Supernatural being

“ Everywhere, from time to time, the proximity of the unseen world and the existence of the Supernatural were made manifest: while, here and there, examples of special miraculous interventions evidently stood forth to show that neither the Arm of the Most High was shortened nor the faith of the followers of our Blessed Lord stunted in its growth. ”

“ It is surely the strangeness, the unknown nature, the anomalous character of the supernatural agents here employed, that makes them to operate so powerfully on our hopes, fears, curiosities, sympathies, and, in short, on all the feelings of our hearts. ”

“ I had witnessed many very extraordinary phenomena in various parts of the world—phenomena that would be either totally disbelieved if I stated them, or ascribed to supernatural agencies. Now, my theory is that the Supernatural is the Impossible, and that what is called supernatural is only a something in the laws of nature of which we have been hitherto ignorant. ”

“ English Fiction
INTRODUCTION The supernatural is an ever-present force in literature. It colors our poetry, shapes our epics and dramas, and fashions our prose till we are so wonted to it that we lose sense of its wonder and magic. If all the elements of the unearthly were removed from our books, how shrunken in value would seem the residue, how forlorn our feelings! Lafcadio Hearn in the recently published volume, Interpretations of Literature, says:
There is scarcely any great author in European literature, old or new, who has not distinguished himself in his treatment of the supernatural. ”

“ No inconsiderable number of supernatural events are recorded in their pages, but unbelief itself is compelled to admit that they are all of a dignified character, with perhaps the exception of the entrance of the demons into the swine, and the discovery of the piece of money in the mouth of the fish. From what is monstrous, grotesque and phantastic, they are absolutely free. ”

“ These Powers are not necessarily what the superstitious call ‘supernatural’. We realize now that there is nothing supernatural—that what used to be so called is simply something that we do not understand at present. ”

“ How prone man becomes, by constantly contemplating the natural, [Pg 28] to thrust the Supernatural aside, is the experience of many. And this being so, how merciful is God to remind us of the next world, not only by the ordinary modes and channels appointed for so doing, by change, by revelation, by death; but occasionally by suddenly, strangely, and abruptly breaking in upon the usual order of events, and the ordinary course of nature, to let us see with our natural eyes, and hear with our ears, that He is. ”

“ Ever since the world began it has been the belief of mankind that desolate places are the special haunt of supernatural beings. ”

“ There is at the present a definite revival of interest in the supernatural appearing in the drama, in poetry and in fiction, evident to anyone who has carefully studied the recent publications and magazines. Within the last few years, especially in the last two years, an astonishing amount of ghostly material has appeared. Some of these stories are of the hoax variety, others are suggestive, allegorical or symbolic, while others frankly accept the forces beyond man’s mortal life and human dominion. ”

“ The supernatural and the illusory are to my mind convertible terms: they cannot really exist or take place. Let us be sure, however, that we are agreed as to what supernatural means. If a magician, before my eyes, transformed an old man into a little girl, I should call that supernatural ”

“ Supernatural Life The fiction dealing with immortal life shows, more than any other aspect of the subject, humanity’s deep hunger for the supernatural. Whether it be stories of continuance of earthly existence without death as in the legends of the undying persons like the Wandering Jew; or of supernaturally renewed or preserved youth as described in the tales of the elixir of life ”

“ marvels and mysteries acting upon our emotions and intelligence in ways so inexplicable that it would almost justify the conception of life as an enchanted state. No, I am too firm in my consciousness of the marvellous to be ever fascinated by the mere supernatural, which (take it any way you like) is but a manufactured article, the fabrication of minds insensitive to the intimate delicacies of our relation to the dead and to the living, in their countless multitudes; ”

“ We do not realize how much is due to insanity and how much to the supernatural, when, after telling the story of his obsession, his fears that as a climax [298] he will become like those Eyes, the man suddenly sees his reflection in the mirror and meets their dreadful gaze. ”

“ The human mind delights in grand conceptions of supernatural beings. ”

