In Comparison: "Talks With Shafir" Direct Voice Seance Transcripts

The book cover shows "Acacia Cottage, Berkshire," the author's home prior to living in London following the sudden death of her husband.

In this blog article I am presenting the description of two Direct Voice seances from Behold I Live (1966) by Lucy Chauncey Bridges, who personally attended seances and used a tape recorder to write transcripts of communications.  

In these featured book excerpts, the medium is Peter Clarke and the communicator voice is that of 'Shafir,' "a North American Indian Healer and Teacher in Spirit."  The passages are entitled: "Astral or Magnetic Healing" and "He says 'Goodbye'—brings a Message from Robert" (the name of her late husband).  Other aspects of healing are subjects of other seance transcripts included in the book, which also includes transcripts of Leslie Flint seances attended by the author.

Lucy's first Direct Voice seance took place on January 17, 1953 with medium Peter Clarke and a seance group of around 100 sitters in a London public hall, where she witnessed "demonstrations of departed friends."  The following month, she attended her initial "small Group [Direct] Voice Seance" in Clarke's office.  Two recurring guides of Clarke were reported to have been the first to manifest: Jamie—"the young man who helps to run the proceedings from the other side"—and Dr. John Walker, who informed Lucy that her husband and mother were there.  The perspectives of the two loved ones in Spirit were regularly expressed to Lucy during the sittings with Clarke that continued once a month for the next four years.  On one occasion, "a fifteen minutes conversation with Mother" resulted with Lucy learning ". . . Father could not talk to me because he thought it wrong to lower his vibration in order to come to earth—but that he sent his love."

Another part of Behold I Live presents "Talks By Timothy Wilson" during Lesley Flint seances.  Lucy commented in a "Tributes" paragraph about her loved ones and "dear friend" guide 'Dr. Timothy Wilson' (1836-1914).  She found their contributions to seances inspirational ". . . to the compiling of this book, which Timothy always called 'our book,' as indeed it is, in which he has shown clearly that every individual on earth will be able to declare after their transition: 'Behold I Live.'  (Revelation 1:18)."

Part Three of Behold I Live derives from seances tape-recorded between 1957 and 1963.  This part of the book is entitled "Talks With Shafir of the White Brotherhood* (*He lived 1,000 years ago.)"  The following two transcripts are offered for comparison with those in preceding blog articles about Direct Voice mediums and seances.  In addition to the series of recent articles about Leslie Flint, articles have featured excerpts from transcripts of 'Direct Voice' seances presented in the books of William Usborne Moore (1, 2) and Edward C. Randall (3).
   

July 26th, 1956.

Shafir started by returning my greetings.  He said that Mr. Clarke was with him, and he replied to questions I asked which had transpired from our last talk.

He said that your remarks to the patient should deal solely with the patient's health.  They should be simple, direct and clear, so that only one interpretation was possible.  You should suggest complete relaxation to your patient, and try to make him relax completely—starting with one leg, then the other, then the lower part of the body, followed by arms, shoulders, neck, head.  When you have induced relaxation, make convincing suggestions of perfect health, say he is being healed and is getting better.  In healing it is most important that you should not concentrate on the disease but rather try to give the idea of perfect health.

Too many people in our world place too great an importance on what they believe to be physical laws.  These are not really laws but just ideas regarding diet, etc.  What a man eats or does is not important, but what he thinks is important.  He should live reasonably and sensibly and not indulge in excesses, and should think rightly about himself and his environment.  Bad thinking is the cause of an illness.  Only perfection can heal.  Each one should use the tools appropriate to his own skill and strength.  The vital principle in healing lies in one's own consciousness.  All truth is working towards the end, which is perfection.

If you are to succeed in your healing work, you should try and find out which method suits your own personality.  That is why there are so many methods.  Whatever the method, and whatever form of healing, it is essential that you have faith in the power of the spirit and in yourself.  You must believe that the power is with you whenever you need to use it.  If you have no faith, the amount of healing you are able to perform will be lesser in proportion.

In these first few discussions on the various methods of healing I want to deal with, and Wilson wants me to deal with those methods which can be used in conjunction with the methods you have already learned.  The first method with which we shall deal today is Astral healing (also known as Magnetic healing if it is made by direct contact).  In Magnetic healing it is necessary that direct contact is used.  You should also use Absent healing following direct contact treatment.  There are three basic principles:—

(1) The desire to bring about a cure.

(2) Visualisation of the desired condition.

(3) Concentration in order to focus.

You must remember that between contact treatments some of the improvement made by the contact treatment will diminish and the patient will relapse—therefore absent treatment nightly is absolutely vital.

All true psychic healing makes perfection in the astral or etheric plane before bringing it down to the physical.  The astral or etheric body is an exact counterpart of the physical one and is the pattern on which the physical body is built up.  It is difficult for a person still in the physical body to understand why spiritual healing is successful.

Astral healing is effected entirely by thought—by a conscious system of applied thought, though it must be applied with concentration and visualisation.  In the contact between your own mind and another you have to visualise and impress your own thought forms on the astral body of another person.

I was referring to your absent treatment as visualising the desired condition but, when in contact with the patient, you must also visualise the desired treatment.  You are going to pour life force into your patient.  This is healing power.  You must prepare yourself for inhaling into yourself vital healing power.  All around there is vital force.  It is a substance of God Himself, and is called Prana (Physic Energy).

When working on the Astral plane you should prepare yourself before your patient arrives by relaxing completely and breathing rhythmically for two or three minutes.  Draw in Prana.  You can do what you will with it by directing your mind towards it.  It can be concentrated anywhere by direct projection.  If you concentrate your thoughts you can become conscious of drawing in the Prana.  It is important to concentrate and meditate but, first of all, you must control your rate of breathing.

