here said is the result of a personal experience of some years in this and other forms of psychic development and experimentation. My conclusions are given for what they are worth, and I have no wish to persuade my readers to my view of the nature and source of these abnormal phenomena. The reader is at liberty to form his own theory in regard to them, but such theory should be inclusive of all the known facts. The theories depending on hypnotic suggestion may be dismissed as inadequate. There appear to remain only the inspirational theory of direct revelation and the theory of the world-soul enunciated by the Occultists. I have elected in favour of the latter for reasons which, I think, will be conspicuous to those who read these pages. I should be the last to allow the study of psychism to usurp the legitimate place in life of intellectual and spiritual pursuits, and I look with abhorrence upon the flippant use made of the psychic faculties by a certain class of pseudo-occultists who serve up this kind of thing with their five o'clock tea. But I regard an ordered psychism as a most valuable accessory to intellectual and spiritual development and as filling a natural place in the process of unfoldment between that intellectualism that is grounded in the senses and that higher intelligence which receives its light from within. From this view-point the following pages are written, and will, I trust, prove helpful.
It would perhaps be premature to make any definite pronouncement as to the scientific position in regard to the psychic phenomenon known as "scrying," and certainly presumptuous on my part to cite an authority from among the many who have examined this subject, since all are not agreed upon the nature and source of the observed phenomena. Their names are, moreover, already identified with modern scientific research and theory, so that to associate them with experimental psychology would be to lend colour to the idea that modern science has recognized this branch of knowledge. Nothing, perhaps, is further from the fact, and while it cannot in any way be regarded as derogatory to the highest scientist to be associated with others, of less scientific attainment but of equal integrity, in this comparatively new field of enquiry, it may lead to popular error to institute a connection. It is still fresh in the mind how the Darwinian hypothesis was utterly misconceived by the popular mind, the suggestion that man was descended from the apes being generally quoted as a correct expression of Darwin's theory, whereas he never suggested any such thing, but that man and the apes had a common ancestor, which makes of the ape rather a degenerate lemur than a human ancestor. Other and more prevalent errors will occur to the reader, these being due to the use of what is called "the evidence of the senses"; and of all criteria the evidence of sensation is perhaps the most faulty. Logical inference from deductive or inductive reasoning has often enough been a good monitor to sense-perception, and has, moreover, pioneered the man of science to correct knowledge on more than one occasion. But as far as we know or can learn from the history of human knowledge, our senses have been the chiefest source of error. It is with considerable caution that the scientist employs the evidence from sense alone, and in the study of experimental psychology it is the sense which has first to be corrected, and which, in fact, forms the great factor in the equation. A person informs me that he can see a vision in the crystal ball before him, and although I am in the same relation with the "field" as he, I cannot see anything except accountable reflections. This fact does not give any room for contradicting him or any right to infer that it is all imagination. It is futile to say the vision does not exist. If he sees it, it does exist so far as he is concerned. There is no more a universal community of sensation than of thought. When I am at work my own thought is more real than any impression received through the sense organs. It is louder than the babel of voices or the strains of instrumental music, and more conspicuous than any object upon which the eye may fall. These external impressions are admitted or shut out at will. I then know that my thought is as real as my senses, that the images of thought are as perceptible as those exterior to it and in every way as objective and real. The thought-form has this advantage, however, that it can be given a durable or a temporary existence, and can be taken about with me without being liable to impost as "excess luggage." In the matter of evidence in psychological questions, therefore, sense perceptions are only second-rate criteria and ought to be received with caution. Almost all persons dream, and while dreaming they see and hear, touch and taste, without questioning for a moment the reality of these experiences. The dreaming person loses sight of the fact that he is in a bedroom of a particular house, that he has certain relations with others sleeping in the same house. He loses sight of the fact that his name is, let us say, Henry, and that he is famous for the manufacture of a particular brand of soap or cheese. For him, and as long as it lasts, the