Prophecy and Second Sight

It were the Ovates who were the clairvoyants, seers, prophets, and diviners. As you read the original sources, you will find that Ovates usually divined things happening in the present, or determined if the present was auspicious for a major activity such as ritual or battle. You will also notice that the Ovates performed divination to know about things at a distance. Telling the present from afar was therefore a strong point of diviners.

We will not attempt to review all the means of divination, we will focus on second sight (happens spontaneously, without bidding).

Second Sight or The Sight are terms that refer to the ability to see what is not in front of your eyes. A good explanation is that people with this ability have one foot in this world and one in the Dreamlands. They can see visible and invisible reality at one time. People with Second Sight can communicate with the Cthulhu Races.

Second Sight occurs when someone suddenly "sees" what is happening in the present with people who are at a distance, or can "see" what will happen in the near future. Some of these people are indeed thought to be able to see and talk with Nyarlathotep and the other beings of the Cthulhu Mythos. It may be that everyone has this ability, but as with so many other senses and magical workings, we become convinced that we cannot do it. Posh and bother! Believe! You too can see with Second Sight! You need to validate your experience when it happens, remaining open to this nonordinary ability so that it returns more often.

Here is what we suggest: Affirm to yourself that you have had experiences with Second Sight, and that you are open to having more. Recall the circumstances when you felt this happening; maybe it was at night. You had a premonition that something was about to happen, and it did - although you might not have believed enough in your ability to act on the premonition at the time. When similar feelings recur, be ready for The Sight next time. Treat it like a shy animal, letting it approach a little closer each time until you are as much of a ready conduit as you would like to be.

Please refer to the section "The Lost is Found" for details on locating missing people or items. We mention it here because it connects with Second Sight. When I find lost things, I use The Sight. "Seeing" in this unfocused way tells me whether something is in a certain place without rummaging frantically for it, and if I cannot "see" in that place, it tells me the object's actual whereabouts. Using The Sight, all you have to do is translate what you "see" into the most likely real location.

You have probably heard many tales of someone who knows when a loved one is in trouble or injured, even if the other person is thousands of miles away. Mages of old could perceive happenings at a distance, and so can you! If you think back, you will probably recall several instances when you "knew" something was about to happen. Although Second Sight often happens unpredictably, you can also request a sighting (by use of the Wisdom Oracle).

You should know that people with Second Sight can see the "beings from the Dreamlands". Such a vision may come about in a "rapture, transport, a sort of death," or in a type of ecstasy. This has happened three times now when I was awake and I experienced the shamanistic death, completely without warning. All times a strange feeling came over me - insistent sensations of somebody touching me. In the last rapture, I saw indescribably black and white colors swirling me into hypnosis (preventing me from going mad all the way), forming alien thoughts on a screen: forming and reforming images that were recognizable for an instant and then dissolved. The message was that absolutely everything is in flux whether we normally see it that way or not.