When your patient arrives, place him comfortably and make a few helpful suggestions to him.  Get him to breathe rhythmically for a few minutes and to hold his breath gently and easily before exhalation.  Hold the idea of health firmly in your mind and get any strain out of the atmosphere.  Harmony is vitally important and if there is no harmony everything will be affected; you will have no success as you cannot heal if there is strain.  Tell the patient that you are going to pour Prana into him.  See that your arms hang limply, concentrate on your finger tips, flicking them with water, and be aware of tingling in them.  Then face your patient, make from six to ten downward passes over the entire length of the body from head to feet.  Visually draw off the toxins that are in the etheric body of the patient.  You should be conscious of a slight electric current.  Put your right hand at the base of the patient's head, and your left hand over his heart.  Concentrate on pouring in the vital force that you have gathered.  Inhale and exhale through your finger tips for about two minutes.  Place your hands by your own sides, flick them a little, then concentrate your attention on the diseased part of your patient—the organ or part of the body—and make two or three small passes over this area.  Draw off the poisons and clean your hands of them.  Then place your hands over the affected area and concentrate for a minute or two upon curing this part.  Try to build an area of perfect health in the part or organ concerned.  Remove your hands and, if possible, wash them, for conditions can be picked up through these physical treatments that are bad for the health and may be communicated.

Tell the patient that, although he will be away from you, you will give him treatment by Absent healing.  A date and time should be arranged with him for you to do this so that he can be sure of relaxing and concentrating at the right time.

You should practice clear visualisation.  If you find difficulty, go through a series of exercises.  Learn absolute concentration upon the matter in hand, and make yourself able to visualize a picture of what you are doing.  The pattern must be strong and clear, and then the strong healing force will be transferred to your patient.

It is not essential to know all about anatomy and the physical body but a little knowledge is helpful, and you must know the center of the disease or pain.

The laws of positive thought allow of no unhappiness or poverty.  In God everything exists.  You can do and be exactly what you want to do and be at all times.  With visualisation and absolute concentration you are the master of your environment.  You must get rid of bad habits of thinking.

Astral (or Magnetic) healing must not clash with the Chakra method you have learnt.  Once the elementary technique is mastered, the purely mental method will have a marked response.  Absent treatment is an important factor towards a high percentage of success.  Absent treatment is better given during the evening because of more probably relaxation on the part of both you and your patient and, if you should fall asleep, you will probably continue giving the treatment in your sleep.

Encourage faith and confidence in your patient.  Try many methods as one or more may not suit one particular patient.  You can treat any sort of imperfection.  Give the patten to the Infinite.  Question:

Me: "How am I to get my flat let.  What kind of prayer do I use?"

"Think that your flat is let on terms acceptable and suitable to yourself, and not that it is going to be let.  Do not worry over it or whom it may be let to.  Just think that it is let."

The above para. was in answer to a question as to the best method of prayer about the letting of my flat, which was becoming urgent.

November 7th, 1957.

Shafir: "Your husband wanted me to impress upon you the fact of his presence and companionship in your life all the while.  We want you to feel happy in your work, to feel that it is worthwhile and important, and it is going forward very well.  You must not expect to perform miracles, but you can expect to do a great deal of good for a great many people.  That is the gist of your husband's message—not the exact words, but that is what he wants me to convey to you.

"Your mother also is very happy at the way you are going forward, and she stands around you and seems to fill you with a great radiance, a great light, a warm and loving light.  She is registering her approval of the improvements you have made.

"You know little Lucy one, you have become a better person in the last two or three years.  You have become much broader in your mind and in your spirit—you know you were a little narrow, a little self-centred owing to the circumstances of your life which have been rather conducive to that type of thinking.  But lately you have done a lot more for others and a lot less for yourself, and that is the way to make real progress; to think kindly and charitably, to condemn no-one at any time—and to do everything in every way to brighten the lives of all people, men, women and children, and animals as well.  Anything that you can do to brighten the lives of all people, do that.  From now on, be angered at nothing, scorn no-one, for there will be many brought to you who will be a test for you.  There will be those whom you will not like and who you will feel are bad people.  But remember as we have tried to teach you, there are no bad people—there are only mistaken people and therefore they are to be pitied and to be helped as best you can, more than those who have been successful and who have been pure and honest.  All people need your help and the more generous you are in your thoughts as well as in your deeds, the brighter your own and the greater your power to do spiritual work.  There may not be many more times when I, Shafir may be able to talk to you.  I am not talking to you today about your technical work, I am not treating you.  I am merely trying to point out to you some of the things you should have absorbed from contact with us, and I hope I have succeeded."

"But won't you be able to continue, is that because of the Medium?"

"Some of the band, they will get through, but I, Shafir may not get through.  For you know I have for the whole of my little man's liftetime been his personal Guide.  It was many years before I could get through to him and make him understand about this his gift of Mediumship, and it was still longer before I could get the co-operation to talk with him, and talk to him as I am talking to you now.  I know now that in a little while the circumstances of his life will change and that it is most unlikely that anything that I can do will prevent him leaving this part of the world so that he can continue the work he is doing.  Meanwhile, although I believe that later I will return to work of a slightly different kind, but nevertheless work in which I can anticipate.  But it may well be that we shall not be talking to each other many more times, but this will not be the last time."

"What about the lectures?"