dream is the one reality. Now the question of the philosopher has always been: which is the true dream, the sleeping dream or the waking dream? The fact that the one is continuous of itself while the other is not, and that we always fall into a new dream but always wake to the same reality, has given a permanent value to the waking or external life, and an equally fictitious one to the interior or dreaming life. But what if the dream life became more or less permanent to the exclusion of all other memories and sensations? We should then get a case of insanity in which hallucination would be symptomic. (The dream state is more or less permanent with certain poetical temperaments, and if there is any insanity attaching to it at all, it consists in the inability to react.) Imagination, deep thought and grief are as much anaesthetic as chloroform. But the closing of the external channels of sensation is usually the signal for the opening of the psychic, and from all the evidence it would seem that the psychic sense is more extensive, acuter and in every way more dependable than the physical. I never yet have met the man or woman whose impaired eyesight required that he or she should use glasses in order to see while asleep. That they do see is common experience, and that they see farther, and therefore better, with the psychic sense than with the physical has been often proved. Emanuel Swedenborg saw a fire in Stockholm when he was resident in England and gave evidence of it before the vision was confirmed by news from Sweden. A lady of my acquaintance saw and described a fire taking place at a country seat about 150 miles away, the incident being true to the minutest details, many of which were exceptional and in a single instance tragic. The psychic sense is younger than the physical, as the soul is younger than the body, and its faculty continues unimpaired long after old age and disease have made havoc of the earthly vestment. The soul is younger at a thousand years than the body is at sixty. Let it be admitted upon evidence that there are two sorts of sense perception, the physical and the psychical, and that in some persons the latter is as much in evidence as the former. We have to enquire then what relations the crystal or other medium has to the development and exercise of the clairvoyant faculty. We know comparatively little about atomic structure in relation to nervous organism. The atomicity of certain chemical bodies does not inform us as to why one should be a deadly poison and another perfectly innocuous. We regard different bodies as congeries of atoms, but it is a singular fact that of two bodies containing exactly the same elements in the same proportions the one is poisonous and the other harmless. The only difference between them is the atomic arrangement. The atomic theory refers all bodies to one homogeneous basic substance, which has been termed protyle (proto-hyle), from which, by means of a process loosely defined as differentiation, all the elements are derived. These elements are the result of atomic arrangement. The atoms have various vibrations, the extent of which is called the mean free path of vibration; greatest in hydrogen and least in the densest element. All matter is indestructible, but at the same time convertible, and these facts, together with the absolute association of matter and force, lead to the conclusion that every change of matter implies a change of force. Matter, therefore, is ever living and active, and there is no such thing as dead matter anywhere. The hylo-idealists have therefore regarded all matter as but the ultimate expression of spirit, and primarily of a spiritual origin. The somewhat irksome phraseology of Baron Swedenborg has dulled many minds to a sense of his great acumen and philosophical depth, but it maybe convenient to summarize his scientific doctrine of "Correspondences" in this place as it has an important bearing on the subject in hand. He laid down the principle of the spiritual origin of force and matter. Matter, he argued, was the ultimate expression of spirit, as form was that of force. Spirit is to force what matter is to form--its substratum. Hence for every spiritual force there is a corresponding material form, and thus the material or natural world corresponds at all points to the world of spirit, without being identical. The apparent hiatus between one plane of existence and the next he called a discrete degree, while the community between different bodies on the same plane he called a continuous degree. Thus there is community of sensation between bodies of the same nature, community of feeling, community of thought, and community of desire or aspiration, each on its own plane of existence. But desire is translated into thought, thought into feeling, and feeling into action. The spirit, soul (rational and animal in its higher and lower aspects), and the body appear to have been the principles of the human constitution according to this authority. All spirits enjoy community, as all souls and all bodies on their respective planes of existence; but between spirit and soul, as between soul and body, there is a discrete degree. In fine, mind is continuous of mind all through the universe, as