CAUSE AND NATURE OF SOMNAMBULISTIC CLAIRVOYANCE.

Being of a different nature from those occurring in the waking state, the perceptions that take place in the somnambulistic state cannot be transmitted by the same organs. It is known that in this case vision is not effected by means of the eyes, which, moreover, generally remain closed and may even be shielded from the rays of light, so as to set aside any cause for suspicion. Furthermore, vision at a distance and through opaque bodies excludes the possibility of using the ordinary organs of sight. We must therefore admit that in the state of somnambulism a new sense develops, as the seat of new faculties and perceptions, which we do not know and of which we can become aware only by analogy and by reasoning. It is plain that there is nothing impossible in this; but what is the seat of this new sense? It is not easy to determine it with exactness. Not even the somnambulists provide any precise indication in this regard. There are some who, in order to see better, apply objects to the epigastrium, others to the forehead, others to the occiput. The sense in question does not seem, therefore, to be confined to a determined place; it is, however, certain that its greatest activity resides in the nervous centers. What is positive is that the somnambulist sees. By what means and how? That is what not even he can explain. Let us note, however, that in the somnambulistic state the phenomena of vision and the sensations that accompany it are essentially different from what occurs in the ordinary state, for which reason we shall use the term to see only by way of comparison and because we naturally lack one by which to designate an unknown thing. A people composed of persons blind from birth would surely lack a word to designate light and would refer the sensations it produces to some of those familiar to them by their being subject to them.

Someone was trying to explain to a blind man the vivid and dazzling impression of light upon the eyes. I understand, he said, it is like the sound of a trumpet. Another, somewhat more prosaic no doubt, to whom they wished to make clear the emission of luminous rays in beams or colors, replied: Ah! yes, it is like a sugarloaf. We are in the same condition with respect to somnambulistic lucidity: we are truly blind, and, just as those latter do with respect to light, we compare it to that which has most analogy with our visual faculty. But if we wish to establish an absolute analogy between these two faculties and to judge of one by the other, we shall necessarily be mistaken, like the two blind men we have just cited. This is the error of nearly all those who claim to seek conviction through experience: they attempt to subject somnambulistic clairvoyance to the same tests as ordinary sight, without considering that between them the only existing relation is that of the name we give them. Hence, since the results do not always answer their expectation, they find it simpler to deny. If we proceed by analogy, we shall say that the magnetic fluid, disseminated throughout all Nature and whose principal foci seem to be animate bodies, is the vehicle of somnambulistic clairvoyance, as the luminous fluid is the vehicle of the images that our visual faculty perceives. Now, just as the luminous fluid renders transparent the bodies it freely traverses, the magnetic fluid, penetrating all bodies without exception, renders opaque bodies nonexistent for the somnambulists. Such is the simplest and most material explanation of lucidity, speaking from our point of view. We hold it to be certain, since the magnetic fluid incontestably plays an important part in this phenomenon; it could not, however, elucidate all the facts. There is another that encompasses them all; but, in order to set it forth, some preliminary explanations become indispensable. In vision at a distance, the somnambulist does not distinguish an object far off, as we would do with the aid of a spyglass. It is not that the object, by an optical illusion, draws near to him; IT IS HE WHO DRAWS NEAR TO THE OBJECT. The somnambulist sees the object exactly as if it were at his side; he sees himself in the place he observes; in a word: he transports himself to that place. His body, at the moment, seems extinguished, his speech comes more muffled, the sound of his voice presents something singular; animal life also seems to be extinguished in him; spiritual life is wholly in the place to which his own thought transports him: only matter remains where it was. There is, then, a certain portion of the being that separates from his body and transports itself instantaneously through space, carried by thought and by will. Evidently, this portion is immaterial; otherwise, it would produce some of the effects that matter produces. It is this portion of ourselves that we call: the soul. It is the soul that confers upon the somnambulist the marvelous faculties he enjoys. The soul it is that, under certain circumstances, manifests itself, isolating itself in part and temporarily from its corporeal envelope. For whoever has attentively observed the phenomena of somnambulism in all their purity, the existence of the soul is manifest, and the idea that everything in us ends with animal life becomes a folly demonstrated to the point of evidence. One may therefore say with some reason that magnetism and materialism are incompatible. If some magnetizers depart from this rule and profess materialist doctrines, it is no doubt because they have confined themselves to a very superficial study of the physical phenomena of Magnetism and do not seriously seek the solution of the problem of vision at a distance. Be that as it may, we have never seen a single somnambulist who did not show himself imbued with a profound religious sentiment, whatever his opinions in the waking state. Let us return to the theory of lucidity. The soul being the basic principle of the somnambulist's faculties, it is necessarily in it that clairvoyance resides and not in this or that confined part of the material body. This is the reason why the somnambulist cannot indicate the organ of this faculty, as he would designate the eyes when it was a matter of exterior vision. He sees by his whole moral being, that is, by his whole soul, since clairvoyance is one of the attributes of all the parts of the soul, as light is one of the attributes of all the parts of phosphorus. Wherever, then, the soul can penetrate, there is clairvoyance; this is the cause of the lucidity of somnambulists through all bodies, under the thickest coverings, and at all distances. An objection, as is natural, presents itself to this system, and we hasten to answer it. If the somnambulistic faculties are the same as those of the soul released from matter, why are these faculties not constant? Why are some somnambulists more lucid than others? Why, in one and the same individual, is the lucidity variable? One conceives of the physical imperfection of an organ; but one does not conceive of that of the soul.

The soul is bound to the body by mysterious ties that we could not have known before Spiritism had demonstrated the existence and the role of the perispirit. This question having been treated in a special manner in the Spiritist Review and in the fundamental works of the doctrine, we shall not expand upon it here, limiting ourselves to saying that it is through our material organs that the soul manifests itself outwardly. In our normal state, these manifestations naturally remain subordinate to the imperfection of the instrument, just as the best craftsman cannot make a perfect work with poor tools. Thus, however admirable the structure of our body may be, whatever the provision of Nature may have been with respect to our organism for the exercise of the vital functions, above these organs subject to all the disturbances of matter, there is the subtlety of our soul. As long, then, as it remains bound to the body, it suffers its hindrances and vicissitudes. The magnetic fluid is not the soul; it is a bond, an intermediary between the soul and the body. It is by acting more or less upon matter that it renders the soul more or less free, whence the diversity of the somnambulistic faculties. The somnambulist is the man stripped of only a part of his garments and whose movements are encumbered by what remains to him of those garments.

Only when it has cast off the last remnants of the earthly gangue, like the butterfly that abandons its chrysalis, does the soul find itself in the fullness of itself and enjoy complete freedom in the use of its faculties. If there were a magnetizer powerful enough to give the soul absolute freedom, the earthly bond would break and immediate death would follow. Somnambulism, therefore, has made us set foot in the future life; it has raised a corner of the veil under which are hidden the truths that Spiritism today allows us to glimpse. We shall not know it, however, in its essence until we have entirely freed ourselves of the material covering that obscures it in this world.