The Epworth Phenomena | Page 4

the most difficult to harmonise with any explanation by ordinary material causes. The concordant testimony of so many honest and fairly intelligent persons certainly produced, as will have been seen from my report, a strong impression on my mind at the time." Later on he made an attempt to discount his own report, on the general ground of the fallibility of human testimony, but most readers will probably agree that the first-hand statements and the report Written at the time are more weighty than the discounting effort of thirteen years later.
* Proceedings S.P.R., vol xii. pp. 46-58.
These alleged and well-attested Worksop events of 1893 are far more extraordinary than anything in the Wesley case, and the evidence is far stronger. They occurred recently; an S.P.R. expert was at once available; eleven eye-witnesses were cross-examined .by him, and their statements written out, within a few weeks of the occurrences. Yet this expert could not explain them. If we are forced to belief in a supernormal cause, or even to suspense of judgment, in this case, we have no justification for rejecting the testimony in the much more limited Wesley case.
But in addition to these Poltergeist accounts, of which more may be found in the volume of Proceedings just cited, we have the numerous cases of raps in experimental seances, from the tiny percussive or crackling sounds heard by Sir William Crookes and Dr Joseph Maxwell, to the thunderous knockings and other noises at the sittings with Stainton Moses, and, still better, with Miss Goligher of Belfast. These latter experiments, still continuing under the able direction of a doctor of science who is also a practical engineer, seem to establish beyond reasonable doubt a species of phenomena analogous to those of the Wesley haunt.* If a heavy table with Sir William Barrett sitting on it can be lifted up in the air by invisible means, there is no difficulty in believing that the Worksop basins and other similarly light articles really did behave in the same surprising way; or that old Mr. Wesley's trencher did dance as stated, or that he really was three times pushed by something that he could not see (as happened also to a clergyman known to me), or that Emily Wesley experienced similar things with doors and latches. So with the knockings, which Dr Crawford obtains at will, under excellent conditions. The Wesley raps were no more extraordinary, as described, than those at the Belfast circle; rather less so, in fact.** As to the other noises, the crashing among the bottles, which, however, were not broken, is rather specially interesting to me, for a friend of mine has frequently heard the same sort of thing in his own house; a sound as if all the crockery in the house were smashed all at once, yet nothing is found broken. I am compelled to believe in my friend's experience, and in its supernormality and probable objectivity-actual atmospheric vibration-because others hear it also. This friend has also "watched" footsteps descending the stairs in broad daylight, the sounds changing when they reached the bottom, where there was linoleum instead of carpet. There was no naughty little girl in the house, but my friend seems to have a mediumistic wife. He himself is a vigorous materialist, and will have none of the spirit hypothesis. The things happen, he agrees, but he, doesn't know why, and he wishes they wouldn't.
* The Reality of Psychic Phenomena, by W. J. Crawford, D.Sc. ** Also less extraordinary than the raps and movement of untouched objects described in Sir William Barrett's book On the Threshold of the Unseen.**
But this, admittedly, is unsatisfactory. We are naturally cause-seekers, and must have some sort of provisional theory, though we must be open-mindedly ready to modify it or to replace it with a better if new facts require. My own idea is that some of these physical phenomena may be caused by the action of subliminal will, though the method is entirely beyond me. I have hopes that Dr Crawford may solve the, scientific problem, for he has already made great strides towards a solution in his theory of rod and cantilever composed of some kind of modified matter. But in some cases I am compelled to go beyond the subliminal will of the living people concerned. I am acquainted with two ladies who were once kept awake nearly all night by violent and inexplicable knockings, heard also by another lady whom they fetched; and one of them was so upset that she developed brain fever. It was afterwards found that the brother of the two in whose room the noises occurred had died some miles away, as the result of an accident, twenty minutes before the disturbance began.* The one who was ill afterwards was the man's favourite sister.