ll very well, but
there are a good many things to which I have never been, but I have not
the smallest intention of leaving off talking about them. I refuse (for
instance) to leave off talking about the Siege of Troy. I decline to be
mute in the matter of the French Revolution. I will not be silenced on
the late indefensible assassination of Julius Caesar. If nobody has any
right to judge of Spiritualism except a man who has been to a _seance_,
the results, logically speaking, are rather serious: it would almost
seem as if nobody had any right to judge of Christianity who had not
been to the first meeting at Pentecost. Which would be dreadful. I
conceive myself capable of forming my opinion of Spiritualism without
seeing spirits, just as I form my opinion of the Japanese War without
seeing the Japanese, or my opinion of American millionaires without
(thank God) seeing an American millionaire. Blessed are they who have
not seen and yet have believed: a passage which some have considered as
a prophecy of modern journalism.

But my correspondent's second objection is more important. He charges me
with actually ignoring the value of communication (if it exists) between
this world and the next. I do not ignore it. But I do say this--That a
different principle attaches to investigation in this spiritual field
from investigation in any other. If a man baits a line for fish, the
fish will come, even if he declares there are no such things as fishes.
If a man limes a twig for birds, the birds will be caught, even if he
thinks it superstitious to believe in birds at all. But a man cannot
bait a line for souls. A man cannot lime a twig to catch gods. All wise
schools have agreed that this latter capture depends to some extent on
the faith of the capturer. So it comes to this: If you have no faith in
the spirits your appeal is in vain; and if you have--is it needed? If
you do not believe, you cannot. If you do--you will not.

That is the real distinction between investigation in this department
and investigation in any other. The priest calls to the goddess, for the
same reason that a man calls to his wife, because he knows she is there.
If a man kept on shouting out very loud the single word "Maria," merely
with the object of discovering whether if he did it long enough some
woman of that name would come and marry him, he would be more or less in
the position of the modern spiritualist. The old religionist cried out
for his God.