"They will go on for a little while, but if they stop little Lucy one, I shall expect you to work with and upon the knowledge you have received from me and from the others.  If you do that efficiently the time will come when we shall again be in touch with you.  When you will have already made great progress with the material you have been given.  We shall then give you further material which you will use to the best of your ability; but you are already far better informed than many people who are out in your world healing every day.  Your knowledge is greater already than many healers.  You have a great deal to learn and you have a great deal of work to do; but already you are possessed of knowledge and power bigger than that of many healers in your world.  You are equipped to work and you will go on learning, but the knowledge you already have you can meditate upon and you will find it invaluable in your practice.  Do this as we have told you to do it, but do not be rigid, but realise that it is possible to modify and adapt the principles that you have learnt.  The main thing is the desire to heal—the love of your fellowmen—the belief in God and in yourself and the knowledge that there are around you at all times those who are anxious to help you while you are doing good.  For my part wherever my little man is I shall be there, but it is unlikely that I shall communicate through other mediums."

Self: "I do think that is sad."

"If I find one through whom I can communicate reliably I will inform you of that one, but there will be those who will in time hear that you have been in contact with me, and who will try and bring me through little one—but they will not be true, beware of that.  I will give you before the last time I speak—I will give you a phrase that I shall always use when I come to you, and before believing that it is I who come back, you will say 'Give me the phrase.'  And whenever it is me, I will give you the phrase and you will always know that it is me.  Now I will leave you with my blessing."

Nandor Fodor's Encylopaedia Article about 'Direct Voice' Phenomena

Nandor Fodor included a description of ‘Direct Voice’ phenomena in Encyclopaedia of Psychic Science (1934).  The article is presented in this blog post to remind readers about the numerous reports of anomalous voices among the annals of 'unexplained phenomena.'  The aspect of transcendental communication known as 'Direct Voice phenomena' is the topic of the current series of blog articles.
 
Fodor's experiences of anomalous phenomena include at around the age of seven an "auditory experience" after a last blessing during the burial of his grandfather: ". . . I heard, as clearly as ever I heard anything, my grandfather answering back."  (Between Two Worlds 1964)  Descriptions of two William Cartheuser Direct Voice seances (of 1927 and 1943) are included in Fodor's The Haunted Mind (1959) although he was unable to develop a perspective of what he witnessed.  Fodor took part in research experiments with mediums through the help of the London Spiritualist Alliance.  
 
Any reader intent upon learning more about metaphysical subjects should be warned that Wikipedia seems to be an inadequate source of information concerning topics known categorically as pertaining to 'paranormal' or 'unexplained' phenomena.  Some reader comments to a previous blog article show how denialist information sources (including Wikipedia articles) may influence readers who know little about original case study books and other sources of documentation.

 

DIRECT VOICE, an isolated voice in space without visible source of agency.  It issues mostly from a trumpet which sails about the seance room in the dark and appears to serve as a condenser.  With an increase of power the trumpet may be dispensed with and the voice may be heard from the centre of the floor or from any part of the room.  Dennis Bradley records an experience in which the communicator began his sentence in the middle of the room, half way up he dropped the trumpet whilst his voice travelled upwards to the extreme right hand corner of the ceiling and there ended on the pronouncement of the last syllable of his last word.  (Towards the Stars, p. 20).  Physically the phenomenon requires the supposition that some material, more solid than air, is withdrawn from the medium's or from the sitter's body to produce the necessary vibrations in the surrounding atmosphere.  Indeed, seance room communications speak of improvisation of a larynx.  It is a strange notion.  Yet the improvisation of human limbs and entire bodies is still stranger.  The first vague description of a "voice box" is to be found in an out-of-body experience of Stainton Moses.  He says: "I did not observe how the sound was made, but I saw in a distant part of the room near the ceiling something like a box round which blue electric light played, and I associate the sound with that.  The "voice box" of Walter, Mrs. Margery Crandon's control, has been photographed as a white mass on the medium's shoulder, connected to her left ear and nostril with ectoplasmic tubes.  This psychic microphone seems to be very closely associated with the medium's organism.  John Watt, Mrs. Everitt's control, claimed that he used the medium's breath in speaking.  If Mrs. Everitt held her hand over her mouth the volume of the voice diminished and it ceased entirely if Mrs. Everitt placed her palm on her mouth.  The spirit of Cecil Husk warned Dennis Bradley not to smoke excessively on the days he was sitting as sometimes this affects the vocal organs from which part of the ectoplasmic force is taken.  Archdeacon Colley describes an instance in which Dr. Monck was wakened from trance to greet a materialised fellow-student.  They had to speak in turn.  There was an impasse if they tried to speak at once.  Bastian's direct voice was heard when his mouth was full of water, but it immediately ceased if his nose was temporarily stopped.  Mrs. Everitt could never speak simultaneously with the spirits.  Her lips and tongue moved but no sound was made.  Other mediums felt no handicap.  Signor Damiani, in his testimony before the London Dialectical Society in 1870, spoke of a seance with Home in which two voices were heard, together with the persistently speaking medium.  David Duguid often spoke simultaneously.  George Valiantine and Mrs. Wriedt have no difficulty in joining with the spirit voices.  According to Noel Jaquin the problem consists not so much in the use of the physical voice organ, but in the co-ordination of thought.  He experienced an incoherence of thinking while the direct voice was heard and could only master it by a strong mental effort.  Independent conversation by two or three voices was occasionally carried on in the seances of Mrs. Wriedt, of Detroit.  J. A. Findlay reported the same with Sloan.  Admiral Moore was told that the spirits seemed to speak with his voice.  During the time he often felt a slight cough and irritation of the throat.  Others have observed that the sitters' voices weaken if there is a prolonged direct voice conversation going on.  An interesting experiment was tried with Mrs. Wriedt.  She was asked to sit with seven deaf mutes from Flint, Mich.  No one in the room could utter an articulate word except herself.  No voices were heard.

