From the Editor of Borderland:[1]
There is no subject in the whole range of occult science more mysterious than that which the ancients described in their treatises of the Incubus and the Succuba. Defoe, in his treatise on the Natural History of the Devil, accepted the mediaeval doctrine as substantially correct, fastening all the phenomena of erotic illusion upon the author of Evil, it may be that these phenomena are merely subjective. But the evidence as to their objective reality is very strong. For a long time I shrank from alluding to the subject in Borderland. A friend of mine, whose experiences on this plane were the most extraordinary I ever heard of for their persistency, rationality, and consistency, went so far as to prepare a book on the subject under the title of “Heavenly Bridegrooms,” taking as her text the well-known passage in Genesis, which suggested a theme to the muse of Macaulay, of Byron, and of Moore. Thomas Lake Harris, in an interesting conversation which I had with him in New York, described the objective reality of these mysterious visitants, and quoted cases in his own experience in corroboration of his opinion. The doctrine is mystically put forth in “Sympneumatica.” The possibility of such visitations in the shape of the doubles of the living is asserted by Dr. Anna Kingsford as having occurred in her own experience; and there is reason to believe that in one shape or another similar phenomena are of much more frequent occurrence than is generally supposed. The form, the mode, the nature, of these visitations vary infinitely. Sometimes the occurrence takes place in sleep, and is hardly distinguishable from a dream; but on many occasions the suggestion that the recipient is asleep is stoutly denied by the party most concerned. Sometimes the “Demon” is the double of a living friend, lover, or husband, sometimes the double of one who is unknown at the time, but who is afterwards revealed. One large class of visitants profess to be the disembodied spirits of husbands or lovers who have died; while others again are unidentified, although their personality remains distinct and is always recognizable.
There is the same variety in the nature of the manifestation. Sometimes it is rudimentary—the materialisation being reduced to the minimum. At other times the materialisation is complete, the Demon being apparently complete both as to mind and body. This kind of occult wedlock is more often than not involuntary. Indeed, in most cases, the phenomenon at first fills the recipient with dread; on the other hand, when it has been most eagerly and passionately sought, it has most persistently evaded the seeker.
So far as I have been able to ascertain from comparison of the narratives of those who have experienced such phenomena, the only physical mischief that has ensued has been similar to those which would have occasioned equal mischief on the material plane.
Excess, over-indulgence, abuse, brought with them the inevitable Nemesis. But where excess was avoided, I have hitherto failed to discover any evidence of evil results, whereas in several the health and happiness of the recipient showed a very marked improvement. In some cases the “Demon” visitant is reported as having displayed a self-control and a reserve which would not have done discredit to a St. Anthony. In other cases it is very different. But I cannot attribute to differences in the character of the recipients the difference in their psychic experiences. The difference seems always to be in the character of the Demon, who is lord of his own actions, and whose standard of right and wrong is quite distinct and clearly marked.
Lucifer has published a paper by Madame Blavatsky, describing him as an Elemental. I have received from Dr. Hartmann and from an American correspondent two communications on this weird and obscure subject. Dr. Hartmann works as a philosopher, generalizing on the experience of others. My American correspondent describes her own experience. Both entertain the strongest possible objection to the “Demon.” I print these communications for what they are worth. One, indeed, is to some extent a refutation of the assertions of the other. No one could accuse my American correspondent of that excess of sex which, according to Dr. Hartmann, is the causa causaus of the phenomenon. Her letter seems, indeed, to point to the opposite extreme. I must also say that in all the cases reported to me at first hand, I have observed none of the symptoms which Dr. Hartmann describes. His hypothesis may be correct. But it certainly does not fit the facts so far as they have been reported to me. Without further preface, however, here is his paper.
