The Book 4th Edition
“I think I can safely say I am the most tested medium
this country has ever produced... I have been boxed up,
tied up, sealed up, gagged, bound and held, and still the
voices have come to speak their message of life eternal.”
Leslie Flint
Direct voice mediums have a rare gift. Those who have 'died'
can be heard talking in their own voices in their presence;
they do not use the medium's voice box or vocal organs but
rather speak through a voice-box constructed of ectoplasm,
a substance taken from the medium’s body.
John Sloan and Arthur Findlay
One of the greatest direct voice mediums in the UK was
John Sloan. For many years he gave sittings without charge
to small groups of friends. One of his long-term sitters
was Arthur Findlay who, until he met Sloan, was an agnostic
stockbroker.
Findlay was convinced of the afterlife when through Sloan
he head the voice of his own deceased father and a family
friend who conveyed to him information not known by any
living person. He began a monumental study of psychic science
and produced the series of world renowned classics listed
in the Bibliography which I very highly recommend.
Leslie Flint
Another direct voice medium who was thoroughly tested in
recent times was Leslie Flint. In his presence while in
trance, with his mouth taped shut or full of water:
…literally thousands of different voices of discarnate
persons have been tape-recorded for posterity, speaking
in different dialects, in foreign languages unknown to
me and even in languages no longer spoken on this earth
(Flint 1971: 170).
In his autobiography Voices in the Dark Flint
describes how he was 'boxed up, tied up, sealed up, gagged,
bound and held, and still the voices have come to speak
of life eternal' (Flint 1971: 169).
The picture left shows how in a test sitting (this one
in 1972) he allowed scientists to gag him and bind him to
his chair without any effect on his mediumship.
Flint describes how he gave sittings extempore in hotel
rooms, in houses of strangers, in foreign countries, in
halls, theatres and churches.
In 1948 Flint submitted to a series of experiments conducted
by scientists from the Society for Psychical Research (see
picture below)
The Psychic News of 14th February 1948 reports in detail
one experiment where he conducted a séance with elastoplasts
pressed over his lips, bandages over the elastoplasts, and
his hands and legs tied to a chair.
The observers concluded that in spite of the above restrictions
the voices were soon speaking with their usual clarity,
even shouting. Some twelve persons in the room all heard
more than enough to convince the most obdurate skeptic that
the sealing of Mr. Flint's lips in no way prevented the
unseen speakers from saying anything they wished. At the
conclusion of the experiment they found the plaster and
the cords intact and undisturbed.
Lawyer identifies judge’s
voice
Dr Aubrey Rose, OBE, CBE, one of the most brilliant lawyers
in England, attended many sittings with Leslie Flint and
claims that through Flint he received “the most detailed
evidence of survival of the individual beyond this life.”
I
I n his recent autobiography The Rainbow Never Ends
(2005) he states that his investigation into the afterlife
began when he heard a tape recording of a voice re recognized
as that of deceased Judge, Lord Birkett, speaking through
Leslie Flint. Rose became a close friend of Leslie Flint
and went on to become a spiritual healer himself.
No cold reading
The information coming through a Flint sitting was not,
as some critics of mediums claim, vague suggestions which
could apply to anyone. Take for example the following exchange
between a young airman killed in World War II and his parents.
He had initially appeared at a séance attended by
Lord Dowding, giving his name as Peter William Handford
Kite, and asking that his parents be contacted at an address
he gave. The parents accepted an invitation to attend a
second séance and for close on forty minutes Peter
came through and in his own voice told them the following
which his parents confirmed to be true:
• of a joke about buying an Alsatian he made before
he died
• that his mother had put a photograph of himself
and photographs of his grave in Norway in her bag that morning
• that he liked the cherry tree in the memorial garden
they had planted for him
• that his bedroom had not been changed in the six
years since he died
• that he had not liked the wallpaper in his bedroom
• that his father was still driving his car although
it was a too small for him.
Flint describes his bitter disappointment with parapsychologists
in the following extract:
When first I began to allow myself to be tested I was
naive enough to believe that if the tests were successful
the scientists and researchers who had carried them out
under their own conditions would proclaim to all the world
the truth of life after death. All too soon I learned
the hard way that many of those who call themselves researchers
have immutable values of their own which preclude belief
in a meaning or purpose in man's existence or in the possibility
of a life after death. Their concern was to disprove the
reality of my voices and they would postulate any alternative
however far-fetched or absurd sooner than admit the implication
of their own successful experiment (Flint 1971: 169).
