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Spiritist Review - Journal of Psychological Studies - 1865
Spiritist Review - Journal of Psychological Studies - 1865
January
To the subscribers of the Spiritist Review
The Spiritist Review starts its eighth year. It is already a considerable time considering a new idea at the same time it belies those that forecasted the premature death of Spiritism. Like in previous years, the time for the renewal of subscriptions is to the majority of the subscribers that come directly to us an opportunity to reiterate their recognition for the benefits of the Doctrine. Since we cannot respond to each one in particular we ask them to accept here our sincere thanks for their testimonies of sympathy that were kindly sent to us on this occasion. If the Doctrine does good, if it gives consolations to those in suffering, if it strengthen the weak and raises the abated courage, it is God that we must thank before the server and to the great Spirits that are the true initiators of the idea and supervisors of the movement. We nevertheless feel profoundly touched by the vows that are addressed to us so that we can preserve the necessary force to reach the end of the mission that is reserved to us. That is what we endeavor to deserve through our zeal and devotion that will not fail us so that we can pass the work on, as much advanced as possible, to the one that shall one day replace us and carry out what has been left unfinished with even more strength.
Spiritism in 1864 at a Glance
Has Spiritism grown or diminished? This question is in the interest of both its followers as well as its adversaries. The former affirm that it grew the latter say that it declines. Who is eluded? Neither ones nor the others because those that proclaim its decadence know their drive well and do demonstrated it permanently by the fear that they express and the importance that they attribute to Spiritism. Some, however, act in good faith for they feel confident after swinging a strong punch in the air, seriously saying: It is dead! Or better, it must be dead!
The Spiritists are based on more positive data, in facts that can be observed. From our stand point we can assess even better the general movement and we are happy to say that the Doctrine incessantly gains terrain in all layers of society and that 1864 was not less productive than previous years in that regard. In the absence of other indicators our Spiritist Review would already be a material proof of the state of opinion with respect to the new ideas. A special journal that reaches is 8th year of existence and that witnesses the number of subscribers grow in a remarkable proportion; that since its inception saw three times the edition of previous years sold out, that does not demonstrates the decadence of the Doctrine that it propagates or the indifference of the followers. Up until December we received new subscription for that very year and the number of subscribers on January 1st, 1865 was already 20% greater than that number at the same time in the previous year. That is a material fact, undoubtedly not concluding to strangers, but that is much more meaningful to us because we have not solicited subscription to no one and we do not impose them in any way or fashion. There isn’t a single one that was forced or that has been put as the price to any private favor. Besides, we flatter nobody to get their adhesion to our cause. We allow things to follow their natural course telling ourselves that if what we do and the way we see things are not good nothing will make it prevail. We know well that for not having flattered certain individuals we send them away from us and they moved to the side where there was flattering. Never mind! The ones that are more useful to the cause, in our view, are the serious ones and we do not see as serious those that are attracted by the mistletoe of self-love, as demonstrated by many. We do not want them and we are sorry for having them given more value to the praise of words than sincerity. We keep our conscience clear that over our whole life we have never acquired any debt with adulation or intrigue. That is the reason why we did not squirreled away a lot and it is not with Spiritism that we would have started. We happily praise our accomplishments and the services done but never in anticipation of the services that can be done or even promised to be done, first by principle and then because we only attribute a mediocre importance to the value of titles accepted by pride.
That is why we never claim them. When we stop approving we do not reproach and keep our silence unless the interest of our cause requires rupture. Hence, those that come to us come out of their free-will, voluntarily, attracted by an idea that is convenient to them and not after any kind of soliciting or due to our personal merit that is a secondary question considering that, irrespective of the merit, one could not attribute value to an idea that one would not have. That is the reason why we say that the testimonies that we receive are addressed to the idea and not to the person and it would be a silly presumption from our side to be flattered by that. From the point of view of the Doctrine the majority of those testimonies come to us from people that we have never seen, frequently from people that we have never written to or to whom we certainly were not the first ones to write. Therefore, ruling out the idea of recruiting or comradery, that is why we say that the situation of the Spiritist Review has a particular significance as an indicator of the progress of Spiritism and that is the only reason why we mentioned it.
Besides, the year saw the birth of a number of promoters of the idea: the Sauveur des Peuples, the Lumière, the Voix d’outre-tombe, in Bordeaux; the Avenir, in Paris; the Médium Évangélique, in Toulouse and in Brussels the Monde Musical, that although is not a special journal it treats Spiritism in a serious way. For sure if the founders of those publications had believed that the idea was declining they would not have ventured into similar endeavors.
In 1864 progress is still marked by an increase in the number of Spiritist groups and societies formed in several places where there was none in France or abroad. Every moment we hear about the formation of a new center. That number is in reality much higher than it seems given the amount of familiar and private gatherings that have no official character. It is against such gatherings that the attacks of a systematic opposition are powerless, even the inquisition type, like in Spain where there occur in more than thirty cities an in the house of persons of the highest social echelon.
Side by side to these material indications there is the part that is revealed through social relationships. It is rare today to meet people that do not know Spiritism at least by name and almost everywhere we find those that are sympathetic to the idea. The ones that do not believe speak with more reservation and everyone can attest how much the mockery has diminished. It generally gives place to a more rational discussion. With the exception of same jokes by the press and a few more or less heated sermons, the passionate and violent attacks are increasingly rarer. This takes place because by repealing the idea the detractors unwillingly feel its upper hand and begin to understand that it has conquered its place before public opinion. As a matter of fact most of them find followers among their own and their friends that they can mock in private but dare not do publically. Finally, we all could observe how many times the Spiritist ideas are reproduced in literature in a serious way and without the use of the word. Never before we had seen so many publications of that kind as we have lately. Be it true belief or fantasy from the part of their authors it is undoubtedly a sign of vulgarization of the idea because if it is exploited it is because they believe that it will find echo.
Progress, however, is far from being uniform. In certain places it is still kept in check by the prejudices or by a hidden force that frequently appears unexpectedly. In several places there are more followers than people think but that are not declared. The proof of that is in the number of books sold that goes much beyond the number of known Spiritists. Then it is just necessary that a person manifests her opinion to make progress move from latent to positive. That is what must have happened in Paris that for a long time was much behind any provincial city. Since two years ago, but in particular in the last year, Spiritism developed here with a surprising speed. The declared groups are in large number today and the private gatherings uncountable. It is not an exaggeration to estimate the number of followers from top to bottom at around a hundred thousand. In short, progress along the year that has just ended is incontestable when considering the whole and not isolated places. Although it has not been manifested through any brilliant sign or exceptional event, it is evident that the idea daily penetrates more and more the spirit of the masses and ever in a stronger way. Nevertheless we must not conclude that the period of struggle is over. No. Our adversaries do not give up so easily. The erect new batteries in silence and because of that we must remain watchful. We shall say a few words about it in a new article.
The Spiritists are based on more positive data, in facts that can be observed. From our stand point we can assess even better the general movement and we are happy to say that the Doctrine incessantly gains terrain in all layers of society and that 1864 was not less productive than previous years in that regard. In the absence of other indicators our Spiritist Review would already be a material proof of the state of opinion with respect to the new ideas. A special journal that reaches is 8th year of existence and that witnesses the number of subscribers grow in a remarkable proportion; that since its inception saw three times the edition of previous years sold out, that does not demonstrates the decadence of the Doctrine that it propagates or the indifference of the followers. Up until December we received new subscription for that very year and the number of subscribers on January 1st, 1865 was already 20% greater than that number at the same time in the previous year. That is a material fact, undoubtedly not concluding to strangers, but that is much more meaningful to us because we have not solicited subscription to no one and we do not impose them in any way or fashion. There isn’t a single one that was forced or that has been put as the price to any private favor. Besides, we flatter nobody to get their adhesion to our cause. We allow things to follow their natural course telling ourselves that if what we do and the way we see things are not good nothing will make it prevail. We know well that for not having flattered certain individuals we send them away from us and they moved to the side where there was flattering. Never mind! The ones that are more useful to the cause, in our view, are the serious ones and we do not see as serious those that are attracted by the mistletoe of self-love, as demonstrated by many. We do not want them and we are sorry for having them given more value to the praise of words than sincerity. We keep our conscience clear that over our whole life we have never acquired any debt with adulation or intrigue. That is the reason why we did not squirreled away a lot and it is not with Spiritism that we would have started. We happily praise our accomplishments and the services done but never in anticipation of the services that can be done or even promised to be done, first by principle and then because we only attribute a mediocre importance to the value of titles accepted by pride.
That is why we never claim them. When we stop approving we do not reproach and keep our silence unless the interest of our cause requires rupture. Hence, those that come to us come out of their free-will, voluntarily, attracted by an idea that is convenient to them and not after any kind of soliciting or due to our personal merit that is a secondary question considering that, irrespective of the merit, one could not attribute value to an idea that one would not have. That is the reason why we say that the testimonies that we receive are addressed to the idea and not to the person and it would be a silly presumption from our side to be flattered by that. From the point of view of the Doctrine the majority of those testimonies come to us from people that we have never seen, frequently from people that we have never written to or to whom we certainly were not the first ones to write. Therefore, ruling out the idea of recruiting or comradery, that is why we say that the situation of the Spiritist Review has a particular significance as an indicator of the progress of Spiritism and that is the only reason why we mentioned it.
Besides, the year saw the birth of a number of promoters of the idea: the Sauveur des Peuples, the Lumière, the Voix d’outre-tombe, in Bordeaux; the Avenir, in Paris; the Médium Évangélique, in Toulouse and in Brussels the Monde Musical, that although is not a special journal it treats Spiritism in a serious way. For sure if the founders of those publications had believed that the idea was declining they would not have ventured into similar endeavors.
In 1864 progress is still marked by an increase in the number of Spiritist groups and societies formed in several places where there was none in France or abroad. Every moment we hear about the formation of a new center. That number is in reality much higher than it seems given the amount of familiar and private gatherings that have no official character. It is against such gatherings that the attacks of a systematic opposition are powerless, even the inquisition type, like in Spain where there occur in more than thirty cities an in the house of persons of the highest social echelon.
Side by side to these material indications there is the part that is revealed through social relationships. It is rare today to meet people that do not know Spiritism at least by name and almost everywhere we find those that are sympathetic to the idea. The ones that do not believe speak with more reservation and everyone can attest how much the mockery has diminished. It generally gives place to a more rational discussion. With the exception of same jokes by the press and a few more or less heated sermons, the passionate and violent attacks are increasingly rarer. This takes place because by repealing the idea the detractors unwillingly feel its upper hand and begin to understand that it has conquered its place before public opinion. As a matter of fact most of them find followers among their own and their friends that they can mock in private but dare not do publically. Finally, we all could observe how many times the Spiritist ideas are reproduced in literature in a serious way and without the use of the word. Never before we had seen so many publications of that kind as we have lately. Be it true belief or fantasy from the part of their authors it is undoubtedly a sign of vulgarization of the idea because if it is exploited it is because they believe that it will find echo.
Progress, however, is far from being uniform. In certain places it is still kept in check by the prejudices or by a hidden force that frequently appears unexpectedly. In several places there are more followers than people think but that are not declared. The proof of that is in the number of books sold that goes much beyond the number of known Spiritists. Then it is just necessary that a person manifests her opinion to make progress move from latent to positive. That is what must have happened in Paris that for a long time was much behind any provincial city. Since two years ago, but in particular in the last year, Spiritism developed here with a surprising speed. The declared groups are in large number today and the private gatherings uncountable. It is not an exaggeration to estimate the number of followers from top to bottom at around a hundred thousand. In short, progress along the year that has just ended is incontestable when considering the whole and not isolated places. Although it has not been manifested through any brilliant sign or exceptional event, it is evident that the idea daily penetrates more and more the spirit of the masses and ever in a stronger way. Nevertheless we must not conclude that the period of struggle is over. No. Our adversaries do not give up so easily. The erect new batteries in silence and because of that we must remain watchful. We shall say a few words about it in a new article.
New Cure of an Obsessed Young Lady from Marmande
Mr. Dombre brings to our attention the following report of a new cure of the most remarkable kind obtained by the Spiritist circle of Marmande. Despite its extension we thought appropriate to have it published soon given its level of significance and also to help to connect the dots with respect to the events. We believe the readers will be thankful for that. We only suppressed some details that seem not to have great importance. The consequent teachings are multiple, serious and grave and cast a new light upon this issue of current interest and upon these phenomena that tend to multiply. Given the extension of the article we will give our considerations in a new issue so that we can make the necessary developments.
“Mr. Allan Kardec,
It is with a renovated strength and trust in God corroborated by the facts that give me enthusiasm but without surprising me that I bring you the report of a cure of an obsession, remarkable in several aspects. Ah too blind someone that does not see the touch of God in that. Every principle of the sublime Doctrine is confirmed there: the individuality of the soul, the intervention of the Spirits in the corporeal world, atonement, punishment and reincarnation are demonstrated in an impressive way through the facts with which I am going to entertain you. As I said, I am sorry to have to speak of myself and the role I played in the case as an instrument used by God to shine onto people’s eyes. Should I remain quiet about the events related to me? I don’t think so. You are in charge of controlling, studying and analyzing the facts and spreading light. The minor details must then be become known to you. By reading from the bottom of our hearts God knows that I was not driven by a useless satisfaction of self-love; in fact I am aware that whoever has the privilege of being called to do any good is soon reduced to nothing if only for an instant forgets the divine intervention becoming even unhappy if not punished.
Here are the report of the events:
Since the first days of 1864 in a certain region of the city nobody spoke of nothing else but the convulsive crises experienced by a thirteen year old young lady, Valentine Laurent. Those crises took place several times per day in such a violent way that even five men had difficulties keep her in bed, by holding her head, arms and legs. She had enough strength to shake them away and sometimes to free herself. Her hands would then grab everything. Shirts, dresses, blankets from the bed that were torn off instantaneously; her teeth also had an important role in her fits of rage, not surprisingly scaring the persons around her. Had she not been held back and she would have broken hear head against the wall and despite the efforts and precautions she still showed some cuts and bruises. She had no lack of medical support. She was seen by four doctors successively; she was given doses of ether, pills, all types of medication that she took without resistance; the leeches behind the ears and the vesicatory on her thighs were not spared either but unsuccessfully. During the crises she presented perfectly regular pulse; she had no memory of her suffering and convulsions but a lot of astonishment by seeing the house full of people and her bed surrounded of breathless men, some complaining about a torn shirt or jacket. Vicar X… from a parish located about two or three kilometers from Marmande enjoyed a newly started celebrity for having the gift of healing all kinds of diseases; he was consulted by the young lady’s father. Not knowing the actual nature of the problem the vicar inadvertently prescribed a little bit of a white powder for her to take with water and also offered to pray a mass for her. But not the powder nor the mass precluded the young Valentine from having fourteen crises on the following day, something that had never happened before. After so many unsuccessful efforts must have necessarily created superstitious ideas in the minds of the locals. In fact the gossip around was about the witchcraft and curses cast onto the girl.
During that period and in the silence of our own privacy we consulted with our spiritual guides about the nature of that disease and here is what they told us: - It is an obsession of the most serious whose characteristics will change multiple times. You must act calmly; observe, study and evoke Germaine.
In the first evocation that Spirit did not spare cursing and showed great reluctance in responding to our questions. None of us had entered the patient’s house yet and before our intervention we wanted the family to exhaust all means that they thought appropriate. It was only when the powerlessness of science and Church was attested that we induced the desperate father to attend our meeting in order to learn about the true cause of his daughter’s disease and the moral medicine to be administered. This first meeting took place on September 16th, 1864. Before the evocation of Germaine our guides gave us the following instruction: - Be very careful, observe carefully and with caution. You are going to deal with a mystifying Spirit that adds hypocritical skills to astuteness and a very evil character. Never stop to study and work for the moralization of that Spirit and to pray with that objective. Make the parents a recommendation to never show fear for the state of the girl in her presence. They must, on the contrary, to carry on with her normal activities and in particular they must be kind to her. Above all she must hear that there are no witches: this is very important. A young and flexible brain receives impressions with great easiness and her psychological state could suffer with that; she must not be left with persons susceptible to tell her absurd stories that give false ideas to children and sometimes pernicious ideas. The parents need to ensure that sincere prayer is the only medicine capable of freeing the girl. We told you, Spiritists, that the Spirit Germaine is skillful. He will always find ridiculous beliefs and have rumors circulating around the girl; he will try to retaliate you. Take advantage of the case: the obsession will present itself in new ways. Watch out; think that you must work with perseverance and intelligence observing the minimal details that will give away the maneuvers of the Spirit. Do not trust calmness. If the crises are the shocking effects of obsessions there are much more dangerous consequences. Mistrust the idiocy and infantilism of an obsessed that like in this case did not suffer physically. The more dissimulated the obsessions the more dangerous they are; sometimes they are purely of the moral kind. This one does not think properly, the other one loses memory about what was done and said. However one must not assess too hastily and attribute everything to obsession. I repeat: study, observe and work seriously; do not expect everything from us; we will help you since we work in harmony but do not rest believing that everything will be revealed to you. –
“Mr. Allan Kardec,
It is with a renovated strength and trust in God corroborated by the facts that give me enthusiasm but without surprising me that I bring you the report of a cure of an obsession, remarkable in several aspects. Ah too blind someone that does not see the touch of God in that. Every principle of the sublime Doctrine is confirmed there: the individuality of the soul, the intervention of the Spirits in the corporeal world, atonement, punishment and reincarnation are demonstrated in an impressive way through the facts with which I am going to entertain you. As I said, I am sorry to have to speak of myself and the role I played in the case as an instrument used by God to shine onto people’s eyes. Should I remain quiet about the events related to me? I don’t think so. You are in charge of controlling, studying and analyzing the facts and spreading light. The minor details must then be become known to you. By reading from the bottom of our hearts God knows that I was not driven by a useless satisfaction of self-love; in fact I am aware that whoever has the privilege of being called to do any good is soon reduced to nothing if only for an instant forgets the divine intervention becoming even unhappy if not punished.
