“Now, after a long and constant watchfulness, seeing
for months and years its progress and its practical work-
ings upon its devotees, its believers, and its mediums,
we are compelled to speak our honest conviction, which
is, that the manifestations coming through the acknowl-
edged mediums, who are designated as rapping, tip
ping, writing and entrance mediums, have a baneful
influence upon believers, and create discord and confu-
don; that the generality of thce teachings inculcate
false ideas, approve of selfish individual acts, and en-
dorse theories and principles which, when carried out,
debase and make man little better fhan the brute. These
are among the fruits of modern Spiritualism.
“Seeing, as we have, the gradual progress it makes
with its believers, particularly its mediums, from lives
of morality to those of sensuality and immorality, grad-
ually and cautiously undermining the foundation of
good principles, we look back with amazement to the
radical change which a few months will bring about
in individuals; for its tendency is to approve and en-
dorse each individual act and charadter, however good
or bad these acts may be.”
He concludes by saying-“We
desire to send forth
our warning voice, and if our humble position, as the
head of a public journal, our known [former] advoca-
cy of Spirituzlism, our experience, and the conspicu-
ous part we have played among its believers, the hon-
esty and fearlessness with which we have defended the
subject, will weigh anything in our favor, we desire
that our opinions may be received, and those who are
moving passively down the rushing rapids to destruc-
tion, should pause, ere it be too late, and save them-
selves from the blasting influence which those mani-
festations are causing. “
So bold and outspokenly immoral did some of the
prominent representatives of Spiritism become, spe-
cially the female mediums (and most of its mediums
are females) that the moral sense of civilization was