PSYCHIC OR SUPERMUNDANE EXPERIENCES.

F

BY CORA L. V. RICHMOND.

ROM between ten and eleven years of age I have been endowed with gifts and favored with experiences that,

I am well assured, are very exceptional, and that, until quite recently, have not been admitted to the realm of psychical investigation, philosophical discussion, or even human credence. Lately, however, there have been found a sufficient number of well authenticated facts in similar lines of experience to warrant the investigation and classification of them (if possible) under a modern name, "Psychic Research," and under a well established and not so recent one, Spiritualism.

I am not intending to discuss these subjects, per se, nor to endeavor to classify or explain the experiences I am about to relate. They are experiences, as real as any of those in my human or mundane existence; indeed, if I were called upon to decide that one is real and the other illusion, I should say without hesitation that these, and similar ones throughout my lifetime, are the real, and the ordinary mundane experiences unreal.

At the age above referred to I was, without any seeking, and without any surrounding circumstances to "suggest" such a state, taken possession of (entranced) by intelligences, distinct personalities in thought, word, and action, who spoke through my organism, unfolded and educated my mind, in fact became my mental and spiritual instructors. The public discourses and teachings given under these conditions are well known to many of the readers of THE ARENA, as these labors are the work of a lifetime.

It is not of this public work that I am constrained to write; but I may as well say here that I have had no other teachers, no other instructors, and have pursued no course of study or reading of human books; those whom I call my guides and guardians have been my teachers. During the time that these outside intelligences are controlling and speaking through my organism I am wholly unconscious of what is passing in human

life and wholly unaware of that which is being uttered through my lips. I am also unaware of the lapse of time.

It may be best for me to here declare that I am not, in the usual sense, peculiar, nor was I different in my childhood from other children, save as each differs from the other. I was very diffident, and not using the word in the psychical sensesensitive. I was not given to morbid states or to the "dreaming of dreams." Perhaps I was imaginative; most children are; and I loved fairy tales, but not unduly. This is simply to show that there was no abnormal condition of mind or body to produce the supernormal results that I have referred to.

I ought also to say that I never made the slightest preparation for the discourses and poems given through my lips, many of which, as the reader may know, were listened to by able and thoughtful minds, and from them received the highest praise. I tell this, not boastingly, but with humble gratitude that I have been made the instrument of giving the message of immortality to the world.

My own experiences during this period of entrancement, or while in the supernormal state, may be of peculiar interest to the reader, since they seem to be almost unique. While passing into this state I experience no physical sensations that are describable; a sense of being set free, of passing into a larger realm,—not of being transported or going anywhere,—is all that I can ever recall as sensation. Before I have time or opportunity to think how I feel, I am in the other state. Then I see, but I now know it is perception more than sight; I sometimes experience that which we call hearing in the human state, but I am fully aware; perception supersedes the senses.

Those whom I meet are individualities; many are friends known to me in the form before they passed from the mortal state; many are those who were unknown to me personally, only known by name and fame; and many I have never known until they revealed themselves to me in this "inner," "higher," other realm. When returning to outward consciousness, I often see, or remember as sight, such visions of surpassing loveliness that no language, no gift of art, even with genius-portraiture, could describe or picture them. These scenes and visions are associated with individuals who exist in that state, and, appar

ently, are objective; yet I am fully aware that they illustrate or depict the states and tastes of the individuals with whom they are seen, and are not organic physical forms, but psychic projections of the individual spirits. These forms and scenes readily pass and change according to the state of the one seeing them, or according to the state of the individual with whom they are associated. The "sphere" of a spirit, or of spirits, is the state or condition, not the environment.

In early life, before my mind had thought on the "objective" and "subjective" meanings of thoughts and things, I thought these scenes were "objective" in the human, mundane sense. I am now perfectly aware that every sensuous faculty – seeing, hearing, etc. is superseded by this "perception" to which I have before referred; in fact, that the bodily senses as well as the mental faculties brain expression are but the different avenues of perceiving and conveying the intelligence of the individual spirit while associated with material form, this perception, or awareness, being the one supreme state of the spirit. Still I have been shown series after series of beautiful scenes, gardens, landscapes, visions of art, transcendent pictures of tint, form, and tone that no language can portray; and I am sure these abide for all who wish for or have need of them, and are the illustrations of the spiritual states of those with whom one comes in spiritual contact - rapport. Yet the greater the degree of perception, the less important become these illustrations of states; we not only see "face to face," but perceive soul to soul. I became ashamed, almost, of the state of mind requiring these illustrations or any similar presentations. I found knowledge, however, in all the methods employed by my teachers, for they knew my needs.