matter is continuous of matter; while mind and matter are separated and need to be translated into terms of one another. Taking our position from the scientific statement of the atomic structure of bodies, atomic vibration and molecular arrangement, we may now consider the action exerted by such bodies upon the nervous organism of man. The function of the brain, which may be regarded as the bulbous root of a plant whose branches grow downwards, is twofold: to affect, and to be affected. In its active and positive condition it affects the whole of the vital and muscular processes in the body, finding expression in vital action. In its passive and negative state it is affected by impressions coming to it in different ways through the sense organs, resulting in nervous and mental action. These two functions are interdependent. It is the latter or afferent function with which we are now concerned. The range of our sense-perceptions puts us momentarily in relations with the material world, or rather, with a certain portion of it. For we by no means sense all that is sensible, and, as I have already indicated, our sense impressions are often delusive. The gamut of our senses is very limited, and also very imperfect both as to extent and quality. Science is continually bringing new instruments into our service, some to aid the senses, others to correct them. The microscope, the microphone, the refracting lens are instances. It used to be said with great certainty that you cannot see through a brick wall, but by means of X-rays and a fluorescent screen it is now possible to do so. I have seen my own heart beating as its image was thrown on the screen by the Rontgen rays. Many insects, birds and animals have keener perceptions in some respects than man. Animalculae and microbic life, themselves microscopic, have their own order of sense-organs related to a world of life beyond our ken. These observations serve to emphasise the great limitation of our senses, and also to enforce the fact that Nature does not cease to exist where we cease to perceive her. The recognition of this fact has been so thoroughly appreciated by thoughtful people as to have opened up the question as to what these human limitations may mean and to what degree they may extend. We know what they mean well enough: the history of human development is the sequel to natural evolution, and this development could never have had place apart from the hunger of the mind and the consequent breaking down of sense limitations by human invention. As to the extent of our limitations it has been suggested that just as there are states of matter so fine as to be beyond the range of vision, so there may be others so coarse as to be below the sense of touch. We cannot, however, assert anything with certainty, seeing that proof must always require that a thing must be brought within our range of perception before we can admit it as fact. The future has many more wonderful revelations in store for us, no doubt. But there is really nothing more wonderful than human faculty which discovers these things in Nature, things that have always been in existence but until now have been outside our range of perception. The ultra-solid world may exist. The relations of our sense-organs to the various degrees of matter, to solids, fluids, gases, atmosphere and ether, vary in different individuals to such a wide extent as to create the greatest diversity of normal faculty. The average wool-sorter will outvie an artist in his perception of colour shades. An odour that is distinctly recognizable by one person will not be perceptible to others. In the matter of sound also the same differences of perception will be noted. On a very still night one can hear the sugar canes growing. Most people find the cry of a bat to be beyond their range. The eye cannot discern intervals of less than one-fiftieth of a second. Atmospheric vibration does not become sound until a considerable frequency is attained. Every movement we make displaces air but our sense of touch does not inform us of it, but if we stand in a sunbeam the dust particles will show that it is so. Our sense of feeling will not register above certain degrees of heat or below certain degrees of cold. Sensation, moreover, is not indefinitely sustained, as anyone may learn who will follow the ticking of a watch for five minutes continuously. But quite apart from the sense and range of our perceptions, the equality of a sense-impression is found to vary with different persons, affecting them each in a different way. We find that people have "tastes" in regard to form, colour, flavour, scent, sound, fabric and texture. The experience is too general to need illustration, but we may gather thence that, in relation to the nervous system of man, every material body and state of matter has a variable effect. These remarks will clear the ground for a statement of my views upon the probable effect a crystal may have upon a sensitive person.