Here are the report of the events:
Since the first days of 1864 in a certain region of the city nobody spoke of nothing else but the convulsive crises experienced by a thirteen year old young lady, Valentine Laurent. Those crises took place several times per day in such a violent way that even five men had difficulties keep her in bed, by holding her head, arms and legs. She had enough strength to shake them away and sometimes to free herself. Her hands would then grab everything. Shirts, dresses, blankets from the bed that were torn off instantaneously; her teeth also had an important role in her fits of rage, not surprisingly scaring the persons around her. Had she not been held back and she would have broken hear head against the wall and despite the efforts and precautions she still showed some cuts and bruises. She had no lack of medical support. She was seen by four doctors successively; she was given doses of ether, pills, all types of medication that she took without resistance; the leeches behind the ears and the vesicatory on her thighs were not spared either but unsuccessfully. During the crises she presented perfectly regular pulse; she had no memory of her suffering and convulsions but a lot of astonishment by seeing the house full of people and her bed surrounded of breathless men, some complaining about a torn shirt or jacket. Vicar X… from a parish located about two or three kilometers from Marmande enjoyed a newly started celebrity for having the gift of healing all kinds of diseases; he was consulted by the young lady’s father. Not knowing the actual nature of the problem the vicar inadvertently prescribed a little bit of a white powder for her to take with water and also offered to pray a mass for her. But not the powder nor the mass precluded the young Valentine from having fourteen crises on the following day, something that had never happened before. After so many unsuccessful efforts must have necessarily created superstitious ideas in the minds of the locals. In fact the gossip around was about the witchcraft and curses cast onto the girl.
During that period and in the silence of our own privacy we consulted with our spiritual guides about the nature of that disease and here is what they told us: - It is an obsession of the most serious whose characteristics will change multiple times. You must act calmly; observe, study and evoke Germaine.
In the first evocation that Spirit did not spare cursing and showed great reluctance in responding to our questions. None of us had entered the patient’s house yet and before our intervention we wanted the family to exhaust all means that they thought appropriate. It was only when the powerlessness of science and Church was attested that we induced the desperate father to attend our meeting in order to learn about the true cause of his daughter’s disease and the moral medicine to be administered. This first meeting took place on September 16th, 1864. Before the evocation of Germaine our guides gave us the following instruction: - Be very careful, observe carefully and with caution. You are going to deal with a mystifying Spirit that adds hypocritical skills to astuteness and a very evil character. Never stop to study and work for the moralization of that Spirit and to pray with that objective. Make the parents a recommendation to never show fear for the state of the girl in her presence. They must, on the contrary, to carry on with her normal activities and in particular they must be kind to her. Above all she must hear that there are no witches: this is very important. A young and flexible brain receives impressions with great easiness and her psychological state could suffer with that; she must not be left with persons susceptible to tell her absurd stories that give false ideas to children and sometimes pernicious ideas. The parents need to ensure that sincere prayer is the only medicine capable of freeing the girl. We told you, Spiritists, that the Spirit Germaine is skillful. He will always find ridiculous beliefs and have rumors circulating around the girl; he will try to retaliate you. Take advantage of the case: the obsession will present itself in new ways. Watch out; think that you must work with perseverance and intelligence observing the minimal details that will give away the maneuvers of the Spirit. Do not trust calmness. If the crises are the shocking effects of obsessions there are much more dangerous consequences. Mistrust the idiocy and infantilism of an obsessed that like in this case did not suffer physically. The more dissimulated the obsessions the more dangerous they are; sometimes they are purely of the moral kind. This one does not think properly, the other one loses memory about what was done and said. However one must not assess too hastily and attribute everything to obsession. I repeat: study, observe and work seriously; do not expect everything from us; we will help you since we work in harmony but do not rest believing that everything will be revealed to you. –
- Evocation of Germaine. A. – I am here.
- Do you have anything to say, following our previous conversation? A. – No, nothing gentlemen.
- Do you realize that you did shock us a lot? A. – You were bad to me too.
- We gave you advices. Have you thought about them? A. – Yes, a lot, I swear; I considered them carefully. I was crazy, I acknowledge that. It was delirious but I am calm here.
- Could you then tell us why you torture that girl? A. – It is useless to return to that subject. It would take long to tell you. I suppose this is not a court. Don’t ask me to take the place of the defendant to respond to your questions.
- Absolutely not; you are totally free; we ask out of our interest about you and the girl and what caprice or serious thing could lead you to such attacks. A. – Did you say caprice? Ah you wish it was just out of caprice because as you know caprice is mutable and finishes.
- Are you really calm? A. – As you can see.
- Apparently yes but are you disguising your feelings? A. – I am not here to trap you; I don’t need that.
- Would you state that to the Spirits around us? A. – Let us not put anybody between us. If there is anything to be dealt with be it between you and me. I don’t like the involvement of third parties.
- Well then! We don’t believe that you act bona fide and... A. – That is why you must accept this guarantee. In fact I will force you to believe me if you resist. I don’t lack proofs to convince you of my honesty.
- Have you heard that and understood the vows that we have just expressed? A. – Yes. I am even surprised by all of your promises. I do not deserve that. But I am a doubtful Spirit and dare not believe in them. Let us see if your prayers will give me the calmness that I have lacked for so long. It is true, I am alone, and I know nobody but the one that tries to shatter me.[2] We’ll see.
- Don’t you see good Spirits near you? A. – I want nothing but from you.
- Well! As an exchange for the good that we want to do to you can’t you stop harming and tormenting her? A. – And Am I the only cause of that harm? She is as much to blame as I am. Do you say torment? We fight, struggle; we are equally to blame. She was my accomplice. I don’t see why you would blame only me for the responsibility of the violent acts from which I am also a victim.
- Nonetheless the girl will not go after you and if you torment her it is because you want to. You have your own free-will. A. – Who told you so? You are wrong. We are connected by a fatality.
- Tell us everything then. A. – I cannot. One is not totally free here… I am frank.
- Let us pray for you Germaine. Bye for now!
- Now, Germaine, do you believe in our connection with you? A. – I have the right to doubt it for the pariah hardly believes in the fraternal kiss that is given in-passing. I am used to see disdain and neglect chasing me.
- God wants us to love one another. A. – I don’t know that. Here the one that is embraced by or persecuted by remorse is an enemy, a serpent that we stone away. Do you believe that this is not revolting to the damned one? By instinct he becomes the enemy of all; passion and hatred blind him. Unfortunate is the one that falls under the claws of that vulture.
- Germaine, we want to love you and extend our hands to you. A. – Why haven’t you spoken like that earlier on? Nevertheless there are generous hearts in the world where I live. Have I then scared you away? Why haven’t you ever told me: you are our sister and you can share our fate? I still have poison in my soul, particularly when I think about the past. Crime deserves punishment but this has been too much. I had the feeling that everything was falling on me, smashing me. On such occasions God is forgotten. We say blasphemies, denying God, revolting against him and his servers when we are left abandoned.
- The Spirit of Jules that you see around you was also a criminal, a suffering and unfortunate Spirit? A. – My position was worse. Think of everything that can lacerate the soul; think of how a poison burns the guts: I experienced everything, and the worst part to me was solitude, abandoned and damned. I inspired pity on nobody. Do you understand the anger that pops out of my heart? I suffered a lot! I could not die; suicide was not an option. And the most somber future always before me! I never saw a flash of light. Not a single voice said: wait. I then screamed anger and vengeance! Let the victims come! I will at least have companion in suffering. This is not the first time that the girl feels my hugs.[3]
- Thank God for having made you suffer so much. These sufferings are the atonement that purifies you. A. – Thank God! That is too much to ask! I suffered too much! Hell was preferable to what I went through. As I was told, those in hell suffer, cry and scream together; they can fight and debate among themselves, but I was alone. Oh that is horrible! I am ready to say blasphemies and jump onto my prey when I describe these things to you. Don’t you think that I am embarrassed when you interpose an angel between her and myself! I will fight anyone.
- Whatever the feelings that drive you we will only oppose them with calmness, prayer and love. A. – What is mostly pleasant to me is that you speak without pointing fingers, without repealing me and you want me to wait. Ah don’t expect me to give in so easily because I am afraid of disappointment. After making me so beautiful promises, so much that I cannot believe, will you abandon me? What would be of me, then? I am thinking, why such a late consolation? Why you? Would it be a hidden trap? Look, I don’t know what to believe and what to do. In reality all this seems strange, surprising to me!
- Hear me out, Germaine. I will explain what surprises you. Since some years now the immortality of the soul and its relationship with those that are still on Earth were unequivocally demonstrated. Spiritism – that is the name of the new science – gives its followers the duty of loving and helping their brothers. We are Spiritists and out of love towards two of our sisters in suffering, you and the girl victim of yours, we come to offer our hearts and the help of our prayers. Do you understand that now? A. – Not much. I have never seen that kind of reasoning. You then have to deal with those that live like you and the Spirits that suffer like me? It must be a very commendable work.
- If you can see our sincerity would you promise to consider showing good intentions to the girl? A. – Good in proportion to how much you had been good to me. I consider you all sincere. Your language leads me to believe it but I still doubt. If you eliminate this doubt I will be on your side. I will endeavor to do what I promise you. As the doubt fades away there will be less harm and the girl will heal. If you play games with it will be disgraceful! She will die by strangulation. The victim waits for her freedom or the attack that I have ready upon her head, and that depends on you. This is not a threat to intimidate you; it is a warning that hatred and rage would make me blind. You came in time. She would perhaps be dead by now. Since we cannot talk all the time tell your friends that live where I live to continue the conversation; and do not repeal me although my bad actions have not stopped because I have not done much for that. I cannot demand more than I promised you.
- Evocation of Germaine A. – I am here, much more calm. I want to be fair, I believe I owe you that. As you see I did what I said. Good relationships make good friends. Talk to me since you are a friendly voice. This is so strange, so new to me that you allow me to enjoy an entertainment in which hatred will be replaced by… love and I don’t know that. Tell me what to do to love and be loved, me the miserable Germaine, aged by disgrace, misfortune and crime! Do you baptize people? Here you have a novice.
- Germaine, we thank you… A. – Don’t mention that because I feel ashamed. I am the one that bow and say grace. I owe you a great reparation, poor child! The life of the Spirits is eternal. God put in front of me the means and the time to repair the devastations caused by the blindness of passions. Rest assured! Pray sometimes for the unfortunate Germaine, the regretful criminal asks for your forgiveness. Poor child, forget your pains and the one that caused them; only remember that she wants to be your friend now. She is no longer the same Germaine. The prayer said on my behalf made my soul cleaner; it extinguished my thirst for vengeance. The memory of my infame past will be my atonement. My prayer, together with yours, will mitigate the remorse that tortures me. Thank you all for calling me to the path of truth and good when I was lost in the depth of vice and impenitence. I believe you now. The doubt is over. I love you and thank you for having saved and cured me. I also thank you for this poor child to whom you returned health and life. I can say that I am happy because I am among good Spirits that console and strengthen me through their kind and persuasive moral. I am no longer alone; despite all darkness in my soul they admitted me in their blessed family. I am the sick one and they are my guardians. I don’t have the words to tell you everything that I feel. Tell me, all of you and particularly you, poor child, that you forgive me. I need to hear these words from your heart. Please give me that consolation.
When heard the name Germaine the father of the obsessed girl said in astonishment: Ah that is funny! And when he left he still repeated several times: That is funny! (This will be explained a bit later below). On the following day, the 17th, I went to the home o that family for the first time wishing to witness one attack by the Spirit. I was served well. Valentine was having a fit; I entered with locals that ran into the house.
I saw a splendid young lady in bed, strong for her age, sustained by eight or ten strong arms, as described above. Only her head was free then agitating and flogging in the air in all directions, her hair disarranged. The semi open mouth allowed the two rows of white teeth to be seen and particularly threatening. Her eyes seemed lost, the pupils meeting near the corner of the nose. A savage scream would add to that horrible picture that you can imagine. For a while I observed the power of jerk movements; I then inclined upon the body of the girl and placed my right hand on her forehead, the left on her chest. The movements stopped instantaneously, the convulsive behavior ceased, and her head calmly rested on the pillow. I then moved the right hand towards her mouth that gave rise to a beautiful smile. Her large pupils returned to their place the satanic appearance was replaced by the most gracious face. The girl then manifested her surprise for having so many people around her, saying that she was not sick. These were always her words after the crises. I elevated my soul to God and felt two tears of enthusiasm and recognition in her eyes. That had just happened on that morning of the 17th. I returned around 5pm when the crises habitually multiplied but they had happened before the typical hour and had already finished. At 7pm I returned to have dinner in place when they sent for me saying that the girl was experiencing a terrible crisis. I returned immediately. With one hand I then took both arms of the girl, near her wrists, and said to the men that were holding her: Let her go. I then placed the other hand on her chest and we saw her suddenly calming down. I then touched her face provoking a smile and her eyes went back to the normal state. It was the same as in the morning. I remained by her side for part of the night. Her sleep was agitated but she had no crisis. Her face had something of convulsive; I could see the white of her eyes; she seemed to be suffering mentally. She gesticulated, spoke distinctly and said things with an energetic and moved tone: Go! Go! What a villain… the child… the child… the rocks. A kind of ecstasy followed that agitation; she cried and returned in a plangent tone: Ah you suffer the pains of hell! You always want me to suffer… always… always! And then extending her arms in the air she would say: Well, take me, take me! Every time the father would say: Ah that is funny! And the mother added: There is a mystery in all this. From 1am to dawn the girl slept peacefully.
Those agitations, criticisms, ecstasies and cries renovated daily after the violent attacks of the Spirit and lasted much longer on the evenings of September 18th, 19th and 20th. I would be by the patient’s side on a daily basis and in a way I ended up installing myself at her house. While I was around nothing happened; as soon as I left a new crisis took place. I would return and calm her down as seen before. That lasted several days. It was certainly a remarkable phenomenon that the crises would suddenly stop by the imposition of hands. Three was rumors all around town and there was material for a serious study there; I nonetheless was sorry for not having met any of the four doctors that had treated and observed the girl.
During all that time I noticed sometimes an exaggerated happiness in the girl, sometimes something like silliness. Her parents thought that those manners were natural, justifying the predictions of our guides. On September 21st the girl’s parents join me in our session. At the beginning the guides said: Evoke Germaine; ask her to be by your side and tell her this: - Germaine, you are our sister; this young lady is also our sister and your sister. If some sort of dismal action connected you in the past and had the divine justice laying the hand on you both you may touch the Supreme Judge. You must appeal to his infinite mercy; ask for his forgiveness as we do in your favor; have the Lord touched by your fervent prayer and regret. It is useless to you to seek peace to your remorse and refuge in vengeance; and it is useless to seek justification by bulling her with your accusations. Therefore, listen to us. Forgive and you will be forgiven; do not try to deceive us; don’t believe that just the appearance of honesty may seduce us. Whatever the means you are employing we will have them identified and opposed by our strength and will power. May your heart, blinded by suffering and hate, open up to pity and forgiveness. We shall not stop praying to the Eternal and to the good Spirits, God’s faithful messengers, to spread consolation and benefit onto your heart. What we want, Germaine, is to free you from your sufferings. You will always be welcomed by us as a sister; you will be helped. Do not look at us as enemies for we want your happiness; do not be deaf to our words; listen to our advices and soon you will enjoy a peaceful conscience. Remorse will be sent far away and regret will have taken its place. The good Spirits will embrace you like a stray sheep that is found. The bad ones will follow your example. This family that lives with the turmoil that you create will speak highly of you and there will be recognition. This girl will also pray for you and if you are separated by hate you will one day unite by love. The one that seeks vengeance is always unhappy; there is no rest to the one that hates. The one that forgives is close to love. Happiness and tranquility replace suffering and uneasiness. Come, Germaine, join us through your prayers. You want you near us under the happy protection of our guides like Jules[1] and the other Spirits that like you were on the bad path. You are alone. Be the step daughter of this family that prays to the Eternal in favor of those that suffer and teaches everyone to love him to be happy. If you are adamant in remaining cruel to this girl you will prolong and aggravate your sufferings and hear the imprecations from the girl and those around her. Take the friendship offered by your brothers with an open heart; stop these tortures from which you leave kind of dead. Believe in our words; believe above all in the advices of the good Spirits that guide us and in particular in the advices given by the Little Cárita. Don’t remain deaf to this prayer. As a proof that you accept our offer give this girl a few days of peace and rest without disturbance. We will pray for you and shall not stop asking for the end of your suffering. -
We then called Germaine and read what had just been dictated to us.
