IS SPIRITUALISM SPURIOUS?

NZ Truth, Issue 771, 14 August 1920, Page 2

IS SPIRITUALISM SPURIOUS?

Sir Conan Doyle and "Spooks" Tom Driver Still Under the Hallucinaation that he Exposed Bailey. Mr. W. H. Stewart writes m reply to Tom Driver thus: — Mr. Tom Driver is quite right m one thing, his quotation oi Sir (Jonan Doyle "Lhat to deceive the living by imitating the dead is a crime of the deepest dye the most horrible man could commit." 1 add one other quotation from the same source. At a meeting held m the City of Aberdeen, Sir Arthur stated: "I have had no personal experience of frivolous and vexatious messages from the other side of life, although my expeiviences go over thirty years. My own son who died a year ago at the war came to me and spoke to me face to face last month. He brought a message to me, it was 'Plough on, plough on; others will sow the seed,' and his message always come 3to me when I talk, that « is what I have come to Aberdeen for, to plough the furrbw of spiritualism. !lt is the. religion of the future and it is a religion that means without mere talk, death has really lost its sting and the grave has really* lost its victory; WHAT A BLASPHEMOUS LIAR 1 would be i£i I did not believe and know that my son still lives." If there was not a genuine spiritual philosophy there could not be a spurious .spiritualism. That there have been frauds and imposters is granted, 'but there are frauds m everything on earth, even m anagicians. Mr. Driver refers to Houdini.and Maskelyne. Robert Houdini says m reference to spiritualism that there is something m it beyond him. Maskelyne, when challenged recently by the Rev. W. Wynne to reproduce an imitation of spiritual phenomena under the same conditions as a test seance, declined. Why? Because, like Mr. Driver, he cannot conjure anything m a bare room m a strange house. It is not to his liking. He needs a room full of stage properties to perform his "stunts," and he knows he cannot produce even an imitation of the genuine, under the conditions under which they occur; and he is not fool enough to try. The same applies to Kellar and Carlton, world famous illusionists, who ho Mostly admit the genuineness of the science which they say cannot be explained away by any known rule of logic or reason from the sublimity of a Driver. How could he expose anybody when he has "never been there"? He can only repeat like a parrot — who has no mind attached to its tongue — "I did it" and that is his limit. Spiritualists have proved for themselves to their own satisfaction. Driver admits he can neither do one or the other and if he lacks the brains to EITHER PROVE OR DISPROVE it, that is not our fault. My challenge to him was that he could not disprove it or that he ever attended a seance of the man he alleged he had exposed. No daily newspaper m this city would publish a challenge from him and ho knows it. His deposit to you is a bluff which, if we called, he would repeat the tactics of his former challenge. He says he was not allowed to attend Bailey's seances. No. because he withdrew his challenge and turned tail when called to toe the mark. It is no use. He is counted out! He thought when he attacked absent men he was safe. He is like the famous frog that imagined he was a bull and burst himself with his croaking. His balloon has burst. Nothing he can say. n- do will stop the progress of Truth! That there are frauds m all religions does not prove that there is nothing genuine m any of them. Spiritualists claim that they can see behind the veil, and no other power on earth can assure sorrowing 1 hearts that those, whom they have loved and apparently lost, are still safe and well, conscious and happy m a new world of activity and advancement. As to his puerile attack upon Mr. John Page, that is beneath contempt. His work during the past five years m Wellington speaks for itself, and the long period he has worked m the Dominion for our Societies without fee or reward is cheerfully recognised by those m a position . to know. Our church can stand his venomous attack. It will be m evidence when he is not., I am the man who exposed Driver, and he is the bald-headed man who was stung by a bee and didn't know what had bit him. Tt is still m "his bonnet. When he wakes up he will realise that things have got going some since he went into retirement. Better have stayed there! He has admitted he was never at a seance of "Bailey's. He can join the great crowd who for 1 years have opposed progress m any form.