SPIRITUALISM AND INSANITY. N OT long ago we expressed the opinion
that the phenomena of "psychical research" are a fit subject for the most careful scientific examination. Under the head of what is called Spiritualism there is notoriously a good deal
of bunkum and quackery, which naturally alienates many normal persons, and unfortunately not a few highly dis-
tinguished men who in most matters have open minds. Yet a violent prejudice against the investigation of all psychical and mental phenomena is just as much to be condemned as the excesses of credulity and the folly of dabbling without training in little understood elements. Honour, however, where honour is due. If there are still numerous successors to " Mr. Sludge the Medium," there are also men of high scientific
attainments who are bold to say, not only that there is a case for inquiry, but that inquiry is positively desirable. And, indeed, what could be of more vital interest to mankind than proof that he has subconscious senses, or faculties, of a scope and potency hitherto unsuspected, or—to turn from material to supernatural explanations of the phenomena—that there is a possibility of impressions being conveyed from the other world on to the dull retina of our earthly intelligences P There is no conceivable region of speculation in which scientific inquiry is out of place. And it is for scientific inquiry, and for that alone, that we ask.
But the reverse of this principle is equally true. That which is suitable only to scientific inquiry should be closed voluntarily to frivolous and fantastic experiments by laymen. We referred lately to a Report which had been published on what are known as "cross-correspondences." Those experi- ments were conducted by studious and careful people in an unexceptionable manner. But there are many experiments passing under the name of spiritualism at seances which are nothing but an opportunity for gratifying morbid curiosity, and many experiments, too, by amateurs in hypnotism,—a thing not to be played with lightly by persons ignorant of the incalculable forces they bring into play. In the " Harveian
Oration on Experimental Psychology and Hypnotism " which was delivered last autumn before the Royal College of Physicians, and has been lately published (H. Frowde, ls.), Dr. G. H. Savage said in discussing the effects of
hypnotism :-
" Among possible dangers it is said that a nervousness may be induced. It is quite possible that this is true in some cases, especially when handled incautiously. Hysteria and hystero- epileptic attacks are said not infrequently to have followed the use of hypnotism. Those who have practised it say that Each
results are very rare. From my point of view I think there is a certain amount of danger, especially in highly neurotic people, lest it should tend to the development of hallucinations of the senses. It is quite certain that a fair number of people develop delusions of persecution as the result of the study of spiritualism or occultism."
Dr. Savage is, nevertheless, a convinced believer in the therapeutic uses of hypnotism, and he well understands that of which he speaks. He understands it from personal experi- ence. We cannot help feeling that it is a curious irony that the latest Harveian Oration should have offered to the earnest consideration of the Royal College of Physicians accounts of hypnotic treatment such as have been familiar for a great many years to any one who has been sufficiently interested in mental therapeutics to read the books on the subject. But the fact is that while llesnier was calling the attention of the world to the extraordinary results of his experiments—he believed, of course, that mesmerism conveyed a curious invisible fluid from one human body to another—and was mixing his conclusions up with a great deal of clap-trap and superfluous mysticism, the use of anaesthetics was discovered, and the attention of doctors was diverted to a much safer and more explicable means of producing physical insensibility to pain. If doctors have erred in never quite forgiving or forgetting the charlatanry of mesmerism and the later science of hypnotism, they have the natural excuse that both have been rendered superfluous sciences. We should not, how- ever, make the mistake of supposing that the study of these things has been rendered permanently superfluous. As Dr. Savage says in his Oration, "experimental neurology is advancing, and the tendency in physical and chemical sciences seems to be towards unity and simplicity. So that the belief is growing that forces such as electricity, and matters such as are called elements, are really fundamentally alike. And so I believe it will be found that the senses are fundamentally alike and comparable. Experimental psychology will have a great deal to say in proving this unity. The fact that already mathematical formulae are being applied to experiments upon the senses is an indication of the movement which is taking place."
The dangers to which Dr. Savage alludes in the study of spiritualism or occultism are explained more explicitly, and, perhaps we ought to add, less scientifically, by Dr. C. Williams in a little book called " Spiritualism and Insanity " (The Ambrose Company, ls. 6d. net). Dr. Williams says :-
"I get a very large number of cases of mental and nervous diseases coming under my care in the course of a year, and in going into the history of the cases I nearly always ask the patients or their friends if they have recently, or at any time, had anything to do with Spiritualism. Sometimes the reply is in the affirmative and sometimes in the negative, and if it is in the affirmative I am always careful to lay down as the first and most important element in the treatment that they promise, at once and for all time, to have nothing further to do with the subject. That this advice should be given no one who has any real acquaintance with the subject and what takes place at Spiritualistic seances should be surprised at. And this for two reasons. First of all, there is the serious injury to the mental organism which is bound to result from constantly getting into the habit of forcing the Will to become perfectly passive—an indispensable condition to the success of any seance, and a frame of mind which all sitters are always strongly urged to cultivate by the experienced Spiritualists who conduct the seances."
The popular practice of spiritualism, after producing this mental passivity, leads from a colourless to a morbid state
in which the senses, being in continual expectation of manifestations, are peculiarly liable to hallucinations. Dr. Williams declares that some years ago he was so greatly interested in spiritualism that he became president of a certain spiritualistic society. "This post, I may say," he goes on, " I held for one year only, and it numbered in members, so far as my memory serves me, not more than about forty at most. Now mark what happened! During that short space of twelve months only, and amongst that small com- munity of but a few dozen at most, several members became from being normal people quite changed and neurotic; at least one member became thoroughly insane, and had to be sent to an asylum, and another became so unhinged in mind that be committed suicide by shooting himself ! Now for all these occurrences there is no doubt that the pursuit of this study of Spiritualism was directly responsible, and, this being so, the question I should like to ask is this : 'If in such a short space of time and amongst such a small number,
so many lamentable occurrences of the nature I have described took place, what may we expect if ever the community as a whole gives itself over to this subject ? " The question, no doubt, is absurd, because the whole com- munity will not give itself over to spiritualism ; and Dr. Williams's experience was no test of what would happen to the whole community if it did, because his fellow- members of the society had, to begin with, a certain predisposition to morbid introspective states, or they would not have been drawn to the seances of the society. The danger which he points cut, however, is quite real enough as it is, and would affect a sufficient number of people to be a very serious matter. When minds which are never well fortified with the checks and balances of complete rationality become empty, swept and garnished by cultivating the required condition of passivity, they are free for the entry of one knows not how many demons, and the last state of those minds is worse than the first. Such dangers are not imaginary ; they have been proved. It is necessary, then, to make a very clear distinction between genuine research by scientific persons in the scientific spirit, and unregulated phil.ndering with perilous subjects.
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