The sense, as of separation, which a savage dreamer or seer would feel after a dream or vision in which he visited remote places, would satisfy him that his soul, at least, was volatile8. But some experience of what he would take to be visits from the spirits of others, would be needed before he recognised that other men, as well as he, had the faculty9 of sending their souls a journeying.
Now, ordinary dreams, in which the dreamer seemed to see persons who were really remote; would supply to the savage reasoner a certain amount of affirmative evidence. It is part of Mr. Tylor’s contention10 that savages (like some children) are subject to the difficulty which most of us may have occasionally felt in deciding ‘Did this really happen, or did I dream it?’ Thus, ordinary dreams would offer to the early thinker some evidence that other men’s souls could visit his, as he believes that his can visit them.
But men, we may assume, were not, at the assumed stage of thought, so besotted as not to take a great practical distinction between sleeping and waking experience on the whole. As has been shown, the distinction is made by the lowest savages of our acquaintance. One clear waking hallucination, on the other hand, of the presence of a person really absent, could not but tell more with the early philosopher than a score of dreams, for to be easily forgotten is of the essence of a dream. Savages, indeed, oddly enough, have hit on our theory, ‘dreams go by contraries.’ Dr. Callaway illustrates11 this for the Zulus, and Mr. Scott for the Mang’anza. Thus they do discriminate13 between sleeping and waking. We must therefore examine waking hallucinations in the field of actual experience, and on such recent evidence as may be accessible. If these hallucinations agree, in a certain ratio, beyond what fortuitous coincidence can explain, with real but unknown events, then such hallucinations would greatly strengthen, in the mind of an early thinker, the savage theory that a man at a distance may, voluntarily or involuntarily, project his spirit on a journey, and be seen where he is not present.
When Mr. Tylor wrote his book, the study of the occasional waking hallucinations of the sane14 and healthy was in its infancy15. Much, indeed, had been written about hallucinations, but these were mainly the chronic16 false perceptions of maniacs17, of drunkards, and of persons in bad health such as Nicolai and Mrs. A. The hallucinations of persons of genius — Jeanne d’Arc, Luther, Socrates, Pascal, were by some attributed to lunacy in these famous people. Scarcely any writers before Mr. Galton had recognised the occurrence of hallucinations once in a life, perhaps, among healthy, sober, and mentally sound people. If these were known to occur, they were dismissed as dreams of an unconscious sleep. This is still practically the hypothesis of Dr. Parish, as we shall see later. But in the last twenty years the infrequent hallucinations of the sane have been recognised by Mr. Galton, and discussed by Professor James, Mr. Gurney, Dr. Parish, and many other writers.
Two results have followed. First, ‘ghosts’ are shown to be, when not illusions caused by mistaking one object for another, then hallucinations. As these most frequently represent a living person who is not present, by parity18 of reason the appearance of a dead person is on the same level, is not a space-filling ‘ghost,’ but merely an hallucination. Such an appearance can, prima facie, suggest no reasonable inference as to the continued existence of the dead. On the other hand, the new studies have raised the perhaps insoluble question, ‘Do not hallucinations of the sane, representing the living, coincide more frequently than mere19 luck can account for, with the death or other crisis of the person apparently20 seen?’ If this could be proved, then there would seem to be a causal nexus21, a relation of cause and effect between the hallucination and the coincident crisis. That connection would be provisionally explained by some not understood action of the mind or brain of the person in the crisis, on that of the person who has the hallucination. This is no new idea; only the name, Telepathy, is modern. Of course, if all this were accepted, it would be the next step to ask whether hallucinations representing the dead show any signs of being caused by some action on the side of the departed. That is a topic on which the little that we have to say must be said later.
In the meantime the reader who has persevered22 so far is apt to go no further. The prejudice against ‘wraiths24’ and ‘ghosts’ is very strong; but, then, our innocent phantasms are neither (as we understand their nature) ghosts nor wraiths. Kant broke the edges of his metaphysical tools against, not these phantasms, but the logically inconceivable entities25 which were at once material and non-material, at once ‘spiritual’ and ‘space-filling.’ There is no such difficulty about hallucinations, which, whatever else may be said about them, are familiar facts of experience. The only real objections are the statements that hallucinations are always morbid26 (which is no longer the universal belief of physiologists27 and psychologists), and that the alleged coincidences of a phantasm of a person with the unknown death of that person at a distance are ‘pure flukes.’ That is the question to which we recur28 later.
In the meantime, the defenders29 of the theory, that there is some not understood connection of cause and effect between the death or other crisis at one end and the perception representing the person affected30 by the crisis at the other end, point out that such hallucinations, or other effects on the percipient, exist in a regular rising scale of potency31 and perceptibility. Suppose that ‘A’s’ death in Yorkshire is to affect the consciousness of ‘B’ in Surrey before he knows anything about the fact (suppose it for the sake of argument), then the effect may take place (1) on ‘B’s’ emotions, producing a vague malaise and gloom; (2) on his motor nerves, urging him to some act; (3) or may translate itself into his senses, as a touch felt, a voice heard, a figure seen; or (4) may render itself as a phrase or an idea.
Of these, (1) the emotional effect is, of course, the vaguest. We may all have had a sudden fit of gloom which we could not explain. People rarely act on such impressions, and, when they do, are often wrong. Thus a friend of my own was suddenly so overwhelmed, at golf, with inexplicable32 misery33 (though winning his match) that he apologised to his opponent and walked home from the ninth hole. Nothing was wrong at home. Probably some real ground of apprehension34 had obscurely occurred to his mind and expressed itself in his emotion.
