311. These moral considerations aside, we will not aver that there cannot be interested mediums, honorable and conscientious, because there are honest men in all trades ; we speak only of the abuse : but it will be readily agreed that there is more reason for the abuse in paid mediums, than with those who, regard ing their faculty as a favor, employ it only to render a service.
The degree of confidence or mistrust that may be given to a paid medium depends entirely upon the esteem his character and morality may command, in dependent of circumstances. The medium who, with an eminently serious and profitable aim, would be pre vented from utilizing his time in any other way, and for that reason exonerated, must not be confounded with the speculating medium, him who, from premedLtated design, would make a trade of his mediumship. According to the motive and the end, the spirits could condemn, absolve, or even favor ; they judge the in tention rather than the material fact.
