The seven principles of man / By Annie Besant.

  • Annie Besant
Date:
1892
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The seven principles of man / By Annie Besant. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    80/96 page 76
    There is another class of facts: that of astral ap- pearances, whether of living or dead persons, wraiths, apparitions, doubles, ghosts, etc., etc. Of course the know-everything person of the end of the nineteenth century will sniff with lofty disdain at the mention of such silly superstitions. But sniffs do not abolish facts, and it is a question of evidence. . The weight -of evidence is enormously on the side of such appear- ances, and in all ages of the world human testimony has borne witness to their reality. The enquirer whose demand for proof I have in view may well set to work to gather first-hand evidence on this head. Of course, if he is afraid of being laughed at, he had better leave the matter alone, but if he is robust enough to face the ridicule of the superior person, he will be amazed at the evidence he will collect from persons who have themselves come into contact with ~ astral forms. ‘‘Illusions! hallucinations!” the su- perior person will say. But calling names settles nothing. Illusions to which the vast majority of the human race bear witness are at least worthy of study, if human testimony is to be taken as of any worth. There must be something which gives rise to this unanimity of testimony in all ages of the world, testi- mony which is found to-day among civilized people, amid railways and electric lights, as among ‘“‘bar- barous races.” The testimony of millions of Spiritualists to the reality of astral forms cannot be left out of considera- tion. When all cases of fraud and imposture are ‘discounted there remain phenomena that cannot be ‘dismissed as fraudulent, and that can be examined by any persons who care to give time and trouble to— ‘the investigation. There is no necessity to employ a
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3