Theoretical essays about the magical mirrors
The expression magic mirrors is given to objects that show strong reflections of light such as ice, metallic surfaces, bottles, glass, etc. in which certain persons see images that portray past, present and sometimes future events, allowing them to answer questions about it. The phenomenon is not extremely rare. Strong minds call them superstitious beliefs, effect of imagination, charlatanism, as everything else that they cannot explain by natural laws. The same applies, according to them, to every somnambulistic and mediumistic effect. However, if the fact do exist their opinion should not prevail against the reality and we are strongly inclined to admit the existence of a new law, not yet observed.
Up until now we have not agreed on this subject, despite the numerous reports that were given to us because it is our principle only to affirm what we have understood, always explaining the mode of production and the causes of that thing, meaning that we want to add, as much as possible, and a rational explanation to the report. We mentioned the fact with the testimony of serious and respectable people but on admitting the phenomenon and even its reality we had not yet seen with enough clarity the law that could explain them to be in the condition of providing a solution. That is why we abstained. The reports that were brought to us, as a matter of fact, could be loaded with exaggeration; certain details, in particular, would be necessary to accommodate our thoughts. Now that we saw, observed and studied them we can speak with knowledge of cause. To begin with we will strictly report the facts that were witnessed by us. We do not wish to convince the non-believers; all we want is to try to clarify a still obscure point of the Spiritist science.
During our last year’s trip when we spent some days at the house of Mr. W…, member of the Spiritist Society of Paris, in the canton of Berne, Switzerland, he talked about a worker from the region, a turner by profession, that enjoys the faculty of finding springs and seeing the answers to questions addressed to him on a glass. To find the springs he travels to places and sometimes utilizes the stick typically used for that; on other occasions he provides the necessary indications by the use of glass and without dislocation. Here a remarkable example of his clarity.
In Mr. W… property there was a very long water pipe but due to local circumstances some thought that the water intake should take place at a closer location. In order to possibly avoid unnecessary excavations Mr. W… reached out to the water spring whisperer. Looking at a glass the latter said: “In the path of the water pipe there is another source; it is at an x number of feet deep, below the fourteenth pipe, from a given position.” The spring was found at the position indicated by him. The occasion was too favorable to let it go so that in the interest of general instruction we went to the house of that person followed by Mr. and Mrs. W… and two other persons. At this point it seems useful to provide some information about that person. He is a sixty four year old tall, slim man enjoying some good health although walking with some difficulty. He is protestant, very religious and habitually reads the Bible and books of prayers. His health issue dates from the time when he was thirty years old. That was the time when his skill was revealed. He says that God wanted to give him a compensation. His face is expressive and joyful, his eyes lively, intelligent and penetrating. He only speaks a German dialect from his region and doesn’t understand a word of French. He is married and has a family; he makes his living out of a few lots of land and his personal work so that although not enjoying an easy life he is not in difficulty. When sought for consultation by strange people his first reaction is always mistrust. He kind of probes the actual intention of the visitors and however little favorable the impression he has he responds that he only deals with the springs and that he refuses any experience with his glass. In special he refuses to answer questions originated by greed such as treasure hunting, adventurous speculations or the accomplishment of any bad task, in a word, everything that could harm loyalty and kindness. He says that if he were up to these things God would reclaim his gift. When someone is introduced to him by an acquaintance of his and when that person is sympathetic to him his face opens up and becomes welcoming. If the reason why he is sought is serious and useful he becomes interested and join in the search. If the questions are futile and out of pure curiosity, if he is thought after like a fortune teller, he doesn’t answer. Thanks to the presence of Mr. W… we were very lucky to be in good terms with him and we can only appreciate the opportunity for being welcomed and counting on his good will. That man is completely ignorant with anything related to Spiritism; he has no idea about the mediums or evocations or even the intervention of the Spirits or their fluidic action. To him his faculty is part of his nervous system in a force that he does not understand or that he had never tried to understand because when we wanted him to tell us how he could see things through the glass it seemed to us that it was the first time that he was giving any thought to that. To us it was essential; it was only after a few successive questions that we came to understand his thought. His glass is a common empty glass. It is however always the same and is only used for