The title The Imprisoned Splendour derives from the author’s conviction that there is a world of unfolding “spiritual” potentiality interpenetrating the world of matter, and that to understand ourselves, and our relationship to nature and the creatures of the physical world we inhabit, this interpenetration must be philosophically considered.

In this book, physicist, Raynor Johnson explores natural science, psychical research and mystical experience. The book is valuable for the serious and casual reader alike or anyone wishing to explore the mystical world of paranormal phenomena.

Telepathy, clairvoyance, clairaudience, telekinesis, poltergeist phenomena, phantoms of the living and the dead, trance phenomena, automatic writing, and the evidence for the “etheric body” are all discussed, Johnson the Scientist is clearly a mystic at heart, and this makes for fascinating reading; No stone is left unturned and theological dogma is cast aside. Pre-existence is discussed in depth. Johnson explains,

“If the general conception of evolution be regarded as applicable to the soul as well as to the physical world, it is not either improbable or unreasonable that the soul should adventure forth into the physical world in a newly-built body to acquire further experience of the kind which this world can provide. The fact that the soul has done so once was presumably for adequate and compelling reasons, and whatever these are, it is apparent that more might be gained by a series of such incarnations.”

The imprisoned Splendour is deeply impressive and now considered a classic in psychical research literature.

Raynor Carey Johnson was born on 5th April 1901 in Leeds, England. He earned a BA and MA at Oxford University and a PhD in physics at the University of London. He later taught physics at Queens University Belfast and the University of London where his specialist subject was spectroscopy; the study of the interaction between matter and radiated energy. He authored and co-authored a number of scientific papers, and published three scientific books, Spectra, Atomic Spectra, and Introduction to Molecular Spectra. In his field he was considered a leading research scientist of the time.

In 1934 Johnson, his wife Mary, and their children, moved to Australia where he had been invited to take up the post of Master of Queen’s College at the University of Melbourne. It was there that he became friends with the author Ambrose Pratt who introduced him to psychical research, mysticism, and the Society of Psychical Research.

After many years of studying eastern religion and the paranormal Johnson abandoned his Methodist beliefs and particularly the belief in the divinity of Jesus Christ. In Johnson’s mind Jesus was one of the greatest spiritual beings to grace this earth but not the source of all creation.

In the space of ten years, Johnson authored four books on mysticism, The Imprisoned Splendour, Nurslings of Immortality, Watcher on the Hills, and The Light and the Gate. 

In 1964 he retired from academia and spent the rest of his life devoted to mysticism and God, traveling to India to a bid to experience enlightenment rather that just the intellectual pursuit of it. In 1984, his final book, Light of All Life: Thoughts towards a philosophy of life was published. He died on 16th May 1987.