The Washington herald., 1914-05-24
Mr.. Shannon in Trim.

Of pleasure. pain. horror. wrath, love
steal. kind person cruel: II can wips
out memory and do a myriad otheI
things besides
| An Outside Conseiousness.
That is, an outside consciousness car
take possession Of a brain and work ,,
| Tor its own ends, the real owner beins
meanwhile elected. Further, In trance the
real owner may show himself far more
| fully than he does when normally work
ing through the brain; memory is in
tensifed both as TO past events and pres
ent adhesive capacity: reason becomes
keener and subtler; Imagination takes
flights II cannot reach when clogxed
in nervous matter: power Of expression
appears and the hating tongue Is
eloquent; latent faculty awakens and a
factory girl rivals Jenny Lind. Nay,
physical boundaries are transcribed, and
the entranced person diagnoses internal
disease, the diagnosis being later con-
firmed by post-mortem investigation; or
he sees what is occurring hundreds Of
miles away. he reports a conversation
held at far distance. Space fails me
even to summarize the facts. but this
matters not. for the student must read.
must investigate for himself. in order
that the force of the ever-accumuiatins
evidence may play on his mind. forcing
him to the conclusion that but a small
part Of consciousness expresses itself
through the brain.
Very important-but also very scanty
are the results obtained by hynotizing
lunatics. Cases are on record in which,
in the trance condition. the lunatic be-
came sane. returning to his normal
lunacy when he emerged from trance
q II hon, ha ha-
gan to try to function through the i'm
perfect instrument OF his brain. 1t =
difficult to imagine more definite evidence
that the brain Is but the instrument Of
the waking consciousness than tina: OBJ
tanned along this line, and 1t is much
to be desired that doctors in charge Of
lunatics should collect facts in relation
to them under the influence Of mesmerism
or hypnotism.
study of Evidence.
The student should next study the evil
dence for the appearance of ''the double
apart from the physical body. the '.phan-
tasms OF the living as they have been
called. Messrs. Gurney and Myers work
on this subject will serve as starting |
point. and each may collect evidence on |
this head for himself from his circle
Of acquaintances. A few will find that
In this way by an effort Of the will. but |
the experience will be rare. But II hu-
man evidence is to be held as worth
anything. the fact that phantasms Of
the living do appear can be put beyond
doubt, and this means that conscious
ness can function far away from the
physical body which 1t normally uses as
instrument.
The next stage Is to show that the
Individual consciousness. thus found able
70 work outside the body during life"
survives death" Here the phenomena
,lassed as ''spiritualistic" have their place
irst studied than that in which Sir
William Crookes records his own in
,estigations. Any sincere and patient
may convince himself by
,ersonal experiment of the fact Of in
lividual survival, and apart from all
eances and formal seekings there Ii evil
ence and to spare of volunteered COM
nunications. visible and audible, from
hose who had passed beyond the veil,"
nut for some reasons strove to reach
gain their friends In the flesh.
When in this way a strong prima facie
ase, to say the least. has been es-
lblished for the separability Of con-
,iousness from its physical organ and
'r its survival after the death Of that
rgan, the student may be willing to sub
ut himself to the training and the dis ,
pline necessary to obtain true
nowledge of the souls existence. The
ay OF meditation. reaching the higher
,nsciousness, is the path he must now .
cad. and cannot be expected to enter !
1t until he thinks that there Is q
'ssibiiity Of gaining the knowledge he
,eks.
Process II T0flsome.
The process Is toilsome and laborious, .
I'd demands long perseverance, ere much {
'parent progress Is made: but scores {
ION scores. nay. hundreds upon hum
eds of men and women have pursued II
,th In the past and In the present. and 4