produce a cumulative quasi-statistical proof of telepathy."<ref>Mitchell, Thomas Walker. (1923). Phantasms of the Living. Nature 111: 211–212.</ref> It was enthusiastically praised by psychologist William James as a "most extraordinary work...exhibiting untiring zeal in collecting facts, and patience in seeking to make them accurate." Some scholars, however, criticised Phantasms of the Living for its lack of written testimony and the time elapsed between the occurrence and the report of it being made. Some of the reports were analysed by the German hallucination researcher Edmund Parish (1861–1916) who concluded they were evidence for a dream state of consciousness, not the paranormal. Charles Sanders Peirce wrote a long criticism of the book arguing that no scientific conclusion could be reached from anecdotes and stories of unanalyzed phenomena. Peirce argued that the stories were "worthless, partly because of the uncertainty and error of the numerical data, and partly because the authors have been astonishingly careless in the admission of cases ruled out by the conditions of the argumentation." A strong attack on the book was made by physiologist William Thierry Preyer. Mathematician Simon Newcomb noted that there were many possible natural explanations for the stories including "unconscious exaggeration; the faculty of remembering what is striking and forgetting what is not; illusions of sense, mistakes of memory; the impressions left by dreams; and, finally, deceit and trickery, whether intentional or unconscious." Because of all these possible factors that were not ruled out, he concluded "there is therefore no proof of telepathy in any of the wonders narrated in these volumes." Alexander Taylor Innes attacked the book due to the stories lacking evidential substantiation in nearly every case. According to Innes the alleged sightings of apparitions were unreliable as they rested upon the memory of the witnesses and no contemporary documents had been produced, even in cases where such documents were alleged to exist. Edmund Gurney replied to the criticism, but "could only point to three cases that met Innes's requirements, one of which later turned out to be fraud".Peirce, Charles Sanders. (2000). Writings of Charles S. Peirce: 1857–1866. Peirce Edition Project. p. 426. "Innes Attack proved the most devastating. In many of his cases Gurney had referred to corroborating evidence from contemporary documents, such as postmarked letters. Innes notes that there was no indication in the book that such letters were received and examined by Gurney and his assistants. In his reply to Innes, Gurney