Andrew Jackson Davis (August 11, 1826 – January 13, 1910), American Spiritualist, was born at Blooming Grove, New York.

Early years

He had little education, though probably much more than he and his friends pretended. In 1843 he heard lectures in Poughkeepsie on animal magnetism, as the phenomena of hypnotism was then termed, and found that he had remarkable clairvoyant powers. In the following year he had, he said, spiritual messages telling him of his life work. He eventually became known as "the Poughkeepsie Seer".

Andrew Jackson Davis, about 1860

Work

For the next three years (1844–1847) he practised magnetic healing with much success; and in 1847 he published The Principles of Nature, Her Divine Revelations, and a Voice to Mankind, which in 1845 he had dictated while in a trance to his scribe, William Fishbough. He lectured with little success and returned to writing (or dictating ) books, publishing about 30 in all including:

• The Great Harmonia (1850–1861), an encyclopaedia in six volumes;
• The Philosophy of Special Providences (1850), which with its evident rehash of old arguments against special providences and miracles would seem to show that Davis' inspiration was literary;
• The Magic Staff: an Autobiography (1857), which was supplemented by Arabula: or the Divine Guest, Containing a New Collection of New Gospels (1867), the gospels being those according to St Confucius, St John (G.Whittier),St Gabriel (Derzhavin),St Octavius (Frothingham), St Gerrit (Smith), St Emma (Hardinge), St Ralph (W. Emerson), St Selden (J. Finney), St Theodore (Parker) and others;
• A Stellar Key to the Summer Land (1868);
• Tale of a Physician, or, the Seeds and Fruits of Crime (1869) Internet Archive; online edition (pdf format, 22 MB, entire book on one pdf);
• Views of Our Heavenly Home (1878), each with illustrative diagrams and The Fountain with Jets of New Meanings (1870) Illustrated published by McCrea & Miller.

Influences and legacy

Davis was much influenced by Swedenborg and by the Shakers, who reprinted his panegyric praising Ann Lee in the official work, Sketch of Shakers and Shakerism (1884).

Edgar Allan Poe was inspired by Davis, whose lectures on mesmerism he had attended, in the writing of "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar" (1845).

Davis in turn directly influenced self-proclaimed psychic Edgar Cayce (1877–1945) who adopted "trance diagnosis" and similar activities with few modifications from Davis's example. In fact, Davis's complete library is now housed within the Edgar Cayce Library.