Research source

Occasionally the object seen or the sound heard is non-human in character

Date of account: Published 1908
Source: Occultism and common-sense
Reference: Occultism and common-sense · selected passage 64
Rights: public_domain
Language: English
Record updated: 2026-08-24

Record summary

Published source text

Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.

Source passage

Source text · mention only

Occasionally the object seen or the sound heard is non-human in character. In insanity and in diseases such cases are frequently met with, the hallucination being often of a grotesque or horrible sort. Thus we have a case in which a young child beheld a vision of dwarfish gnomes dancing on the wall. Among the phantasms of inanimate objects in the collection of the late E. Gurney were a star, a firework bursting into stars, a firefly, a crown, landscape vignettes, a statue, the end of a draped coffin coming in through the door, and a bright oval surrounding the words "Wednesday, October 15, Death." Geometrical patterns, sometimes taking very complicated forms, comprise another known type of hallucination.

Historical context

Contextual commentary · mention only

This comes from historical psychical research. Methods, witness handling and standards of evidence differ from present-day research and should be assessed from the cited passage and edition.

Modern context

Contextual commentary · mention only

The passage can support a history of claims and recurring descriptions. It does not establish a paranormal mechanism, and competing psychological, social and physical explanations remain relevant.

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