MR. HOME’S AFFIDAVIT.
83
Prussia, and other royal personages, who have had ample oppor¬
tunities, which they have used, of investigating the phenomena
and inquiring into the character of the medium.
“I have resided,” continues Mr. Home, “in America, Eng¬
land, France, Italy, Germany, and Russia; and in every country
I have been received as a guest and friend by persons in the
highest position, who were quite competent to discover and
expose, as they ought to have done, any thing like contrivance
on my part to produce these phenomena. I do not seek, and
never have sought, the acquaintance of any of these exalted
personages. They have sought me; and I have thus had a cer¬
tain notoriety thrust upon me. I do not take money, and never
have taken it; although it has been repeatedly offered me for or
in respect of these phenomena. . . . Some of the phenomena in
question are noble and elevated, others appear to be grotesque
and undignified. For this I am not reponsible, any more than I
am for the many grotesque and undignified things which are
undoubtedly permitted to exist in the material world. I sol¬
emnly swear thafe^ I do not produce the phenomena aforesaid,
or, in any way whatever, aid in producing them.”
In the course of the cross-examination, Mr. Home said, “I
have seen spirits ; have conversed with them orally. They have
called to me in sounds audible to my ear; and I have talked to
them. Strange sounds are heard, like a rapping. It does not
indicate who the spirit is. We take it for granted, the same as
in the call of the telegraph wire, that there is an intelligence
there at the end of it. The language used by the spirits is
exceedingly beautiful and elevated.
“I have been bodily displaced in violation of the ordinary
rules of gravity. (I must protest against its being supposed
that I am the only person to whom this has occurred.) Chairs
and tables have been moved in the same way. I have found a
useful result of Spiritualism in convincing those who did not
believe in it of the immortality of the soul.”
Mr. Home is a person of very delicate constitution and ex¬
treme nervous sensibility. He is tall, slender, and fair-haired,