Essays in Psychical Research |
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Adamnan alleged Andrew Lang asked believe Beuno body called child Church clairvoyance Columba consciousness crystal crystal-gazing cure degree divining rod doctor door dowser dowsing evidence experience explain externalisation eyes fact faculty fairies feel ghost girls hand haunted hear heard Highlands Holywell hypnosis hypnotised hypnotism idea impression inquiry interest Iona kind King lady Liébeault living look means memory Mesmer mind morning nature never night observation occult Odic force one's passed patient perhaps persons phenomena picture possible present Psychical Research question reason recognised rhabdomancy saint scene Scotland séances second sight seems seen seer sensation Sir William Crookes sleep Society for Psychical speak spirits spiritualists stone story sub-conscious suggestion suppose talk telepathic tell theory things thought thought-transference tion told unconscious vision visualisation White Winifride word writing
Popular passages
Page 326 - Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses; whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings. Far from me and from my friends be such frigid philosophy, as may conduct us indifferent and unmoved over any ground which has been dignified by wisdom, bravery, or virtue. That man is little to be envied, whose patriotism would not gain force upon the plain of Marathon, or whose piety would not grow warmer among the ruins...
Page 88 - She is the fairies' midwife ; and she comes In shape no bigger than an agate-stone On the fore-finger of an alderman, Drawn with a team of little atomies Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep : Her waggon-spokes made of long spinners...
Page 260 - But now for many years I cannot endure to read a line of poetry: I have tried lately to read Shakespeare, and found it so intolerably dull that it nauseated me.
Page 288 - Finally, we commend to thy fatherly goodness all those who are any ways afflicted, or distressed in mind, body, or estate ; that it may please thee to comfort and relieve them according to their several necessities, giving them patience under their sufferings, and a happy issue out of all their afflictions.
Page 325 - We were now treading that illustrious island, which was once the luminary of the Caledonian regions, whence savage clans and roving barbarians derived the benefits of knowledge, and the blessings of religion. To abstract the mind from all local emotion would be impossible if it were endeavoured, and would be foolish if it were possible. Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses, whatever makes the past, the distant...
Page 88 - Prick'd from the lazy finger of a maid ; Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut, Made by the joiner squirrel, or old grub, Time out of mind the fairies' coach-makers. And in this state she gallops night by night Through lovers...
Page 90 - Ne let false whispers, breeding hidden fears, Break gentle sleep with misconceived doubt. Let no deluding dreams, nor dreadful sights, Make sudden sad affrights, Ne let housefires, nor...
Page 40 - O'er all there hung a shadow and a fear ; A sense of mystery the spirit daunted, And said, as plain as whisper in the ear, The place is Haunted!
Page 27 - How do you know that ? Have you been there to see ? And if you had been there to see, and had seen none, that would not prove that there were none. If Mr. Garth does not find a fox in Evers*ley Wood — as folks sometimes fear he never will — that does not prove that there are no such things as foxes. And as is Eversley Wood to all the woods in England, so are the waters we know to all the waters in the world. And no one has a right to say that no...
Page 259 - Vitus's dance, his rolling walk, his blinking eye, the outward signs which too clearly marked his approbation of his dinner, his insatiable appetite for fish-sauce and veal-pie with plums, his inextinguishable thirst for tea, his trick of touching the posts as he walked, his mysterious practice of treasuring up scraps of...