Image provided by: University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Lincoln, NE
About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (March 22, 1914)
semi-monthly magazine 1, SLDruckkeb ; - HEX A SCIENTIFIC iVk'ii.l mice usked t lit Into Professor .lames what he hoped to ac complish by his persistent delving into occult phenomena, his instant reply was: "To And balm for men's soul.'' And undoubtedly this answer summed up with incisive vividness the chief motive that, from the days of the early eighties when organized psychical research came into being, has led scientists of such pre-eminent standing as Professor James, Sir Oliver Lodge, Sir William ( Yookes and 'csare Lombroso, to disregard the sneering criticisms of their colleagues and to ad venture into the bewildering realm of the weird and the uncanny. One and all, they hoped to gain scien tifically acceptable evidence validating the traditional belief of mankind in a life beyond the grave. But there was another motive prompting them to undertake their ridicule-provoking task. This was their realization that the progress of knowledge has always depended on the degree of niieution paid to the "unclassilled residua" of the facts of experience, and that the obstinate refusal of the scientific world in general to pay any attention whatever to unclassi fied residua like hanntings, apparitions, premonitions and mediumistic communications, quite possibly in volved serious pops in a full understanding of the nature of man here on earth. "Is science a completed book?" these open-minded thinkers asked. "Do we know everything that is to be known concerning our selves and the universe in which we live Or is it not our duty to seek to win a larger knowledge by whatsoever means are available to us, and no matter how laborious or distasteful the work of investiga tion may be?" In this belief, and from this point of view, William .James and his fellow psychical re searchers attacked the mysteries of spiiitism. The result has been to .justify abundantly their courage and their confidence. If the actuality of the soul's survival still balllcs scientific demonstration, the etTort to demonstrate it has most assuredly en riched our knowledge of the human mind, and has brought to light facts not only of an astonishing character but of immense significance to the interests and needs of everyday life. So true is this that today, especially in the fields of medicine and educa tion, practical application is being made of novel principles and methods, the discovery of which has been directly or indirectly due to psychical research. TAKE the now well-established psychological law of "subconscious mentation" the law which af firms that all of us constantly perceive and remem ber far more than we appreciate, and that these sub conscious perceptions and memories often exercise a controlling influence over our conscious thoughts and behavior. Out of the discovery of this vital truth has resulted on the one hand a complete explanation on a naturalistic basis of many phenomena formerly reputed to he supernatural, and on the other hand recognition of the tremendous role played by subcon scious ideas in affecting one's character and career, and even at times in affecting bodily health. There can not be the slightest question that psychical re search first put science in earnest on the trail of the subconscious, and that to it must he credited much of the strongest evidence substantiating this hitherto unsuspected phase of the mental life of man. Even before the Society for Psychical Research was organized in 1882. its chief founders - Profes sor Sidgwick, Frederic Myers, and Edmund flurney from their personal observations were inclined to the belief that memory was a vastly more complicated, extensive, and retentive process than was t licit com monly supposed. That this was the ease (iurney in particular demonstrated, soon after the organization of the society, by carrying out an elaborate series of experiments that constituted the first really psycho logical investigation ever made of the strange phe nomena of hypnotism. He discovered, among much else, that although persons, on being brought back to their normal waking state, had no conscious recol lection of what had transpired while they were hyp notized, they nevertheless did somehow possess a lruo memory of the things said to them during hyp nosis; as was proved by the fact that, if ordered to perform a certain act, or acts, at a specified time after they had been debypnotized, they would faith fully execute the command, albeit without being able to give any reason for doing so, and often without being aware that they bad done so. More than this, (iurney found to his astonishment that it often was possible to detect in the waking state the presence and operation of thesubinergedhypnotic. memories bv means of "automatic writing." That is to saw if the after being brought out of hypnosis, were given pencil anil paper, and a screen held between his face and his iifintt .J, fiini ts ho could not. see tne vv paper, he w o u 1 d write, without being conscious of what he was doincr. sentences referring to the stotements made to him while hypnotized. That he really was not con scious of the words his hand formed, was cvi deuced by his invariable inability, despite the offer of substantial sums of money, to tell whut he had written. Equally astonishing was the discovery made by another investigator, Mr. Myers, that some "subjects," if told after they had been debypnotized to gaze into "subject," MJ 1 'Y a crystal or other body with a idled im: surface, would see in it hallucinatory pictures represent mu the ideas conveyed to them during hypnosis. To illustrate, Mr. Myers once hypnotized a young man, n simple working-lad, and narrated to bi'm the story of the appearance of Manquo's ghost al Mac helh's feast. After he had been awakened, the oiler of a liberal reward failed as usual to elicit from him any account of what he had just been told, lie was then ordered to look into a glass of water. Only a few minutes elapsed before he exclaimed: T SKE two or three men standing some silling one in a chair on n raised place, like where the head man sits. Thai's the mayor, I suppose." A pause then, wilh a loud whistle: "Here comes the bogey man. Look at that chap in I he corner. Isn't he frightened of him! And the mayor's quite upset." Another pause. "Why, it's a ghost! Look at him! They all stick their swords through him. It doesn't hurt him. lie's a ghost !" Many similar experiments by Mr. Myers were fully as successful, and in no instance did the "subject" realize that the pictures he saw in the glass of water were representative of information given to him while hypnotized. Now, the phenom ena o f automatic Wt'tlillfF nil mtctnl Wti gazing had up to sTj that time been re garded as aiisoiutciv Sfe ' ' ; frWftWi li "itxi,'i'i"'i(' other Yyj B ' W ! 1 '' l,m" n s"l'i'niatural ;,f.Jtyy ground. The question Wjl V al once arose in the minds of (iurney, Myers, and other psychical re searchers: Can it be that t if. Yj "sensitives" who write t ranee Yli messages or see crystal visions merely draw on forgotten rem- M iniscences for the contents of their messages or visions' Investigations set on fool as soon as (bis question was raised, ami continuing to the present day, have left no doubt that, to a large extent at any rate, it must be answered in the allirniative. They have, indeed, proved beyond contradiction that every human being carries within him memories that have totally faded from conscious recollection but may be recalled under certain conditions. ' and that such memories not infrequently re late to matters of which he never' had conscious knowledge but which it can be demonstrated once proved part of his ad mil experience. Perhaps the most remarkable instance on record (('mitiniinl an i ! )
