160. Physical mediums are more especially fitted for producing physical phenomena, such as the movement of inert bodies, noises, & etc. They may be divided into two categories, Voluntary mediums, and Natural or Involuntary mediums. (See Part Second, Chaps. II and IV)

Voluntary mediums are those who exert their power consciously, and obtain spirit phenomena by an act of their will. This faculty, although inherent, as we have already said, in the human species, is far from existing in all men in the same degree; but, though there are few persons in whom the medianimic faculty is absolutely null, those who are able to obtain the most startling effects; such as the levitation of heavy bodies, the transport of objects, and above all, apparitions; are rarer still. The simplest effects produced are those of the rotation of objects and the production of raps and tilts. Without attaching any great importance to phenomena of this elementary character, we cannot pass them over altogether, for they suggest interesting questions, and are always useful in convincing beginners. But we must remark that the power of producing physical effects rarely exists in connection with the more advanced means of communication, such as involuntary writing, or inspirational speaking. Physical medianimity generally diminishes in proportion as a medium develops the higher modes of medianimic action.

161. Natural or Involuntary mediums are those who are influenced without their knowing it. They have no idea of their power, and the abnormal occurrences which take place around them (do not appear to them at all extraordinary. Their peculiar faculty seems to them to be a part of themselves, as is the case with persons who are endowed with second sight, and who have no suspicion that such is the case. Mediums of this description are well worthy of observation; and we should not neglect to collect and study all the facts that may come to our knowledge in regard to them. They are of all ages; young children often possessing this faculty in a high degree. (See Chap. V - Spontaneous Manifestations.)

The faculty we are about to treat of is not, in itself, an indication of a diseased state of body, for it is not incompatible with the soundest health. A person so constituted may be sickly, but, in that case, his ill health is due to some other cause, and medical treatment is therefore powerless to prevent the manifestation of his medianimity. This faculty may undoubtedly co-exist with some forms of organic debility, but it is never produced by them. There is no reason for dreading this faculty on the score of health; because medianimity only becomes a cause of bodily weakness when the medium uses his power too continuously, and thus makes a too lavish emission of his vital fluid, which is always injurious to his bodily health.

162. Reason revolts at the idea of the tortures, both moral and physical, too often inflicted by science upon feeble and delicate persons, in order to ascertain whether there is, or is not, deception on their part in the production of the phenomena we are considering. The experiments to which such persons are often subjected, and which are not unseldom entered upon with malevolent or hostile sentiments, are always injurious to sensitive organisations; and serious injury is often done to the system by tests which may, in some cases, be justly designated as a trifling with life. Dispassionate observers know that there is no necessity for expedients such as are sometimes resorted to in cases of this kind; the abnormal phenomena exhibited by this class of patients being connected with the moral rather than with the physical nature, for which reason they cannot be explained by purely physical science.

From the fact that these phenomena are closely allied to the moral nature, whatever might tend to over excite the imagination of such patients should be scrupulously avoided. We know the evil effects that may result from fear; and people would be less frequently guilty of the imprudence of appealing to this sentiment, if they knew all the cases of imbecility and epilepsy that have been occasioned by nursery terrors. What, then, must be the effect of persuading weak minds that they are possessed by the devil? [1]

Those who sanction such ideas know not how heavy a responsibility they assume, for, by so doing, they may cause the death of a fellow creature. And the danger of such ideas is not confined to a single individual, but is shared by all the inmates of the same house, who may also be made ill by the idea that their abode is a den of demons. This direful belief led to the commission of innumerable acts of atrocity in times of ignorance and superstition. But even in those dark and gloomy days, the inquisitors ought to have known that, in burning the body of those who were reputed to be possessed by the devil, they could not burn the devil; and that, in order to get rid of the devil, it was the devil himself that would have had to be killed. Spiritist doctrine, by enlightening us concerning the true cause of all these phenomena, gives the death blow to the belief in the devil. So far, then, from giving our sanction to that belief it is our bounden duty, in the interests of morality and humanity, to combat and destroy it wherever it exists.

Whenever involuntary medianimity develops itself spontaneously in an individual, it should be allowed to follow its natural course. Nature is wiser than man and Providence, forecasting its ends, may use the humblest of us as an instrument for the accomplishment of the greatest designs. It must, however, be admitted that this phenomenon sometimes attains proportions which render it annoying and fatiguing to all who are in contact with a medium of the character in question[2]; and in all such cases, as we have already remarked (Chap. V. Concerning spontaneous physical manifestations), we should endeavour to enter into communication with the disturbing spirit, so as to find out what he wants.

The invisible beings who reveal their presence by troublesome manifestations are generally spirits of an inferior order, and such as may be controlled by moral ascendancy; and this ascendancy we must both seek and acquire if we would influence such uncomfortable visitants.

In order to do this, we must begin by modifying the medianimity of the individual through whose fluid the phenomena occur, so as to change his state from that of a natural (or involuntary) medium to that of a voluntary medium. A result is thus effected analogous to what occurs when natural somnambulism is put a stop to, as is usually done by the super inducing of magnetic somnambulism; in which case, the action of the faculty which emancipates the soul is not arrested, but merely turned in another direction. It is the same with the medianimic faculty. Instead of attempting to prevent the production of the phenomena (which can rarely be done, and cannot be attempted without danger), the medium must be urged to produce the same phenomena voluntarily, thus making the spirit work by an exertion of his will. In this way, he acquires a mastery over the spirit, and often succeeds in converting him into a docile servant, instead of the tyrant he was before. It is worthy of remark that, in circumstances of this kind, a child has often no less, or even more authority than an adult; a fact which gives new proof of that capital point of our doctrine, viz., that a child is only a child as regards his body, that his spirit possesses the degree of development he had acquired before his present incarnation, and that he has necessarily a proportional ascendancy over spirits whose development is inferior to his own.

The moralisation of an obsessing spirit, through the counsels of an influential and experienced third party, is often efficacious when the medium is not in a state to act for himself. We shall return to this point by and by.