Such cases are by no of means uncommon, and clear up rapidly when the victim is separated from the vampire.
Whenever there is a record of a close and dominating bond between two people with the devitalisation of one of them, it is a good plan to recommend a temporary separation and observe the results.
Such cases as these, however, may more justly be described as parasitism than vampirism.
Such psychic parasitism is exceedingly common, and explains many psychological problems.
We will not pursue the subject in these pages, however, as it is outside the scope of our present enquiry, and is merely mentioned for illustrative purposes.
Vampirism, as generally understood, is a very different matter, and we shall do well to reserve the term for those cases wherein the attack is deliberate, applying the term parasitism to the cases wherein it is unconscious and involuntary.
In my opinion, true vampirism cannot take place unless there is power to project the etheric double.
All the records of vampirism that we have give an account of something much more tangible than a haunting.
In Western Europe the occurrence seems to be comparatively rare in modern times, but in Eastern Europe and in primitive countries it appears to be by no means uncommon, and innumerable well-authenticated cases occur in books of travel.
Commander Gould, in his exceedingly interesting book, Oddities, gives an account of vampirism among the Berberlangs of the Philippine Islands.
His account is based on a paper printed in the Journal of the Asiatic Society, Vol.
LXV, 1896.
These unpleasant people, according to Mr.
Skertchley, the author of the article which Commander Gould quotes, “are ghouls, and must eat human flesh occasionally or they would die.
.
.
.
When they feel a craving for a meal of human flesh they go away into the grass, and having carefully hidden their bodies, hold their breaths and fall into a trance.
Their astral bodies are then liberated.
.
.
They fly away, and entering a house, make their way into the body of one of the occupants and feed on his entrails.
“The Berberlangs may be heard coming, as they make a moaning noise, which is loud at a distance and dies away to a feeble moan as they approach.
When they are near you, the sound of their wings may be heard, and the flashing lights of their eyes can be seen dancing like fire-flies in the dark.” Mr.
Skertchley declares that he himself saw and heard a flight of Berberlangs pass by, and visiting next day the house he saw them enter, found the occupant dead without any sign of external violence.
Compare Mr.
Skertchley’s account of the Berberlangs lying in the long grass and throwing themselves into trance with Mr.
Muldoon’s account of “The Projection of the Astral Body,” with which every student of occultism ought to be familiar, for it is undoubtedly a classic of occult literature, being a practical account of occult experiences and detailed instructions how to go and do likewise.
But to return nearer home.
In the course of my experience of the byways of the human mind, which, from the nature of my work, has been, like Sam Weller’s knowledge of London, extensive and peculiar, I have only known one case of genuine vampirism, according to the sense in which I use the term, and this was not one of my own cases, though I knew the persons concerned, but was handled by my original teacher, whom I have already referred to in connection with the case of the good lady who chased me with a carving-knife.
I have made use of the facts of this case as a groundwork for one of the stories in The Secrets of Dr.
A historical or mythical chain of transmission for secret wisdom from master to disciple across time and cultures — the credential of the teaching, not merely its content. Distinct from oral_tradition (the spoken-not-written modality of transmission, which a lineage may or may not use) and hidden_sayings (the concealment-for-readiness of a teaching's meaning, independent of who transmitted it or in what unbroken chain).
The author references her 'original teacher' who handled a case of genuine vampirism, indicating a chain of transmission or mentorship in occult knowledge.
The doctrine and practice by which the etheric or astral double separates from the physical body, at will or involuntarily, to act, travel, or encounter other entities on a plane subtler than the physical — remaining tethered to the body by a silver cord, and capable of returning physical injury (bruises, exhaustion) sustained while thus projected. Distinct from linga_sharira (the static doctrine that a subtle form persists as a template) in describing its active operative use, and from shamanic_journey (a trance-journey framed within a shamanic ritual complex, undertaken to return with knowledge, songs, or a recovered soul) in being a Western-esoteric technical practice with its own physiology of cord-attachment and reciprocal wounding.
The author states that true vampirism requires the power to project the etheric double and cites Muldoon's work on astral body projection as a parallel.
The state of a person being controlled or inhabited by an external spirit or entity — the entity as subject acting through the person's body, rather than merely troubling them from without. Distinct from haunting (a discarnate soul or place-bound presence that interferes without necessarily entering and controlling a living body) and from spirit_conjuration (an operator deliberately commanding a spirit's appearance, the reverse relation — here the spirit is uninvited and in control, not summoned and subordinated).
The text describes Berberlangs entering the body of occupants to feed on entrails, which aligns with the concept of an entity inhabiting or controlling a living body.
The condition, often unconscious on the vampire's part, in which one person chronically drains the vital force of another in close relationship, leaving the victim persistently exhausted or ill while the vampire is sustained. Distinct from psychic_attack in mechanism (a parasitic, often unintentional energy-transfer within an ongoing relationship, rather than a deliberate willed assault) and in being a chronic condition rather than a discrete event.
The entire passage is dedicated to defining, distinguishing, and providing examples of psychic vampirism versus parasitism.
Form-mutability as a constitutional property of divine and preternatural beings — gods, heroes, spirits, and their human practitioners possessing inherent capacity to alter form across human, animal, plant, or elemental states. Loki and Odin's transformations in Norse, Math's pigs and Blodeuwedd's owl-shape and Pwyll's exchange with Arawn in the Mabinogion, the Greek Proteus, the Indian dasavatara, Vainamoinen's bird-flight in the Kalevala, Ovid's metamorphoses, the shamanic and witch's capacity for ritual form-change. Distinct from anthropomorphism (divine taking specific human form, single embodiment) in that anthropomorphism establishes a stable form whereas this concept establishes form's plurality and instability.
The Berberlangs are described as hiding their bodies and flying away with wings and flashing eyes, implying a transformation or astral form distinct from their physical state.