But one may illustrate12 what did look like a coincidence by the experience of the same friend. He inhabited, as a young married man, a flat in a house belonging to an acquaintance. The hall was covered by a kind of glass roof, over part of its extent. He was staying in the country with his wife, and as they travelled home the lady was beset35 with an irresistible36 conviction that something terrible had occurred, not to her children. On reaching their house they found that one of their maids had fallen through the glass roof and killed herself. They also learned that the girl’s sister had arrived at the house, immediately after the accident, explaining that she was driven to come by a sense that something dreadful had happened. The lawyer, too, who represented the owner of the house, had appeared, unsummoned, from a conviction, which he could not resist, that for some reason unknown he was wanted there.1 Here, then, was not an hallucination, but an emotional effect simultaneously38 reaching the consciousness of three persons, and coinciding with an unknown crisis.2
Cases in which a person feels urged to an act (2) are also recorded. Indeed, the lawyer’s in our anecdote39 is such an instance. Not to trouble ourselves (3) with ‘voices,’ hallucinations of sight, coinciding with a distant unknown crisis, are traced from a mere feeling that somebody is in the room, followed by a mental, or mind’s eye picture of a person dying at a distance, up to a kind of ‘vision’ of a person or scene, and so on to hallucinations appealing, at once, to touch, sight, and hearing. As some hundreds of these narratives40 of coincidental hallucinations in every degree have been collected from witnesses at first hand, often personally known, and usually personally cross-questioned, by the student, it is difficult to deny that there is a prima facie case for inquiry42.3
There is here no question of ‘spirits,’ with all their physical and metaphysical difficulties. Nor is there any desire to shirk the fact that many ‘presentiments’ and hallucinations of the sane coincide with no ascertainable43 fact. We only provisionally posit44 the possibility of an influence, in its nature unknown, of one mind on another at a distance, such influence translating itself into an hallucination. An inquiry into this subject, in the ethnographic and modern fields, may be new but involves no ‘superstition.’
We now return to Mr. Tylor, who treats of hallucinations among other experiences which led early savage thinkers to believe in ghosts or separable souls, the origin of religion.
As to the causes of hallucinations in general, Mr. Tylor has something to say, but it is nothing systematic45. ‘Sickness, exhaustion46, and excitement’ cause savages to behold47 ‘human spectres,’ in ‘the objective reality’ of which they believe. But if an educated modern, not sick, nor exhausted48, nor excited, has an hallucination of a friend’s presence, he, too, believes that it is ‘objective,’ is his friend in flesh and blood, till he finds out his mistake, by examination or reflection. As Professor William James remarks, in his ‘Principles of Psychology,’ such solitary49 hallucinations of the sane and healthy, once in a life-time, are difficult to account for, and are by no means rare. ‘Sometimes,’ Mr. Tylor observes, ‘the phantom50 has the characteristic quality of not being visible to all of an assembled company,’ and he adds ‘to assert or imply that they are visible sometimes, and to some persons, but not always, or to everyone, is to lay down an explanation of facts which is not, indeed, our usual modern explanation, but which is a perfectly51 rational and intelligible52 product of early science.’
It is, indeed, nor has later science produced any rational and intelligible explanation of collective hallucinations, shared by several persons at once, and perhaps not perceived by others who are present. Mr. Tylor, it is true, asserts that ‘in civilised countries a rumour53 of some one having seen a phantom is enough to bring a sight of it to others whose minds are in a properly receptive state.’ But this is arguing in a circle; What is ‘a properly receptive state’? If illness, overwork, ‘expectant attention,’ make ‘a properly receptive state,’ I should have seen several phantoms54 in several ‘haunted houses.’ But the only thing of the sort I ever saw occurred when I was thinking of nothing less, when I was in good health, and when I did not know (nor did I learn till long after) that it was the right and usual phantom to see. Mr. Podmore remarks that various members of the Psychical55 Society have sojourned in various ‘haunted houses,’ ‘some of them in a state of expectancy56 and nervous excitement,’ which never caused them to see phantoms, for they saw none.4
Mr. Tylor treats of waking hallucinations in much the same manner as he deals with ‘travelling clairvoyance.’ He does not study them ‘in the field of experience.’ He is not concerned with the truth of the facts, important as we think it would be, but with his theory that hallucinations, among other causes, would naturally give rise to the belief in spirits, and thus to the early philosophy of Animism. Now, certainly, the hallucination of a person’s presence, say at the moment of his death at a distance, would suggest to a savage that something of the dying man’s, something symbolised in the word ‘shadow,’ or ‘breath’ (spiritus), had come to say farewell. The modern ‘spiritualistic’ theory, again, that the dead man’s ‘spirit’ is actually present to the percipient, in space, corresponds to, and is derived57 from, the animistic philosophy of the savage. But we may believe in such ‘death-wraiths,’ or hallucinatory appearances of the dying, without being either savages or spiritualists. We may believe without pretending to explain, or we may advance the theory of ‘Telepathy,’ Hegel’s ‘magical tie,’ according to which the distant mind somehow impresses itself, in a more or less perfect hallucination, on the mind of the person who perceives the wraith23. If this be so, or even if no explanation be offered, the truth of the stories of coincidental apparitions58 becomes important, as pointing to a new region of psychical inquiry. Then the evidence of savages as to hallucinations of their own, coincident with the death of their absent friends, will confirm, quantum valeat, the evidence of many modern observers in all ranks of life, and all degrees of culture, from Lord Brougham to an old nurse.5
As to hallucinations coincident with the death of the person apparently seen, Mr. Tylor says: ‘Narratives of this class I can here only specify60 without arguing on them, they are abundantly in circulation.’6 Now, the modern hallucinations themselves can scarcely, perhaps, be called ‘survivals from savagery,’ though the opinion that an hallucination of a person must be his ‘spirit’ is really such a survival. It is with that opinion, with Animism in its hallucinatory origins, that Mr. Tylor is concerned, not with the hallucinations themselves or with the evidence for their veridical existence.