Dr. Eugene Crowell writes of Mrs. Andrews' seances in The Identity of Primitive Christianity and Modern Spiritualism: "One of the common forms of manifestations at Moravia is singing by spirits.  This generally occurs when the persons assembled sing with animation, the spirits seizing the moment when they are 'with one accord' raising their voices, to join in the strain, and generally the spirit voice is heard clearly above all others."  He continues later: "When our spirit friends had conversed more freely than usual, the medium afterwards complained of much soreness and tenderness of the throat and lungs, evidently without any definite idea of its cause.  It seemed to me that the spirits . . . were compelled to draw directly from the vocal and pulmonary organs of the medium those elements that are liberally supplied by public circles, and which are necessary for the production of spirit voices."

J. Arthur Findlay's On the Edge of the Etheric contains the statement of the communicators that they often make use of a psychic tube from the mouth of the medium to the trumpet.  This would explain why the independent voice may resemble that of the medium and also why moisture is sometimes found within the trumpet.  The spirit communicators of Findlay also gave a full description how the artificial larynx is made.  It reads:

"From the medium and those present a chemist in the spirit world withdraws certain ingredients which for want of a better name is called ectoplasm.  To this the chemist adds ingredients of his own making.  When they are mixed together a substance is formed which enables the chemist to materialise his hands.  He then, with his materialised hands, constructs a mask resembling the mouth and tongue.  The spirit wishing to speak places his face into this mask and finds it clings to him, it gathers round his mouth, tongue and throat.  At first, difficulty is experienced in moving this heavier material, but by practice this becomes easy.  The etheric organs have once again become clothed in matter resembling physical matter, and by the passage of air through them your atmosphere can be vibrated and you hear his voice."

Findlay's explanation received confirmation two years later at a seance recorded by the Rev. V. G. Duncan in his book Proof.  The mediums in this instance were the Misses Moore.  When asked how it was possible to speak to us on earth the communicator stated:

"I can only explain it like this.  You know when you have been to the dentist for an extraction and been given an anaesthetic, he puts that queer mask over your face for you to breathe the gas into your lungs.  I have to use a contrivance like that in order to speak to you.  This contrivance is composed of etheric matter, partly provided by the mediums and sitters, and partly supplied from our side.  It is a kind of transformer, and it has a double purpose.  It helps to retard my vibrations and so allows me to make my voice audible to you and provides a temporary set of vocal organs."

Findlay's views are further enlarged upon in his second book The Rock of Truth (1933).

The voices may be human (sometimes of someone living.  See Control by the living), or belong to the animal kingdom.  The barking of fairly well materialised dogs, three in number, was heard by Lieut. Col. E. R. Johnson in a London seance with Mrs. Wriedt.  Dennis H. Bradley in The Wisdom of the Gods speaks of a direct voice seance in which very loud and distinct barks were heard.  "There came back an answering bark of my Alsatian wolfhound in an outhouse some distance away from the room in which the seance was being held."  Mr. John M. Dick, the sporting journalist, was told that the dog was a Great Dane, in fact, his own.  They had deep affection for it.  This dog would always bark in four distinct barks at a time.

Technically, the process of speaking appears to be the same as the ordinary one.  After a long sentence the controls often pause for breath, and the indrawing sound becomes distinctly audible.  Still the phenomena may so differ individually that it is unadvisable to generalise.  The vocal effects know of no restriction.  The invisible communicator may laugh, whistle or sing.  Walter (the control of Margery) can give expression to all sorts of moods by whistling: surprise, contentment, joy, anger and melancholy.  Once, the medium and Walter laughed at the same instant.  The two chuckles came from a common point in space and gave the impression of being tangled up together, as though conceivably from a common physical organism.  The language may be unknown both to the medium and the sitters.  Yet the nationality of the medium may have a curious influence.  English, for instance, is easier spoken when the medium is English than another tongue.  As an explanation it was suggested that the material to build up the artificial larynx may be drawn from the oral cavity and therefore it may be less adaptable to unusual inflexions.  The experience of Dr. Abraham Wallace with John King who unexpectedly spoke to him in broad Scotch suggests a similar participation on the part of the sitter.  When interrogated on the subject John King replied: "Why, I got it from you."  Such indications and the bewildering variety of strange languages spoken through some mediums are mysteries, the depths of which has not been fathomed.  In the Valiantine seances Portuguese, Basque, Welsh, Japanese, Russian, Hindustani and ancient pure Chinese is spoken.  Dr. Neville Whymant, a famous orientalist, studied this linguistic phenomenon, and on March 25, 1927, it was also recorded on gramophone in Lord Charles Hope's apartment in London.  A special telephone cable was laid on to the Columbia Gramophone Company's recording house in Petty France Street.  A megaphone was connected with the recording machine and two assistants stationed outside the seance room gave the signals at various times.  In the presence of Lord Charles Hope, Dennis Bradley and his wife three voices spoke in English, one in an Indian dialect, one in Hindustani, one in Italian and two in Chinese.  The last one, claiming to be the voice of Confucius, was admitted by Dr. Whymant to be apparently the same as heard by him in New York.

Was Confucius actually present?  Walter, when the question was put to him in Boston, explained the matter thus:

"When K'ung-fu-T'zu manifests in our seance room he is not necessarily personally present.  However, at the time of Whymant's interview with K'ung-fu-T'zu through Valiantine in trance, the Master was actually present in person."

Further light is thrown on the problem in Mrs. E. Duffey's Heaven Revised.  In answer to her doubts as to the presence of illustrious spirits a vision was given to her:

"I beheld, or seemed to behold—for it was not sight, it was a perception as strong as the sense of seeing—a succession of links extending from sphere to sphere and from spirit to spirit, until it had finally found utterance on earth."