that. Given the possibility of an accident he had acquired another one that he reserved. When he interrogates the glass he keeps it in the palms of the hands and looks inside the glass; if the glass is maintained on the table he sees nothing. When he looks to the bottom his eyes seem to be veiled for an instant of time and then recover the normal shine; then, looking alternatively to the glass and to his interlocutors he speaks normally, explaining what he sees and responding to the questions in a natural and simple way. In his experiences he makes no evocation, uses no cabalistic signs, and pronounces no formulas or sacramental words. When asked he concentrates his attention and will on the proposed subject matter, looking to the bottom of the glass where images of persons and things relative to theme in question are formed. Regarding persons he describe them physical and morally like a somnambulistic person would do so that there is no doubt about the identity of the person. He also describes with more or less accuracy places that are unknown to him. This destroys the idea that whatever he sees is the product of his imagination. When he told Mr. W… that the water source was a number of feet below the fourteenth pipe he couldn’t get that information from his own brain. To make it more clear he sometimes utilize a piece of chalk to trace points, circles and lines of several lengths, indicating the persons and places that he is talking about, their relative position, etc. so that there would be no need to show them again, saying: it is this one that does this or it is this point where something happens.
One day a lady questioned him about the fate of a girl that had been kidnapped by drunks more than fifteen years ago and since then nobody heard about her. He started from the place where it had happened, like a somnambulistic person, followed the traces of the girl that he said he could see in the glass and that had, according to him, followed the borders of a large body of water that is the sea. He said she was alive and described her situation but without indicating where she lived because according to him the time for having her returned to her mother had not come yet; that certain things that he specified had to happen first and that a fortuitous situation would lead the mother to recognize her daughter. In order to better establish her location he asked to have a geographic map brought to him on another occasion. That map was shown to him on the day of our visit but since he did not have any notion of geography he had to learn about the traces of roads, sea, rivers, cities and the mountains. He then placed his finger on the starting point and indicated the path that would lead to the place in question. Although some time had passed since the first consultation he remembered perfectly well everything that he had said and he was the first one to mention the girl before he was questioned. Since the matter has not been solved yet we cannot prejudge the results of his forecast. The only thing we say about the known circumstances is that he had seen with accuracy. We only mentioned the case to show the way he saw things.
As for what is related to us we could equally attest his lucidity. Without any previous question and even without thinking about the case he spontaneously mentioned an illness that we carry for some time, pointing out to its termination. A remarkable thing is that it coincided with the same indicated by the somnambulist Mrs. Roger that we had consulted about the issue six months prior. He did not know us by name or in person and although difficult for him in his ignorance to understand the nature of our work he indicated the objective, tendencies and the inevitable results of our work through circles, images and expressions. This seemed to interest him greatly since he repeated incessantly that the thing should take place and that we were predestined from birth and that nothing would interrupt that. Out of his own initiative he talked about the person that was supposed to continue our work after our death, about the obstacles that certain persons tried to interpose in our path, the envious rivalries and personal ambitions; he unequivocally designated those that could second us and those that we should distrust, strongly moving from ones to the others; he then entered in a detailed description perfectly accurate, even more remarkable by the fact that they did not result from any interrogation and that all points coincided with revelations sometime made by our spiritual guides for our own awareness.
That kind of subject had nothing to do with the habits and knowledge of that man, as he said himself. He repeated several times: “I say here many things that I would not say to others, because they would not understand me but him (pointing to us) understand me perfectly well.” In fact there were things that were said kind of half-way only understood by ourselves. We saw a special mark of the benevolence of the Spirits in all that wanting to confirm by this new and unexpected means the instructions that they had given on different circumstances, being to us at same matter of observation and study. We then attested that the man was really gifted by a faculty that sees things. Does he always see accurately? That is not the question. As long as he had seen many times that would confirm the existence of the phenomenon. Nobody on this Earth is infallible for the simple fact that there is no absolute perfection here. How is it that he sees? That is the essential point that cannot be deduced if not by observation.
