Mediums Rare Read Online Free Page A
Author: Richard Matheson
young woman altered the course of American history?
CELEBRITIES
So great was the interest in Spiritualism in the middle and latter half of the nineteenth century that some outstanding mediums became internationally known figures.
One of these was Andrew Jackson Davis.
Born in 1826, Jackson became noted for his clairvoyant ability, at one time giving an accurate description, cellar to garret, of a distant house.
He heard voices which imparted medical and spiritual counsel.
He—apparently—transmitted an extended discourse by the celebrated Greek physician Galen.
His “dictations” from the other side lasted from forty minutes to four hours, often spoken in languages and displaying a Biblical and scientific knowledge he knew nothing about in his conscious state.
Fourteen months and one hundred and fifty seven sittings resulted in a 782-page book entitled
The Divine Revelation
.
The book included an enormous amount of material from half a dozen sciences including astronomy, geology and archaeology.
All this from an uneducated, nineteen-year-old boy.
Another famous medium of this period was a Universalist preacher named John Murray Spear who became well-known for his gift at spiritual healing.
On one occasion, directed (according to him) by the spirits of Swedenborg and Benjamin Franklin, he was “led” sixteen miles without knowing why, finally ending up at the house of a woman recently struck by lightning.
His presence gave her immediate relief.
In addition to his continued healing accomplishments, Spear also delivered public lectures while entranced.
The Koons family of Ohio became famous briefly for the so-called Spirit Room which—under spiritual “advisement”—they constructed in their house.
The room was in a log cabin twelve by fourteen feet with a seven foot ceiling.
It was furnished with seating for twenty people in addition to two tables and a rack for such instruments as a bass drum, two fiddles, a guitar, a French horn, a triangle, and a tambourine.
Conducting public seances, the mediumship of the Koons produced “spirit” concerts as well as lengthy communications from the Other World.
Reports indicated that the instruments, playing by themselves, gyrated wildly above the heads of the spectators.
The Davenport brothers became widely known when, at the ages of sixteen and fourteen, they appeared in a public séance during which hands and arms were materialized and floating instruments played by themselves—despite the fact that both boys were carefully bound with ropes.
These séances were repeated for many years.
Famous author Richard Burton (translator of the
Arabian Nights)
attended four of the Davenports’ séances and reported seeing musical instruments fly and play and feeling a “dry, hot and rough” materialized hand pull at his moustache and pat his head.
Arguably the greatest physical medium in the history of Spiritualism, however, was Scotch medium Daniel Douglas Home.
Home counted among his supporters Count Tolstoy, Napoleon III and the Empress Eugenie as well as many of the crowned heads of Europe.
Literary figures who sat with him included William Thackeray, Anthony Trollope, Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Alexander Dumas.
Of Home’s work, the famous British physicist, Sir William Crookes, wrote:
The phenomena I am prepared to attest are so extraordinary and so directly oppose the most firmly rooted articles of scientific belief—amongst others, the ubiquity and invariable action of the force of gravitation—that, even now, on recalling the details of what I witnessed, there is an antagonism in my mind between reason which pronounces it to be scientifically impossible and the consciousness that my senses, both of touch and sight, are not lying witnesses
.
D. D. Home
February 22, 1867
London, England
T he four men—Lord Adare, Charles Wynne, Mr. Saal and Mr. Hurt—stood around the grand piano, trying with all their strength to push it down.
The piano
CELEBRITIES
So great was the interest in Spiritualism in the middle and latter half of the nineteenth century that some outstanding mediums became internationally known figures.
One of these was Andrew Jackson Davis.
Born in 1826, Jackson became noted for his clairvoyant ability, at one time giving an accurate description, cellar to garret, of a distant house.
He heard voices which imparted medical and spiritual counsel.
He—apparently—transmitted an extended discourse by the celebrated Greek physician Galen.
His “dictations” from the other side lasted from forty minutes to four hours, often spoken in languages and displaying a Biblical and scientific knowledge he knew nothing about in his conscious state.
Fourteen months and one hundred and fifty seven sittings resulted in a 782-page book entitled
The Divine Revelation
.
The book included an enormous amount of material from half a dozen sciences including astronomy, geology and archaeology.
All this from an uneducated, nineteen-year-old boy.
Another famous medium of this period was a Universalist preacher named John Murray Spear who became well-known for his gift at spiritual healing.
On one occasion, directed (according to him) by the spirits of Swedenborg and Benjamin Franklin, he was “led” sixteen miles without knowing why, finally ending up at the house of a woman recently struck by lightning.
His presence gave her immediate relief.
In addition to his continued healing accomplishments, Spear also delivered public lectures while entranced.
The Koons family of Ohio became famous briefly for the so-called Spirit Room which—under spiritual “advisement”—they constructed in their house.
The room was in a log cabin twelve by fourteen feet with a seven foot ceiling.
It was furnished with seating for twenty people in addition to two tables and a rack for such instruments as a bass drum, two fiddles, a guitar, a French horn, a triangle, and a tambourine.
Conducting public seances, the mediumship of the Koons produced “spirit” concerts as well as lengthy communications from the Other World.
Reports indicated that the instruments, playing by themselves, gyrated wildly above the heads of the spectators.
The Davenport brothers became widely known when, at the ages of sixteen and fourteen, they appeared in a public séance during which hands and arms were materialized and floating instruments played by themselves—despite the fact that both boys were carefully bound with ropes.
These séances were repeated for many years.
Famous author Richard Burton (translator of the
Arabian Nights)
attended four of the Davenports’ séances and reported seeing musical instruments fly and play and feeling a “dry, hot and rough” materialized hand pull at his moustache and pat his head.
Arguably the greatest physical medium in the history of Spiritualism, however, was Scotch medium Daniel Douglas Home.
Home counted among his supporters Count Tolstoy, Napoleon III and the Empress Eugenie as well as many of the crowned heads of Europe.
Literary figures who sat with him included William Thackeray, Anthony Trollope, Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Alexander Dumas.
Of Home’s work, the famous British physicist, Sir William Crookes, wrote:
The phenomena I am prepared to attest are so extraordinary and so directly oppose the most firmly rooted articles of scientific belief—amongst others, the ubiquity and invariable action of the force of gravitation—that, even now, on recalling the details of what I witnessed, there is an antagonism in my mind between reason which pronounces it to be scientifically impossible and the consciousness that my senses, both of touch and sight, are not lying witnesses
.
D. D. Home
February 22, 1867
London, England
T he four men—Lord Adare, Charles Wynne, Mr. Saal and Mr. Hurt—stood around the grand piano, trying with all their strength to push it down.
The piano
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