The Mysticism of Emanuel Swedenborg by Lewis Spence 1920

Emanuel Swedenborg the Mystic by Lewis Spence 1920

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Swedenborg, Emanuel, 1688-1772: One of the greatest mystics of all time, was born at Stockholm in Sweden on the 29th January. His father was a professor of theology at Upsala, and afterwards Bishop of Scara, and in his time was charged with possessing heterodox opinions. Swedenborg completed his education at the university of Upsala in 1710, after which he visited England, Holland, France and Germany. Five years later he returned to his native town, and devoted much time to the study of natural science and engineering, editing a paper entitled Daedalus hyperboreus which dealt chiefly with mechanical inventions. About 1716, Charles XII. appointed him to the Swedish Board of Mines. He appears at this time to have had many activities. He published various mathematical and mechanical works, and even took part in the siege of Friederickshall in an engineering capacity. Originally known as Swedberg, he was elevated to the rank of the nobility by Queen Ulrica and changed his name to Swedenborg. Sitting in the House of Nobles, his political utterances had great weight, but his tendencies were distinctly democratic. He busied himself privately in scientific gropings for the explanation of the universe, and published at least two works dealing with the origin of things which are of no great account, unless as foreshadowing many scientific facts and ventures of the future. Thus his theories regarding light, cosmic atoms, geology and physics, were distinctly in advance of his time, and had they been suitably disseminated could not but have influenced scientific Europe. He even sketched a flying-machine, and felt confident that although it was unsuitable to aerial navigation, if men of science applied themselves to the problem, it would speedily be solved. It was in 1734 that he published his Prodomus Philosophia Ratiocinantrio de Infinite which treats of the relation of the finite to the infinite and of the soul to the body. In this work he seeks to establish a definite connection between the two as a means of overcoming the difficulty of their relationship. The spiritual and the divine appear to him as the supreme study of man. He ransacked the countries of Europe in quest of the most eminent teachers and the best books dealing with anatomy, for he considered that in that science lay the germ of the knowledge of soul and spirit. Through his anatomical studies he anticipated certain modern views dealing with the functions of the brain, which are most remarkable.

About the age of fifty-five a profound change overtook the character of Swedenborg. Up to this time he had been a scientist, legislator, and man of affairs; but now his enquiries into the region of spiritual things were to divorce him entirely from practical matters. His introduction into the spiritual world, his illumination, was commenced by dreams and extraordinary visions. He heard wonderful conversations and felt impelled to found a new church. He says that the eyes of his spirit were so opened that he could see heavens and hells, and converse with angels and spirits: but all his doctrines relating to the New Church came directly from God alone, while he was reading the gospels. He claimed that God revealed Himself to him and told him that He had chosen him to unveil the spiritual sense of the whole scriptures to man. From that moment worldly knowledge was eschewed by Swedenborg and he worked for spiritual ends alone. He resigned his several appointments and retired upon half pay. Refreshing his knowledge of the Hebrew tongue, he commenced his great works on the interpretation of the scriptures. After the year 1747 he lived in Sweden, Holland and London, in which city he died on the 29th of March 1772. He was buried in the Swedish Church in Prince's Square, in the parish of St. George's in the East, and in April, 1908 his bones were removed, at the request of the Swedish government, to Stockholm.

There can be no question as to the intrinsic honesty of Swedenborg's mind and character. He was neither presumptuous nor overbearing as regards his doctrines, but gentle and reasonable. A man of few wants, his life was simplicity itself—his food consisting for the most part of bread, milk and coffee. He was in the habit of lying in a trance for days together, and day and night had no distinctions for him. His mighty wrestlings with evil spirits at times so terrified his servants, that they would seek the most distant part of the house in refuge. But again he would converse with benignant angels in broad daylight. We are badly hampered regarding first-hand evidence of his spiritual life and adventures—most of our knowledge being gleaned from other than original sources.

So far from attempting to found a new church, or otherwise tamper or interfere with existing religious systems, Swedenborg was of the opinion that the members of all churches could belong to his New Church in a spiritual sense. His works may be divided into: expository volumes, notably The Apocalypse Revealed, The Apocalypse Explained, and Arcana Celestia; books of spiritual philosophy, such as Intercourse between the Soul and the Body Divine Providence, and Divine Love and Wisdom; books dealing with the hierarchy of supernatural spheres such as Heaven and Hell and The Last Judgment; and those which are purely doctrinal, such as The New Jerusalem, The True Christian Religion, and Canons of the New Church. Of these his Divine Love and Wisdom is the volume which most succinctly presents his entire religious systems. God he regards as the Divine Man. Spiritually He consists of infinite love, and corporeally of infinite wisdom. From the divine love all things draw nourishment. The sun, as we know it, is merely a microcosm of a spiritual sun which emanates from the Creator. This spiritual sun is the source of love and knowledge, and the natural sun is the source of nature; but whereas the first is alive, the second is inanimate. There is no connection between the two worlds of nature and spirit unless in similarity of construction. Love, wisdom, use; or end, cause and effect, are the three infinite and uncreated degrees of being in God and man respectively. The causes of all things exist in the spiritual sphere and their effects in the natural sphere, and the end of all creation is that man may become the image of his Creator, and of the cosmos as a whole. This is to be effected by a love of the degrees above enumerated. Man possesses two vessels or receptacles for the containment of God—the Will for divine love, and the Understanding for divine wisdom. Before the Fall, the flow of these virtues into the human spirit was perfect, but through the intervention of the forces of evil, and the sins of man himself, it was much interrupted. Seeking to restore the connection between Himself and man, God came into the world as Man; for if He had ventured on earth in His unveiled splendour, he would have destroyed the hells through which he must proceed to redeem man, and this He did not wish to do, merely to conquer them. The unity of God is an essential of the Swedenborgian theology, and he thoroughly believes that God did not return to His own place without leaving behind him a visible representative of Himself in the word of scripture, which is an eternal incarnation, in a three-fold sense—natural, spiritual and celestial. Of this Swedenborg is the apostle; nothing was hidden from him; he was aware of the appearance and conditions of other worlds, good and evil, heaven and hell, and of the planets. "The life of religion," he says, "is to accomplish good." "The kingdom of heaven is a kingdom of uses." One of the central ideas of his system is known as the Doctrine of Correspondences. Everything visible has belonging to it an appropriate spiritual reality. Regarding this Vaughan says: "The history of man is an acted parable; the universe, a temple covered with hieroglyphics. Behmen, from the light which flashes on certain exalted moments, imagines that he receives the key to these hidden significances—that he can interpret the Signatura Rerum. But he does not see spirits, or talk with angels. According to him, such communications would be less reliable than the intuition he enjoyed. Swedenborg takes opposite ground. 'What I relate,' he would say, 'comes from no such mere inward persuasion. I recount the things I have seen. I do not labour to recall and to express the manifestation made me in some moment of ecstatic exaltation. I write you down a plain statement of journeys and conversations in the spiritual world, which have made the greater part of my daily history for many years together. I take my stand upon experience. I have proceeded by observation and induction as strict as that of any man of science among you. Only it has been given me to enjoy an experience reaching into two worlds—that of spirit, as well as that of matter.'

