Spiritual sense A second letter from Doctor Grégory contains the following:
“Erastus, in a communication, stated an idea that struck me and made me think. Man, he says, has seven senses: the well-known senses of hearing, smell, sight, taste, touch, and in addition, the somnambulistic sense, and the mediumistic sense.
I add to these words that these last two senses exist only by exception, sufficiently developed in a few privileged natures, admitting that they exist in a rudimentary state in every man. Now, there is in me a conviction acquired by more than one observation, and by a fairly long experience of homeopathic powers, that our well-chosen medicines, taken for a long time, can develop these two admirable faculties."
In our opinion, it would be wrong to consider somnambulism and mediumship as the product of two different senses, since they are only two effects resulting from the same cause. This double faculty is one of the attributes of the soul, and its organ is the perispirit, whose radiance carries perception beyond the limits of the action of the material senses. It is, strictly speaking, the sixth sense that is referred to as the spiritual sense.
Somnambulism and mediumship are two varieties of the activity of this sense, that as we know, present innumerable nuances, and constitute special aptitudes. Apart from these two faculties, more noticeable because they are more apparent, it would be a mistake to believe that the spiritual sense only exists in a rudimentary state. Like the other senses, it is more or less developed, more or less subtle, depending on the individual, but everyone possesses it, and it is not the one that renders the least service, by the very special nature of the perceptions from which it is the source. Far from being the rule, its atrophy is the exception, and can be considered as an illness, like the absence of sight or hearing. It is through this sense that we receive the fluidic emanation of the Spirits, that we unsuspectingly take inspiration from their thoughts, that we are given the intimate warnings of consciousness, that we have a presentiment and intuition of future or absent things, whether there is fascination, unconscious and involuntary magnetic action, the penetration of thought, etc. These perceptions are given to man by the Providence, as are sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch, for his own preservation; these are very vulgar phenomena that he hardly notices from his habit of experiencing them, and of which he has not realized until this day, owing to his ignorance of the laws of the spiritual principle, of the very denial, in some, of the existence of this principle; but whoever pays attention to the effects that we have just cited and to many others of similar nature, will recognize how frequent they are and that they are completely independent of the sensations perceived by the organs of the body.
Spiritual sight, commonly called double sight or second sight, is a less rare phenomenon than one might think; many people have this faculty without realizing it; only it is more or less emphasized, and it is easy to ascertain that it is foreign to the organs of vision, since it is exercised without the aid of these organs, that even the blind possess it. It exists in some people in the most perfect normal state, with no apparent trace of sleep or ecstatic state. We know a lady, in Paris, that has it permanently, and as natural as the ordinary sight; she sees, without effort and without concentration, the character, the habits, the antecedents of whoever approaches her; she describes illnesses and prescribes effective treatments with greater ease than many ordinary somnambulists; all you have to do is to think of an absent person for her to see them and point them out. We were at her house one day, and we saw someone passing in the street, with whom we have a relationship and whom she had never seen. Without being provoked by any question, she made the most exact moral portrait of him, and gave us very wise advices about him.
This lady is not, however, a somnambulist; she talks about what she sees, as she would talk about anything else, without deviating herself from her occupations. Is she a medium? She does not know anything about it herself, for not long ago she did not even know Spiritism by name. Therefore, this faculty with her is as natural and as spontaneous as possible. How does she perceive, if not through the spiritual sense?
We must add that this lady has faith in the signs of the hand; so, she examines it when she is questioned; she sees in it, she says, the evidence of diseases. As she sees correctly, and it is obvious that many of the things she says cannot have any physiological relationship with the hand, we are convinced that it is simply a way for her to relate, and to develop her sight, by fixating it on a determined point; the hand acts as a magic or psychic mirror; she sees in it as others see in a vase, in a flask or other object. Her ability has a lot to do with that of the Clairvoyant of Zimmerwald Forest, but it is superior to him in some ways. Moreover, since she does not derive any profit from it, this consideration eliminates any suspicion of charlatanism, and since she only uses it to render service, she must be assisted by good spirits. (See the Spiritist Review, October 1864: The Sixth Sense and Spiritual Sight; October 1865: New Studies on Psychic Mirrors. The Clairvoyant of the Zimmerwald Forest).
