The Development of Metaphysics

Two major influences shaped spiritualism. First was feminism. Women were silenced and subjugated. Suddenly, through mediumship, they could speak with authority—even to powerful men. A second was American Platonism. Newspapers like The Platonist published translations of Plato and Plotinus. The Platonist was even printed in St. Louis, then a cattle town. Abner Doubleday—often credited with inventing baseball—translated occult texts and served as a Theosophical Society VP.

Figures like Victoria Woodhull emerged—abused, exploited, but deeply intuitive. She escaped her father’s manipulation and built an independent life through mediumship, eventually becoming the first female stockbroker, the first woman to address Congress, and a major feminist voice advocating for birth control and female sexual agency.

Spiritualism empowered women. They could address audiences, interpret societal ills, and offer mystical insights, often guided by a spiritual “control,” frequently represented by indigenous figures—sometimes stereotyped, but symbolically significant. This reflects how spiritualism became a safe space for oppressed groups, including minorities and women.

America’s occult roots are often denied, but they run deep. Virginia farmers used astrology. Early pilgrims explored alchemy. John Winthrop the Younger, a Rosicrucian and alchemist, brought crates of John Dee’s books to the colonies. When he died, Cotton Mather eulogized him as “Hermes Christi.”

Despite spiritualism’s growth, it faced internal collapse. One of the Fox Sisters admitted the knockings were faked by popping joints, though she later retracted the confession. Fraudulent mediums and criminal enterprises tainted the movement. Crime syndicates used obituaries to scam the grieving.

Sexuality also interwove with spiritualism. The infamous Witch of Lime Street, tested by Houdini, conducted seances in sheer robes, turning the events into erotic theater. Her spirit guide, “Baby Ruth,” used racist tropes and seductive antics. Houdini tried to expose her fraud, but results were mixed—under control, her phenomena diminished, but when unrestrained, she sometimes offered inexplicable insights.

This complexity—between sacred and profane, genius and fraud—defines spiritualism. It’s both empowering and controversial, inclusive and exploited, mystical and human. Like all great movements, its truth lies not in certainties, but in paradox.