"According to Swedenborg, all the mythology and the symbolisms of ancient times were so many refracted or fragmentary correspondences—relics of that better day when every outward object suggested to man's mind its appropriate divine truth. Such desultory and uncertain links between the seen and the unseen are so many imperfect attempts toward that harmony of the two worlds which he believed himself commissioned to reveal. The happy thoughts of the artist, the imaginative analogies of the poet, are exchanged with Swedenborg for an elaborate system. All the terms and objects in the natural and spiritual worlds are catalogued in pairs. This method appears so much formal pedantry. Our fancies will not work to order. The meaning and the life with which we continually inform outward objects—those suggestions from sight and sound, which make almost every man at times a poet—are our own creations, are determined by the mood of the hour, cannot be imposed from without, cannot be arranged like the nomenclature of a science. As regards the inner sense of scripture, at all events, Swedenborg introduces some such yoke. In that province, however, it is perhaps as well that those who are not satisfied with the obvious sense should find some restraint for their imagination, some method for their ingenuity, some guidance in a curiosity irresistible to a certain class of minds. If an objector say, 'I do not see why the ass should correspond to scientific truth, and the horse to intellectual truth,' Swedenborg will reply, 'This analogy rests on no fancy of mine, but on actual experience and observation in the spiritual world. I have always seen horses and asses present and circumstanced, when, and according as, those inward qualities were central.' But I do not believe that it was the design of Swedenborg rigidly to determine the relationships by which men are continually uniting the seen and unseen worlds. He probably conceived it his mission to disclose to men the divinely-ordered correspondences of scripture, the close relationship of man's several states of being, and to make mankind more fully aware that matter and spirit were associated, not only in the varying analogies of imagination, but by the deeper affinity of eternal law. In this way, he sought to impart an impulse rather than to prescribe a scheme. His consistent followers will acknowledge that had he lived to another age, and occupied a different social position, the forms under which the spiritual world presented itself in him would have been different. To a large extent, therefore, his Memorable Relations must be regarded as true for him only—for such a character, in such a day, though containing principles independent of personal peculiarity and local colouring. It would have been indeed inconsistent, had the Protestant who (as himself a Reformer) assayed to supply the defects and correct the errors of the Reformation—had he designed to prohibit all advance beyond his own position."

The style of Swedenborg is clear-cut and incisive. He is never overpowered by manifestations from the unseen. Whereas other mystics are seized by fear or joy by these and become incomprehensible, he is in his element, and when on the very pinnacles of ecstasy can observe the smallest details with a scientific eye. We know nowadays that a great many of his visions do not square with scientific probabilities. Thus those which detail his journeys among the planets and describe the flora and fauna, let us say, of Mars, can be totally disproved, as we are aware that such forms of life as he claims to have seen could not possibly exist upon that planet. The question arises: Did the vast amount of work accomplished by Swedenborg in the first half of his life lead to more or less serious mental derangement? There have been numerous cases of similar injury through similar causes. But the scientific exactness and clarity of his mind survived to the last. So far as he knew science he applied it admirably and with minute exactness to his system; but just as the science of Dante raises a smile, so we feel slightly intolerant of Swedenborg's scientific application to things spiritual. He was probably the only mystic with a real scientific training; others had been adepts in chemistry and kindred studies, but no mystic ever experienced such a long and arduous scientific apprenticeship as Swedenborg. It colours the whole of his system. It would be exceedingly difficult to say whether he was more naturally a mystic or a scientist. In the first part of his life we do not find him greatly exercised by spiritual affairs; and it is only when he had passed the meridian of human days that he seriously began to consider matters supernatural. The change to the life of a mystic, if not rapid was certainly not prolonged: what then caused it? We can only suspect that his whole tendency was essentially mystical from the first, and that he was a scientist by force of circumstance rather than because of any other reason. The spiritual was constantly simmering within his brain, but, as the world is ever with us, he found it difficult to throw off the superincumbent mass of affairs, which probably trammelled him for years. At length the fountains of his spirit welled up so fiercely that they could no longer be kept back; and throwing aside his scientific oars, he leaped into the spiritual ocean which afterwards speedily engulfed him. There is perhaps no analogy to be found to his case in the biography of science. We cannot altogether unveil the springs of the man's spirituality, but we know that they existed deep down in him. It has often been said that he was a mere visionary, and not a mystic, in the proper sense of the word; but the terms of his philosophy dispose of this contention; although in many ways it does not square with the generally-accepted doctrines of mysticism, it is undoubtedly one of the most striking and pregnant contributions to it. He is the apostle of the divine humanity, and the "Grand Man" is with him the beginning and end of the creative purpose. The originality of his system is marked, and the detail with which he surrounded it provides his followers of the present day with a greater body of teaching than that of probably any other mystical master.

The following extracts from Swedenborg's works will assist the reader in gaining some idea of his eschatology and general doctrine:—

"The universe is an image of God, and was made for use. Providence is the government of the Lord in heaven and on earth. It extends itself over all things, because there is only one fountain of life, namely, the Lord, whose power supports all that exists.

"The influence of the Lord is according to a plan, and is invisible, as is Providence, by which men are not constrained to believe, and thus to lose their freedom. The influence of the Lord passes over from the spiritual to the natural, and from the inward to the outward. The Lord confers his influence on the good and the bad, but the latter converts the good into evil, and the true into the false; for so is the creature of its will fashioned.

"In order to comprehend the origin and progress of this influence, we must first know that that which proceeds from the Lord is the divine sphere which surrounds us, and fills the spiritual and natural world. All that proceeds from an object, and surrounds and clothes it, is called its sphere.

"As all that is spiritual knows neither time nor space, it therefore follows that the general sphere or the divine one has extended itself from the first moment of creation to the last. This divine emanation, which passed over from the spiritual to the natural, penetrates actively and rapidly through the whole created world, to the last grade of it, where it is yet to be found, and produces and maintains all that is animal, vegetable, and mineral. Man is continually surrounded by a sphere of his favourite propensities; these unite themselves to the natural sphere of his body, so that together they form one. The natural sphere surrounds every body of nature, and all the objects of the three kingdoms. Thus it allies itself to the spiritual world. This is the foundation of sympathy and antipathy, of union and separation, according to which there are amongst spirits presence and absence.

"The angel said to me that the sphere surrounded men more lightly on the back than on the breast, where it was thicker and stronger. This sphere of influence, peculiar to man, operates also in general and in particular around him by means of the will, the understanding, and the practice,

"The sphere proceeding from God, which surrounds man and constitutes his strength, while it thereby operates on his neighbour and on the whole creation, is a sphere of peace and innocence; for the Lord is peace and innocence. Then only is man consequently able to make his influence effectual on his fellow man, when peace and innocence rule in his heart, and he himself is in union with heaven. This spiritual union is connected with the natural by a benevolent man through the touch and the laying on of hands, by which the influence of the inner man is quickened, prepared, and imparted. The body communicates with others which are about it through the body, and the spiritual influence diffuses itself chiefly through the hands, because these are the most outward or ultimum of man; and through him, as in the whole of nature, the first is contained in the last, as the cause in the effect. The whole soul and the whole body are contained in the hands as a medium of influence. Thus our Lord healed the sick by laying on of hands, on which account so many were healed by the touch; and thence from the remotest times the consecration of priests and of all holy things was effected by laying on of hand. According to the etymology of the word, hands denote power. Man believes that his thoughts and his will proceed from within him, whereas all this flows into him. If he considered things in their true form, he would ascribe evil to hell, and good to the Lord; he would by the Lord's grace recognise good and evil within himself, and be happy. Pride alone has denied the influence of God, and destroyed the human race."

In his work Heaven and Hell, Swedenborg speaks of influence and reciprocities — Correspondences. The action of correspondence is perceptible in a man's countenance. In a countenance that has not learned hypocrisy, all emotions are represented naturally according to their true form; whence the face is called the mirror of the soul. In the same way, what belongs to the understanding is represented in the speech, and what belongs to the will in the movements. Every expression in the face, in the speech, in the movements, is called correspondence. By correspondence man communicates with heaven, and he can thus communicate with the angels if he possess the science of correspondence by means of thought. In order that communication may exist between heaven and man, the word is composed of nothing but correspondences, for everything in the word is correspondent, the whole and the parts; therefore he can learn secrets, of which he perceives nothing in the literal sense; for in the word, there is, besides the literal meaning, a spiritual meaning—one of the world, the other of heaven. Swedenborg had his visions and communications with the angels and spirits by means of correspondence in the spiritual sense. "Angels speak from the spiritual world, according to inward thought; from wisdom, their speech flows in a tranquil stream, gently and uninterruptedly,—they speak only in vowels the heavenly angels in A and O, the spiritual ones in E and I, for the vowels give tone to the speech, and by the tone the emotion is expressed; the interruptions, on the other hand, corresponds with creations of the mind; therefore we prefer, if the subject is lofty, for instance of heaven or God, even in human speech, the vowels U and O, etc. Man, however, is united with heaven by means of the word, and forms thus the link between heaven and earth, between the divine and the natural."

