The New York herald., 1921-05-11
Seances That Failed.
Professor Elihu Thomson's Opinion
Of Psychic Revelations.


From a letter by Elihu Thomson to the
Weekly Revic,o.
Professor Leo Wiener's Psychic REM
iniscences' in your issue of March 16
strikingly parallel some OF my own ex-
periences. When I was younger, friends
persuaded me to investigate with them
more than one supposed mystery. Their
motive was not only further to convince
themselves but also to convince me.
The result was invariably failure as
far as I was concerned, but--and here's
the rub---the exposure OF one deception
after another led my friends in most
cases to the admission Of fraud In the
particular instance Investigated and to
restatement of belief that there were
In fact honest mediums If they could
be found
The will to believe Is paramount in
such cases In my early experiences.
among other things. the method of get
ting at sealed missives and returning the
letter apparently in Its original unopened
condition was exposed. Some tricksters
charged good round fee for this read
ing Of sealed letters.
Then there were table turning and
spirit rapping of course. One instance
OF the latter occurred In which the spir-
its had been silent for some time and
the proceedings were getting dull. when
l took upon myself the duty of fur
nishing the raps to find whether the
medium could distinguish my rappings
from her own. The remarkable clear
ness and consistency Of the answers to
questions as furnished by me was far
ahead of expectation and led to the de-
velopment Of kind of exaltation Of the
medium and those about the table
excepting myself-which was expressed
other forms of emotional possession.
In the table turning I was once given
the title of negative medium" This
was when by pressure OF my hands on
the table 1t could not be tilted or moved
by the medium. In this case the hands
Of the medium would creak and slip on
the vanished surface OF the table.
|. Like DR.. Wiener, I. too. had a test
with the famous mind reader, Bishop, to
whom he refers. Bishop failed utterI,
with me as with DR.. Wiener. This was
forty-five years ago in Philadelphia. A
brother and learned the method en-
p.oyed by Bishop and often used Il as a
means of harmless amusement and with
s'lccess in as large a percentage Of cases
as he.
A few years later a friend prevailed
on me to attend a seance in Hartford
at which Slade, the famous slate writins
medium. was to preside. 1t was of hin
and his exploits that the German phys.
icist, Professor Zoel'ner. had written 0
book. which I had read. detailing many
wonderful things. such as tying knots ir
an endless string. exposing the contents
OF sealed packages and such like feats IL
defiance Of the laws of physics. But no
Slade wouldn't repeat such a programme
for US. but instead treated us to a serie.
OF obvious tricks In legerdemain with
which I had long been familiar. Ny
the spirit influence.
We arranged. however. for secont
seance, in advance of which posted m,
friend as to what he was to look 10,
In detecting the trickery. During thi.
second seance / soon saw that he saw
there was no exaltation, no enthusiasm
Slade saw II too and brought the sit.
ting abruptly TO a close on the grounc
o. the inactivity Of the control thai
day II Is too long a story to relat,
hcre how I caught slade by out-trickina
him. though he didn't know It, He wa,
soon after publicly exposed, | believe.
In Sir oliver Lodges THE Survival OF
Man" the exploits OF Eusapia Paladinc
bulk large. But Eusapia was promptly
shown to be fraud on her coming tc
America. as most scientific men know
Yet IL our newspaper reporters are to b,
believed. Lodge gave out as his opinion
on coming to lecture In Boston thai
there might be dishonest mediums, bu
Il 80, he had never met one.
Time Is too precious to waste in chas
ing phantoms.