IS SPIRITUALISM BASED
ON FRAUD?
THE EVIDENCE GIVEN BY SIR A. C. DOYLE
AND OTHERS DRASTICALLY EXAMINED
BY
JOSEPH McCABE
London:
WATTS & CO.,
17 JOHNSON'S COURT, FLEET STREET, E.C.4
PREFACE
On March 11 of this year Sir Arthur Conan Doyle did me the honour ofdebating the claims of Spiritualism with me before a vast anddistinguished audience at the Queen's Hall, London. My opponent hadinsisted that I should open the debate; and, when it was pointed outthat the critic usually follows the exponent, he had indicated that Ihad ample material to criticize in the statement of the case forSpiritualism in his two published works.
How conscientiously I addressed myself to that task, and with whatresult, must be left to the reader of the published debate. Suffice itto say that my distinguished opponent showed a remarkable disinclinationto linger over his own books, and wished to "broaden the issue." Sincethe bulk of the time allotted to me in the debate was then alreadyspent, it was not possible to discuss satisfactorily the new evidencesadduced by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and not recorded in his books. Ihasten to repair the defect in this critical examination of everyvariety of Spiritualistic phenomena.
My book has a serious aim. The pen of even the dullest author—and Itrust I do not fall into that low category of delinquents—must growlively or sarcastic at times in the course of such a study as this. Whenone finds Spiritualists gravely believing that a corpulent lady istransferred by spirit hands, at the rate of sixty miles an hour, overthe chimney-pots of London, and through several solid walls, one cannotbe expected to refrain from smiling. When one contemplates a group ofscientific or professional men[Pg iv] plumbing the secrets of the universethrough the mediumship of an astute peasant or a carpenter, or a lady ofless than doubtful virtue, one may be excused a little irony. When ourcreators of super-detectives enthusiastically applaud things which werefully exposed a generation ago, and affirm that, because they could not,in pitch darkness, see any fraud, there was no fraud, we cannotmaintain the gravity of philosophers. When we find this "new revelation"heralded by a prodigious outbreak of fraud, and claiming as its mostsolid foundations to-day a mass of demonstrable trickery and deceit, oursense of humour is pardonably irritated. Nor are these a few exceptionalweeds in an otherwise fair garden. In its living literature to-day, inits actual hold upon a large number of people in Europe and America,Spiritualism rests to a very great extent on fraudulent representations.
Here is my serious purpose. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle made two pointsagainst me which pleased his anxious followers. One—which evoked athunder of applause—was that I was insensible of the consolation whichthis new religion has brought to thousands of bereaved humans. I am asconscious of that as he or any other Spiritualist is. It has, however,nothing to do with the question whether Spiritualism is true or no,which we were debating; or with the question to what extent Spiritualismis based on fraud, which I now discuss. Far be it from me to slight thefiner or more tender emotions of the human heart. On the contrary, it isin large part to the more general cultivation of this refinement a