Introduction to science / by Alex Hill.

  • Alexander Hill
Date:
1900
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Introduction to science / by Alex Hill. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    believes in ghosts is fain to answer in the words of the cautious Scot, “ Weel, I wun’na say that such things cud’na be.” No wise man would assert that ghosts cannot be. But a man trained in science has great difficulty in believing in the ghost as it is always described to him. Some years ago a much-haunted house in Buckinghamshire was placed at the disposal of the Society for Psychical Re¬ search. No house could have afforded a better opportunity for the patron of ghosts to meet one of his clients. The ghost gave the best of references. Three clergymen vouched for it, one in a long affidavit. These gentlemen also asserted that the ghost was perfectly punctual and regular in its habits. Every night as the clock struck twelve it mounted the creak¬ ing stairs, entered the haunted room, deposited its pack on the floor (it was the ghost of a murdered pedlar), and uttered its formula—“ Three stages more, and then comes death ! ” Several Cambridge men, including the writer, spent a solitary night in the room with the blood-stained floor—the blood was found on examination to be soluble in benzol, but that is a scientific detail—yet no ghost appeared. Not that the villagers’ belief in their ghost was in the least shaken by what might be regarded as a base refusal on its part to substantiate their story. They were not even sur¬ prised at the disappointment of the seekers after truth. “What was the use,” they asked, “of sending men from Cambridge to see a ghost? Why, they don’t believe in any¬ thing in Cambridge! ” Ghosts only show themselves to persons who are prejudiced in their favour, and at the Universities such a pre-possession is uncommon, it is to be hoped. The credulity implied by the villagers’ word “ believe ” is not a scientific attitude of mind. Now, without for a moment admitting that a scientific training deadens the senses to sights and sounds which the unscientific can perceive, we assert that loyalty to science compels us, whether we can or cannot see and hear the ghost, to ask for an explanation of its power of rendering itself visible and audible. Emission of light and production
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