It’s the opinion of most of his critics that, like Nikola Tesla, the late Wilhelm Reich suffered a mental deterioration during the latter part of his life, and this seems both more likely and kinder than the other negative position that he forsook truth to become a successful charlatan. Regardless, there is little question that, unless one entirely rejects all of psychoanalytic theory, and psychoanalytic philosophy, Reich began with a brilliant mind. His early work may well rank second only to the master’s, Freud, with whom he had a severe and permanent argument in the early Thirties.
However, it’s not ideas, per se, with which we’re concerned in this chapter, but inventions. And his invention was the “orgone box.” Actually, to give it the dignity accorded it by its creator, it’s called the “Orgone Energy Accumulator.” This compartment consists of “plyed” sheet iron and wood, constructed to resemble a standing coffin, with door, or a phone booth. Of course, this was the simplest form of accumulator; more complicated ones were devised composed of up to more than a dozen layers of metal “wool,” “rock,” wood, metal, and the like.
The theory of therapy behind these apartment compartments was that they collected “orgone energy,” which was the scientific basis for sexual vitality. Having absorbed this condensation of sexuality in his accumulator, the “patient” proceeded to deposit himself in the box for a while and derive the benefits of the “life force.” As propounded by Reich, this was the cure-all, the panacea for every ill of man—and woman, because it would lead to complete and successful orgasms; he held that the achievement of total orgasms would dissipate all neuroticism, and, in general, restore the average unhealthy, or unhappy, person to the height of well-being.
Unfortunately, since his death, although orthodox scientists tend to view most of Reich’s later theories—particularly the orgone accumulator—as nonsense, not all do. And it’s difficult for the layman to know if he really went off the track, and if he went off, when; and having determined when, how far.
I should also mention that the same once eminent Dr. Reich subsequently added another machine to his catalog—this was a gun-like “rainmaker.” It never achieved the fame of the accumulator, but several were distributed around the East Coast, and success-claims were made for them. Recently, they seemed to have passed out of interest, but the popularity of the “orgone box,” while diminished, still brings its message to the public. But more on Reich later.
Another box which has been rather widely acclaimed was created by Thomas G. Hieronymous, and promoted by editor John Campbell Jr. It’s commonly referred to as the “Hieronymous machine,” but often classified as being of the “psionics” type. According to Campbell, “psionics” is a new science which combines electronics and psychic phenomena, but when the original device was constructed the inventor wasn’t informed of this new area of investigation. Hieronymous asserts that his machine, patented in 1949, analyzes the “eloptic” (a combination of electric and optic) radiation in minerals. This, of course, is a previously undiscovered type of emanation, but one which is supposed to be very important.
In appearance, the instrument may be about the size and shape of a shoe box, and contain some wires, resistors, and so on. A selection of unknown mineral is placed on the specimen plate, and by moving the calibrated dial the composition of the mineral is established. At least, that’s what Hieronymous claims.
Campbell has commented rather caustically on the original device, holding that his improved and modernized version is the one that really works—at least for him. One of such late-edition psionic machines represents an excursion to the farthest outposts of “science.” With this instrument, the electrical insides may be removed and replaced with a simple schematic of the original “guts,” and it works perfectly. A specimen is placed on the specimen area, the dial is adjusted, and the free hand is placed upon a plastic plate. When the plastic plate gets “sticky,” you have it made.
Oddly enough, Campbell has admitted on occasions that his model doesn’t work too well for people of either analytical or mystical turns of mind. He also refreshingly reveals that he intuitively feels that the device operates beyond all known dimensions, but that the inter-relationship of various things have something to do with its function—providing, of course, that you believe that it does function. Amazing to tell, there are hundreds of persons who claim at least a fragmentary knowledge of some of the sciences, who not only accept, but vocally support, this ridiculous curiosity.
It’s quite possible that the following report may not really belong in the same category as the foregoing as, I understand, there are some very reputable scientific persons who support the contention that it’s based on fact. Yet, I must confess that, although I have no answers for a couple of the points I’ll mention, I can’t accept this one either. The purported science is titled “Bio Rhythm.” Fathered by a Dr. William Fliess, the theory of bio rhythmics is based upon the conviction that our life is strongly influenced, if not controlled, by the cyclic fluctuations of our cells. The supposition is that there are three separate orders of cells, and, therefore, three distinct cycles affecting us. In each set, it’s the ebb and flow, the building up and dissipation of our cells which determines our physical, emotional and intellectual tempers.
The first of these cycles reflects the physical welfare, strength and endurance characteristics; and it’s designated, for no understandable reason, as the “male substance.” Why the “physical” is considered masculine in nature is a mystery, since most modern biologists hold that the woman usually has a higher degree of physical endurance, lives longer, and in general gives the impression of being, if less strong, more “physical.”