"But when angels speak spiritually with me from heaven, they speak just as intelligently as the man by my side. But if they turn away from man, he hears nothing more whatever, even if they speak close to his ear. It is also remarkable that several angels can speak to a man; they send down a spirit inclined to man, and he thus hears them united."

In another place he says:—"There are also spirits called natural or corporeal spirits; these have no connection with thought, like the others, but they enter the body, possess all the senses, speak with the mouth, and act with the limbs, for they know not but that everything in that man is their own. These are the spirits by which men are possessed. They were, however, sent by the Lord to hell; whence in our days there are no more such possessed ones in existence."

Swedenborg's further doctrines. and visions of Harmonies, that is to say, of heaven with men, and with all objects of nature; of the harmony and correspondence of all thing with each other; of Heaven, of Hell, and of the world of spirits; of the various states of man after death, etc.—are very characteristic, important, and powerful. "His contemplations of the enlightened inward eye refer less to everyday associations and objects of life (although he not unfrequently predicted future occurrences), because his mind was only directed to the highest spiritual subjects, in which indeed he had attained an uncommon degree of inward wakefulness, but is therefore not understood or known, because he described his sights so spiritually and unusually by language. His chapter on the immensity of heaven attracts more especially because it contains a conversation of spirits and angels about the planetary system. The planets are naturally inhabited as well as the planet Earth, but the inhabitants differ according to the various individual formation of the planets. These visions on the inhabitants of the planets agree most remarkably, and almost without exception with the indications of a clairvoyant whom I treated magnetically. I do not think that she knew Swedenborg; to which, however, I attach little importance. The two seers perceived Mars in quite a different manner. The magnetic seer only found images of fright and horror. Swedenborg, on the other hand, describes them as the best of all spirits of the planetary system. Their gentle, tender, zephyr-like language, is more perfect, purer and richer in thought, and nearer to the language of the angels, than others. These people associate together, and judge each other by the physiognomy, which amongst them is always the expression of the thoughts. They honour the Lord as sole God, who appears sometimes on their earth."

"Of the inhabitants of Venus he says:—'They are of two kinds; some are gentle and benevolent, others wild, cruel and of gigantic stature. The latter rob and plunder, and live by this means; the former have so great a degree of gentleness and kindness that they are always beloved by the good; thus they often see the Lord appear in their own form on their earth.' It is remarkable that this description of Venus agrees so well with the old fable, and with the opinions and experience we have of Venus.

"The inhabitants of the Moon are small, like children of six or seven years old; at the same time they have the strength of men like ourselves. Their voice rolls like thunder, and the sound proceeds from the belly, because the moon is in quite a different atmosphere from the other planets."

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Chess in Ancient Ireland By Patrick W. Joyce 1903

Chess in Ancient Ireland By Patrick Weston Joyce 1903

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In ancient Ireland chess-playing was a favourite pastime among the higher classes. Everywhere in the Romantic Tales we read of kings and chiefs amusing themselves with chess, and to be a good player was considered a necessary accomplishment of every man of high position. At banquets and all other festive gatherings this was sure to be one of the leading features of the entertainment. In every chief's house there was accordingly at least one set of chess appliances for the use of the family and guests: and chess-boards were sometimes given as part of the tribute to kings. Chess furniture was indeed considered in a manner a necessity, so much so that in this respect it is classified in the Brehon Law with food.

As to the general form and construction of the chessboard there can be no doubt, for Cormac's Glossary (p. 75) describes it with much exactness. This old authority states first, in regard to the game, that the play demands ciall and fath [keeal, faw], i.e. attention and judgment: and it goes on to say that the fidchell or chess-board was divided into black and white compartments by straight lines: that is to say, into black and white squares. The game was called fidchell or fidchellecht [fihel, fihelleght]: and fidchell was used to designate the chess-board. But this was also called clar-fidchilli, clar being the general name for a board or table. The chessmen were called fir-fidchilli, i.e. 'men of chess,' or collectively foirenn, which is the Irish word for a party or body of men in general. The whole set of furniture was called fidchelleght, or fidchell.

The men, when not in use, were kept in a fer-bolg or 'man-bag,' which was sometimes of brass or bronze wire woven. The chiefs took great delight in ornamenting their chessboards and men richly and elaborately with the precious metals and gems. We read in the "Story of the Battle of Mucrime," that when the Irish chief Mac Con was an exile in disguise at the court of the king of Scotland, the king's chessmen were of gold and silver: meaning ornamented with these metals. The following quotation from a much older authority—the "Courtship of Etain" in the Book of the Dun Cow—is very instructive and very much to the point. Midir the fairy king of Bri-leith, comes on a visit to King Ochy:— "What brought thee hither?" said Ochy. "To play chess with thee," answered Midir. "Art thou good at chess?" said Ochy. "Let us try it," said Midir. "The queen is asleep," said Ochy, "and the house in which are the chessboard and men belongs to her." "Here I have as good a set of chess," said Midir. That was true indeed; for it was a board of silver and pure gold; and every angle was illuminated with precious stones; and the man-bag was of woven brass wire." In the Will of Cahirmore, king of Ireland in the second century, we are told that he bequeathed his chessboard and chessmen to his son Olioll Ceadach—an indication of their great value.

The men were distinguished half and half, in some obvious way, to catch the eyes of the two players. Sometimes they were black and white. The foirenn or party of chessmen of Crimthan Nia Nair, king of Ireland about the first century of the Christian era, are thus described:— "One-half of its foirenn was yellow gold, and the other half was findruine" (white bronze). Many ancient chessmen have been found in bogs, in Lewis and other parts of Scotland: but so far as I know we have only a single specimen belonging to Ireland, which was found about 1817 in a bog in Meath, and which is now in the National Museum, Dublin. It is figured above. We frequently read in the tales that a hero, while playing chess, becoming infuriated by some sudden attack or insulting speech, flings his chessman at the enemy and kills or disfigures him. When we remember that chessmen were sometimes made partly of metal and were two and a half inches long, we may well believe this.

The game must, sometimes at least, have been a long one. When St. Adamnan came to confer with King Finachta, he found him engaged in a game of chess: but when his arrival was announced, the king, being aware that he had come on an unpleasant mission, refused to see him till his game was finished: whereupon Adamnan said he would wait, and that he would chant fifty psalms during the interval, in which fifty there was one psalm that would deprive the king's family of the kingdom for ever. The king finished his game however; and played a second, during which fifty other psalms were chanted, one of which doomed him to shortness of life. But when he was threatened with deprivation of heaven by one of the third fifty, he yielded, and went to Adamnan.

That the Irish retained the tradition of the origin of chess as a mimic battle appears from the name given to the chessmen in the story of the Sick Bed of Cuculainn in the Book of the Dun Cow:—namely fianfidchella, i.e. as translated by O'Curry, 'chess-warriors'; fian, a champion or warrior: from which we may infer that the men represented soldiers.

Another game called brannuighecht, or 'brann-playing,' as O'Donovan renders it, is often mentioned in connexion with chess; and it was played with a brannabh, possibly something in the nature of a backgammon board. A party of Dedannans were on one occasion being entertained; and a fidchell or set of chess furniture was provided for every six of them, and a brannabh for every five, showing that chess-playing and brann-playing were different, and were played with different sets of appliances. Among the treasures of the old King Feradach are enumerated his brandaibh and his fithchella. The Brehon Law prescribes fithchellacht and brannuidhecht (as two different things) with several other accomplishments, to be taught to the sons of chiefs when in fosterage. Notwithstanding that chess-playing and brann-playing are so clearly distinguished in the above and many other passages, modern writers very generally confound them: taking brannuighecht to be only another name for fitchellecht or chess-playing, which it is not.

There is still another game called buanbaig, mentioned in connexion with chess and brann-playing, as played by kings and chiefs. When Lugaid mac Con and his companions were fugitives in Scotland, they were admired for their accomplishments, among them being their skilful playing of chess, and brandabh, and buanbaig. Nothing has been discovered to show the exact nature of those two last games.

