Vout Peters, one of the most famous, is a diligent collector
of old books and an authority upon the Elizabethan drama; while
Mr. Dickinson, another very remarkable discerner of spirits, who
named twenty-four correctly during two meetings held on the same
day, is employed in loading canal barges. This man is one
gifted clairvoyants in England, though Tom Tyrrell the
weaver, Aaron Wilkinson, and others are very marvellous.
Tyrrell, who is a man of the Anthony of Padua type, a walking
saint, beloved of animals and children, is a figure who might
have stepped out of some legend of the church. Thomas, the
powerful physical medium, is a working coal miner. Most mediums
take their responsibilities very seriously and view their work in
a religious light. There is no denying that they are exposed to
very particular temptations, for the gift is, as I have explained
elsewhere, an intermittent one, and to admit its temporary
absence, and so discourage one's clients, needs greater moral
principle than all men possess. Another temptation to which
several great mediums have succumbed is that of drink. This
comes about in a very natural way, for overworking the power
leaves them in a state of physical prostration, and the stimulus
of alcohol affords a welcome relief, and may tend at last to
become a custom and finally a curse. Alcoholism always weakens
the moral sense, so that these degenerate mediums yield
themselves more readily to fraud, with the result that
several who had deservedly won honoured names and met all hostile
criticism have, in their later years, been detected in the most
contemptible tricks.
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