When we finished the spiritual guides said: - For a few days get together in the greatest possible number. Have your thoughts mostly addressed to her. She will be touched by your honesty and zeal and the results we seek, we hope so, will come quickly thanks to that measure.
The 22nd passed uneventful. As customarily we gathered at night. Evocation of Germaine:
Observation: This last thought of the Spirit is the result of the super excitation in which she finds herself but it raises an important point. “Why they haven’t spoken to me like you do in the world where I live?” Because the ignorance about the future is momentarily part of the punishment of certain guilty persons; it is only after their hardening is overcome by tiredness that they are led to foresee a ray of hope as a relief to their penalties. They need to voluntarily turn their eyes to God. But the good Spirits do not abandon them. They strive to inspire good thoughts in them; watch for the minimal signs of success and as soon as they see the minor sign of regret they provoke instructions that will lead them to good through their enlightenment. Such instructions are given by the Spirits when time is right and can also be given by the incarnate ones so that they can see the solidarity that exists between the visible and the invisible worlds. In the present case it was useful to Germaine’s rehabilitation to have her granted forgiveness from the part of those that should complain about her, something that would simultaneously be their merit. That is the reason why the intervention of humans is frequently requested for the betterment and relief of the suffering Spirits, particularly in the case of obsessions. The intervention of the Spirits would certainly be enough but human charity with respect to their brothers in space is a means of advancement to them that has been reserved by God.
Observation: If we were asked why God allows bad Spirits to throw their rage against innocent people we would say that there is no undeserved suffering and that the one that is innocent today and suffers certainly has something to pay for. Those bad Spirits in such a case act as instruments of atonement. Their malevolence, besides, is a test of patience, resignation and charity.
Observation: In fact experience demonstrates that hard and bad words are an inadequate means of freeing oneself from the bad Spirits. That irritates them even further, leading to a more aggravated bloodthirsty.
We asked our guides to welcome Germaine. They responded:
I saw a splendid young lady in bed, strong for her age, sustained by eight or ten strong arms, as described above. Only her head was free then agitating and flogging in the air in all directions, her hair disarranged. The semi open mouth allowed the two rows of white teeth to be seen and particularly threatening. Her eyes seemed lost, the pupils meeting near the corner of the nose. A savage scream would add to that horrible picture that you can imagine. For a while I observed the power of jerk movements; I then inclined upon the body of the girl and placed my right hand on her forehead, the left on her chest. The movements stopped instantaneously, the convulsive behavior ceased, and her head calmly rested on the pillow. I then moved the right hand towards her mouth that gave rise to a beautiful smile. Her large pupils returned to their place the satanic appearance was replaced by the most gracious face. The girl then manifested her surprise for having so many people around her, saying that she was not sick. These were always her words after the crises. I elevated my soul to God and felt two tears of enthusiasm and recognition in her eyes. That had just happened on that morning of the 17th. I returned around 5pm when the crises habitually multiplied but they had happened before the typical hour and had already finished. At 7pm I returned to have dinner in place when they sent for me saying that the girl was experiencing a terrible crisis. I returned immediately. With one hand I then took both arms of the girl, near her wrists, and said to the men that were holding her: Let her go. I then placed the other hand on her chest and we saw her suddenly calming down. I then touched her face provoking a smile and her eyes went back to the normal state. It was the same as in the morning. I remained by her side for part of the night. Her sleep was agitated but she had no crisis. Her face had something of convulsive; I could see the white of her eyes; she seemed to be suffering mentally. She gesticulated, spoke distinctly and said things with an energetic and moved tone: Go! Go! What a villain… the child… the child… the rocks. A kind of ecstasy followed that agitation; she cried and returned in a plangent tone: Ah you suffer the pains of hell! You always want me to suffer… always… always! And then extending her arms in the air she would say: Well, take me, take me! Every time the father would say: Ah that is funny! And the mother added: There is a mystery in all this. From 1am to dawn the girl slept peacefully.
Those agitations, criticisms, ecstasies and cries renovated daily after the violent attacks of the Spirit and lasted much longer on the evenings of September 18th, 19th and 20th. I would be by the patient’s side on a daily basis and in a way I ended up installing myself at her house. While I was around nothing happened; as soon as I left a new crisis took place. I would return and calm her down as seen before. That lasted several days. It was certainly a remarkable phenomenon that the crises would suddenly stop by the imposition of hands. Three was rumors all around town and there was material for a serious study there; I nonetheless was sorry for not having met any of the four doctors that had treated and observed the girl.
During all that time I noticed sometimes an exaggerated happiness in the girl, sometimes something like silliness. Her parents thought that those manners were natural, justifying the predictions of our guides. On September 21st the girl’s parents join me in our session. At the beginning the guides said: Evoke Germaine; ask her to be by your side and tell her this: - Germaine, you are our sister; this young lady is also our sister and your sister. If some sort of dismal action connected you in the past and had the divine justice laying the hand on you both you may touch the Supreme Judge. You must appeal to his infinite mercy; ask for his forgiveness as we do in your favor; have the Lord touched by your fervent prayer and regret. It is useless to you to seek peace to your remorse and refuge in vengeance; and it is useless to seek justification by bulling her with your accusations. Therefore, listen to us. Forgive and you will be forgiven; do not try to deceive us; don’t believe that just the appearance of honesty may seduce us. Whatever the means you are employing we will have them identified and opposed by our strength and will power. May your heart, blinded by suffering and hate, open up to pity and forgiveness. We shall not stop praying to the Eternal and to the good Spirits, God’s faithful messengers, to spread consolation and benefit onto your heart. What we want, Germaine, is to free you from your sufferings. You will always be welcomed by us as a sister; you will be helped. Do not look at us as enemies for we want your happiness; do not be deaf to our words; listen to our advices and soon you will enjoy a peaceful conscience. Remorse will be sent far away and regret will have taken its place. The good Spirits will embrace you like a stray sheep that is found. The bad ones will follow your example. This family that lives with the turmoil that you create will speak highly of you and there will be recognition. This girl will also pray for you and if you are separated by hate you will one day unite by love. The one that seeks vengeance is always unhappy; there is no rest to the one that hates. The one that forgives is close to love. Happiness and tranquility replace suffering and uneasiness. Come, Germaine, join us through your prayers. You want you near us under the happy protection of our guides like Jules[1] and the other Spirits that like you were on the bad path. You are alone. Be the step daughter of this family that prays to the Eternal in favor of those that suffer and teaches everyone to love him to be happy. If you are adamant in remaining cruel to this girl you will prolong and aggravate your sufferings and hear the imprecations from the girl and those around her. Take the friendship offered by your brothers with an open heart; stop these tortures from which you leave kind of dead. Believe in our words; believe above all in the advices of the good Spirits that guide us and in particular in the advices given by the Little Cárita. Don’t remain deaf to this prayer. As a proof that you accept our offer give this girl a few days of peace and rest without disturbance. We will pray for you and shall not stop asking for the end of your suffering. -
We then called Germaine and read what had just been dictated to us.
When we finished the spiritual guides said: - For a few days get together in the greatest possible number. Have your thoughts mostly addressed to her. She will be touched by your honesty and zeal and the results we seek, we hope so, will come quickly thanks to that measure.
The 22nd passed uneventful. As customarily we gathered at night. Evocation of Germaine:
Observation: This last thought of the Spirit is the result of the super excitation in which she finds herself but it raises an important point. “Why they haven’t spoken to me like you do in the world where I live?” Because the ignorance about the future is momentarily part of the punishment of certain guilty persons; it is only after their hardening is overcome by tiredness that they are led to foresee a ray of hope as a relief to their penalties. They need to voluntarily turn their eyes to God. But the good Spirits do not abandon them. They strive to inspire good thoughts in them; watch for the minimal signs of success and as soon as they see the minor sign of regret they provoke instructions that will lead them to good through their enlightenment. Such instructions are given by the Spirits when time is right and can also be given by the incarnate ones so that they can see the solidarity that exists between the visible and the invisible worlds. In the present case it was useful to Germaine’s rehabilitation to have her granted forgiveness from the part of those that should complain about her, something that would simultaneously be their merit. That is the reason why the intervention of humans is frequently requested for the betterment and relief of the suffering Spirits, particularly in the case of obsessions. The intervention of the Spirits would certainly be enough but human charity with respect to their brothers in space is a means of advancement to them that has been reserved by God.
Observation: If we were asked why God allows bad Spirits to throw their rage against innocent people we would say that there is no undeserved suffering and that the one that is innocent today and suffers certainly has something to pay for. Those bad Spirits in such a case act as instruments of atonement. Their malevolence, besides, is a test of patience, resignation and charity.
Observation: In fact experience demonstrates that hard and bad words are an inadequate means of freeing oneself from the bad Spirits. That irritates them even further, leading to a more aggravated bloodthirsty.
We asked our guides to welcome Germaine. They responded:
- To begin with she is a beloved sister and even more for having suffered so much. Come, Germaine. If you never had your hand shaken by a friendly hand before come closer; we shall extend our hands to you. Our only concern is your happiness. You will always find brothers in us despite the bad action that you still feel capable of doing. We are sorry for that and will not condemn you. Join our family. Happiness smiles to us. There is not bitter tear among us. Happiness replaces pain and love replaces hatred. Sister, your hands!
- Start your work by the evocation of Germaine. She looks forward to that. You must demonstrate to her that you are especially dedicated to her. Avoid anything that may seem indifference or obliviousness to keep any doubt away from her. Understand that her attacks were just suspended. Be sensible. Be happy but without self-love and without pride and above all be heartful in your prayers. If she expresses the desire to keep talking for a long time do not bargain even if that takes the whole night.
- The baptism that you request Jeanne (Germaine) you have already received, I responded; it is in your regret, in your resolution to march on a new path.
- Yes, Germaine, I forgive you; even more, I love you!
- And we too, I immediately added, we all love you as a sister.
- I also begin to love. To whom I owe this transformation? To those that I did harm and that despite all the horror that I must have inspired in them had pity on me, calling me their sister and demonstrated that they were not deceiving me! Yes, you opened up to me a path to a happy future. I was miserable and abandoned and now I live among those that have a lot: I am not to feel sorry for. The good Spirits say that they will prepare me for the atonements that I will have to infallibly endure. It will no longer be to spread death around me but to love and deserve their benevolence and friendship. I would still have a lot to say but I do not want to be inconvenient. Let us pray. It seems that it will be good to me.
- Almighty, eternal and merciful God, hear me prayer. Forgive my blasphemies, my deviations. I did not know the path that leads to the kingdom of the righteous. My earthly brothers made me know it; my spiritual brothers lead me to that. May the infinite justice follow its course to the poor Germaine! She will now suffer but without complaints; not a single groan will leave her mouth. I acknowledge your greatness and benevolence of a Father towards your blessed servants that came to rescue me from the vice. May my prayer be taken to you and may the angels that serve and surround your throne one day welcome me among you as they did to these good Spirits. Today I understand that it is only virtue that may entail happiness. Your grace, oh God, to those that like me still suffer. Give the child that I tortured the sweetness and virtues that constitute happiness on Earth.
- I then asked Valentina’s father, are you well convinced that it is the Spirit of your grandmother?
- Oh Sir, he responded, I was already convinced before this conversation. The name Germaine and the words Valentina used in her crises left no doubt in my mind about it. I promptly told my wife. Even more when you talked to me about Spiritism and reincarnation I immediately thought that my mother was incarnate in Valentine.
The 23rd went by without a crisis, like the day before. The young lady followed her father to our session at night to hear Germaine to whom she was already showing a lot of interest.
Our guides then said:
Your guides
The 24th was as calm as the preceding day. We called Germaine at the session at night.
The young Valentine then said to her:
Germaine then continued:
Germaine
Help yourself and heavens will help you, you were told. The Spirits that guide you will not do the work that is imposed to you as a duty but if you do your part they will abbreviate as much as they can the assigned task under the immortal flag of charity. Go without discouragement and weakness. May your faith becomes stronger and one day you will perhaps ask yourself the origin of that strength. Work for the moralization of your incarnate brothers and the delayed Spirits. Do not be satisfied by preaching the consolations of Spiritism. Show its greatness and power through your actions. That is the best refutation that you can offer to the adversaries. Words fly but the actions strengthen and raise. May the happiness that now takes the family over together with the young doctrine be due to the care and charity of sincere followers! Be confident and humble about what happens to you without which the fruits that you deserve will be lost.
Your guides
Observation: As seen, the Spirits are not inactive or indifferent with respect to the suffering Spirits that must be brought to good. But when the intervention of humans may be useful they allow them the initiative and merit, but still supporting them with their advices and encouragement.
Starting on September 25th and following the advice of our guides I induced the young Valentina to sleep through hypnosis to completely eliminate the influence of the bad fluids that had involved her and strengthen her physical organization. Since her liberation she felt ill, some stomach discomfort, small nervous commotion, all inevitable consequence of the obsession.
Observation: What would have been the utility of the magnetic sleep if the cause was still there? First it was necessary to eliminate the cause before attacking the effect or at least simultaneously act upon both.
The girl was somewhat spoiled by the care and attention that she had received during the illness. She became a bit capricious and willful and hardly accepted to be put to sleep. One day she even refused and I left. As soon as I got home they sent for me saying that she was having a fit. Well, I said, it is Germaine’s punishment. I returned immediately and saw her agitating in bed. The crisis was not as violent as before but showed the same features. I calmed her down as from the other ones. A few hours later she had a second one that I detained in the same way.
We met at night and Germaine came uninvited; she said that she wanted to give the girl a lesson and warn her when she was not behaving properly and making the girl feel her presence. Besides, she gave her very good advices and made the parents feel the inconveniences of giving in to the caprices of children.
Following the cure and the conversion of the Spirit there was the revelations of the drama whose end result had been the violent obsession of Valentina. However interesting and moving may this part of the report be we suppressed the details for being up to a certain extent strange to our subject and because it is related to contemporary matters whose painful memories are still present and were witnessed by persons that are still alive. We summarized them for the conclusions at which we must arrive. For the same reasons we dissimulate the true names that would add nothing to the instruction that stems from this story.
From those revelations made in the intimacy, outside of the group, and through another medium, results that Germaine was Mr. Laurent’s grandmother, and he was the father of the obsessed Valentina. She had a daughter that had two children, one of which was Mr. Laurent. The other was murdered by the grandmother that threw him from a cliff at… She was sentenced to ten years in prison for that murder and she spent that time at C… jail. She gave the most detailed information about these facts with accuracy of names, places and dates so that there was no doubt about her identity. Those private details, only known by Mr. Laurent and his wife, were confirmed by them. In order to be better recognized by her grandson she called him by his nickname that was unknown to the medium and only spoke through a dialect that she used when alive.
One could not be mistaken. Germaine was really Mr. Laurent’s grandmother, the one that was condemned for infanticide. As for her daughter whose son had been killed she is now Laurent’s daughter, the young Valentina that she still come to torment through a terrible obsession. She explained the cause of her hatred. They had fought one another in Spirit and that struggle continued when one of them incarnate. One fact comes to confirm that assertion: the words pronounced by the young lady in her sleep. It is understandable that her parents kept her oblivious to what had happened in the family. These words: “The child! The child! The rocks!” were evidently the result of the memory that her Spirit kept in a state of detachment.
That is how we can explain the repeated phrases said by Laurent: That is funny. And by his wife: There is a mystery in this.
Starting on September 25th and following the advice of our guides I induced the young Valentina to sleep through hypnosis to completely eliminate the influence of the bad fluids that had involved her and strengthen her physical organization. Since her liberation she felt ill, some stomach discomfort, small nervous commotion, all inevitable consequence of the obsession.
Observation: What would have been the utility of the magnetic sleep if the cause was still there? First it was necessary to eliminate the cause before attacking the effect or at least simultaneously act upon both.
The girl was somewhat spoiled by the care and attention that she had received during the illness. She became a bit capricious and willful and hardly accepted to be put to sleep. One day she even refused and I left. As soon as I got home they sent for me saying that she was having a fit. Well, I said, it is Germaine’s punishment. I returned immediately and saw her agitating in bed. The crisis was not as violent as before but showed the same features. I calmed her down as from the other ones. A few hours later she had a second one that I detained in the same way.
We met at night and Germaine came uninvited; she said that she wanted to give the girl a lesson and warn her when she was not behaving properly and making the girl feel her presence. Besides, she gave her very good advices and made the parents feel the inconveniences of giving in to the caprices of children.