I. Vampires. By Franz Hartmann, M.D.
Everyone who, for a long time, in a rational manner and without prejudice, investigates the phenomena of spiritism, will, sooner or later, meet in them some perplexing element, which cannot be explained by the theory of “departed spirits,” nor by “sub-conscious” mental action, nor by “telepathy,” nor by any other of the manifold theories that have been invented for the purpose of explaining these phenomena by the conscious or unconscious action of powers inherent in the constitution of man; there always comes in at a certain period a foreign element which seems to have a will, if not an intelligence of its own; such as does not naturally belong to the “medium,” and which cannot be an angel, nor a “departed human spirit,” but which rather seems to belong to some fool or idiot, playing pranks on the astral plane. In fact, we may say, that while upon the terrestrial plane, in our daily life, we continually are surrounded by a multitude of illusive appearances, errors, and falsehoods, each containing a kernel of truth, on the astral plane we meet with an endless array of undeniable facts and apparent truths, each of which, if closely examined, is found to be based upon a kernel of truth.
Lying Spirits.
Let me explain what I mean. There is, for instance, Mr. H. B. Foulke, of Philadelphia, who receives oil-paintings that have been undoubtedly produced in an occult manner through the mediumship of Mrs. Betse; they are well executed, but they never are what they claim to be, for there is one representing the “wife Pythagoras,” who presumably never was married, another represents “Jacob Boehme in his college costume,” while it is certain that Boehme was a poor shoemaker, who never went to a college; there are “Mahatma letters” that are perfectly “genuine,” except in so far as they have never been written or even indicated by a Mahatma; there are innumerable tests of spirit identity, absolutely satisfactory to a superficial observer, but found to be sadly wanting in truth, when closely examined. In most instances it seems as if a host of lying spirits were assuming the true masks of known persons; the acting is often perfect, but the actor behind the mask is not what he represents himself to be, although many a deluded person, being delighted with the idea of communicating with a beloved friend or relative, is most unwilling to incur the risk of finding himself deceived. Whenever the communicating spirit represents himself in the garb of a spirit-lover or spirit-bride, human vanity becomes excited to the highest pitch, and a cure is almost impossible. Such persons regard doubts about the identity of their “spirits” as being blasphemy and heresy of the worst kind.
Force Centres Without Consciousness.
All these perplexing things, however, become plain if we accept the doctrine of mischievous elementals inhabiting the astral plane, of whom the occultists of the middle ages have written a great deal, whose nature H. P. Blavatsky has more clearly explained than any other writer, and who have also been referred to in Mr. Leadbeater’s rehearsal of occult teachings concerning the inhabitants of the astral plane. The acceptance of that doctrine makes at once explainable many otherwise “unexplainable” facts, such as the exhibitions of superhuman strength by Miss Emma Abbott, &c., in regard to which H. P. Blavatsky says:—
“They have no forms, and in trying to describe what they are, it is better to say that they are “centres of force,” having instinctive desires but no consciousness, as we understand it. Others, of certain elements and species, change from under a fixed law which Kabalists explain. The most solid of their bodies is ordinarily just material enough to escape perception by our physical eyesight, but not so unsubstantial but that they can be perfectly recognised by the inner or clairvoyant vision. They not only exist and can all live in ether, but can handle and direct it for the production of physical effects, in which occupation they are readily helped by the ‘human elementaries’ or ‘shells.’ More than this, they can so condense it as to make for themselves tangible bodies, which by their protean power they can cause to assume such likeness as they choose, by taking as their models the portraits they find stamped in the memory of the persons present.”[2]
And again H. P. Blavatsky says in regard to those elementals who exhibit great physical strength:—“Poruthû Mâdon is the “wrestling demon,’ he is the strongest of all, and whenever there are feats shown in which physical force is required, such as levitations, or taming wild animals, he will help the performer by keeping him above the soil, or will overpower a wild beast,” &c.
Vampires.
But it is of another kind of “spirits” that I wish to speak, and which are the more dangerous as they appear under the alluring mask of “spirit-brides” and “spirit-lovers,” but which are nothing else but vampires, extracting vitality from those whom they obsess, and through them, from all with whom they come into contact. These vampires are exceedingly numerous, and I have had ample opportunity to observe during a twenty years’ investigation of spiritism the detrimental effects of vampirism. If, in the following pages, I do not give the exact names of the persons referred to, it is for obvious reasons; but I am willing to reveal these names confidentially to anybody, provided that it is of importance that he should be made acquainted with them.
