How George Pelham has proved his identity--He recognises his friends and
alludes to their opinions--He recognises objects which have belonged to
him--Asks that certain things should be done for him--Very rarely makes
an erroneous statement.
Some of my readers must have asked themselves what the returning George
Pelham can have said to make grave and intelligent men think he has
proved his identity. I shall try to give them some idea by relating such
incidents as I can report without entering into too slight or complete
details. I cannot relate everything, in the first place for want of
space, and secondly, because I should be tiresome--a thing to be avoided
in a popular work like the present.
When Dr Hodgson wrote the report which appeared in 1898, George Pelham,
who, like Phinuit, is always ready to act as intermediary (though
employing writing instead of speech) had had occasion to see one hundred
and fifty sitters, among whom thirty were old friends of his. He
recognised the whole thirty, and never mistook a stranger for a friend.
He not only addressed them all by name but took with each of them the
tone he had been accustomed to take.
We do not speak in the same way to all our friends. The tone of our
conversation differs according to the character and the age of the
person we address, and according to the degree of esteem or affection we
have for him. These shades of manner are typical, though instinctive,
and therefore are difficult to reproduce artificially.
George Pelham, then, addressed the thirty friends whom he had the
opportunity of meeting through the medium in the tone which he was in
the habit of taking formerly with each one of them. The incidents I
shall quote are only examples; I have said why I cannot recapitulate all
that has been published about these sittings.[55] Besides, the sitters,
for reasons easy to imagine, have declined to permit the publication of
all that was most private, and consequently most convincing, in the
sittings.
From the beginning George Pelham asks to see his father. He says that he
wishes to talk to him about private affairs, and also that he should
like to convince him, if possible, of his existence in a new world. Mr
Pelham was at once informed, and though he was very sceptical both by
nature and education, he, with his second wife, George Pelham's
step-mother, visited Mrs Piper at once. They were introduced under false
names. Quite at the beginning of the sitting George Pelham wrote,
"Hullo, father and mother, I am George!" The communications which
followed were altogether what Mr Pelham, senior, would have expected
from his living son.
At one of the earliest sittings he asks after one of his friends, a
young writer, and urges that he should edit one of his, George Pelham's,
unpublished papers.
While George Pelham was living in Boston he was connected by bonds of
strong affection with the Howard family. He lived with them often and
for long periods. He and James Howard often discussed serious
philosophical problems together. At the first sitting George Pelham
insistently asked for the Howards.[56] "Tell Jim I want to see him. He
will hardly believe me, believe that I am here. I want him to know where
I am. O good fellow!" He welcomes Mr and Mrs Howard in a characteristic
way: "Jim, is that you? Speak to me, quick. I am not dead. Don't think
me dead. I'm awfully glad to see you. Can't you see me? Don't you hear
me? Give my love to my father, and tell him I want to see him. I am
happy here, and more so since I find I can communicate with you. I pity
those people who can't speak."
A Mr Vance has a sitting. George Pelham had known him. At first the
communicator does not appear to notice him, being occupied in giving
messages to Dr Hodgson. But presently George Pelham recognises him, and
says, "How is your son? I want to see him some time." "George, where did
you know my son?" "In studies in college." "George, where did you stay
with us?" "Country, peculiar house, trees around, porch that projects at
the front. Vine at the side. Porch at the front, and swing on the other
side." All this was correct.[57]
Miss Helen Vance and George Pelham had belonged at the same time to a
society formed for mutual aid in the art of writing. She came to a
sitting some time after it had begun. Mrs Piper, in her normal state,
had never met her. Nevertheless, George Pelham asks her at once, "How is
the society getting on?" A little later on, the following dialogue takes
place between Miss Vance and George Pelham: "Now, whom do you have to
correct your writings?" "We correct one another's." "But do they give
satisfaction?" "Yes." "What, in their corrections?" "Yes, but not as
much as you; your corrections were better than theirs." "Well, that is
what I am trying to get out of you." "In other words, George, you wanted
a compliment from me." "Oh, bosh, you know me better than that."
