About twenty-five years ago, there was a young lady residing in the Cavendish Square district, daughter of a clergyman, who on account of her clairvoyant and other powers caused considerable sensation. Her wonderful performances created such a stir, that a number of sceptical men requested her presence at a test-seance. At one of their sittings I attended. We were twelve men. No friend or intimate acquaintance of the lady was allowed to be present, and so sceptical were some members of the committee, that the room itself was closely examined, furniture moved, and carpets taken up, to make sure of no hidden contrivances. That evening the experiments were entirely confined to one kind, namely, thought-transference and "willing" without contact. The room was one of the largest drawing-rooms in the district, and we sat in as wide a circle as its size would permit. Two men were always outside to watch the lady and to blindfold her. One experiment was for someone in the room to show the number of a bank-note, of which all present had to think. Then the young lady would be led in by the two watching members and be seated in the middle of the circle. After a minute or two she would tell us that she could see a bank-note, and give us the correct number. She would do the same with cards, titles of a book, name on a visiting card, etc., and in each case the answer given by the blindfolded subject was correct. Sometimes secret tests were performed, as, for instance, half the members would know the real number of a bank-note, while the other half would be told a wrong number to think of. The effect was still correct, for the subject gave as a reply both numbers together. Then complicated actions would be "willed" by the audience, Avhich the subject had to carry out on entering the room. Although no one was allowed to touch her, she went through the performances slowly, but exactly as we desired in our thoughts. I had no opportunity of testing the young lady's clairvoyant power, of which I had heard so much. I only know that her fame spread so much, that someone suggested to her she might give a public performance for "money," of what she had done hitherto from mere love of the mysterious. A hall was engaged, and all those who had witnessed her powers were asked to take tickets. Never was there such a " fiasco." Not a single item on the programme succeeded. She knew not why. But the answer is simple. There were no thoughts to transfer, the audience had come not "to work" by concentrating their thoughts on what she was to do, but they came to be entertained. Had this lady been a fraud, or had she had any accomplice at any of her private performances, she would have taken precautions to succeed in public, but she was genuine.

The experiments just related differ from the usual "willing" games, inasmuch as there was no contact whatever between the subject and any member of the audience. That form of pastime used to be played in drawing-rooms, and usually as follows. One of the party, generally a lady, leaves the room, and the rest determine on something which she is to do on her return—as to take a flower from some specified vase, or to strike some specified note on the piano. She is then recalled, and one or more of the "willers" place their hands lightly on her shoulders. Sometimes nothing happens; sometimes she strays vaguely about; sometimes she moves to the right part of the room and does the thing, or something like the thing, which she has been willed to do. This looked at first like; a promising starting-point for a new branch of scientific inquiry, but it is pretty obvious that the will of the player generally expressed itself in a gentle push. Even when the utmost care is used to maintain the light contact without giving any impulse whatever, it is impossible to lay down the limits of any given subject's sensibility to slight muscular impressions. The difference between one person and another in this respect is very great; on the other hand, the "wilier" may be quite unaware of the pressure he applies according as the movements are on the right track or not, and which afford a kind of "Yes" or "No" indication quite sufficient for a clue.

The experiments of the "Cavendish Square" lady illustrate the power of thought-transmission by persons concentrating on an image, and suggesting it to a subject who has voluntarily placed herself in a "passive" state, a state in which, according to our theory, the subconscious mind is most active, while the conscious or objective or supra-liminal mind is in abeyance. The threshold of consciousness must be displaced so as to enable the subconscious mind to take cognizance of the message.

"We have seen how a number of men impress their thought on a single person. Sometimes, however, the opposite is the case, that a single person can cause a mental image on a number of people. Some people, like the Yogis and Indian Fakirs, possess the power of producing hallucinations in the minds of other persons, simply by forming pictures in their own minds, which they mentally impress upon the minds of the spectators, not upon one only, but, it is said, upon hundreds and thousands at once, making what is known as a collective hallucination.

