Glimpses Of The Next State.Pdf - Spiritualists' National Union

136true—viz., that there are all shades of substantiality in materialisation, from the phantasmalform which you can walk through (ghosts, in fact—more properly called “etherialisations”) to aform wholly solid. The habitués of Jonson’s cabinet, like Viola, and especially Kitty (who seldomappears), are able to assume the substance of mortality at will, and throw it off in a fraction of asecond. Not so the visiting spirits, those who are relatives and friends of the sitters. Though visiblefrom head to foot, they are intangible, except in one or two places, more often than not faces andhands. It is only by long practice in the same cabinet that a large degree of substantiality can beobtained. If the visiting spirits attempted more than they do, they would fail altogether, or, as Kittyoften said, “not stick together,” but “go all to pieces.”The genuineness of the Jonsons can only be doubted by those who do not know how toobserve.Materialisation of spirits is only of scientific interest; this phenomenon brings home, as nothing elsewill, the power of invisible beings around us; but the simulacrum is seldom perfect. I have seenreally good materialisations of my guide twice in England and once in America. On a great numberof occasions in England I have seen her, and she has identified herself, but I cannot say the faceswere good copies of the original. It is the “direct voice” that takes the first place in spiritmanifestation. Nothing brings the truth of spiritism so home to one as conversation with those whohave passed on; the utterances of the materialised spirits are generally very brief, and confinedalmost wholly to proving their identity.TEST-SITTINGS WITH THE BANGS SISTERS.(99) When I was at Detroit, Michigan, I thought a few days would not be ill spent if I ranover to Chicago and asked the Bangs Sisters to give me some test-sittings. I arrived, byappointment, at their house, 1759 Adams Street West, at 10 a.m., on January 28, 1911, the doorbeing opened by Mrs. Bangs,the mother. As usual, neither sister was ready, and I was left to my own devices for an hour, duringwhich time I made a careful re-examination of the seance-room, and found it precisely the same as Ileft in March, 1909. Mrs. Bangs was called in, and helped me to measure the room; the table wasthoroughly examined underneath, and May Bangs’s drawer taken out. In this I found nothing moreincriminating than five dirty pocket-handkerchiefs, a pencil or two, and a small pad.About 11 a.m. I was able to collect the Bangs and explain the object of my visit. I said“Certain medium-hunters in this country, and a first-rate conjurer in England (who is quitesincere in believing you to be conjurers like himself), have spread reports about you very much toyour detriment. One of the Americans I mention has written an article in an English magazine,saying that in June, 1909, you cheated him, quoting extensively from another person, who also saysyou deceived him some years ago. I do not suppose that either of these persons had the courage tosend you a copy of their charges. You know me, and are quite aware that I have entered this roomhaving full confidence in the genuineness of what I saw with you in 1909. You are psychics, andmust know my state of mind at the present moment. I ask you to give me a complete test for both apicture and a letter. Let me upset your usual conditions, and direct the proceedings myself. Refuseme, and I think none the worse of you, for I have tested you before; but the fact that you haverefused me will be reported in my accounts of this visit to America.”To this Lizzie Bangs replied“Mr. Moore, we trust you, and will submit to your wishes; but we warn you that the veryknowledge of what the man has said in the English magazine will upset conditions to such an extentthat I doubt if you will be successful. The man you mention was never in this house. We know hisdescription, and should sense hostility if anybody came in that way No arrangements were madefor him or anyone else by Dr. Funk in 1909, as he describes; nor have we ever sat three times forone person, for a picture, in one day.” (And more of the same sort, all of which, I believe, is quitetrue.) “Do what you like, and tell us what to do.”I then proceeded to seal the two sashes of the one window in the room with five labels, eacheight inches long. In the course of examination of this window, I found a peculiarity about it that Ihad forgotten when addressing the London Spiritualist Alliance on December 8, which effectually