Mysterious Psychic Forces: An Account of the Author's Investigations in Psychical Research, Together with Those of Other European SavantsFlammarion, Camille
Philosophy
Mysterious Psychic Forces: An Account of the Author's Investigations in Psychical Research, Together with Those of Other European Savants
Flammarion, Camille
Parapsychology -- Investigation; Spiritualism
At the moment when the table was whirling with a powerful and
irresistible rotation, at a given signal we all lifted our fingers.
Then keeping our hands united by means of the little fingers, and
continuing to form the chain at a height of say an eighth or a quarter
of an inch above the table, we continued our circular movement. _To
our great surprise the table did the same_; it made in this way three
or four turns! We could scarcely believe our good fortune; the
by-standers (witnesses) could not keep from clapping their hands. And
the way in which the rotation took place was as remarkable as the
rotation itself. Once or twice the table stopped following us because
the little accidents and interruptions of our march had withdrawn our
fingers from their regular distance from the top of the table. Once or
twice the table had come to life again--if I may so express
myself--when the turning chain had again got into the right relation
with it. We all had the feeling that each hand had carried along in
its course that portion of the table immediately beneath it.
_Seance of September 29_
We were naturally impatient to submit rotation without contact to a
new test. In the confusion of the first success we forgot to renew and
vary this decisive experiment. When we got to thinking about it
afterwards we saw that it behooved us to do the thing over again with
more care and in the presence of new witnesses; that it was, above
all, important to produce the movement and not merely to continue it,
and to produce it in the form of levitations instead of limiting it to
rotations. Such was the program of our meeting of September 29. Never
was program carried out with greater precision. As a preliminary, we
repeated our successful feat of the 24th. While the table was rotating
rapidly, the interlocked hands were lifted from it, though continuing
to turn above it and form the chain. The table followed, making now
one or two revolutions, and now a half or a quarter turn only. The
success, more or less prolonged, was certain. We confirmed it several
times. But some one might say that, the table being already in motion,
the momentum carried it along mechanically while we imagined it was
yielding to our fluidic force. The objection was absurd, and we would
have challenged anybody to obtain a single quarter of a turn without
forming the chain, however rapid might have been the rotation
imparted. Above all, would we have challenged anyone to renew its
motion when it had been for an instant suspended. However, it is well
in such cases to forestall even absurd objections, however little of
plausibility they may have. And this particular objection might seem
plausible to the inattentive man. It was imperative, then, that we
should produce rotation starting from a state of complete inertia.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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