The next aspect consideration in bio-rhythmics is the one governing sensibility, nerves, feeling, intuition, and creative ability, and is described as being “female.” The reason for this interpretation is even more mysterious than the former, since it’s generally understood that men don’t “bounce back” emotionally with quite the verve possessed by women; certainly, while they may not be as maudlin as women they’re just as feeling; and lastly, but indisputably, men are, excepting for motherhood, almost exclusively “creative.”
The third, and final, of the cycles is the one dominating the intellect, intelligence, memory, logic, reason, and ambition. This area is left un-sexed by the bio-rhythmers.
Each of the three cycles operates on a different schedule. The first, which is designated with red ink on their graphs, functions on a twenty-three day sequence. The second, indicated by blue, has a twenty-eight day pattern. The last projects itself over a period of thirty-three days. Each of these cycles is subdivided into a period of “unfolding” and a phase of “regeneration,” which are exactly half of the full time span.
Now, the machine that explains all of the strange and prophetic things is called a “Bio-Rhythm Computer.” There are large ones and small ones, but the popularly available models are of two types—identical, except for the metal employed in the casing. One is shelled in stainless steel, and one in gold plate. The former costs $35.00; the latter $45.00.
Visualize a disc two inches in diameter and slightly less than half an inch deep. This computer is set internally to your birth day and locked closed. Now, by looking at the back, which is a series of white dials marked in three languages, you can see the days of the year. Turning the dial, by means of a small ridge on the clear plastic cover, sets the computer to the date you wish to know about—either in the past, present, or future—but within the year. Then reversing the computer you find three “travelling” circles, one inside the other, which have been adjusted by the manipulation of the back. One hand is red and white; one, blue and white; and the last green and white. In order, as explained before, they represent the physical, the emotional, and the intellectual. A spin of the dial and you have all of the answers. At least, so the bio-rhythmics assure us.
I will admit that I paused to wonder when Mr. George Thorn-men, representing the device in the United States (it’s qui
te well known in Europe), told me on the night of November 11th, 1960, that Clark Gable would have a severe “double critical” day on the 16th of the month. This “double critical” kind of indication, he had told us, meant that the subject was in his “most vulnerable” condition. Just a day or so before his prognostication, Mr. Gable had had a heart attack, but the papers had reported that he was well on the road to recovery. Tragically, on the day noted, the “King of Hollywood” died.
By going back to a point about three weeks prior to his appearance, Mr. Thommen demonstrated another curious accuracy. He drew up a chart for Paris Flammonde, saying that he had had a “critical” day on a particular date. Upon hearing the date specified, we both recalled that Paris had had a fairly severe accident around that time. He had scalded his arm rather badly. We checked the calendar and found out that it was the very day designated.
Naturally, with my almost inescapable scepticism, I don’t buy bio-rhythm, but apparently many, many people do—and on the first hearing, too.
And there aren’t dozens more, not scores more, not hundreds more, not even thousands more,—there are probably tens of thousands more insane, impossible, improbable, unlikely, questionable, possible and, maybe, even probable inventions waiting for the people who believe easily. And buy even more easily than that.
CHAPTER 6—A BACKWARD LOOK AT BRIDEY MURPHY AND REINCARNATION
“I believe the future is only the past
again, entered through another gate.”—The Second Mrs. Tanqueray Sir Arthur Wing Pinero
NO CASE, in our time, made such an impact for and against reincarnation as the one filed “Bridey Murphy.” Beginning as just another offbeat book, one of hundreds in that year of 1956, it zoomed steadily to the top of the best seller lists and stayed there. Every magazine and newspaper ran articles on the book, its heroine, or the general subjects of hypnotism, reincarnation, pre-natal regression and anything else that could be tied in with the publicity-valuable Bridey theme. Radio and television programs soon evidenced the effect of the fad, as did comedians of every size, shape and delivery. It was a real wild brainchild, this “search for Bridey Murphy,” begun by Morey Bernstein and carried on by half the country.
I don’t doubt that many of you never actually read the book, although all of you must have heard the jokes and seen the strained cartoons. Others of you have probably forgotten the details. They went something like this.
Morey Bernstein, a very successful businessman from Colorado, who had been an amateur hypnotist for some time, began a series of “age regression” tests on a young housewife who is usually called “Ruth Simmons.” The first of these experiments took place late in 1952, and set Bernstein and “Ruth” off on an amazing adventure both in the psychic field (we’ve been assured) and in the realm of public attention.
Now the term “age regression” merely means that a subject is put into a deep hypnotic trance and told to recall, and then relive, previous periods of her life. Eventually, the regressionists claim, a person can be reduced to a state of infancy where she behaves as though she were only a few months old. In a few rare cases, the most famous of which is the Bridey Murphy affair, the position is taken that the subject can then be projected past the “birth moment” into a state called “pre-natal regression.” In this condition she is supposed to be reliving another life. Oddly enough, this “other life” is almost never one immediately preceding the present one, but rather an existence the subject went through a hundred or a thousand years ago. Very frequently, in fact in ninety percent of cases, even though in life the person is a clerk, or a plumber, or a house wife, when regressed to another time he, or she, turns out to be Moses, or a great Indian prince, or Prime Minister of England. However, in the Murphy report, this wasn’t the case.