Thought-transference or "telepathic" communication is just as much a suggestion to the subjective mind as is oral speech. Indeed, telepathic suggestion is often far more effective than objective language. "Telepathy" is primarily the communion of subjective minds, or rather it is the normal means of communication between subjective minds. The reason of the apparent rarity of its manifestations is that it requires exceptional conditions to bring its results above the threshold of consciousness. There is every reason to believe that the subjective minds of men can and do habitually hold communion with one another when not the remotest perception of the fact is communicated to the objective intelligence. It may be that such communion is not general among men; but it is certain that it is held between those who, from any cause, are en rapport. It is reasonable to suppose, inasmuch as it is the subconscious mind of the percipient that is to be impressed, the message must proceed from the subconscious mind of. the agent; in other words, the subjective or passive condition being a necessity on the part of the percipient or subject, an analogous condition is a necessity on the part of the agent or operator.

The old mesmerists used to concentrate their attention and exercise all their will-power to get their subject magnetised. By their passes, fixed gazing and mental concentration, they almost, if not entirely, hypnotised themselves by the same act by which they mesmerised their subjects. This absorption of the mesmerisers put their subconscious mind in activity, and so it was possible, without a word being spoken, for the mesmerised subjects to receive the impression of the thoughts of the operators.

Thought-transference in those days was a common phenomenon at mesmeric seances, whereas hypnotists practising the method of suggestion, that is to say, looking on more or less indifferently while the subject hypnotises" himself," none of the results are produced nowadays.

Thus Professor Bernheim, one of the originators of the "suggestion" theory, says: "I have tried to produce phenomena of thought-transmission in hundreds of cases, but without success. I have found nothing definite. If thought-transmission exists, it is a phenomenon of another order, which has still to be studied. It has nothing in common with the phenomenon of suggestion." This concluding sentence gives us the explanation.

Moll goes farther than Bernheim. To him, what cannot be explained by the theory of suggestion must be the result of deception or fraud. He says: "In many of the experiments in thought-transference the passive party, i.e., the recipient—was first of all hypnotised, as this is supposed to make the transference easier. But experiments have also been made when both persons were quite awake. Sometimes, also, both were hypnotised. We can understand that the recipient being in hypnosis largely increases the number of successes, because a hypnotic has a much greater tendency to pay attention to the smallest sign made by the experimenter, than a person who is awake has. But it is just in this that one of the chief sources of error lies, because what in reality depends on the influence produced by such insignificant signs is very often taken to be the result of telepathic influence. A certain amount of practice, perhaps also a special capacity, enables some persons to perceive signs that are so slight that others overlook them. This is particularly the case with hypnotics; their whole attention is so fixed—possibly subconsciously—on these signs, that they are able to perceive signs of the existence of which the spectators have no notion. The signs can be made in ways that differ very considerably. Anyone who has drawn a card and looks at it hard, is inclined to make some corresponding movement with his lips. Sometimes when the thought-reader is taking a wrong direction the person who is concentrating his thoughts, or often someone else who is present, will involuntarily give a sign that at once tells the practised thought-reader that he is on the wrong track. A loud breath, for example, will do this. A rapid and distinctly audible inspiration will very often tell the thought-reader that he is making a mistake. It is not necessary even that the thought-reader should be able to see when he is in direct contact with the subject, because such direct contact enables him to feel the movements that are made. But, since the involuntary movements are also audible, we can understand that the thought-reader can solve the problem that is set him correctly, even when his eyes are bandaged and he is not in contact with the subject experimented on. Such a case is not necessarily an instance of telepathy, although uncritical experimenters would probably ascribe it thereto."

Dr. Moll concludes with the assurance: "I have never observed anything of an occult nature occur during my own experiments, provided the necessary precautions were taken."

Quite so, but thought-transference is not an occult phenomenon, and we are not dealing with professional thought-readers, but with experiments conducted by scientific men with the strictest precautions; men who have no wish to deceive themselves, and would think it dishonourable to deceive others.

