"For my part, I have no doubt whatsoever on the subject. I have had definite proof that the beings who communicate with us are really those whom they declare themselves to be." Sir Oliver Lodge,

Speech, November 22, 1914.

Where is the Beyond? It is generally admitted by psychicists that the Beyond is not a place: mental life is not limited by space. The Beyond is a mental condition capable of crossing the present known limit of the relation of beings. Beyond? We are always there, even at present. We are there in such a manner, however, that from the physical plane we cannot communicate with our fellow beings without making for ourselves a new material means of communication.

In the Beyond, we do not experience physical sensations, but we live through thoughts and feelings.

It follows that in the present incorporation, we are not in a condition to communicate. Between you and me, relations cannot be established except by the aid of a subterfuge, which has been created by us through the medium of verbal images or words, which moreover would have remained abstract representations had it not been possible to clothe them with a material body for the physical plane.

These images have taken on in handwriting a visible body which presents itself to our visual faculties, and in the word which addresses itself, more particularly, to the auditive organs. Thus sounds and written signs are the material symbols which affect the material organs, and through them reach the intellectual plane: and these conventional signs give you no absolute certainty in communicating with me since with my lips and with a pen, I can lie without your even suspecting it, because between you and me, no really direct relation may exist.

The "ego" sees into the Beyond: it exists independently of the physical body, just as my thought exists by itself independent of those sounds by which I express it and of the material characters which I trace upon paper. We shall now approach the great question - "Is there in the Beyond something other than ourselves: are there manifestations from the Beyond which come from strange beings?" These manifestations, if they exist, are outside ourselves: they may produce themselves spontaneously and not otherwise. William Stead, the distinguished journalist and English spiritist whose heroic death occurred on the Titanic, defined his position in relation to the Beyond in the Review of January 15, 1909. He used a comparison from the recent application of wireless telegraphy. He compared the tomb to the ocean before Columbus had discovered America: then, by an ingenious supposition, Mr. Stead pictured the explorer and those who followed him, as incapable of navigating from the West to the East. No one then would have been able to make the return voyage. All Europe would therefore have concluded the non-existence of another continent. Nevertheless American civilization would have progressed along with that of the Old World. European navigators would have persisted in exploring and, one day, one of them would have arrived at a flourishing republic on the other side of the water. What would he do then? He would hasten to use every resource of modern science to inform the mother country: he would try, let us say, wireless telegraphy, at that time quite imperfect: thus in Europe they would have received distorted, obscure, possibly incomprehensible messages. After many deceptive messages, they would finally be able to decipher a somewhat clearer one:

From Captain Smith (South Sea) to the Lloyds, in London. "Everybody alive, safe and sound. Discovery New World, filled with descendants of Columbus and his companions."

But this message might be accredited to any European Marconi station: it would be necessary that a certain number of opinionated, incredulous searchers after the truth should undertake to follow up this statement and verify it by experiment, before the people would be convinced and admit the possibility of a phenomenon at first seemingly unbelievable. But gradually better equipped receiving stations would be established and the solution of practically the same difficulties which confront us when we try to establish with actual certainty the existence of another life after death, would have been achieved.1

Our position is well defined by this comparison. The Beyond manifests itself spontaneously: if we reply with indifference, skepticism, or ridicule to the efforts which it makes, all effort will cease. The difficulty consists in the preliminary establishment of a receiving station. We must at least accept this hypothesis in order that we may have correspondence with the Beyond: we must pay attention to the slightest indication of a wireless telegraphy which may perhaps be sent us from beyond the tomb. And in order to be in condition to receive these hypothetical messages, we must also, so far as possible, perfect the receiving stations. These receivers are the "sensitives": in themselves they are but useless aids to lucidity. Even though they obtain the most valuable communications, of which they themselves are but the simple narrators, these communications would be worthless were they not attested by sufficient witnesses. The ideal receiving post would be that which could be established with a clairvoyant who was at the same time sensitive to these influences and capable of being put in touch with the Beyond in a somnambulistic state. It would be necessary, moreover, that this person be capable of great self-sacrifice, that he or she be surrounded by experimentalists thoroughly acquainted with such phenomena, well informed upon the history of physical science, not skeptical and working under the aforesaid hypothesis. There should be a resident medium in a locality where it would be possible to have many witnesses supplied with pecuniary resources and a material organization, making possible the maintenance of a society for study. This, the laws of France render impossible, for a society may not possess any localities whose revenue permits it to supply funds for experiments or to be used to contribute to the living expenses of its adherents.

1 See the article in full in the Revue Scientifique et Morale du Spiritisme, March, 1909, p. 529.