“Duals.”
I am not the only person to whom a great many spiritistically-inclined people are known who claim to live on most intimate terms of soul communion and even bodily intercourse with their “duals.” They are always in communication with their unseen friend, and it would be useless to attempt to persuade them that they are labouring under an hallucination, and that the “spirit” is a creation of their own fancy. They feel the presence of that “spirit,” they ask him questions and he answers them, they converse with him, and many instances are known in which such “spirits” have “materialized” and been seen objectively, not only by the mediums themselves, but also by other persons present. In olden times such observing elementals, if male and attached to a woman, were called “incubi,” if female and attached to a man they were called “succub.” The history of mediaeval witchcraft is full of accounts of their doings; neither can any intelligent reader studying that history set down all the reported cases as being lies and superstitions due to ignorance. There were as intelligent men at those times as there are now, and on the whole there was more known at those times about the occult laws of nature than is known at present, and if our modem investigators would take the trouble to study the works of Theophrastus Paracelsus, they might find many a problem already solved, over the solution of which they are vainly breaking their heads.
Their Victims.
Persons obsessed by a vampire may be very intellectual and refined, but they are always sensually inclined people, and usually given to secret vices. To a sensitive person the shake of their hands feels clammy and cadaverous. If you are for a long time in their presence you will feel exhausted; it is as if they were drawing strength from you. It is also very likely that after you leave them you will be for a few days in a very bad humour, liable to quarrel and to find fault, and not unfrequently it happens that a person having been in company of such a “medium” will leel strongly inclined to commit suicide. Many are even driven to suicide by such vampires, without knowing the source of that influence. Moreover, the abstraction of vitality does not necessarily cease upon leaving the presence of the “medium”; the connection once formed the vampire will follow you to any distance and abstract life from you. A case is known to me in which a previously healthy young lady, after visiting such an obsessed person, experienced a continual loss of vitality, causing a waste of flesh amounting to about three pounds per week.
Vampirization.
The vampire draws strength from its medium. For this reason such mediums usually have a voracious appetite, they sleep a great deal; but, nevertheless, they do not grow strong, but are always exhausted and unfit for fatiguing or continuous labour. They are irritable, highly emotional, ready to shed tears for insignificant reasons, loving solitude, and finding their greatest comfort in the intercourse with their duals. Being continually vampirized they in their turn unconsciously vampirize every sensitive person with whom they come into contact, and they instinctively seek out such persons and invite them to stay at their house. I know of an old lady, a vampire, who thus ruined the health of a lot of robust servant girls, whom she took into her service and made them sleep in her room. They were all in good health when they entered, but soon they began to sicken, they became emaciated and consumptive, and had to leave their service. Two of them died shortly after.
An Elemental Aided By a Ghost.
A young lady at G—— had an admirer who asked her in marriage, but as he was a drunkard she refused and married another. Thereupon that lover shot himself, and soon after that event a vampire, assuming his form, visited her frequently at night, especially when her husband was absent. She could not see him but felt his presence in a way that could leave no room for doubt. The medical faculty did not know what to make out of that case, they called it “hysterics” and tried in vain every remedy in the pharmacopœia, until she had at last had the spirit exorcised by a man of strong faith. In this case there is an elemental making use of, and being aided by, the elementary of the suicide.
A Vampire Burnt.
A miller at D—— had a healthy servant boy, who, soon after entering service, began to fail. He had a ravenous appetite, but nevertheless grew daily more feeble and emaciated. Being interrogated, he at last confessed that a thing which he could not see, but which he could plainly feel, came to him every night and settled upon his stomach, drawing all the life out of him, so that he became paralyzed for the time being, and could neither move nor cry out. Thereupon the miller agreed to share the bed with that boy, and proposed to him that he should give him a certain sign when the vampire arrived. This was done, and when the sign was given the miller grasped an invisible but very tangible substance that rested upon the boy’s stomach, and, although it struggled to escape, he grasped it firmly and threw it into the fire. After that the boy recovered, and there was an end of these visits. Those who, like myself, have on innumerable occasions removed “astral tumors,” and thereby cured the physical tumors, will find the above neither “incredible” nor “unexplainable.” Moreover, the above accounts do not refer to events of the past, but to persons still living in this country.
