Frank Podmore

“ Thus sensations of organic processes are frequently predominant during sleep, just as the Clank and clash of shunting trains, the gross machinery which underlies our social life, forms an unregarded element in the complex mass of sound which fills our ears in the daylight hours, but attains to solitary distinctness in the quiet of the night. ”

“ We thus sometimes obtain in dreams knowledge of latent illness of which no sign could be discerned in our waking hours. Again, in sleep we frequently revert to forgotten memories of our earlier years, and our dreams are constantly coloured by the emotional tone which prevailed in childhood. Our consciousness in dreams is thus still a compound, but it is a compound which includes different elements. Further, in dreams there may be spontaneous intellectual activity, unrelated to the main stream of consciousness, as when problems are solved or poetry composed in sleep. ”

“ AMONGST the subjects of investigation set out in the original prospectus of the Society, as already indicated, was the study of hypnotism and the phenomena of the induced trance. In the Society’s early years some valuable experimental work in this direction was done by the late Edmund Gurney, especially in investigating the relations of the hypnotic to the normal consciousness. And up to the present time we have let pass no opportunity for studying any case of automatism, abnormal lapse of memory, or secondary consciousness. ”

“ But when, as in sleep, the pressure on the limits of consciousness is relieved by the inactivity of some of the higher cerebral centres, the "critical point" of consciousness is lowered, various new elements rise above the threshold, and elements hitherto subordinate acquire greater prominence. Of the throng of images present to the mind during sleep, the most part are so evanescent as to fade from the memory shortly after waking. ”

“ In the language of physiology, consciousness reflects the simultaneous, co-ordinate activities of an immense number of nerve-centres, but reflects them very imperfectly, much as—to employ Ribot's illustration—a map represents the main features of a countryside. ”

“ Our waking consciousness at any given moment may by careful introspection be found to consist in a heterogeneous mass of impressions of every degree of intensity. Take, for instance, the case of a man walking about and talking with a friend in some crowded place. His consciousness will include many distinct groups of ideas; he will be "thinking" primarily of some particular aspect of the subject under discussion, but there will enter as elements into his consciousness ideas of its other aspects and of cognate subjects. ”

“ More generally, however, messages of this kind, purporting to emanate from the dead, are received either when the "medium" is in a state of trance, or if awake, through some form of automatic action. The simplest form of automatism, and that which seems the easiest to cultivate, is the movement of the table in tilting out messages by means of the alphabet, or the movement of some instrument like Ouija, with a pointer and a dial. An instrument of this kind, consisting of a sliding rod and an alphabet board, was the means of communication in the following case. ”

“ After this preface we will pass to consider some examples of messages received in some form of trance or automatism, or, at lowest, when there is reason to suspect some slight dissociation of consciousness. Sometimes the state of reverie is present in what seems a condition of normal wakefulness. At any rate the lapse from ordinary consciousness may be so slight that the percipient is not aware of any change, and is able to observe and record his own impressions as if in full possession of his waking faculties. ”

“ Speaking broadly, then, it may be inferred that all changes in memory and consciousness are conditioned by changes in the physical basis of memory and consciousness; in sleep the supply of blood to the brain is diminished; in intoxication the higher centres are poisoned; the enlargement of memory in the case of the Salpétrière patient represents the removal of an inhibition, the revivification of dormant tracts of cerebral tissue ”

“ But the observations accumulated in the last twenty or thirty years have revolutionised our conception of man's personality. On the one hand, in the hypnotic trance we commonly find a memory and consciousness differing from those of normal life. Many hypnotic subjects retain in waking life no recollection of what they have done and suffered in the hypnotic trance ”

“ It is, in short, an inference from the observed phenomena, which is almost inevitably made by persons without special knowledge of the subject. [1] The pseudo-personality will in many cases give proof of knowledge outside the range of the primary consciousness; it may show traces of keener sensibilities, and even of new faculties. Again, in some cases, it will act in opposition to its host. It will repudiate their common identity; and will take pains to thwart the schemes made by the other self. ”

“ Even English medical men have at length reluctantly admitted the existence of the hypnotic state, and are beginning to discern in it profitable material for study. On the Continent hypnotism has been incorporated in medical practice in many independent quarters for nearly a generation; of recent years the baffling manifestations of dissociated personality are, especially in France and America, being made the subject of careful and prolonged research ”

“ Even when the pseudo-personality shows an intimate knowledge of the life and family affairs of the deceased person whom it claims to represent, it may be of incidents almost passed from living memories, we are bound to consider whether the knowledge displayed could not have been gained by cunning guesses, or telepathically from the minds of the living friends present in the room. ”

“ The common run of dreams, no doubt, are comparable in intensity to the feebler reverberations accompanying the main movement of our waking thoughts, and assume temporary importance only because they do not come into competition with more vivid impressions. ”

“ Strange and almost incredible as are some of the things recorded, they seem to represent no more than an exaggerated form of the struggle between opposing tendencies which is constantly taking place in human life—a struggle which forms indeed the very basis of moral evolution. ”

“ This opposition of the primary and secondary consciousness occurs even in the simpler forms of automatism; planchette will frequently write coarse or blasphemous expressions which are repugnant to the upper self. ”

“ This in fact is what frequently happens, not only in the more extreme pathologic cases, but even in profound hypnotism or in the spontaneous trance observed at spiritualistic séances. Even the talking table will personify itself, and the hand of the automatic writer will frequently proclaim its separate individuality. The new consciousness will then speak of the normal personality as "he" or "she" or the "medium" ”

“ Some of the telepathic impressions cited in previous chapters appear to have been received when the percipient was in a reverie of this character. [2] Crystal visions, it is probable, generally imply some lapse from normal wakefulness. Indeed, as already said, some writers are of opinion that any subjective vision, whether or not attaining to the proportion of an actual hallucination, involves a greater or less degree of dissociation of consciousness. ”

“ Until a generation or two ago the survey of our intellectual processes was practically limited to the two fields of sleep and wakefulness, with stray facts gleaned from delirium or occasional instances of automatic action,—Dr. ”

“ Here is a message for the doctor.' At the moment I fancied that I had upon my lap a pad of paper, and I thought I wrote upon this pad with a pencil the following words:
"'Dear Doctor: Do you remember Katy McGuire, who used to live with you in Chester? She died in 1872. ”

“ Wilkie had at one time heard of these details of his friend's early life. The two had met, as Dr. De Wolf tells us, soon after his removal to Chicago in 1873, when the memory of Kitty McGuire would have been still comparatively recent. But in the circumstances such an explanation can scarcely be held as plausible.
In the next case the percipient was fully entranced It will be observed that she did not claim to be "possessed," but only to be in communication with spirits of the dead.
No. 66. From Dr. O. Vidigal, San Paulo, Brazil. ”