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Second Sight: A study of Natural and Induced Clairvoyance by Sepharial

II. MATERIALS AND CONDITIONS

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In other cases the concave mirror, either of polished copper or black japan, will be found serviceable. In certain cases where the faculty is already developed but lying in latency, any shining surface will suffice to bring it into activity. Ecstatic vision was first induced in Jacob Boehme by the sun's rays falling upon a bowl of water which caught and dazzled his eyes while he was engaged in the humble task of cobbling a pair of shoes. In consequence of this exaltation of the visual sense we have those remarkable works, _The Aurora, The Four Complexions, Signatura Rerum_, and many others, with letters and commentaries which, in addition to being of a spiritual nature, are also to be regarded as scholarly when referred to their source. In Boehme's case, as in that of Swedenborg, whose faculty did not appear until he was fifty-four years of age, it would appear that the faculty was constitutional and already developed, waiting only the conditions which should bring it into active operation.

The agent most suitable for developing clairvoyance cannot therefore be definitely prescribed. It must remain a matter of experiment with the subject himself. That there are some persons in whom the psychic faculties are more prone to activity than in others is certain, and it would appear also that these faculties are native in some by spiritual or hereditary succession, which fact is evident from their genitures as interpreted by astrology. Many planets in flexed signs and a satellitium in the nadir or lower angle of the horoscope is a certain indication of extreme nervous sensibility and predisposition to telaesthenic impressions, though this observation does not cover all the instances before me. It is true, however, where it applies. The dominant influence of the planet Neptune in a horoscope is also to be regarded as a special indication of some form of psychic activity, as I have frequently observed.

In cases where the subject is not prepared by evolutional process for the exercise of the psychic faculties, it will be found that the same or similar indications will tend to the simulation of such faculties, as by mediumism, conjuring, etc., while they may even result in chicanery and fraud.

But among those who are gifted in the direction spoken of, all are not clairvoyant. The most common form of psychic disturbance is involuntary clairaudience, and telaesthesia is not perhaps less general. St. Paul indicates a variety of such psychic "gifts," _e.g._ the gifts of prophecy, of healing, of understanding, etc.; but these may also be regarded in quite a mundane sense. The development among the early Christians of spiritual gifts, visions, hearing, speaking in foreign tongues, psychic healing, etc., appears to have given rise to a variety of exceptional experiences by which they were induced to say "we cannot but speak the things we have seen and heard." "One star differs from another in glory," says St. Paul, and this diversity of spiritual gifts proceeds from the celestial world, and is so ordered that each may fulfil the part required of him in the economy of life.

Psychic tradition is as important a fact as is physical heredity. The latter is a factor of immense importance as affecting the constitution and quality of the organism in and through which the soul is required to function. But psychic tradition is that which determines the power and faculty brought to bear upon the physical organism. Past evolution is not a negligible quantity, and its effects are never wasted or lost to the individual. We are what we are by reason of what we have already been, as well individually as racially. "The future is, the past unfolded" or "entered upon by a new door," as it has been well said. We do not suddenly acquire faculties, we evolve them by effort and successive selection. In our upward striving for liberty we specialize along certain lines which appear to us to be those offering either the least resistance or the most ready means of self-preservation, liberty and well-being. Hence some evolve a special faculty for money-making and, as schoolboys, will be expert traders of alley-taws, jack-knives, toffee and all sorts of kickshaws. Others of another bent or list will traffic in knowledge to the abounding satisfaction of their masters and the jealous pride of their form.

So that psychic tradition while disposing some to the speedy revelation of an already acquired faculty, disposes others to the more arduous but not less interesting work of acquiring such faculty. And because the spiritual needs of mankind are ever of primary importance, there are always to be found those in whom the power of spiritual interpretation is the dominant faculty, such persons being the natural channels of intercourse between the superior and inferior worlds. The physical body of man is equipped with a corresponding order of microbic life which acts as an organic interpreter, translating the elements of food into blood, nerve, fibre, tissue and bone agreeably to the laws of their being. What I have to say in this place is addressed especially to those who would aspire to the faculty of clear vision and in whom the psychic powers are striving towards expression. Every person whose life is not wholly sunk in material and selfish pleasures but in whom the aspiration to a higher and better life is a hunger the world cannot satisfy, has within himself the power to see and know that which he seeks behind the veil of the senses. Nature has never produced a desire she cannot satisfy. There is no hope, however vague, that the soul cannot define, and no aspiration, however high, that the wings of the spirit cannot reach. Therefore be patient and strive. To others I would say: Be content. All birds cannot be eagles. The nightingale has a song and the humming bird a plumage the eagle can never possess. The nightingale may sing to the stars, the humming bird to the flowers, but the eagle, whose tireless eyes gaze into the heart of day, is uncompanioned in its lofty loneliness amid the mountain tops.

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