The latter, invariably either of diseased mind by nature or over-excited for the occasion, believe they see and hear manifestations in the outer world, which in reality exist only in their own consciousness. A Catholic medium is thus visited by spirits from heaven and hell, while the Protestant medium never meets souls from purgatory. Nothing has ever been revealed concerning the future state of man, that was not already well known upon earth. Most diverting are the jealousies of great spirits, of Solomon and Socrates, Moses and Plato--when the media happen to be jealous of each other! A somewhat satirical writer on the subject explains even the fact that spirits so often contradict each other and say vile things of sacred subjects, by the inner wickedness of the media, which comes to light on such occasions, while they carefully conceal it in ordinary life! If these spirits are really the creations of the inner magic life, of which we are just learning to know the first elementary signs, then the powers which are hidden within us may well terrify us as they appear in such exhibitions, while we will not be surprised at the manner in which many an ordinary mortal appears here as a poet or a prophet--if not as a wicked demon. Nor must it be overlooked that our memory holds vast treasures of knowledge of which we are utterly unconscious until, under certain circumstances, one or the other fact suddenly reappears before our mind's eye. The very fact that we can, by a great effort and continued appeals to our memory, recall at last what was apparently utterly forgotten, proves the presence of such knowledge. A state of intense excitement, of fever or of trance, is peculiarly favorable to the recovery of such hidden treasures, and there can be no doubt that many a medium honestly believes to receive a new revelation, when only old, long forgotten facts return to his consciousness. Generally however, we repeat, nothing is in the spirit that is not in the medium. The American spiritualist conjures up only his own countrymen, and occasionally some world-renowned heroes like Napoleon or Cæsar, Shakespeare or Schiller, while the cosmopolitan German receives visits from men of all countries. Finally it must be borne in mind that, according to an old proverb, we are ever ready to believe what we wish to see or hear, and hence the amazing credulity of the majority of spiritualists. Even skeptics are not free from the influence of this tendency. When Dr. Bell, the eminent physician of Somerville, Mass., investigated these phenomena of modern magic, many years ago, he promptly noticed that the spirits never gave information which was not already in the possession of one or the other person present. Only in a few cases he acknowledged with his usual candor, and at once, at the meeting itself, that a true answer was returned. But when he examined, after his return home, these few exceptional revelations, he discovered