The crystal is a clear pellucid piece of quartz or beryl, sometimes oval in shape but more generally spherical. It is accredited by Reichenbach and other researchers with highly magnetic qualities, capable of producing in a suitable subject a state analogous to the ordinary "waking trance" of the hypnotists. It is believed that all bodies convey, or are the vehicles of certain universal property called od or odyle (od-hyle), which is not regarded as a force but as an inert and passive substance underlying the more active forces familiar to us in kinetic, calorific and electrical phenomena. In this respect it holds a position analogous to the argon of the atmosphere, and is capable of taking up the vibrations of those bodies to which it is related and which it invests. It would perhaps not be amiss to regard it as static ether. Of itself it has no active properties, but in its still, well-like depths, it holds the potentiality of all magnetic forces. This odyle is particularly potent in certain bodies and one of these is the beryl or quartz. It produces and retains more readily in the beryl than in most other bodies the images communicated to it by the subconscious activity of the seer. It is in the nature of a sensitized film which is capable of recording thought forms and mental images as the photographic film records objective things. The occultist will probably recognize in it many of the properties of the "astral light," which is often spoken of in this connection. Readers of my Manual of Occultism will already be informed concerning the nature of subconscious activity. The mind or soul of man has two aspects: the attentive or waking consciousness, directed to the things of the external world; and the subconscious, which is concerned with the things of the interior world. Each of these spheres of the mind has its voluntary and automatic phases, a fact which is usually lost sight of, inasmuch as the automatism of the mind is frequently confounded with the subconscious. All purposive action tends to become automatic, whether it be physical or mental, sensory or psychic. The soul in this connection is to be regarded as the repository of all that complex of emotions, thoughts, aspirations, impressions, perceptions, feelings, etc., which constitute the inner life of man. The soul is none the less a fact because there are those who bandy words about its origin and nature. Reichenbach has shown by a series of experiments upon sensitive and hypnotized subjects, that metals and other materials produce very marked effects in contact with the human body. The experiments further showed that the same substance affected different patients in diverse manners. The hypnotic experiments of the late Dr. Charcot, the well-known French biologist, also demonstrate the rapport existing between the sensitive subject and foreign bodies in proximity. A bottle containing a poison is taken at random from a number of others of similar appearance and is applied to the back of the patient's neck. The hypnotic subject at once begins to develop all the symptoms of arsenical, strychnine or prussic acid poisoning; it being afterwards found that the bottle contains the toxine whose effects have been portrayed by the subject. But not all hypnotic subjects are capable of the same degree of sensibility. Community of sensation is as common a phenomenon as community of thought between a hypnotizer and his subject, and what are called sympathetic pains are included in common experience. Sensitive persons will simulate all the symptoms of a virulent disease, e.g. mock measles. The phenomena of psychometry reveal the fact of bodies being able to retain records and of the human possibility of reviving these records as sensations and thought images, although there is no direct community of sensation between an inanimate object and the nervous organism of a sensitive. It need not, therefore, be a matter of surprise that the crystal can exert a very definite and sensible effect upon the nervous organism of a certain order of subjects. It does not affect all alike nor act in a uniform and constant manner on those whom it does so affect. The modifications of sensibility taking place in the subject or sensitive render the action of the agent a variable quantity. Where its action is more or less rapid and remarkable, however, the quartz or beryl crystal may be regarded as the most effective agent for producing clairvoyance. In other cases the concave mirror, either of polished copper or black japan, will be found serviceable. In certain cases where the faculty is already developed but lying in latency, any shining surface will suffice to bring it into activity. Ecstatic vision was first induced in Jacob Boehme by the sun's rays falling upon a bowl of water which caught and dazzled his eyes while he was engaged in the humble task of cobbling a pair of shoes. In consequence of this exaltation of the visual sense we have those remarkable works, The Aurora, The Four Complexions, Signatura Rerum, and many others, with letters and commentaries which, in addition to being of a spiritual nature, are also to be regarded as scholarly when referred to their source. In Boehme's case, as in that of Swedenborg, whose faculty did not appear until he was fifty-four years of age, it would appear that the faculty was constitutional and already developed, waiting only the conditions which should bring it into active operation. The agent most suitable for developing clairvoyance cannot therefore