Undoubtedly communication is possible both in the waking state and the hypnotic state between mind and mind otherwise than through the known channels of the senses. Telepathy is, in effect, a convenient phrase under which we group all those unaccountable phenomena which we attribute, some rightly, some perhaps wrongly, to the action of mind on mind where the two minds do not communicate by the spoken word or by signs or symbols of any visible kind.

It is, of course, impossible for us to know the processes employed in the ordinary communication of subjective minds. The messages that telepathy conveys appear to be impressions which in some cases raise ideas and in some cases do not raise ideas.

The degree of clearness of the mental image is largely determined by the intensity of the thought compressed in the act of its transference, whether intentional or not. The state of clearness of the activity displayed by the operative functions of the mind that receives the message, will also affect the result. This clearness will chiefly be determined by the state or degree of quietude indulged during the thinking.

The impression made upon the recipient brain is transferred outwards. In other words, there is a hallucination produced, and that hallucination will vary according to the general experiences and knowledge of the recipient. That is why the same message or impression reaching different persons may produce different hallucinations, and be interpreted differently.

If we assume that a nerve-force or some other still unknown energy can radiate from the brain, and that such force may travel and strike a brain, which is in tune with it, and is not functioning at the time, that is to say, is in a passive state, we have bridged the difficulty of "telepathy." For that an impression striking a passive brain should produce an image which is transferred outward is nothing uncommon, and is often caused by other stimuli—electrical, chemical and mechanical—as evidenced in experiments upon animals. Various forms of auto-intoxication may supply the stimulus in certain diseases, as for instance in migraine, epilepsy and hysteria, in which subjective visual phenomena are of frequent occurrence, ranging from flashes of light, plays of colours, to actual hallucinations. The same may also be produced by the alkaloids present in certain poisonous drugs introduced into the system, such as opium, etc. Again, it may be due to some subtle stimulus acting from one part of the brain on another during certain states of consciousness, as in dreams; why not then from one brain to another?

Let it be granted that whensoever any action takes place in the brain, a chemical change of its substance takes place also; or, in other words, an atomic movement occurs; and let it be granted that no brain action can take place without creating a wave of undulation in the all-embracing ether; why might not such undulations, when meeting with and falling upon duly sensitive substances, produce impressions? And these impressions are "felt," not thought of.

Such oblique methods of communicating between brain and brain would probably but rarely take effect. The influences would be too minute and subtle to tell upon any brain already preoccupied by action of its own, or on any but brains of extreme, perhaps morbid, susceptibility. But if, indeed, there be radiating from living brains any such streams of vibratory movements these may well have an effect even without speech, and be perhaps the modus operandi of "the little flash, the mystic hint" of the poet—of that dark and strange sphere of half-experiences which the world has never been without. It is quite open to surmise some sort of analogy to the familiar phenomena of the transmission and reception of vibratory energy. A swinging pendulum suspended from a solid support will throw into synchronous vibration another pendulum attached to the same support if the period of oscillation of the two be the same; the medium of transmission here being the solid material of the support. One tuning-fork or string in unison with another will communicate its impulses through the medium of the air. Glowing particles of a gas, acting through the medium of the luminiferous ether, can throw into sympathetic vibration cool molecules of the same substance at a distance. It is also said that a permanent magnet brought into a room will throw any surrounding iron into a condition similar to its own, though by what means of communication is not known. Similarly, we may conceive, if we please, that the vibration of molecules of brain-stuff may be communicated to an intervening medium, and so pass under certain circumstances from one brain to another, with a corresponding simultaneity of impressions.

However, when we admit that all thought is connected with cellular vibrations, we comprehend easily by analogy what happens in mental suggestion at a distance; the communicating cerebral zones may be compared with two pianos or two harps which vibrate in unison, or to two tuning-forks which give the same note, and of which the one repeats spontaneously the vibrations given by the other; they may be again compared with two wireless telegraphy-stations more or less perfectly attuned.

