"The first principle to guide us in the study of the subject," said
Panhandle, "is that no genuine ghost ever recognised itself as what you
suppose it to be. The conception which the ghost has of its own being is
fundamentally different from yours. Because it lacks solidity you deem
it less real than yourself. The ghost thinks the opposite. You imagine
that its language is a squeak. From the ghost's point of view the
squeaker is yourself. In short, the attitude of mankind towards the
realm of ghosts is regarded by them as a continual affront to the
majesty of the spiritual world, perpetrated by beings who stand on a low
level of intelligence; and for that reason they seldom appear or make
any attempt at open communication, doing their work in secret and
disclosing their identity only to selected souls. Far from admitting
that they are less real than you, they regard themselves as possessed of
reality vastly more intense than yours. Imagine what your own feelings
would be if, at this moment, I were to treat you as a gibbering bogey,
and you will then have some measure of the contempt which ghosts
entertain for human beings."
"You must confess, my dear Panhandle," I answered, "that you are flying
in the face of the greatest authorities, and have the whole literature
of the subject against you. You tell me that no genuine ghost ever
recognised itself as such."
"I mean, of course," interrupted Panhandle, "that it never recognised
itself as a ghost in your inadequate sense of the term."
"Then," said I, "what do you make of the Ghost's words in _Hamlet_:
'I am thy father's spirit'?