Archdeacon Colley heard direct voices in the darkness of the night when sleeping in the same room with Dr. Monck while holding his hand over the mouth of his sleeping companion.  During an operation on Mrs. Eileen Garrett in 1931, whilst she was unconscious and gagged, the doctors in attendance heard voices in her proximity.  One voice spoke glibly in a tongue which none of the doctors understood.  According to Dr. Reid Clanny's account of the strange case of Mary Jobson, individuals connected with the Jobsons were sometimes accosted in their own homes by the voice which spoke in the presence of the girl and they were told to go and see her.

In the first attempts of new communicators, or when the power is insufficient, the voice is feeble or hoarse.  With an increase of power or practice it becomes characteristic in tone and distinctive in enunciation.  It has a conspicuous selective intelligence, always addressing itself to the right person in the right language.

As soon as the power begins to ebb the trumpet is made increasing use of.  This waning of power is curiously described in Mrs. G. K. Hack's notes of the July 8, 1928 seance in Millesimo Castle: "The power suddenly failed and consequently the pronunciation of the words he used became confused and the sounds almost inarticulate, until at last they became a sort of prolonged whistle which gradually extinguished itself and formed itself into a mournful sigh."

The general strength of the voice may vary individually.  Conan Doyle heard a voice in Chicago which he could only compare to the roar of a lion.  Duguid's voices were usually husky.  But on one occasion his speaking was so loud and harsh that the sitters became alarmed and asked the spirit to retire.  Similarly, in Mrs. Robert Johnson's seances, remonstrations had to be made on account of the volume in the voice.  In Mrs. Blake's case the voices were occasionally heard at the distance of one hundred feet.  Kokum and Hawk Chief (Valiantine) had tremendous resounding voices.  They were heard, as Dennis Bradley records, by his wife in a bedroom on the upper floor thirty to forty yards away with all the doors closed.  Kokum's voice carried to a distance of two hundred yards.  Mrs. Blake, Valiantine, Mrs. Wriedt, Miss Hazel Ridley and Mrs. Murphy Lydy often produced the phenomenon in full light.  The usual demonstration is to shut the light out of the trumpet with the palm of the medium and hold the small end to the sitter's ear.  Mrs. Lydy gave several successful platform demonstrations in this manner in May, 1931, in London.

Mr. J. B. McIndoe, of Glasgow, constructed a telephonic apparatus for the hearing of the voice in daylight.  A very sensitive telephone transmitter was placed under a tightly buttoned, very high black oilskin coat, on the medium's (Andrew McCreadie) larynx.  The sitters were connected with a telephone receiver through which they could hear voices in daylight.  The result was the same if a trumpet was placed with the small end under the oilskin coat on the medium's larynx.  Through the large end, if closely listened to, voices came through.

Many and varied experiments have been conducted to prove the verity of the phenomenon.  Ventriloquism on the medium's part offered itself as the first natural explanation.  This was, however, turned down by Prof. Hyslop and Dr. Hereward Carrington in their respective experiments and was also disproved by the observations of Malcolm Bird in the Margery seances.  According to Carrington at a very near range it is impossible for a ventriloquist to produce the illusion of distant sounds or voices; he must then depend upon near ventriloquism, and the nearer the listener's ear to the mouth of the performer the less perfect the illusion, until at quite close range the illusion vanishes altogether, and the sounds are correctly located, as issuing from the ventriloquist's mouth.  There is no such a thing as "throwing the voice" across the room, or to any distant location in space.  The voice merely seems to issue from the spot because the performer distracts the attention of his audience to it.  Deprived of light to aid the view the illusion cannot be produced and the investigators who sit quite close to the medium can immediately locate the voice at its point of origin.

The medium was often asked to hold water in her mouth to see whether the voices are independent.  With Mrs. Emily French, of Buffalo, the voices were tested in exacting conditions, by Prof. Hyslop, Dr. Isaac Funk and others for a full week.  Findlay records how often he had his car at Sloan's mouth when one or more voices were speaking and no sound came from it.  In other experiments a special solution was used which, under the effect of the saliva, changes colour in proportion to the time during which it is held in the mouth.  If one of the sitters also takes an amount into his mouth and ejects it at the same time the colour should be identical.  It was by this test that Dr. Abraham Wallace contended to have established the good faith of Susannah Harris.

The Voice Control Machine, designed by Dr. Mark Richardson, of Boston, for use in the Margery seances, is a modern control apparatus.  It consists of a U-shaped tube in which small luminous floats were placed on the surface of the water.  By means of a flexible tube which had a specially constructed mouthpiece the medium blew into the tube and caused, by the pressure of air, the second column of water to rise.  This position was retained as long as the mouthpiece was tightly held by the medium's lips and tongue.  The collapse of the column of water could be immediately detected in the dark by means of the luminous floats.  Yet an even more satisfactory control was devised by B. K. Thorogood; a cubical box, made of layers of seven different materials, completely soundproof, closed and padlocked, containing a large, very sensitive microphone, connected by two wires emerging from the box to a distant loudspeaker.  While sitters in the seance room heard nothing the voice of Walter issued from the loudspeaker in the distant room, proving that the voice had its origin through the "mike" in the box.  Under such conditions the independence of the voices. in the Margery seances was completely proved.

In direct voice communications there are two elements of the supernormal: the voice in space and the contents of the message.  If it turns out that the trumpet was actually used by the medium in the dark the validity of the communication may yet be established by the other criterion.  Carrington, whose Physical Phenomena of Spiritualism describes many possibilities of fraud, points out that many investigators attend trumpet seances quite convinced that the medium does the talking.  They contend that the content of the messages is the important thing.

Historically, the Davenport Brothers and Jonathan Koons, of Ohio, were the first mediums through whom direct voice phenomena were produced.  It was John King who introduced it and it is also due to this romantic control that we owe the invention of the trumpet.  Voice mediumship is one of the most dramatic forms of supernormal manifestations.  In view of the ease with which it was acquired by Dennis Bradley one may understand his enthusiastic forecast in The Wisdom of the Gods: "Communication with the spirits in their actual voices may, within this century, become as simple as the telephone or wireless.  In fact, it seems to me that it is a new and phenomenal form of wireless communication."