Mr. Tylor gives three anecdotes61, narrated62 to him, in two cases, by the seers, of phantasms of the living beheld63 by them (and in one case by a companion also) when the real person was dying at a distance. He adds: ‘My own view is that nothing but dreams and visions could have ever put into men’s minds such an idea as that of souls being ethereal images of bodies.’7 The idea may be perfectly erroneous; but if the occurrence of such coincidental appearances as Mr. Tylor tells us about could be shown to be too frequent for mere chance to produce, then there would be a presumption64 in favour of some unknown faculties65 in our nature — a proper theme for anthropology66.
The hallucinations of which we hear most are those in which a person sees the phantom of another person, who, unknown to him, is in or near the hour of death. Mr. Tylor, in addition to his three instances in civilised life, alludes67 to one in savage life, with references to other cases.8 We turn to his savage instance, offering it at full length from the original.9
‘Among the Maoris’ (says Mr. Shortland) ‘it is always ominous68 to see the figure of an absent person. If the figure is very shadowy, and its face is not seen, death, although he may ere long be expected, has not seized his prey69. If the face of the absent person is seen, the omen7 forewarns the beholder70 that he is already dead.’
The following statement is from the mouth of an eyewitness71:
‘A party of natives left their village, with the intention of being absent some time, on a pig-hunting expedition. One night, while they were seated in the open air around a blazing fire, the figure of a relative who had been left ill at home was seen to approach. The apparition59 appeared to two of the party only, and vanished immediately on their making an exclamation72 of surprise. When they returned to the village they inquired for the sick man, and then learnt that he had died about the time he was said to have been seen.’
I now give Maori cases, communicated to me by Mr. Tregear, F.R.G.S., author of a ‘Maori Comparative Dictionary.’
A very intelligent Maori chief said to me, ‘I have seen but two ghosts. I was a boy at school in Auckland, and one morning was asleep in bed when I found myself aroused by some one shaking me by the shoulder. I looked up, and saw bending over me the well-known form of my uncle, whom I supposed to be at the Bay of Islands. I spoke73 to him, but the form became dim and vanished. The next mail brought me the news of his death. Years passed away, and I saw no ghost or spirit — not even when my father and mother died, and I was absent in each case. Then one day I was sitting reading, when a dark shadow fell across my book. I looked up, and saw a man standing74 between me and the window. His back was turned towards me. I saw from his figure that he was a Maori, and I called out to him, “Oh friend!” He turned round, and I saw my other uncle, Ihaka. The form faded away as the other had done. I had not expected to hear of my uncle’s death, for I had seen him hale and strong a few hours before. However, he had gone into the house of a missionary75, and he (with several white people) was poisoned by eating of a pie made from tinned meat, the tin having been opened and the meat left in it all night. That is all I myself had seen of spirits.’
One more Maori example may be offered:10
From Mr. Francis Dart76 Fenton, formerly77 in the Native Department of the Government, Auckland, New Zealand. He gave the account in writing to his friend, Captain J.H. Crosse, of Monkstown, Cork78, from whom we received it. In 1852, when the incident occurred, Mr. Fenton was ‘engaged in forming a settlement on the banks of the Waikato.’
‘March 25, 1860
‘Two sawyers, Frank Philps and Jack79 Mulholland, were engaged cutting timber for the Rev80. R. Maunsell at the mouth of the Awaroa creek81 — a very lonely place, a vast swamp, no people within miles of them. As usual, they had a Maori with them to assist in felling trees. He came from Tihorewam, a village on the other side of the river, about six miles off. As Frank and the native were cross-cutting a tree, the native stopped suddenly, and said, “What are you come for?” looking in the direction of Frank. Frank replied, “What do you mean?” He said, “I am not speaking to you; I am speaking to my brother.” Frank said, “Where is he?” The native replied, “Behind you. What do you want?” (to the other Maori), Frank looked round and saw nobody. The native no longer saw anyone, but bid down the saw and said, “I shall go across the river; my brother is dead.”
‘Frank laughed at him, and reminded him that be had left him quite well on Sunday (five days before), and there had been no communication since. The Maori spoke no more, but got into his canoe and pulled across. When he arrived at the landing-place, he met people coming to fetch him. His brother had just died. I knew him well.’
In answer to inquiries82 as to his authority for this narrative41, Mr. Fenton writes:
‘December 18, 1883.
‘I knew all the parties concerned well, and it is quite true, valeat quantum, as the lawyers say. Incidents of this sort are not infrequent among the Maoris.
‘F.D. FENTON,
’Late Chief Judge, Native Law–Court of N.Z.‘
Here is a somewhat analogous83 example from Tierra del Fuego:
‘Jemmy Button was very superstitious84’ (says Admiral Fitzroy, speaking of a Fuegian brought to England). ‘While at sea, on board the “Beagle,” he said one morning to Mr. Bynoe that in the night some man came to the side of his hammock and whispered in his ear that his father was dead. He fully85 believed that such was the case,’ and he was perfectly right. . . . ‘He reminded Bennett of the dream.’11
Mr. Darwin also mentions this case, a coincidental auditory hallucination.
