John William Strutt, third baron Rayleigh, O.M., F.R.S., sometime president of the Royal society and chancellor of the University of Cambridge / by his son Robert John Strutt, fourth baron Rayleigh.

  • Robert Strutt, 4th Baron Rayleigh
Date:
1924
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: John William Strutt, third baron Rayleigh, O.M., F.R.S., sometime president of the Royal society and chancellor of the University of Cambridge / by his son Robert John Strutt, fourth baron Rayleigh. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    watching for opportunities. I have often said that on the unfavour¬ able hypothesis her acting was as wonderful as her conjuring. Seldom, or never, during the long hours we were together at meals or seances did she make an intelligent remark. Her interests seemed to be limited to the spirits and her baby. Mr. Jencken is another difficulty. He, an intelligent man, was a spiritualist, and, I have no reason to doubt, an honest one, before he married his wife. Could she have continued to deceive him ? It seems almost impossible. He bore eye-witness to the baby— at the age of three months I think it was—taking a pencil and writing a spirit message, of which we saw what purported to be a photo¬ graph. If, on the other hand, he had found her out, would he have permitted her to continue her deceptions ? After the death of Home and Mrs. Jencken, so-called physical manifestations of a well attested kind seem rather to have fallen into abeyance, except in the case of Eusapia Paladino. Although I attended one or two of her seances at Cambridge and saw a few curious things, other members of the Society have had so much better opportunities that I pass them by. There is no doubt that she practised deception, but that is not the last word. One of the difficulties which beset our inquiry is the provoking attitude of many people who might render assistance. Some see nothing out of the way in the most marvellous occurrences, and accordingly take no pains over the details of evidence on which everything depends. Others attribute all these things to the devil, and refuse to have anything to say to them. I have sometimes pointed out that if during the long hours of stances we could keep the devil occupied in so comparatively harmless a manner we deserved well of our neighbours. A real obstacle to a decision arises from the sporadic character of the phenomena, which cannot be reproduced at pleasure and submitted to systematic experimental control. The difficulty is not limited to questions where occult influences may be involved. This is a point which is often misunderstood, and it may be worth while to illustrate it by examples taken from the history of science. An interesting case is that of meteorites, discussed by Sir L. Fletcher, formerly Keeper of Minerals in the British Museum, from whose official pamphlet (published in 1896) some extracts may be quoted :—“ 1. Till the beginning of the present [i.e. 19th] century, the fall of stones from the sky was an event, the actuality of which neither men of science nor the mass of the people could be brought to believe in. Yet such falls have been recorded from the earliest times, and the records have occasionally been received as authentic by a whole nation. In general, however, the witnesses cc