ONLINE LIBRARY

An Amazing Experiment

Publisher: Lectures Universal Ltd
Published: 1936
Pages: 128

Part 3: Difficulties of Communication

 - Charles Drayton Thomas -

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         READERS WILL have noticed, while reading the attempts of Bobbie and others to make clear their meaning, that there must have been difficulties which prevented them from expressing themselves as simply and as clearly as they would have wished. It is significant also that Feda sometimes speaks of "feeling", while at other times she expresses herself as "seeing" or as "hearing".

The success in giving so much correct information supports the view that the failures, and the frequent vagueness of the messages, were due to Feda's imperfect understanding of what the Communicators tried to say. There must be inevitable difficulties in transmitting through two minds, Feda's and that of the medium.

The following may help us to picture the position.

It is analogous to an astronomer's attempt to inspect a group of sunspots. He directs his telescope towards the sun. He would have wished for a perfectly clear sky, but there are clouds about. This necessitates his awaiting favourable moments when the clouds disperse sufficiently to show the sun. There are cirrus clouds forming a thin curtain at a great height, also some low-lying rain clouds passing.

When the lower clouds draw away the sun shows blurred and ill defined through the cirrus layer. Let this represent those times when the Control is only able to receive the thoughts of the Communicator in a rather hazy form, and not with clear-cut accuracy. On such occasions Feda will express in her own words the received idea, and I do not then get those precise indications of the Communicator's personality and phrasing which I do when Feda can repeat verbatim his very words.

The cirrus layer of cloud represents those obscuring causes which are due to Feda. Then there are the rain clouds to consider, and this represents, in our analogy, the medium's mind. If the rain cloud should be thick the astronomer can do little more than guess the general whereabouts of the sun, the cloud looking rather lighter in that direction; or the cloud may be too dense to permit even that.

On our analogy this would represent the poorest conditions of all, or a very inefficient medium. One then receives little more than the vaguest indication of the Communicator's personality. At other times the medium lets rather more come through; but things are best when the medium's mind neither presents obstacles to the passing of the message nor distorts it in transit. The astronomer rejoices when the rain clouds disperse and leave a clear view of the sun.

If the day should be one of variable weather the astronomer may have to wait long before there comes an interval when neither the lower nor the higher layers of cloud obscure his view. Both layers may have breaks in them, and when these clear spaces coincide the sun is seen to perfection. So, at times, even in an otherwise poor sitting, there may be intervals during which the messages come through accurately.

I must now refer to the sitter, for he also plays a part in bringing success or failure.

Intervals of clear sunshine may be spoilt for our astronomer by smoke from neighbouring chimneys, or by low-lying mist which the sun does not entirely disperse. This, on our analogy, corresponds with hindrances attributable to the sitter; his state of mind, or his health, can adversely influence conditions, so that an otherwise promising occasion produces but vague and confused results.

So much for causes due to Control, Medium and Sitter. The Communicator has now to be considered. He may find himself hindered from saying what he wishes because, on entering the conditions of the sitting, he no longer has that complete control of memory which is his when residing in his own realm. Parts of what he had prepared to say he cannot now recollect. It is as if the sunspots, which the astronomer wishes to photograph, are turned away from earth by the revolving sun so that they are either invisible or too far from the centre of the disc to be conveniently examined.

Or again, the moon may pass over the sun's face eclipsing it wholly or in part. The sun is there, but is obscured by another heavenly object. This, by analogy, represents occasions when another Communicator wishes to speak through the medium, and his proximity and thoughts confuse the Control, who gets a little from one and a little from the other, so that the result is a mingling of the two. I have sometimes discovered, on analysing notes of a sitting, that what at first appeared to be hopeless confusion was a mixture of messages from two Communicators which the Control had unwittingly combined.

When once a person is satisfied that messages received are actually expressing the mind of a friend in the Beyond it is natural to expect more and better messages on subsequent occasions. This expectation is sometimes realized, but often it is otherwise. Then the disappointed listener asks: "Why does he not say much more and say it much more clearly?" This frequently happens with those who have not the advantage of visiting gifted and highly trained sensitives.

The answer to this question involves a study of the whole method of psychic communication. I have dealt with it in a booklet, The Mental Phenomena of Spiritualism (L.S.A. Publications, Ltd., is.) in the section (p. 85) entitled Difficulties met with by Communicators and Control during Trance Communication. Here are a few quotations:

"Trance Mediumship is the best method of transmitting messages from the life beyond death. But in its use there are difficulties which impose limits to the success of a sitting. I allude to these in order that prospective sitters may realize that there are reasons for the obscurities and errors which they will certainly notice, and that, knowing the reasons, they may be able to make somewhat more easy that which must always be an intricate task."

