It is a vain thing to
urge that science has not admitted this contention, and that the
statement is pure dogmatism. The science which has not examined
the facts has, it is true, not admitted the contention, but its
opinion is manifestly worthless, or at the best of less weight
than that of the humblest student of psychic phenomena. The real
science which has examined the facts is the only valid authority,
and it is practically unanimous. I have made personal appeals to
at least one great leader of science to examine the facts,
however superficially, without any success, while Sir William
Crookes appealed to Sir George Stokes, the Secretary of the Royal
Society, one of the most bitter opponents of the movement, to
come down to his laboratory and see the psychic force at work,
but he took no notice. What weight has science of that sort? It
can only be compared to that theological prejudice which caused
the Ecclesiastics in the days of Galileo to refuse to look
through the telescope which he held out to them.
It is possible to write down the names of fifty professors in
great seats of learning who have examined and endorsed these
facts, and the list would include many of the greatest
intellects which the world has produced in our time--Flammarion
and Lombroso, Charles Richet and Russel Wallace, Willie Reichel,
Myers, Zollner, James, Lodge, and Crookes. Therefore the facts
HAVE been endorsed by the only science that has the right to
express an opinion.
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