TC Lethbridge | The Sons of TC-Lethbridge | Tekh's Anthological Review

The Power of the Pendulum

Routledge & Kegan Paul, London, 1976

The Power of the Pendulum was compiled from Lethbridge’s notes, by his widow Mina and her cousins Bridget and Peter Accland. Tom had always seen himself and Mina as a team and therefore this work stands as a testament to their team spirit. The book commences with a foreword written by Colin Wilson, whose 1971 publication The Occult dealt with matters that would have been of great interest to Lethbridge. It was only after the publication of The Occult that Wilson became familiar with his work after a recommendation from his wife Joy. On realising that Lethbridge lived only a hundred miles or so from his home in Cornwall, Wilson sent him a signed copy of The Occult. Instead of receiving back a ‘thank you’, he received a sad letter back from Mina, informing him of her husband’s death.

The regret of having not met the great man fuelled Wilson’s next major project Mysteries. Published in 1978, part one of Mysteries is dedicated to Tom Lethbridge and his ideas. It is this publication that led many, like myself, to Lethbridge’s work. But for the initiate, Wilson’s introduction to The Power of the Pendulum is an excellent starting point, for he believed him to be a classic exponent, not just of parapsychology but also of English Literature.

The book commences with one of Lethbridge’s greatest dilemmas; was our existence on earth planned or just pure chance? It was in fact a reiteration of a question discussed at length in The Monkey’s Tail back in 1969. Was there a middle way, an explanation of existence that bridged religious thinking with that of science?

Lethbridge had been greatly influenced by Dunne’s Experiment with Time and he had come to accept, that on the next level, time and sequence were irrelevances and pertinent only for our earth level existence. Experiments with the pendulum had led him to discover other dimensions and that dreams also provided a glimpse into this ‘other’ world.

The Power of the Pendulum expands upon and summarises many of the ideas previously discussed in previous publications, including pendulum-rates, ESP and vibrations. His chapters on breeding and heredity, compliment the incomplete theories discussed in Part One of The Monkey’s Tail.

Mina had once remarked that she could never understand why people were always looking for security. Surely the whole point of life was to learn how to deal with insecurity. Lethbridge believed that no true artist could ever feel secure because he knew they could never paint the perfect picture, for whatever they see, they will always see flaws in it. It is for this reason that Moslems put deliberate errors in their weaving, for only Allah could make the perfect article. This notion appealed to Lethbridge, for it showed the humour in ancient literature, a humour far in advance of anything found in contemporary mediaeval Europe. Lethbridge was able to relate to philosophies like these, for it revealed a human facet of history.

The big unanswered question is, “where would these remarkable lines of enquiry have led if Lethbridge had survived another ten years or so?” Unfortunately, the trail runs cold, so we shall never know. It is over twenty years since Lethbridge’s last published work and we now find science delving into areas once thought to be out of bounds. The occult was perceived as something dark and evil and something to be avoided, but this ‘head in the sand’ approach led to the dogma that Lethbridge knew to be the curse of all learning. Cynics who sneered at him throughout the last decade of his life, could soon be made to eat humble pie.

Welbourn Tekh, Lincoln - 7th September 2003

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