Page:The Naturalisation of the Supernatural.pdf/64

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44
Experimental Thought Transference

There was a considerable correspondence in some of the other experiments in this first series. The same ladies made a second series of fifteen trials in October and November, 1906, and here also the results showed a remarkable correspondence between the agent's thoughts and the percipient's impressions. The whole record is worth studying for the light thrown upon the nature of the percipient's impressions and on the conditions which apparently favour success in experiments of this kind.[1]

As already stated we have reproduced many of the effects ascribed by the earlier mesmerists to "community of sensation" between the operator and subject. Amongst other remarkable effects which may be ascribed to telepathy, are the inhibition of speaking on the part of the hypnotised subject by the silent will of the experimenter, and the production of sleep at a distance. The classic experiments of this character in recent times are those conducted by Professor Pierre Janet, Dr. Gibert, and later by Professor Richet, with Madame B.[2]

On the hypothesis of telepathy, the marvel of sleep at a distance may of course be explained without recourse to subtle fluids and visibly radiant will-power. But in the early days of the experimenting in this subject carried on by the Society

  1. Proceedings, S. P. R., vol. xxi, p. 60.
  2. See Proceedings, S. P. R., vol. iv., p. 133 seqq.; vol. v. pp. 43–45; Revue de l' Hypnotisme, February, 1888, etc.