be definitely prescribed. It must remain a matter of experiment with the subject himself. That there are some persons in whom the psychic faculties are more prone to activity than in others is certain, and it would appear also that these faculties are native in some by spiritual or hereditary succession, which fact is evident from their genitures as interpreted by astrology. Many planets in flexed signs and a satellitium in the nadir or lower angle of the horoscope is a certain indication of extreme nervous sensibility and predisposition to telaesthenic impressions, though this observation does not cover all the instances before me. It is true, however, where it applies. The dominant influence of the planet Neptune in a horoscope is also to be regarded as a special indication of some form of psychic activity, as I have frequently observed. In cases where the subject is not prepared by evolutional process for the exercise of the psychic faculties, it will be found that the same or similar indications will tend to the simulation of such faculties, as by mediumism, conjuring, etc., while they may even result in chicanery and fraud. But among those who are gifted in the direction spoken of, all are not clairvoyant. The most common form of psychic disturbance is involuntary clairaudience, and telaesthesia is not perhaps less general. St. Paul indicates a variety of such psychic "gifts," e.g. the gifts of prophecy, of healing, of understanding, etc.; but these may also be regarded in quite a mundane sense. The development among the early Christians of spiritual gifts, visions, hearing, speaking in foreign tongues, psychic healing, etc., appears to have given rise to a variety of exceptional experiences by which they were induced to say "we cannot but speak the things we have seen and heard." "One star differs from another in glory," says St. Paul, and this diversity of spiritual gifts proceeds from the celestial world, and is so ordered that each may fulfil the part required of him in the economy of life. Psychic tradition is as important a fact as is physical heredity. The latter is a factor of immense importance as affecting the constitution and quality of the organism in and through which the soul is required to function. But psychic tradition is that which determines the power and faculty brought to bear upon the physical organism. Past evolution is not a negligible quantity, and its effects are never wasted or lost to the individual. We are what we are by reason of what we have already been, as well individually as racially. "The future is, the past unfolded" or "entered upon by a new door," as it has been well said. We do not suddenly acquire faculties, we evolve them by effort and successive selection. In our upward striving for liberty we specialize along certain lines which appear to us to be those offering either the least resistance or the most ready means of self-preservation, liberty and well-being. Hence some evolve a special faculty for money-making and, as schoolboys, will be expert traders of alley-taws, jack-knives, toffee and all sorts of kickshaws. Others of another bent or list will traffic in knowledge to the abounding satisfaction of their masters and the jealous pride of their form. So that psychic tradition while disposing some to the speedy revelation of an already acquired faculty, disposes others to the more arduous but not less interesting work of acquiring such faculty. And because the spiritual needs of mankind are ever of primary importance, there are always to be found those in whom the power of spiritual interpretation is the dominant faculty, such persons being the natural channels of intercourse between the superior and inferior worlds. The physical body of man is equipped with a corresponding order of microbic life which acts as an organic interpreter, translating the elements of food into blood, nerve, fibre, tissue and bone agreeably to the laws of their being. What I have to say in this place is addressed especially to those who would aspire to the faculty of clear vision and in whom the psychic powers are striving towards expression. Every person whose life is not wholly sunk in material and selfish pleasures but in whom the aspiration to a higher and better life is a hunger the world cannot satisfy, has within himself the power to see and know that which he seeks behind the veil of the senses. Nature has never produced a desire she cannot satisfy. There is no hope, however vague, that the soul cannot define, and no aspiration, however high, that the wings of the spirit cannot reach. Therefore be patient and strive. To others I would say: Be content. All birds cannot be eagles. The nightingale has a song and the humming bird a plumage the eagle can never possess. The nightingale may sing to the stars, the humming bird to the flowers, but the eagle, whose tireless eyes gaze into the heart of day, is uncompanioned in its lofty loneliness amid the mountain tops.