Books largely on direct voice experiences: Dennis Bradley: Towards the Stars; The Wisdom of the Gods; . . . And After.  W. Usborne Moore: The Voices; G. K. Hack: Modern Psychic Mysteries at Millesimo Castle; J. Arthur Findlay: On the Edge of the Etheric; Edward Randall: The Dead Have Never Died; May Wright Seawall: Neither Dead Nor Sleeping; J. H. Remmer: Is Death the End?; Clive Chapman: The Blue Room; Mrs. O'Hara Pincock: The Trails of Truth; Wilson G. Bailey: No, Not Dead, They Live; H. Montague Crane: Spirit Voices; Maurice Barbanell: The Trumpet Shall Sound; Bessie Clarke Drouet: Station Astral; Rev. V. G. Duncan: Proof.

Excerpts from There Is Life After Death

There Is Life After Death (1978) is the second of two books of transcripts compiled from tape recordings of Direct Voice seances with medium Leslie Flint when the widow Mrs. Eira Conacher was able to learn about life in the ascended realm of human existence for her husband Douglas.  Eira wrote in the Introduction: 

At one of my early direct voice sittings my husband said: "I would like to concentrate on this form of communication; my idea is to be of service and to try to get my thoughts and my message and my knowledge to as many as possible, through what I hope one day will become a book."

 
To avoid repetition as far as possible I have deleted passages here and there, and in one or two instances included information on the subject in question from tapes not otherwise used.

The seances usually commenced with a welcoming from 'Mickey,' Flint's 'control.'  This article presents excerpts from the transcripts of transcendental communication presented in There Is Life After Death.  Eira's own statements are identified with the word 'Self' and parts of one of her conversations with Mickey are included.  The 'Douglas Conacher Collection of Leslie Flint Recordings' are available for listening without charge at wholejoy.com.  The first tape recording was made by Eira on October 16, 1959, the year after her husband's physical demise.

Douglas (Direct Voice):

In producing this book I seek to place in the hands of innumerable readers a guide to the truth as I now know it to be; that life is truly eternal, and death but the gateway to life; that one only begins to live when one has died; that death is the beginning of a greater realisation and a greater wisdom.


At the same time we should realise that earthly existence is essential.  Indeed, one might liken it to the schoolroom in which we must learn lessons that are needed before we enter the greater outer world of the spirit.


In some instances it may be necessary to return to the schoolroom for a brief span of time to learn some lessons we may have failed previously.


Perhaps some of us when on earth were taught things in all sincerity by our teachers which nevertheless have proved to be wrong.  In that category I feel that I can place myself.  I learnt lessons taught not necessarily by bad teachers, but shall I say ill-informed teachers, and although not a prejudiced person, I blindly accepted certain things which I now know to be false.

Yet I realise only too well the difficulties of those in high places, particularly those who perhaps have been given a work to do and endeavour to do it as best they can, and who perpetuate many assumptions which I now know to lack truth.  But this is not in any way a criticism, for all I say and all I endeavour to do, is done in love; my one aim, my one desire, is to serve.


Voice (deep, vibrant and with a French accent): I am so pleased to come and speak to you, Mrs. Maconacher.

Self: Who is speaking, please?

Voice: Maria.  Maria.  You know there are many people who come to you from this side; apart from your husband, there are many other people who are interested in being of service.  I think you are going to do a lot of writing because you are getting a great deal of inspiration from our side.  Oui.  You will do more than you realise.  Your husband was a very talented man, but he did not have the opportunity to develop certain aspects of his ability.


Douglas: You know this time business puzzles me.  I have not a clue really as to time.  Since I have been here, I have found it very difficult to be sure about time as such.  In fact, I am more conscious of time through your mind.


Oh, I do think it is marvellous that I can come and talk to you like this!  Of course I do not know what my voice sounds like.  All I know is that I am here and speaking to you through this 'box,' which in some remarkable way transmits my thoughts into sound.  It is rather strange; one concentrates one's thoughts, and the voice-box automatically responds.

I suppose, in a kind of way, it is rather like on earth; you think of what you wish to say and your vocal organs automatically respond, and you vibrate the atmosphere and create sound, and people hear your thoughts as sound.

This is exactly what I am doing.  But in a sense this mechanism is artificial, which will possibly alter the voice.  I would like to become very familiar with this form of communication so that I can do it better.  I want to help you.


Self: Have you seen the Rev. W. Stainton Moses lately?  (He had often been seen and described by mediums as being with my husband.)

Douglas: Yes I have, and I must say he is a most wonderful person, and has been a great blessing and help to me.  We get on very well together.  Do you find his book interesting?

Self: Yes.  I am still reading it.  The Rev. Maurice Elliot is on your side now.

Douglas: Yes, he is with us.  Many people I never even knew on earth I have had the pleasure of meeting here — the Rev. Drayton Tomas, for instance; and I have met Inge.  Do you remember Dean Inge?

Self: I remember how much you enjoyed his books.


When I come to talk to you, I am not exactly solid to your world.  It is like a half-way house.  I am more conscious of your thoughts than I am of the physical self.  I am conscious of the room in which you sit because I have tuned in to a certain extent to the atmosphere and condition of the place.  But it is really the mental aspect you are receiving, the thought which is being transmitted artificially, as it must be, to you; and of course that has its complications.  I shall improve as I get more confidence and know a little more of how it is done.  Today I feel more tuned in, as it were, than probably I have ever been before.


I would not like people to think, as so many do on your side, that after death you suddenly become very angelic; or if you have not been so very good on earth, that you are condemned to the lower realms.

