The short but very interesting debate in the House of
Lords last week on the Fraudulent Mediums Bill was reported in the Press as adequately as present conditions permit, which does not mean adequately in any normal -sense. The archaic measures, like the Witchcraft Act of 1835, which, on the ground that there were no such things, as mediums (I defy any pedant to say media), declared anyone claiming to be a medium to be a fraud, were generally and universally condemned. Lord Simon, citing Bunyan, Tom Paine and Bradlaugh as men who had in their day to suffer for unpopular opinions, quoted what he called the famous opinion of Voltaire; "I oppose and abominate your opinion, but I am ready to go to the stake for your right to express it and to preach it." I know Voltaire is credited with saying that or something like it, and I expect Lord Simon could locate it. But I have also seen it denied that he ever said it. The admirable Dictionary of Quotations emanating from the Press of the University of which Lord Simon is High Steward knows nothing of it
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