“ I loved the supernatural in book and fancy, and on rare occasions, when I was in a state of spiritual exaltation, a vague belief would steal upon me that I should one day possess the power of piercing the veil which shuts off the unseen from mortal eyes. ”

“ We notice in these scientific stories a widening of the sphere of supernatural fiction. It is extended to include more of the normal interests and activities of man than has formerly been the case. Here we notice a spirit similar to that of the leveling influence seen in the case of the ghosts, devils, witches, angels, and so forth, who have been made more human not only in appearance but in emotions and activities as well. Likewise these scientific elements have been elevated to the human. ”

“ Poetry in general in all times has freely used the various elements of supernaturalism. The epic has certain distinct themes, such as visits to the lower world, visions of heaven, and conflict between mortal and divine powers, and brings in mythological characters, gods, goddesses, demigods, and the like. Fate is a moving figure in the older dramas, while the liturgical plays introduced devils, angels, and even the Deity as characters in the action. In the classical and Elizabethan drama we see ghosts, witches, magicians, as dramatis personæ. ”

“ The word "supernatural" was, after all, only an expression invented by man in his finite ignorance, to define those things which he did not understand. Telegraphy, telephony, the phonograph, the moving picture-all would have been regarded with superstition by an age less advanced than ours. Man had only to become familiar with the laws governing them, in order to discard the word "supernatural" as applied to their manifestations.
What right, then, had I to term the phenomena, which I had just witnessed, supernatural? ”

“ He renews his youth every forty years, growing suddenly from a decrepit man to a handsome, gifted youth, which naturally suggests complications of human love-affairs. Other elements of supernaturalism are used, as angels, demons, and so forth while the Æons and the Intermedii (whoever they are!) ”

“ As I have observed, the principle is found energizing wherever man exists. Although in one age it may be more active than in another, it is alike the inheritance of the civilized man and the savage. It has displayed itself in the creations of the poet and the writer of fiction; in the various forms of religious thought; in the production of ghost-stories and pictures of the under-world; in the creation of the various forms of demonology, witchcraft and magic; in the milder form of fairy-tales; in charms and incantations, and in efforts to pry into the future. ”

“ The supernatural, though appealing to certain powerful emotions very widely and deeply sown amongst the human race, is, nevertheless, a spring which is peculiarly apt to lose its elasticity by being too much pressed upon. ”

“ They are made up of the images of the earth:—they are told in the language of the earth.—Yet the whole effect is, beyond expression, wild and unearthly. The fact is, that supernatural beings, as long as they are considered merely with reference to their own nature, excite our feelings very feebly. ”

“ In addition to the weird stories told with direct aim and art—ghosts for ghosts’ sake—there are tales where the supernatural element is of secondary importance, being used to teach some truth or ridicule some fallacy. ”

“ All that is indispensable for the enjoyment of the milder feeling of supernatural awe is, that you should be susceptible of the slight shuddering which creeps over you when you hear a tale of terror—that well-vouched tale which the narrator, having first expressed his general disbelief of all such legendary lore, selects and produces, as having something in it which he has been always obliged to give up as inexplicable. ”

“ The reader, as well as the writer, must put himself in the mental attitude of acceptance of the supernatural else the effect is lacking, for the ghostly thrill is incommunicable to those beyond the pale of at least temporary credulity. ”

“ the supernatural is the natural not yet understood. ”

“ But, whatever be the reasons, there has been a continuity of the ghostly in literature, with certain rise and fall of interest. There is in modern English fiction, as likewise in poetry and the drama, a great extent of the supernatural, with wide diversity of elements. Beginning with the Gothic romance, that curious architectural excrescence that yet has had enormous influence on our [3] novel, the supernatural is found in every period and in every form of fiction. The unearthly beings meet us in all guises, and answer our every mood, whether it be serious or awed, satiric or humoresque. ”

“ The supernatural, beginning at the base of a desolate rock and announced only by the voice of a child, had entered upon its course, overthrowing all obstacles, drawing the people with it, and gaining to itself on the way enthusiastic acclamations, prayers, and the cries of gratitude from the popular faith. ”

