Inauguration of a Spiritist Center in BordeauxDespite certain resistance, Spiritist centers multiply daily. It is a duty and a pleasure to present to our many readers the inaugural speech given in one of those by its founder Mr. Condat on March 20th, 1862.
The way in which the serious question of Spiritism is presented demonstrates how much it is understood with respect to its objective and true social reach. We are pleased to say that such a feeling is now general for curiosity is replaced by the search for instruction and betterment. That is what we verified in our visits with several towns.
We saw them dedicated to instructive communications, and the mediums who received them appreciating their value. It is a characteristic fact in the history of establishment of Spiritism. We do not know the referred group but we can assess its tendencies based on the inaugural speech. The speaker would not have used such a language before a lighthearted and superficial audience just gathered for distraction. Serious meetings are the ones that give a serious idea of Spiritism and that is one it is never too much to incentivize their multiplication.
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“Ladies and gentlemen,
I would like to thank you for accepting my invitation. Now please allow me to address you with some words about the reason for our gathering. Given my lack of presentation skills. I hope you will still find the conviction of a man profoundly dedicated to the progress of humanity. Frequently the fearless traveler willing to reach the mountain summit finds the narrow path obstructed by a rock; on other occasions during the ages when humanity tries to approach God an obstacle is found: the rock is materialism. Humanity stations for some time, perhaps for centuries, but obeying the invincible power that acts in proportion to the resistance, it wins the battle against the obstacle and humanity. As humanity is always required to move forward, it reestablishes the march with greater inspiration. Hence, ladies and gentlemen, let us not be surprised by the announcement of one of those great ideas that better illustrates the celestial nature of the human beings; when one of those prodigious facts takes place, coming to confuse restrictive calculations and limited observations of the materialistic science.
Let us not be amazed and above all let us not be discouraged by the resistances that oppose anything that serves to demonstrate that humans are not just formed by a little bit of clay whose elements return to earth after death. Instead, let us attest and attest joyfully, we the followers of Spiritism, the children of the nineteenth century, a century that was the most comprehensive manifestation of skepticism and its discouraging consequences; let us attest that humanity advances!
Behold the ongoing progress of Spiritism in this great, beautiful and intelligent town. Look around and see the doubt-giving place to the clarity of this new science.
Let us count, ladies and gentlemen, and let us sincerely confess how many among us still, even yesterday, bore a smile of disbelief in our lips, and today we are on our way, the hearts resolved not to back down. It is understandable since we follow and are dragged by the flow.
What is this doctrine then ladies and gentlemen? Where will it take us?
Awake human courage, support humanity in those weak moments, fortify humanity against the vicissitudes of life, cheer up people’s faith and demonstrate the immortality of the soul not only philosophically but also through the facts, that is the doctrine and where it takes us!
Which other doctrine can produce better moral and intellectual results? Will it be the denial of a future life that would be offered as a preferable alternative in the interest of humanity and towards a moral and intellectual perfection of every one individually?
Taking by principle the following words that summarize materialism, what can be produced other than the void? – Everything is over when the grave is open.
I have a painful feeling, a kind of shame for having established a parallel between these two extremes. The hope of finding a better world, our loved ones whose souls opened their wings, the invincible horror that we feel and even the atheist feels when thinking that it will all be annihilated with the last breath of the material part of our being, all that would be enough to keep away any idea of comparison.
Nonetheless, ladies and gentlemen, if all the reassurance contained in Spiritism were only a matter of belief; if it were just a purely speculative system, an ingenious work of fiction, as objected by the apostles of materialism, saying that the objective is to submit certain weak intelligences to some rules arbitrarily called virtues and by doing so keeping them away from the seductive appetite of matter, a compensation that on a pitiful day the author of this fatal order of things, who gives everything to some and suffering to the majority just as a distraction.
Wouldn’t those ingenious combinations, ladies and gentlemen, established as a consequence of an unfounded principle and as a sole result of imagination, wouldn’t they be another torment added to the fatality that the strong and rational intelligences cannot avoid?
Demonstration, no doubt, is something remarkable. It tests, before anything else, human reason and soul, the abstraction of matter. But until now its only starting point has been Descartes saying: ‘I think hence I exist.’
Today Spiritism came to give a huge push to the principle of immortality of the soul, based on tangible and irrefutable facts.
All the above explains why and how we gathered here. However, ladies and gentlemen, allow me to describe an impression that I have always had, a constantly renewed desire every time I found a society whose objective was the moral betterment of human race. I wish I had taken part in the first group, the first communications from soul to the soul of the founders; I wish I had presided over the development of the germ of the idea that, like the grain that turns into a giant, later produced abundant fruits.
Well, ladies and gentlemen! Today that I can gladly propose the formation of a new Spiritist group my idea has plentiful support and I beg you to join me and keep in your minds and hearts this day March 20th.
