In vain may ‘so good an observer as Miss X. think herself fully awake’ (as she does think herself) when crystal-gazing, because once, when she happened to have ‘her eyes fixed on the window,’ her expression was ‘associated’ by a friend ‘with something uncanny,’ and she afterwards spoke ‘in a dreamy, far-away tone’ (p. 297).  Miss X., though extremely ‘wide awake,’ may have looked dreamily at a window, and may have seen mountains and marvels.  But the point is that she was not voluntarily gazing at a crystal for amusement or experiment—­perhaps trying to see how a microscope affected the pictures—­or to divert a friend.

I appeal to the shades of Aristotle and Bacon against scientific logic in the hands of Herr Parish.  Here is his syllogism: 

A. is occasionally dreamy when not crystal-gazing.  A. is human.  Therefore every human being, when crystal-gazing, is more or less asleep.

He infers a general affirmative from a single affirmative which happens not to be to the point.  It is exactly as if Herr Parish argued: 

  Mrs. B. spends hours in shopping. 
  Mrs. B. is human. 
  Therefore every human being is always late for dinner.

Miss X., I think, uplifted her voice in some review, and maintained that, when crystal-gazing, she was quite in her normal state, dans son assiette.

Yet Herr Parish would probably say to any crystal-gazer who argued thus, ’Oh, no; pardon me, you were not wholly awake—­you were a-dream.  I know better than you.’  But, as he has not seen crystal-gazers, while I have, many scores of times, I prefer my own opinion.  And so, as this assertion about the percipient’s being ‘dissociated,’ or asleep, or not awake, is certainly untrue of all crystal-gazers in my considerable experience, I cannot accept it on the authority of Herr Parish, who makes no claim to any personal experience at all.

As to crystal-gazing, when the gazer is talking, laughing, chatting, making experiments in turning the ball, changing the light, using prisms and magnifying-glasses, dropping matches into the water-jug, and so on, how can we possibly say that ’it is impossible to distinguish between waking hallucinations and those of sleep’ (p. 300)?  If so, it is impossible to distinguish between sleeping and waking altogether.  We are all like the dormouse!  Herr Parish is reasoning here a priori, without any personal knowledge of the facts; and, above all, he is under the ‘dominant idea’ of his own theory—­that of dissociation.

Herr Parish next crushes telepathy by an argument which—­like one of the reasons why the bells were not rung for Queen Elizabeth, namely, that there were no bells to ring—­might have come first, and alone.  We are told (in italics—­very impressive to the popular mind):  ’No matter how great the number of coincidences, they afford not even the shadow of a proof for telepathy’