Real Ghost Stories | Page 3

days used to drive whole nations half mad with fright.
To this day the black disc of the moon no sooner begins to eat into the
shining surface of the sun than millions of savage men feel "creepy,"
and begin to tremble at the thought of the approaching end of the world.
But in civilised lands even the most ignorant regard an eclipse with
imperturbable composure. Eclipses are scientific phenomena observed
and understood. It is our object to reduce ghosts to the same level, or
rather to establish the claim of ghosts to be regarded as belonging as
much to the order of Nature as the eclipse. At present they are
disfranchised of their natural birthright, and those who treat them with
this injustice need not wonder if they take their revenge in "creeps."
The third class of objection takes the ground that there is something
irreligious and contrary to Christianity in the chronicling of such
phenomena. It is fortunate that Mary Magdalene and the early disciples
did not hold that theory. So far from its being irreligious to ascertain
facts, there is a subtle impiety in the refusal to face phenomena,

whether natural or supernatural. Either these things exist or they do not.
If they do not exist, then obviously there can be no harm in a searching
examination of the delusion which possessed the mind of almost every
worthy in the Old Testament, and which was constantly affirmed by the
authors of the New. If, on the other hand, they do exist, and are
perceptible under certain conditions to our senses, it will be difficult to
affirm the impiety of endeavouring to ascertain what is their nature, and
what light they are able to throw upon the kingdom of the Unseen. We
have no right to shut our eyes to facts and close our ears to evidence
merely because Moses forbade the Hebrews to allow witches to live, or
because some of the phenomena carry with them suggestions that do
not altogether harmonise with the conventional orthodox theories of
future life. The whole question that lies at bottom is whether this world
is divine or diabolic. Those who believe it divine are bound by that
belief to regard every phenomenon as a window through which man
may gain fresh glimpses of the wonder and the glory of the Infinite. In
this region, as in all others, faith and fear go ill together.
It is impossible for any impartial man to read the narratives of which
the present book is composed without feeling that we have at least one
hint or suggestion of quite incalculable possibilities in telepathy or
thought transference. If there be, as many of these stories seem to
suggest, a latent capacity in the human mind to communicate with other
minds, entirely regardless of the conditions of time and space, it is
undeniable that this would be a fact of the very first magnitude. It is
quite possible that the telegraph may be to telepathy what the stage
coach is to the steam engine. Neither can we afford to overlook the fact
that these phenomena have in these latter days signally vindicated their
power over the minds of men. Some of the acutest minds of our time
have learned to recognise in them scientific demonstration of the
existence of the fact that personal individuality survives death.
If it can be proved that it is occasionally possible for persons at the
uttermost ends of the world to communicate instantaneously with each
other, and even in some cases to make a vivid picture of themselves
stand before the eyes of those to whom they speak, no prejudice as to
the unhealthy nature of the inquiry should be allowed to stand in the

way of the examination of such a fact with a view to ascertaining
whether or not this latent capacity of the human mind can be utilised
for the benefit of mankind. Wild as this suggestion may seem to-day, it
is less fantastic than our grandfathers a hundred years ago would have
deemed a statement that at the end of the nineteenth century portraits
would be taken by the sun, that audible conversation would be carried
on instantaneously across a distance of a thousand miles, that a ray of
light could be made the agent for transmitting the human voice across
an abyss which no wire had ever spanned, and that by a simple
mechanical arrangement, which a man can carry in his hand, it would
be possible to reproduce the words, voice, and accent of the dead. The
photograph, the telegraph, the telephone, and the phonograph were all
more or less latent in what seemed to our ancestors the kite-flying folly
of Benjamin Franklin. Who knows but that in Telepathy we may have
the faint foreshadowing of another