Preliminary Report of the Commission Appointed by the University of Pennsylvania Part 20

February 10th, 1887.

I enter Col. Kase's house, 1601 North 15th Street, in company of Drs.

Leidy, White and Mr. Sommerville, a friend of the first. We are received by the Colonel and pa.s.s scrutiny. The seance takes place in the second story sitting-room. This is furnished with a large oak table, a square piano, and one corner is made into an alcove, the curtains of which are thrown back and reveal several drawings in black and white--one of the young Raphael. Over the mantlepiece a painting representing the apparition of a Spirit-form, to a young lady sitting in front of a fire-place. On entering this room find the Medium, Mrs. Thayer, engaged in seating the audience. She is a middle-aged lady of good proportions, hair black, color flushed, the light eyes look weary, the lower face rather square, deep lines around the mouth. She is evidently not in very good humor. After a while the company, between twenty and thirty persons, mostly women, get seated.

Owing to the many people present I could not see what preparations had been made. Medium requests that the piano be moved against the door (to keep off illicit Spirits?). Chair placed against the door. Light turned out completely. Singing of "Sweet by-and-bye." Medium requests a lady to invoke Divine blessing. Disgusting cant. More singing. Darkness impenetrable. Sudden b.u.mping noise on the table. Match struck by the Colonel just as something crawls over my hand and falls to the floor. It is a red-bellied terrapin. Some ferns appear neatly arranged on the table in front and to the left of the Medium. Expressions of gratification. Dark. Singing. A pine-bough is thrown against me.

Screaming on account of terrapin. Match. Several parties have large lilies in front of them. My neighbor a lily of the valley (he states that his wife said before he left: "I wish you would get a lily of the valley"). Dark. Singing. Match. Dr. Leidy has some red lilies; some smilax and a wreath are on the table. Great astonishment. Colonel Kase says it is wonderful, but during the Centennial year they got tables loaded with flowers (the Medium has not given a flower seance for some years, she says, hence the rather meagre supply.) A lady points out the fact that the flowers are quite cold and have a sort of dew on them. But I found those before me quite dry, as if they had been in the room for some time. The Medium is tired and retires. Mrs. X. is requested to come under the influence of her Spirit-guides, and she does. She puts herself in an oratorical posture, eyes closed, and reels off the common-places of the _Banner of Light_: the Spirits are eager for investigation, but benighted men in the flesh cannot make the conditions, and thus continue to wallow in darkness. The Spirits are kind. They do not d.a.m.n those poor benighted ones, but still hold out, in beautiful optimism, the hope that all those who do want to know the truth will find it!

Another lady, Mrs. Y., is now called upon to put herself under Spirit-guidance, and she thereupon proceeds to enlighten the sheep-fold how it is possible that these flowers and branches and turtles can come through solid walls and closed windows. "It is all awfully simple; it is nothing but PROJECTION! The Spirits understand the laws of electric projection; even the electric forces themselves understand the laws of nature and the currents. The electric force s.n.a.t.c.hes the flower, or plant, and propels it along invisible wires. There is no such thing as solid substance, matter is permeable to these forces, and, therefore, it is easy to see how a terrapin can come quick as lightning through a wall." (Verbatim.)

Mr. Copeland is now called upon to give the audience some tests, a rather inoffensive looking young man with hair standing up. The light is turned down; he jerks his head and body, pa.s.ses his hand over his eyes and begins to talk in broken, childish sentences. A little Indian maid now controls him. The maid describes a tall, bony, black-haired gentleman standing near _me_, with a fatherly look; he is Charley, and holds something, as if I were undertaking some grand enterprise. But as I do not know Charley, Charley disappears, and the spirit of a Quaker gentleman comes to a lady not far from me--all right. Soon, however, the maid is at me again. This time it is William. He has something chemical, like a discovery. Have I not been across the water where people had the cholera and turned black and died? Did I not very much disappoint a young lady over there? Did I give her a ring? Margaret, or some name like that, now comes around. Have I never seen the Medium before? No.

Then I should pay him a visit. Wants to talk with me about my past and future. Has much to say; and so on. Do I not go often into a building where many persons work at chemistry? Am I not sceptical?--rather. Wants to cure my scepticism, and so on, _ad nauseam_. Me is tired, me wants go. Again the jerks, the rubbing of the eyes, and the Indian maid is once more Mr. Copeland.

Seance terminates with the payment of one dollar, cash, at 9.30 P.M.

Stifling atmosphere breathed for 1-1/2 hours, for what? _Quelle betise!_

GEO. A. KOENIG.

Sat.u.r.day, March 26th, 1887.

I attended a seance at the house of Col. Kase, 1601 North 15th Street, on Thursday evening, March 24th, Mrs. Wells acting as Medium. There were about thirty persons present, of whom several seemed to be Mediums. The seance was held in the sitting-room in the second story--a room separated by double doors from a smaller room behind. The back room, used as a Cabinet, was shut off by portieres, and the persons were arranged in front of the curtains, in the form of a deep curve, Dr.