Here people are as they are, good and bad and indifferent.  But since the majority of people are a combination of so many things, in the beginning you enter a condition of life which is general for the average person.

Gradually you evolve, you assimilate new knowledge, you meet new people who are often more advanced and they can help and show you many varying degrees of life.  You enter into a new spirit, as it were.


Death is a tremendous adventure!  It means starting out in a new world, meeting old friends, making new ones, seeing new sights, having new experiences, getting rid of all the infirmities and ills of the body; being able for the first time to feel a sense of lightness without having to carry around a body which quite often had become sick and ill and difficult.


Self: I liked your earlier comparison of death to a voyage we take.

Douglas: Yes, it is in a sense a voyage — a voyage of discovery.  But many people do not prepare for it by their thoughts and their actions — by doing what they know within themselves is right.

That good which you have within yourself is, in a sense, the only luggage you can bring with you.  The things which are God, the things which are of the highest in man — these are what man should cultivate.

So much luggage has to be discarded by people and forgotten.  Man carries too much weight.  He loads himself with all kinds of thoughts and ideas and responsibilities which are a drawback and a hindrance.  Man must learn true values and then he will carry only that which is good.

Death is something to look forward to, realising that it is a release from all the evils of the material world.  It is rather like the chrysalis and the butterfly.  Man is like the chrysalis not fully conscious and aware, not yet released from the prison of his thoughts.  When he is able to depart from material thoughts and ideas — then he will become a beautiful spiritual creature and find happiness in a spiritual realm.


Self: Mickey, we always call you Mr. Flint's control.  Could you explain what that means, please.

Mickey: Well, I suppose a control is a person who takes charge under  the varying conditions that prevail at the time of communication.  It is my job to be close to the medium, and to help some of the newcomers through.  Those who have had little or no experience of communication need advice, and I act in the capacity of controlling the conditions that are prevalent at the time of communication.

At first, people from your side and ours who are not familiar with this form of communication are very apprehensive, and I have to be cheerful and amusing to relieve the tension.  There is often tremendous tension in the atmosphere  at such sessions as these — people become over-anxious or a little emotional, and they need calming and amusing to make them forget themselves.  It's not an easy job but I love it, and I meet all sorts of people.


Self: You have a very important job, Mickey.

Mickey: Yes, and it is a job for which one has to train.  I was with this medium several years before I was even allowed to communicate let alone act as control.

People say, "Why should they send someone like Mickey who to all outward appearances is not very advanced"; but what they don't realise is that in order to communicate, no matter who we are or from what sphere, we have to lower our vibrations in order to tune-in with you and your world, and that in itself is not an easy thing to do.

Therefore, someone like myself who over a long period has trained to do that, can be a great help.  Often I can relay messages when when spirit friends may find it difficult to lower their vibrations sufficiently to communicate with your side.

Self: I think you are advanced but assume this innocent air!

Mickey: Well, I do my best, Auntie.  I live in two worlds more than the average communicator.  In order to work with the medium, I have tuned in to his vibrations, but I also have my own separate existence which is on an entirely different sphere.  In a sense I have to live in two worlds at the same time.


Douglas: Everything that has life on your side has life here.  But the lower forms of life, such as reptiles and insects and so on which are common in your world, do not exist in the same shape and form on the highest planes.  They all go through stages of evolution; they are all in the process of change.


Here we do not marry — there is no giving and taking in marriage, and there is no possessing.  Here one does not desire to possess another person in any sense.  One is completely in harmony with another soul, tremendously tuned in, and has like thoughts, like outlook, like mind.  There is no birth in the sense that you understand it.

Of course all this is natural law too, but it cannot be regulated by material ceremonies.  Two people will only remain together when they are absolutely right for each other, when they are so tuned in, when this love is so overwhelming, so all-embracing, that they naturally and instinctively desire to be as one and assist each other to expand and grow in mental and spiritual stature.


Here nothing is hidden.  Everything is shown gradually, in its evolution.  If you want to tune-in to someone for whom you have admiration, you can see that person and by the mere process of thought, enter into a condition of their life and their personality.  You see events as they actually happened in the form of picturisation in ether, almost as if you were watching a moving picture screen — a cinema screen.


On earth you are living in a world which is really the product of past lives, past minds, and to some extent you are suffering from the wrong thinking and wrong actions of people who went before you.  The world is always creating.  Man is given free will and the opportunity to do great things, and often he does in some directions.  But unfortunately man also builds and creates through his mind things which are not happy.

People often say "Oh, why does God permit this, and God allow that," but God does not interfere with free will.


There are many, many spheres — that is, there are many conditions of life and many forms of development.

There are spheres here which are very like the material and natural conditions of earth, and to some extent the earthly way of life.  It is not until you get away from the material aspect of life that you really begin to lose this feeling that certain things are necessary and that they have to be produced in a certain way.  It is all a matter of development and evolution.


Here you learn that fundamentally all things are mind or the power of thought.  The creative power is from within.  It is the better part of man — the God-like part of man — that brings forth this beauty.


Self: Yesterday, I was trying to help a young man who was very upset at the passing of his mother to understand something of this truth, but his comment was: "It all sounds very nice but it can't be proved."

Douglas: When a person say it is all very interesting but it cannot be proved, I think he is being foolish.  For the simple reason that if he does not make the effort, he cannot expect this knowledge to fall into his lap.


If a person sincerely endeavours to discover the truth, it is all there to be discovered, and he will be helped and guided and has no need to fear.


Self: Can you tell me about the government of your world?

Douglas: One can say that we are conscious of government from the point of view of everything being in order, everything being conducted in an orderly fashion.