If we suppose two men in whom the cerebral cells vibrate harmoniously, whether in consequence of a bond of kinship or friendship, or because one of them, the magnetiser, has imposed his rhythm on the other, the magnetised, their brains may perhaps be in the same conditions to each other as two tuning-forks; all live thought which causes vibration of the one is able to make the other vibrate without impressing the various brains which are on the line of the vibrating wave. The brain of the subject impressed plays the role of resonator; the impression produced will arrive much more easily at the consciousness of the subject as the latter is less disturbed by other impressions. That is why it is important to choose for experiments of this character a time when we believe the subject to be disengaged or asleep.

In his Presidential Address on Medicine, delivered at the annual meeting of the British Medical Association, 1905, Dr. Maudsley expresses himself as follows:

"Without subscribing to the strange stories of telepathy, of the solemn apparition of a person somewhere at the moment of his death a thousand miles away, of the unquiet ghost haunting the scenes of its bygone hopes and endeavours, one may ask whether two brains cannot be so tuned in sympathy as to transmit and receive a subtle transfusion of mind without the mediation of sense. Considering what is implied by the human brain with its countless millions of cells, its complexities of minute structure, its innumerable chemical compositions, and the condensed forces in its microscopic and ultramicroscopic elements, the whole a sort of microcosm of cosmic forces to which no conceivable compound of electric batteries is comparable; considering, again, that from an electric station waves of energy radiate through viewless air to be caught up by a fit receiver a thousand miles distant, it is not inconceivable that the human brain may send off still more subtle waves to be accepted and interpreted by the fitly tuned receiving brain. Is it, after all, mere fancy that a mental atmosphere of effluence emanates from one person to affect another, either soothing sympathetically or irritating antipathetically ?"

If the passive condition of the agent is necessary for the successful transmission of telepathic suggestions or communications, or if it is the best condition for such a purpose, it follows that the more perfectly that condition is attained, the more successful will be the experiment. As before observed, the condition of natural sleep is manifestly the most perfectly passive condition attainable. It is necessarily perfect, for all the objective senses are locked in slumber, and the subjective mind is free to act in accordance with the laws which govern it. Hence most messages and impressions are received in light sleep, or on just going off to sleep, or resting in a chair in that passive state that is very much akin to sleep.

This theory explains why, if we act on a sensitive subject previously hypnotised or magnetised, we can provoke from a distance during natural sleep, visual hallucinations or dreams so powerful as to cause awakening. We are able to act at a distance, but at an agreed time, on a waking subject who is, by the mere fact that it has been arranged, in a state of expectation favourable to suggestion.

The production of sleep in the subject at a distance is one of the latest attested marvels of hypnotism. The long series of experiments made in France by Professor Richet and Professor Janet would appear to attest this power.

Another phenomenon that may be explained on the hypothesis just described is "prevision," and this is a subject on which I can speak from my own experiences, having a special disposition that way. I am by nature a good visualiser, and whatever I have had to learn by heart, having a defective verbal memory, had to be visualised in some form. I could never learn the course of a nerve from the anatomy-book, but I could remember its position, origin and direction, once I had seen it in a dissection, or diagrammatic representation. Similiarly, although endowed with a bad memory for names, the thought of a person would at once call up a mental image of that person. The "prevision" to which I am disposed, in common with many other people, is that sometimes when I think of a person—generally one that I have not seen for years, or who is most unlikely to pass the locality in which I am moving at the time—that I meet this very person soon afterwards coming around the corner or out of a house; in short, under conditions which preclude the possibility of my having seen him previously, even subconsciously. Of course, often these previsions may be mere coincidences, but the frequency with which I have experienced them leads me to think there may be some deeper reason for them. For in all these cases I experienced first of all a " feeling" that Imight meet a certain person, or a sensation that I have actually seen them so far away that my eyes could not possibly see, then I may reason that it is most unlikely to meet that person, and then finally he stands before me. As someone has pointed out we have here something analogous to what takes place in, the detectors of the Hertzian waves in the Marconi system of telegraphy; when the known person comes within a certain radius his approach is in a way felt, but he is not identified, because this method of feeling is outside of the habitual action of our senses, and therefore, as in the case of other phenomena of this nature, it passes unperceived, because our attention is not yet adapted to receive it.