A Vampire Marriage.
A woman in this vicinity has an incubus, or, as she calls it, a “dual,” with whom she lives on the most intimate terms as wife and husband. She converses with him and he makes her do the most irrational things. He has many whims, and she, being a woman of means, gratifies them. If her dual wants to go to see Italy “through her eyes,” she has to go to Italy and let him enjoy the sights. She does not care for balls and theatres; but her dual wants to attend them, and so she has to go. She gives lessons to her “dual,” and “educates” him in the things of this world, and commits no end of follies. At the same time her “dual” draws all her strength from her, and she has to vampirize everybody with whom she comes into contact to make up for the loss.
Vampires Self-Created.
But how do such vampires grow, or how are they attracted? In the human system are contained all the seeds for good and for evil, and those that are cultivated grow by attracting the elements corresponding to their own nature from the astral plane, in the same way as a seed in the earth attracts its appropriate elements from the earth. The power that stimulates the seed of a plant to grow in the sunshine, the power that causes a psychic germ to develop is thought. If the sexual instinct in a person is very strong and cannot be gratified or overcome, the mind rests upon it, and the thought causes it to grow. It attracts from the astral form corresponding elemental forces, which take shape in the organism of the medium, are supplied with his own vitality and assume a form according to his own imagination. Thus the form of the elemental may be a product of the patient’s fancy, but its substance is real; it is like every other creature, a manifestation of individual will and thought.
Killed by a Vampire.
But there are also other cases of vampires, and space permits me to mention only typical ones as samples of certain classes.
In Vienna a certain lawyer became very much incensed against another lawyer on account or the loss of a lawsuit. The second lawyer, whom I will call T., was a very strong and healthy man, but at the beginning of December, 1888, he suddenly began to grow more and more feeble, day by day, nor could the doctors find out any cause for it; while he himself said he felt as if every day a portion of blood were drawn from him. During the month of December, the other lawyer, his enemy, whom I will call H., and who had previously been in feeble health, grew daily more strong, and went on a pleasure trip to Meran. On December 20th, 1888, Mr. T. died from exhaustion, after asserting that he had been vampirized by H. From that day Mr. H.’s health began to fail, and on January ist, 1889, a telegram came from Meran announcing his death. As a matter of course, in this case the scientific proof, such as the sceptic wants, is missing, but to those present all the little details and circumstances connected with the case, and which cannot here be entered into, were sufficient to convince them that it was a case of vampirism by the living.
All such things become very easily explainable as soon as we accept as a working hypothesis the sevenfold classification of the principles of the constitution of man as taught by H. P. Blavatsky, and previously to her, although not so plainly, by Theophrastus, Paracelsus and others. A knowledge of the odic odor, “ethereal body,” solves many a problem; but if we wish to explain such phenomena while we ignore all that is not already accepted by official science, we will never find our way through the mysteries presented by the “nightside of nature.” Mere external observation does not go to the root of a thing, and a science that is proud of ignoring is no science at all.
The Vampire of the Grave.
But there are also vampires of the grave. They used to be known by the name of “ghouls.” H. P. Blavatsky calls such a being the “Shudâla Madan,” and says that, “he delights where crime and murder were committed, near burial places and places of execution.” It may be this demon elemental that sucks the vitality of living people and feeds the corpse in the grave to which he is attached, thus keeping up an appearance of life in the corpse. This is rather a disgusting subject, but, for all that, this does not prevent the facts being true. This vampirism of the grave became, at one time, of such an epidemic character, and so many people became victims of it, that it was made the subject of an official investigation by the authorities in Kisolova, in Hungary, also in Meduegga, in Servia [Serbia], and at other places, on which occasion the most horrible details were brought to light Those interested in such things may find ample material for investigation in Professor Maximilian Perty’s book Mystiche Erscheinungen in der Natur. Some such cases are also described in H. P. Blavatsky’s Isis Unveiled.
