The Philosophy of Mystery · 32 of 35

Transmigration.—analysis of Trance

“Thou shalt hold the opinion of Pythagoras, ere I will allow of thy wits; and fear to kill a woodcock, lest thou dispossess the soul of thy grandam.”

Twelfth Night.

“Through all thy veins shall run

A cold and drowsy humour, which shall seize

Each vital spirit.”

Romeo and Juliet.

Astr. You have granted me more than you desire, dear Evelyn. If life be restored, it had never deserted the body, and yet the mind had deserted it.

The mind and body, then, are both independent of each other. From this truth, a metaphysical question of deep and wondrous interest arises. In what condition does the mind exist, during so long a period, uninfluencing and uninfluenced by the power of perception? I remember searching for some elucidation of this mystery among those ghost-stories of the Hebrews, founded on the “purgatorie of souls” in Stehelin’s “Traditions of the Jews,” but I rose from my reading unenlightened.

Ida. And ever will, Astrophel. Profane curiosity must fail in such a study; adoration alone can sanctify this mystic question, on which theologians and philosophers, even those devoutly confident in the sublime truths of immortality, have so essentially differed.

Like Astrophel, Paley inquires where is the soul during suspended vitality? and Priestly, where when the body was created? Hume, with the subtlety of a sceptic, asks how can the soul long be the same, seeing that, like the body, its particles are constantly changing? While Glanville thinks himself a wondrous wight, as he prates of its “ essential spissitude, a something that is more subtle than body, contracting itself into a less ubi.”

Were this sublime secret fathomable by the deepest intellect, then would be unfolded things above, which are ordained to be ever mysteries to creatures on earth; such as the future existence of the spirit, and the nature of Paradise.

Although revelation has given us glimpses, enough to satisfy humble devotion, what mind can decide on the exact nature and changes of its own future state? The negative answer is at once returned by the variety of these learned opinions:—That the soul is, immediately after death, submitted to its reward or punishment;—That its state after death is one of half happiness or misery, until it be again joined to its body on the resurrection; and then it shall enjoy or suffer the extremes of felicity or torment;—That the soul rests in quiet unconsciousness until the day of judgment;—And lastly, that souls are purified by purgatory and comparative suffering, and then are admitted into the realms of perpetual enjoyment.

Astr. Is it not strange that in this notion of purgatory, with slight variations, pagans, and Romanists, and Egyptians, and Brahmins, so nearly accord? In the creed of the Brahmins, there is something of sublimity, whatever may be their error, and Ida will not chide, if I repeat the essence of their creed, which Robertson has gathered from the “Baghvat Geeta.”

“Every intelligent nature, particularly the souls of men, they conceived to be portions separated from this great spirit; to which, after fulfilling their destiny on earth, and attaining a proper degree of purity, they would be again reunited. In order to efface the stains with which a soul, during its residence on earth, has been defiled by the indulgence of sensual and corrupt appetites, they taught that it must pass, in a long succession of transmigrations, through the bodies of different animals, until, by what it suffers and what it leaves in the various forms of its existence, it shall be so thoroughly refined from all pollution, as to be rendered meet for being absorbed into the divine essence, and returns, like a drop, into that unbounded ocean from which it originally issued.”

Aristotle, in taking up this notion of transmigration in his book “De Animâ,” says that “the soul was always joined to a body, sometimes to one, sometimes to another.” And from this idea were taken the stories of Fadlallah and the Dervis, in the “Spectator,” of the “Transmigrations of Indus,” and the beautiful fable of “Psyche,” or the soul, which when a body died, could not live alone on earth, and so crept into another. Herodotus, in the second book of his history, has some allusions to the Egyptian creed; and, indeed, the fear of this transmigration was the origin of mummies among the Copts. Their belief that the soul (the immortality of which they very early, if not the first, decided,) could not leave the body when entire, induced them to preserve that body as long as possible; and the mummy unrollers and hieroglyphic readers must commit sad sacrilege, by exposing their sacred dust to the decomposition of air.

When the body was dissolved, however, the soul entered that of some animal that instant born; and profane commentators have, on this creed, presumed to explain the sacred story of the “banishment and savage life of Nebuchadnezzar.” At the end of 30,000 years, it again entered that of a man; and it is likely that their object in embalming was, to have the soul re-enter the same body from choice and habit.