I have headed this short section with the name "Chess," and have all through translated fitchell by 'chess,' in accordance with the usage of O'Donovan, O'Curry, and Petrie. Dr. Stokes, on the other hand, uniformly renders it "draughts." But, so far as I am aware, there is no internal evidence in Irish literature sufficient to determine with certainty whether the game of fitchell was chess or draughts: for the descriptions would apply equally to both.

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The Living Death by Ferencz Molnar (Hungarian Mystery Story) 1909

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The Living Death by Ferencz Molnar (Hungarian Mystery Story) 1909

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THERE is a very serious reason, my dear sisters, why at last, after an absence of twenty years in America, I am confiding to you this strange secret in the life of our beloved and lamented father, and of the old house where we were children together. The truth is, if I read rightly the countenances of my physicians as they whisper to each other by the window of the chamber in which I am lying, that only a few days of this life remain to me.

It is not right that this secret should die with me, my dear sisters. Though it will seem terrible to you, as it has to me, it will enable you to better understand our blessed father, help you to account for what must have seemed to you to be strange inconsistencies in his character. That this secret was revealed to me was due to my indolence and childish curiosity.

For the first, and the last, time in my life I listened at a keyhole. With shame and a hotly chiding conscience I yielded to that insatiable curiosity—and when you have read these lines you will understand why I do not regret that inexcusable, furtive act.

I was only a lad when we went to live in that odd little house. You remember it stood in the outskirts of Rakos, near the new cemetery. It stood on a deep lot, and was roughly boarded on the side which looked on the highway. You remember that on the first floor, next the street, were the room of our father, the dining room, and the children's room. In the rear of the house was the sculpture studio. There we had the large white hall with big windows, where white-clothed laborers worked. They mixed the plaster, made forms, chiseled, scratched, and sawed. Here in this large hall had our father worked for thirty years.

When I arrived, in the holidays, I noted a change in our father's countenance. His beard was white, even when he did not work with the plaster. Through his strong spectacles his eyes glittered peculiarly. He was less calm than formerly. And he did not speak much, but all the more did he read.

Why, we all knew that after the passing away of our mother he became a bookworm, reading very often by candlelight until morning.

Then did it happen, about the fourth day after my arrival. I spent my leisure hours in the studio; I carved little figures, formed little pillar heads from the white plaster. In the corner a big barrel stood filled with water. It was noon; the laborers went to lunch.

I sat down close to the barrel and carved a Corinthian pillar. Father came into the studio and did not notice me. He carried in his hands two plates of soup. When he came into the studio he closed the door behind him and looked around in the shop, as though to make sure he was not observed. As I have said, he did not notice me. I was astonished. Holding my breath, I listened. Father went through the large hall, and then opened a small door, of which I knew only so much that it led into a chamber three steps lower than the studio.

I was full of expectation. I listened. I did not hear a word of conversation. Presently father came back with the empty plates in his hand. Somebody bolted the chamber's door behind him.

Father went out of the studio, and I, much embarrassed, crept from behind the barrel.

I knew that the chamber had a window, which looked back toward the plowed fields. I ran out of the studio and around the house. Much to my astonishment, the chamber's window was curtained inside. A large yellow plaid curtain hid everything from view. But I had to go, anyway, for I heard Irma's voice calling from the yard:

"Antal, to lunch!"

I sat down to the table with you, my sisters, and looked at father. He was sitting at the head of the table, and ate without saying a word.

Day after day I troubled my head about this mystery in the chamber, but said not a word to anybody. I went into the studio, as usual, but I did not notice anything peculiar. Not a sound came from the chamber, and when our father worked in the shop with his ten laborers he passed by the small door as if beyond it there was nothing out of the ordinary.

On Thursday I had to go back to Germany. On Tuesday night curiosity seized me again. Suddenly I felt that perhaps never would I know what was going on in my father's house. That night, when the working people were gone, I went into the studio. For a long time I was lost in my thoughts. All kinds of romantic ideas passed through my head, while my gaze rested on that small mysterious chamber door.

In the studio it was dark already, and from under the small door in a thin border a yellow radiance poured out. Suddenly I regained my courage. I went to the door and listened. Somebody was speaking. It was a man's voice, but I did not understand what he was saying. I was putting my ear close to the door, when I heard steps at the front of the studio. Father came.

I quickly withdrew myself behind the barrel. Father walked through the hall and knocked on the door softly. The bolt clicked and the door opened. Father went into the chamber and closed the door immediately and locked it.

Now all discretion and sense of honor in me came to an end. Curiosity mastered me. I knew that last year one part of this small room had been partitioned off and was used as a woodhouse. And I knew that there was a possibility of going into the woodhouse through the yard.

I went out, therefore, but found the woodhouse was closed. Driven by trembling curiosity, I ran into the house, took the key of the woodhouse from its nail, and in a minute, through the crevice between two planks, I was looking into that mysterious little room.

There was a table in the middle of the room, and beside the wall were two straw mattresses. On the table a lighted candle stood. A bottle of wine was beside it, and around the table were sitting father and two strangers. Both the strangers were all in black. Something in their appearance froze me with terror.

I fled in a panic of unreasoning fear, but returned soon, devoured by curiosity.

You, my sister Irma, must remember how I found you there, gazing with starting eyeballs on the same mysteriously terrifying scene—and how I drew you away with a laugh and a trifling explanation, so that I might return and resume my ghastly vigil alone.

One of the strangers wore a frock coat and had a sunburned, brown face. He was not old yet, not more than forty-five or forty-eight. He seemed to be a tradesman in his Sunday clothes. That did not interest me much.

I looked at the other old man, and then a shiver of cold went through me. He was a famous physician, a professor, Mr. H_____. I desire to lay stress upon it that he it was, for I had read two weeks before in the papers that he had died and was buried!

And now he was sitting, in evening dress, in the chamber of a poor plaster sculptor, in the chamber of my father behind a bolted door!

I was aware of the fact that the physician knew father. Why, you can recall that when father had asthma he consulted Mr. H_____. Moreover, the professor visited us very frequently. The papers said he was dead, yet here he was!

With beating heart and in terror, I looked and listened.

The professor put some shining little thing on the table.

"Here is my diamond shirt stud," he said to my father. "It is yours."

Father pushed the jewel aside, refusing the gift.

"Why, you are spending money on me," said the professor.

"It makes no difference," replied father; "I shan't take the diamond."

Then they were silent for a long while. At length the professor smiled and said:

"The pair of cuff buttons which I had from Prince Eugene I presented to the watchman in the cemetery. They are worth a thousand guldens."

And he showed his cuffs, from which the buttons were missing. Then he turned to the sunburned man:

" What did you give him, General Gardener?"

The tall, strong man unbuttoned his frock coat.

"Everything I had—my gold chain, my scarf pin, and my ring."

I did not understand all that. What was it? Where did they come from? A horrible presentiment arose in me. They came from the cemetery! They wore the very clothes in which they were buried!

What had happened to them? Were they only apparently dead? Did they awake? Did they rise from the dead? What are they seeking here?

They had a very low-voiced conversation with father. I listened in vain. Only later on, when they got warmed with their subject and spoke more audibly, did I understand them.

"There is no other way," said the professor. "Put it in your will that the coroner shall pierce your heart through with a knife."

Do you remember, my sisters, the last will of our father, which was thus executed?

Father did not say a word. Then the professor went on, saying:

"That would be a splendid invention. Had I been living till now I would have published a book about it. Nobody takes the Indian fakir seriously here in Europe. But, despite this, the buried fakirs, who are two months under ground and then come back into life, are very serious men. Perhaps they are more serious than ourselves, with all our scientific knowledge. There are strange, new, dreadful things for which we are not yet matured enough.

"I died upon their methods; I can state that now. The mental state which they reach systematically I reached accidentally. The solitude, the absorbedness, the lying in a bed month by month, the gazing upon a fixed point hour by hour—these are all self-evident facts with me, a deserted misanthrope.

"I died as the Indian fakirs do, and were I not a descendant of an old noble family, who have a tomb in this country, I would have died really.

