clearly enough. We understand now that to perceive a person with the external senses is not equivalent to having a normal consciousness of the reality of that person; and, similarly, we see that a remembered experience however clear and detailed it may bemay affect us as if it were not really a memory of that experience. Something must be added to what the senses give us, and to the recalled sensory impressions, in order to produce the conviction of reality. What that something is, is partly indicated in the instances I have described to you. The sight of the daughter leaves the father cold; he does not feel the joy he knows he would feel were that young woman really his daughter. And the idea of the beloved dead husband leaves the wife entirely indifferent. Let us remember these facts when, later on, we shall pass to the explanation of both the sense of the Unreality of the Real and the sense of the Reality of Invisible Presences.

We normal people may perhaps get a glimpse of the disheartening experiences of these poor neuropaths by seeking to realize what would happen within us if, when about to greet with joy an old friend, we found ourselves facing, not the friend, but some stranger who happened to be a perfect image of the friend. Our attitude, feelings, and thoughts would instantly be radically changed, and with that change would come the sense of the absence of the friend.

The obvious psychological lesson taught by these mental disorders is that the conviction of the reality of people and things does not depend merely on the impressions they make upon the external senses, but on the awakening within us, by these sensory impressions, of complex reactions among which the emotional reactions play a conspicuous rôle.

III

We may now pass on to the counterpart of these abnormal experiences that is, the conviction of the presence of someone in the absence of any perception by the external senses. If the former variety of experience is of little social significance, the latter has been and is, as you will see, of very great importance in the history of individuals and of societies.

The writings of the classical Christian mystics contain numerous instances of the Sense of Invisible Presence. Here is one of the many reported by the great Spanish mystic, Saint Theresa. 'On the day of Saint Peter, as I was in prayer, I saw near me, or rather I felt

for I did not perceive anything either with the eyes of the body or with the eyes of the soul-I felt the Christ near me and I knew it was He who was speaking to me. . . . It seemed to me that He kept walking at my side; and, as it was not a vision of the imagination, I did not know under what form He was present . . but He was always on my right side; I felt Him very clearly.' Observe how, in this description, Saint Theresa is puzzled by the assurance she has of the presence of Christ in the absence of any external sensation or even of ‘vision of the imagination.'

A woman whom we shall call Mlle. V, Protestant in religion, had suffered impatiently throughout her life from the lack of an intimate companion. One night, before falling asleep, she became suddenly aware of a friendly Presence. She calls it the Friend. His approach was not made known to her through the senses. She felt him somewhere in space and yet within herself. She talked to him more than he to her. The Presence was soothing, purifying. But although this Friend affected her like a really present

person, Mlle. V did not long let herself be deceived. She knew too much and was too keen an observer to mistake the creation of her heart's desire for an objective reality. She said, 'I wish I was not so sure that he is merely a split in my personality, so that I might take it more seriously; but I see the ropes too clearly.'

A few months later, the character of the Presence changed. It was no longer a human Friend, but a divine Presence. It reappeared thirty-one times at irregular intervals in the course of sixteen months, and then the manifestation ceased. I wish there were room to add some details, to tell you in particular how Mlle. V convinced herself gradually that the whole affair was a creation of her 'subconscious self,' that is her own expression,- and how, - and how, when she had made that discovery, the experience came to an end.

With these two instances before us, it is probably unnecessary for me to say that the Sense of Presence is something else, something more, than the mere thought of someone's presence. On hearing a door open or the steps of a person, I may infer that someone is there in my neighborhood. That inference of a presence is not at all the Sense of Presence, although it may well be its starting point. Usually, however, it remains a mere thought, a mere inference of the presence of someone. What difference there is between these two experiences we shall see more fully as we proceed.

It would be an error to suppose that this conviction of an impressive Presence, more concretely real than what the eyes see and the hands touch, occurs only in the religious life. Many are the persons who have experienced it outside of all religious connections. From a collection gathered from contemporaries I transcribe two instances that are little more than commonplace.