Following the cure and the conversion of the Spirit there was the revelations of the drama whose end result had been the violent obsession of Valentina. However interesting and moving may this part of the report be we suppressed the details for being up to a certain extent strange to our subject and because it is related to contemporary matters whose painful memories are still present and were witnessed by persons that are still alive. We summarized them for the conclusions at which we must arrive. For the same reasons we dissimulate the true names that would add nothing to the instruction that stems from this story.
From those revelations made in the intimacy, outside of the group, and through another medium, results that Germaine was Mr. Laurent’s grandmother, and he was the father of the obsessed Valentina. She had a daughter that had two children, one of which was Mr. Laurent. The other was murdered by the grandmother that threw him from a cliff at… She was sentenced to ten years in prison for that murder and she spent that time at C… jail. She gave the most detailed information about these facts with accuracy of names, places and dates so that there was no doubt about her identity. Those private details, only known by Mr. Laurent and his wife, were confirmed by them. In order to be better recognized by her grandson she called him by his nickname that was unknown to the medium and only spoke through a dialect that she used when alive.
One could not be mistaken. Germaine was really Mr. Laurent’s grandmother, the one that was condemned for infanticide. As for her daughter whose son had been killed she is now Laurent’s daughter, the young Valentina that she still come to torment through a terrible obsession. She explained the cause of her hatred. They had fought one another in Spirit and that struggle continued when one of them incarnate. One fact comes to confirm that assertion: the words pronounced by the young lady in her sleep. It is understandable that her parents kept her oblivious to what had happened in the family. These words: “The child! The child! The rocks!” were evidently the result of the memory that her Spirit kept in a state of detachment.
That is how we can explain the repeated phrases said by Laurent: That is funny. And by his wife: There is a mystery in this.
[1] Obsessing Spirit of the young Teresa B…, from Marmande (Spiritist Review, June 1864)
[2]The continuation of the report will explain this last words
[3] We learned from her parents that she had crises that they could not understand when she was six years old.
Evocation of an Incarnate Deaf-Mute
Mr. Rul, member of the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies sends us the following:
“In 1862 I knew a deaf-mute young man of twelve to thirteen years old. Wishing to make an observation I asked the protector Spirits if I it would be possible to evoke him. After having a positive answer I invited the young man to my room and made him sit on an armchair with a plate of grapes that he promptly devoured. As for myself I sat at a table, prayed and made the evocation as I customarily did. After a few moments my hand trembled and I wrote: I am here.
I looked at the boy and he was silent, eyes closed, calm and asleep with the plate on his knees. He was done with eating. I then addressed the following questions to him:
Q. – Where are you now? A. – In your bedroom, on your armchair.
Q. – Can you tell us why you were born deaf-mute? A. – An atonement of my past crimes.
Q. – Which crimes were that? A. – I was a parricide.
Q. – Can you tell us if your beloved mother had been your mother or your father in the existence that you mentioned, the object of our crime? I waited for the answer that did not come. My hand remained still. I looked at the boy again and he had just woken up and ate the grapes with appetite. I then asked the guides what had just happened; they responded: He gave you the teachings that you wanted and God did not allow him to give others.
I don’t know how the proponents of the exclusive communication of the devil would explain that fact. I came to my own conclusion that God sometimes allows us to evoke an incarnate Spirit and equally allows with respect to the discarnate when we do that with a spirit of charity.”
Observation: From our side we will make another observation about that. The proof of identity here results from the sleep provoked by the evocation and to the interruption of the writing at the moment of waking up. As for the silence that remained after the last question it demonstrates the utility of the veil that is cast upon the past. In fact suppose that the present mother of the boy had been his victim in another existence and that he wanted to repair his mistakes through the love that he dedicates to her. Wouldn’t the mother be strongly affected if she knew that her son had been her murderer? Wouldn’t her feelings be affected? He was allowed to reveal the cause of his disability as a matter of study and in order to give us another proof that the sufferings here have a previous cause when it is not in the present life and that everything is therefore established according to the justice. But the rest would have been useless and could have reached the mother’s ears and for that reason the Spirits woke him up at the very moment when he would likely respond. Later on we will explain the difference between the position of this boy and that of Valentina in our preceding report.
Besides, the fact demonstrates a point of capital importance: It is not only after death that the Spirit recovers the memory of the past. It may be said that it is never lost, even as incarnate, because during the sleep of the body, when the Spirit enjoys certain freedom, it is conscious of previous actions. The Spirit knows the reason for suffering and that suffers deservedly; the memory is only faded during the life of relationships. But, in the absence of a precise memory that could be painful and damaging to social relationships, the Spirit acquires new forces at the times of emancipation of the soul if she knows how to take advantage of them. Must it follow that every deaf-mute is a parricide? That would be an absurd consequence because God’s justice is not circumscribed to absolute limits like human justice.
Other examples demonstrate that the disability may sometimes result from the bad use that was made of the spoken word. But how come, some will ask. The same atonement to two different faults in their seriousness? Is that fair?
However, those that reason in that manner ignore the fact that the same fault may present infinite degrees of culpability and that God measures the responsibility by the circumstances? Besides, who knows that the boy, supposing an inexcusable crime, has not been severely punished in the spiritual world and if his regret and his desire for reparation have not reduced the earthly atonement to a simple disease?
Admitting hypothetically, since we do not know, that his present mother was his victim, if he did not maintain his resolution to repair the fault with her through his love it is certain that a terrible punishment would wait for him, be it in the world of the Spirits or in another existence.
God’s justice never fails and if it is sometimes late it loses nothing for the wait. But God in his infinite benevolence never condemns in a irremissible way and always leaves the door of regret open. If the guilty person takes a long time to take advantage of that suffering will last longer. Thus, it is always up to oneself to abbreviate her sufferings. The duration of punishment is proportional to the duration of the hardening. That is how God’s justice conciliates with his love and benevolence to his creatures.
“In 1862 I knew a deaf-mute young man of twelve to thirteen years old. Wishing to make an observation I asked the protector Spirits if I it would be possible to evoke him. After having a positive answer I invited the young man to my room and made him sit on an armchair with a plate of grapes that he promptly devoured. As for myself I sat at a table, prayed and made the evocation as I customarily did. After a few moments my hand trembled and I wrote: I am here.
I looked at the boy and he was silent, eyes closed, calm and asleep with the plate on his knees. He was done with eating. I then addressed the following questions to him:
Q. – Where are you now? A. – In your bedroom, on your armchair.
Q. – Can you tell us why you were born deaf-mute? A. – An atonement of my past crimes.
Q. – Which crimes were that? A. – I was a parricide.
Q. – Can you tell us if your beloved mother had been your mother or your father in the existence that you mentioned, the object of our crime? I waited for the answer that did not come. My hand remained still. I looked at the boy again and he had just woken up and ate the grapes with appetite. I then asked the guides what had just happened; they responded: He gave you the teachings that you wanted and God did not allow him to give others.
I don’t know how the proponents of the exclusive communication of the devil would explain that fact. I came to my own conclusion that God sometimes allows us to evoke an incarnate Spirit and equally allows with respect to the discarnate when we do that with a spirit of charity.”
Observation: From our side we will make another observation about that. The proof of identity here results from the sleep provoked by the evocation and to the interruption of the writing at the moment of waking up. As for the silence that remained after the last question it demonstrates the utility of the veil that is cast upon the past. In fact suppose that the present mother of the boy had been his victim in another existence and that he wanted to repair his mistakes through the love that he dedicates to her. Wouldn’t the mother be strongly affected if she knew that her son had been her murderer? Wouldn’t her feelings be affected? He was allowed to reveal the cause of his disability as a matter of study and in order to give us another proof that the sufferings here have a previous cause when it is not in the present life and that everything is therefore established according to the justice. But the rest would have been useless and could have reached the mother’s ears and for that reason the Spirits woke him up at the very moment when he would likely respond. Later on we will explain the difference between the position of this boy and that of Valentina in our preceding report.
Besides, the fact demonstrates a point of capital importance: It is not only after death that the Spirit recovers the memory of the past. It may be said that it is never lost, even as incarnate, because during the sleep of the body, when the Spirit enjoys certain freedom, it is conscious of previous actions. The Spirit knows the reason for suffering and that suffers deservedly; the memory is only faded during the life of relationships. But, in the absence of a precise memory that could be painful and damaging to social relationships, the Spirit acquires new forces at the times of emancipation of the soul if she knows how to take advantage of them. Must it follow that every deaf-mute is a parricide? That would be an absurd consequence because God’s justice is not circumscribed to absolute limits like human justice.
Other examples demonstrate that the disability may sometimes result from the bad use that was made of the spoken word. But how come, some will ask. The same atonement to two different faults in their seriousness? Is that fair?
However, those that reason in that manner ignore the fact that the same fault may present infinite degrees of culpability and that God measures the responsibility by the circumstances? Besides, who knows that the boy, supposing an inexcusable crime, has not been severely punished in the spiritual world and if his regret and his desire for reparation have not reduced the earthly atonement to a simple disease?
Admitting hypothetically, since we do not know, that his present mother was his victim, if he did not maintain his resolution to repair the fault with her through his love it is certain that a terrible punishment would wait for him, be it in the world of the Spirits or in another existence.
God’s justice never fails and if it is sometimes late it loses nothing for the wait. But God in his infinite benevolence never condemns in a irremissible way and always leaves the door of regret open. If the guilty person takes a long time to take advantage of that suffering will last longer. Thus, it is always up to oneself to abbreviate her sufferings. The duration of punishment is proportional to the duration of the hardening. That is how God’s justice conciliates with his love and benevolence to his creatures.
Varieties
Perispirit described in 1805Extracted from the German book The mystical phenomena of human life
by Maximilien Perty, Professor at the University of Berne,
Leipzig and Heidelberg, 1861
Dr. Woetzel published a book with the title – Real apparition of my wife after her death – Chemnitz, 1804 that caused great sensation in the first years of this century. The author was attacked in several publications, particularly the Wieland that ridicules him in the Euthanasia. During his wife disease Woetzel had asked her that would come back and show up to him after her death. However, after a few weeks after her death a strong wind seemed to blow in the bedroom, although it was closed; the light was almost extinguished; a small window in the room opened and with the dimly lit ambient Woetzel saw the shape of his wife that told him in a sweet voice: Charles, I am immortal. One day we will meet again. The apparition and those reassuring words took place again later on. The woman showed up in a white dress with the appearance that she had before her death. The dog that had not moved during the first apparition was then agitated and moved around a circle as if going around a known person.
In a second work about the same subject (Leipzig, 1805) the author speaks of invitations that had been sent to him to belie the matter because otherwise many scientists would be forced to resign to what up until that moment they had considered like true and fair opinions and because superstition would find food for thought there. However, he had already requested the Council of the University of Leipzig to allow him to take a legal oath. The author develops his theory. According to him the soul, after death, would be surrounded by an ethereal, luminous body, through which it could become visible; that she could use other garments on top of that luminous envelope; that the apparition had not acted upon his interior feelings but exclusive upon the exterior senses.
As it can be seen the only missing word is perispirit. However, Woetzel is wrong when he believes that the apparition only acted upon the exterior senses and not onto the interior. Today we know that it is the opposite that happens. But he may have meant that he was awaken and not in a dreaming state that would have made him think that he had perceived the apparition only by the corporeal sight for he did not know the properties of the perispiritual fluid nor the mechanism of spiritual vision.
As a matter of fact, reading the scientific work of Mr. Pezzani about the Plurality of the existences one has the proof that the knowledge about the spiritual body goes back to the high antiquity and that only the name perispirit is modern. St. Paul described it in his first epistle to the Corinthians, chapter XV. Woetzel only recognized it by the force of the reasoning. Having studied them in the numerous facts that were observed, modern Spiritism described its properties and deduced the laws of its formation and manifestations.
With respect to the part that refers to the dog there is nothing special there. Several facts seem to demonstrate that certain animals feel the presence of the Spirits. In the Spiritist Review, June 1860 (The Spirit and the little dog) we cite an example that has remarkable analogy with that of Woetzel. It is not positively proven that they cannot see the Spirits. It would not be impossible that under certain circumstances, for example, the horses that show fear and adamantly refuse to move forward without an apparent reason may suffer the influence of a hidden influence.
In a second work about the same subject (Leipzig, 1805) the author speaks of invitations that had been sent to him to belie the matter because otherwise many scientists would be forced to resign to what up until that moment they had considered like true and fair opinions and because superstition would find food for thought there. However, he had already requested the Council of the University of Leipzig to allow him to take a legal oath. The author develops his theory. According to him the soul, after death, would be surrounded by an ethereal, luminous body, through which it could become visible; that she could use other garments on top of that luminous envelope; that the apparition had not acted upon his interior feelings but exclusive upon the exterior senses.
As it can be seen the only missing word is perispirit. However, Woetzel is wrong when he believes that the apparition only acted upon the exterior senses and not onto the interior. Today we know that it is the opposite that happens. But he may have meant that he was awaken and not in a dreaming state that would have made him think that he had perceived the apparition only by the corporeal sight for he did not know the properties of the perispiritual fluid nor the mechanism of spiritual vision.
As a matter of fact, reading the scientific work of Mr. Pezzani about the Plurality of the existences one has the proof that the knowledge about the spiritual body goes back to the high antiquity and that only the name perispirit is modern. St. Paul described it in his first epistle to the Corinthians, chapter XV. Woetzel only recognized it by the force of the reasoning. Having studied them in the numerous facts that were observed, modern Spiritism described its properties and deduced the laws of its formation and manifestations.
With respect to the part that refers to the dog there is nothing special there. Several facts seem to demonstrate that certain animals feel the presence of the Spirits. In the Spiritist Review, June 1860 (The Spirit and the little dog) we cite an example that has remarkable analogy with that of Woetzel. It is not positively proven that they cannot see the Spirits. It would not be impossible that under certain circumstances, for example, the horses that show fear and adamantly refuse to move forward without an apparent reason may suffer the influence of a hidden influence.
A new egg from Saumur
As it seems, Saumur is prodigal in oviparous wonders. You may remember that in September last a chicken born in that city residing at Rue de Visitation laid miraculous eggs on which shells one could see perfectly embossed drawings of sacred object and inscriptions. That brought a great commotion to certain environments and excited the teasing vein of the nonbelievers.
The Echo Saumurois made a lot of fun out of the fact. The place was visited by crowds; law enforcement was touched by that and suggested that a policeman should watch the chicken waiting for the event. We will not repeat the witty and not less judicious explanation given by the Sauveur des Peuples, in Bordeaux, September 18th, 1864 to which we refer the readers for detailed description of the case.
Not long ago one of our subscribers from Saumur sent us another phenomenal egg originated in that town, asking us to have the bizarre thing carefully examined although it had no drawings or inscriptions. It is not that he believed in a prodigy but on the contrary, he wanted our opinion so that he could it to oppose people that were too credulous in matters of miracles because, as it seems, this had also produced a certain uproar in the public, following the previous series of events. We don’t know if it is from the same chicken. Here is what it is about: the egg shows an alteration at one end in the shape of a thick string, twisted around itself, with the same material of the shell, glued to the shell along its full extension of about 6 to 7 centimeters.
One only needs to understand the formation of eggs to realize the phenomenon. It is a known fact that the egg is formed out of a single membrane similar to a bowl in which the yoke and the white, embryo and food to the future chick. Some are sometimes laid in that state. Before the laying the membrane is covered by a layer of calcium carbonate that forms the shell. In the present case considering that the content was not enough to fill out the vesicular membrane resulted that the empty space forming the bowl contracted and wound itself around the body of the egg. The whole limestone body was hardened later on giving rise to the abnormal formation. It the whole space had been fulfilled the egg would be monstrous for a chicken egg because it would measure about 10 centimeters in its larger diameter whilst in the present case it has a regular dimension.
Which relationship can all that have with Spiritism? Absolutely none. The reason why we talk about the subject is for the fact that people wanted to involve the name of Spiritism in the first case and we don’t know exactly on which premises unless it was a follow up on their habit of looking for any opportunity to ridicule Spiritism, even with the strangest things. We wanted to demonstrate once more that the Spiritists are not as much credulous as they say. If a rare event occurs they seek the explanation in the tangible word, before anything else, and do not mix the Spirits with everything that is extraordinary since they know the limits and the laws that govern their actions.
The Echo Saumurois made a lot of fun out of the fact. The place was visited by crowds; law enforcement was touched by that and suggested that a policeman should watch the chicken waiting for the event. We will not repeat the witty and not less judicious explanation given by the Sauveur des Peuples, in Bordeaux, September 18th, 1864 to which we refer the readers for detailed description of the case.
Not long ago one of our subscribers from Saumur sent us another phenomenal egg originated in that town, asking us to have the bizarre thing carefully examined although it had no drawings or inscriptions. It is not that he believed in a prodigy but on the contrary, he wanted our opinion so that he could it to oppose people that were too credulous in matters of miracles because, as it seems, this had also produced a certain uproar in the public, following the previous series of events. We don’t know if it is from the same chicken. Here is what it is about: the egg shows an alteration at one end in the shape of a thick string, twisted around itself, with the same material of the shell, glued to the shell along its full extension of about 6 to 7 centimeters.
