Spiritualism

Spiritualism, in a philosophical sense, denotes the opposite of materialism, and maintains that over and above the matter that composes the human body there is a further informing principle that enables the body to perform its functions. But in a more popular sense it denotes the doctrine that living people can hold converse with disembodied spirits, chiefly by the intermediary of certain peculiarly gifted persons called mediums. This doctrine, like many other startling things, originated in America, where in 1848 Mr. Fox of New York, with his family, was disturbed by sundry rappings, which practice enabled them to decipher as messages from spirit-land. In 1850 Mr. Home made further developments, such as levitation, etc. Most of the phenomena of rapping, table-turning, spirit-photography, spirit-writing, and the like, can be and have been produced by ordinary means, and much imposture has undoubtedly been practised by some mediums. But after all deduction made there appears to be a residuum of phenomena thus far unexplained by scientific examination, though what this may imply is a matter of conjecture. Among men of trained minds who have become converts to spiritualism are Mr. A. R. Wallace, Mr. Crookes, F.R.S., and Professor De Morgan. There are quantities of spiritualistic literature extant.