Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-07-25
IMAGINARY GHOSTS.

PIIISBUkG OlSPATCH
IMAGINARY GHOSTS.
WRITTEN FOR THE D1sPArcH.I
| Mr.. II. c. BUNNER has recently written
in the comic weeklies ghost story with q
! moral.
The hero Of the ghost story, coming in
| late one night. discovered a spook waiting
| for him, sitting patiently upon q post OF the
bed. 81 am a Spook!'' says the spook.
| .'very WELL" answers the imperturbable
hero, 'Spook when you are spoken to! 1 go
to Sleep" But this brave front in no wise
dismays the spook. He stands across the
path to slumber. His mission is to recite in
the unwilling ears of the hero, who now
figures more as victim than as hero, all the
platitudes. all the conventionalirfes, all the
| idiotic and imbecile things that he has said
during the day.
There Is q vexatious and exasperating 2
spirit known to most of us by long acquaint-
ance, and called the Spirit of the Staircase,
which whispers to us as we go up the stairs
to get our coat and hat after the evening is
over, all the brilliant things that we might
have said, II we only had wit enough and
sense enough to think of them at the proper
moment. But the spoolr of Mr.. Burners
fnane things that were actually spoken.
The Differences Between Ghosts.
UNPLEASANT as it would be to have a
nightly visitation from ghost of such
critical and unkind disposition, there might
conceivably be some profit in the expert
ence. just here, it seems, is the difference
between real ghosts and the ghosts of the
literary imagination. Real ghosts SO far as
hos hxy
mortals, appear to have no sense. There
are no people in all these western regions
who know so much about ghosts as the
Society for Psychical Research.
However, much may have been found out
about the "undfscovered country" in the
land Of esoteric Buddhism, of theosophy, of
mahatmas and astral journeyings, few there
are who know. The theosophists say that
the great minds OF the East have for ages
given themselves to the study of spirit, as
the great minds of the West have followed
the study of matter, and that all our
material discoveries and inventions, all our
railroads, and telegraphs, and telephones,
and monographs, work no greater conquest
over time and space than the oriental sages
have won in the domains of the invisible.
They know as much over there about ghosts
as we know over here about dynanos.
They Have No Manners
HOWEVER, what we do know in any
systematic way about the mysteries of the
unseen universe around us is summed up
for the most part in the records of the
Society for Psychical Research. And this
society asserts in the fourth article of its
last report on ghosts that "There is a total
absence of any apparent object or intelli-
gent action on the part OF ghosts" All the
ghosts with which the members of this
society have been able to come in contact
have appeared to be quite destitute not
only OF their manners, but of all coherency
of action.
Some of the spirits of the illustrious de-
parted who condescend to put themselves
at the beck and call of spiritualistic mediums
have certainly parted with all their knowl-
edge of English grammar. Plainly enough |
they have not learned anything in the other |
life. No truth, before unknown, has, be- |
lfeve, been added to the sum of human |
through the mediation of any of |
these messengers from the spirit world. !
Some of the spiritualist ghosts add to the |
terror of death by showing strong interest |
in buying and selling, in stocks and bonds, |
md real estate These things bother most |
If us sufficiently down here. It would be |
amentable to believe that we shall concern
ourselves with them up above.
SOme OF Them Tell Lies.
MY friend, Mr. Joseph Hartmann, of this
,ity, who knows enough about ghosts to
lave written a considerable volume re-
ating his peculiar experiences, believes that
'ome ghosts lie. The medium may be honest
but the spirit lies. Ghosts, accord
ng to the witness of their best friends, are
10 good
had the pleasure one night of hearing the
H.,
lent OF Trinity College, tell his famous
host story. We had the lights turned down
i'll they turned blue, and listened to the
reepy story in sepulchral darkness. This
; a real ghost story.
1t was one winter night, after hard and
vearisome day, that Dr. Smith was return
ng from his dinner to his study. This room
vas in a detached building, which stood
ack gooc way from the street, and was
cached by long path. There was snow on
he ground, banked up on either side of the
valk. The gas lamps in the streets cast the
ong shadows of the trees over the white
now. Suddenly the doctor felt that there
7as somebody behind him. As he turned
o look, his attention was attracted by
TRANCE black shadow on the snow. 1t was
OF the shadow of a tree, for it fell at a diff.
erent angle. And it was q moving shadow.
IS he went back the shadow retreated, as
e came on it advanced.
A Real Ghost Story.
HE thought that this was a somewhat
TRANCE phenomenon, and in this opinion
is little dog shared emphatically. This lit
e dog, a short-legged and wide cared Great
re, which looked like the dogs of the Ger
ian spook stories, showed signs of evident
larm.
However, the professor went on to his