843. This case of Professor Flournoy's, then - this classical case, as it may already be fairly termed - may serve here as our culminant example of the free scope and dominant activity of the unassisted subliminal self. The telepathic element in this case, if it exists, is relatively small; what we are watching in Mlle Helene Smith resembles, as I have said, a kind of exaggeration of the submerged constructive faculty, - a hypertrophy of genius - without the innate originality of mind which made even the dreams of R. L. Stevenson a source of pleasure to thousands of readers.

In reference to the main purpose of this work, such cases as these, however curious, can be only introductory to automatisms of deeper moment. In our attempt to trace an evolutive series of phenomena indicating ever higher human faculty, the smallest telepathic incident, - the most trivial proof, if proof it be, of communication received without sensory intermediation from either an incarnate or a discarnate mind, outweighs in importance the most complex ramifications and burgeonings of the automatist's own submerged intelligence.

I pass on, then, to evidence which points, through motor automatisms, to supernormal faculty; and I shall begin by citing in 843 A and B certain experiments (due to Professor Richet and to Mr. G. M. Smith) in the simplest of all forms of motor automatism, viz., table-tilting, with results which only telepathy can explain. It will be seen that these experiments are closely parallel to our simplest sensory experiments in telepathy, as recorded in Chapter VI (Sensory Automatism). And it may be remembered that the transferences of diagrams there described sometimes contained a motor as well as a visual element; - the percipient not only discerning a "mind's eye" picture of the diagram, but also feeling an impulse to draw it.

Experiments like these should be repeated as often as possible. Trivial though they seem, they may with a little care be made absolutely conclusive. Had Professor Richet's friends, for example, been willing to prolong this series, we might have had a standing demonstration of telepathy, reproducible at will.

844. I pass on to some experiments with Planchette, in which an element of telepathy was shown. The account came from Mrs. Alfred Moberly, Tynwald, Hythe, Kent, and was corroborated, with some additional examples, by two other ladies present at the time.

(From Proceedings S.P.R., vol. ii. p. 235).

May 9th, 1884.

The operators were placed out of sight of the rest of the company, who selected - in silence - a photograph, one of an albumful, and fixed their attention on it. We - the operators - were requested to keep our minds a blank as far as possible and follow the first involuntary motion of the Planchette. In three out of five cases it wrote the name or initial or some word descriptive of the selected portrait. We also obtained the signatures to letters selected in the same manner. We both knew perfectly well that we were writing - not the spirits, as the rest of the company persist to this day in believing - but had only the slightest idea what the words might prove to be.

1 Further considerations supporting this view are given in Nouvelles Observations, pp. 232-237. - Editors.

We have tried it since, and generally with some curious result. A crucial test was offered by two gentlemen in the form of a question to which we couldn't possibly guess the answer. "Where's Toosey?" The answer came, "In Vauxhall Road." "Toosey," they explained, was a pet terrier who had disappeared; suspicion attaching to a plumber living in the road mentioned, who had been working at the house and whose departure coincided with Toosey's.

Of course, in the case of the inquiry after the lost dog, we may suppose that the answer given came from the questioner's own mind. Mrs. Moberly and her friends seem to have been quite aware of this; and were little likely to fall into the not uncommon error of asking Planchette, for instance, what horse will win the Derby, and staking, perhaps, some pecuniary consideration on the extremely illusory reply.