Flint rebuts the skeptics
Flint gives some examples of the ludicrous theories put
forward by these psychic researchers. One was that the voices
were not real but produced by a combination of hypnotic
power on his part coupled with mass auditory hallucinations
on the part of the sitters. This was disproved when the
voices were recorded (Flint 1971: 167).
Another theory was that Flint was a ventriloquist. This
was disproved when a throat microphone was attached to his
throat so that the slightest sound made through his larynx
would be magnified enormously while observers watched him
through an infrared telescope (Flint 1971: 168). When they
could come up with no further explanations one of the psychic
researchers put forward the idea that Flint could talk through
his stomach (Flint 1971: 163).
For those who, being unable to think of any other explanation,
allege fraud Flint had this to say:
It has been hinted that I might have a two-way voice
channel to another room where accomplices mimic the voices
of the departed or that I might conceal tape-recorders
which play prepared messages from the dead. There is no
end to the ingenious tricks which have been thought up
by those determined not to believe and who more often
than not have never even had a sitting with me…
I could also ask these stubborn cynics how these supposed
accomplices of mine however skilled their mimicry contrive
to produce the recognizable voice of a wife or a husband
or other dead relative of a sitter who is as likely as
not newly arrived from Australia, India or Timbuktu. I
do not however waste my precious energies bandying words
with skeptics who are as ill-informed as they are prejudiced
(Flint 1971: 170).
One expert who did investigate Leslie Flint and thoroughly
vouched for his authenticity was Professor William R. Bennett,
Professor of Electrical Engineering at Columbia University
in New York City.
My experience with Mr Flint is first hand; I have heard
the independent voices. Furthermore, modern investigation
techniques not available in earlier tests corroborate
previous conclusions by indicating that the voices are
not his. But to be thorough, one should consider the possibility
of live accomplices... This suggestion became untenable
for me during his visit to New York in September 1970,
when, in an impromptu séance in my apartment, the
same voices not only appeared but took part in conversations
with the guests (Flint 1971: 220).
Emily French and Edward C Randall
Another American direct voice medium who was thoroughly
investigated over many years was Mrs Emily French of Buffalo
New York. For fourteen years this frail elderly woman sat
in a séance every week at the home with a leading
lawyer from Buffalo, New York, Edward C Randall, his wife
and his close associates.
For five of those years they were joined by a prominent
judge, Dean Shuart of Rochester, “a learned jurist
and man of such impeccable character that he had been repeatedly
elected to the responsible office of Surrogate Judge”.
Every person who attended the circle was initially skeptical
and sure that the voices were fraudulent. And each person
was allowed to conduct however many exacting experiments
they needed to be convinced that they were genuine.
It is inconceivable that these people would waste their
time in this manner if they had any hint that the phenomena
were not 100% genuine. Mrs French was from a well-known
family, had a reputation in her close community for over
sixty years as a person of unimpeachable integrity and never
took a cent for her involvement.
Were they all deluded?
In 1905 Edward C Randall wrote to Isaac K. Funk D.D. LL.D,
a prominent psychic researcher and co-owner of the publishing
house Funk and Wagnalls New York/London asking him to arrange
for Mrs French to be scientifically investigated.
Dr Funk agreed on condition that Mrs French would come
to New York City and conduct sittings every day for two
weeks in the homes of people she did not know surrounded
by highly experienced and skeptical observers.
Then 72 years old, extremely feeble and frail with a dangerous
heart condition and almost totally deaf, Mrs French sat
with Dr Funk with barely any time to rest after a long journey
from Buffalo. She was surrounded by people who were skeptical
of her.
And night after night she produced magnificent direct voice
evidence of the afterlife.
The full favourable results of these detailed tests were
published by Dr Funk in his “Psychic Riddle”
and are reprinted in Chapter 11 of N. Riley Heagerty’s
highly recommended book The French Revelation (1995).
On the Internet
To hear some of Leslie Flint’s voices on the Internet
go to
The Leslie Flint Educational Trust http://www.leslieflint.com/
OR Paranormal Voices http://www.xs4all.nl/~wichm/death_ra.html
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