Leidy, Dr. Knerr and myself being put in the second row. Mrs. Thayer directed us where to sit. The room in which we sat was lighted by a single gas-jet, situated some distance behind the spectators; a piece of music was placed before this to prevent any direct light from falling on the curtains, and the gas was turned very low. Mrs. Wells entered the room used as a Cabinet, and took her seat in a chair opposite the curtains. Mrs. Thayer closed the curtains.

After some time Spirits began to show themselves one by one between the curtains, and to whisper. Mrs. Thayer stepped forward and interpreted for them, calling up persons in the circle to receive communications.

The forms were very indistinct from the circle, and apparently not very distinct to those called up, as they expressed some dissatisfaction. One man called up to speak with his daughter (one of the better forms) remarked that he "saw her putty good, but not very." One or two of the forms stepped out in front of the curtains (one was dressed as a man, one purported to be Mary, Queen of Scots), but they did not advance to the circle, and the light was so dim that they could not be seen at all clearly. Only on one or two occasions two forms appeared at once, and then not in front of the curtains, but one on each side of one of the curtains--this curtain being pulled together, as though some one were reaching around behind it. The appearance could very readily have been made by the Medium's appearing between the two curtains, and holding up a bit of drapery at the side of one of them. The audience was evidently an uncritical one. When a Spirit called for her husband, Mrs. Thayer, the interpreter, asked, "Has anyone here a wife on the other side?" An old man present stated that his had died two years before. He asked if the Spirit's name were _May_. When he came back to his seat, I heard him remark to his neighbor that that "must have been her, but she had more flesh on than when I knew her." No examination was made before or after the seance of either room or Medium, and no tests of any sort were applied. The seance lasted about an hour and a-half.

GEO. S. FULLERTON,

_Secretary_.

(Copied and arranged from notes made in the car on the way home from this seance--Sat.u.r.day evening, March 26th, 1887.)

N.B.--I have neglected to state (though it is mentioned in my notes) that the seance was commenced by an "invocation" from Mrs. Coleman, who sat near the curtains. It was in no wise remarkable.

G.S.F.

DR. LEIDY.

The undersigned, a member of The Seybert Commission, appointed by the University, in company with one or more of the other members, at different times, from March, 1884, to April, 1887, attended twelve seances with reputed Spiritualist Mediums. Led to view Spiritualism with the respect due to its importance, based on the reflection that many of the most intelligent and honorable of the community had become convinced of its truth, I undertook the investigation of the subject free from conscious prejudice, and with a desire to observe with unbiased judgment the phenomena which might be presented to me in the seances of Spiritualist Mediums. Of the dozen seances attended in company with other members of the Commission, five were held with three Slate-writing Mediums, two with as many Rapping Mediums, and five with four Materializing Mediums. All the Mediums possessed more or less celebrity as such among the advocates of Spiritualism. I further attended, unaccompanied by members of the Commission, three seances, of which one was held with one of the former Materializing Mediums, and two with other Rapping Mediums.

The reputed phenomena or manifestations were carefully observed, as far as circ.u.mstances would permit, _i.e._, under the conditions ordinarily exacted by Mediums.

I have kept a record of my observations of the Spiritualist seances, but it is unnecessary to relate them here. As the result of my experience thus far, I must confess that I have witnessed no extraordinary manifestation, such as we ordinarily hear described as evidence of communication between this and the Spirit world. On the contrary, all the exhibitions I have seen have been complete failures in what was attempted or expected, or they have proved to be deceptions and tricks of jugglery. Sometimes accompanied by buffoonery, I never saw in them anything solemn or impressive, and never did they give the slightest positive information of interest. Having thus far failed to discover anything in evidence of the truth of Spiritualism, I yet remain ready to receive such evidence from an honest Medium.

One of the Slate-writing Mediums, with whom we held several seances, relieved the tedium of waiting for a slate-communication by writing in pencil on slips of paper, under Spirit control, as we were a.s.sured, communications from a succession of Spirits. The hand of these communications was good, and in each one different as it would appear from different individuals. There was, however, in all a similarity of expression and grammatical construction, which indicated a want of entire Spirit control. One of these communications, in my possession, reads literally thus:

"People have thought my manner and habit very strange indeed regarding the Truth of Spirit control There has been many things practiced which I see now was wrong and foolish yet the Truth stills exist that we can come back and make ourselves felt you ask if I am pleased with what Thomas [probably Thomas R. Hazard, who was with us at the time] is doing I am in many respects though there are things best left undone and unsaid You are perfectly aware of my past feelings also of my desire to have the truth properly investigated which I feel it will be and the Truth and Truth only sought after by the Committee I am more concious now than a time back Henry Seybert"

Another communication in my possession, obtained by a friend from the same Medium, at another seance, is in an equally good and strikingly different hand from the former, and reads thus: "Yes both of those Spirits were there and were plainly seen There was others there that were imperceptable Alice Cary"

As examples of communications, in irregular scrawls on slips of paper, in my possession, thrown from behind a screen by a Materialized Spirit, at a seance of Mr. Keeler, are the following: "h.e.l.lo folks" "Oh I am a big slugger" "How is your nose Doc" "I am seeing the sad result of my work. H. Seibert" [_sic_]. The punctuation and spelling are carefully copied.