I have found no other savage cases quite to the point. This is, undeniably, ‘a puir show for Kirkintilloch,’ a meagre collection of savage death-wraiths, but it may be so meagre by reason of want of research, or of lack of records, travellers usually pooh-poohing the benighted86 superstitions87 of the heathen, or fearing to seem superstitious if they chronicle instances. However few the instances, they are, undeniably, exact parallels to those recorded in civilised life.
In filling up the lacuna in Mr. Tylor’s anthropological88 work, in asking questions as to the proportion between phantasms of the living which coincide with a crisis in the experience of the person seen, and those which do not, it is obviously necessary to reject all evidence of people who were ill, or anxious, or overworked, or in poignant89 grief at the time of the hallucination. It will be seen later that neither grief nor amatory passion (dominating the association of our ideas as they do) beget90 many phantasms. Our business, however, is with the false perceptions of persons trustworthy, as far as we know, sane, healthy, not usually visionary, and in an unperturbed state of mind.
There remains91 a normal cause of subjective92 hallucinations, expectancy. This appears to be a real cause of hallucination or, at least, of illusion. Waiting for the sound of a carriage you may hear it often before it comes, you taking other sounds for that which you desire. Again, in an inquiry embracing 17,000 people, the S.P.R. collected thirteen cases of an hallucinatory appearance of one person to another who was expecting his arrival. Once more, it is very conceivable that a trifle, the accidental opening of a door, a noise of a familiar kind in an unfamiliar93 place, may touch the brain into originating an hallucination of a person passing through the door, or of the place where the sound now heard used once to be familiar. Expectancy, again, and nervousness, might doubtless cause an hallucination to a person who felt uncomfortable in a house with a name to be ‘haunted,’ though, as we have seen, the effect is far less common than the cause. All these sorts of causes are undoubtedly94 more apt to be prevalent among superstitious savages than among educated Europeans. And it stands to reason that savages, where one man ‘thinks he sees something,’ will be readier than we are to think they ‘see something’ too. Yet collective hallucinations, which are shared by several persons at once, are especially puzzling. Even if they occur when all are in a strained condition of expectancy, it is odd that all see them in the same way.12 Examples will occur later. When there is no excitement, the mystery is increased. We may note that, among the expectant multitudes who looked on while Bernadette was viewing the Blessed Virgin96 at Lourdes, not one person, however superstitious or hysterical97, pretended to share the vision. Again, only one person, and he on doubtful evidence, is asserted to have shared, once, the visions of Jeanne d’Arc. In both cases all the conditions said to produce collective hallucination were present in the highest degree. Yet no collective hallucination occurred.
Narratives about hallucinations coincident with a death, narratives well attested98, are abundant in modern times, so abundant that one need only refer the curious to Messrs. Gurney and Myers’s two large volumes, ‘Phantasms of the Living,’ and to the S.P.R ‘Report of Census99 of Hallucinations’ (1894). Mr. Tylor says: ‘The spiritualistic theory specially95 insists on cases of apparitions, where the person’s death corresponds more or less nearly with the time when some friend perceives his phantom.’ But visionaries, he remarks truly, often see phantoms of living persons when nothing occurs. That is the case, and the question arises whether more such phantoms are viewed (not by ‘visionaries’) in connection with the death or other crisis of the person whose hallucinatory appearance is perceived, than ought to occur, if there be no connection of some unknown cause between deaths and appearances. As Mr. Tylor observes, ‘Man, as yet in a low intellectual condition, came to associate in thought those things which he found by experience to be connected in fact.’13 Did early man, then, find in experience that apparitions of his friends were ‘connected in fact’ with their deaths? And, if so, was that discovered connection in fact the origin of his belief that an hallucinatory appearance of an absent person sometimes announced his death?
That the belief exists in New Zealand we saw, and find confirmed by this instance, one of ‘many such relations,’ says the author. A Maori chief was long absent on the war-path. One day he entered his wife’s hut, and sat mute by the hearth100. She ran to bring witnesses, but on her return the phantasm was no longer visible. The woman soon afterwards married again.
Her husband then returned in perfect health, and pardoned the lady, as she had acted on what, to a Maori mind, seemed good legal evidence of his decease. Of course, even if she fabled101, the story is evidence to the existence of the belief.14
What, then, is the cause of the belief that a phantom of a man is a token of his death? On the theory of savage philosophy, as explained by Mr. Tylor himself, a man’s soul may leave his body and become visible to others, not at death only, but on many other occasions, in dream, trance, lethargy. All these are much more frequent conditions, in every man’s career, than the fact of dying. Why, then, is the phantasm supposed by savages to announce death? Is it because, in a sufficient ratio of cases to provoke remark, early man has found the appearance and the death to be ‘things connected in fact’?
I give an instance in which the philosophy of savages would lead them not to connect a phantasm of a living man with his death.
The Woi Worung, an Australian tribe, hold that ‘the Murup [wraith] of an individual could be sent from him by magic, as, for instance, when a hunter incautiously went to sleep when out hunting.’15 In this case the hunter is exposed to the magic of his enemies. But the Murup, or detached soul, would be visible to people at a distance when its owner is only asleep — according to the savage philosophy. Why, then, when the wraith is seen, is the owner believed to be dying? Are the things bound to be ‘connected in fact’?
