§ Order for Second Reading read.
§ Mr. KELLYI beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
Very few words are needed from me, because what has to be said for this Bill was said when leave was given to introduce it. It is to remove an injustice that is now placed on a section of our population and that has come down to us from the 18th century, and it is to ask that those who are engaged in this work, which they term religious, shall, with the certificate of a committee approved by the Board of Trade, be able to give certificates to those who are engaged in it. I may say that one of the last pieces of work of the late Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, within seven days of his death, was an appeal to the Home Office to remedy this injustice.
§ Mr. CARTERI beg to second the Motion.
§ Lieut.-Colonel FREMANTLEI wish to move a direct negative to this proposal. I cannot conceive any Measure being passed in this House without some explanation from the Mover and Seconder as to its object. I am afraid that I am very ignorant about these things as I do not know what a spiritualist is, and I do not know why I or this House should be asked to relieve an indefinite set of people, spiritualists and mediums, from any burdens that the law has thought fit 572 to place upon them, without any explanation as to who those people are, what the burdens are, or in what way they should be relieved. It is a most fantastic proposal. I will only say that I am extremely ignorant in these matters. I have associated spiritualists and mediums with the fairy stories of Hans Andersen and the like. To my mind, at the present moment, they are an instance of the working of the mind in its detachment from the actualities of the universe, and I should be very sorry to spoil the connection hitherto existing between spiritualists and mediums on the one hand and the picture of witches sailing on their brooms in the sky, with the law on the other hand.
I cannot conceive that there are any serious prosecutions or other difficulties brought against these people by the law. On the other hand, there is no question that, generally, there is a very real and sincere apprehension in the minds of many people from the one actual contact that they may have had directly or indirectly with spiritualism. Spiritualism, in my undergraduate days at Oxford and, still more since then, I understand has been associated with a certain perversion of the uninformed mind of the young, and it has had most disastrous effects in many cases. Therefore, whether they were prosecuted under laws as to witchcraft or whatever else, nothing could be too much for these people, and we certainly would not think of remitting in any way the care that has been, presumably, carefully and definitely taken by the law for the protection of people from such misguidance.
§ Notice taken that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members not being present—
§ The House was adjourned at Twenty-nine Minutes after Two of the Clock until Monday next, 26th January.