Christism and Spiritualism
Christism and Spiritualism is an article written by Minnermus published in The Freethinker on 30 march 1919.
Christism and Spiritualism
- A world in the hand is worth two in the bush———
- Let us have to do with real men and women, and not with skipping ghosts — Emerson.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's conversion to Spiritualism, coupled with his propagandist zeal, has once again revived speculation and discussion over what strange adventures are perpetrated in the name of theology in Christian England. On such an occasion people become aware what a strong hold fancy religions, of which Spiritualism is a specimen, have in this country.
Spiritualism, like Christian Science, thrives upon curiosity. The well-to-do sentimentalist, half-educated, with little to exercise his mind seriously, with money to spend, is ever on the search for new sensations. He is waiting anxiously to be exploited. A charlatan comes along with his trap baited with modern miracle-mongering, and a new disciple is caught without so much as a wriggle. To the professors of Spiritualism, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's conversion is worth much, and his name is being used everywhere as a triumphant proof of the existence of spiritual phenomena.
The so-called argument appears to be that if Conan Doyle is satisfied as to the truth of "spiritual manifestations" then they are true. On the same principle, it seems to me, that, if a distinguished actor, or grocer, or boxer, were to give us his opinions on electrons, criminal lunacy, or evolution, those opinions should carry weight and be accepted without demur. It is carrying authority to the very gates to Colney Hatch.
Present-day Spiritualism seems to me but a natural development of the old belief in omens, warnings, and manifestations. When I pick up a Spiritualist paper I am not surprised to find its advertisement columns crowded with the manifestoes of astrologers and palmists and alluring displays: inviting me to get into touch with another world at a ridiculously cheap price. The spiritualistic conception of immortality invites the sarcastic comment that it is an endless capacity for the interchange of platitudinous nonsense. When spiritualistic professors disturb the "ghosts" of great and good men and women, and persuade them to "re-visit the glimpses of the moon" at psychical gatherings, the results are most melancholy and unsatisfactory. Not only have the thoughts of the departed not grown finer nor more original, but invariably there is a vast change for the worse. The reported utterances of Burns and Shakespeare, for example, suggest that these great poets have taken to drink, or are suffering from softening of the brain. They give no iota of information concerning a post-mortem existence, but seem preoccupied with composing puerile parodies of their previous utterances on earth.
Our scepticism with regard to the "spirit messages" is not mitigated by the supposition that the authors of Tam O'Shanter and Hamlet may conceivably pass their tremendous and enforced leisure tapping at the under side of tables, or scratching incoherences into locked slates for the professional purposes of Spiritualist professors. It is too significant that the "spirits" are more deeply preoccupied with things temporal rather than with matters dealing with their alleged post-mortem existence. Nor, in our case, is the matter placed in any more favourable light by suggesting that Nelson, Wellington, and Napoleon, to name no others, may fill in their lengthy leisure with discords on concertinas or solos on dinner-gongs for the delectation of psychical students.
We Freethinkers can afford to smile at the crude conceptions of the Spiritualists concerning immortality. Yet it is well to remember that cruder and more barbarous opinions regarding another world are held firmly by millions of people who profess and call themselves Christian. At the worst, the sincere Spiritualists merely wish to meet their lost friends and relatives in another existence. They do not regard discussion as blasphemy, nor do they insult and imprison people who differ from them, nor threaten opponents with everlasting agony elsewhere. If Christianity be true, Burns and Dickens, in company with many millions of other unhappy human beings, are now in a most unenviable position. Frankly, we dislike both the Spiritualistic and the Christian views concerning immortality, but we confess that the Spiritualist conception is far less brutal and degrading than that held by Orthodox Christians. Of the two things, we prefer legerdemain to vivisection.
MIMNERMUS.
