The Unknown Guest [17]
this theory, which is not necessarily indefensible, we will merely remark that, since the faculty is manifested in psychometry without the intervention of the spirits, there can be no sufficient reason for attributing it to them in cross-correspondence.
9
But in whom does it reside? Is it hidden in ourselves or in the medium? According to Dr. Osty, the clairvoyants are mirrors reflecting the intuitive thought that is latent in each of us. In other words--it is we ourselves who are clairvoyant, and they but reveal to us nor own clairvoyance. Their mission is to stir, to awaken, to galvanize, to illumine the secrets of our subconsciousness and to bring them to the surface of our normal lives. They act upon our inner darkness exactly as, in the photographic dark-room, the developing-bath acts upon the sensitized plate, I am convinced that the theory is accurate as regards intuition and clairvoyance proper, that is to say, in all cases where we are in the medium's presence and more or less directly in touch with him. But is it so in psychometry? Is it we who, unknown to ourselves, know all that the object contains, or is it the medium alone who discovers it in the object itself, independently of the person who produces the object? When, for instance, we receive a letter from a stranger, does this letter, which has absorbed like a sponge the whole life and by choice the subconscious life of the writer, disgorge all that it contained into our subconsciousness? Do we instantly learn all that concerns its author, absolutely as though he were standing before us in the flesh and, above all, with his soul laid bare, though we remain profoundly ignorant of the fact that we have learnt it until the medium's intervention tells us so?
This, if you like, is simply shifting the question. Let it be the medium or myself that discovers the unknown personality in the object or tracks it across time and space: all that we do is to widen the scope of our riddle, while leaving it no less obscure. Nevertheless, there is some interest in knowing whether we have to do with a general faculty latent in all men or an inexplicable privilege reserved to rare individuals. The exceptional should always be eliminated, if possible, and not left to hang over the abyss like an unfinished bridge leading to nothing. I am well aware that the compulsory intervention of the medium implies that, in spite of all, we recognize his possession of abnormal faculties; but at any rate we reduce their power and their extent appreciably and we return sooner and more easily to the ordinary laws of the great human mystery. And it is of importance that we should be ever coming back to that mystery and ever bringing all things back to it. But, unfortunately, actual experience does not admit of this generalization. It is clearly a case of a special faculty, one peculiar to the medium, one which is wholly unknown to our latent intuition. We can easily assure ourselves of this by causing the medium to receive through a third party and enclosed in a series of three envelopes, as in the experiment described above, a letter of which we know the writer, but of which both the source and the contents are absolutely unknown to the messenger. These unusual circumstances, in which all subconscious communications between consultant and consulted are strictly cut off, will in no way hamper the medium's clairvoyance; and we may fairly conclude that it is actually the medium himself who discovers directly, without any intermediary, without "relays," to use M. Duchatel's expression, all that the object holds concealed. It, therefore, seems certain that there is, at least in psychometry, something more than the mere mirror of which Dr. Osty speaks.
10
I consider it necessary to declare for the last time that these psychometric phenomena, astonishing though they appear at first, are known, proved and certain and are no longer denied or doubted by any of those who have studied them seriously. I could have given full particulars of a large number of conclusive experiments; but this
9
But in whom does it reside? Is it hidden in ourselves or in the medium? According to Dr. Osty, the clairvoyants are mirrors reflecting the intuitive thought that is latent in each of us. In other words--it is we ourselves who are clairvoyant, and they but reveal to us nor own clairvoyance. Their mission is to stir, to awaken, to galvanize, to illumine the secrets of our subconsciousness and to bring them to the surface of our normal lives. They act upon our inner darkness exactly as, in the photographic dark-room, the developing-bath acts upon the sensitized plate, I am convinced that the theory is accurate as regards intuition and clairvoyance proper, that is to say, in all cases where we are in the medium's presence and more or less directly in touch with him. But is it so in psychometry? Is it we who, unknown to ourselves, know all that the object contains, or is it the medium alone who discovers it in the object itself, independently of the person who produces the object? When, for instance, we receive a letter from a stranger, does this letter, which has absorbed like a sponge the whole life and by choice the subconscious life of the writer, disgorge all that it contained into our subconsciousness? Do we instantly learn all that concerns its author, absolutely as though he were standing before us in the flesh and, above all, with his soul laid bare, though we remain profoundly ignorant of the fact that we have learnt it until the medium's intervention tells us so?
This, if you like, is simply shifting the question. Let it be the medium or myself that discovers the unknown personality in the object or tracks it across time and space: all that we do is to widen the scope of our riddle, while leaving it no less obscure. Nevertheless, there is some interest in knowing whether we have to do with a general faculty latent in all men or an inexplicable privilege reserved to rare individuals. The exceptional should always be eliminated, if possible, and not left to hang over the abyss like an unfinished bridge leading to nothing. I am well aware that the compulsory intervention of the medium implies that, in spite of all, we recognize his possession of abnormal faculties; but at any rate we reduce their power and their extent appreciably and we return sooner and more easily to the ordinary laws of the great human mystery. And it is of importance that we should be ever coming back to that mystery and ever bringing all things back to it. But, unfortunately, actual experience does not admit of this generalization. It is clearly a case of a special faculty, one peculiar to the medium, one which is wholly unknown to our latent intuition. We can easily assure ourselves of this by causing the medium to receive through a third party and enclosed in a series of three envelopes, as in the experiment described above, a letter of which we know the writer, but of which both the source and the contents are absolutely unknown to the messenger. These unusual circumstances, in which all subconscious communications between consultant and consulted are strictly cut off, will in no way hamper the medium's clairvoyance; and we may fairly conclude that it is actually the medium himself who discovers directly, without any intermediary, without "relays," to use M. Duchatel's expression, all that the object holds concealed. It, therefore, seems certain that there is, at least in psychometry, something more than the mere mirror of which Dr. Osty speaks.
10
I consider it necessary to declare for the last time that these psychometric phenomena, astonishing though they appear at first, are known, proved and certain and are no longer denied or doubted by any of those who have studied them seriously. I could have given full particulars of a large number of conclusive experiments; but this