1. A young woman was sitting in the drawing room of her parents at half after eleven at night, waiting for her father's return. Her mother lay on a couch near her, dozing. She herself was completely absorbed in the reading of a book. No one else in the house was awake. As she read, she was slightly disturbed by the feeling that someone was in the room in the corner opposite her mother's couch. She looked up, expecting to see her father, but saw no one and began reading again. The same sensation came over her three or four times; but since, each time she looked up, she saw no one, she continued to read, being very deeply absorbed in her book. Suddenly she felt someone come from the corner and cross between herself and her mother. She felt it so vividly that she even thought she saw something, but could not say what the something looked like. She was perfectly certain, however, that someone had crossed the room. Startled, she cried to her mother, 'What was that?' Her mother had seen and felt nothing, but the girl insisted that someone had passed, and persuaded her mother to search the house with her. They searched the house in vain.

2. 'We had an early dinner, as we we were all going to a wedding. I was dressing in my room on the third floor, and the rest of the family were on the second floor. I could hear them talking, and I sometimes joined in the conversation, calling down the stairs. Altogether, we were having a most hilarious time. Suddenly, for no reason that I know of, a sort of terror came over me. The electric lights had not yet been turned on, and my bedroom, although not dark, was lighted only by the gas light from my study and from the hallway. I seemed to feel a Presence, and it was in the air, moving quite rapidly, about six feet from the floor. I did not look in that direction, but

tried to quiet myself by thinking that such a thing could not physically hurt me, and that, if it were anything spiritual, I should be glad to learn what it had to say. Then I turned of course to find nothing. I was still nervous, and went downstairs as soon as I was dressed.' The writer of this letter adds that under ordinary circumstances she is never afraid in the house.

In this last instance the Presence was indefinite in character; whether it was a person or something else was not revealed. Such cases are not rare. The two following instances are more or less of that description.

Under date September 20, 1842, James Russell Lowell wrote to a friend: 'I had a revelation last Friday evening. I was at Mary's, and happening to say something of the presence of spirits (of whom, I said, I was often dimly aware), Mr. Putnam entered into an argument with me on spiritual matters. As I was speaking the whole system rose up before me like a vague Destiny looming from the abyss. I never before so clearly felt the spirit of God in me and around me. The whole room seemed to me full of God. The air seemed to waver to and fro with the presence of something. I knew not what. I spoke with the calmness and clearness of a prophet.' Note in this account that 'something' - Lowell did not know exactly what-filled the room with its vague presence. Nevertheless, he ventured the descriptive term 'God.'

My last illustration bears a deeper significance than the preceding; it comes from a university teacher of science, a woman very similar to Mlle. V in her profound loneliness and yearning for an adequate intimate companion. Throughout her early maturity, and until the events we are about to relate, her life had been a pathetic, almost tragic, experience of

frustration. Satisfying human companionship having failed her altogether, she came to believe that the only hope of a tolerable and honorable existence was in a divine Companion who would understand her, sympathize with her, and love her. This period of her life culminated in a soul-stirring, mystical adventure which I relate in her own words:

"Then one night, after a week of this sort of thing, the sense of God's presence came upon me with overpowering fullness. I cannot express the sense of personal intimacy, understanding, and sympathy that it gave to me. I felt the thing whatever it was

so close to me, so a part of me, that words and even thoughts were unnecessary, that my part was only to sink back into His personality personality - if such it were - and drop all worries and temptations, all the straining and striving that had been so prominent in my life for years and years. Then, as I felt consolation and strength pouring in upon me, there came a great upwelling of love and gratitude toward their source, even though I was all the time conscious that that source might not be either personal or objective. It felt personal, I said to myself, and no harm would be done by acting as if it were so. This experience lasted for two days in nearly its original strength. Every time attention relaxed from my tasks, the Presence was there, and it was the last at night and the first in the morning in my consciousness. Gradually it became less vivid, but at times it still recurs with its original force.'

This substantial, intimate, and dynamic realization of the presence of persons, either human or divine, is fairly frequent. It should not be regarded as an expression of abnormality in the experiencer- not even though it should have to be regarded as an illusion. The normal mind is

subject to deceptions of many kinds, in particular to those mentioned at the beginning of this paper: the universal, stupendous, and yet normal illusions of magic and of primitive religion, illusions which controlled for ages the life of poor humanity.