Simonides, four hundred years after the siege of Troy, ungallantly reversed this doctrine, deciding that “the souls of women were formed of the principles and elements of brutes.” The Pythagorean system was, if not more courteous, at least more just.

“Thus all things are but altered, nothing dies;

And here and there th’ embodied spirit flies.

By time, or force, or sickness, dispossess’d,

And lodges, where it lights, in bird or beast;

Or hunts without, till ready limbs it find,

And actuates those according to their kind.

From tenement to tenement is toss’d,

The soul is still the same, the figure only lost.”

This is from Dryden’s translation of Chaucer.

And Burton’s record is as follows:

“The Pythagoreans defend Metempsychosis and Palingenesia, that souls go from one body to another, epotâ prius Lethes nudâ, as men into wolves, beares, dogs, hogs, as they were inclined in their lives, or participated in conditions:

‘ ——inque ferinas

Possumus ire domus pecudumque in corpora condi. ’

“Lucian’s cock was first Euphorbus, a captaine:

‘ Ille ego (nam memini) Trojani tempore belli

Panthoides Euphorbus eram. ’ ”

And Plato, in Timæus, and in Phædo —

Ev. Enough of Plato, dear Astrophel; or believe, with me, that his philosophy on this point was merely figurative of the similarity of mind, or genius, or feature, between the dead and the living;—as it was said of old, that the soul of Raphael had transmigrated to the body of Francesco Mazzola (Parmegiano), because his style and personal beauty so closely resembled those of the all but divine master of his art.

And pray what was the gist of that special astronomer, who affirmed that he “saw something written in the moon?”—A wild romance only? No, forsooth. Pythagoras may classically vociferate —

“——errat, et illinc,

Huc venit, hinc illuc, et quoslibet occupat artus

Spiritus: eque feris humana in corpora transit,

Inque feras noster.”

But read further, and you will find the high moral to be a severe injunction against flesh-eating:

“Then let not piety be put to flight,

To please the taste of glutton appetite;

But suffer innate souls secure to dwell,

Lest from their seats your parents you expel:

With rabid hunger feed upon your kind,

Or from a beast dislodge a brother’s mind.”

Think you this injunction will be obeyed, in the face of the “Almanac des Gourmands?”

Ida. Evelyn is severe. May I tell him that, among the records of the East, he will find incidents blended with this idea which may almost consecrate the creed of a Pagan. As the honey is hung close to the poisoned sting of the bee, there may be a bright spot to illuminate the gloomy annals of superstition. The very belief in transmigration may impart an atom of mercy, even to an infidel; and where superstition, shorn of the light of Christianity, must prevail, it were better sure to foster that notion which may, even in one little sentiment, half humanize the heart.

Listen to this contrast, between some orient sects, along the eastern shores of Hindostan. The daughters of Guzzerat fold their infants to their bosoms drugged with opium; and when the babe is thus poisoned, the Hindu girl will answer with a languid and seeming innocent smile, “It is not difficult to blast a flower-bud.”

Then the Kurrada Brahmins (as we read in the “Rudhiradhyaya”), believing themselves the agents of Vishara Boot, the spirit of poison, sacrifice the pundits to their vampire goddess, Maha-Lackshmi.

Equally blind, yet more happy in the nature of their superstition, are the Shravuch Banians, or the proselytes of Jena. The Yati, or officiating priest of this order, in purifying the temples, sweeps the floor with the Raju-hurrun, a broom of cotton-threads, lest hapless one little insect may be destroyed. And this we may believe, from the creed of transmigration being influential among these people. Sir Paul Rycaut also, in his oriental history, informs us of parallel incidents among the devout Mahomedans, who, believing that in the body of a brute may reside the soul of a departed relative, ransom, with their gold, many a bird that would otherwise flutter away its captivity in a cage.

Cast. I will not flout your praises, Ida; but, in our own island, this illusion has rather led to captivity. I remember the story of a lady, living in Worcestershire, who, under the innocent delusion that her daughters were changed into singing-birds, hung her pew in the cathedral with cages of goldfinches and linnets. And Lord Orford, in his “Reminiscences,” thus records the monomania of the Duchess of Kendal:

“In a tender mood, he (King George) promised the duchess that if she survived him, and it were possible for the departed to return to this world, he would make her a visit. The duchess, on his death, so much expected the accomplishment of that engagement, that a large raven, or some black fowl, flying into one of the windows of her villa, at Isleworth, she was persuaded it was the soul of her departed monarch so accoutred, and received and treated it with all the respect and tenderness of duty, till the royal bird, or she, took the last flight.”