"God knows how it happened. I don't think there is any use of worrying ourselves about it. I have still four days. Then we go for good and all. But not back, no, no, not back to life!"

He pointed with his hand toward the city. His face was burning from fever, and he knitted his brows. His countenance was horrible at this moment. Then he looked at the man with the sunburned face.

"The case of Mr. Gardener is quite different. This is an ordinary physician's error. But he has less than four days. He will be gone to-morrow or positively day after to-morrow."

He grasped the pulse of the sunburned man.

"At this minute his pulse beats a hundred and twelve. You have a day left, Mr. Gardener. But not back. We don't go back. Never!"

Father said nothing. He looked at the professor with seriousness, and fondly. The professor drank a glass of wine, and then turned toward father.

"Go to bed. You have to get up early; you still live; you have children. We shall sleep if we can do so. It is very likely that General Gardener won't see another morning. You must not witness that."

Now father began to speak, slowly, reverently.

"If you, professor, have to send word—or perhaps Mr. Gardener—somebody we must take care of—a command, if you have"

The professor looked at him sternly, saying but one word:

"Nothing."

Father was still waiting.

"Absolutely nothing," repeated the professor. "I have died, but I have four days yet. I live those here, my dear old friend, with you. But I don't go back any more. I don't even turn my face backward. I don't want to know where the others live. I don't want life, old man. It is not honorable to go back. Go, my friend—go to bed."

Father shook hands with them and disappeared. General Gardener sat stiffly on his chair. The professor gazed into the air.

I began to be aware of all that had happened here. These two apparently dead men had come back from the cemetery, but how, in what manner, by what means? I don't understand it perfectly even now. There, in the small room, near to the cemetery, they were living their few remaining days. They did not want to go back again into life.

I shuddered. During these few minutes I seemed to have learned the meaning of life and of death. Now I myself felt that the life of the city was at a vast distance. I had a feeling that the professor was right. It was not worth while. I, too, felt tired, tired of life, like the professor, the feverish, clever, serious old man who came from the coffin and was sitting there in his grave clothes waiting for the final death.

They did not speak a word to each other. They were simply waiting. I did not have power to move away from the crack in the wall through which I saw them.

And now there happened the awful thing that drove me away from our home, never to return.

It was about half-past one when someone tapped on the window. The professor took alarm and looked at Mr. Gardener a warning to take no notice. But the tapping grew louder. The professor got up and went to the window. He lifted the yellow curtain and looked out into the night. Quickly he returned and spoke to General Gardener, and then both went to the window and spoke with the person who had knocked. After a long conversation they lifted the man through the window.

On this terrible day nothing could happen that would surprise me. I was benumbed. The man who was lifted through the window was clad in white linen to his feet. He was a Hebrew, a poor, thin, weak, pale Hebrew. He wore his white funeral dress. He shivered from cold, trembled, seemed almost unconscious. The professor gave him some wine. The Hebrew stammered:

"Terrible! Oh, horrible!"

I learned from his broken language that he had not been buried yet, like the professor. He had not yet known the smell of the earth. He had come from his bier.

"I was laid out a corpse," he whimpered. "My God, they would have buried me by to-morrow!"

The professor gave him wine again.

"I saw a light here," he went on. "I beg you will give me some clothes—some soup, if you please—and I am going back again." Then he said in German:

"Meine gute, theure Frau! Meine Kinder!" (My good wife, my children.)

He began to weep. The professor's countenance changed to a devilish expression when he heard this lament. He despised the lamenting Hebrew.

"You are going back?" he thundered. "but you won't go back! Don't shame yourself!"

The Hebrew gazed at him stupidly.

"I live in Rottenbiller Street," he stammered. "My name is Joseph Braun."

He bit his nails in his nervous agitation. Tears filled his eyes.

"Ich muss zu meine Kinder," he said in German again. (I must go to my children.)

"No!" exclaimed the professor. "You'll never go back!"

"But why?"

"I will not permit it!"

The Hebrew looked around. He felt that something was wrong here. His startled manner seemed to ask: "Am I in a lunatic asylum?" He dropped his head and said to the professor simply:

"I am tired."

The professor pointed to the straw mattress.

"Go to sleep. We will speak further in the morning."

Fever blazed in the professor's face. On the other straw mattress General Gardener now slept with his face to the wall.

The Hebrew staggered to the straw mattress, threw himself down, and wept. The weeping shook him terribly. The professor sat at the table and smiled.

Finally the Hebrew fell asleep. Hours passed in silence. I stood motionless looking at the professor, who gazed into the candlelight. There was not much left of it. Presently he sighed and blew it out. For a little while there was dark, and then I saw the dawn penetrating the yellow curtain at the window. The professor leaned back in his chair, stretched out his feet, and closed his eyes.

All at once the Hebrew got up silently and went to the window. He believed the professor was asleep. He opened the window carefully and started to creep out. The professor leaped from his chair, shouting:

"No!"

He caught the Hebrew by his shroud and held him back. There was a long knife in his hand. Without another word, the professor pierced the Hebrew through the heart.

He put the limp body on the straw mattress, then went out of the chamber toward the studio. In a few minutes he came back with father. Father was pale and did not speak. They covered the dead Hebrew with a rug, and then, one after the other, crept out through the window, lifted the corpse out, and carried it away. In a quarter of an hour they came back. They exchanged a few words, from which I learned that they had succeeded in putting the dead Hebrew back on his bier without having been observed.

They shut the window. The professor drank a glass of wine and again stretched out his legs on the chair.

"It is impossible to go back," he said. "It is not allowed."

Father went away. I did not see him any more. I staggered up to my room, went to bed, and slept immediately. The next day I got up at ten o'clock. I left the city at noon.

Since that time, my dear sisters, you have not seen me. I don't know anything more. At this minute I say to myself that what I know, what I have set down here, is not true. Maybe it never happened, maybe I have dreamed it all. I am not clear in my mind. I have a fever.

But I am not afraid of death. Here, on my hospital bed, I see the professor's feverish but calm and wise face. When he grasped the Hebrew by the throat he looked like a lover of Death, like one who has a secret relation with the passing of life, who advocates the claims of Death, and who punishes him who would cheat Death.

Now Death urges his claim upon me. I have no desire to cheat him—I am so tired, so very tired.

God be with you, my dear sisters.

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The Ghost Clown & Other Hauntings by Elliot O'Donnell 1919

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See also The Ancient (and Dark) History of the Clown by Andrew Halliday 1863

The idea of a theatre being haunted—a theatre where everything is bright and everyone full of life—must, for the moment, strike one as preposterous. Why, the mere thought of the footlights, to say nothing of the clapping of hands and thunders of applause from the Gods, conjures up a picture which is the very antithesis of ghosts. Besides, why should a theatre be haunted? To be haunted, a place must have a history—someone must have committed a crime there, such as murder or suicide; and surely no such thing has ever happened in a theatre! Imagine a murder, a real one, at Drury Lane, or a suicide, say, at the Gaiety! Why, the thing is monstrous, absurd! And as to a ghost—a bona fide ghost—appearing on the stage or in the auditorium, why, such an idea is without rhyme or reason; it is, in fact, inconceivable, and the public—the all-wise public—would, of course, laugh it to scorn.

But stop a moment. Does the general public know everything? Is not the theatre, to it, simply the stage, and is it not profoundly ignorant of all that lies beyond the stage—away back, behind the hidden wings? Is it not profoundly ignorant, also, of the great basement below the stage with its dark and tortuous passages; and profoundly ignorant of the many flights of cold and carpetless stairs, leading to story upon story of seemingly never-ending dressing-rooms and corridors? What does it know, too, of the individual lives of the many generations of actors and actresses, call-boys and dressers who have toiled wearily up those stairs and along those dimly lit passages in between the acts? what does it know of the thoughts of all that host of bygones—of their terrible anxieties, their loves, their passions? what does it know of the tragedies with which, doubtless, many of these people have been intimately associated, and of the crowd of ghosts they have, wittingly or unwittingly, brought with them from their own homes?—for ghosts, even as they haunt houses, haunt people and mercilessly attach themselves to them. Moreover, although they have long since been forgotten, tragedies have occurred in some of the oldest of the London theatres. Hunt up the records of eighty and ninety years ago, and you will find that more than one dressing-room witnessed the tragic ending of some lesser star, some member of the crowd, a mere “walker on”; that duels were not infrequently fought in grim earnest on the boards; and that more than one poor super has been found hanging from a cobwebby beam in a remote corner of the great maze-like basement of the building.