Miss Warner had two sittings with Mrs Piper[58] five years after George
Pelham's death. He had known her when she was quite a child, but he had
not seen her for three years before he died, and in eight years a child
becomes a tall young girl. Consequently, at the first sitting, George
Pelham did not recognise Miss Warner at all. At the second sitting he
admitted this and said, "I do not think I ever knew you very well."
"Very little. You used to come and see my mother." "I heard of you, I
suppose." "I saw you several times. You used to come with Mr Rogers."
"Yes, I remembered about Mr Rogers when I saw you before." "Yes, you
spoke of him." "Yes, but I cannot seem to place you. I long to place all
my friends, and could do so before I had been gone so long. You see, I
am farther away--every day I get further away from you. I do not recall
your face; you must have changed." At this moment Dr Hodgson said, "Do
you remember Mrs Warner?" "Of course, oh, very well. For pity's sake,
are you her little daughter?" "Yes." "By Jove! how you have grown! I
thought so much of your mother, a charming woman."
George Pelham not only recognises his friends,[59] as we have just seen;
he also remembers their opinions, their occupations, their habits. James
Howard is an author. He asks him, "Why don't you write on this subject?"
(the future life). Rogers writes also. He asks, "What is Rogers writing
now?" "A novel." "I don't mean that. Isn't he writing something about
me?" "Yes, he is preparing a memoir of you." "That is kind of him. One
is pleased not to be forgotten. He was always very good to me when I was
alive."
He remembers the opinions of his father, and the discussions they had
upon philosophical questions. "I should like to convince my father," he
says; "but it will be hard. My mother will be easier." He says to James
Howard, "Do you remember how we used to ask each other for books of
certain kinds, about certain books, where they were, and you always knew
just where to find them." Formerly, when James Howard and George Pelham
were talking together in the evening, the first-named habitually smoked
a long pipe. At a sitting held in the library where these conversations
used to take place, George Pelham said to Mr Howard, "Get the long pipe
and smoke." Katharine is one of James Howard's daughters, who plays the
violin. Formerly her practising used to greatly annoy George Pelham, who
lived with the Howards. He said to her at a sitting, "Katharine, how is
the violin? To hear you playing is horrible, horrible." Mrs Howard
replies, "Yes, George, but don't you see she likes her music because it
is the best she has." "No, but that is what I used to say."
"Marte" is a pseudonym adopted by Dr Hodgson to designate a well-known
American writer. He is a monist, a partisan of Darwinism, convinced that
the death of the body is for us the end of all. At a sitting George
Pelham said to him, "Evolution is all right in the real life, as Darwin
says, but it goes on evoluting in the ideal life, which fact he, of
course, knew nothing of until he came here."
George Pelham also recognises objects which have belonged to him,
principally those which have some remembered emotional association.
John Hart, at the first sitting at which George Pelham appeared, gave
some sleeve-links he was wearing, and asked, "Who gave them to me?"
"That's mine. I sent that to you." "When?" "Before I came here. That's
mine. Mother gave you that." "No!" "Well, father then, father and mother
together. You got those after I passed out. Mother took them, gave them
to father, and father gave them to you. I want you to keep them. I will
them to you." All this is correct.
At another sitting Mrs Howard gives a photograph. She placed it on the
top of the medium's head. "Do you recognise this?" "Yes, it is your
summer house; but I have forgotten the name of the town." "Don't you
remember D.?" "Oh, the little brick house and the vine, grape-vine some
call it. Yes, I remember it all; it comes back as distinctly as the
daylight. Where is the little outhouse?" All this is correct. The
outhouse which George Pelham was surprised not to see was a henhouse
left just out of the photograph. At another sitting Mrs Howard put a
book on the medium's head. We must not forget that the medium's eyes are
shut, and the ocular globes upturned. "Do you recognise this book?" "Oh,
yes, it is my French Lyrics." Needless to add that this was correct.
George Pelham asks for information on the subjects which interested him
in life. He asks to have things done for him. At the first sitting he
said to the sitter, John Hart, "Go up to my room, where I write. I left
things all mixed up. I wish you'd go up and straighten them out for me.
Lots of names, lots of letters. You answer them for me."
Evelyn is another of Mr. Howard's daughters. George Pelham had given her
a book, and had written her name in it. He asks her if she remembers it.
He has not forgotten his former speeches either. He was fond of Evelyn,
but this did not prevent his constantly teasing her. Thus she is weak in
mathematics. At one sitting George Pelham says to her, "I won't
tantalise Evelyn now; I used to torment her a great deal, but she will
forgive me, I know." Which does not prevent his adding directly after,
"Evelyn is a girl that can always tell how much two and two is. You
have just learned, haven't you? You are not a great one for mathematics,
are you?" But he adds quickly, "Now be good, Evelyn. It doesn't matter
so much about your lessons; being good is the most important point of
all."
James Howard had asked George Pelham several questions to which the
latter had not replied, asserting that he had forgotten. On this account
James Howard still doubted George Pelham's identity. One day the former
said, "George, tell me something that you and I alone know. I ask you,
because several things I have asked you you have failed to get hold of.
We spent a great many summers and winters together and talked on a great
many things and had a great many views in common, went through a great
many experiences together. Tell me something now that you remember." The
hand at once began to write eagerly: the occurrences related were so
private that they cannot be published. At a given moment the hand wrote
"Private." Dr Hodgson then left the room. On his return James Howard
told him that he had obtained all the proof he could desire, and that he
was "perfectly satisfied, perfectly."
At the first sitting at which George Pelham appeared, when John Hart was
the sitter, George spoke suddenly of Katharine, James Howard's daughter,
and he said something which at the time had no meaning for John Hart.
"Tell her, she'll know. I will solve the problems, Katharine." When John
Hart reported these words to the Howards they were more struck than by
anything else. During George Pelham's last stay with them he had talked
frequently with Katharine upon deep philosophical questions, such as
Time, Space, Eternity, and had pointed out to her how unsatisfactory the
commonly-accepted solutions were. Then he had added the words of the
communication almost textually, "I will solve those problems some day,
Katharine." Remark that at this time the Howards had never yet seen Mrs
Piper, that John Hart knew absolutely nothing of these conversations,
and that Dr Hodgson, who took notes at the sitting, did not at the time
know the Howards or of the conversations.
George Pelham had received a good classical education. He was a
Humanist. Consequently a rather large number of Latin expressions are
found in his language; usual, no doubt, with people of his education,
but with which Mrs Piper is not acquainted in her normal state. Phinuit,
who cannot have been a good Latinist, does not employ them either.
Observation of this fact inspired Professor Newbold[60] with the idea of
asking George Pelham to translate a short fragment of Greek, and he
proposed the first words which occurred to him; the beginning of the
Paternoster: [Greek: Pater hemon ho en tois ouranois]. George Pelham
made some attempts, and finally translated "Our Father is in heaven."
Professor Newbold then proposed a longer phrase, which he composed
himself on the spot for the occasion: [Greek: Ouk esti thanatos; hai gar
ton thneton psychai zoen zosin athanaton, aidion, makarion]. This means,
"There is no death; the souls of mortals really live an immortal eternal
happy life." George Pelham called to his aid Stainton Moses, who in his
lifetime passed for a good Hellenist. Both together only succeeded in
understanding the first proposition, "There is no death." These
experiments, at all events, prove that Mrs Piper in the trance state can
understand a little Greek, though in her normal state she does not even
know the letters. Again, George Pelham and Stainton Moses may have known
Greek tolerably well and have forgotten it: it is an accident which has
happened to many of us.
