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Phantasms of the Living
This two-volume work, co-authored by Edmund Gurney (1847–1888), Frederic W. H. Myers (1843–1901) and Frank Podmore (1856–1910), all leading members of the Society for Psychical Research, was first published in 1886. This collection, containing over 700 case studies of sensory phantasms and hypnotic experiments, was one of the first attempts to deal scientifically with the hypothesis of psychic thought-transference and to catalogue and provide a body of evidence in its support. Volume 2 presents data and analyses of auditory, visual, and tactile hallucinations, and those of a reciprocal or collective nature. It contains addenda and a conclusion for the two volumes. This pioneering study is an indispensable source for the history of psychical research and nineteenth-century attitudes to the idea of telepathy. It provides detailed insights into the Victorian fascination with the occult and the supernatural.
- GenresParanormal
520 pages, Hardcover
Published November 1, 1918
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
April 5, 2011
Massive late Victorian study filled with anecdotes of people (still living at the time) who appeared (allegedly) as apparitions to others who knew them. Contains the famous "Veiled Lady in Black" case that occured at the Despard family home in Cheltenham, England, in the 1880's (and would be debunked--perhaps--in the 1950's by Trevor Hall, who claimed the woman in black was actually the home-owner's secret mistress, disguised as a phantom in order to make her illict visits).
December 5, 2025
TWO IMPORTANT WORKS OF THE EARLY PSYCHICAL RESEARCH MOVEMENT
Parapsychological researcher Gardner Murphy wrote in the Foreword, "The second part of the present volume is the exemplification of the first successes achieved by the unlimited energies of Edmund Gurney in collecting, ordering and writing up the records, assisted powerfully by Frank Podmore, and in both case-collecting and interpretative analysis by Frederic W.H. Myers. Some beginnings had already been made in the development of EXPERIMENTAL approaches to telepathy, and Gurney and his collaborators included in this publication some experiments of their own.
"The resulting huge two-volume work, Phantasms of the Living, 1886, became one of the landmarks of the new psychical research. The two volumes were reduced to a one-volume abridgement two decades later by Eleanor Mildred Sidgwick. Thereby she preserved it in a form which remains well nigh as useful today as when it first appeared in 1918. Some five years later she followed this up by systematically gathering together and analyzing the best spontaneous material which had appeared during the thirty-five years since Gurney's original publication. This huge follow-up study of the material from 1886 to 1920 appears here side by side with the earlier study." (Pg. vi)
She admits, "Now it is very difficult to obtain adequate evidence of communication from the dead, and many reasons may be urged for caution in the acceptance of alleged communications as genuine. But the confused quality of many of the supposed 'messages' when received is not one of these reasons. Communication from the dead is presumably of the same nature as telepathic communication between the living, and similar confusion is exhibited in what appear to be indubitable instances of the latter. I do not think that anyone experienced in psychical research doubts this." (Pg. 432)
She argues, "I believe... that what happens in the typical case is that the telepathic impression first reaches a subliminal part of the mind. From this it is transmitted to the waking consciousness, emerging in various ways... The impression thus transmitted is often indistinct or otherwise obscure and needs interpretation. There are obviously in this process several opportunities for error to intrude. The impression as subliminally received may be imperfect, there may be defect or addition or distortion in the transmission from the subliminal, and there may be misinterpretation of the impression of which the percipient ultimately becomes conscious..." (Pg. 450)
Myers said in his introduction to the second book, "my argument is that here again, as in the case of religion, telepathy... would be the first indication of a possible scientific basis for much that now lacks not only experimental confirmation, but even plausible analogy." (V2, Pg. xxv)
The authors state, "But however things may be on the physical plane, the facts recorded in this book are purely PSYCHICAL facts... Can it be asserted that this treatment is illegitimate unless a concurrent physical theory can also be put forward? It is surely allowable to do one thing at a time. There is an unsolved mystery in the background... but it need not perpetually oppress us. After all, is there not that standing mystery of cerebral and mental correlation in the individual---a mystery equally unsolved and perhaps more definitely and radically insoluble---at the background of every fact and doctrine of the recognised psychology?" (V2, Pg. 94)
They suggest, "A new element is now introduced, which has seemed to many weighty authorities a full and sufficient explanation of all post-mortem phantasms. I am not aware, indeed, that any crucial instance has ever been forthcoming---that anyone, believing a friend to be dead who was really in a perfectly normal state, has seen his 'ghost.'" (Pg. 331)
For anyone studying the history of the early movement of psychical research, this dual volume will be "must reading."
Parapsychological researcher Gardner Murphy wrote in the Foreword, "The second part of the present volume is the exemplification of the first successes achieved by the unlimited energies of Edmund Gurney in collecting, ordering and writing up the records, assisted powerfully by Frank Podmore, and in both case-collecting and interpretative analysis by Frederic W.H. Myers. Some beginnings had already been made in the development of EXPERIMENTAL approaches to telepathy, and Gurney and his collaborators included in this publication some experiments of their own.
"The resulting huge two-volume work, Phantasms of the Living, 1886, became one of the landmarks of the new psychical research. The two volumes were reduced to a one-volume abridgement two decades later by Eleanor Mildred Sidgwick. Thereby she preserved it in a form which remains well nigh as useful today as when it first appeared in 1918. Some five years later she followed this up by systematically gathering together and analyzing the best spontaneous material which had appeared during the thirty-five years since Gurney's original publication. This huge follow-up study of the material from 1886 to 1920 appears here side by side with the earlier study." (Pg. vi)
She admits, "Now it is very difficult to obtain adequate evidence of communication from the dead, and many reasons may be urged for caution in the acceptance of alleged communications as genuine. But the confused quality of many of the supposed 'messages' when received is not one of these reasons. Communication from the dead is presumably of the same nature as telepathic communication between the living, and similar confusion is exhibited in what appear to be indubitable instances of the latter. I do not think that anyone experienced in psychical research doubts this." (Pg. 432)
She argues, "I believe... that what happens in the typical case is that the telepathic impression first reaches a subliminal part of the mind. From this it is transmitted to the waking consciousness, emerging in various ways... The impression thus transmitted is often indistinct or otherwise obscure and needs interpretation. There are obviously in this process several opportunities for error to intrude. The impression as subliminally received may be imperfect, there may be defect or addition or distortion in the transmission from the subliminal, and there may be misinterpretation of the impression of which the percipient ultimately becomes conscious..." (Pg. 450)
Myers said in his introduction to the second book, "my argument is that here again, as in the case of religion, telepathy... would be the first indication of a possible scientific basis for much that now lacks not only experimental confirmation, but even plausible analogy." (V2, Pg. xxv)
The authors state, "But however things may be on the physical plane, the facts recorded in this book are purely PSYCHICAL facts... Can it be asserted that this treatment is illegitimate unless a concurrent physical theory can also be put forward? It is surely allowable to do one thing at a time. There is an unsolved mystery in the background... but it need not perpetually oppress us. After all, is there not that standing mystery of cerebral and mental correlation in the individual---a mystery equally unsolved and perhaps more definitely and radically insoluble---at the background of every fact and doctrine of the recognised psychology?" (V2, Pg. 94)
They suggest, "A new element is now introduced, which has seemed to many weighty authorities a full and sufficient explanation of all post-mortem phantasms. I am not aware, indeed, that any crucial instance has ever been forthcoming---that anyone, believing a friend to be dead who was really in a perfectly normal state, has seen his 'ghost.'" (Pg. 331)
For anyone studying the history of the early movement of psychical research, this dual volume will be "must reading."
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews