Dr. Hegy is a medical practitioner who. hag done a certain amount of spiritualistic investigation. He is obviously, from the manner of his writing, one who has a great belief Inthe existence of life after death, and the demonstration of proofs, Which he claims to have witnessed, might, if all the necessary safeguards against irregularities, when have been proved to be so common in this line of investigation, had been taken, appear on the face of his story to be sufficient to convince the most incredulous. Dr. Hegy brings no particularly new thought to the Study of the phenomena which he writes of witnessing. It is apparent from the early chapters of his Work, that he did not approach the Subject quite in the dispassionate frame of mind of an impartial in-Vestigator nto one of the most dif-cult problems of life, or death, but seems to have been let into a suit-bie frame of mind for easy conviction by his own speculations, and apparcat desire to be convinced of the most favourable possible of all interpretations to be. placed on Certain phenomena which he was fortunate to witness, The stories he tells of seances are the author describes. Spirit.
which has been exposed times with-'Out number. It is mot suggested for tone moment that Dr. Hegy is guilty of anything but self-deception, That probably brought about by a very human and widespread desire that there should be some proof of post-mortem existence, and a readness to accept as evidence much that would be rejected by people of a more dis passionately scientific mind. But there is another aspect of the matier which undoubtedly appeals to those who retain an open mind upon the subject, and that is the fact that most of their results recorded from Seances indicate that the departed spend most of their time performing cheap conjuring tricks, most of Which can and have been reprodueed by conjurers under much more dificult conditions than those in which the average medium works. Of the doctrines which go to fill out Dr. Hegy's work, there is litle to bbe said, except that they are just as admirable without the spiritualistic foundation upon which Dr. Hegy bases them. The result Is, n, that the author has produc book which can only appeal to those already convinced of what so many are sceptical, and that, as a contribution to the consideration of a very difficult and Important subject, his work is not impressively valuable. cominoa enough to those who have spent any length of time investigating spiritualism. There is the same old rigmarole, of luminous trumpets and the execution of the apparently. impossible; the same old playing on the gramophone. Dr. Hegy appears, fo have witnessed most of the ectoplasmic "demonstrations so common most accounts of these seances, He reports having seen a materializ~ ed child, covered with an ectoplasmic garment, on another occasion a materialized puppy; bouquets of flowers presented to, materialized visitors have immediately dematerialized and never been seen again, One interesting case which he reports is as follows:—
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.