Now, ladies and gentlemen, it is time to put hands on and I might be late. Without transition to fix the waste of time much dedicated to a relief I will touch the objective of our meeting, asking you to be forewarned against an objection that will naturally occur to you as it did to me about the indispensable need of mediums in the formation of a Spiritist group. That is an apparent but not a true difficulty. In the beginning the absence of mediums in our sessions will not make them sterile, believe me. Here is an idea that I would like to submit to your advice:
The first part of each session would be dedicated to the reading of The Spirits’ Book and The Mediums’ Book. The second part would be dedicated to the formation of mediums among us and believe me, ladies and gentlemen, if we follow the advices given by our venerable Mr. Allan Kardec in these books the mediumistic faculty will soon develop in most of us. Our works will then receive their greatest and kind reward because God, the creator of all things, the infallible judge, will make no mistake with respect to the righteous use of that we intent to make of the precious mediumistic faculty. He will certainly give us the most beautiful reward, allowing us to have among us one medium at the same level as the several mediums that we are fortunate to have among us tonight.
Our dear brothers Gourgues and Sabo that I have the honor of introducing to you, wanted to give our inaugural session the highest degree of importance by attending it. We beg them to give us the hope of visiting us with the frequency that is possible. Their presence will strengthen our faith and stimulate those among us that could feel discouraged before any initial disappointments in their first mediumistic attempts.
In particular, ladies and gentlemen, let us not take the wrong path. Let us be clear about the precise nature of our endeavor and its objective. It would be a regrettable mistake by anyone who wanted to take part in our organization just in the hopes of finding here futile distractions and misaligned with the good moral preached by the good Spirits.
‘The essential aim of Spiritism’, said our honorable chief, ‘is the betterment of people. In Spiritism one can only look for what can help the moral and intellectual progress. Let us not forget that the belief in Spiritism is only beneficial to the person that may say: Today I am better than yesterday’.
Let us not forget that our planet is a purgatory where we atone in our current existence the faults carried out in previous ones. This demonstrates, ladies and gentlemen, that none of us may be considered perfect since we will reincarnate whilst there are faults to be atoned. Hence, our presence on Earth attests our imperfection.
Spiritism placed the landmarks of the route leading to God. Let us move on keeping our eyes on them. The line delineated by the good Spirits, geometricians of God, is sided by cliffs and thorns. Let us not fear the bruises. What are the ulcers compared to the eternal happiness that shall welcome the traveler at the end of the trip.
Such an objective, ladies and gentlemen, has been the object of my meditations for a long time. Looking back into my past and recognizing the thorn bush that hurt me, the obstacle that made me stumble, I could not but do what every person must do at least once in their life time: the balance of joyful moments and disappointments, the good moments of courage and those of discouragement. With a tranquil mind and a free soul, I said to myself: Human existence is just a dream, but a horrible dream that begins when the soul or incarnate spirit of the child is illuminated by the first sparks of intelligence to terminate at the moment of death. Death! This disgraceful word to so many people in reality is just the awakening from that bad dream, the compassionate benefactor that frees us from the unbearable nightmare that followed us every step of the way since birth.
I speak in general but not in absolute terms. The life of a righteous person has a different character. The great deeds, the great and useful things illuminate their dreams. For such a person the transition from life to death is not painful. Nothing that could compromise the future spiritual life is left behind, a future life that is the reward for the good deeds.
To the voluntary blind ones who had their eyes closed to good, who denied the existence of God, who refused to contemplate God’s divine works as well as the proofs and manifestations of His goodness, His justice and His power, to those I say that the awakening will be terrible, full of bitter regrets, particularly for having neglected the healthy advices of their Spiritist brothers. The moral suffer that they will endure will last until a true repentance takes place and God will have pity on them through the concession of a new incarnation.
Many people still see the works of the devil in the Spiritist communications. Their number, however, diminishes on a daily basis. Such a fortunate reduction is due to the curiosity of visiting Spiritist groups and reading The Spirits’ Book for among the curious there are people who become convinced particularly those who read the book.
Make no mistake, ladies and gentlemen, you will not make many followers by just bringing them to our sessions. I have a strong conviction that a person completely strange to Spiritism will not be convinced by what they may see in our activities. Such a person will, on the contrary, tend to laugh at the phenomena instead of taking them seriously.
As for myself, ladies and gentlemen, I believe I have done much more for Spiritism by leading someone to read The Spirits’ Book than taking that person to one of our sessions. When I am sure that the book was read and that it gave good results, something that cannot be different, then I am pleased to take that person to a Spiritist group. I am positive that at that moment the person will understand everything that is happening and the one who would possibly laugh will experience opposite feelings. I do not mean to say that the person will cry.
The best way to finish this is with a citation from The Spirits’ Book. This will convince the ones who do not believe in the truthful foundation of the Spiritist beliefs more than with my words.
‘Those who say that the Spiritist beliefs threaten to invade the world are for that very reason attesting its power for an idea that completely lacks logic will not become universal. If then Spiritism is established everywhere, if it recruits particularly in the enlightened echelons of society, as everybody acknowledges, the reason is its true foundation. The efforts of the detractors will be vain against such tendency. A proof of that is that the ridicule that they try to impinge on Spiritism
far from stopping it seems to give it a new breath. Such a result totally justifies what the Spirits have told us many times: - Do not worry about the opposition. Everything that will be done against you will revert in your favor and your greatest adversaries will unwillingly serve your cause. The will of humans will not prevail against God’s will.”
Condat