As is well known, the Society for Psychical Research has attempted a little census, for the purpose of discovering whether hallucinations representing persons at a distance coincided, within twelve hours, with their deaths, in a larger ratio than the laws of chance allow as possible. If it be so, the Maori might have some ground for his theory that such hallucinations betoken102 a decease. I do not believe that any such census can enable us to reach an affirmative conclusion which science will accept. In spite of all precautions taken, all warnings before, and ‘allowances’ made later, collectors of evidence will ‘select’ affirmative cases already known, or (which is equally fatal) will be suspected of doing so. Again, illusions of memory, increasing the closeness of the coincidence, will come in — or it will be easy to say that they came in. ‘Allowances’ for them will not be accepted.
Once more, 17,000 cases, though a larger number than is usual in biological inquiries, are decidedly not enough for a popular argument on probabilities; a million, it will be said, would not be too many. Finally, granting honesty, accurate memory, and non-selection (none of which will be granted by opponents), it is easy to say that odd things must occur, and that the large proportion of affirmative answers as to coincidental hallucinations is just a specimen104 of these odd things.
Other objections are put forward by teachers of popular science who have not examined — or, having examined, misreport — the results of the Census in detail. I may give an example of their method.
Mr. Edward Clodd is the author of several handbooks of science — ‘The Story of Creation,’ ‘A Manual of Evolution,’ and others. Now, in a signed review of a book, a critique published in ‘The Sketch’ (October 13, 1897), Mr. Clodd wrote about the Census: ‘Thousands of persons were asked whether they had ever seen apparitions, and out of these some hundreds, mostly unintelligent foreigners, replied in the affirmative. Some eight or ten of the number — envied mortals — had seen “angels,” but the majority, like the American in the mongoose story, had seen only “snakes.” . . . In weighing evidence we have to take into account the competency as well as the integrity of the witnesses.’ Mr. Clodd has most frankly105 and good-humouredly acknowledged the erroneousness of his remark. Otherwise we might ask: Does Mr. Clodd prefer to be considered not ‘competent’ or not ‘veracious’? He cannot be both on this occasion, for his signed and published remarks were absolutely inaccurate106. First, thousands of persons were not asked ‘whether they had seen apparitions.’ They were asked: ‘Have you ever, when believing yourself to be perfectly awake, had a vivid impression of seeing, or being touched by a living being or inanimate object, or of hearing a voice; which impression, so far as you could discover, was not due to any external physical cause?’ Secondly107, it is not the fact that ‘some hundreds, mostly unintelligent foreigners, replied in the affirmative.’ Of English-speaking men and women, 1,499 answered the question quoted above in the affirmative. Of foreigners (naturally ‘unintelligent’), 185 returned affirmative answers. Thirdly, when Mr. Clodd says, ‘The majority had seen only “snakes,”’ it is not easy to know what precise sense ‘snakes’ bears in the terminology108 of popular science. If Mr. Clodd means, by ‘snakes,’ fantastic hallucinations of animals, these amounted to 25, as against 830 representing human forms of persons recognised, unrecognised, living or dead. But, if by ‘snakes’ Mr. Clodd means purely109 subjective hallucinations, not known to coincide with any event — and this is his meaning — his statement agrees with that of the Census. His observations, of course, were purely accidental errors.
The number of hallucinations representing living or dying recognised persons in the answers received, was 352. Of first-hand cases, in which coincidence of the hallucination with the death of the person apparently seen was affirmed, there were 80, of which 26 are given.
The non-coincidental hallucinations were multiplied by four, to allow for forgetfulness of ‘misses.’ The results being compared, it was decided103 that the hallucinations collected coincided with death 440 more often than ought to be the case by the law of probabilities. Therefore there was proof, or presumption, in favour of some relation of cause and effect between A’s death and B’s hallucination.
If we were to attack the opinion of the Committee on Hallucinations, that ‘Between deaths and apparitions of the dying a connection exists which is not due to chance alone,’ the assault should be made not only on the method, but on the details. The events were never of very recent, and often were of remote occurrence. The remoteness was less than it seems, however, as the questions were often answered several years before the publication of the Report (1894). There was scarcely any documentary evidence, any note or letter written between the hallucination and the arrival of news of the death. Such letters, the evidence alleged, had in some cases existed, but had been lost, burnt, eaten by white ants, or written on a sheet of blotting110 paper or the whitewashed111 wall of a barrack room. If I may judge by my own lifelong success in mislaying, losing, and casually112 destroying papers, from cheques to notes made for literary purposes, from interesting letters of friends to the manuscripts of novelists, or if I may judge by Sir Walter Scott’s triumphs of the same kind, I should not think much of the disappearance113 of documentary evidence to death-wraiths. Nobody supposed, when these notes were written, that Science would ask for their production; and even if people had guessed at this, it is human to lose or destroy old papers.
The remoteness of the occurrences is more remarkable114, for, if these things happen, why were so few recent cases discovered? Again, the seers were sometimes under anxiety, though such cases were excluded from the final computation: they frequently knew that the person seen was in bad health: they were often very familiar with his personal aspect. Now what are called ‘subjective hallucinations,’ non-coincidental hallucinations, usually represent persons very familiar to us, persons much in our minds. I know seven cases in which such hallucinations occurred. 1, 2, of husband to wife; 3, son to mother; 4, brother to sister; 5, sister to sister; 6, cousin (living in the same house) to cousin; 7, friend (living a mile away) to two friends. In no case was there a death-coincidence. Only in case 4 was there any kind of coincidence, the brother having intended to do (unknown to the sister) what he was seen doing — driving in a dog-cart with a lady. But he had not driven. We cannot, of course, prove that these seven cases were not telepathic, but there is no proof that they were. Now most of the coincidental cases, on which the Committee relied as their choicest examples, represented persons familiarly known to the seers. This looks as if they were casual; but, of course, if telepathy does exist, it is most likely (as Hegel says) to exist between kinsfolk and friends.16
The dates might be fresher!