Personification.
Elementals are semi-intelligent forces of nature, which may become personified in man, and a person obsessed by such an elemental is himself, to a certain extent, that elemental personified. The elemental having originally no individual life of its own, in becoming individualized in man, absorbs from him life, and is endowed by him with his own consciousness. In this way another centre of consciousness, besides his own, is called into existence in a person, and thus may arise many of the perplexing cases of double consciousness which have not yet been satisfactorily explained, and which never will be fully understood as long as we leave out of consideration one of the prominent factors in the production of physical phenomena, namely, the elemental spirits of nature.
The proper place to study the nature of obsessing spirits would be within the precincts of insane asylums, and if their nature were known a most important factor would be added for the treatment of insanity. At present the principal cause of insanity is ignored by medical science, and thus medical science deprives itself of some of the means of accomplishing the object of its existence.
Hallein, Austria, Feb. 4th, 1896.
II.—Elementals.
A correspondent, signing himself “R. D’O.,” to whom I submitted the foregoing paper, writes me as follows;—
“The doctor, in his otherwise very able paper on this subject, makes one great and fundamental error, which to a great extent destroys the value of his communication. He treats of two essentially different classes of beings as being identical, and assumes that the undoubted visitations of elementaries to human beings are made by ‘Vampires.’ Now ‘vampires’ and elementaries have scarcely anything in common, either in their origin, their nature, or their temperament. They are two absolutely distinct species of spirits.
“But before I proceed to their differentiation, a few words as to these visitations. In the first place there is no doubt that they actually do take place: everyone who has investigated the subject knows instances where women of great intellectual powers, and having no tendency whatever to hysteria or illusions of any kind (being at the same time persons of undoubted veracity), claim that they have been—and are—visited in this manner.
“The immense mass of evidence, collected from many countries, by different scientific observers — medical men and others—cannot be set aside. Doubtless, if only one or two cases existed, we should explain them by the one word—’ hysteria’; but the accumulated mass of facts from so many different temperaments cannot be dealt with in this manner. We must accept the facts, though we may differ as to their cause. And as to this there are only three solutions possible:—1. That they are purely the product of a too vivid imagination, probably assisted by hysteria; 2. That the visitants are, what they usually represent themselves to be, spirits of pre-deceased lovers; 3. That they are other spirits, ‘elementaries’ or ‘vampires,’ masquerading as spirits of the dead.
“The answer to the first hypothesis is, that, as a rule, the recipients of these visits are, more frequently than not, people not distinguished for imaginative powers. And the slightest reflection will show that an enormous fund of creative imagination must exist to make a woman absolutely certain that her lover is present with her as tangible as in life.
“And not only do these manifestations take place, but, in many cases, long conversations are held, sometimes for hours together; questions are asked and answered, and replies (sometimes true, but usually false) obtained which could not have emanated from the brain of the querist, being sometimes accurate information of circumstances which could by no possibility have been known to her. Further, these visitation! are frequently made to men, when, of course, the visitor is of female form. Another fact, difficult to account for on the first hypothesis, is that these visits have been paid to people who had never heard of such things, and who were Philistines of the Philistines regarding all kinds of ‘spirit’ or psychic phenomena.
“Consequently, we will dismiss theory No. 1 as untenable, and consider No. 2. That is, that the visitants, warm, living, breathing, palpitating, are the spirits of the dead. And here I will quote one who, amidst an enormous farrago of nonsense, self-deception, and false fact, has somehow stumbled on a few truths—Anna Kingsford: ‘There are no such things as “spirits of the dead,” there are only “shades” of the dead.’ And these shades are certainly unable to make themselves even audible, much more tangible, palpable, and warm-blooded. We know quite sufficient about them to know that.
“Then there only remains the third proposition, that they are other spirits, who, for their own purposes, assume the shape and verisimilitude of dead persons.
“Is Dr. Hartmann right then in considering them to be ‘vampires’? and, if not ‘vampires,’ what are they?