Astr. You spoke of the absolute senselessness of trance; and yet there were some hints of the awakening power of fear. Is this consistent?

Ev. I expected your objection. In the cases of perfect catalepsy, the brain is not conscious of its mind, or if the mind be active, there is no assurance of its activity. But, as its faculties are awakened, it usually begins to work exactly where it left off;—one of the most imposing proofs, both of a separate existence during life, and of our bodies’ unconsciousness of this transient disunion.

Astr. I may own, Evelyn, that your illustrations of our questions, in despite of some straining at explanation, carry, on many points, conviction to my own mind, but not on all. There is another question equally interesting with the former. How is vitality preserved during this protracted abstinence?

Ev. Remember, dear Astrophel, my confession, that there are inexplicable mysteries. But, to the point of your last question. We are aware of the long period during which the body may fast after shipwreck, or beneath a fallen cliff, or even on the incarceration of animals for the purpose of experiment. Thus Captain Bligh, and seventeen persons, sailed four thousand miles in an open boat, with a small bird occasionally for the food of all. The Juno’s crew, wrecked off Aracan, existed twenty-three days without food; and the wreck of the Medusa is fresh in our memories. Here the body feeds on its own fat, shrinking until that supply is lost, and then it dies.

I might relate to you the very impressive stories of Anne Moore, of Tutbury; of Janet M’Cleod, told by Dr. Mackenzie; and many strange facts related by Dr. Willan, Sir William Hamilton, and others.

I might refer you to legends, of which I can scarcely press for your belief. As the strange but authenticated story of Anna Garbero, of Racconiggi, forty miles from Turin, who existed without nutrition for two years, becoming like a shrivelled mummy. And that of Eve Hergen, who existed thirteen years upon the odour of flowers! But even with that incredulous frown of Astrophel’s, and that faint smile of thine, fair Castaly, let me at once to my explanations.

In natural sleep the functions of the body are impeded. One of these is digestion. As there is little waste of the system there is little necessity for repletion, and life can be supported by a very slight action of the heart, a minute current of blood; like the slender vitality of infants, who, even in a state of health, seem frequently scarcely to breathe. The circulation is materially influenced in sleep, the pulse being slower and more feeble than during waking; the relaxation of the cutaneous vessels inducing frequent perspiration, especially in debilitated systems, and in the last stages of adynamic fevers.

The body of the cataleptic patient descends to the condition of less complex animal life, in which there appears a much greater simplicity of organization; and we well know, as we descend in the scale of creation, towards the cold-blooded single-hearted animals, and especially if we reach the zoophyte, in how exact a proportion to this simplicity of structure is the tenacity of life increased. “Fish,” says Sir John Franklin, “were taken out of the nets frozen, and became a solid mass of ice, being by a blow of a hatchet easily split open; they, however, recovered their vitality on being thawed.”

A course of systematic abstinence will enable us, if we wished it, to endure extreme privations, which a high feeder would soon sink under; and this is probably the discipline adopted by the fakirs of India, who fast so long under the influence of superstitious devotion.

Vaillant’s spider lived without food nearly one year; John Hunter’s toad fourteen months; land tortoises eighteen months; a beetle three years; and two serpents, according to Shaw, five years; an antelope has survived twenty days without food; some dogs forty days; an eagle 23 days.

Now all animals fall asleep at certain temperatures, which they cannot resist, but the common effect of extreme cold is death. Dr. Solander was yielding to the influence of intense cold in Terra del Fuego, but was saved by the firmness of Sir Joseph Banks. Richmond, the black, lay down on the snow to sleep, and died.

There is a close analogy between this state and the hybernation of animals, although the causes are not similar. Animalculæ often become torpid for lack of moisture, and, even after the lapse of twenty-seven years, have been revivified by water. The small furcularia anastobea will repeatedly become animated and lively by a single drop of water, its previous condition being completely quiescent. The snail, the alligator, indeed most of the ophidian and saurian reptiles, assume the torpid state in a period of extreme drought; and Humboldt states this also of the centenes solosus, a Madagascar hedgehog.