Until quite recently the faculty of seership has been associated in occult literature with various magical formulae. There are in existence works by Tristemius, Francis Barrett, Ebenezer Sibley and others in which the use of the crystal is made by means of magical invocations and a variety of ceremonial observances. It is not within the scope of this treatise to determine the value of such rites or the desirability of invoking extraneous intelligences and powers by the use of magical practices; but I think we may conclude that communion of this order is not unattended by grave dangers. When the Israelites were ill-content with the farinaceous manna they invoked Heaven to send them meat. They got what they wanted, but also the dire penalty which it incurred; and it is quite likely that in invoking occult forces beyond one's power to control great evils may ensue. All action and reaction are equal and opposite. A child can pull a trigger but cannot withstand the recoil of a gun, or by moving a lever may set machinery in motion which it can by no means control. Therefore without strength and knowledge of the right sort it is foolish to meddle with occult forces; and in the education of the development of the psychic and spiritual faculties native in us, it is better to encourage their natural development by legitimate exercise than to invoke the action of a stimulus which cannot afterwards be controlled. Water will wear away a rock by continual fretting, though nobody doubts that water is softer than a rock, and if the barrier between this and the soul-world be like granite, yet the patient and persistent action of the determined mind will sooner or later wear it away, the last thin layer will break and the light of another world will stream through, dazzling our unaccustomed eyes with its bright effulgence. It is my object here to indicate by what means and by what persons the natural development of the clairvoyant faculty may be achieved. In regard then to the subject, medium or seer, there are two distinct temperaments in which the faculty is likely to be dominant and capable of high and rapid development. The first is the nervous temperament, characterized by extreme activity of body and mind, nervous excitability, dark complexion, prominent features, and wiry frame. Types of this temperament are to be seen in the descriptions of Dante, Swedenborg, Melancthon, Edgar A. Poe and others. This type represents the positive seers. The other temperament is of the passive type and is characterized by a full lymphatic habit, pale or delicate complexion, blue eyes, straight fine hair, small hands, tapering fingers, cold and fleshy to the touch; usually a thin or high voice and languid manner. These two types of seers--of which there are many varieties--achieve their development by quite opposite means. The positive seer projects the mental images by a psychic process impossible of description, but by a certain psychic metabolism by which the apperceptions of the soul are transformed into mental images of a purely symbolical nature. The psychic process of picture-production is involuntary and unconscious, but the perception of the mental pictures is a perfectly conscious process and involves the exercise of an introspective faculty. The passive seer, on the contrary, is effortless, and receives impressions by reflection, the visions coming imperceptibly and having a literal interpretation. The vision is not in this case of an allegorical or symbolic nature, as is the case with the positive seer, but is an actual vision of a fact or event which has already happened or as it will transpire in the future. Thus the positive vision consists in the projection of the mind towards the things of the soul-world, while the passive vision in the result of a propulsion of the soul-world upon the passive sense. Of the two kinds of vision, the passive is the more serviceable as being the more perspicuous and literal, but it has the disadvantage of being largely under the control of external influences and consequently of greater variability than the positive vision. It is, indeed, quite the common experience that the passive medium requires "conditions" for the proper exercise of the faculty and where these are lacking no vision can be obtained. The positive type of seer exercises an introspective vision, searching inwardly towards the soul-world whence revelation proceeds. The passive seer, on the other hand, remains in a static condition, open to impressions coming inwards upon the mind's eye, but making no conscious effort towards inward searching. Those who have experienced both involuntary and voluntary visions will readily appreciate the difference of attitude, which is difficult to convey to others in so many words. Now the exercise of this faculty does not exist apart from some definite use, and it may be of advantage to consider what that use may be. Primarily, I should be disposed to regard the mere opening up of a channel of communication between the material and psychic worlds as adequate reason for the exercise of the faculty. The Gates of Heaven have to be kept open by human endeavour and the exercise of the spiritual and psychic faculties, otherwise a complete lesion and cutting off of our source of inspiration would follow. Except we aspire to the higher world that world will come no nearer to us. Action and reaction are equal and opposite. It was never said that the door would be opened to others than those who knocked. The law of spiritual compensation