elopment is long and arduous to mount. The
number of the climbers steadily diminishes as the top is reached. Here,
as elsewhere, there is a common crowd, content with the steps nearest
the earth, in morals a faithful reflection of average humanity. They are
neither better nor worse, they are merely different. They are the masons
of the mind, a race of builders, addicted to a workmanship of their own.

To a discerning psychologist they are profoundly interesting, heralds of
a new race and a new age; to an unsophisticated alienist they are merely
insane, dangerous victims of sick brains. The whole fabric of evidence
relating to lunacy would be broken up by the admission that these
strange people who fall into trance and speak unknown tongues or convey
messages from the dead are sane. Current theories of psycho-pathology
would be hopelessly disturbed by the admission that there may be a
super-sanity in which clairvoyance and clairaudience are normal and
healthy manifestations of life. A person who professes to be an exponent
of psychometry, who recalls circumstances and events from the "aura" of
inanimate objects, such as a letter or a glove, is naturally classed
with the insane. Hallucinations _en masse_ are proffered as explanation
of the physical phenomena which take place. Thus only can orthodox
psychiatry remain unperturbed when heavy objects are lifted without any
apparent cause, when unearthly sounds and voices are produced, when
human forms take shape, are seen, and disappear.

The study of psychic faculties is above all a study of consciousness.
Maeterlinck speaks of "the gravest problem that can thrill mankind, the
knowledge of the future." The knowledge of the present, of the hidden
powers and graces within our souls, is even more thrilling. I can
imagine no science of greater importance, no investigation more worthy
of devotion. The profundity of the problems is but an incitement. We
have not hesitated to tabulate the stars, to weave precious conjectures
as to their courses and destinies. Is the human soul more remote and
inscrutable? We are assured that it has five windows and no more, that
it is useless to look for others. But when an increasing number of
explorers in the house of life tell us that there are six or seven or
more, we may at any rate listen and follow their directions.
Obscurantism is revelling in proclaiming prohibited areas of
investigation.

I recognize that the problem is complicated by t