One only needs to understand the formation of eggs to realize the phenomenon. It is a known fact that the egg is formed out of a single membrane similar to a bowl in which the yoke and the white, embryo and food to the future chick. Some are sometimes laid in that state. Before the laying the membrane is covered by a layer of calcium carbonate that forms the shell. In the present case considering that the content was not enough to fill out the vesicular membrane resulted that the empty space forming the bowl contracted and wound itself around the body of the egg. The whole limestone body was hardened later on giving rise to the abnormal formation. It the whole space had been fulfilled the egg would be monstrous for a chicken egg because it would measure about 10 centimeters in its larger diameter whilst in the present case it has a regular dimension.
Which relationship can all that have with Spiritism? Absolutely none. The reason why we talk about the subject is for the fact that people wanted to involve the name of Spiritism in the first case and we don’t know exactly on which premises unless it was a follow up on their habit of looking for any opportunity to ridicule Spiritism, even with the strangest things. We wanted to demonstrate once more that the Spiritists are not as much credulous as they say. If a rare event occurs they seek the explanation in the tangible word, before anything else, and do not mix the Spirits with everything that is extraordinary since they know the limits and the laws that govern their actions.
Bibliographic News
The plurality of the existences of the soulby André Pezzani, Lawyer at the Imperial Court of Lyon
This book, impatiently expected for some time, has just appeared at Mr. Didier & Co. store. All of those that know the author, his erudition and analytical and investigative mind, did not doubt that this serious issue of the plurality of the existences would be dealt with by him according to its importance. We are pleased to say that he did not fail in his undertaking. Nonetheless he did not do much to use his own reasoning to demonstrate this great law of humanity, although he dedicated himself to the subject. However wise he may be, he is humble, very humble even and that rarely is the corollary of knowledge. He says that his personal opinion would not be relevant and would weigh little on the scale and that is why he bases the work more on other people’s opinion than on his own. He wanted to demonstrate that the principle had not been foreseen by the greatest geniuses of all times; that it is found in every religion, sometimes clear and categorically formulated, but frequently disguised by allegory that implicitly is the source of a number of dogmas. He proves by authentic documents that the theory of the immortality and progression of the souls was part of secret teachings, only reserved to the initiated in the mysteries. That could have utility in those remote times, as he demonstrates, by hiding from the masses certain truths that they were not mature enough to understand, and that would have confused instead of enlightened them. His work is then rich in citations from the sacred books of the Hindus, Persians, Jewish, Christians, Greek Philosophers, the Neo-Platonic, the doctrines of the Druids, to modern writers such as Charles Bonnet, Ballanche, Fourier, Pierre Leroux, Jean Reynaud, Henri Martin, etc. and by conclusion and final expression the Spiritist books.
In that vast horizon the revises every opinion and the diverse theories about the origin and destinies of the soul. He gives a large space to the doctrine of animal metempsychosis, treating it in a new way. He demonstrates that the plurality of human existences preceded it and that the transmigration into the bodies of animals is just a derivation of that and not the principle. It was the belief reserved to the masses, incapable of understanding the high abstract truth, and as a brake to the passions. The incarnation in animals was a punishment, a kind of visual and present hell that was supposed to impress more than the fear of a spiritual punishment. Here is what Timaeus of Locri, that Cicero affirmed to have been the teacher of Plato, says about it: “If someone is vicious and violates the laws of the state it is necessary that the person be punished by the laws and censorships; the person must then be spanked by the fear of hell, by the anxiety of the continuous penalties, punishments and the horrors and inevitable punishments that are reserved to the unfortunate criminals down below Earth.”
“I praise a lot the Ionic poet (Homer) for having turned men religious, for old and useful fables, because like we heal the bodies with stinky medication if they do not respond to more pleasant one, we also repeal the souls for their false speeches if they are not led by the truthful ones. It is for the same reason that one must establish transient penalties based on the belief in the transmigration of the souls, so that the souls of shy men take, after death, the bodies of women exposed to scorn and injuries; the souls of the murderers to the bodies of wild animals to receive punishment there; the souls of sinners to the bodies of pigs and wild boars; the souls of inconstant and frivolous to the bodies of flying birds; the souls of the lazy, idle, ignorant and mad ones to the bodies of sea creatures. All these things are judged by the goddess Nemesis in the second period, that is, in the circle of the second region around Earth, with the demons, avengers of crimes that are the earthly Inquisitors of human action and to whom the conductor God of everything assigned with the administration of the world full of gods, men and other animals that were produced according to the excellent image of the eternal form.”
It follows from that and from several other documents that the majority of the philosophers openly professed animal metempsychosis as a means because they did not believe it themselves and that they had a secret and more rational doctrine about future life. That seems also to have been Pythagoras’ feelings; as it is known he was not the author of the idea of metempsychosis but he was only its spreader in Greece after having found it among the Indians. As a matter of fact incarnation in animals was only a temporary punishment of a few thousands of years, more or less according to the culpability, a kind of prison from which the soul would enter humanity. Animal incarnation, therefore, was not an absolute condition but it was connected, as one can see, to human reincarnation. It was a kind of scarecrow to the simple ones, much more than an article of faith to the old philosophers. Hence, as people say to children: “if you are bad the bad wolf will devour you”, in Antiquity they said to the criminals: “you will become a wolf”.
The doctrine of the plurality of the existence, coming out of fables and from the times of ignorance, today evidently tends to take part in modern philosophy, abstraction made of Spiritism, because serious thinkers find in that idea the only possible solution to the greatest moral problems of human life. Mr. Pezzani’s work then comes just in time to cast the historical light upon that important question. It will spare laborious and difficult researches, many times impossible to a lot of people. The author did not write the book from Spiritism’s point of view that is only used as an accessory and as a teaching. He wrote it from a philosophical point of view in order to open to him doors that would have been closed given the label of a new belief. It is the complement of the Plurality of Inhabited Worlds by Mr. Flammarion that on his side vulgarized one of the great principles of our Doctrine without talking about that.
We shall return to Mr. Pezzani’s work, making several citations to that.
In that vast horizon the revises every opinion and the diverse theories about the origin and destinies of the soul. He gives a large space to the doctrine of animal metempsychosis, treating it in a new way. He demonstrates that the plurality of human existences preceded it and that the transmigration into the bodies of animals is just a derivation of that and not the principle. It was the belief reserved to the masses, incapable of understanding the high abstract truth, and as a brake to the passions. The incarnation in animals was a punishment, a kind of visual and present hell that was supposed to impress more than the fear of a spiritual punishment. Here is what Timaeus of Locri, that Cicero affirmed to have been the teacher of Plato, says about it: “If someone is vicious and violates the laws of the state it is necessary that the person be punished by the laws and censorships; the person must then be spanked by the fear of hell, by the anxiety of the continuous penalties, punishments and the horrors and inevitable punishments that are reserved to the unfortunate criminals down below Earth.”
“I praise a lot the Ionic poet (Homer) for having turned men religious, for old and useful fables, because like we heal the bodies with stinky medication if they do not respond to more pleasant one, we also repeal the souls for their false speeches if they are not led by the truthful ones. It is for the same reason that one must establish transient penalties based on the belief in the transmigration of the souls, so that the souls of shy men take, after death, the bodies of women exposed to scorn and injuries; the souls of the murderers to the bodies of wild animals to receive punishment there; the souls of sinners to the bodies of pigs and wild boars; the souls of inconstant and frivolous to the bodies of flying birds; the souls of the lazy, idle, ignorant and mad ones to the bodies of sea creatures. All these things are judged by the goddess Nemesis in the second period, that is, in the circle of the second region around Earth, with the demons, avengers of crimes that are the earthly Inquisitors of human action and to whom the conductor God of everything assigned with the administration of the world full of gods, men and other animals that were produced according to the excellent image of the eternal form.”
It follows from that and from several other documents that the majority of the philosophers openly professed animal metempsychosis as a means because they did not believe it themselves and that they had a secret and more rational doctrine about future life. That seems also to have been Pythagoras’ feelings; as it is known he was not the author of the idea of metempsychosis but he was only its spreader in Greece after having found it among the Indians. As a matter of fact incarnation in animals was only a temporary punishment of a few thousands of years, more or less according to the culpability, a kind of prison from which the soul would enter humanity. Animal incarnation, therefore, was not an absolute condition but it was connected, as one can see, to human reincarnation. It was a kind of scarecrow to the simple ones, much more than an article of faith to the old philosophers. Hence, as people say to children: “if you are bad the bad wolf will devour you”, in Antiquity they said to the criminals: “you will become a wolf”.
The doctrine of the plurality of the existence, coming out of fables and from the times of ignorance, today evidently tends to take part in modern philosophy, abstraction made of Spiritism, because serious thinkers find in that idea the only possible solution to the greatest moral problems of human life. Mr. Pezzani’s work then comes just in time to cast the historical light upon that important question. It will spare laborious and difficult researches, many times impossible to a lot of people. The author did not write the book from Spiritism’s point of view that is only used as an accessory and as a teaching. He wrote it from a philosophical point of view in order to open to him doors that would have been closed given the label of a new belief. It is the complement of the Plurality of Inhabited Worlds by Mr. Flammarion that on his side vulgarized one of the great principles of our Doctrine without talking about that.
We shall return to Mr. Pezzani’s work, making several citations to that.
The Evangelical Medium
New Spiritist Journal of Toulouse[1]
The last month of last year saw the birth of a new vehicle of Spiritism, and that corroborates our thoughts contained in the article above about the state of art of Spiritism in 1864. According to its beginning and the letter that its director kindly sent to us before the publication, we must count on another champion in the defense of the true principles of the Doctrine. We talk about those that today are sanctioned by the great control of general agreement. Welcome!
Expecting that one may be judged by their works we say that if the saying “nobility obliges” is true we can say even with more reason that the title obliges. The Evangelical Medium has a full and beautiful program that imposes great obligations but nonetheless could be understood in two ways. It could mean that the journal would deal mainly with religious controversies, from a dogmatic point of view, or that by understanding the essential objective of Spiritism that is the moralization, it will be edited according to the Evangelical principle that is synonym of charity, tolerance and moderation. In the first case we will not follow it because the very interest of the Doctrine requires extreme reservation in the development of its consequences and because we many times have to step back for wanting to move too fast. “There is no need to rush; one must leave on time”.
In the second case we will be entirely with him. In fact here you have a summary of his profession of faith as a heading to his first issue:
“The journal that we endeavor to found with the title Evangelical Medium has the objective of entering the new paths that the world is concerned with today, I mean, the avenues of Spiritism. We thought this journal was needed in Toulouse at a time in which the Spiritists are already uncountable among us and their numerous groups grow every day. Publicity will be in fact a means of spreading the work done by those several groups and making them more useful to the moral progress to which all of our destinies are invited. However, to avoid fluctuating with the winds of the taste of the Doctrine in these still difficult paths we thought we should fly a flag to sponsor our sincere and resolute march, certain that the great principle of the moral renovation is no longer where the Greek and Romans are, that is, Jewish, Protestants and Catholics, but instead a great family united by the links of fraternity and tending to a common objective in its eager career through the mysterious solitudes of life. You know that flag. It is not the golden cross, daughter of pride and vain thoughts of mankind, but the wooden cross, daughter of devotion and sacrifice, say daughter of true charity.”
We are sorry for not having enough space to dedicate to the entire profession of faith. However we have no doubt that we will come back to that on another occasion.
[1] Published every Saturday, since December 15th. Price: Toulouse 8 francs per year, 4.5 per semester – Departments 9 francs and 5 francs. Subscription in Toulouse Rue de la Pomme, 34. In Paris, Boulevard St. Germain, 68
Expecting that one may be judged by their works we say that if the saying “nobility obliges” is true we can say even with more reason that the title obliges. The Evangelical Medium has a full and beautiful program that imposes great obligations but nonetheless could be understood in two ways. It could mean that the journal would deal mainly with religious controversies, from a dogmatic point of view, or that by understanding the essential objective of Spiritism that is the moralization, it will be edited according to the Evangelical principle that is synonym of charity, tolerance and moderation. In the first case we will not follow it because the very interest of the Doctrine requires extreme reservation in the development of its consequences and because we many times have to step back for wanting to move too fast. “There is no need to rush; one must leave on time”.
In the second case we will be entirely with him. In fact here you have a summary of his profession of faith as a heading to his first issue:
“The journal that we endeavor to found with the title Evangelical Medium has the objective of entering the new paths that the world is concerned with today, I mean, the avenues of Spiritism. We thought this journal was needed in Toulouse at a time in which the Spiritists are already uncountable among us and their numerous groups grow every day. Publicity will be in fact a means of spreading the work done by those several groups and making them more useful to the moral progress to which all of our destinies are invited. However, to avoid fluctuating with the winds of the taste of the Doctrine in these still difficult paths we thought we should fly a flag to sponsor our sincere and resolute march, certain that the great principle of the moral renovation is no longer where the Greek and Romans are, that is, Jewish, Protestants and Catholics, but instead a great family united by the links of fraternity and tending to a common objective in its eager career through the mysterious solitudes of life. You know that flag. It is not the golden cross, daughter of pride and vain thoughts of mankind, but the wooden cross, daughter of devotion and sacrifice, say daughter of true charity.”
We are sorry for not having enough space to dedicate to the entire profession of faith. However we have no doubt that we will come back to that on another occasion.
[1] Published every Saturday, since December 15th. Price: Toulouse 8 francs per year, 4.5 per semester – Departments 9 francs and 5 francs. Subscription in Toulouse Rue de la Pomme, 34. In Paris, Boulevard St. Germain, 68
Spiritist Alphabet
teaching to be happy
With this title our very honorable brother in Spiritism, Mr. Delhez, from Vienna, Austria, and whose zeal for the cause of the Doctrine is indefatigable, has just published a brochure in German with a part translated into French. It is an interesting collection of mediumistic communications in prose and verses received at the Spiritist Society of Vienna about several moral subjects, placed in alphabetical order. The brochure can be found in Vienna at the author’s address Singerstrasse, 7 and in all bookstores. Price: 1 florin. Mr. Delhez is the translator of The Mediums’ Book from French to German.
Instructions by the Spirits
Antwerp Society – 1864
I
Acknowledge the greatness and mercy of God towards every creature. The voice of the Almighty has been heard. Bow and be humble because the Lord’s power is great. The whole planet must shake under his merciful hand and those that abide by his laws will be blessed like Abraham of old marching towards an unknown land because the voice of the Eternal spoke to his heart.
The Almighty will support those that march under his paternal eyes, humble and believing. Let them treat you as poor of Spirit and the strong God will gracefully attract you to him. Be firm working in his vineyard and neglect the disdain of the impious because the Eternal has touched you with his protecting hand. Be courageous and move on not knowing where he is leading you. God protects those that support their own weaknesses on his force. The Creator is great. Be impressed by his work. Spiritism spreads around Earth like the soothing dew of the night, refreshing a very dry land. He will spread the celestial dew in your souls and your hearts will produce good fruits by the unction of the divine grace and your work will propagate His glory and greatness. God is Almighty and haven’t the tables of Moses shaken the planet when his force led Moses by the arm? What is it that you fear? Will God abandon you to your weakness when He gave his force to Moses? Hasn’t the Almighty sent the mana to the desert? Will it be the case that God will be less merciful to you than He was to the sons of Israel, allowing your hearts to be driven by ignorance? God is as just as great. Have trust in God and God will inundate you with his grace. Your hearts will expand and become the dwelling of faith and charity because truth has shone upon Earth and you were touched by the benevolent hand of the Almighty. Courage Spiritists! The powerful God watches you. May your souls be the tables on which God writes his laws and may nothing stain the temple of the Eternal so that you become worthy of publicizing the commandments. Have no fear of waking in darkness when the divine light leads you. The times designated by the Almighty have come. Darkness shall be vanished from Earth giving rise to the divine rays that will inundate your souls, if you do not repeal the voice of God. The force of the Almighty will spread over his people and your children will bless him singing praises from the purity of their hearts. May nothing stop you! May nothing discourage you! Be firm in the works of God. Be you all children of a great family and may you be conducted by the eyes of our Celestial Father and may your work be fruitful.
II
The kingdom of Christ is near. The precursors announced that; the quiet fights multiply; the incarnate Spirits agitate to the breath of impure princes of darkness: it is the devil of pride that throws its fire like the crater of a volcano in eruption. The invisible world stands up by the cross and the whole spiritual hierarchy of heavens is at motion towards the divine struggle. Spiritists, stand up; hole your brothers’ hands, the apostles of faith, so that you are strong when facing the terrible army that wants to destroy you. Bow before the cross that is your safeguard in danger, your reward in victory. The fighting field is covered in danger, we do not hide that, but the struggle is needed to make the triumph of faith shinier and stronger and so that these words of Jesus Christ be accomplished: the doors of hell will not prevail.
