SPIRITUALISM A SATANIC DELUSION.
SPIRITUALISM, in its modern phases and manifestations, began in the Fox family, in Hydesville, N. Y., in 1848. It next broke out in Rochester, and took the name of “Rochester Knockings.” The manifestations have increased and spread, until now in every part of the world there are “rapping,” “writing,” “speaking,” and “healing” mediums. In the United States alone, Spiritualists number upward of ten millions. Only thirty-three years have passed since the development of Spiritualism; yet it can now boast of far greater numbers than any religious sect. Who, then, will deny that it is a matter of importance, and that it demands attention? Every candid man who has had a fair chance to witness its phenomena, is compelled to acknowledge that it must be the work of invisible spirits, that have both power and intelligence more than human. Judge Edmunds, in “Year-Book of Spiritualism,” for 1871, makes the following statement in regard to their numbers at that time : “Preparatory to the Ecumenical Council, the Pope desired to learn the religious convictions of Christendom; and the Catholic hierarchy of this country took pains to obtain it through its numerous priesthood; and the result of inquiry was what I obtained and gave to the world; so that it was not our statement of our strength, but that of our adversaries, and they have never contradicted or in any way questioned it. “Within the last two or three months there has been at Baltimore a convocation of the Roman Catholic bishops and archbishops of this country. One of the most interesting subjects for their consideration was the statistical religious condition of our people. Each diocese brought its information; and the result was, that while Romanism and Protestantism combined numbered from eight to nine millions, with some forty-five thousand preachers, Spiritualism numbered between ten and eleven millions with fifty thousand mediums. “Recollect, now, that this estimate comes, not from us, but from our opponents; is not the product of our imaginations, but the result of the severe scrutiny of those who have no sympathy with us. I confess, however, that I believe it to be accurate; all my information goes to confirm it; and my error was in estimating the number too low, lest I might be accused of exaggeration.” On the importance of spiritual phenomena, as demanding attention, we clip the following from one of the leading dailies of the Pacific Coast, which has a circulation of about one hundred thousand. “Until quite recently, science has coldly ignored the alleged phenomena of Spiritualism, and treated Andrew Jackson Davis, Home, and the Davenport brothers, as if they belonged to the common fraternity of showmen and mountebanks. But now there has come a most noteworthy change. We learn from such high authority as the Fortnightly Review that Alfred R. Wallace, F. R. S.; William Crookes, F. R. S., and editor of the Quarterly Journal of Science; W. H. Harrison, F. R. S., and president of the British Ethnological Society, with others occupying a high position in the scientific and literary world, have been seriously investigating the phenomena of spiritism. The report which those learned gentlemen make is simply astounding. There is no fairy tale, no story of myth or miracle, that is more incredible than their narrative. They tell us, in grave and sober speech, that the spirit of a girl who died a hundred years ago appeared to them in visible form. She talked with them, gave them locks of her hair, pieces of her dress, and her autograph. They saw her in bodily presence, felt her person, heard her voice; she entered the room in which they were, and disappeared without the opening of a door. The savants declare that they have had numerous interviews with her under conditions forbidding the idea of trickery or imposture. “Now that men eminent in the scientific world have taken up the investigation, spiritism has entered upon a new phase. It can no longer be treated with silent contempt. Mr. Wallace's articles in the Fortnightly have attracted general attention, and many of the leading English reviews and newspapers are discussing the matter. The New York World devotes three columns of its space to a summary of the last article in the Fortnightly, and declares, editorially, that the ‘phenomena’ thus attested ‘deserve the rigid scientific examination which Mr. Wallace invites for them.’”—S. F. Chronicle.