Research source

If I go on and describe your pains, there is nothing astonishing in it

Date of account: Published 1910 from earlier writings
Source: The Astral World—Higher Occult Powers Clairvoyance, Spiritism, Mediumship, and Spirit-Healing Fully Explained
Reference: The Astral World—Higher Occult Powers Clairvoyance, Spiritism, Mediumship, and Spirit-Healing Fully Explained · selected passage 24
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

If I go on and describe your pains, there is nothing astonishing in it. I am simply in _rapport_ with your nerve-medium. I am sometimes wondered at for this, but I might be a fool and yet do it. There is no wisdom involved in such a power; and it is erroneous to suppose, as some do, that because clairvoyants can tell them what ails them, they can tell them how to cure it. These powers belong to very different classes, but they may be united in the same individual, and he may be competent to discover disease and to prescribe its remedy. I refer to this simply to correct the false impression that clairvoyance is a wondrous power. It is one of the simplest powers in nature. It is one of the powers that may be made use of to bless; but if not properly understood, it may be made use of to curse. What is true in regard to this nervous medium is true also of thought. You often witness cases of this kind in mesmeric and magnetic experiments, when the subject and operator being brought into _rapport_, whatever one thinks the other thinks—what one wills the other wills.

Historical context

Contextual commentary · mention only

This is a historical account assembled under the reporting and publishing conventions of its period. It may preserve testimony, hearsay, retelling and editorial interpretation together.

Modern context

Contextual commentary · mention only

A modern comparison can identify recurring descriptions and possible explanations, but the account is not treated as independently verified evidence merely because it appeared in print.

Investigate related details with Anomaly Graph’s account-based search, or read how matching and provenance work.