“All that I can say is that a ball of fire came out of clear sky quite slowly and destroyed part of the foliage of an apple tree under conditions precluding any human agency.” The above is Calvin Muir’s account. To an occultist the connection between the Power of Fire and the violation of a Cromlech is convincing, but it is difficult to conceive in what manner the Powers were propitiated. Scientific people have suggested slow-drying phosphorus solution as an explanation of an apparently supernatural occurrence. Muir, on the other hand, was positive that it was a true manifestation of a fire elemental, and that the old man who knew about “owl blasting” was not an interested or malevolent party in a peasant’s plot. So far, no hypothesis that will serve as a rational explanation of all the facts has ever been advanced. FOOTNOTES: [38] Mr. Gambier Bolton, who was present, assures me of the reality of this inexplicable incident. [39] The really genuine fire medium can hold a red-hot coal or glowing asbestos from the gas fire on the palm of the hand for two minutes. No shorter duration of time should be accepted. CHAPTER IX POSSESSION From time to time we come across cases of demoniacal possession. In these there is apparently the permanent or temporary domination of the soul or mind of the victim by an evil spirit or demon of alien personality. Cases of possession are invariably claimed as “proofs” of the existence of spirit intelligence, and in cases where the possession is nominally at least a mild one the possessed are sometimes quite proud of it. It is, in fact, exhibited as quaint and dreadful deformity would be--the phrase is exact. It is a mental deformity. Now, it must be understood that the psychologists have of late years made enormous strides in their knowledge of the vagaries of the subconscious mind. Possession, like “shell shock,” is in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred a perfectly curable disease. It springs from a perversion of the subconscious state, can be diagnosed by psychoanalysis and eradicated by transference or by suggestion. The processes of Christian exorcism often attained the same result. The wise priest was able to “cast out demons,” and medical science of to-day, working by analytical methods rather than by rule-of-thumb, achieves the same results. Whether one accepts the scientific theory that these “possessions” are but multiple personalities and that there may be several mental personalities in the one mind, or whether one believes the idea of spirit influence, does not much matter. In any case the doors of the mind can be firmly locked on either spirit or mental disease. Possession is curable--if the patient really desires to be cured.