“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(The 22nd envelope test was held this evening. The test object was a ball-point pen drawing of a dog; my four-year-old nephew made it while my brother Bill’s family and Jane and I visited my parents last Sunday. I thought David’s drawing good for one his age, and added notes of my own. I intended to file it for the future, but today decided it would make a good test subject. Jane had not seen it. The drawing is on paper the weight of this page. A drawing on the back doesn’t apply here. I sealed it in the usual double envelopes, between two pieces of Bristol.

Our tests must be considered in the light of action, for this is what they are. They involve a more immediate and basic action than physical mobility, and therefore we are concerned with manipulations that are not physical. The associations, personal associations on Ruburt’s part, when they are directly connected to test objects in our envelope tests, represent to some degree a step forward on his part.

We are not speaking of my part now; for in such cases the connections are becoming specific, you see, and the preliminary connection has been made. The personal associations on his part that do not apply to the test object, do represent the fact that his own abilities have not fully developed.

Within a fairly decent amount of time, Ruburt and I will be able to work hand in hand, so that our own separate perceptions will build up together, to a more or less precise picture of the object involved. But upon many occasions his personal associations now are connected with the object; so he does not fight me, but we work together.

A stopwatch, though I do not know to what this refers. An upright composition. A group, but I pick up busts rather than full figures, and a round object. People about a round object, such as a table.

(See the tracing of the test object on page 131. During last Sunday there was a family gathering at my parents’ home in nearby Sayre, PA. There were twelve people in all: My parents, Jane and I, my brother Loren, his wife and son, and my brother Bill and his wife, and their two daughters and one son. Bill’s son is named David, he is four years old, and it is he who drew the test object, with a black ball-point pen on white paper.

(As Seth explains on page 134 of this session, some of the test data tonight represents preliminary connections with the test object, just as in the last envelope test with the drawing made by Roy Fox. Thus Jane’s personal associations are now often connected with the test object, and she is working with Seth and not against him.

(Jane said that Seth’s count of 1, 2, 3 was his way—or Jane’s?—of leading up to the number 4 that I wrote on the drawing, referring to David’s age. “A room” is too general. Also “Round shapes”; although there are round shapes on the drawing. “The number 12” can apply easily enough. Not only is the month of the test the twelfth month, but there were twelve people present in Sayre the day the test object was drawn. And again, the test object was drawn on December 12th, and so dated by me.

(“A stopwatch” does not ring a bell with us. We think David’s drawing of the dog can be called an “upright composition.” The next statement, about “A group... busts rather than full figures... people about a round object, such as a table,” is quite interesting, and can apply twice, as the number twelve applied four times. My parents’ dining room table is round, and of course we ate Sunday dinner at this table. My parents also have a round mirror-topped coffee table in the living room. It is a low table; often a group of the children would be playing games on the table, and to do this they had to sit on the floor. Thus only their torsos projected above the tabletop, and were reflected in the mirror.

(“Light tissue paper” may be nebulous. Jane and I gave the children their Christmas presents Sunday, and rather than wait for Christmas they opened the gifts then. They were wrapped in regular Christmas paper; if this is called tissue It can be a connection. The test object was drawn in 1965 of course, not 1963. The thought here is that calligraphically the numerals 3 and 5 are quite similar.

(Finally, “Something missing, and someone who could not come,” is also interesting. As soon as the test was over, and I believe before she knew what the test object was, Jane told me that she believed “Something” and “someone” referred to the same thing. Only one member of the family was missing at the gathering Sunday, and this was my brother Loren’s daughter Linda, who was at work in Scranton, PA. It was too far away for her to make the trip up to Sayre, and back, in one day.

(Jane also said that Seth was going to say something about lettering on the test object, but she did not give voice to it. I had made notes on it.