Given his lack of education and the prejudices that abound in the environment in which he has always lived he is biased by certain superstitious ideas that he mixes with the reports. That is how for example he believes in the influence of the planets upon people’s destinies and on their happy as well as miserable days. According to what he had seen about us we should have been born under a given sign; we should avoid undertaking important tasks in certain periods of the moon. We did not try to persuade him for we would not have succeeded and it would have only served to disturb him. But for the simple reasons that he bears some false ideas there is no reason to deny his faculty. For the fact that there are bad grains on a pile of wheat it does not follow that there is no good wheat; and for the reason that a man does not see with accuracy it does not mean that he sees nothing.
When he more or less realized the objective and the results of our own work he very seriously and with a kind of anxiety whispered in the ear of Mr. W… if we had eventually found the sixth book of Moses. Well, there is a popular legend in certain places that Moses had written a sixth book containing new revelations and the explanation of everything that was obscure in the previous five books. According to the same legend that book should be discovered one day. If something is supposed to offer the key to all allegories in the Scriptures that is certainly Spiritism somehow offering the idea of the sixth book of Moses. It is very singular that such a man had made that kind of connection.
A more careful analysis of the facts demonstrates a complete analogy between his skill and the phenomenon designated by the name of “second vision, double sight or awaken somnambulism” described in The Spirits Book, chapter VIII: Emancipation of the soul, and in The Mediums’ Book, chapter XIV. Its principle is in the radiant property of the spiritual fluid that allows the soul, in certain cases, to realize things from a distance, that is, through the emancipation of the soul that is a law of nature. It is not the eyes that see but beams of soul that extends further and exerts its action on a given point without the help of the physical organs of the body. Such a faculty, much more common than supposed, presents itself with very diverse aspects and levels of intensity according to the individuals: in some it manifests by a permanent or accidental perception of distant things, more or less clearly; in others by the simple intuition of those same things and finally in others through telepathy. It is remarkable that many people have that unnoticeably since it is inherent to their own being and hence seems natural to them like their eye sight; they even frequently confuse those two perceptions. When asked how they see most of the time they cannot explain better than they would do with the normal mechanism of the eyes.
The number of people that spontaneously enjoy that faculty is really considerable and that indicates that such a faculty requires any kind of instrument. The glass that this man utilizes is an accessory that it is only useful due to his habit since we attested on several occasions that he would describe things without looking to the glass. As for our own observation he described people using the piece of chalk and by characteristic signs typical of his skills and position. It was through those signs that he seem to see things very well looking at his table that he seemed to see as well as when looking at the glass that he hardly did. Yet the glass seemed to be necessary to him and here the explanation for that.
The image that he observes is formed in the beams of spiritual fluid that transmit the sensation to him. When he looks to the bottom of the glass he drives those beams there and the image very naturally forms there as it would on any other object: a glass of water, a bottle, a piece of paper, a map or an abstract point in space. It is a means of concentration his thoughts and circumscribing them so much so that we are convinced whoever may present such faculty would be able to go without it and see equally well after some exercise and a strong will power.