III
Man is never as strong as when he feels his weakness; he can do everything under the gaze of God. His moral strength grows in proportion to his confidence, because he feels the need to reach out to the Creator to protect his weakness from the failures that he can be led to by human imperfection. He who puts his will into that of God can face the Spirit of evil with impunity without becoming intimidating. If the Supreme Being allows the struggle between the angel and the devil, it is to give the creature the opportunity to triumph and sacrifice oneself in the struggle. When St. Paul felt the voice of God vibrating in him, he said: "I can do everything in Him who strengthens me.” And the greatest sinner became the most zealous apostle of the faith. St. Augustine, abandoned to the weaknesses of his ardent and passionate nature, succumbs; he becomes strong by the eyes of God, who always gives strength to the one who asks to resist evil. But man, in his blindness, believes to be powerful by himself; and in abandoning the support of God, he falls into the abyss that he digs out of self-love. Courage, then, for no matter how strong the Spirit that blocks the way, by leaning on the cross you have nothing to fear; on the contrary, you have everything to gain for your soul, which will grow under the divine ray of faith. Let yourself be led through the storms, and you will reach the end of your journey, where Jesus waits for you.
Every man needs advice. Unfortunate is the one thinks himself strong enough in his own light, for he will have many disappointments. Spiritism is filled with pitfalls even in the groups, and even more so in isolation. The excessive fear of being deceived is good for you because it has been your safeguard in more than one circumstance. Your communications, however, need control; some appreciations alone are not enough. That is why your protecting Spirits advised you to speak to your Spiritist leader, so that you may learn about their worth.
It is necessary to prove, by their union, that all the serious followers work together in the vineyard of the Lord who will extend his branches onto the whole world. The more the workers get together, the faster the great Spiritist chain will be formed, and sooner also the human family will be inundated with the divine fragrances of faith and charity that will regenerate souls under the power of the Creator.
May each of you bring their stone to the edifice to the extent of their strength; but if everyone wants to build as they please, without taking into account the instructions we have given, and that form the foundation; if there is no agreement among you; if you do not have a common ground, then you will build a Babel power. We have shown you this point: let every one of you make it their only goal. We have given you this sign. Let each one inscribe it on their flag and then you will recognize each other and you will hold each other’s hands. But God will scatter the presumptuous ones that have not listened to his voice. He will blind the proud ones that believe to be strong enough by themselves, and those that deviate from the path which he has traced to them will wander in the wilderness.
Spirits, be strong in courage, perseverance and firmness, but humble of heart, according to the precept of the Gospel, and Jesus will lead you through torments and bless your work. Every struggle courageously endured under the gaze of God is an ardent prayer that rises to him like the pure incense of a pleasant aroma. If it were enough to mumble words to address God, the lazy ones would only need to take a book of prayers to satisfy the obligation to pray. Work, the activity of the soul, is the only good prayer that purifies and makes it grow.
Fénelon
I
Acknowledge the greatness and mercy of God towards every creature. The voice of the Almighty has been heard. Bow and be humble because the Lord’s power is great. The whole planet must shake under his merciful hand and those that abide by his laws will be blessed like Abraham of old marching towards an unknown land because the voice of the Eternal spoke to his heart.
The Almighty will support those that march under his paternal eyes, humble and believing. Let them treat you as poor of Spirit and the strong God will gracefully attract you to him. Be firm working in his vineyard and neglect the disdain of the impious because the Eternal has touched you with his protecting hand. Be courageous and move on not knowing where he is leading you. God protects those that support their own weaknesses on his force. The Creator is great. Be impressed by his work. Spiritism spreads around Earth like the soothing dew of the night, refreshing a very dry land. He will spread the celestial dew in your souls and your hearts will produce good fruits by the unction of the divine grace and your work will propagate His glory and greatness. God is Almighty and haven’t the tables of Moses shaken the planet when his force led Moses by the arm? What is it that you fear? Will God abandon you to your weakness when He gave his force to Moses? Hasn’t the Almighty sent the mana to the desert? Will it be the case that God will be less merciful to you than He was to the sons of Israel, allowing your hearts to be driven by ignorance? God is as just as great. Have trust in God and God will inundate you with his grace. Your hearts will expand and become the dwelling of faith and charity because truth has shone upon Earth and you were touched by the benevolent hand of the Almighty. Courage Spiritists! The powerful God watches you. May your souls be the tables on which God writes his laws and may nothing stain the temple of the Eternal so that you become worthy of publicizing the commandments. Have no fear of waking in darkness when the divine light leads you. The times designated by the Almighty have come. Darkness shall be vanished from Earth giving rise to the divine rays that will inundate your souls, if you do not repeal the voice of God. The force of the Almighty will spread over his people and your children will bless him singing praises from the purity of their hearts. May nothing stop you! May nothing discourage you! Be firm in the works of God. Be you all children of a great family and may you be conducted by the eyes of our Celestial Father and may your work be fruitful.
II
The kingdom of Christ is near. The precursors announced that; the quiet fights multiply; the incarnate Spirits agitate to the breath of impure princes of darkness: it is the devil of pride that throws its fire like the crater of a volcano in eruption. The invisible world stands up by the cross and the whole spiritual hierarchy of heavens is at motion towards the divine struggle. Spiritists, stand up; hole your brothers’ hands, the apostles of faith, so that you are strong when facing the terrible army that wants to destroy you. Bow before the cross that is your safeguard in danger, your reward in victory. The fighting field is covered in danger, we do not hide that, but the struggle is needed to make the triumph of faith shinier and stronger and so that these words of Jesus Christ be accomplished: the doors of hell will not prevail.
III
Man is never as strong as when he feels his weakness; he can do everything under the gaze of God. His moral strength grows in proportion to his confidence, because he feels the need to reach out to the Creator to protect his weakness from the failures that he can be led to by human imperfection. He who puts his will into that of God can face the Spirit of evil with impunity without becoming intimidating. If the Supreme Being allows the struggle between the angel and the devil, it is to give the creature the opportunity to triumph and sacrifice oneself in the struggle. When St. Paul felt the voice of God vibrating in him, he said: "I can do everything in Him who strengthens me.” And the greatest sinner became the most zealous apostle of the faith. St. Augustine, abandoned to the weaknesses of his ardent and passionate nature, succumbs; he becomes strong by the eyes of God, who always gives strength to the one who asks to resist evil. But man, in his blindness, believes to be powerful by himself; and in abandoning the support of God, he falls into the abyss that he digs out of self-love. Courage, then, for no matter how strong the Spirit that blocks the way, by leaning on the cross you have nothing to fear; on the contrary, you have everything to gain for your soul, which will grow under the divine ray of faith. Let yourself be led through the storms, and you will reach the end of your journey, where Jesus waits for you.
Every man needs advice. Unfortunate is the one thinks himself strong enough in his own light, for he will have many disappointments. Spiritism is filled with pitfalls even in the groups, and even more so in isolation. The excessive fear of being deceived is good for you because it has been your safeguard in more than one circumstance. Your communications, however, need control; some appreciations alone are not enough. That is why your protecting Spirits advised you to speak to your Spiritist leader, so that you may learn about their worth.
It is necessary to prove, by their union, that all the serious followers work together in the vineyard of the Lord who will extend his branches onto the whole world. The more the workers get together, the faster the great Spiritist chain will be formed, and sooner also the human family will be inundated with the divine fragrances of faith and charity that will regenerate souls under the power of the Creator.
May each of you bring their stone to the edifice to the extent of their strength; but if everyone wants to build as they please, without taking into account the instructions we have given, and that form the foundation; if there is no agreement among you; if you do not have a common ground, then you will build a Babel power. We have shown you this point: let every one of you make it their only goal. We have given you this sign. Let each one inscribe it on their flag and then you will recognize each other and you will hold each other’s hands. But God will scatter the presumptuous ones that have not listened to his voice. He will blind the proud ones that believe to be strong enough by themselves, and those that deviate from the path which he has traced to them will wander in the wilderness.
Spirits, be strong in courage, perseverance and firmness, but humble of heart, according to the precept of the Gospel, and Jesus will lead you through torments and bless your work. Every struggle courageously endured under the gaze of God is an ardent prayer that rises to him like the pure incense of a pleasant aroma. If it were enough to mumble words to address God, the lazy ones would only need to take a book of prayers to satisfy the obligation to pray. Work, the activity of the soul, is the only good prayer that purifies and makes it grow.
Fénelon
February
Fear of Death[1]Irrespective of the social echelon, man since the savage state has the innate feeling of the future. Intuition tells him that death is not the last word in life and the ones that we miss are not lost forever. The belief in the future is intuitive and infinitely more general than that of the nothingness. Therefore, how can it be that among those that believe in the immortality of the soul we still find so much attachment to earthly things and so much fear of death?
Fear of death is the effect of God’s wisdom and a consequence of the instinct of conservation that is common to all living creatures. It is necessary while mankind is not enlightened enough with respect to the conditions of a future life, as a counterweight to the tendency that, without that brake, people would be led to prematurely leave the earthly life and neglect the work here that must serve their own advancement. That is why future is only a vague intuition among primitive peoples, then it is a simple hope and later on a certainty, but still countered by a secret attachment to the corporeal life. As man better understands future life the fear of death diminishes; better understanding, at the same time, his mission on Earth he waits for the end with more calm, resignation and less fear.
The certainty of a future life gives another course to the ideas, other objectives to his works. Before finding that certainty he only works for the present; with that certainty he works with eyes in the future, without neglecting the present because he knows that his future depends on a more or less good direction that he might have followed in the present. The certainty of meeting his friends after death; of continuing the relationships that he had on Earth; of not wasting the fruit of any work and of growing incessantly in intelligence and perfection, give him the patience to work and the courage to withstand the temporary fatigues of the earthly life. The solidarity that he sees taking place between the living and the dead makes him understand the one that must exist among the living ones and from that fraternity has a meaning and charity becomes an objective in the present and in the future.
In order to free himself from the apprehensions of death he must be able to face it from its true point of view, that is, in his thoughts he must has penetrated the invisible world and made an idea as much accurate as possible, indicating a certain development to the incarnate Spirit and a certain aptitude to detach from matter.
In those that are not sufficiently advanced, material life still predominates upon spiritual life. Attached to the exterior, man only sees the life of the body whereas the real life is in the soul. When the body is precluded form life, to his eyes everything is lost and he meets desperation. If, instead of concentrating his mind in the terrestrial outfit, he turned his eyes to the very source of life, to the soul, the real being that outlives everything, he would be less sorry for the body, source of so many miseries and pains. For that, however, the Spirit requires a strength that is only obtained with maturity.
The fear of death, therefore, has its origin in the insufficiency of notions about the future life but indicates the necessity of living and the fear that the destruction of the body is the end of everything. It is therefore provoked by the secret desire of survival of the soul, still veiled by uncertainty. The fear weakens as the certainty grows; it disappears when the certainty is complete. That is the providential side of the issue. It was wise not to disturb the man whose reason was not yet strong enough to withstand the very positive and seducing perspective of a future, and that could have made him neglect the present that is necessary to his material as well as intellectual advancement.
That state of affairs is fed and prolonged by purely human causes that will disappear with progress. The first is the aspect by which the future life is presented, aspect that could be enough to little advanced intelligences, but that could not satisfy the requests of reason of thoughtful men. They say that if they were presented with principles contradicted by logic and the positive data of science as absolute truths it would mean that they are not true. From that stems the incredulity of some in many a belief stained by doubt. Future life to them is a vague idea, a probability instead of an absolute certainty; they believe in that, they wanted it to be so and yet they tell themselves: “And if it is not so? The present is a certainty. Let us deal with that first. Future will come as a bonus.” They then add: “Definitely, what is the soul? Is it a point, an atom, a spark, a flame? How does the soul feel? How does the soul see? How does the soul perceive?
To them the soul is not an effective reality. It is an abstraction. In their minds their loved ones are reduced to the state of atoms and in a way they are lost, and to their eyes they no longer have the qualities that give them the capacity of loving. They do not understand the love of a spark nor the love that one might have for that spark and they themselves are happy to be transformed into monads.[2] Hence the return to the positivism of earthly life that is more substantial. The number of those that are dominated by these ideas is considerable.
Another reason that connects to the earthly life even those that strongly believe in a future life is due to the impression that they keep from the teachings that they received in their infancy. The image that religions makes of that is must acknowledge is not very attractive or reassuring. From one side one sees the contortions of the damned ones that eternally atone their momentary sins through tortures and flames. For these centuries are succeeded by centuries without any hope of mitigation or pity and what is even more impious is that regret is useless to them. On another hand one sees the languid and suffering souls of purgatory, waiting for their freedom that depends on the good will of the living ones that pray or send prayers to them, not depending on their own efforts of progress. These two categories form the immense majority of the population from beyond the grave. Above that there is the very restrictive category of the elected ones, enjoying a contemplative beatitude for eternity.
Such a state satisfies neither the aspirations nor the instinctive idea of progress, the only one that seems compatible with an absolute happiness. It is difficult to understand that the ignorant savage, morally obtuse, may be at the same level of someone that reached the most elevated level of education and practical morality, after long years of work, just because those received baptism. It is even less conceivable that the boy that died in his early years, before having conscience of himself and his actions, may enjoy the same privileges just as a consequence of a ceremony that did not even depend on him.
Such thoughts certainly agitate the most eager believers, however little they may think. The progressive work that we do on Earth having no value to the future life; the easiness with which they believe to acquire that happiness by means of a few exterior practices; the very possibility of buying that with money, without a serious change of character and habits, all that leave to the mundane pleasures all of its value. More than one believer say in their intimacy that considering that their future is guaranteed by the practice of certain formulas, or by post-mortem gifts that deprive them from nothing, it would be superfluous to impose sacrifices to oneself or some sort of trouble to the benefit of others since salvation can be found by each one working for oneself.
That is certainly not the way everybody thinks for there are great and beautiful exceptions but it is incontestable that this is the way the majority thinks and that the necessary things to be done to be happy in the other world has nothing to do with the assets in this world, leading therefore to egotism. We add to that the fact that everything in our traditions concur to have a missed earthly life and the passage from Earth to heavens to be feared. Death is only surrounded by lugubrious ceremonies that cause more horror than bring hope. When death is represented it is always in a disgusting way and never like a sleep of transition. All symbols of death recall the destruction of the body, showing it horribly and discarnate. None symbolizes the soul radiantly detaching from its earthly links. Departure to that happier world is only followed by the lamentation of the survivors, as if a great disgrace would happen to those that depart. An eternal good-bye is waved as if they were never be seen again. What they are sorry about for them is the termination of the enjoyment down here, as if they were not going to find better enjoyment beyond the grave. What a disgrace, they say, dying at such an early age, rich, happy and when there is still a brilliant future ahead! The idea of a happier condition only vaguely comes to mind because it has no roots. Everything then concurs to inspire the horror of death instead of giving rise to hope. Man will certainly take a very long time to leave these prejudices behind but he will get there as his faith is more solid and that a healthier idea is made of the spiritual life.
The Spiritist Doctrine changes entirely the way future is faced. Future life is no longer a hypothesis, but a reality; the state of the Spirits after death is no longer a system but the result of observation. The veil is raised; the spiritual world appears in its full practical reality. It was not men that discovered it by the struggle of an ingenious conception, but it was the very inhabitants of that world that came to describe their situation. We see them there in at all levels of the spiritual scale, in all phases of happiness and disgrace. We observe every activity of life beyond the grave. To the Spiritists that is the reason why they face death with calm and why so much serenity during their last moments on Earth. They are supported not only by hope but also by certainty. They know that future life is only the continuation of the present life in better conditions and they wait for that with the same confidence that they wait for sunrise after a stormy night. The reasons for such confidence are in the facts that they have witnessed and in the agreement of those facts with God’s logic, justice and benevolence and the internal aspirations of man.
Besides, vulgar belief places the souls in regions that are only accessible to thoughts, where they become kind of strange to the survivors. The Church itself places an unpassable barrier between them since it declares that all relationships are broken and every communication is impossible. If they are in hell there is no hope of seeing them again unless we go there too; if they are among the elected ones they will be totally absorbed in a contemplative beatitude. All that establishes such a distance between the dead and the living ones that the separation is seen as eternal and hence it seems preferable to keep them close, suffering on Earth, than seeing them departing even to heavens. Besides, is the soul in heavens really happy when that soul sees her son, father, mother or friends burning in eternity?
To the Spiritists the soul is no longer an abstraction. It has an ethereal body that makes it a defined being that can be conceived and embraced by our mind. That alone is a lot to point out the ideas about its individuality, aptitudes and perceptions. The memory of the loved ones rests on something real. They are no longer represented by fleeing flames that have no association with our thoughts but under a concrete form that better show them like living creatures. Besides, instead of being lost in the depth of space, they are around us. The visible and invisible worlds are have perpetual relationship and mutually help one another. Fear of death has no reason to exist since any doubt about the future is no longer allowed. Death is faced cold-bloodedly, as a liberation, like the door of life and not the door to nothing.