“The learned doctor has evidently thoroughly studied the subject of vampires, enjoying as he does facilities for research in the very country which (if we except the West Indies) has from time immemorial to the present been the scene of their most awful manifestations—Hungary.
“And it is quite true what Dr. H. says, that ‘persons obsessed by a vampire are always sensually inclined people; and usually given to secret vices?
“And in purity of heart and mind are to be found absolute protection from their body and soul-destroying influences; nothing more is needed.
“Dr. H. recounts five cases within his personal knowledge, which he attributes to the action of vampires. But, of these five, only the third and fifth in order were undoubtedly due to vampire action, and the first one is almost more than doubtful. The others were certainly not vampires. There is no reason for thinking that the old lady who undermined the health of her servants was under the power of a vampire: it being a well-known fact that many (in fact most) very old people who sleep with young and impressionable ones, gradually absorb the greater part of their vitality; and all physicians in this country are very precise in forbidding it.
“The second case shows no trace of a vampire’s presence, of its ‘devouring’ propensities, or of its horrible bate for the victim from whom it nightly drains the very life-blood, it is simply a case of an ‘ “elemental” (as the doctor says) making use of and being aided by the elementary of the suicide.’ But, as before said, an ‘elemental’ is not a vampire.
“The third case, of the miller’s boy, is a good instance of one mode of action of an undoubted vampire.
“In the fourth case the ‘dual,’ there is nothing to indicate a vampire. The idea that the ‘dual’ drew all the woman’s strength from her was most probably not the fact. The fifth case is doubtless a genuine one of vampirism by the living, as Dr Hartmann asserts.
“Now then, having so far cleared the ground, what are vampires?
“They are not ‘elementals’ but ‘demons’: there are no ‘demon elementals.’ Demons are differentiated from spirits in possessing souls, and this, while it intensifies their power of malignant hate towards man, renders them, in one sense, superior to sex passion. They have an infinite capacity of hatred and malignity, which they can only gratify at the expense of those who are sensuously inclined. But they have no power—as the elementals have in certain cases—to assume human form: they can give no pleasure, either mental or physical. All that they can do is to absorb, to waste, to madden, and destroy.
“Dr. Hartmann gives very correctly all the recognised symptoms of vampirism.
“The elementals, on the contrary, are in this connection perfectly harmless. So far from bearing any hatred or malice towards the recipients of their favours, they are actuated towards them by (at least so far as they are capable of feeling it) love. This is self-evident by their conduct.”
In Lucifer for June there appeared an article by Madame Blavatsky which bears directly upon the phenomenon described by Dr. Hartmann:—
In the course of preparing the third volume of The Secret Doctrine (or the press, a few manuscripts were found mixed with it that form no part of the work itself, and these will be published in her old magazine. Next month the article from her pen will be a criticism of the line taken by Hargrave Jennings and others touching the phallic element in religions, and will be entitled, “Christianity, Buddhism and Phallicism.”
Madame Blavatsky’s article is entitled “‘Spirits’ of Various Kinds,” and the object is to maintain that the spooks of the séance room and elsewhere need not necessarily be the spirits of the disembodied dead. She refers to the Abbé de Villars’ book on the “Elementaries of the Cabala,” and declares that when he jocosely writes of Sylphs, Gnomes, Nymphs, and Salamanders, who might gain immortality if they could, by any means, obtain intercourse with mortals, he merely veiled behind his apparent mirth a very serious fact.
All the would-be mystics, she says, interdicted all intercourse with women, but compensated them for the restriction by allowing unbridled license with elementals or demons. She says [in part]:—
We speak here of the well-known ancient statutes in the sorcery of the Asiatics and in the demonology of Europe. The witch had to renounce her husband; the wizard his marital rights over his legitimate human wife; as the Dugpa renounces to this day commerce with living women, and as the New Orleans Voodoo does when employed in the exercise of his powers. Every Kabalist knows this.
The Jewish Kabalist of Poland, when bent on revenge, calls the female spirit of Nergal to his help and to infuse into him power; the Mussulman sorcerer calls a female djini; a Russian Kaldoon a deceased witch (vedyma); the Chinese malefactor has a female houen in his house at his command; the above intercourse is said to give magic powers and a supernal force. . . .