We see the results of government, although we are not fully conscious of the people who govern us.  There is no such thing as government as you understand the term, and yet there are those who are much more highly evolved and developed, who have a great part to play in the lives of thousands and millions of souls and organizations in each particular state of being.


Self: Which body are you using today?

Douglas: The etheric body.

Self: Is the spirit body within the etheric?

Douglas: The spirit body, as such, is not in a sense a body.  If one can realise that as one goes through varying degrees of experience, or shall we say, stages of evolution, so are there subtle almost imperceptible changes that take place.  Although one would not feel anything, there would be an inner awareness of certain aspects of change.

I do not want you to think that we become bodiless, just spirit and mind, as it were, and an animating force.  It is true that this life-giving force — this power, this part of the indestructible which we call God, this breath of life, whichever way you like to put it — is the reality: But we are still individuals and recognisable as such.


Douglas: Here animals have freedom to roam and enjoy their existence; there is no fear in their make-up.  They do not fear one another or man.


Self: Has anything particularly exciting been happening on your strata of the spirit spheres?

Douglas: The answer to that would be that it is never anything else but exciting.  When you consider that untold millions upon millions of people have come over here through generations and generations of time — in all different degrees of evolution, different types of individuals, educated, uneducated, all different nationalities, different viewpoints, different approaches to life — the whole immensity of it is such that to even begin to depict the minutest part beggars description.


This assumption that the earth is the only world to be concerned about is wrong because there are lives, there are people, there are worlds that have been going on for untold centuries upon centuries, millions upon millions of years.

On these other worlds the consciousness of people is much more spiritually and psychically advanced than on earth; their knowledge is tremendous!  There are degrees of intelligence much more highly advanced than anything known on earth.

In fact people on certain planets are very concerned about the earth, and indeed have been trying to make contact.

The vast majority of people on other planets are to all outward appearance similar to ourselves, and many of them are also very like material earthly beings mentally; but there are other conditions of life where the shape and form are different; I could not even begin to describe that.


What is important is that the power of the Holy Spirit manifests itself in many forms and in many ways.

Christ cannot be narrowed down in the sense that He is often narrowed down.  And, then again, we must not refer to him as a person.  God and Christ are one — but in a spiritual sense.

People become confused about all this because they will give shape and form, they will give name and title.


It is the power of the Holy Spirit manifesting in so many different ways that is life itself.  It is the power which generates in us and through us and about us.  It is this that makes us part of the divine spiritual beings.  Because we have outward shape and form we think of ourselves as people.  But we must not think just of figure and shape and size and appearance, of names and titles — we must think of the Holy Spirit, that eternal power which is life itself, and which generates in all things.

There is eternal life not only in the human but also in the animal kingdom.  People seem to think that an animal has no life beyond the material.  That is not so.

There is a vital spark of life in all things that have being — an eternal spirit which is all the time motivating new life.


Douglas: The book [Chapter of Experience] is going to do a great deal of good and arouse tremendous interest.  Now you will have to do a follow-up.  That is going to take some time but you have done this so beautifully.

Self: I have only written down from the tape recorder what you have said, dear.


Self: What is your work now, dear?

Douglas: I do various things.  I am a teacher and visit various planes, or spheres where thousands of souls congregate and live on different levels of consciousness.  One tries to convey to these people something of life that we have experienced which is beyond their normal knowledge.  In other words, to try to raise up their desire for further knowledge and experience.  But not by speech as you understand it.  We can convey by our thought-forces and by assembling our experiences together.

We are able to vibrate the atmosphere.  We are able to transmit on certain wavelengths not only what we are thinking, what we are feeling, and what we are expressing — but we can also picturise it.  We can transmit thought-pictures.  As they are hearing our thoughts as sound waves, they are also seeing in picture form in the atmosphere that which we have in our minds.

It is almost like a television set.  We are, in a sense, what you would term transmitters.  You could say that not only are we receiving sets, but we are also able to give out; we are able to send out.


Self: You seem to work very hard, dear.

Douglas: When one is working one is happy.  The realisation that you are serving, uplifting, guiding, and some senses I hope inspiring others to seek and to find — this is the kind of work which brings joy to one's heart.

The whole point is that all of us, more or less according to our experience, are working for the betterment of the human race, the betterment of humanity.  Each one is contributing his bit according to his light.

Even those on the lower planes are seeking — perhaps they are not always aware or conscious of it — and yet there is an inner awareness that something is lacking, they only need that little guidance, that little help, that little inspiration that we can give, to set them on the path of progression.

We are all instruments, my dear.  You are as much an instrument as the medium and Mickey, and all the others working in this pattern we are creating.


We see you and others like you as vital links in a chain which we are building up over a period of earthly time.  When it is strengthened, this chain will be of such power that people in your world will be able to understand a little more, and the strength of it will pull them nearer to a realisation of the spirit, to be uplifted by it.


Self: Can you tell me about your new vibrations, your new habitat as you call it?

Douglas: Yes.  One has to realise that there is no such thing as a demarcation line between one state of being and the next; there is a kind of intermingling.  At first one may not be aware or conscious of a new state of being.  In most cases this will come gradually.

It did so with me.  I can only say it was as if I were in a sleep-state — drowsing if you like — and then instead of awakening into the condition of life to which I had become accustomed, I was aware of changes.  The environment was different, the whole atmosphere was more rarified, there was greater luminosity.

Unconsciously, perhaps, we accept everything around and about us as being natural and as we desire it.  We acclimatise ourselves and settle in and accept this as a matter of course whether it is in your world or in this life.

From the 1973 book Chapters of Experience: (left) "A psychic sketch of Douglas drawn by Frank Leah, clairvoyant artist, in 1962—four years after Douglas's so-called death.  Neither of the Conachers had ever met Frank Leah when this sketch was made"; (right) "Douglas at age fifty-nine"