In case 1, percipient knew that his aunt in England (he being in Australia) was not very well. No anxiety.
2. Casual acquaintance. No anxiety. Case of accident or suicide.
3. Acquaintance who feared to die in childbed, and did. Percipient not much interested, nor at all anxious.
4. Father in England to son in India. No anxiety.
5. Uncle to niece. Sudden death. No anxiety. No knowledge of illness.
6. Brother-in-law to sister-in-law, and her maid. No anxiety reported. Russian.
7. Father to son. No anxiety reported. Russian.
8. Friend to friend. No knowledge of illness or anxiety reported.
9. Grandmother to grandson. No anxiety. No knowledge of illness.
10. Casual acquaintance, to seven people, and apparently to a dog. Illness known. Russian.
11. Step-brother to step-brother. No anxiety. No knowledge of illness.
12. Friend to friend. No anxiety or knowledge of illness.
13. Casual acquaintance. No anxiety.
14. Aunt to nephew and to his wife. Illness known. No anxiety.
15. Sister to brother. Illness known. No anxiety.
16. Father to daughter. No knowledge of illness. No anxiety.
17. Father to son. Much anxiety. (Uncounted.)
18. Sister to sister. Illness known. ‘No immediate37 danger’ surmised115.
19. Father to son. Much anxiety. Russian. (Uncounted.)
20. Friend to friend. Illness known. Percipient had been nursing patient. Brazilian. (Very bad case!)
21 Friend to friend. Illness known. No anxiety.
22. Brother to brother. Illness known. No anxiety.
23. Grandfather to grand-daughter. Illness known. No pressing anxiety.
24. Grandfather to grandson. Illness known. No anxiety.
25. Father’s hand. Illness chronic. No anxiety. Percipient a daughter. Russian.
20. Husband to wife. Anxiety in time of war.
27. Brother to sister. Slightly anxious from receiving no letter.
28. Friend to friend. No anxiety.
Anxiety is only reported, or to be surmised, in two or three cases. In a dozen the existence of illness was known.
It may therefore be argued, adversely116, that in the selected coincidental hallucinations, the persons seen were in the class most usually beheld in non-coincidental and, probably, purely subjective hallucinations representing real persons; also, that knowledge of their illness, even when no anxiety existed, kept them in some cases before the mind; also, that several cases are foreign, and that ‘most foreigners are fools.’ On the other hand, affection, familiarity, and knowledge of illness had not produced hallucinations even in the case of these percipients, till within the twelve hours (often much less) of the event of death.
It would have been desirable, of course, to publish all the non-coincidental cases, and show how far, in these not veridical cases, the recognised phantasms were those of kindred, dear friends, known to be ill, and subjects of anxiety17.
The Census, in fact, does contain a chapter on ‘Mental and Nervous Conditions in connection with Hallucinations,’ such as anxiety, grief, and overwork. Do these produce, or probably produce, many empty hallucinations not coincident with death or any great crisis? If they do, then all cases in which a coincidental hallucination occurred to a person in anxiety, or overstrained, will seem to be, probably, fortuitous coincidences like the others. All percipients, of all sorts of hallucinations, hits or misses, were asked if they were in grief or anxiety. Now, out of 1,622 cases of hallucination of all known kinds (coincidental or not), mental strain was reported in 220 instances; of which 131 were cases of grief about known deaths or anxiety. These mental conditions, therefore, occur only in twelve per cent. of the instances. On the whole, it does not seem fair to argue that anxiety produces so much hallucination that it will account by itself for those which we have analysed as coincidental.
The impression left on my own mind by the Census does pretty closely agree with that of its authors. Fairly well persuaded of the possibility of telepathy, on other grounds, and even inclined to believe that it does produce coincidental hallucinations, the evidence of the Census, by itself, would not convince me nor its authors. We want better records; we want documentary evidence recording117 cases before the arrival of news of the coincidence. Memories are very adaptive. The authors, however, made a gallant118 effort, at the cost of much labour, and largely allowed for all conceivable drawbacks.
I am, personally, illogical enough to agree with Kant, and to be more convinced by the cumulative119 weight of the hundreds of cases in ‘Phantasms of the Living,’ in other sources, in my own circle of acquaintance, and even by the coincident traditions of European and savage peoples, than by the statistics of the Census. The whole mass, Census and all, is of very considerable weight, and there exist individual cases which one feels unable to dispute. Thus while I would never regard the hallucinatory figure of a friend, perceived by myself, as proof of his death, I would entertain some slight anxiety till I heard of his well-being120.
On this topic I will offer, in a Kantian spirit, an anecdote of the kind which, occurring in great quantities, disposes the mind to a sort of belief. It is not given as evidence to go to a jury, for I only received it from the lips of a very gallant and distinguished121 officer and V.C., whose own part in the affair will be described.
This gentleman was in command of a small British force in one of the remotest and least accessible of our dependencies, not connected by telegraph, at the time of the incident, with the distant mainland. In the force was a particularly folly122 young captain. One night he went to a dance, and, as the sleeping accommodation was exhausted, he passed the night, like a Homeric hero, on a couch beneath the echoing loggia. Next day, contrary to his wont123, he was in the worst of spirits, and, after moping for some time, asked leave to go a three days’ voyage to the nearest telegraph station. His commanding officer, my informant, was good-natured, and gave leave. At the end of a week Captain —— returned, in his usual high spirits. He now admitted that, while lying awake in the verandah, after the ball, he had seen a favourite brother of his, then in, say, Peru. He could not shake off the impression; he had made the long voyage to the nearest telegraph station, and thence had telegraphed to another brother in, let us say, Hong Kong, ‘Is all well with John?’ He received a reply, ‘All well by last mail,’ and so returned, relieved in mind, to his duties. But the next mail bringing letters from Peru brought news of his Peruvian brother’s death on the night of the vision in the verandah.