“ Miracles, spells, incantations, witchcrafts, in short all the facts that are incorrectly called supernatural, can only be possible and accounted for by the authority with which some other mind compels us to accept the effects of a mysterious law of optics which magnifies, or diminishes, or exalts creation, enables it to move within us independently of our will, distorts or embellishes it, snatches us up to heaven, or plunges us into hell—the two terms by which we express the excess of rapture or of pain. These phenomena are within us, not outside us. ”

“ They believed in the Supernatural, and they thought that sacrifices and prayer, fasting and weeping, would induce the Supernatural to give them sunshine, rain and harvest—long life in this world and eternal joy in another. To them, God was an absolute monarch, quick to take offence, sudden in anger, terrible in punishment, jealous, hateful to his enemies, generous to his favorites. ”

“ But since the things of the spirit are intangible they must be represented in concrete form, as definite beings whom our minds can apprehend. Thus the poets and dramatists and story-makers must show us images to shadow forth spiritual things. As with a shudder we close the books that tell us horrifying tales of satanic spirits, of accursed beings that are neither wholly animal nor human, of mortals with diabolic powers, we shrink from the evils of the soul that they represent, and recognize their essential truth in the guise of fiction. ”

“ But the further question arises, Is it necessary in order to constitute an event a miracle that it should be one which transcends the known or the unknown forces of material nature to have produced? It is clear that to constitute an event a miracle it must involve supernatural or superhuman agency of some kind; that is to say, it must be either supernatural in the mode of its production as an objective fact, or superhuman in its productive elements, by which I mean, that it must be preceded by an announcement that it is going to occur, which must be beyond the sphere of human knowledge. ”

“ It is not too much to say, that there was hardly an occurrence in nature, and hardly an event of daily life, which was not influenced by these supernatural powers, and very frequently in a manner unspeakably grotesque. ”

“ From these nightly vigils came the fruitful conception of an invisible influence radiating from the heavenly bodies—an influence potent for good and evil, yet transcending the limitations of mortal senses. ”

“ Now the supernatural, as it appears in this volume, is strictly individual and peculiar, evidencing that the authoress has herself contemplated, face to face, the spiritual truths she has embodied.
While the present story is thus eminently a work of creative imagination, working in the region of the supernatural, and ranking “strange combinations out of common things,” it is at the same time intensely human, touching at every step on some affection or aspiration of the human heart, and full of the glee and gloom of our common life. ”

“ Thus near are we, in every exercise of our reasonable life, to the superhuman and to the supernatural. Upon the other hand, there is positively no need of magic, or of miracle, or of mysterious promptings from the subconscious, to prove to us the reality of the human and of the supernatural, or to define our reasonable relations with it. ”

“ Each seems without a prototype, yet all fascinate us with elements wrested from the shadow of the Supernatural. Now the highest imagination is concerned about the soul of things; it may or may not inspire the Fantasy that peoples with images the interlunar vague. ”

“ In other words, it has been affirmed that there have been certain conditions of mankind in which the love of the marvellous has been so powerful, and the action of reason so weak, as to destroy all sense of the distinction between a natural and a supernatural occurrence. ”

“ The mode in which its miracles were performed is characterized by the utmost simplicity, destitute alike of anything scenic or fantastic, entirely in harmony with the great character who performed them. The supernaturalism of the ancient world is marked by the opposite characteristics. ”

“ The experience of all the world witnesses that whenever there comes, in reality, or in a man's conceptions or fancy, the contact of the supernatural, as it is called, with the natural, there is a shrinking, a sense of eerieness, an apprehension of vague possibilities of evil. ”

“ We must, therefore, in examining the relations between art and the supernatural, eliminate as far as possible this species of scientific speculation, and consider only that supernatural which really deserves the name, which is beyond and outside the limits of the possible, the rational, the explicable—that supernatural which is due not to the logical faculties, arguing from wrong premises, but to the imagination wrought upon by certain kinds of physical surroundings. ”