involves the fact that we receive what we ask for. If we get it otherwise, there is no guarantee of its continuance or that its possession will be a blessing. But if we ask according to our needs and strive according to our strength there is no law which can prevent a commensurate response. The ignorance of our asking and the imperfection of our striving will modify the nature of the response, but they cannot be negative of results. We can trust nature and there is a spiritual law in the natural world as well as a natural law in the spiritual world, for they are interdependent. But even our daily life affords numerous instances wherein the use of the clairvoyant faculty is attended by beneficial results. How many people there are who have been warned in dreams--wherein all people are naturally clairvoyant--of some impending danger to themselves or those around them, must have struck any casual reader of the daily press; for during recent years much greater interest has been taken in psychological matters and we are continually in hearing of new facts which give us knowledge of the power of the soul to foresee danger, and to know what is determined upon the world for the greater ends of human evolution. Some experiences of this nature will no doubt form a fit subject for a subsequent chapter. The qualifications which should supplement and sustain the natural aptitude of the seer or seeress demand consideration in this place, and the following remarks may not be without value in this respect. Mental stability, self-possession and confidence in one's own soul-faculties must be the firm rock on which all revelation should rest. The element of doubt either negatives results or opens the door to the ingress of all manner of deceptive impressions. Integrity of purpose is imperative. The purer the intention and motive of the seer the more lucid will be the vision accorded. No reliable vision can be obtained by one whose nature is not inherently truthful. Any selfish desire dominating the mind, in regard to any thing or person will distort the vision and render it misleading, while a persistent self-seeking spirit will effectually shut the door to all revelation whatsoever. Therefore above all things it is essential for the investigator of psychic phenomena to have an unflinching love of truth, to be resigned to the will of Heaven, to accept the revelations accorded in a spirit of grateful confidence, and to dispel all doubt and controversy by an appeal to the eyes of one's own immortal soul. These are qualifications with which the seer or seeress should be invested, and if with these the quest of the vision is unsuccessful after a period of earnest trial, it must be taken as sufficient warrant that the faculty of clairvoyance is not in the category of one's individual powers. Haply the same qualifications brought to bear on some other psychic faculty will result in a rich recompense. As for those triflers who at odd moments sit for the production of what they call "phenomena," with no other object than the gratification of an inquisitive vanity, I would drive them with whips from the field of psychical research. They are people whose presence in this area of serious enquiry does no good either to the cause of truth or the service of the race, and this loose traffic of sorts in the hope of finding a new sensation would, were it transferred to another sphere of activity, deservedly receive a very ugly name. The suggestion that the clairvoyant faculty is latent in all of us has no doubt been responsible for much misunderstanding, and not a little disappointment; but I doubt if it is so far removed from the truth as that which makes the possession of the faculty a certain sign of a superior degree of evolution. Although the faculty of clear vision brings us into more intimate conscious relations with a new order of existence, where the past and future, the distant and the near, would seem to be brought into immediate perception, it does not therefore confer upon us a higher degree of spirituality. It may undoubtedly offer us a truer perspective than that we may derive from the ordinary circumstance of our lives, and may suggest good grounds for a more comprehensive ethical system, but it cannot compel one to do the right thing or to lead the virtuous life. Clairvoyance, indeed, is a faculty which has no direct moral relations. It is no more the gift or property of the wise or the good man than extraordinary muscular power is an adjunct of high intelligence. And yet it is a curious fact that in all the sacred writings of the world there is a suggestion that holy men, or "Men of God," have this and other transcendent faculties, such as clairaudience and the power of healing. Throughout the Hebrew Scriptures clairaudience seems to constitute the peculiar authority of the teacher or prophet. Thus we have expressions such as: "The Word of the Lord came to me saying," etc., and "I heard a voice which said," etc., which is sometimes but not always associated with direct vision. But because holy men of old were distinguished by this power of direct vision it is not to be supposed that all who have it are equally sanctified. By natural gift or by such means we are here discussing, the