This, of course, is not offered as evidence. For evidence we need Captain —— ‘s account, his Hong Kong brother’s account, date of the dance, official date of the Peruvian brother’s death, and so on. But the character of my informant indisposes me to disbelief. The names of places are intentionally124 changed, but the places were as remote from each other as those given in the text.
We find ourselves able to understand the Master of Ravenswood’s cogitations after he saw the best wraith in fiction:
‘She died expressing her eager desire to see me. Can it be, then — can strong and earnest wishes, formed during the last agony of nature, survive its catastrophe125, surmount126 the awful bounds of the spiritual world, and place before us its inhabitants in the hues127 and colouring of life? And why was that manifested to the eye, which could not unfold its tale to the ear?’ (‘Her withered128 lips moved fast, although no sound issued from them.’) ‘And wherefore should a breach129 be made in the laws of nature, yet its purpose remain unknown?’
The Master’s reasonings are such as, in hearing similar anecdotes, must have occurred to Scott. They no longer represent our views. The death and apparition were coincidental almost to the minute: it would be impossible to prove that life was utterly130 extinct, when Alice seemed to die, ‘as the clock in the distant village tolled131 one, just before’ Ravenswood’s experience. We do not, like him, postulate132 ‘a breach in the laws of nature,’ only a possible example of a law. The tale was not ‘unfolded to the ear,’ as the telepathic impact only affected the sense of sight.
Here, perhaps, ought to follow a reply to certain scientific criticisms of the theory that telepathy, or the action of one distant mind, or brain, upon another, may be the cause of ‘coincidental hallucinations,’ whether among savage or civilised races. But, not to delay the argument by controversy133, the Reply to Objections has been relegated134 to the Appendix18.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
savage
|
|
| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
savages
|
|
| 未开化的人，野蛮人( savage的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
clairvoyance
|
|
| n.超人的洞察力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
abode
|
|
| n.住处，住所 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
alleged
|
|
| a.被指控的，嫌疑的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
phenomena
|
|
| n.现象 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
omen
|
|
| n.征兆，预兆；vt.预示 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
volatile
|
|
| adj.反复无常的，挥发性的，稍纵即逝的，脾气火爆的；n.挥发性物质 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
faculty
|
|
| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
contention
|
|
| n.争论，争辩，论战；论点，主张 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
illustrates
|
|
| 给…加插图( illustrate的第三人称单数 )； 说明； 表明； （用示例、图画等）说明 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
illustrate
|
|
| v.举例说明，阐明；图解，加插图 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
discriminate
|
|
| v.区别，辨别，区分；有区别地对待 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
sane
|
|
| adj.心智健全的，神志清醒的，明智的，稳健的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
infancy
|
|
| n.婴儿期；幼年期；初期 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
chronic
|
|
| adj.(疾病)长期未愈的，慢性的；极坏的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
maniacs
|
|
| n.疯子（maniac的复数形式） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
parity
|
|
| n.平价，等价，比价，对等 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
mere
|
|
| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
apparently
|
|
| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
nexus
|
|
| n.联系；关系 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
persevered
|
|
| v.坚忍，坚持( persevere的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
wraith
|
|
| n.幽灵；骨瘦如柴的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
wraiths
|
|
| n.幽灵( wraith的名词复数 )；（传说中人在将死或死后不久的）显形阴魂 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
entities
|
|
| 实体对像； 实体，独立存在体，实际存在物( entity的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
morbid
|
|
| adj.病的；致病的；病态的；可怕的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
physiologists
|
|
| n.生理学者( physiologist的名词复数 )；生理学( physiology的名词复数 )；生理机能 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
recur
|
|
| vi.复发，重现，再发生 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
defenders
|
|
| n.防御者( defender的名词复数 )；守卫者；保护者；辩护者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
affected
|
|
| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
potency
|
|
| n. 效力，潜能 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
inexplicable
|
|
| adj.无法解释的，难理解的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
misery
|
|
| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
apprehension
|
|
| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
beset
|
|
| v.镶嵌；困扰，包围 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
irresistible
|
|
| adj.非常诱人的，无法拒绝的，无法抗拒的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
immediate
|
|
| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
simultaneously
|
|
| adv.同时发生地，同时进行地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
anecdote
|
|
| n.轶事，趣闻，短故事 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
narratives
|
|
| 记叙文( narrative的名词复数 )； 故事； 叙述； 叙述部分 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
narrative
|
|
| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
inquiry
|
|
| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
ascertainable
|
|
| adj.可确定（探知），可发现的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
posit
|
|
| v.假定，认为 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
systematic
|
|
| adj.有系统的，有计划的，有方法的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
exhaustion
|
|
| n.耗尽枯竭，疲惫，筋疲力尽，竭尽，详尽无遗的论述 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
behold
|
|
| v.看，注视，看到 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
exhausted
|
|
| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
solitary
|
|
| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
phantom
|
|
| n.幻影，虚位，幽灵；adj.错觉的，幻影的，幽灵的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
perfectly
|
|
| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
intelligible
|
|
| adj.可理解的，明白易懂的，清楚的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
rumour
|
|
| n.谣言，谣传，传闻 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
phantoms
|
|
| n.鬼怪，幽灵( phantom的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
psychical
|
|
| adj.有关特异功能现象的；有关特异功能官能的；灵魂的；心灵的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
expectancy
|
|
| n.期望，预期，（根据概率统计求得）预期数额 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
