Southern sentinel. [volume] (Plaquemine, Parish of Iberville [La.]) 1848-1858, 1852-05-29
q Strange Delusicn.

| lie New ofk Herald OF the iOh inst. con
taIns a singular publication, written by Judge
Jno W. Edmonis. OF the SUprr,n" Court o
New York city, detailing what he calls his "pcr
so'laI experience" OF spiritual manifestations
1t read, like the rhapsody of some r"zz &c
brain lnst from fresh reading of GoctEc's
Faust. The Judge is evidently tIe victim OF
some strong mental illusions, which make him
4 better subject for the care ofa udic,us ply
sician than a lecturer upon the mysteries of
| another world.
Iappcars that under the Influence ola great
grief, i'll the loss Of the person most near and
dear to him on earth, the Judge became deeply
interested in the exhibitions Of spiritual inter
course, and dwclt on them with such an inten-
slty OF desire to see again the lost object of his
affection, that he says he became IA medium"
of this intercourse himself One form of the
manifestation to him is by seeing pictures pain
ted to the minds eye as bright, as vivid and rs
distinct as any which physical vision can con-
! vey to him. This dream, land into which the
craving visionary enters, he treats as actual and
direct communications with him by the spiritual
world, and he occupies a column and half of
the New York Herald in describing what he
saw in one of these early experiences.
He tells how his lost love appeared to him in
shining garments, accompanied by other spirits
of his dead kindred, all clad in the same shining
robes, except that some, in order that he might
recognize them, appeared in the clothes heg
wore on earth. It must have been the ghosts of
their habiaments, for the material of cloth or
cotton doubtless subsists yet somewhere in this
"outward" world.
William Penn appeared to him and conversed
with him; Sir Isaac Newton gave him some
new ideas on the subject of gravitation Swe-
denborg expanded and corrected his theory of
the new Jerusalem; aud DR.. Franklin, who is
pursuing the study Of science still, was about
to explain to him the true principles of fmagnet-
ism, rs the fluid agent for spiritual manifesto
tons, when he was interrupted bya miscelane-
Gus crowd of spirits who surrounded DR. Frank
lin and chcercd him as their great benefactor,
while the Doctor received these cheers with
':meek but overtlowinr jov'
There seems to have been a mass meeting
Of these shining spirits in Judge Edmonds
brain, which was followed by vision of another
petually all the vile passions and acts of crime
ofwhich they had been guilty upon earth. The
shadows of the murderer, the adulterer, the
mser, the seducer, the warrior, the suicide, re-
hearsed continually, over and over again their
earthly deeds Of blackDess, with all the horrors
of disappointment and impotence The judge |
saw one consoling phenomenon, that good |,
spirit succeeded iE dctacLing one of these black |
ones from the demon crowd, and putting him in
the way of reformation among the brighter
throng.
All this, the creations of diseased fancy
and oyertasked brain, Judge Edmonds retails
to the public as his own experience, the results
Of his actual communication with the disem-
bodied spirits. 1t is clear case for the doctors
IF we had suit in that Supreme Court we
should be afraid that the judge might consult
might call up the shades of Lord Cooke, or
Sir Matthew Hale, or Baron Holt, and take an
appeal to their spiritual from earthly decisions
or the guidance of his own Judicial DEGREES
-Picayune