This may be true; but it is also true that where the "character and habits" of a supposed spirit are known to the medium, or to those who are in telepathic rapport with him, simulation of that character and those habits is perfectly easy to the expert medium. The more generally the character and habits are known, the less evidential value is to be attached to their reproduction. Our author then proceeds:-- "Without doubt the spirit can give the proofs if asked, but he does not always do so, unless it is agreeable to him, and generally the asking wounds him; for this reason it should be avoided. In leaving his body the spirit has not laid aside his susceptibility; he is wounded by any question tending to put him to the proof. _It is such questions as one would not dare to propose to him, were he living_, for fear of overstepping the bounds of propriety; why, then, should there be less regard after his death? Should a man enter a drawing-room and decline to give his name, should we insist, at all hazards, that he should prove his identity by exhibiting his titles, under the pretext that there are impostors? Would he not, assuredly, have the right to remind his interrogator of the rules of good breeding? This is what the spirits do, either by not replying or by withdrawing. Let us make a comparison. Suppose the astronomer Arago during his life had presented himself in a house where no one knew him, and he had been thus addressed; 'You say you are Arago; but as we do not know you, please prove it by answering our questions; solve this astronomical problem; tell us your name, your Christian name, those of your children, what you did such and such a day, at such an hour, etc.' What would he have answered? Well, as a spirit he will do just what he would have done during his lifetime; and other spirits do the same."