ABSTRACT
The most widely known group of psychical phenomena is that relating to the Mediumistic Trance, since it is through this that communications are received which ostensibly proceed from the dead. The important idea suggested by William James is that the trance-phenomena contain depth: the surface explanation may not be the whole explanation. There was always an interesting phase of the Piper Trance, which took place just as the trance proper was coming to an end. The Piper case suggests, then, that in trance-mediumship the people are dealing with certain states of consciousness which bear an analogy to hypnosis or auto-hypnosis; that these are full of dream-like associations leading to much nonsensical material; that impersonations of dead take place, sometimes unconvincingly, sometimes presenting false communicators, sometimes more convincingly, but that behind all this there is evidence of a will to communicate which, when conditions are at their best, gives a strong impression of a genuine deceased communicator somewhere in the background.
