Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1884-09-17
pSyogIoAL REsEARcH.
n markabie Work Performed b. tbs L'ndon

TrhIIadeIpbia Press

Soefety.
rphiiadeIpbia Prsss.l
Professor w. i. Barrett, OF the Society
for Psychical Research OF England, who Is
m Philadelphia helping to form an Ameri'
can organization With similar objects, has,
during his stay here, interested large
number Of people In thought transfer
eDce and the various phenomena that
arc classcd with II. 1t Is probable
that the American Psycbical Society
Will before many months be an as
sured fact, and thst Its membership will be
large. Professor Rarrcit says that the In
vestigaticn Of bypnotIsm will tend TO ruin
the business OF tricksters and charlat,ns.
iussuuch rs Il viii prove beyond doubt
that the manifestations that they initiate
and exaggerate have about them nothing
Of the supernatural, but that they are
merely the result Of what may be almost
termed sixth sense.
ave are making our researches scien-
tiGcally,- said Professor Barrett 10 Press
reporter, "and the more scientific and
arithmetical we are about them the more
surely do we prove that thought transfer
ence Is not I matter OF accident. Cases
where person becomes aware OF the death
u a relative are mere instances OF thought
Transformers, even when the knowledge Of
the death is accompanied by what is thought
TO be an apparitlon. We do not believe In
ghosts, but we have remarkable batch OF
cases where q percipent, or what Is often
called the 'tbought-reader,' has been made
aware OF something happening miles away
through the appearance OF an imaginliy
phantom. Now we deny that in these cases
any phantom really appeared. Our cxpls-
nation Is that death or some other hap
pening was conveyed 10 the brain OF the
perclpient, just as in our experiments
number or card thought OF Dy some per-
son has been named by a percIpicut in
an other room, and that the sudden con-
seriousness Of the death or happening
created an excitement in the percipicnts
brain. which in its turn resulted In the
creation OF ghost or phantom.
SCORES OF cAsEs.
at has been demonstrated almost as GER
tainly az has been the law OF gravitation
that scores Of cases have occurred where
some person In one town has, at certain
hour or minute, seen the figure OF friend
fit across a room, and has then aiterward
discovered that at that very hour and min
ute tAe friend breathed his last in a distint
town, or, maybe, in foreign country.
Now, these cases are ineXplcab'e by any
formula Of science, yet that they have hap
pened is scientifically proved. II Is custo-
mary TO put them down as mere CO.
medicines. Now, we have made some
calculations which show how impossible an
explanation this is.
81 will cite a case and give You few
figures in the same connection. Rev. Ro-
bert Bee, Of Wigan, on December IS. 1873.
at 100 o'clock in the evening, distinctly
saw on a staircase the figure OF woman.
The appnrition was going downstairs. At
the same time his wife was coming up the
stairway, which was narrow, and IL the
figure was real, must have brushed against
it. Ii turned out, however, that no other
woman was in the house, and that the fig
ure was. phantom OF the brain. Next day
Mr.. Bee received the news OF his mothers
death, which had occurred almost Mt the
recise minute at which he saw the appar-
ton. On making inquiries, he found that
she died after being taken i'll in the street.
and was dressed somewhat in the same way
as the figure he had seen.
1.-THE improbability that this was a mere
chance coincidence is 90 enormous" Pro-
fetsor Barrett went on, "that il IL hard TO
express it with anything like accuracy in
actual figures. We viii do so, however.
roughly and IN the following way: Let US
say that the percipient has had only thirty
years OF intelligent life. and that during
that time he has slept for nine hours day.
lie has then had $50 hours OF intel
ligent waking existence. Now in this
space lie has had one apparitOn, which
resembled his mother and was within
few minutes OF her death. Now, il We say
oVlt that ~ Nit Io rfn 81
hour in which death occurred. there are
G57 900 Quaiter-hours OF life in which that
apparition might have come; so that the
chance OF its coming in the right quarter
was one in 81. 1000. But this is on the sup
position that the only appariton which
could possibly appear 10 him would be his
mothers. or at least one which resembled
his mother in general aspect rs nearly 10
the phantom which he actually saw.
VISUAL HALLUCIHATIoNs.
"Now. visual Authorizations, known to
he morbid, are by no means limited TO the
human shape; they are grotesquely varied
in ways too numerous to mention. But,
for the sake OF argument. am willing 10
assume-and it is monstrous assump-
tion-that one tenth OF all phantopls actu-
ally caused are likely to represent lady
in a black bonnet and shawl. The
chance. then, that an apparition OF
the right C!nss-tbe old lady class
would show Itself in the right quarter
hour-;he Quarter-hour Of actual decease-
will be over G,5O0,000 10 /. That is 10 say.
in order to explain satisfactorily Mr.. Bees
experience on the superstition CT accidental
coincidence. il ought to be shown that there
are something like G.j00,000 adult English.
men now living who have had one single
visual hallucinaton OF a very distinct sort
in the course OF their lives.
"But We find that the proportion Of hall
lucinations that really betoken some agits-
ting cause at distance. such as death, is so
great that the coincidence theory is unten-
able. We have on our books 800 cases
of authenticated thought transierence.
In large number OF instances the percipi-
ent became aware Of the decease OF friend.
Now, even IL the figures on which | have
based my calculations were accurate, and
they really reduce the possibilities. only
ore case OF the sort would happen in the
whole lifetime OF G,500,000 persons, ASST
ming that every person living had during
his or her lifetime one distinct hallucina-
zion. which hypothesis is tremendous eX-
az gCyatiOn,D