Challenger, Professor (Fictitious character) -- Fiction; Spiritualism -- Fiction
“I was much surprised at the information thus received, and naturally
sent for a transcript of that judgment. I found it entered Oct. 21,
1896, and with that evidence of the indebtedness I collected from the
judgment debtor seventy dollars with interest. I question if anyone knew
of that transaction besides the makers of the note and the prothonotary
at Erie. Certainly I did not know about it. I had no reason to suspect
it. The psychic present at that interview could not have known about the
matter, and I certainly collected the money. My father’s voice was
clearly recognisable on that occasion, as it has been on hundreds of
others, and I cite this instance for the benefit of those who measure
everything from a monetary standpoint.”
The most striking, however, of all these posthumous communications are
to be found in “Thirty Years Among the Dead,” by Dr. Wickland of Los
Angeles. This, like many other valuable books of the sort, can only be
obtained in Great Britain at the Psychic Bookshop in Victoria Street, S.
W.
Dr. Wickland and his heroic wife have done work which deserves the very
closest attention from the alienists of the world. If he makes his
point, and the case is a strong one, he not only revolutionises all our
ideas about insanity, but he cuts deep also into our views of
criminology, and may well show that we have been punishing as criminals
people who were more deserving of commiseration than of censure.
Having framed the view that many cases of mania were due to obsession
from undeveloped entities, and having found out by some line of enquiry,
which is not clear to me, that such entities are exceedingly sensitive
to static electricity when it is passed through the body which they have
invaded, he founded his treatment with remarkable results upon this
hypothesis. The third factor in his system was the discovery that such
entities were more easily dislodged if a vacant body was provided for
their temporary reception. Therein lies the heroism of Mrs. Wickland, a
very charming and cultivated lady, who sits in hypnotic trance beside
the subject ready to receive the invader when he is driven forth. It is
through the lips of this lady that the identity and character of the
undeveloped spirit are determined.
The subject having been strapped to the electric chair--the strapping is
very necessary as many are violent maniacs--the power is turned on. It
does not affect the patient, since it is static in its nature, but it
causes acute discomfort to the parasitical spirit, who rapidly takes
refuge in the unconscious form of Mrs. Wickland. Then follow the amazing
conversations which are chronicled in this volume. The spirit is
cross-questioned by the doctor, is admonished, instructed, and finally
dismissed either in the care of some ministering spirit who
superintends the proceedings, or relegated to the charge of some sterner
attendant who will hold him in check should he be unrepentant.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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