[1] Text inserted into the book Heavens and Hell, part I, Chap II
[2] Simple substances in metaphysics (TN)
Fear of death is the effect of God’s wisdom and a consequence of the instinct of conservation that is common to all living creatures. It is necessary while mankind is not enlightened enough with respect to the conditions of a future life, as a counterweight to the tendency that, without that brake, people would be led to prematurely leave the earthly life and neglect the work here that must serve their own advancement. That is why future is only a vague intuition among primitive peoples, then it is a simple hope and later on a certainty, but still countered by a secret attachment to the corporeal life. As man better understands future life the fear of death diminishes; better understanding, at the same time, his mission on Earth he waits for the end with more calm, resignation and less fear.
The certainty of a future life gives another course to the ideas, other objectives to his works. Before finding that certainty he only works for the present; with that certainty he works with eyes in the future, without neglecting the present because he knows that his future depends on a more or less good direction that he might have followed in the present. The certainty of meeting his friends after death; of continuing the relationships that he had on Earth; of not wasting the fruit of any work and of growing incessantly in intelligence and perfection, give him the patience to work and the courage to withstand the temporary fatigues of the earthly life. The solidarity that he sees taking place between the living and the dead makes him understand the one that must exist among the living ones and from that fraternity has a meaning and charity becomes an objective in the present and in the future.
In order to free himself from the apprehensions of death he must be able to face it from its true point of view, that is, in his thoughts he must has penetrated the invisible world and made an idea as much accurate as possible, indicating a certain development to the incarnate Spirit and a certain aptitude to detach from matter.
In those that are not sufficiently advanced, material life still predominates upon spiritual life. Attached to the exterior, man only sees the life of the body whereas the real life is in the soul. When the body is precluded form life, to his eyes everything is lost and he meets desperation. If, instead of concentrating his mind in the terrestrial outfit, he turned his eyes to the very source of life, to the soul, the real being that outlives everything, he would be less sorry for the body, source of so many miseries and pains. For that, however, the Spirit requires a strength that is only obtained with maturity.
The fear of death, therefore, has its origin in the insufficiency of notions about the future life but indicates the necessity of living and the fear that the destruction of the body is the end of everything. It is therefore provoked by the secret desire of survival of the soul, still veiled by uncertainty. The fear weakens as the certainty grows; it disappears when the certainty is complete. That is the providential side of the issue. It was wise not to disturb the man whose reason was not yet strong enough to withstand the very positive and seducing perspective of a future, and that could have made him neglect the present that is necessary to his material as well as intellectual advancement.
That state of affairs is fed and prolonged by purely human causes that will disappear with progress. The first is the aspect by which the future life is presented, aspect that could be enough to little advanced intelligences, but that could not satisfy the requests of reason of thoughtful men. They say that if they were presented with principles contradicted by logic and the positive data of science as absolute truths it would mean that they are not true. From that stems the incredulity of some in many a belief stained by doubt. Future life to them is a vague idea, a probability instead of an absolute certainty; they believe in that, they wanted it to be so and yet they tell themselves: “And if it is not so? The present is a certainty. Let us deal with that first. Future will come as a bonus.” They then add: “Definitely, what is the soul? Is it a point, an atom, a spark, a flame? How does the soul feel? How does the soul see? How does the soul perceive?
To them the soul is not an effective reality. It is an abstraction. In their minds their loved ones are reduced to the state of atoms and in a way they are lost, and to their eyes they no longer have the qualities that give them the capacity of loving. They do not understand the love of a spark nor the love that one might have for that spark and they themselves are happy to be transformed into monads.[2] Hence the return to the positivism of earthly life that is more substantial. The number of those that are dominated by these ideas is considerable.
Another reason that connects to the earthly life even those that strongly believe in a future life is due to the impression that they keep from the teachings that they received in their infancy. The image that religions makes of that is must acknowledge is not very attractive or reassuring. From one side one sees the contortions of the damned ones that eternally atone their momentary sins through tortures and flames. For these centuries are succeeded by centuries without any hope of mitigation or pity and what is even more impious is that regret is useless to them. On another hand one sees the languid and suffering souls of purgatory, waiting for their freedom that depends on the good will of the living ones that pray or send prayers to them, not depending on their own efforts of progress. These two categories form the immense majority of the population from beyond the grave. Above that there is the very restrictive category of the elected ones, enjoying a contemplative beatitude for eternity.
Such a state satisfies neither the aspirations nor the instinctive idea of progress, the only one that seems compatible with an absolute happiness. It is difficult to understand that the ignorant savage, morally obtuse, may be at the same level of someone that reached the most elevated level of education and practical morality, after long years of work, just because those received baptism. It is even less conceivable that the boy that died in his early years, before having conscience of himself and his actions, may enjoy the same privileges just as a consequence of a ceremony that did not even depend on him.
Such thoughts certainly agitate the most eager believers, however little they may think. The progressive work that we do on Earth having no value to the future life; the easiness with which they believe to acquire that happiness by means of a few exterior practices; the very possibility of buying that with money, without a serious change of character and habits, all that leave to the mundane pleasures all of its value. More than one believer say in their intimacy that considering that their future is guaranteed by the practice of certain formulas, or by post-mortem gifts that deprive them from nothing, it would be superfluous to impose sacrifices to oneself or some sort of trouble to the benefit of others since salvation can be found by each one working for oneself.
That is certainly not the way everybody thinks for there are great and beautiful exceptions but it is incontestable that this is the way the majority thinks and that the necessary things to be done to be happy in the other world has nothing to do with the assets in this world, leading therefore to egotism. We add to that the fact that everything in our traditions concur to have a missed earthly life and the passage from Earth to heavens to be feared. Death is only surrounded by lugubrious ceremonies that cause more horror than bring hope. When death is represented it is always in a disgusting way and never like a sleep of transition. All symbols of death recall the destruction of the body, showing it horribly and discarnate. None symbolizes the soul radiantly detaching from its earthly links. Departure to that happier world is only followed by the lamentation of the survivors, as if a great disgrace would happen to those that depart. An eternal good-bye is waved as if they were never be seen again. What they are sorry about for them is the termination of the enjoyment down here, as if they were not going to find better enjoyment beyond the grave. What a disgrace, they say, dying at such an early age, rich, happy and when there is still a brilliant future ahead! The idea of a happier condition only vaguely comes to mind because it has no roots. Everything then concurs to inspire the horror of death instead of giving rise to hope. Man will certainly take a very long time to leave these prejudices behind but he will get there as his faith is more solid and that a healthier idea is made of the spiritual life.
The Spiritist Doctrine changes entirely the way future is faced. Future life is no longer a hypothesis, but a reality; the state of the Spirits after death is no longer a system but the result of observation. The veil is raised; the spiritual world appears in its full practical reality. It was not men that discovered it by the struggle of an ingenious conception, but it was the very inhabitants of that world that came to describe their situation. We see them there in at all levels of the spiritual scale, in all phases of happiness and disgrace. We observe every activity of life beyond the grave. To the Spiritists that is the reason why they face death with calm and why so much serenity during their last moments on Earth. They are supported not only by hope but also by certainty. They know that future life is only the continuation of the present life in better conditions and they wait for that with the same confidence that they wait for sunrise after a stormy night. The reasons for such confidence are in the facts that they have witnessed and in the agreement of those facts with God’s logic, justice and benevolence and the internal aspirations of man.
Besides, vulgar belief places the souls in regions that are only accessible to thoughts, where they become kind of strange to the survivors. The Church itself places an unpassable barrier between them since it declares that all relationships are broken and every communication is impossible. If they are in hell there is no hope of seeing them again unless we go there too; if they are among the elected ones they will be totally absorbed in a contemplative beatitude. All that establishes such a distance between the dead and the living ones that the separation is seen as eternal and hence it seems preferable to keep them close, suffering on Earth, than seeing them departing even to heavens. Besides, is the soul in heavens really happy when that soul sees her son, father, mother or friends burning in eternity?
To the Spiritists the soul is no longer an abstraction. It has an ethereal body that makes it a defined being that can be conceived and embraced by our mind. That alone is a lot to point out the ideas about its individuality, aptitudes and perceptions. The memory of the loved ones rests on something real. They are no longer represented by fleeing flames that have no association with our thoughts but under a concrete form that better show them like living creatures. Besides, instead of being lost in the depth of space, they are around us. The visible and invisible worlds are have perpetual relationship and mutually help one another. Fear of death has no reason to exist since any doubt about the future is no longer allowed. Death is faced cold-bloodedly, as a liberation, like the door of life and not the door to nothing.
[1] Text inserted into the book Heavens and Hell, part I, Chap II
[2] Simple substances in metaphysics (TN)
Perpetuation of Spiritism
In a previous article we talked about the incessant progresses of Spiritism. Are those progresses durable or ephemeral? Is it a meteor that shines with a temporary light, like many other things? That is what we are going to examine in a few words.
If Spiritism were a simple theory, a philosophical school founded on a personal opinion, nothing would guarantee its stability because it could please today and not please tomorrow; in a given time it could no longer be in harmony with the customs and the intellectual development, and then it would fall like all other things that are outdated and that did not follow progress; finally, it could be replaced by something better. That is what happens to every human conception, every legislation and every purely speculative doctrine.
Spiritism presents itself in completely different conditions, as we have pointed out so many times. It is founded on a fact, the communication between the visible and invisible worlds. A fact cannot be nulled by time, like an opinion. Undoubtedly it is not yet accepted by everybody but why bother with the denial of some when Spiritism is daily attested by millions of individuals whose number grows incessantly, and who are not sillier or blinder than the others? A time will then come when there will no longer be deniers as there aren’t any more deniers of the movement of Earth these days. How much opposition hasn’t this last point raised! For a long time the nonbelievers did not lack apparent reasons to dispute that. “How to believe, they used to say, in the existence of the antipodes[1] upside down? And if Earth turns around as they pretend, how can we believe that every other 24h interval we ourselves are in that uncomfortable position as well and without noticing it? In that situation we would not be able to maintain contact with Earth unless we could walk upside down like flies on a ceiling. Besides, what would happen to the oceans? When the vase is inclined, doesn’t the water spills over? The thing is simply impossible, therefore absurd and Galileo is a mad man!” Nonetheless, if that absurd thing is a fact it defeated every contrary reason and every anathema. What was it that was missing for its admission? The knowledge of the natural law that is its foundation. If Galileo was satisfied by saying that Earth turns, even today he would not be believed but the denials fell before the knowledge of the principle.
The same will happen to Spiritism. Considering that it rests on a material fact that results from an explained and demonstrated law that eliminates any characteristic of wonderful and supernatural, it is imperishable. Those that deny the possibility of the manifestations are in the same situation as those that denied the movement of Earth. The majority denies the primary cause that being the soul, its survival and its individuality. Therefore it is not surprising that they deny the effect. They judge by the simple announcement of the fact and declare it absurd like in the past the belief of the antipodes was declared absurd. But what can their opinion do against a phenomenon that has been attested by observation and demonstrated by a natural law? Since the movement of the planet is a purely scientific fact its demonstration was not at the reach of the masses; it was necessary to accept the authority of the arguments of the scientists. But in its favor Spiritism has the fact that it can be attested by everybody and that is what explains its fast propagation. Every new discovery of some importance has more or less serious consequences. The movement of Earth and the Gravitational Law that governs that movement had incalculable consequences. Science opened up a vast horizon of exploration and one could not count all discoveries, inventions and applications that followed as a consequence of that. The progress of science led to the progress of technology and the progress of technology changed the way we live, our habits, in short the living conditions of humanity. The knowledge of the relationships between the visible and the invisible worlds has even more direct and immediately practical consequences because it is available to all individualities and it is of the interest of everybody.
Since every person must one day die, nobody can remain indifferent to what will succeed after their death. By the certainty that Spiritism gives about the future, each person changes the way they see it and that has influence upon their morality. By inhibiting egotism, Spiritism will modify profoundly the social relationships between individuals and peoples.
Many reformers of generous thoughts formulated more or less attractive doctrines, but in their majority they only had the success of a temporary and circumscribed sect. It was like that and it will always be like that with purely systematic theories, because it is not given to man on Earth the conception of something perfect and complete. Spiritism, on the contrary, founded not on a preconceived idea but on positive facts, is shielded from those fluctuations and can only grow as the facts become widely known, better known and understood. Well, no single human power can hinder the propagation of facts that everybody may attest. Once the facts are attested, nobody will be able to preclude the consequences that result from them. These consequences are here a complete revolution of ideas and in the way people see things from this world as from the other. This will take place before this century is over. But, some will say, besides the facts you have a theory, a doctrine; who can assure that the theory will not suffer variations; that in a few years it will be the same as today?
Undoubtedly it may suffer modifications in its details, before new observations, but once the principle is established it cannot vary and even less be eliminated. That is the essential. Since Copernicus and Galileo the movement of Earth and the stars have been better calculated but the fact of the movement remained as being the principle.
We have said that Spiritism is above all a science of observation. That is what constitutes its force against the attacks that it suffers and gives its followers an unbreakable faith. All lines of thoughts that are opposed fall before the facts and the more those lines of reasoning are driven by interest the less those thoughts have value to their eyes. It is useless with some say this is not like that or it is something else, the followers respond: We cannot deny evidence. If it were only about an individual there could be reason to believe that the individual was deluded, but when millions of individuals see the same thing, in every country, one logically concludes that the deniers are the mistaken ones.
If the Spiritist facts only resulted in the satisfaction of curiosity, they would certainly only lead to a momentary concern, like everything else that is useless. However the consequences that stem out of Spiritism touch the heart; make the persons happy; satisfy their aspirations; fulfill the emptiness left by doubt; cast a light upon the fearful issue of the future; even more, a powerful instrument for the moralization of society is found. That leads to a great interest. Now, one does not easily resign to a source of happiness. Certainly, it is not with the perspective of obliviousness or with the flames of hell that the Spiritists will be yanked from their belief.
Spiritism will not move away from the truth and will have nothing to fear from the contrary opinions, as long as its scientific theory and its moral Doctrine are a deduction of scrupulously and consciously observed facts, without prejudice or preconceived systems. It was before a more complete observation that every premature and adventurous theories that appeared at the origin of the modern days Spiritist phenomena fell, and came to melt with the powerful unity that there is today, and against which only a few rare and diminishing number of individuals voice their opinion. The blanks that the current theory may have will be filled out in the same way. Regarding the consequences, Spiritism is far from having announced its final word, but it remains inflexible in its foundation because that foundation is based on facts.
Therefore, may the Spiritist have no fear because the future is theirs; let the adversaries struggle under the influence of the truth that obfuscates them for any denial is powerless against the evidence that will inevitably prevail by the force of things. It is a matter of time, and in this century time moves at strides of giants by the impulse of progress.
[1] Natives of New Zealand (TN)
If Spiritism were a simple theory, a philosophical school founded on a personal opinion, nothing would guarantee its stability because it could please today and not please tomorrow; in a given time it could no longer be in harmony with the customs and the intellectual development, and then it would fall like all other things that are outdated and that did not follow progress; finally, it could be replaced by something better. That is what happens to every human conception, every legislation and every purely speculative doctrine.
Spiritism presents itself in completely different conditions, as we have pointed out so many times. It is founded on a fact, the communication between the visible and invisible worlds. A fact cannot be nulled by time, like an opinion. Undoubtedly it is not yet accepted by everybody but why bother with the denial of some when Spiritism is daily attested by millions of individuals whose number grows incessantly, and who are not sillier or blinder than the others? A time will then come when there will no longer be deniers as there aren’t any more deniers of the movement of Earth these days. How much opposition hasn’t this last point raised! For a long time the nonbelievers did not lack apparent reasons to dispute that. “How to believe, they used to say, in the existence of the antipodes[1] upside down? And if Earth turns around as they pretend, how can we believe that every other 24h interval we ourselves are in that uncomfortable position as well and without noticing it? In that situation we would not be able to maintain contact with Earth unless we could walk upside down like flies on a ceiling. Besides, what would happen to the oceans? When the vase is inclined, doesn’t the water spills over? The thing is simply impossible, therefore absurd and Galileo is a mad man!” Nonetheless, if that absurd thing is a fact it defeated every contrary reason and every anathema. What was it that was missing for its admission? The knowledge of the natural law that is its foundation. If Galileo was satisfied by saying that Earth turns, even today he would not be believed but the denials fell before the knowledge of the principle.
