Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1920 edition. Excerpt: ... CONCLUSION--THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY i IF Stephen is real, if he is what he purports to be, then the probability is that the things he has told Joan and me are, in the main, true. "In the main," I say; because, however truthful the general outline of Stephen's philosophy, the chance of error in detail must not be overlooked. Coloring, to use Stephen's own term, must be reckoned with. By coloring we have thus far meant the unconscious distortion of a message by the receiving station. Are there other circumstances that make for inaccuracy of communication? There are, just as surely as a communicated thought requires a material medium of transmission. Convinced, in the days of the ouija-board, that neither Joan nor I guided the tripod, our hands seeming rather to follow it, I asked Stephen for an explanation. He said: "I confess my inability to make clear to you how this ouija-board is operated. Here, as elsewhere, your limited understanding sets bounds to the knowledge I can bring you. There is involved in communication a psychology and physics new to you concerning which I can tell you little, because of lack of earth terms." Yet repeatedly I raised the question. At the risk of being none too coherent, I submit the following, which summarizes various remarks Stephen has made relative to the material medium employed in transmission of a message: There is a refined form of energy, called by Stephen magnetic consciousness, through the medium of which he is able to impress his thought on Joan's subconscious mind, in some such fashion as I am able to impress my thought on her conscious mind through the medium of atmospheric vibration. But this, we have seen, is not enough; communication results only on release of Stephen's message from Joan's...
