SPIRITUALISM

Greymouth Evening Star, 4 December 1926, Page 3

SPIRITUALISM

i - — 1 ■- EXPERIMENTS IN COPENHAGEN. Being a scientist of repute, pros bably with little or no previous ki-.ow--3 ledge of spiritualism or of occult . teachings, Dr. R. J. Tillyard’s statei ments regarding physical matters , will be taken seriously by the general . public (states a London correspond ent). Such is human nature. The New Zealand scientist is likely to make a name for himself, therefore, not because he speaks of any new thing, but because, .while being an accredited authority on exact sciences, he yet has the courage to investigate a subject which is unpopular among 5 conventional thinkers. ■ While in the United States, Dr. ■ Tillyard attended a seance given by a > famous medium. He was permitted • to apply tests which were quite sat's- - factory to himself and which convinced him that he was not being de- , luded in any way. Since then he has ' attended a course of experiments in Copenhagen, and he has given some . of his impressions to an. audience at ' the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Dr. Tillyard confessed he could not at present accept the things the spiritualist did, and he wanted all the available phenomena studied, and nob a mere picking out of scien- ' tific facts that fitted the theory one wanted to support. He looked for an all-embracing theory to correlate in one whole the varied phenomena of psychical research, just as Darwin’s theory of evolution correlated the facts of biology. As a biologist, Dr. Tillyard said, he was totally unable to account for the phenomenal substance known as teleplsam. “It is a most remarkable experience for .a biologist to handle this substance, as I have done in the course of experiments conducted in Copenhagen,” he said. “It has been suggested that teleplasm was some form of animal tissue and that, therefore, it would be easily spotted by a biologist. I may say definitely that there is no tissue in the body of an animal, and certainly none in the body of the medium, that corresponds in any way with what I felt and handled. “It is a phenomenon of tremendous significance, I know, but it baffles me absolutely, and I cannot connect it with our ideas of morphology or physiology, while, in my view, it is impossible that teleplsam could be produced on the lines of natural selection.” During one erpjeriment at which Dr. Tillyard was present, the medium, he said, went into a semitrance. The circle observed that she was undergoing a transfiguration during which. all her features changed from feminine to masculine, while she began to speak in a deep masculine voice. “I understand that the group . conducting the experiment were quite satisfied that the phenomenon was traceable to natural causes,” he added. The Bishop of Gloucester, writing in his diocesan magazine, says:—“l am given to understand that some of the clergy are inclined to take part in spiritual seances. Now I do not wish to interfere with the freedom of investigation into anything which occurs, or is reputed to occur. Our proper attitude with regard to such phenomena as those concerned with spiritualism is not to be too anxious to condemn anything unheard ; at the same time mv general feeling is that it is unfortunate if we allow our- „ selves to be mixed up with these things. I have read various books which have been written on the subject and I am bound to say it is very difficult to believe in the genuineness of most of these manifestations. “I think there is no doubt in some cases there is quite definite fraud. . . Where there is no fraud I think there is what one may call self-hypnotism. I think that probably some of the mediums really believe that the manifestations which come through them are genuine. . . . In any case, quite sufficient evidence has come to me of the very harmful character of these on the minds of some people. In some casse I think they lead definitely to loss of reason. I think that, in any case, we clergy ought to keep ourselves entirely free from anything which has such unsatisfactory associations. I think we may leave it to scientific men to investigate and form their opinion about the phenomena, and when they have finally settled the suestion, then it is for us. ’more definitely to make up our minds. My own opinion is that the whole thing is partly imposture and partly self hypnotism and delusion.”