Conversation in that state is not by means of speech or even language; sometimes before the thought is formulated the answer comes. Such is the rare sympathy existing between teacher and pupil in this state that the guide knows before the question is formed. Still, there must be the conscious desire for knowledge, or no knowledge can be received; reminding one of the "Seek, and ye shall find" of the ancient Truth-Teller.

When in that state I readily pass to a knowledge of what intimate friends in earth-life are doing and thinking. I even

enter into such rapport as to be aware of their material surroundings, their states of mind, and their bodily health, obtaining all this from their minds, not from physical consciousness or sensation. Many times they have been also conscious of my presence, and we have afterward verified these experiences by outward correspondence, mostly to satisfy our friends. One or two instances will suffice to illustrate this class of experiences.

When I was yet a child, twelve years of age, my father accompanied me on one of my pilgrimages of spiritual work to western New York, our former home. During that visit or tour a circle for investigation and experiment was formed in Dunkirk, N. Y. After we returned to our then home in Wisconsin, I was one evening entranced, as was usual, and while in that state was distinctly conscious of being in Dunkirk, of seeing every member of the circle, with all of whom I was acquainted except one lady. She proved to be the seer of the evening. She saw me and described me so accurately that everyone in the circle recognized me, and, of course, thought I was dead. This so disturbed her mental or psychic state that I could not impress upon her mind that my body was entranced and that this was but one of my usual spiritual pilgrimages. On returning to my mundane state I narrated what I had experienced, and asked my father to write at once to the circle in Dunkirk and relieve their minds. He did so, but, as naturally would occur, they had also written, the letters crossing each other on the way, and their letter confirmed what I had told in every particular.

Later in life I had a lady friend whom I repeatedly visited and comforted, for she was in great sorrow. One time I made her see my body, or its apparition, so plainly that she saw the dress in which it was clothed precisely what I had wished, as it was the color she most liked to see me wear. Another friend in California became so susceptible to my presence that she wrote long letters from me automatically — which I, in this state, dictated to her, thus rendering correspondence between us almost superfluous except for verification to our outward senses. My own mother was aware of my presence almost daily; and it was a curious fact that my telltale spirit would go to her and reveal the very things I wished to keep from her, - any little surprises or presents, or the time of my

arrival home on a visit. However late the hour, I always found her ready with a warm supper to receive me. When arriving after the journey home she would say: "You came to me last night in spirit and told me you were coming in body." All important things connected with my welfare she knew in a similar way.

Two friends, Mr. and Mrs. B were extensive travellers. At one time they were absent three years, taking a tour of the Orient. We did not keep up a regular correspondence, as mutually our time was too much taken up with our respective duties or pleasures, but I could always locate them while I was in this "inner" state. At one time I saw them surrounded by what seemed more like a scene in the spirit state than in earth-life. They were on an island, surrounded by water-lilies; the skies were full of golden light, and they were amid pavilions, grottos, and altars of quaint and unique design. I could not place them, but on returning to my mundane state I related to my family what I had seen, and I wrote down the date. In about three or four weeks I had a letter from them dated at Tokio, giving a description of this very island I had seen; they were there on that very day when I saw them, and the island was as I had seen it. It proved to be one of the sacred islands in Japan.

This consciousness of visiting earth friends is, however, only the smallest part of these inner experiences; and usually occurs when I am passing into or out of the deeper or more spiritual states. Although I could fill volumes with these interesting experiences, verified by being shared with others in human life, I feel it due to the reader that I narrate my more inner experiences; at least in sufficient degree that they may be recorded, and that there may be some perception, however inadequately expressed, of what is possible in this surpassing realm.

I cannot pass from this subject of my visits to human friends, however, without here recording one other phase of this manythreaded line of experiences. While in this realm of spirit I often meet and converse freely, or commune, with friends that are yet in human forms, but who appear as spirits and seem to possess all the activities of the spiritual state. They meet and mingle freely with those who have "died" to human life, yet I