IV

The Sense of Presence is the expression of a mental activity so natural and ordinary that it can be reproduced in probably anyone willing to submit to simple experimental conditions. I have myself produced it in a number of persons. The subject of the experiment was seated in a dimly lighted room with his back to the assistants, who sat silent some twenty-five feet away. His eyes were carefully covered to exclude all light. He was told that at any time someone might come forward and stand behind his chair, and that he was then to indicate awareness of the Presence by raising his hand. The floor between the attendants and the subject was covered with heavy rugs in order to eliminate, so far as possible, all sound of footsteps. Under these circumstances I expected that the subject would have two different experiences, and would spontaneously separate them: the ordinary thought of and belief in the presence of someone behind him, and that other impression we have called the Sense of Presence. This anticipation was verified. Of the seven subjects who took part in the experiment, three experienced the Sense of Presence. Had we persevered, all of them might have. The following notes are extracted from the observations of the successful subjects.

1. 'Very suddenly there came a feeling that someone was near me; there was no visualization except to the point of knowing that the person was large. I was very sure it was a person,

and that he or she was behind my chair, a little to the left, about one and one half metres away. [No one was in the room, nor had there been anyone there for about three minutes.] I had a slightly uncanny feeling. Almost immediately there appeared an intense desire to stand up and turn around toward the person, so as to be facing him during a conversation I felt sure would ensue. I had no idea what the topic of conversation would be, or why it would take place. But the idea of carrying on a conversation and the necessity of standing (more to have better control of my mental faculties than anything else - it was not out of respect to another person) were very clear and insistent.'

2. After an interval, there came a Sense of Presence not very clear. Then It became very clearly present. "Bearing down upon me" was the phrase that flitted through my mind. There was a growing feeling of terror tinged with awe. By this time there was a noticeable muscular tension all over, accompanied by an increased rate of breathing. Shortly after this I began to shiver, and later I had a feeling of cold not connected with the temperature of the room. The shivering ended in jerking all over. When the shivering began, I had the feeling of cowering in my chair. After a short time I could stand it no longer and I impulsively removed the bandage from my eyes, though I knew we had agreed that the experiment should last ten minutes.'

It is by the third subject that the distinction between the thought of a person present and the Sense of Presence is most clearly made.

3. "The sounds made by people approaching and retreating, the tick of the clock, and so forth, had no effect upon me, for I was attending to my own psychic processes. The atmosphere

seemed thicker than usual and felt charged with what might be called "latent personality." Out of this more or less vitalized atmosphere I tried to form definite presences, determining their position with reference to my own left front, right front, and so forth. I succeeded to some extent; but the fact that I was consciously imagining these figures detracted from their reality.' So far there is nothing unusual. She hears, as she thinks, steps approaching her chair from behind, and she thinks someone is there behind her. But after a while something more happens. 'Finally, without any effort or force, I felt a Presence standing at the table to my right, and a little behind my chair. It existed only in reference to me. It did not look at me [remember that her eyes were so covered that she could not see anything], but as it turned toward me, and put out its arms as if it were about to touch me, I was so overcome with terror that I lost the sense of its nearness and became aware only of my own tendency to shrink away - almost run- and of my quickened pulse.'

Attention should be called to an interesting feature of this experiment: several of the subjects made an effort to produce the Presence. They thought hard of a person and attempted to visualize him and to determine his position with reference to their own. These efforts remained invariably fruitless. If the Presence appeared at all, it came unexpectedly, after they had ceased the effort of visualization. This is exactly what the Christian mystics have recorded. They also desired and sought a Presence, in

itself, as you understand, to a belief in the intervention of a personality other than the subject. The latter feels as if the Presence had not appeared in answer to his own bidding, but at the will of the Presence itself.

In order not to misunderstand the meaning of this impression of passivity and of intervention by another will, we must observe that it is characteristic not only of the Sense of Presence but of much of our ordinary mental life. Consider, for instance, what happens when you try to solve a problem, or merely to write a letter writing a letter is often a considerable problem. You begin with some stereotyped remark and come to a stop. You do not know how to proceed. What happens then? You think for a moment and nothing satisfactory appears. For an instant instant you let go of the problem, or the problem lets go of you. You look out of the window, you light your pipe. Suddenly, unexpectedly, the idea you need has popped into your head. It seems to have come from outside. I insist upon this commonplace instance, for it represents the ordinary way of the mind in the process of thinking. Ideas pop into our minds unexpectedly, when we have ceased to make any effort to find them, that is, while we seem passive, — just as the Presence jumps to our side, not as an immediate sequence to our efforts, but, as it seems, of its own volition. In neither case is the sense of passivity of the subject a sufficient proof of the activity of a person other than the subject.