Again, think of the site of a London theatre! Prehistoric man or beast may well lie buried there; witches accused of practising their nefarious rites on or near that site may well have been burnt there.

Think, too, of the houses that once may have stood there! Inns, with dark tell-tale stains on their boards; taverns, tainted with vice—the rendezvous of truculent swashbucklers and painted jades; and even more terrible still, cruel and ghastly slaughter-houses.

Ground, then, and houses alike, all may have had their hauntings; and the ghosts may have stayed on, as ghosts often do, haunting anew each successive building. Yes, more than one London theatre is haunted—and several of these theatres have more than one ghost.

The proprietors affect ignorance and of course tell you nothing. They like to see long queues of people waiting for admission to their show, but they have no desire to see a corresponding crowd at the box office seeking permission to sit up all night in the theatre to see the ghost. No, if you want to find out if a theatre is haunted, you must not apply to the proprietor, you must inquire of the actors themselves; and, in order to stand a really good chance of discovering the truth, you should, if possible, for a time become one of them. It was for the purpose of making such a discovery that I took it into my head one day last year to apply for a walk on at the Mercury. I had often wondered if the Mercury was haunted. I speedily found out that it was not. Still, I was not altogether disappointed, for I learned from some of my fellow-walkers on and from one of the stage hands of several very interesting cases of hauntings at other of the London theatres. There is the Prince Regent’s, for instance, which, as recently as the late nineties had a dressing-room, 25, that was always kept locked. It was in the autumn of 1897 that John W. Mayhewe was engaged to play a small but rather important part there in The Merciful Pirate. The cast was an unusually large one, and Mayhewe discovered that he had to share dressing-room 25 with another actor called Talbotson. The opening night of the play, however, Talbotson was laid up with influenza, and Mayhewe had room 25 to himself. Being one of those over-anxious people who err on the side of being ultra-punctual, he arrived at the theatre at least an hour before the curtain went up, and, on the way to his room, he paused to chat with the stage doorkeeper.

“I noticed,” he remarked, “when I was dressing for rehearsal yesterday that my room smelt very musty. Isn’t it often used?”

“It hasn’t been used since I’ve been here,” was the reply.

“Why?” said Mayhewe.

“I can’t tell you,” the doorkeeper answered surlily. “If you want to know, you had better ask the stage manager.”

Not caring to do this, Mayhewe made no further remarks, but hastened upstairs. No one was about, and the noise of his footsteps sounded strangely loud in the silent emptiness of the passages. Heentered his room at last, hung his coat and hat on the door, and, crossing to his seat in front of a small mirror, sat down. “After all,” he said to himself, “I’m glad Talbotson won’t be here to-night. I’m not in a mood for talking, and the fellow bores me to distraction.” He lit a cigarette, leaned back in a more comfortable attitude, and for some minutes allowed himself to revel in the luxury of a perfectly blank state of mind. Suddenly the handle of the door turned—a solitary, isolated sound—and he sat up sharply in his chair. “Who’s there?” he shouted. There was no response. “I couldn’t have latched it properly,” he reasoned, and once again he leaned back in his chair and smoked. Five or six minutes passed in this fashion, and he was thinking of beginning to dress, when there was another noise. Something behind him fell on the floor with a loud flop.

Once again he turned swiftly round. It was his hat—a hard felt bowler. It had fallen from the door peg on which he had hung it, and was still feebly oscillating.

“It is curious how one sometimes notices all these little things,” he reflected. “I dare say door handles have turned and hats have fallen a thousand times when I might have heard them and haven’t. I suppose it is because everything is so very quiet and I’m alone in this part of the building.” Then he glanced at his coat—a long, double-breasted ulster—and rubbed his eyes thoughtfully. “Why,” he exclaimed, “what a curious shape the thing has taken! It’s swelled out just as if someone were inside it. Or has my eyesight suddenly gone wrong?” He leaned forward and examined it closely. No. He was not mistaken. The coat was no longer untenanted. There was something inside it—something which filled it like he had done; but it was something to which he could ascribe no name. He could see it there, and mentally feel that it was peering at him with eyes full of the most jibing mockery and hate; but he could not define it. It was something quite outside his ken, something with which he had had no previous acquaintance. He tried to whistle and appear nonchalant, but it was of no avail. The coat—his coat—had something in it, and that something was staring back at him. What a fool he had been to come so early. At last, with a supreme effort, he took his eyes from the door, and, swinging round in his chair, resumed smoking. He sat thus for some moments, and then a board close behind him creaked.

Of course there is nothing in a creak—boards and furniture are always creaking, and most people attribute the creaking to a change in the temperature. So did Mayhewe. “The room is beginning to get warm—the gas has heated it,” he said; “that is why.” Still he gradually lowered his eyes, and when they rested on the mirror in front of him, he gave the barest suspicion of a start. In the mirror were reflected the door and the coat, but the latter hung quite limply now. There was nothing whatever filling it out.

What in Heaven’s name had become of the thing? Where had it got to? Close beside Mayhewe was the grate, and a sudden rustling in it, followed by a hurried descent of soot, made him laugh outright. The explanation was now so very simple. The wind was responsible for it all—for the door handle, the hat, the coat, and the creak. How truly ridiculous! He would dress. With that object in view he threw the end of his cigarette in the fender and, rising, was about to quit his seat, when his eyes fell on his gloves. He had thrown them quite carelessly on the wash-stand, almost immediately in front of him, and he had noticed nothing remarkable about them then. But now—surely it could not be the wind this time; there were hands in them, and these hands were strangely unlike his own. Whereas his fingers had blunt, spatulate tips, the tops of these fingers were curved and pointed like the talons of some cruel beast of prey, and the palms were much longer and narrower than his own. He stared at them, too fascinated to do otherwise, and it seemed to him that they shifted their position and came nearer to him, with a slow, stealthy, silent motion, like that of some monstrous spider creeping murderously towards its helpless victim. He watched them for some moments quite motionless, and then, yielding to a sudden fit of ungovernable fury, he threw his tobacco pouch at the nearest.

It rolled convulsively over on its back after the manner of some living stricken creature, and then, gradually reassuming its shape, stealthily began once more to approach him. At last his nerves could stand it no longer. A demoniacal passion to smash, burn, torture it seized him, and, springing to his feet, he picked up his chair, and, swinging it round his head, brought it down with the utmost frenzy on the wash-stand. He was looking at his handiwork—the broken china, chair legs, and gas shade—when the door of his room opened and the call-boy timidly entered.

Mayhewe kept the stage waiting some minutes that night, but the management did not abuse him nearly so violently as he had anticipated, and the next evening he was allotted another room.

Then it transpired, leaked out through one of the old supers who had worked at the theatre for years, that room 25 had always borne the name of being haunted, and that, excepting in circumstances such as the present, it had invariably been kept locked. Some two years ago, according to the old super, when just such another emergency had occurred and the room had been used, the same thing had happened: the gentleman who had been put there had been seized with a sudden fit of madness, and had broken everything he could lay hands on; and some time before that a similar experience had befallen an actress who had unavoidably—there being no other room available—occupied room 25.