JOSEPH LEIDY.

THE SLADE-ZOELLNER INVESTIGATION.

Perhaps no other investigation of Spiritistic phenomena has exercised so strong an influence upon the public mind in America, at least, as that conducted by Professor J.C.F. Zoellner and his colleagues in Leipsic in 1877 and 1878. In November and December of the year 1877 and in May of 1878, Professor Zoellner had a number of seances with Dr. Henry Slade, the American Medium, in Leipsic, the results of which he has narrated in his "Scientific Treatises," and which he finds of special interest in connection with certain physical speculations with which he was before this time occupied. He declares himself specially authorized to mention by name as present at some of his investigations his colleagues, Professors Fechner and Scheibner, of the University of Leipsic, and Professor Weber of Goettingen. These three, he states, were perfectly convinced of the reality of the observed facts, and that they were not to be attributed to imposture or prestidigitation. He also mentions the presence of Professor Wundt at at least one of the sittings.

The phenomena narrated by Zoellner--the bursting of the wooden screen, the pa.s.sages of coins out of closed boxes, the abnormal actions of the solid wooden rings, the tying of knots in the endless cord, the prints made upon smoked paper by the feet of four-dimentional beings--all these have become cla.s.sic in Spiritistic literature, and the accounts may be obtained in convenient form collected, arranged and translated into English by Mr. C.C. Ma.s.sey, of Lincoln's Inn, London.

Of these phenomena themselves, verification is, at this late date, manifestly out of the question. The only published accounts are those made by Zoellner, and in the absence of notes made at the time, all descriptions of phenomena given now by the other persons present would be valueless, except as indicating the impression made upon them at the time by the occurrences.

But, though the phenomena themselves cannot be satisfactorily sifted, the men who were engaged in the investigation are, with the exception of Zoellner himself, still living, and it occurred to me when in Germany during the past summer, that a conference with each of these men, and an inquiry into their qualifications for making such an investigation into the phenomena of Spiritism, might be of no small value. These men are: _William Wundt_, Professor of Philosophy in the University of Leipsic; _Gustav Theodore Fechner_, now Professor Emeritus of Physics in the University of Leipsic; _W. Scheibner_, Professor of Mathematics in the University of Leipsic; and _Wilhelm Weber_, Professor Emeritus of Physics in the University of Goettingen--all of them men of eminence in their respective lines of scholars.h.i.+p.

On Sat.u.r.day, June 19th, I called upon Professor Wundt at his home in Leipsic; with respect to the investigation of 1877-78 he gave me the following information, which I noted down during my conversation with him, asking him to repeat the points mentioned as I noted them, so as to avoid any error or misunderstanding, and which I copied out, with merely verbal changes, two days later.

Professor Wundt said:

1. That at the seances at which he himself was present (and he was present at two or three of them) the conditions of observation were very unsatisfactory. All hands had to be kept on the table, and no one was allowed to look under it.

2. That all that he saw done looked as if it might have been done by jugglery.

3. That the writing on slates was very suspicious--the German was bad, just such German as Slade spoke.

4. That Professor Weber, who was present at the sittings, was a very old man at the time, and presumably not an acute observer.

5. That Professor Fechner, another of those present, was afflicted with an incipient cataract, and could see very little.

6. That Professor Zoellner himself was at the time decidedly not in his right mind; his abnormal mental condition being clearly indicated in his letters and in his intercourse with his family.

7. That he (Professor Wundt) had not a high respect for the scientific judgment of Professor Ulrici, of Halle, who had been so much impressed by the report made by Professor Zoellner; Professor Ulrici he thought literary and poetical, but not scientific.

It will be seen that some of the points mentioned by Professor Wundt are suggestive; but I will postpone an examination of his statements, as of those of each of the others, until they have all been given and can be compared.

On the same day (June 19th) I called upon Professor Fechner, also at his home in Leipsic. Professor Fechner, who no longer lectures, being old and feeble, and suffering from cataract of the eyes, made the following statements, each of which I translated to him for his approval, after I had set it down:

1. That he himself was present at but two sittings, and that these were not very decisive.

2. That he did not look upon Slade as a juggler, but accepted the objective reality of the facts; that he did this, however, not on the strength of his own observations, for these were unsatisfactory, but because he had faith in Professor Zoellner's powers of observation.