So with certain mediums, especially those of America, who boast of spiritual husbands and wives. We know personally several Spiritualists, men and women (and it is not those of Holland who will deny the fact) who escaped lunacy and death only by becoming Theosophisis, and, by following our advice, got finally rid of their spiritual consorts of both sexes.
Shall we be told again that this is a calumny and an invention? Then let those outsiders who are inclined to see nought but a holy, or at any rate an innocent pastime in the nightly and daily intercourse with the so-called “spirits of the dead,” watch some of the developments of Spiritualism in the United States. Let those who ridicule the beliefs of both Spiritualists and Theosophists—laughing at the warnings and explanations of the latter—let them, we say, explain, after analyzing the matter dispassionately, the mystery and the rationale of such as the existence in the minds of certain sensitives of the conviction of their actual marriage with male and female spirits. . . .
But who are these spirits, and what is their nature? Shall we be told that the spirits, of Mme. De Sévigné or of a Delphine, two celebrated French authoresses, one of whom we abstain from naming out of regard to her surviving relatives, were the actual “spirits” of those two deceased ladies? That the latter felt a “spiritual affinity” for an idiotic, old, and slovenly Canadian medium, and thus became “his happy wife,” as he boasts publicly, the result of the union being a number of “spiritual” children? And who is the astral husband of a well-known lady medium whom the writer knows personally? Let the reader get every information he can about this last development of “spiritual” intercourse. Let him think seriously over this, and then read Comte de Gabalis’ work, especially the Appendix to it; and then he perchance, will be better able to appreciate the full gravity of the supposed chaff in the work in question, and to understand the value of the raillery in it. He will then see clearly the ghastly connection there is between fauns, satyrs, and incubi of S. Hieronymus, the sylphs and nymphs of the Comte de Gabalis, the “elementaries” of the Kabalists, and all these poetical spiritual “Lillies” of the “Harris Community,” the astral “Napoleons” and the other departed Don Juans from the “Summer-Land,” the “spiritual affinities from beyond the grave” of the modern world of mediums.
But all this still leaves open the question. Who are the spirits? For “where doctors disagree” there must be room for doubt.
Theosophists give only the product of an experience hoary with age; Spiritualists hold to their own views born some forty years ago, and based on their unflinching enthusiasm and emotionalism. But let any impartial, fair-minded witness to the doings of the “spirits” in America, one that is neither a Theosophist nor a Spiritualist, be asked: “What may be the difference between the vampire-bride from whom Apollonius of Tyana is said to have delivered a young friend of his, whom the nightly succuba was slowly killing, and the spirit-wives and husbands of our own day? Surely none, would be the correct answer. Those who do not shudder at this hideous revival of mediæval demonology and witchcraft may, at any rate, understand the reason why all of the numerous enemies of Theosophy none are so bitter and so implacable as some of the Spiritualists of the Protestant and of the Spiritists of Roman Catholic countries.
III.—The Spirit of the Dead.
The widow in Kansas, who sends me her name and address, which for obvious reasons I do not publish, writes me as follows :—
Sir,—Yesterday I was reading in the St. Louis Globe Democrat, which prints every week a column or two headed: Spiritualism, a case of automatic writing by yourself as printed in a paper called Borderland. Having had an experience of my own in phenomena mystical, I have taken the liberty to address you, as I have been unfortunate enough to have found that which has proved excessively annoying—a power I have not yet been able to control.
The Husband’s Promise.
When my husband, Dr. W. M. S., died four years since, he said, ‘‘If I can I will come back and let you know how it is over there.” About one year afterwards my son bought a planchette, which under my hand wrote as rapidly as anyone could various communications, or rather conversations, over various names, meanwhile trying to magnetize me when asleep as well as when writing, until at last I could not stay in my house on account of the disagreeable influence. I left and came to this place, where for three weeks I was confined to my bed—too weak to rise—all the time hearing voices, and the spirits trying to magnetize me. Fortunately, I proved the stronger demagnetizer, and could, while I moved my hand, throw off their influence; but at night, in order that others might sleep, 1 kept quiet, and with clenched teeth endured them torture. Before Dr. S——’s death, I had heard voices of warning in regard to future events, or words spoken to express a strong desire of someone gone to the other world. My son, who died seven years since, came to me while I was in the farmyard, as it seemed to me at my right shoulder as I was looking over the farm, and said, “This is your Christmas present.” So real was his presence that I answered, “I do not want it, and you gone.”
