A little more purpose is displayed in that class of phenomena in which we intently wish that a certain person shall do a certain thing, and lo! we soon learn that that certain person has done it.  A number of years ago, a popular writer wrote an article in which he mentioned what seemed to him to be a curious instance of some form of mental influence or telepathy.  He said that he had found out that if he would sit down and carefully write a letter to some person from whom he had not heard for a long time, and then destroy the letter instead of sending it, he would be almost certain to receive a letter from that person within a few days.  He did not attempt to account for the phenomenon, he merely called the attention of his readers to it.  Many persons have followed the suggestion, often with very wonderful results.  There is nothing miraculous, or supernatural about such occurrences.  It is merely one phase of telepathy.  The concentrated thought of the writer of the letter is directed toward the other person, and that person begins to think of the first one; then he thinks he will write to him; then he actually does write.  Distance, space, and direction have no importance in this experiment—­it is not necessary to even know where the second person is, in fact.

There are often found persons so closely in psychic harmony with each other that they very often are able to ask questions and receive answers from each other, even though great distances separate them.  Some particular times there is a better psychic harmony existing between the same persons than is found at other times.  All this, of course, affects the success of the experiment.  It is surprising what wonderful results along these lines may be obtained by almost any person of average intelligence, after a little careful, patient, conscientious practice.

But there have been phenomena obtained as the result of long series of careful experiments which are, in a way, even more wonderful than these somewhat less deliberate experiments just mentioned.  I allude to the experiments of a number of earnest, careful scientific students, who surrounded themselves with every precaution against over-enthusiasm, fraud, and coincidence.  Prominent among this class of investigations we find those conducted by the Society for Psychical Research, of England, which really established a firm basis for the work of other investigators who followed the general methods of the said society.  In the following chapter, I shall give you a somewhat extended statement of the results of such investigations, because this information is important to every student of psychic phenomena, not only because it establishes a firm scientific basis for his studies and beliefs, but also because it gives him important information which he may apply in the course of his own experimental work.