The section entitled How Messages are Conveyed to the Control contains a description of various difficulties to be overcome, and the next section, How Messages Pass from the Control to the Sitter, carries the explanation a step further. The following quotation embodies much which a sitter needs to know. My father said, when speaking directly through the medium and not through the Control:

"It is easier for us to read your mind when away from here than it would be during a sitting. It is supposed by some that a Medium reads the mind of the sitter; but one has only to experiment to discover how difficult it is for us to answer questions. We can sail along, giving details quite unknown to you; but if you suddenly ask a simple question which comes into your mind, it presents a difficulty to us. Now, if we were reading your mind there would not be that difficulty.

During a sitting we are bent on keeping intact the link between ourselves and the control; for if we lost it through giving too much attention to you, it would be difficult to regain. It is as a thread which will stretch a little, but if taken round you as well as the Medium, it would break. A question often breaks the thread of our thought and we have to drop the topic. We can often create another and substitute it for the other quite quickly. We do not mind your asking questions, because we know that, if we do not take them up, you will understand that there was a reason. But some sitters would feel distressed and disappointed which makes it hard for their communicator. Our feeling of absolute case with you makes it possible for us to do out best. We know you will not be distressed if we cannot do what you ask at some particular moment."

Towards the close of my tenth year of investigation I remarked to my father while he was controlling:

"I have been studying afresh the difficulties of communication, all I have noticed here, and all that you have told me of the processes involved in giving messages. How different is the reality from my ideas of it; for then I pictured you coming as a shining presence and talking with perfect freedom through Feda."

He replied:

"I think it will be a long while before communication becomes as easy as you pictured it. But it should grow easier when we have a more perfect type of Medium and of sitter, people who can attune their mind to the requisite degree."

The booklet concludes with the following remarks:

"In illustrating psychic and mediumistic achievements one must adduce instances in which they were successful. But experience shows how very frequently the results were poor. It may be that the gift is small or insufficiently trained; the physical or mental state of the demonstrator may be unfavourable to success; the sitter is perhaps unsuited to the particular Medium chose. Again, some portions of a sitting may be excellent, while the remainder is devoid of interest. It is not easy to discover the cause of failure.

"Why are so few psychics or Mediums always at their best? There is much to be said for the hypothesis that psychic activity and mediumship depend for their efficient working upon the presence of a subtle emanation, which forms a field of influence around Medium and sitter. When this emanation is deficient in quantity, or poor in quality, the results suffer.

"Without insisting upon this explanation we repeat that, generally speaking and with brilliant exceptions, psychic and mediumstic faculties are most variable and often unreliable. Psychic science is too young to have discovered much beyond the fact that these faculties exist; it does not know whether, or how, they can be trained to uniform reliability. Since so little is known about the mystery of man's personality, how should the further mystery of its hidden or less observable faculties be made clear? It is encouraging to know that, in every civilized country, there are now groups of students studying psychic science, as well as many others who can give evidence for the reality of their intercourse with departed friends.

"Across the river of death a slender bridge has been already thrown. As yet it is frail and frequently unusable when, at our end, conditions are adverse. But slowly the structure is being strengthened, both at this end and also where our invisible colleagues are working upon it. Not to all men, whether here or there, is it given to realize the imperative necessity for perfecting this bridge between the worlds. The joy of the work rewards its workers, and they know that where they toil to-day, multitudes will hereafter find a highway sufficient for their need.

"In ardent story Jacob dreamed that messengers were already ascending and descending between earth and the world beyond; for us that dream is realized, for we have spoken with those who came back."

From the foregoing account it will be gathered that, despite its difficulty, communication with departed friends is possible. The means by which this can be accomplished are not within the reach of every one, but all can learn from the experience of others. This book will, I trust, suffice to give assurance that though friends pass from out our sight they have not passed out of existence; that they are continuing elsewhere a life more vivid and alert than was possible on earth: that they feel for us the old affection and are often with us.

My father, speaking through Feda, expressed himself thus:

"I am very hopeful about the future. When men understand the nature of life in the Beyond, the aspect of the country to which they must inevitably go sooner or later, they will make up their mind to prepare for it. That is my belief; if a man understands, he will prepare. He has not understood so far. What has he been taught, save that there is another life? He does not know of what sort, nor what it is like, nor what is going on there. All is so vague that his ideas of it are vague too. We wish to make known what it is really like, and what man has to prepare for. As you know, I was always a great believer in personal responsibility. We need to bring that home to men in a practical and spiritual sense."

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