How He Fulfilled It.
But to return to the writings. I believed most of them to be genuine at the time, but took the precaution to prove them as far as I could find the whereabouts of those whose names were given, and have found that they were forgeries, as some of the persons were living and some are still, while others I could not find and do not know, but am under the impression that all were written by Dr. S——. He was an
educated man, and had some experience in spiritual manifestations. What object he can have to annoy me, as he has, by his continual persistent presence and voice for three years past, I do not know, unless it is jealousy, and on the ground of his right- as a husband, which I persistently refuse to grant. Forty years with a live man is more than enough without being tormented the rest of my earth-life by his ghost. He said I should not write this, and has been trying to annoy me by spelling the words for me. I commenced the practice of medicine forty years ago, but for the last few years have partially retired. I am now with my son in a book store, as a necessity, to try to throw off this influence of which I am never unconscious except when soundly sleeping—when talking partially so. Can when in the bed see faces, when the voice says he will show them to me, but no one I recognise. The faces are only shown as an annoyance. But the most fiendish of all is the infernal devil’s assertion I am his wile, and he has the right to me still. Now, I am not a woman who has had a desire for married life, and I steadily resist his attacks. I wrote to Mrs. Bundy, editress of the Religio-Philosophical Journal, and she answered others are troubled the same way, that she knew no way to get rid of it but to resist the influence, “I have found some others personally known to me who have been troubled in the same manner.”
A Peril of Mediumship.
Now is it worth while to continue this developing of mediums with the danger that they may be annoyed by some sprit’s devilish sensuality? I shall use all my influence against any further communication between the two worlds. Spiritualism has helped me this much, that it has revealed to me that the soul is not changed, and if not changed the other world will only be a continuation of the hell of this. If men are not changed I suppose it is just as useless to appeal for help or protection from a husband in that respect in one world as the other. Help or no help, I do most emphatically propose to fight both works on this ground of absolute right, that a wife should never lose her right to her own person. I am voicing my torture from the abuse of a spirit husband. I recognise the tone of his voice. I am not mistaken.
IV.—A Double.
It will be remembered that Mrs. Kingsford was much troubled during her stay in Paris by the persistent visits of the double of a Professor O., who had fallen in love with her. At first he appeared as a fascinating infant, but, after a time, the phantom developed a strong resemblance to Monsieur O., and its visits had become a regular persecution.
Even while we were sitting together it would, though impalpable to me, be visible, audible, and tangible to her as any real person. And she described it as no longer being wholly demon, but partially human, as if compounded of the two natures—the human part resembling her professor. Of the possibility, now familiar to the world, of the projection by a person of a palpable image of himself into the presence ok another we were wholly ignorant, having never even heard of it. But that such was the fact was made ret tain by the professor’s own conduct. For he never failed, on the day after each each apparition, to importune her to admit that she had seen him, saying, “Now, did you not see me last night? I am sure you saw me last night! Do confess; I want so much to know.” And “I believe I am as claivoyant as yourself. Try me. I will describe your room, and you will tell me if I am right.” He was accurate on all points.
An unpleasant faculty truly. It was only after very great difficulty they were able to clear him out.
Notes:
[1] The Doctrine of the Demon Lover. Is He a Vampire, a Double, Or an Elemental. Franz Hartmann, M.D., H. P. Blavatsky and a Correspondent to Borderland–R. D’O. Borderland 3, no. 3 (July 1896), 353-358. {This article was reformatted from the original, but with the content unchanged other than fixing minor typos, by Robert Hutwohl, ©2025}
[2] Lucifer, vol. xiii., p. 31.