derived
|
|
| vi.起源；由来；衍生；导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
apparitions
|
|
| n.特异景象( apparition的名词复数 )；幽灵；鬼；（特异景象等的）出现 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
apparition
|
|
| n.幽灵，神奇的现象 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
specify
|
|
| vt.指定，详细说明 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
anecdotes
|
|
| n.掌故，趣闻，轶事( anecdote的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
narrated
|
|
| v.故事( narrate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
beheld
|
|
| v.看，注视( behold的过去式和过去分词 )；瞧；看呀；（叙述中用于引出某人意外的出现）哎哟 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
presumption
|
|
| n.推测，可能性，冒昧，放肆，[法律]推定 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
faculties
|
|
| n.能力( faculty的名词复数 )；全体教职员；技巧；院 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
anthropology
|
|
| n.人类学 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
alludes
|
|
| 提及，暗指( allude的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
ominous
|
|
| adj.不祥的，不吉的，预兆的，预示的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
prey
|
|
| n.被掠食者，牺牲者，掠食；v.捕食，掠夺，折磨 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
70
beholder
|
|
| n.观看者，旁观者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
71
eyewitness
|
|
| n.目击者，见证人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
72
exclamation
|
|
| n.感叹号，惊呼，惊叹词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
73
spoke
|
|
| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
74
standing
|
|
| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
75
missionary
|
|
| adj.教会的，传教(士)的；n.传教士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
76
dart
|
|
| v.猛冲，投掷；n.飞镖，猛冲 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
77
formerly
|
|
| adv.从前，以前 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
78
cork
|
|
| n.软木，软木塞 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
79
jack
|
|
| n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
80
rev
|
|
| v.发动机旋转，加快速度 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
81
creek
|
|
| n.小溪，小河，小湾 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
82
inquiries
|
|
| n.调查( inquiry的名词复数 )；疑问；探究；打听 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
83
analogous
|
|
| adj.相似的；类似的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
84
superstitious
|
|
| adj.迷信的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
85
fully
|
|
| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
86
benighted
|
|
| adj.蒙昧的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
87
superstitions
|
|
| 迷信，迷信行为( superstition的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
88
anthropological
|
|
| adj.人类学的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
89
poignant
|
|
| adj.令人痛苦的，辛酸的，惨痛的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
90
beget
|
|
| v.引起；产生 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
91
remains
|
|
| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
92
subjective
|
|
| a.主观(上)的，个人的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
93
unfamiliar
|
|
| adj.陌生的，不熟悉的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
94
undoubtedly
|
|
| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
95
specially
|
|
| adv.特定地；特殊地；明确地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
96
virgin
|
|
| n.处女，未婚女子；adj.未经使用的；未经开发的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
97
hysterical
|
|
| adj.情绪异常激动的，歇斯底里般的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
98
attested
|
|
| adj.经检验证明无病的，经检验证明无菌的v.证明( attest的过去式和过去分词 )；证实；声称…属实；使宣誓 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
99
census
|
|
| n.(官方的)人口调查，人口普查 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
100
hearth
|
|
| n.壁炉炉床，壁炉地面 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
101
fabled
|
|
| adj.寓言中的，虚构的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
102
betoken
|
|
| v.预示 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
103
decided
|
|
| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
104
specimen
|
|
| n.样本，标本 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
105
frankly
|
|
| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
106
inaccurate
|
|
| adj.错误的，不正确的，不准确的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
107
secondly
|
|
| adv.第二，其次 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
108
terminology
|
|
| n.术语；专有名词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
109
purely
|
|
| adv.纯粹地，完全地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
110
blotting
|
|
| 吸墨水纸 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
111
whitewashed
|
|
| 粉饰，美化，掩饰( whitewash的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
112
casually
|
|
| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
113
disappearance
|
|
| n.消失，消散，失踪 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
114
remarkable
|
|
| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
115
surmised
|
|
| v.臆测，推断( surmise的过去式和过去分词 )；揣测；猜想 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
116
adversely
|
|
| ad.有害地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
117
recording
|
|
| n.录音，记录 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
118
gallant
|
|
| adj.英勇的，豪侠的；(向女人)献殷勤的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
119
cumulative
|
|
| adj.累积的，渐增的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
120
well-being
|
|
| n.安康，安乐，幸福 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
121
distinguished
|
|
| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
122
folly
|
|
| n.愚笨，愚蠢，蠢事，蠢行，傻话 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
123
wont
|
|
| adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
124
intentionally
|
|
| ad.故意地，有意地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
125
catastrophe
|
|
| n.大灾难，大祸 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
126
surmount
|
|
| vt.克服；置于…顶上 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
127
hues
|
|
| 色彩( hue的名词复数 )； 色调； 信仰； 观点 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
128
withered
|
|
| adj. 枯萎的，干瘪的，（人身体的部分器官）因病萎缩的或未发育良好的 动词wither的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
129
breach
|
|
| n.违反，不履行；破裂；vt.冲破，攻破 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
130
utterly
|
|
| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
131
tolled
|
|
| 鸣钟（toll的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
132
postulate
|
|
| n.假定，基本条件；vt.要求，假定 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
133
controversy
|
|
| n.争论，辩论，争吵 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
134
relegated
|
|
| v.使降级( relegate的过去式和过去分词 )；使降职；转移；把…归类 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |