How to thought-read

According to a detailed book from 1893

“A pleasant hour or so can be profitably filled up on a long winter’s evening with experiments in mind reading…”

In 1893, James Coates, Ph.D., F.A.S., had his book published, How To Thought-Read: A Manual Of Instruction In The Strange And Mystic In Daily Life, Psychic Phenomena, Including Hypnotic, Mesmeric, And Psychic States, Mind And Muscle Reading, Thought Transference, Psychometry, Clairvoyance, And Phenomenal Spiritualism.

It’s typical Victorian fascination with strange phenomena, but it goes into great detail about specific experiments carried out, which makes this a particularly fun example.

But it’s chapter six, “Thought-Reading Experiments” that explains both the details of experiments conducted, and an explanation for readers for how they can attempt to “read minds.”

The experiments

“Sometimes it has been found, when two or more persons think of the same object, as in the “willing game,” the impression becomes more vivid, and the sensitive finds, or describes, the article, or thing, more easily.”

Coates describes one experiment performed by Professor Lodge of University College in Liverpool. The “sensitives” are the test subjects, or people with the presumed telepathy:

“[The experimenter projects] ...two distinct images at the same time to a sensitive. He requested two friends to look at a paper that he had given to each. On one paper a square was drawn, and on the other an oblique cross. Neither person knew what the other was looking at, and after they had looked intently at these diagrams for a short time, the sensitive, who was in a normal condition, but blindfold, said:—“I see two figures—first I see one, and then, below that, another. I do not know which I am to draw. I cannot see either plainly.” Having been requested to draw what she saw, she drew a square, with an oblique cross inside of it. On being questioned, she replied that she did not know why she placed the cross in the square.”

Mr. Guthrie’s experiments

In another experiment, a man was shown a simple drawing, and then sitting across from him blindfolded and behind the drawing pad, was a woman, the test subject. The man was to stare at the drawing for a bit of time, and then the woman would try to draw the shape the man had been staring at, but that she purportedly had not seen.

Below are reproductions of the purported results printed in the book. What makes these intriguing is the level of accuracy varies so much. Some look like nearly exact copies, others look conceptually similar, but different in design:

How to thought-read

The book describes the ways to “cultivate” the abilities of the mind reader and the “projection” tactics the “agent” can practice to make the thought reading easier for the other person. In this book, the mind readers are called “sensitives” and it’s implied they are people who for some reason or another have a “gift.”

The author walks us through the instructions:

“To cultivate mind-reading in a sensitive, the operator should first cultivate in himself the habit of projecting mental pictures, and think of things as seen by the eye, rather than as described by words. This is best done by calling to mind a landscape or domestic scene, by conceiving and mentally building up the same, and, by degrees, getting each feature or detail well stamped in his mind.”

Pretty straightforward. Next, he says that this imagining should be done in a particular way, that is full of details, while not being too complex:

“It is well in the beginning of these experiments to make the scene as simple, and yet as natural and as complete in detail, as possible. For instance, let the operator think of such a picture as this:—A bright little landscape, having a well-defined cottage on the left, just on the margin of a small lake; boat with two figures in the foreground; rising bank upon the right; and a little higher up a defined windmill...”

And then to add an emotional element, and get even more vivid:

“...even allowing himself to get into ecstacies over the scene—peopling the cottage and the mill, and introducing imaginary conversation between the individual dwellers therein, and so on.”

It’s at this point that the thought reader should begin trying to describe the scene being imagined by the other person, and see how accurate they are.

If you’re interested in reading more from this book, is freely available here.

Thanks for continuing to read Vetus Mysteria. Feel free to share or add a comment. I’d love to “hear your thoughts,” so to speak :)