A class of phenomena which has
given rise to many strange and horrible occurrences is that of vampirism, or
the preying upon the vitality of a person and abstracting from him nervous
force.
This kind of vampirism we meet
every day and are ourselves often subjected to it. We often meet people whose
very presence draws upon our strength and causes fatigue.
Sensitive, hysterical or
mediumistic persons always vampirize each other. To magnetize, hypnotize or
influence a person is a kind of obsession; to absorb the thought, magnetism or
influence of another is a kind of vampirism, and there are persons who can live
entirely upon the vitality of others.
I have already mentioned in a
previous paper on "Metathesis” in this Occult
Review (see link) the case of the
“wonder girl" at Radein, who for seven years lived without food or drink,
being nevertheless in good health. Instead of taking food she withdrew vitality
from the children that were brought to her for the purpose of receiving her blessing.
Some of these children sickened,
some wasted away and died. She did not do this consciously and willingly; for
she was a very pious person and, owing to her long fasting, even considered a
saint.
Many other persons of that kind
are known in history; accounts of such sometimes appear in the papers, but they
are soon hushed up, because our scientists cannot explain them; their science
being still only superficially acquainted with certain natural laws.
Still, popular opinion claims
that it is not healthy for young children to sleep with old people in their
beds, and medical science silently approves of this view.
In the Bible it is claimed that
when David grew old, a young girl was given to him to supply him with vitality,
and not very many years ago certain institutions, based upon this principle,
were existing in France. Young girls were supplied to old men or women as
bedfellows.
Usually the old person (after
having had to submit to certain precautionary measures) had to sleep between
two girls, a fair-haired and a dark one; for which privilege he had to pay a
certain sum. All of these girls soon lost vitality; some of them died; and
these establishments were finally closed by order of the police.
~ * ~
This type of vampirism is called "Vampirism among the living”; but
there is another kind of vampirism; namely, vampirism exercised by black magic,
or sorcery, and the vampirism of the grave.
Vampirism exercised by black magic
Of vampirism exercised by
witchcraft, the following may serve as an instance:
1) A miller hired a young man to
labor in his mill. The boy was healthy and strong; but after a while he began
to look pale and emaciated, and his strength grew less from day to day.
The miller asked him about his
ailment; but the boy pretended not to know. At last, however, he confessed to
him that every night near midnight something heavy, of the shape of a
large-sized egg, was pressing upon his breast, causing a distressing nightmare,
and rendering him unable to breathe or to move.
The miller thereupon watched at
the bedside of the boy, and made him promise to give him a certain sign when he
felt the presence of the vampire. The boy gave the sign, and the miller grasped
with both hands that egg-shaped thing, which, although being invisible, seemed
to the touch as if it were made of gelatin.
He carried it to the chimney and
threw it into the fire, and the boy, after that time, was troubled no more.
This story has been told to me by a relative who lived at the said mill when
this occurrence took place.
2) The following is an extract
from one of the numerous letters concerning such subjects which I often
receive:
« Vienna, April 23, 1907.
Dear Sir,
Permit me to ask your advice in
regard to the following mysterious case: A woman in my neighborhood, a widow,
is the mother of four children, of whom the two oldest ones are twins.
One of these, a beautiful girl,
is fearfully troubled by what seems to me a mysterious invisible something,
which almost every night presses upon her breast, drawing the vitality out of
her, the body of the child growing cold and rigid as a corpse.
The vampire, or whatever it may
be called, announces its coming by raps, moving of furniture and noises of
various kinds. I may say that a year ago, shortly before the trouble began, the
mother of the child had to dismiss a thieving servant woman, whereupon that
woman pronounced a curse, and said she would be revenged upon the child.
The child was taken to the
hospital, where they said it was “hysteria”; but they could do no good. While
she was at the hospital the noises at the residence continued, and the mother
received pinches, which caused swellings that remained visible for several
days. Thanking you in advance for your answer.
Yours sincerely,
E. S. »
Explication
There are two obstacles in the
way of understanding the nature of such cases:
Namely, the ignorance of the fact
that vitality is not a product of the cellular activity of the natural body;
but, on the contrary, the vitality of the body is a manifestation of the
activity of life, which is a power as universal as magnetism or electricity.
And furthermore, there is the
ignorance of the fact that this power can be attracted and employed,
unconsciously by the majority of people and consciously by those who are
acquainted with its laws.
I am often asked to advise some
remedy against the influence of black magic or vampirism, and I know of no
other than to restore the health of the body, and to render it thus impermeable
to such influences. In regard to counteracting such influences, magic powers
can be counteracted only by “magic,” i.e. spiritual power.
The best remedy, therefore, is
the power of the true faith; namely, confidence in one's own divine self, by
means of which a protective “astral" shell is formed around us, through
which no evil influence can penetrate. By this means we may protect ourselves
and even another, if we surround him with our aura.
This power, however, is at the
present time not in everybody’s possession; those who can drive out demons are
now as rarely to be found as at the time of Jesus of Nazareth; and it will
probably be some time before the healing by the power of the Holy Spirit will
become generally practiced by the medical fraternity as a whole.
The vampires of the grave
The vampires of the grave belong
to another order; but such cases seem to be at present of very rare occurrence
in civilized countries. They constitute a disgusting subject, which hardly
needs to be discussed in this paper.
Some such cases, where the astral
body of the dead kept the physical body in the grave in a state of preservation
by supplying it with vitality obtained by vampirizing the living, are reported
in Blavatsky's Isis Unveiled. I
myself have no experience in this line.
(The Occult Review, May 1908,
p.256-258, “Vampires”)
OBSERVATION
And I would add another type of vampirism, which is the energetic vampirism
that the entities of the astral plane exert on the living humans that are in
the physical plane and which probably is the most frequent. I detail more in
this other article (What are the astral
parasites?).
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