Cesare Lombroso - After death—what? Spiritistic phenomena and their interpretation.

AFTER DEATHWHAT?

SPIRITISTIC PHENOMENA AND THEIR INTERPRETATION

CESARE LOMBROSO

CENIUt," "THI PEUAU

RinJertJ iate Englrth ij WILLIAM SLOAKE KENNEDY

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BOSTON

SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY

PUBUSHERS

Copyright, 1909

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PREFACE

When, at the close of a career richer in fierce logomachy and struggle than in victory

in which I have figured as a champion of the new trend of human thought in psychiatry and criminal anthropology, I began investigations into the phenomena of spiritism and afterwards determined to publish a book on the subject, my nearest friends rose against me on every side, crying, " You will ruin an honorable reputation,

a career in which, after so many contests, you had finally reached the goal; and all for a theory which the whole world not only repudiates, but, worse still, thinks to be ridiculous."

But all this talk did not make me hesitate for a single moment. I thought it my predestined end and way and my duty to crown a life passed in the struggle for great ideas by entering the lists for this desperate cause, the most hotly contested and perhaps most persistently mocked at idea of the times. It seemed to me a duty that, up to the very last of the few days now remaining to me, I should imflinchingly stand my ground in the very thick of the fight, where rise the most menacing obstructions and where throng the most infuriated foes.

And one cannot in conscience blame these opponents, because spiritistic phenomena, as commonly conceived, seem designed to break down that grand idea of monism which is one of the most precious fruits of our culture, retrieved by so sore a conflict from the clutches of superstition and prejudice; and because, furthermore, when contrasted with the precision of experimental phenomena always accurately tallying with each other in time and space spiritistic observations and experiments, so frequently varying with different mediums, according to the time of day and according to the mental state of the participants in the seance, notwithstanding their frequent repetition and reinforcement by accurate mechanical instruments, and however carefully sifted out by the most severely scientific experimenters (one need only name such men as Crookes, Richet, Lodge, James, Hyslop), are always wrapped in a dim atmosphere of imcertainty and show a tinge of mediaeval science. But note this well, that, however doubtful each separate case may appear, in the ensemble they form such a compact web of proof as wholly to baffle the scalpel of doubt.

In psychical matters we are very far from having attained scientific certainty. But the spiritistic hypothesis seems to me like a continent incompletely submerged by the ocean, in which are visible in the distance broad islands

raised above the general level, and which only in the vision of the scientist are seen to coalesce in one immense and compact body of land, while the shallow mob laughs at the seemingly audacious hypothesis of the geographer.

Cesare Lombroso.

TuKiN, October 29^ 1908.

CONTENTS

Chaftbk ^*"

I HypNonc Phkmoiona

ERRATA

Page 8,1. 29, for Hedenhain read Heidenhain.

Page 63, L 14, for *^komo invisiMe" read "invisible man.**

Page 66^ 1. 6, for Galeotto read Galeotti.

Pages 72, X20, 332, for Fairland read Fairlamb.

Page 178,1. II, for Berret read Barrett.

Page 219,1. 19, for Bee read Dee.

Page 221, read Pelham was Pellew [not Robinson].

Page 244,1. 29, for '< Piddington " read Piddington.

Page 250,11. 9, 10, read Hudson's Law of Psychic Phenomena.

Page 250,11. 29, 30, for Phys. read Psych, Research.

Page 311,1. 21, for Dialect read Dialectical.

Page 325,1. 4, for the Earth read India,

Page 332,1. II, for Vezzano read Venzano.

Page 337,1. 50, for Archives read Annates.

Page 353,11. 1-6, for 717 read 593 and for 43 read 83.

}

CONTENTS

Chaptul Page

I Hypnotic Phenomkna i

II Experiments with Eusapia. 39

III Experiments with Accurate ScnMimc Instru

ments 7'

IV TKe Power and AcnoN of Mediums .. 103

V Mediums and Magicians in Savage Tribes 130

VI LomATIONS OF THE FOWER OF THE MEDIUM. 156

VII Phantasms and Apparitions of the Dead .. 185

VIII Belief in the Spirits of the Dead among

Savages and among Ancient Peoples . 304

IX iDENTmr 231

X Doubles 346

XI Transcendental Photographs and Plastiquks . 358

XII Haunted Houses 369

XIII Tricks, Txlepathv, the UNOONsaous, etc . 304

xrv Biology of the Spmrrs 339

Page CiSARB LoBfBROSO FrotUispieu

Figs. 1-6 13

" 7-10 15

'^ 11-14 14

** 19-31 16

Fig. 33 Eosapia Paladino in 1907 opp. 38

'* 33 Motion of a Table not Due to the Direct

Contact of Hands ** 43

** 34 From a Photograph of Complete Levita

tion of the Table by Easapia '^ 44

'' 35 Diagram of Table and Sitters 67

** 36 Mediumistic Sculpturesthat to the Left by John King (Eusapia), and that to the Right by Nicol6 R.> 1905... opp. 70

'' 37 Plaster Cast of Impression in Clay of

Medium's Foot '* 73

*' 38 BasHrelief of her Face executed by Eusapia

(Chiaja) . " 73

'' 39 Transcendental Sculpture: Bas-reliefs of

Eusapia's Face and Hand .... ''74

'' 30 Experiment with Cardiograph and Recording Cylinder 73

** 31 Cardiographic Tracings by *'John" .... 74

** 33 Cardiographic Tracing by Experimenter . 75

'' 33 Apparatus for Registering Movements of the Medium. Rotating Cylinder under Bell-glass 76

** 34 Experiment with the Manometer 79

it it

xii ILLUSTRATIONS

Page Fig. 35 Impnnt of fingers, the Result of Radioactivity off. 84

" 36 line traced by a Supernumerary Phantasmal Hand 87

'^37 Synchronous Registration of Marks .... 88 ** 38 Eusapia in Trance (Spasmodic Laughter,

etc.) ^. 113

'* 39 Magnesium Light Photography etc... ''114

40 Eusapia after the Stance ''116

41 Flowers drawn with Colored Crayons '^ 130 ** 42a Mediumistic Designs by Machner ... ''12a '' 42^ Mediumistic Designs by Machner ... "124 " 42 ^ Mediumistic Designs by Machner .. '^126 '* 43 Experiment with Ring and KLnotted String '* 128 '' 44 Experiment with Knots formed in a Sealed

String 127

'* 45 The Priestess U3dtshigitshi during a Prediction o^. 138

" 46 Kaffir Priestess "140

" 47 Experiment in Levitation with Zuccariiii " 168 '^ 48 Luminous Bands as seen in Stances with

the Randones ''188

" 49 Phantasmal Portrait of Katie King .. ''194 " 50 Phantasmal Photograph of Yolanda, and