True, it is a narrow breach; but it is the
first that has been opened in that part of the hitherto
uncrannied wall which is not turned towards mankind. What will
issue through it? No one can foretell what we may hope.
37
What astonishes us most is that this revelation has been so long
delayed. How are we to explain that man has lived to this day
with his domestic animals never suspecting that they harboured
mediumistic or subliminal faculties as extraordinary as those
which he vaguely felt himself to possess. One would have in this
connection to study the mysterious practices of ancient India and
of Egypt; the numerous and persistent legends of animals talking,
guiding their masters and foretelling the future; and, nearer to
ourselves, in history proper, all that science of augury and
soothsaying which derived its omens from the flight of birds, the
inspection of entrails, the appetite or attitude of the sacred or
prophetic animals, among which horses were often numbered. We
here find one of those innumerous instances of a lost or
anticipated power which make us suspect that mankind has
forestalled or forgotten all that we believe ourselves to be
discovering. Remember that there is almost always some distorted,
misapprehended or dimly--seen truth at the bottom of the most
eccentric and wildest creeds, superstitions and legends.
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