faculty may be brought into active function, but we should not lose sight of the fact that the attainment of righteousness implies that "all these things shall be added unto you." I think it right, therefore, to regard the quest of clairvoyance as a legitimate occupation, providing that it is purposeful and carried out with a right spirit, while not being allowed to interfere with the proper performance of one's ordinary duties in life. For it is possible to become over-zealous and even morbid over these mysteries of human life, and to become so obsessed by the idea of their importance as practically to render oneself unfitted for any ordinary pursuits, thereby producing an isolation that is in the best sense unprofitable. Moreover, there are mental dangers as well as spiritual and social to be feared, and it is unfortunately not uncommon to observe that neuraesthenia, nervous corrosion, and even insanity attends upon the tireless efforts of the enthusiast in this direction. If we regard clairvoyance as a normal faculty we are more likely to treat it normally than if we give it a paramount and exceptional value and seek to beatify those in whom it appears. I am convinced from experience that it is both normal and educable though not usually active in the large majority of people. I am also of the opinion that it is not peculiar, except in its higher functions, to human beings. I have known animals to possess this faculty; in a higher degree I have seen humans in the exercise of it. Perhaps even the archangels are yet seeking their vision of God. But to us as normal beings clairvoyance should appear a potentially normal faculty, to be studied and pursued by methods that are efficient while yet harmless; and this is the purport of the present treatise. I will therefore ask the reader to follow me in these pages with a mind divested of all disposition to the supernatural.
The first consideration by those who would develop clairvoyance by artificial aids is the choice of a suitable agent. It has been the practice for many years to substitute the original beryl or "rock crystal" by a glass ball. I admit that many specimens I have seen are very creditable productions, but they are nevertheless quite worthless from the point of view of those who consider material agents to be important factors in the production of clairvoyance. The glass ball may, however, very well serve the preliminary essential of concentration, and, if the faculty of clairvoyance is at all active, will be entirely effective as an agent. Those who have any experience at all in this matter will allow that the rock crystal exerts an influence of an entirely different nature to that observable in the use of glass. Indeed, so far as experiment serves us, it may be said that glass only produces negative results and never at any time induced clairvoyance. If this state followed upon the use of a glass ball I am sure that the patient must have been naturally clairvoyant, in which case a bowl of water, a spot upon a wall, a piece of polished brass or copper, or a spot of ink would have been equally efficacious in inducing the degree of hypnosis required. That glass spheres are equally efficient as those of crystal is true only in two cases, namely, when clairvoyance is natural, in which case neither need be used; and when no results are observable after due experiment, from which we may conclude either that the agent is unsuitable or that the faculty is entirely submerged in that individual. In hypnotic clairvoyance the glass ball will be found as useful a "field" as the best rock crystal. Yet it does not follow that because the crystal is highly odylic and glass altogether negative the former will induce clairvoyance. My own first experience with the crystal was entirely disappointing, while very striking results followed immediately upon the use of a black concave mirror. The mirror is usually circular in shape and about one-quarter-inch curve to a six-inch diameter. This gives a long focus, so that the mirror may be hung upon a wall at about two yards distance from the subject. A greater degree of concavity proportionate to the diameter will produce a focus which allows the mirror to be held in the hand while resting in the lap. This disposes to a very easy and passive attitude and helps towards results. The base of the mirror may be of tin, wood or other material, and it is usually filled with a composition of a bituminous nature, the glass covering being painted with a preparation of coal-tar on its nether or convex side. The exact focus and consequent size of the mirror employed as most suitable to the individual is a matter of experiment. It is also to be observed that the distance of the mirror, as also the angle of vision, are matters of experiment. Beyond a certain distance it will be found that the mirror has no "draw" on the subject. If brought closer its pull is immediately felt. It is perhaps too early to theorize upon the modus operandi of the "magic mirror," as it has been called. It appears to induce hypnosis and consequent elevation of nervous activity by refracting and throwing back the rays of magnetic energy which emanate from the subject. |
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