Nevertheless, as regards telepathy in the sense in which we understand and know it to-day, my mind is made up. I am persuaded that it is not in this direction that we must seek for an explanation of the phenomenon; or, if we are determined to find it there, the explanation becomes complicated with so many subsidiary mysteries that it is better to accept the prodigy as it stands, in its original obscurity and simplicity. When, for instance, I was copying out one of the grisly problems which I have mentioned, it is quite certain that my conscious intelligence could make neither head nor tail of it. I did not so much as know what it meant or whether the exponent 3. 4. 5 called for a multiplication, a division or some other mathematical operation which I did not even try to imagine; and, rack MY memory as I may, I cannot remember any moment in my life when I knew more about it than I do now. We should therefore have to admit that MY subliminal self is a born mathematician, quick, infallible and endowed with boundless learning. It is possible and I feel a certain pride at the thought. But the theory simply shifts the miracle by ****** it pass from the horse's soul to mine; and the miracle becomes no clearer by the transfer, which, for that matter, does not sound probable. I need hardly add that, a fortiori, Dr. Hamel's experiments and many others which I have not here the space to describe finally dispose of the theory.
Let us see how those who have interested themselves in these extraordinary manifestations have attempted to explain them.
As we go along, we will just shear through the feeble undergrowth of childish theories. I shall not, therefore, linger over the suggestions of cheating, of manifest signs addressed to the eye or ear, of electrical installations that are supposed to control the answers, nor other idle tales of an excessively clumsy character. To realize their inexcusable inanity we have but to spend a few minutes in the honest Elberfeld stable.
At the beginning of this essay, I mentioned the attack made by Herr Pfungst. Herr Pfungst, the reader will remember, claims to prove that all the horse's replies are determined by imperceptible and probably unconscious movement on the part of the person putting the questions. This interpretation, which falls to the ground, like all the others, in the face of the actual facts, would not deserve serious discussion, were it not that the Berlin psychologist's report created an immense sensation some years ago and has succeeded in intimidating the greater part of the official German scientific world to this day.
It is true that the report in question is a monument of useless pedantry, but we are none the less bound to admit that, such as it was, it annihilated poor Von Oaten, who, being no controversialist and not knowing how to proclaim the truth which was struggling for utterance, died in gloom and solitude.
To make an end of this cumbrous and puerile theory, is it necessary to emphasize again that experiments in which the animal does not see the questioner are as regularly successful as the others? Krall, if you ask him, will stand behind the horse, will speak from the end of the room, will leave the stable altogether; and the results are just the same. They are the same again when the tests are made in the dark or when the animal's head is covered with a close-fitting hood. They do not vary either in the case of Berto, who is stone-blind, or when any other person whatever sets the problem in Krall's absence. Will it be maintained that this outsider or that stranger is acquainted beforehand with the imperceptible signs that are to dictate the solution which he himself often does not know?
But what is the use of prolonging this fight against a cloud of smoke? None of it can bear examination; and it calls for a genuine effort of the will to set one's self seriously to refute such pitiful objections.
On the ground thus cleared and at the portal of this unlooked-for riddle, which comes to disturb our peace in a region which we thought to be finally explored and conquered, there are only two ways, if not of explaining, at least of contemplating the phenomenon: to admit purely and simply the almost human intelligence of the horse, or to have recourse to an as yet very vague and indefinite theory which, for lack of a better designation, we will call the mediumistic or subliminal theory and of which we will strive presently--and no doubt vainly--to dispel the grosser darkness. But, whatever interpretation we adopt, we are bound to recognize that it plunges us into a mystery which is equally profound and equally astonishing on either side, one directly related to the greatest mysteries that overwhelm us; and it is open to us to accept it with resignation or rejoicing, according as we prefer to live in a world wherein everything is within the reach of our intelligence or a world wherein everything is incomprehensible.
As for Krall, he does not doubt for an instant that his horses solve for themselves, without any assistance, without any outside influence, simply by their own mental powers, the most arduous problems set them. He is persuaded that they understand what is said to them and what they say, in short, that their brain and their will perform exactly the same functions as a human brain and will. It is certain that the facts seem to prove him right and that his opinion carries way great weight, for, after all, he knows his horses better than any one does; he has beheld the birth or rather the awakening of that dormant intelligence, even as a mother beholds the birth or the awakening of intelligence in her child; he has perceived its first gropings, known its first resistance and its first triumphs; he has watched it taking shape, breaking away and gradually rising to the point at which it stands to-day; in a word, he is the father and the principal and sole perpetual witness of the miracle.