With regard to this translation of Greek, we might form another
hypothesis. We might suppose that the spirits of George Pelham and
Stainton Moses--if there are spirits--perceiving thought directly, and
not its material expression, have partly understood what Professor
Newbold wanted to say, without knowing in what language it was
expressed. If they did not understand wholly and completely, it would be
because a thought expressed in a foreign language has in our minds a
certain vagueness. We might go further; we might suppose that Mrs
Piper's subconsciousness perceives the thought directly, independently
of the form in which it is expressed. Mrs Piper has often pronounced
words and short sentences in foreign languages. Phinuit likes to say,
"Bonjour, comment vous portez vous? Au revoir!" and to count in French.
Mme. Elisa, an Italian, the dead sister of Mrs Howard, succeeded in
writing or pronouncing some short sentences in more or less odd Italian.
I find also at a sitting where the communicator was supposed to be a
young Hawaian three or four words of Hawaian very appropriate to the
circumstances. Mrs Piper is ignorant of all this in her normal state. I
have just said that spirits--if there are spirits--perceive thought
directly. They themselves tell us this. On the other hand, they do not
perceive matter, which is non-existent to them. This brings me to a new
feature of the sittings, principally of those with George Pelham. If
this feature does not increase the proofs of identity, it is at least an
evidence of the abnormal powers of the medium.[61] George Pelham is
asked to go and see what a certain person is doing at a given time and
to come back and relate it. He goes, and partially succeeds. This is
what appears to happen: if the act is strongly conceived in the mind of
the person he is watching, he perceives it clearly; if it is nearly
automatic, he perceives it vaguely; if it is wholly automatic, he does
not perceive it at all. He often says that actions have occurred which
have only been planned and not executed, at other times he reports past
actions as present. This is because spirits have not, it appears, a
clear notion of time. I have unfortunately neither time nor space to
give examples of this.
Can we say that the communicator George Pelham has never made a
partially or wholly erroneous assertion? No. But the number of such
assertions is very small, which was not the case when Phinuit reigned
alone. Here is one such assertion, at which there has been much
cavilling; people have insisted on seeing in it the stamp of Mrs Piper
and her social environment, and not at all the stamp of the aristocratic
George Pelham. George Pelham is asked, "Could you not tell us something
which your mother has done?" He replies,[62] "I saw her brush my
clothes and put them away. I was by her side as she did it. I saw her
take my sleeve buttons from a small box and give them to my father. I
saw her put some papers in a tin box." When Mrs Pelham is questioned by
letter, she replies, "George's clothes were brushed and put away, not by
me, but by the man who had valeted him." And the hasty conclusion is,
Mrs Piper on this occasion thought herself among her own class. She
forgot that Mrs Pelham did not brush and put away clothes herself. This
is perhaps a too hasty triumph. The most highly-bred women may
occasionally brush and put away clothing. Now suppose that what I have
said above about the way in which spirits perceive our actions should be
true. George Pelham may have seen the project of the action in his
step-mother's mind, and not its execution by the valet. It may be
objected that he ought to have supposed she would not do it herself.
Why? I do not see it. Perhaps he knew that his step-mother was capable,
occasionally, of putting away clothes herself.
George Pelham is often asked questions which he cannot answer. But he
does not at all pretend to have forgotten nothing. If there is another
world, spirits do not go there to ruminate on what has happened in our
incomplete life. They go there to be carried away in the vortex of a
higher and greater activity. If, therefore, they sometimes forget, it is
not astonishing. Nevertheless, they seem to forget less than we do.
FOOTNOTES:
[55] Those readers who are interested in this question are recommended
to read Dr Hodgson's Report, _Proc. of S.P.R._, vol. xiii., _Trans._
[56] _Proc. of S.P.R._, vol. xiii. p. 300.
[57] _Ibid._, p. 458.
[58] _Proc. of S.P.R._, p. 324.
[59] For reports of these sittings see _Proc. of S.P.R._, vol. viii. pp.
413-441.
[60] _Proc. of S.P.R._, vol. xiv. p. 46.
[61] _Proc. of S.P.R._, vol. xiii. p. 329.
[62] _Proc. of S.P.R._, vol. xiii. p. 303.