Now had Mayhewe not heard of these two cases, he might have concluded, in spite of feeling sure that he had been in a normal state of mind upon entering the room, that what he had gone through was due merely to an over-excited imagination; but since he now knew that others had witnessed the same phenomena, he saw no reason to doubt that there was some peculiarly sinister influence attached to the room. As to the cause of the haunting, he could elicit nothing more authentic or definite than the somewhat vague recollections of a very old actor. According to this rather doubtful authority, shortly after the opening of the theatre, one of the performers had suddenly developed madness and had been confined in room 25 till a suitable escort had been found to take him to an asylum. It was the only tragic occurrence, he asserted, that had ever taken place in that theatre. Now, supposing this to be true—that a madman really had been conducted from the stage to room 25 and temporarily confined there—might one not reasonably believe that in this incident lay the origin of the hauntings? It was in this room, in all probability, that the outbreak of madness passed its most acute stage—that psychological stage when the rational ego makes its last desperate stand against the overwhelming assault of a new and diseased self. And again—supposing this incident to be a fact—what more likely than that the immaterial insane ego of the afflicted man would, at times, separate itself from his material body and revisit the scene of its terrible conflict, permanently taking up its abode there after its material body had passed away? This theory—a very possible one, to my mind—would have strong support from parallel cases, for half the most malignant forms of haunting are directly traceable to the earth-bound spirits of the insane. There are several houses within a short walking distance of Bond Street that were once the temporary homes of mentally afflicted people, and they are now haunted in a more or less similar manner to room 25.

If this story of the old actor’s is not correct—if his memory played him false—then of course one must look around for some other solution; and as, apparently, there is no history attached to the Prince Regent Theatre itself, one must assume either that the site of the theatre was haunted prior to the erection of the present building; or that the ghost was originally attached to some person who once occupied room 25, and that it subsequently left that person and remained in the room; or that some article of furniture in room 25, possibly even a fixture, was imported there from some badly haunted locality. There is, indeed, evidence regarding the first point; evidence that, either on or close to the site of the theatre, the remains of prehistoric animals—animals of a singularly savage species, which makes it more than likely that they met with a violent death—were unearthed; and as ghostly phenomena in the form of animals are quite as common as ghostly phenomena in the form of human beings, the hauntings of room 25 may very possibly be due to the spirit of one or more of these creatures. Or again, they might be caused by what is generally known as a Vice Elemental, or “Neutrarian”; that is to say, a spirit that has never inhabited a material body, but which is wholly hostile to the human species. Such spirits are often, I believe, drawn to certain spots by the lustful or malicious thoughts of individuals, and this might well be the case at the Prince Regent’s Theatre.

.......

It was also during my engagement at the Mercury that I heard of a haunting at the Lombard. This theatre, it appears, has a ghostly visitant in the form of a particularly malevolent-looking clown.

According to one report, a lady and her daughter—Mrs. and Miss Dawkins—occupied box 3 one January night during the run of an exceedingly pretty modern version of Cinderella.

The lights were down and all eyes were focused on Cinderella, one of the prettiest and daintiest little actresses in London, dressed in pink and sitting before a very realistic make-belief of a kitchen fire, when Miss Dawkins, who had her elbows resting on the balustrade and was leaning well forward, heard a faint ejaculation from close beside her. Fearing lest her mother was ill, she turned sharply round, and was somewhat surprised to see that Mrs. Dawkins had left her seat and was leaning against the wall of the box with her arms folded and a most satirical smile on her face. Both the attitude and the expression were so entirely novel that Miss Dawkins could only conclude that her mother had suddenly taken leave of her senses; and she was deliberating what to do, when a feeling that a sudden metamorphosis was about to take place held her spellbound. Bit by bit her mother seemed to fade away, to melt into the background; the dim outline and the general posture remained, but instead of the actual body and well-known face, she saw something else gradually begin to form and to usurp their place. Her mother had very delicate and beautifully shaped hands, but these vanished, and the hands Miss Dawkins now looked on were large and red and coarse—horribly coarse. Fearful of what she might see next, but totally unable to fight against some strange, controlling agency, she continued to look. First, her eyes rested on a pair of sleeves—white, baggy, and soiled; then on a broad, deep chest, also clad in white and decorated in the most fantastic manner conceivable in the centre; then on a short, immensely thick neck; and then on the face. The shock she now received was acute. Instinct had prepared her for something very startling, but for nothing quite so grotesque, nor so wholly at variance with the general atmosphere of the theatre. It was the painted, crinkled face of a clown—not a merry, jesting grimaldi, but a clown of a different type—a clown without a smile—a clown born and fully trained to his business in Hell. As he stood there glaring at the footlights, every feature, every atom of his person breathed out hate—hate of a nature so noxious and intense that it seemed to Miss Dawkins as if the very air were poisoned by it. Being a devout Catholic, she at once crossed herself and, although almost powerless with horror, began to pray. The face then faded till it entirely disappeared, and Miss Dawkins once again found herself gazing upon the well-known countenance of her mother.

“Why are you standing?” she asked.

“I am sure I don’t know,” Mrs. Dawkins replied. “But I don’t like this box. I think there is something very unpleasant about it. I haven’t been myself for the last few minutes. When I was sitting by you just now, I suddenly became obsessed with a bitter hatred against everyone on the stage. The very sight of them maddened me. It seemed to me I had met them all in a former existence and that they had done me some irreparable injury. I got up and began to plot how I could best get even with them. Then the idea of setting fire to the theatre seized me. I had clear visions of a small, dimly lighted room, with which I was strangely familiar, down below the stage in a dark, draughty basement. I knew every inch of the place as if I had lived there all my life. ‘I will go there,’ I said to myself, ‘and apply a match. If anyone sees me, no one will suspect. They will only say, “It’s old Tom. He didn’t get the chuck after all. He’s come back.”’ I was repeating the words ‘It’s old Tom,’ and ‘Fire,’ when something seemed to strike me very forcibly on the forehead. This caused me the greatest agony for a moment. Then you spoke, and I was myself again.”

“Would you like to go home?” Miss Dawkins asked anxiously.

“I think I would,” was the response. And they went.

Subsequently, a few judicious inquiries elicited no little light on the matter.

Many years before, an old actor, called Tom Weston, had been employed annually in pantomime at the Lombard as clown. Like so many of his profession, however, particularly the older ones, he took to drink; and he was so often intoxicated on the stage that the management were at last obliged to dismiss him. He took his dismissal very badly, and one night, having gone to the theatre in disguise, he was discovered in the act of setting fire to a room immediately beneath the stage. In consideration for his many years’ service and age, the management did not prosecute, but recommended his friends to keep him under close supervision. Tom, however, very soon ceased to cause the management any anxiety, for, two days after he had attempted, in so diabolical a manner, to wreak his vengeance on all who had been associated with him at the theatre, he shot himself dead in his own home. But on every anniversary of his death, so it is affirmed, he is either seen or heard, or his presence is in some way demonstrated, in box 3 of the Lombard Theatre. That his spirit should frequent that particular spot in the theatre seems to be a fact for which no reason can be assigned.

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A Socialist is a Fanatic Believer in an Economic Fallacy by P. H. Scullin 1910

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A Socialist is a Fanatic Believer in an Economic Fallacy by P. H. Scullin 1910

To the man who does not know, and has not the time nor desire to find out for himself from actual contact and experience of the blind, unreasoning belief of the Socialist in his own economic religion (for it is his religion and his only religion), I would recommend the reading of "The Veiled Prophet" in Moore's "Lalla Rookh," where he tells us: 

"That ne'er did Faith with her smooth bandage bind

Eyes more devoutly willing to be blind 

In his own cause—never was soul inspired 

With livelier trust in what it most desired.

The babe may cease to think that it can play

With Heaven's rainbow—alchemists may doubt

The shining gold their crucible gives out,

But Faith, fanatic Faith, once wedded fast

To some dear falsehood, hugs it to the last."

Once a man embraces Socialism he is outside the pale of all logical reasoning; he will not listen to anything excepting what pertains to the propagation of his own dear, false belief. He has no time to listen to those who do not believe as he does. He wants to do all the talking, and he takes care that he will do all the talking. He doesn't want to be convinced; he is already convinced beyond all hope of change. His mission henceforth is to convert, not to be converted. However patient you may be you cannot get in a word. He never tires; he talks to you, at you, over you and all around you, but he never listens. What's to be done with him then? Just leave him alone, that's all; he'll die sometime. But let us try and save the rising generation from imbibing his false economic doctrine.

