Mesmerism, spiritualism, witchcraft, and miracle : a brief treatise showing that mesmerism is a key which will unlock many chambers of mystery / by Allen Putnam.

  • Allen Putnam
Date:
1858
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Mesmerism, spiritualism, witchcraft, and miracle : a brief treatise showing that mesmerism is a key which will unlock many chambers of mystery / by Allen Putnam. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    simple yes or no. When I ceased to question, the chair bowed itself slowly and gently over to the floor, without falling, and thus bade me good-by. All this occurred in broad daylight, and extended through more than five minutes of time. It was as fairly and as accurately seen by me as any object and motion ever were or ever can be. With my own eyes I saw all that, if I ever saw any thing. If I see the paper on which I am now writing, then I saw such motions of that chair. There was no mistake. The medium did not move it; and I did not. Some invisible, intel- ligent power seemed to be there, and to do it. This statement is carefully nmde; and, so long as I con- tinue to hold God and truth to be more worthy of reverence than man and public opinion, my pen and my tongue will maintain its substantial correctness. This case is like the last, excepting that the power exerted upon inert matter seems much greater here. We are now dealing with those rappings and tip- pings which are sometimes ridiculed and sneered at as low and vulgar, —as beneath a spirit's dignity. Are they such, in fact? What did those strange movements of the dumb chair teach % Dumb, can I call it] No; oh! no; because it gave forth more instructive and commanding eloquence than the tongue of any man could have uttered. It spake as never man spake. The chair was instinct with life, intelligence, and power, there in my very presence. I could no more doubt the action of mind in and through that chair, than I can in and through your body or mine, when our lips give utterance to thoughts.
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