On the first occasion, Bernstein put “Ruth Simmons” into deep trance and immediately began regressing her. Seven years old, then five, three, and one—at each level stopping to ask her general questions, and then retreating in time again. Having achieved this degree of recession, Bernstein then directed her to push even further into the darkness of her memory—back to other times, to “faraway lands.”
“Bridey Murphy” spoke, for the first time, at that moment. At least according to supporters of the story. “Miss Simmons” announced that she was four years old, living in County Cork (Ireland), and that her name was “Bridey.” Her parents were Kathleen and Duncan Murphy, and her brother was named after his father. Some years before, while she was almost an infant, another brother died; she had always been the only daughter in the family.
“Bridey” told Morey Bernstein that her address was “The Meadows,” that her father was a barrister and that she had bright red hair and was named after her grandmother. Later she spoke of trips taken by the family to “Antrim” by the sea shore and passing references are made to the “loughs,” “Carlingford,” “Foyle,” and “Munster.”
At fifteen the colleen of almost a century and a half ago was attending “Mrs. Strayne’s Day School” and less than a year later she had met a young man named Brian MacCarthy. The two young people apparently got involved pretty quickly and they were married when Bridey was seventeen and he was just under twenty. Brian’s father was also a barrister, while her new husband was attending Queens College in Belfast. It was to this town that they went to live.
In her unfamiliar surroundings, she made friends with “Mary Catherine and Kevin Moore,” attended “St. Theresa’s Catholic Church” (although she had been born and raised a Protestant she followed the ways of her husband), and read the Belfast News-Letter.
During the years that followed she became deeply impressed with the parish priest, Father John, and relied much on his counsel.
Speaking from her trance state at a point in her life when she was about forty-seven, she refers to “trouble” of a political nature. One gets the idea that she means unrest in public sentiment and an anti-English attitude in the southern Irish. Curiously there also seems to have been strong opposition to speaking the Gaelic language. At another point in her digression, Bridey speaks of Irish history and legend, referring to a great warrior named “Cuchulain.”
Having reached her sixty-sixth year without producing any heirs or heiresses, Bridey Murphy fell downstairs, broke several bones, and “sort of withered away”—that is to say, she died. Her husband Brian survived her.
One might think that here this remarkable story would end, but it doesn’t. Fortunately, Morey Bernstein pursued the mystery even further. He questioned Bridey intently about the period that followed. The after-life. Death.
As she replied to his queries, Bernstein described “Ruth Simmons’” voice, in the Irish girl’s brogue, as “pained” and “plaintive.” However, according to Bridey there was no pain. No grief. No emotional attachments, nor marriage, nor family, nor friends. No rules, laws, nor regulations existed, and no one ate, slept, got tired, or had sexual relations. One moved from one place to another (although all places were really one) by willing it. Certainly it’s easy to understand why Bridey evaluated the place, or state, as “no better” than the one on earth. And it’s obvious she had good reason not to like it, as she admitted.
Immediately following her demise, Bridey saw her body. For a while it remained in the house with Brian, although, at her request, no wake was held. Later it was “ditched,” that is, buried.
She hung around the house for a while in spirit form, but when Father John finally died she departed for Cork, and her childhood home. Here she saw her brother Duncan, whom she described as being “so old.” Actually, he was about seventy, according to the dates she had supplied. Of course, he was still alive, and so she decided to stay in his home. She tried to con tact him on many occasions, but he never became aware of her. Curiously, although she “met” Father John, after his death, she was never joined by either Brian, her husband, or her brother Duncan.
Bridey remained in this “spirit world” for a long time, although time seemed to mean nothi
ng, but she never succeeded in contacting or “speaking to” people on earth. She did try on numerous occasions, but without any success. Apparently, her failures were to be blamed upon living people who didn’t listen for spirit voices. She never remembered whether any of the other “spirits” were able to make contact. Eventually she was reborn in the United States in the Twenties.
Bridey Murphy is supposed to have lived from 1798 to 1864.
That, in a very much more expanded form, is the essence of the tapes of “Mrs. Ruth Simmons,” as recorded by Morey Bernstein. Tapes upon which she speaks, or is purported to speak, as the colleen Bridey Murphy. The hypnotist made these recorded sessions the hub of his extremely successful book, in which he suggested the probability that the material substantiated the claims of those who believed in reincarnation. Citing “Bridey’s” use of words like “brate” for wishing cup, “ditch” for bury, “lough” for river or lake, noting the names of places and people, and generally arguing that “Ruth Simmons” couldn’t have known of many of the things referred to by Bridey Murphy, he concludes with reincarnation.
He offers the opinions of several reputable scientists and medical men in favor of the rebirth idea, plus the convictions of several mystics such as Steiner and Cayce.
A newspaper editor became interested in the story and decided that an investigation should be made of the matter by an independent agency. The matter was turned over to an Irish legal firm and such people as they chose to assist them.
Long John Nebel Page 10