Socialism in its present stage is a creed, a faith, a blind, unreasoning belief amounting to fanaticism. They teach that they have founded the only infallible, economic religion by which the working man may or can be saved from oppression and injustice. They have their share of hypocrites and unbelievers who preach their gospel for no other reason than to make an easy living, but I believe there are others who have embraced higher and holier creeds, who are equally imposed upon, but the preaching impostor does not, nor can he, detract one iota from our admiration for the honest believer who sits, listens and believes both in the preaching and the preacher. Why, then, blame the Socialist, if he does but honestly believe?

Socialism is a disease. It is a disease of the mind, and what is worse, it is an infectious disease and anarchy is but an acute stage of the disease. It is, from the first, all but incurable, for the simple reason that in its insidious development it blinds the moral perception as to what is just and what is unjust. It strikes its devotees with moral blindness. This is the most hideous feature of this new political faith.

People wonder at the spread and growth of Socialism, but why? Simply because they wonder without thinking. When the followers of Joseph Smith could be brought to look on the bestial institution of polygamy as a religion; when Dowie, the ex-convict, could make thousands not only believe that he was Elijah II, but could get them to surrender their wealth in evidence of their faith, what then? Is not Socialism promising the workingman a heaven here on earth with a choice of broad highways to reach the next?

Any man who has made a study of Socialism, mixed with Socialists, reasoned with them and has himself remained healthy, will confirm my statement that it is an infectious disease. But if it is a disease of the mind, why does it not attack the rich and well-to-do? Easily answered. The subject must be in a receptive mood or it is impervious to disease of any and of all kinds. There are men who could not take smallpox, yellow fever or the mumps. Poverty has ever been responsive both to disease and malignant influence.

We do not find fault with a man for having a fever, smallpox or diphtheria,—not at all. Instead we call upon the most eminent doctors and medical practitioners in our midst to care for the patient and safeguard the community from the spread of the disease.

But what have we ever done, either to cure the diseased Socialistic mind or check the growth or spread of Socialism among our otherwise healthy and well-disposed American workmen? I answer, nothing and worse than nothing. Not content with our neglect at home we are engaged in the business of importing the foreign article. Every vile concoction of international human filth is being dumped upon our American shores. We see the Mafia, the Carbinarria, the Black Hand, the Socialist and the Anarchist take root, grow and flourish in this our land of liberty and equal rights. We see the imported product of foreign nations come to our country and in a few short years, through influence gained in irresponsible organizations, becoming dictators in the political field, dictating to American-born citizens the men for whom they shall vote, and assailing our laws and the dispensers of our laws.

Ex-President Roosevelt has declared that the worst enemies of our American institutions are the men who are trying to array one class of American citizens against another. The scriptures tell us that a house divided against itself must fall. Yet, in spite of the warnings of our president, the scriptures and experience; in spite of our own better judgment; in contemptuous defiance of what may and will follow if we persist in our past and present wicked, selfish, uncharitable and un-American industrial and political methods of disintegration and despoliation, we sleep on.

In the present condition of society, where only wealth or eminence can gain a hearing, where the average business man has neither the time to read nor to listen, it is little short of folly on the one hand and presumption on the other, for the unknown to give expression to thoughts, fraught though they be with importance in relation to our country's future; yet would I call upon our representative men to pause and think, and I would have them do their thinking now, this very minute. There is no to-morrow. It is only the fool that says to-morrow will do. The Socialist, the Anarchist, the professional agitator, the social and industrial disrupter of our peace and unity does not wait for to-morrow. He used up yesterday; he is using to-day, and he will be here tomorrow also, with only this difference: To-morrow there will be two where there is one to-day. If there is one evil in our country to be deplored above another, it is our individual indifference to community interests, and the future of our Nation. No one seems to have a moment to spare for the safeguarding of the best interests of all, and yet if we but took a sane or common-sense business interest in our own children's future how easy it would be to hand down to them and theirs, in perpetuity, that National stability which we have enjoyed and whose very foundations are threatened to-day. And threatened by what? By irresponsible, glibtongued orators, who are spreading abroad the spirit of discontent and instilling in the mind of ignorance the poison of class hatred. They are successful in their mission of evil because of our indifference, but let us not forget that if their converts are not endowed with an overplus of intelligence, they are at least endowed with muscle, and that infuriated ignorance loses little time in its deliberations over who shall be its victims. It strikes first and deliberates afterwards.

While it is my intention, in the near future, to treat at length and in a separate pamphlet, the cure for the evils I have pointed out, I believe the following exposition of Socialism, its methods and designs, would be incomplete did I not endeavor to interest our thinking business and professional men in some specific and earnest movement to counteract the evil that is being done to the present and coming generation, by the false and materialistic education of to-day. This question of Socialism and anarchy can no longer be considered merely a passing delusion. It is here. It is a disease and it is spreading. It is insidious, and like a cancer or leprosy. When it takes the patient he is incurable. What, then, should be done to safeguard society from the dire results that are sure to follow in the fullness of time? There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that can be done except that which the Socialists themselves are doing, namely, educate the people. What our country wants, needs and must have is a well-organized and systematic plan of wholesome economic education. Socialistic and Anarchistic literature is, at the present moment, being printed in the United States in seven different languages and is being distributed by the ton. Emma Goldman and Anarchist Berkman distributed 135,000 anarchist pamphlets to the working men of Chicago and New York during the Labor Day parade of 1903, and are to-day lecturing all over our country, hiring our most expensive halls and stopping in first-class hotels, being interviewed by special reporters, and are given whole columns of advertising in the public press. The Appeal to Reason has 250,000 subscribers and is read by probably 1,000,000, including women and children. There is a Socialistic newspaper in every city of any size in the United States. They have their public lecturers by the thousands, from Debs down to the curbstone orator on the street corner. In the workshop they include the Workmen of the World and the Western Federation of Miners. Their latest move on the Pacific Coast is the offering of money prizes to our public-school children for the best essays on SOCIALISM. This is for the nefarious purpose of inducing our children to read their own literature to the end that their young and impressionable minds may become poisoned or inoculated with the Socialistic virus of to-day.

In my varied experience of sixty years as an observing man, I know of no public evil of which we have been so neglectful. I know of no menace to community interests, to public or national welfare or to the well-being of coming generations to which we have shown such utter indifference. Other diseases kill the body only. This disease affects the mind, destroys all peace, blights hope and hurls the souls of men to perdition. In page 26 of State Socialism and Anarchy, it is said: "We look upon divine authority and religious sanction of morality as the chief pretexts put forward by the privileged classes for the exercise of human authority." "If God exists," says Proudhon, "He is man's enemy." In all other affairs of life we are most watchful, ever on the alert to checkmate, prevent, eradicate and banish from our midst anything and everything that might be hurtful to either the individual or the community. If crime is rampant we add to our police force and pass more stringent laws for the suppression of vice. If typhoid fever is epidemic we immediately improve sanitary conditions. If contagious disease appears we establish quarantine hospitals. Our scientists are forever delving into the mysterious chambers of the unknown to find the means of relieving pain, renewing health and prolonging life, not to speak of the infinite service they have done and are still doing by their classification of microbes, to the end that the good microbe may eat the bad one.

We permit a fool his liberty so long as he is harmless; we do not interfere with the faith and prayer healers so long as they do not neglect to call in the doctor, but the moment the fool becomes dangerous we send him to an asylum, and should the faith curist neglect to call in the doctor and the patient die, we immediately put the man of prayer in jail. There is just one protection against Socialism, and that is to beat the Socialist at his own game. How? Simply by an honest, earnest campaign of wholesome economic education, free from every bias, non-partisan, logical and clean. I feel certain that if some man of standing would only take up this question of combating Socialism in the way I have suggested, not by fault-finding, suppression or harsh treatment, but through rebuttal and by showing the fallacy and degradation of the entire Socialistic structure, great good would result from the effort. There are thousands of wealthy and patriotic citizens who would be glad to give the movement their warmest support. For the entire ten years that I have been before the people, working for industrial peace, both business and professional men have been saying to me, "Something must be done, Mr. Scullin; something must be done." Here they leave the matter.

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