Observations placeholder
Didier, Alexis – Reads from the pages of an uncut book
Identifier
022716
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
A description of the experience
Flammarion, C., Carroll, L, - Death and its mystery: before death
Among them was Alexis, the celebrated somnambulist. Monsieur Marcillet hypnotized him and this is what occurred.
My friend Dr. N- went into an adjoining room to find a book with its leaves still uncut; then, without opening it, he asked the somnambulist to read such and such a line on such and, such a page. The somnambulist hesitated, seemed to make a great effort, then asked for a pen and wrote the line indicated; at that they cut the leaves of the book, found the page and the line, and every one, transfixed with astonishment, learned that the experiment had succeeded perfectly; only the sentence in the book was written in English, and the somnambulist, in transcribing it, had translated it into French. It was a curious fact that, a few minutes later, this same somnambulist could not read the word “Paris," written in large letters on a sheet of paper that had been folded twice.
Here we surely cannot invoke the transmission of thought, as no one had opened this uncut book.