LAW AND SPIRITUALISM

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 20075, 12 October 1928, Page 13

LAW AND SPIRITUALISM

PROTEST BY CONAN DOYLE.

N CALL TO POLITICAL ACTION.

Australian and N.Z. Press Association. LONDON, Oct. 10. .Sir Arthur CoTia.n Doyle calls on tha 250,000 Spiritualists in England to fight politically for freedom. He said the law of England denied to iSpiritualists the right to use mediums according to a recent deciision. This wa«s religious persecution. Ii; the Conservatives were unwilling to help, their choice lay between the Liberals and the Labour Party, "We are not going to bo despised," he said. '* Black materialism surrounds us which wo must break through. We represent the young hope of the world among all the decaying forms of religion by which wo are surrounded.

" Everyone who thinks of the 7,000,000 men who were killed in the war* in Euiope alone must think also that this cama after 1900 years of Christianity. If it is urged that wo arc mixing religion with politics, what does it matter! Does not the Church of England do this? Do not tho Nonconformists do it?" Sir Arthur and Lady Doyle sailed today for South Africa.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was referring (n (he prosecution in July lust of Mis. Clarke Caution, a medium, m the West™ ■muster Police Court on a charge of tolling fortunes, and of Miss Merc.v Phillioiore, secretary of the London Spiritualist Alliance, with aiding the medium. Sir Arthur and S ; r Oliver Lodgo were called as witnesses for the defence. In tho course of his evidence Sir Arthur said the alliance did not countenance fortune-telling. It existed for the study of causes and facts and the possibilities, of receiving messages from the dead. n!so to refute the idea that death ends all careers. Mediums wcro watched most carefully. Undoubtedly tho majority of them were genuine. The laws governing these things were bevond human comprehension. Mediums" were unconscious when they were under the control of a spirit. , The magistrate in bis judgment said: "I have lived long enough to realise tliat there are a great many things in the world of which "f cannot be certain." Ho dismissed thei summonses but ordered defendant to pay .£3O.