We tried to obtain words by means of the alphabet, but without success. (I will remark in this connection that Eusapia knows neither how to read nor to write.) Pierre Ostwalt was able to write a word with the pencil. It seemed as if an invisible force was guiding his hand. The word he pencilled down was the first name of Mme. Werner, _well known to him_. In spite of all our efforts, we were unable to obtain a single proof of identity. Yet it would have been very easy for Mme. Werner to find one, as she had so solemnly promised us to do. In spite of the announcement by raps that an apparition would appear which we would be permitted to see, we were only able to perceive a dim white form, devoid of precise outline, even when we manipulated the light so as to get almost complete darkness. From this new sitting the following conclusions are deduced: _a._ Fraud cannot explain the phenomena, especially the levitation of the table, the violent blows and shakings given to the door, and the projection of the curtain into the room. _b._ These phenomena are certainly produced by a force emanating from the medium, for they all occur in her immediate neighborhood. _c._ This force is intelligent. But it is possible that this intelligence which obeys our requests is only that of the medium. _d._ Nothing proves that the spirit evoked had any influence. These propositions, however, will be examined and developed one by one in the pages that follow. All the experiments described in this first chapter reveal to us unknown forces in operation. It will be the same in the chapters that follow. These phenomena are so unexplained, so inexplicable, so incredible, that the simplest plan is to deny them, to attribute them all to fraud or to hallucination, and to believe that all the participators are sand-blind. Unfortunately for our opponents, this hypothesis is inadmissible. Let me say here that there are very few men--and above all, women--whose spirit is completely _free_; that is, in a condition capable of accepting, without any preconceived idea, new or unexplained facts. In general, people are disposed to admit only those facts or things for which they are prepared by the ideas they have received, cherished, and maintained. Perhaps there is not one human being in a hundred who is capable of making a mental record of a new impression, simply, freely, exactly, with the accuracy of a photographic camera. Absolute independence of judgment is a rare thing among men. A single fact accurately observed, even if it should contradict all science, is worth more than all the hypotheses. But only the independent minds, free from the classic leading-strings which tie the dogmatists to their chairs, dare to study extra-scientific facts or consider them possible.