This hybernation of animals, as of the marmot and the dormouse, resembles the deep sleep arising from cold of a certain degree; for if this be intense, they will sometimes be momentarily roused from it. They may be constantly kept awake by heat and powerful light.

Thus hybernation and the sleep of plants take place from the withdrawal of stimuli; heat being the animal — light the vegetable stimulus.

Cast. The sleep of plants? a fiction surely!

Ev. Nay, a truth. The irritability of plants is excited by their peculiar stimulus; when this is withdrawn, they fall to sleep. Most of the discous flowers turn to the sun in his course, as the sun-flower, the helianthus, and the croton. The acacia leaves at noon point towards the zenith. The tamarind, the oxalis, and the trefoil, fold their leaves on the exclusion of light. The evening primrose shuts its blossom at sunset, while that minion of the moon, the night-blowing cactus, then only begins to bloom; perhaps like the owl, and goat-sucker, and bat, who find the sun too powerful an excitant.

Vegetables may be put asleep by the withdrawal of proper stimulus,—the exclusion of this light. But this is a law of nature, and ordained for a special purpose. It is chiefly during fructification; the leaves at night folding round the flowers and seed-vessels, to protect them from the chilling blight of the night cold, which would congeal their juices. In this condition of the plant its irritability ceases, but the circulation of its sap-vessels is not suspended. Its vitality continues, but if the exercise of its peculiar phenomena be long discontinued, it will fade and die. Now the vis insita of the muscle resembles vegetable irritability; and, as this is lost and sensibility suspended, the body is indeed in a condition of vegetable sleep; for vegetables have not of course sensation, although the Darwinian romance would endow the dionæa, the hedysarum, and the mimosa with sensibility, and all the blossom-beauties of Flora with the fervour of sexual passion. Trance then is caused by the removal of a stimulus. As somnambulism may result from a redundancy of nervous energy, trance and catalepsy, as well as incubus, seem to arise from an inefficient secretion or supply of this quality, in whatever it may consist, or an impediment to its transmission from the sensorium or brain to the expansion of a nerve. Thus the motive power of a muscle is in these diseases suspended, which in paralysis may be permanently impaired or destroyed.

To describe this state, I must abound in negatives. The brain is not conscious: there is no sensation. Even the marrow by its reflex faculty does not excite a muscle: there is no action: the mind has no cognizance: the body is for a time paralyzed. What is there then which may be termed life? merely involuntary circulation and gentle breathing. In this condition also there is a congestion of dark blood about the brain and in the right side of the heart; the circulation being reduced to an extreme lentor or sluggishness, while in real asphyxia there is a total stagnation.

I have done with minute pathology: as there are however two diseases, epilepsy and insanity, which may be the result of catalepsy, I may offer a precept on the point. The propensity to trance cannot suddenly be averted, but the state of the body and mind are important studies for our treatment. Melancholy and apathy are the features of the mind of the cataleptic, and languor and faulty secretions the symptoms of the body. Cheerful society, sympathy with suffering, but firmness in resisting sloth and erroneous fancies, and the direction of the patient’s mind to moral recreations, comprehend the sum of our mental treatment.

It is equally essential to ensure regulation of the secretions, especially those of the liver. We should employ cupping from the nape of the neck, if there be pain, or heat, or fulness of the head, and constant but gentle exercise. The head should not be low during sleep, nor should food be taken within two hours of retiring to rest. I believe obedience to these slight precepts will frequently mitigate, perhaps in the end avert the attacks, especially if they have arisen from diseased conditions of the body, or gloomy or depraved studies, and deep contemplation.

The most simple or unconnected form of catalepsy, is that most likely to end in madness. Perhaps, too, in deep and gloomy subjects, which begin by absorbing mind and sense, the end is thus; so that cataleptic abstraction is but the reverie or foretaste of mania.

As to suspected cases of still existing vitality: where there is plethora, I would employ bleeding, or cupping, insufflation, Galvanism; and I should not in extreme cases fear acupuncture of the heart, and galvanic shocks then transmitted through the needle. Beclard, in “La Pitié,” in Paris, allows the needle to remain three or four minutes and then withdraws it, and I have learned from my oriental friends, that the Chinese practice this mode extensively.