That which was said this afternoon about the Psychical Research Society is true.

It goes into everything unusual with a prejudice against it, rather than with a feeling that there is something to be learned; but on the other hand, one is bound to say that during the last ten or twelve years that Society has done more to familiarise the public with these facts of the hidden powers of man than our own has done in practice, though we have done much more in theory.

Now I am not in favor of much experiment preceding a study of theory; I believe that we need the theory in order to experiment wisely; but I also believe that having a true theory we should use it to guide our investigations, and thus to add to the knowledge of the world.

A part of our work, it seems to me, that lies before us in the coming time, is to help the world to walk wisely along those roads of research on which it has entered now.

You cannot prevent it going forward along them, knowledge is already too widely spread for that; but what you can do is to help men to walk wisely, and to avoid many a pitfall into which otherwise they would be very likely to fall.