“Over a hundred instances where Mr. Home was raised from the floor in the presence of numerous witnesses have been published, and I have had the oral testimony of at least three witnesses to these exhibitions, _i.e._, Count Dunraven, Lord Lindsay, and Captain Wynne. “To reject the numerous depositions presented on this subject would be to reject all human testimony on any other subject; for there are no facts in history, be they sacred or profane, that are supported on such a solid basis of proof. “The number of witnesses who will testify to the levitations of Mr. Home is overwhelming. It is to be greatly desired that persons whose testimony would be accepted as conclusive by the scientific world would seriously examine with patience these facts. “The majority of ocular witnesses of these phenomena are still living, and will most assuredly bear witness; but in a few years it will be difficult, if not impossible, to obtain such _direct evidence_ as in the case of Home.” (_Crookes._) It is to this class of phenomena that the case of Francois Fontaine belongs, the authenticated facts of which, officially recorded and witnessed, are matters of history; her levitations in the prison at Louviers cannot be doubted. The cataleptic symptoms accompanying the ascentional movements of this woman bear witness as to the special neuropathic condition in which she was found—a condition to-day in which most mediums develop _psychic force_, either spontaneously or following hypnotic maneuvers. One of the benefits to future science will be the explanation given to these phenomena now considered supernatural; things that our learned Academicians refuse to believe in, _although not investigating_, insisting that such phenomena are hallucinations, the mere assertions of writers and those who witness them; while these so-called _savants_, who laugh spiritualism to scorn, claiming it a fraud and imposture, are themselves afraid to be convinced by scientific experimentation.[85] CLASS VII.—_Movement of small objects without personal contact._ “Under this title I propose to describe certain particular phenomena of which I have been a witness. “I shall content myself to here allude to some facts all the more surprising, since those who have witnessed them did so under circumstances that rendered all deception impossible; it would be foolish to attribute these results to fraud, for the phenomena were not observed in the house of a medium, but in my own home, where any previous preparation was out of the question. “A medium was taken to my dressing room and seated in a certain portion of the chamber under the watchful eyes of a number of attentive witnesses, and played an accordion _I held in my own hand_ with the keys upside down; this same accordion then floated in the air, playing as it remained suspended.