Admitting what has not been proven yet, however, that the object acts upon certain organizations, like drivers, like provoking the detachment of the spiritual fluid and consequently the isolation of the Spirit, there is a fundamental fact observed by experience: there is no special substance that may show an exclusive property about it. The man in question only sees in an empty glass held in his hand and he cannot see in any other glass that is shown to him or placed elsewhere. If the property were inherent to the substance and form of the object why the same individual would not show the same skill with two objects of the same kind and shape? Why something has an effect on one but not on the other? And why, finally, so many people have the same faculty without the support of any device? As said before the faculty is inherent to the individual and not the glass. The image forms in himself, or better said, in the fluidic beams that emanate from him. The glass only offers the reflex of that image: it is an effect and not the cause. That is the reason that not everyone can see in what was conventionally called magic mirrors. The organic sight is not enough for that but one does need to carry the so called double sight that more accurately should be called spiritual sight. And that is so much true that certain persons see perfectly well with their eyes closed.
Spiritual sight is in reality the sixth sense or spiritual sense that has been much talked about and like the other senses can be more or less obtuse or subtle. Its agent is the spiritual fluid like physical sight has the luminous fluid. In the same way that the irradiation of the luminous fluid carries the image of objects to the retina the irradiation of the spiritual fluid carries certain images and impressions to the soul. Such a fluid has its own effects and sui generis properties.
Since a person is composed by Spirit, perispirits and body during life the perceptions and sensations are simultaneously produced by the physical organs and by the spiritual sense; after death the physical senses are destroyed but since the perispirits remains the Spirit continues to perceive things through the spiritual sense whose subtleness increases in proportion to the detachment of the Spirit. A person that has such a sense developed enjoys therefore and by anticipation of some of the sensations of the free Spirit. Although damped by the prevalence of matter the spiritual sense still produces effects on everybody that are considered extraordinary for a lack of knowledge about the principle.
Since that faculty is part of nature and depend on the nature of the Spirit it has existed in all times; but like every effect whose cause is unknown ignorance attributed it to supernatural causes. Those who had in higher levels and could say, know and do things above the reach of regular persons were either accused of associating with the devil, called witches or burned alive or were beatified for having the gifts of making miracles when, in reality, it was all within the scope of a natural law.
Let us return to the magical mirrors. The word magic that in the past meant the science of the wise, lost its primitive meaning given the abuse of superstition and charlatanism. It has now fallen in discredit and rightly so and we do believe to be difficult to recover that given its connection to cabalistic operations, to gnomes, talismans and a handful of superstitious practices condemned by a lucid reason. Declining any solidarity with those pretense sciences Spiritism must avoid the ownership of words that could misguide the opinion about matters of its own interest.
In the case in question the qualification of magic is as much inappropriate as it would be that of witches attributed to the mediums. The designation of those objects by the name spiritual mirrors seems more adequate to us because it brings up the principle that is the foundation of the effects. To the Spiritist nomenclature then one can add expressions like spiritual vision, spiritual sense and spiritual mirrors.
Considering that the nature, form and substance of those objects are indifferent, one can understand that individuals that are gifted by spiritual vision can see on the coffee sludge, in egg white, in one’s hand, and in cards what others see in a glass of water and that sometimes they say correct things. To them the objects and their combinations have no meaning; it is just a means of fixating their attention, a pretext to speak, a kind of support for it is important to observe that in such a case the individual just look at them, however, if they were not there the person would believe that something was missing; the person would be disoriented like our man in this case if he did not his glass in his hand; he would have difficulty to speak like certain speakers that cannot say anything if they are not located in their habitual place or if they do not have a notebook in their hands that they do not read.
But if there are persons upon whom those objects produce the effect of the magic mirrors there is also a large quantity of people that only see through regular vision but have the language typical of those affected by those signs and abuse of others and themselves; then there is the equally large quantity of charlatans that exploit peoples’ naïveté. It is only superstition that can consecrate the use of such processes as a means of foretelling and a bunch of others that have no more value, attributing virtue to words, significance to material signs and fortuitous combinations that have no necessary connection with the object of the question or the thought.
When we say that certain persons may tell the truth with the help of such processes the intent is not to rehabilitate them before the general opinion but to show that the superstitious ideas sometimes have their origin in a true principle, stained by abuse and ignorance. By unveiling the law that governs the relationships between the visible and invisible worlds Spiritism destroys, for that very reason, the false ideas that had been formed about it, like the law of electricity destroyed not the bolt but the superstitions engineered by the ignorance about the true causes of the bolt.
