Here, then, we find the supreme test applied,--the best conditions possible, as prescribed by one of the ablest and most thoughtful writers on the subject. It will be observed that he is not blind to the possibilities of telepathy, and counts it as a factor in the case. "Of whose thought could this be the reflection?" he asks triumphantly. "No one knew the fact; the captain himself had forgotten the debt." It must be admitted that if this test is conclusive, their case has been proved a thousand times over. But in view of what is now known of the laws of telepathy, it is self-evident that it proves nothing. Telepathy, as we have again and again repeated, is the communion of two or more subjective minds. It is not that of which we are consciously thinking that the subjective mind of the medium perceives. Doubtless the captain had forgotten, objectively, all about the loan. It was a very small amount, and the lieutenant had been dead two years. But the subjective mind of the captain, which remembers all things, great and small, could not forget it, and it was telepathed to the subjective mind of the medium. Besides, there was another very potent agency at work to bring this loan into prominence. We have already seen, in former chapters, that the normal function of the subjective mind is to watch over and protect the life of the individual. It is the strongest instinct of all animate nature. The protection of the material interests of the individual is as much a part of the function of the subjective mind as the protection of his life. Indeed, the promotion of the one is but a means to secure the other. It was, therefore, simple obedience to the first law of nature that prompted the subjective mind of the captain to thrust this loan upon the attention of those present and thus secure its payment.