In short, the spiritual vision is one of the attributes of the Spirit and constitutes one of the perceptions of the spiritual sense. It is then a law of nature. Since a person is an incarnate Spirit that person has the attributes of the Spirit and consequently the perceptions of the spiritual sense. In the vigil state such perceptions are generally vague, fuzzy and sometimes even insensitive and inappreciable since damped by the dominating activity of the material senses. Nonetheless one can say that every extracorporeal perception is due to the action of the spiritual sense that in such a case overcomes the physical resistance. In the natural or induced somnambulistic state of hypnosis, catalepsy, lethargy, ecstasy and even during common sleep, the spiritual sense develops with more freedom due to the momentary benumbing of the corporeal senses. Every exterior cause that tends to numb the physical senses leads for that very reason to the expansion of the activity of the spiritual sense.
The perceptions through the spiritual sense are not exempt from error for the fact that the incarnate Spirit may be more or less advanced, and consequently more or less capable of assessing things correctly and understand them and due to the fact that the Spirit is still under the influence of matter.
A comparison will better clarify what happens in such a case. Someone that has a perfect sight on Earth may be deceived by appearances. People believed in the movement of the sun for a long time. Experience and science were necessary to demonstrate that they were deluded. That is what happens to the more or less advanced Spirits, incarnate or discarnate; they ignore many things from the spiritual world like intelligent people ignore many things on Earth; the spiritual vision only shows them what they already know and that vision is not enough to give them the knowledge that they lack; that is why we encounter so many aberrations in clairvoyants and ecstatic, not to mention the fact that their ignorance places them more than others at the mercy of deceiving Spirits that exploit their credulity and even more their pride. That is why it would be unwise to accept their revelations without control. We cannot lose sight of the fact that we are on Earth, a planet of atonement, where inferior Spirits are all over the place and where really superior Spirits are exceptions. In superior worlds it is the opposite.
Can persons gifted with spiritual sight be considered mediums? Yes and no, according to the circumstances. Mediumship consists on the intervention of the Spirits. What is done by oneself is not a mediumistic act. The one that carries spiritual sight see by her own Spirit and does not require the support of a strange Spirit. That person is not a medium for that fact that she can see but for her relationships with the Spirits. According to her good or bad nature the Spirits that assist her may facilitate or preclude lucidity, make her see true or false things, and that also depends on the objective and utility of certain revelations. Here as in all other types of mediumship curiosity and futile questions, not serious questions, greed and interest attract frivolous Spirits that make fun of very credulous persons and rejoice by mystifying them. Serious Spirits only deal with serious things and the best gifted clairvoyant may not see anything if she is not allowed to respond to what is asked or if disturbed by deluded visions as a punishment to the indiscreet and curious people. Although that person may have the faculty and however strong that may be she does not have the freedom of using it at will. The Spirits frequently guide their application and in the presence of abuse the person may be punished by the intervention of bad Spirits.
There is still remains an important point to clarify: the forecast of future events. One can understand the vision of present things, the vision of the past, but how come the spiritual sight may give certain individuals the knowledge about things that do not exist? To avoid repetition we refer the reader to our article in May, 1864 about the theory of prescience in which the issue is thoroughly analyzed. We only add a few words.
Future, in principle, is hidden to mankind for the reasons that have been exposed so many times. It is only exceptionally revealed and besides it is more presented than forecasted. God has not given mankind any certain means of knowing it. The application of a multitude of processes invented by superstition is therefore useless, processes that are exploited by charlatanism to their own benefit. If there are some readers of luck, professional or not, that have spiritual sight, it is notable the fact that they do see much more in the present and past than in the future. It would therefore be unwise to absolutely trust such predictions and base someone’s behavior on them.