The same will happen to Spiritism. Considering that it rests on a material fact that results from an explained and demonstrated law that eliminates any characteristic of wonderful and supernatural, it is imperishable. Those that deny the possibility of the manifestations are in the same situation as those that denied the movement of Earth. The majority denies the primary cause that being the soul, its survival and its individuality. Therefore it is not surprising that they deny the effect. They judge by the simple announcement of the fact and declare it absurd like in the past the belief of the antipodes was declared absurd. But what can their opinion do against a phenomenon that has been attested by observation and demonstrated by a natural law? Since the movement of the planet is a purely scientific fact its demonstration was not at the reach of the masses; it was necessary to accept the authority of the arguments of the scientists. But in its favor Spiritism has the fact that it can be attested by everybody and that is what explains its fast propagation. Every new discovery of some importance has more or less serious consequences. The movement of Earth and the Gravitational Law that governs that movement had incalculable consequences. Science opened up a vast horizon of exploration and one could not count all discoveries, inventions and applications that followed as a consequence of that. The progress of science led to the progress of technology and the progress of technology changed the way we live, our habits, in short the living conditions of humanity. The knowledge of the relationships between the visible and the invisible worlds has even more direct and immediately practical consequences because it is available to all individualities and it is of the interest of everybody.
Since every person must one day die, nobody can remain indifferent to what will succeed after their death. By the certainty that Spiritism gives about the future, each person changes the way they see it and that has influence upon their morality. By inhibiting egotism, Spiritism will modify profoundly the social relationships between individuals and peoples.
Many reformers of generous thoughts formulated more or less attractive doctrines, but in their majority they only had the success of a temporary and circumscribed sect. It was like that and it will always be like that with purely systematic theories, because it is not given to man on Earth the conception of something perfect and complete. Spiritism, on the contrary, founded not on a preconceived idea but on positive facts, is shielded from those fluctuations and can only grow as the facts become widely known, better known and understood. Well, no single human power can hinder the propagation of facts that everybody may attest. Once the facts are attested, nobody will be able to preclude the consequences that result from them. These consequences are here a complete revolution of ideas and in the way people see things from this world as from the other. This will take place before this century is over. But, some will say, besides the facts you have a theory, a doctrine; who can assure that the theory will not suffer variations; that in a few years it will be the same as today?
Undoubtedly it may suffer modifications in its details, before new observations, but once the principle is established it cannot vary and even less be eliminated. That is the essential. Since Copernicus and Galileo the movement of Earth and the stars have been better calculated but the fact of the movement remained as being the principle.
We have said that Spiritism is above all a science of observation. That is what constitutes its force against the attacks that it suffers and gives its followers an unbreakable faith. All lines of thoughts that are opposed fall before the facts and the more those lines of reasoning are driven by interest the less those thoughts have value to their eyes. It is useless with some say this is not like that or it is something else, the followers respond: We cannot deny evidence. If it were only about an individual there could be reason to believe that the individual was deluded, but when millions of individuals see the same thing, in every country, one logically concludes that the deniers are the mistaken ones.
If the Spiritist facts only resulted in the satisfaction of curiosity, they would certainly only lead to a momentary concern, like everything else that is useless. However the consequences that stem out of Spiritism touch the heart; make the persons happy; satisfy their aspirations; fulfill the emptiness left by doubt; cast a light upon the fearful issue of the future; even more, a powerful instrument for the moralization of society is found. That leads to a great interest. Now, one does not easily resign to a source of happiness. Certainly, it is not with the perspective of obliviousness or with the flames of hell that the Spiritists will be yanked from their belief.
Spiritism will not move away from the truth and will have nothing to fear from the contrary opinions, as long as its scientific theory and its moral Doctrine are a deduction of scrupulously and consciously observed facts, without prejudice or preconceived systems. It was before a more complete observation that every premature and adventurous theories that appeared at the origin of the modern days Spiritist phenomena fell, and came to melt with the powerful unity that there is today, and against which only a few rare and diminishing number of individuals voice their opinion. The blanks that the current theory may have will be filled out in the same way. Regarding the consequences, Spiritism is far from having announced its final word, but it remains inflexible in its foundation because that foundation is based on facts.
Therefore, may the Spiritist have no fear because the future is theirs; let the adversaries struggle under the influence of the truth that obfuscates them for any denial is powerless against the evidence that will inevitably prevail by the force of things. It is a matter of time, and in this century time moves at strides of giants by the impulse of progress.
[1] Natives of New Zealand (TN)
Spirits Instructors of Childhood
Child affected by mutismA lady sent us the following:
“One of my daughters has a three year old boy that has been the source of a lot of concern to her since his birth. By the end of last August his heath was reestablished but he still walked with difficulty and spoke papa, mommy but the rest of his language was a series of inarticulate sounds. About a month ago and after unsuccessful attempts for having him saying the most usual words, my daughter was in bed feeling really sorry for that kind of mutism, particularly devastated for the fact that her husband, long time captain, was about to return home, after a more than a year long absence, and would still find no improvement in his son’s ability to speak, when at 5 am she was woken up by the child’s voice that distinctly said the letters A, B, C, D that she had never tried to have him saying. Believing to be daydreaming she sat on the bed inclining her head to the cradle, near the sleeping child that she heard repeating out loud several times the letters A, B, C marked by a slight movement of the head and after a short interval he would say D with an accent. I entered the room about 6am while the child was still asleep but the sleepless mother was very happy and moved for having heard her son pronouncing those letters. When the boy woke up and from that moment we uselessly tried to have him saying those letters (that he had never heard before, at least in this life), all of our attempts were in vain. Even today he says A and B but it has been impossible to have him saying C and D like more than two sounds, one from the throat, the other nasal, that in no way resembled those letters that we wanted him to say. Isn’t that the proof that the boy had already lived? I stop here since I do not feel instructed enough to dare conclude. I need to learn more and read all about Spiritism but not to convince me; Spiritism answers everything or at least almost everything; but I repeat Sir I do not know enough. That will come for I wish so. God that has never abandoned me since I widowed sixteen years ago; God that helped me to educate my children and conduct them; God that has my full faith will provide with what I lack because I wait and ask with my heart to allow the good Spirits to enlighten and guide me on the good path. Pray for me also, Sir; my thoughts are with you and above all I wish to walk the good path.”
This, no doubt, is the result of previously acquired knowledge. If there is an innate aptitude it is the one revealed during the sleep of the body when nothing could have developed it during the vigil state. If the ideas were the result of matter why a new idea shows up when matter is benumbed whereas it is not only null but impossible to express when the organs are in full activity? Hence the primary cause cannot be in matter. That is how materialism continuously clashes with problems for which it cannot give solution. For a theory to be true it must not be belied by any fact. Spiritism does not formulate any theory prematurely unless it is done hypothetically in which case it avoids giving that as an absolute truth, only providing it as matter for study. That is why it marches steadfast. In the case above since it is evident that the Spirit did not learn during the vigil state he may have learned elsewhere what he says during the sleep. If it were not in this life it was on another one and even more, in an earthly life in which he spoke French for he pronounces letters in French. How can those that deny the plurality the existences or reincarnation on Earth explain the fact? But what there still needs to be learned is why he cannot articulate in vigil what he does in the sleep. Here is the explanation given by a Spirit at the Parisian Society:
November 24th, 1864 – medium Mrs. Cazemajour
“It is an intelligence that could be still veiled for some time through the physical suffering of reincarnation to which the Spirit had great difficulty in accepting and that has temporarily annihilated his faculties. But his guide helps him with kind solicitude allowing him to leave that state through his advices, encouragement and lessons that he gives him during the sleep, lessons that will not be lost and that will be effective when the phase of numbness is over, something that will be determined by a violent shock of extreme commotion. For that it is necessary a struggle of this kind. It is necessary to wait but not fear idiocy because that is not case.”
There is an important and up to a certain extent new teaching here: education in the first infancy given to a incarnate by a discarnate Spirt. Certain scientists would certainly discard this as a puerile and without importance fact, or would explain it by a super excitation of the brain that momentarily expand the senses, because that is how they explain all mediumistic faculties. Undoubtedly in certain cases one could conceive the exaltation in an adult whose imagination grows in proportion to what that person sees or hear, but one could not understand what could excite the brain of a three year old that sleeps. Here we have a fact that is inexplicable by that theory while it finds a logical and natural explanation in Spiritism. Spiritism does not disdain any fact, however insignificant it may appear to be. It watches, observes and studies them all. That is how the Spiritist science progresses, as the facts present themselves to confirm or complete the theory. If those facts contradict Spiritism another explanation is thought for that.
A letter dated December 30th, 1864 sent by a friend of the family says this:
“The Spirits said that a crisis, determined by a violent shock, an extreme emotion will free the child from the numbness of his faculties. They told the truth. The crisis took place by a violent shock and here is how. The child triggered a terrible fall of his grandmother, in which she almost had her head broken, smashing the child. From that moment on the child surprises the parents every time now by saying whole phrases, like for example: watch out mommy, you may fall.”
The articulation of the letters during the boys’ sleep was evidently a mediumistic effect since it resulted from the exercise that the Spirit carried out with him. In a future session of the Society in which the issue was not being discussed, a spontaneous dissertation was given, confirming and developing that kind of mediumship as follows next.
“One of my daughters has a three year old boy that has been the source of a lot of concern to her since his birth. By the end of last August his heath was reestablished but he still walked with difficulty and spoke papa, mommy but the rest of his language was a series of inarticulate sounds. About a month ago and after unsuccessful attempts for having him saying the most usual words, my daughter was in bed feeling really sorry for that kind of mutism, particularly devastated for the fact that her husband, long time captain, was about to return home, after a more than a year long absence, and would still find no improvement in his son’s ability to speak, when at 5 am she was woken up by the child’s voice that distinctly said the letters A, B, C, D that she had never tried to have him saying. Believing to be daydreaming she sat on the bed inclining her head to the cradle, near the sleeping child that she heard repeating out loud several times the letters A, B, C marked by a slight movement of the head and after a short interval he would say D with an accent. I entered the room about 6am while the child was still asleep but the sleepless mother was very happy and moved for having heard her son pronouncing those letters. When the boy woke up and from that moment we uselessly tried to have him saying those letters (that he had never heard before, at least in this life), all of our attempts were in vain. Even today he says A and B but it has been impossible to have him saying C and D like more than two sounds, one from the throat, the other nasal, that in no way resembled those letters that we wanted him to say. Isn’t that the proof that the boy had already lived? I stop here since I do not feel instructed enough to dare conclude. I need to learn more and read all about Spiritism but not to convince me; Spiritism answers everything or at least almost everything; but I repeat Sir I do not know enough. That will come for I wish so. God that has never abandoned me since I widowed sixteen years ago; God that helped me to educate my children and conduct them; God that has my full faith will provide with what I lack because I wait and ask with my heart to allow the good Spirits to enlighten and guide me on the good path. Pray for me also, Sir; my thoughts are with you and above all I wish to walk the good path.”
This, no doubt, is the result of previously acquired knowledge. If there is an innate aptitude it is the one revealed during the sleep of the body when nothing could have developed it during the vigil state. If the ideas were the result of matter why a new idea shows up when matter is benumbed whereas it is not only null but impossible to express when the organs are in full activity? Hence the primary cause cannot be in matter. That is how materialism continuously clashes with problems for which it cannot give solution. For a theory to be true it must not be belied by any fact. Spiritism does not formulate any theory prematurely unless it is done hypothetically in which case it avoids giving that as an absolute truth, only providing it as matter for study. That is why it marches steadfast. In the case above since it is evident that the Spirit did not learn during the vigil state he may have learned elsewhere what he says during the sleep. If it were not in this life it was on another one and even more, in an earthly life in which he spoke French for he pronounces letters in French. How can those that deny the plurality the existences or reincarnation on Earth explain the fact? But what there still needs to be learned is why he cannot articulate in vigil what he does in the sleep. Here is the explanation given by a Spirit at the Parisian Society:
November 24th, 1864 – medium Mrs. Cazemajour
“It is an intelligence that could be still veiled for some time through the physical suffering of reincarnation to which the Spirit had great difficulty in accepting and that has temporarily annihilated his faculties. But his guide helps him with kind solicitude allowing him to leave that state through his advices, encouragement and lessons that he gives him during the sleep, lessons that will not be lost and that will be effective when the phase of numbness is over, something that will be determined by a violent shock of extreme commotion. For that it is necessary a struggle of this kind. It is necessary to wait but not fear idiocy because that is not case.”
There is an important and up to a certain extent new teaching here: education in the first infancy given to a incarnate by a discarnate Spirt. Certain scientists would certainly discard this as a puerile and without importance fact, or would explain it by a super excitation of the brain that momentarily expand the senses, because that is how they explain all mediumistic faculties. Undoubtedly in certain cases one could conceive the exaltation in an adult whose imagination grows in proportion to what that person sees or hear, but one could not understand what could excite the brain of a three year old that sleeps. Here we have a fact that is inexplicable by that theory while it finds a logical and natural explanation in Spiritism. Spiritism does not disdain any fact, however insignificant it may appear to be. It watches, observes and studies them all. That is how the Spiritist science progresses, as the facts present themselves to confirm or complete the theory. If those facts contradict Spiritism another explanation is thought for that.
A letter dated December 30th, 1864 sent by a friend of the family says this:
“The Spirits said that a crisis, determined by a violent shock, an extreme emotion will free the child from the numbness of his faculties. They told the truth. The crisis took place by a violent shock and here is how. The child triggered a terrible fall of his grandmother, in which she almost had her head broken, smashing the child. From that moment on the child surprises the parents every time now by saying whole phrases, like for example: watch out mommy, you may fall.”
The articulation of the letters during the boys’ sleep was evidently a mediumistic effect since it resulted from the exercise that the Spirit carried out with him. In a future session of the Society in which the issue was not being discussed, a spontaneous dissertation was given, confirming and developing that kind of mediumship as follows next.
Mediumship in the infancy
Parisian Society, January 6th, 1865 – medium Mr. Delanne
When the Spirit is just incarnate, after being prepared by the guardian angel, establishing the groundwork for the endurance of new trials for one’s own betterment, the mysterious links that unit the Spirit to the body, to manifest its terrestrial action, begin to establish. This contains a whole study that I will not elaborate on now. I will only speak of the role and disposition of the Spirit during the infancy in the cradle.
The action of the Spirit upon matter in that period of physical vegetation is little noticeable. The spiritual guides, therefore, take advantage of that period in which the physical part does not require the intelligent participation of the Spirit to prepare the latter and give the Spirit encouragement in the good resolutions that impregnate the soul. It is in those moments of detachment that the Spirit, leaving the state of confusion that was necessary for the present incarnation, understands and remembers the commitment made towards moral betterment. That is when the protector Spirits assist and help you to recognize yourselves. Consequently, study the face of a sleeping baby. You will see that many times sleeping to the angels, as they commonly say, an expression that is truer than people think. The child, in fact, smiles to the Spirits that surround her and that must guide her. Watch that little one awake. The eyes are staring, seemingly recognizing friendly creatures, mumbling words with happy gestures, apparently addressing beloved faces. And since God does not abandon his creatures, those same Spirits will later on give that child health instructions, be it in their sleep or by inspiration, in their vigil state. From that you can see that every creature has the gift of mediumship, at least in an embryonic state.
The infancy, per se, is a long series of mediumistic effects and if, later on, children a little bit older and with more strength, were not afraid of the images of those first hours, you would be able to attest such effects in a much better way.
Keep on with your studies, and like grown children, you will be more enlightened everyday if you are not adamant in keeping your eyes closed to what surrounds you.
A protector Spirit
The action of the Spirit upon matter in that period of physical vegetation is little noticeable. The spiritual guides, therefore, take advantage of that period in which the physical part does not require the intelligent participation of the Spirit to prepare the latter and give the Spirit encouragement in the good resolutions that impregnate the soul. It is in those moments of detachment that the Spirit, leaving the state of confusion that was necessary for the present incarnation, understands and remembers the commitment made towards moral betterment. That is when the protector Spirits assist and help you to recognize yourselves. Consequently, study the face of a sleeping baby. You will see that many times sleeping to the angels, as they commonly say, an expression that is truer than people think. The child, in fact, smiles to the Spirits that surround her and that must guide her. Watch that little one awake. The eyes are staring, seemingly recognizing friendly creatures, mumbling words with happy gestures, apparently addressing beloved faces. And since God does not abandon his creatures, those same Spirits will later on give that child health instructions, be it in their sleep or by inspiration, in their vigil state. From that you can see that every creature has the gift of mediumship, at least in an embryonic state.
The infancy, per se, is a long series of mediumistic effects and if, later on, children a little bit older and with more strength, were not afraid of the images of those first hours, you would be able to attest such effects in a much better way.
Keep on with your studies, and like grown children, you will be more enlightened everyday if you are not adamant in keeping your eyes closed to what surrounds you.
A protector Spirit
Questions and Issues
Mediumistic masterpieces
Why don’t the Spirits of the great geniuses that were renowned on Earth produce masterpieces through mediumship, as they did when alive and considering that they did not lose anything in intelligence?
That question is at the same time one of those whose solution interests the Spiritist science, as a matter of study, and an objection opposed by certain deniers to the reality of the manifestations. “Such superior art work, they say, would be a proper proof of identity to convince the most reluctant one, whereas the mediumistic production signed by the most illustrious names is hardly positioned above vulgarity. Up until now there hasn’t been any fundamental work that can be close to the great scholars and great artists. When I see, some add, the Spirit of Homer bringing a new Iliad, Virgil bringing a new Aeneid, Cornelius a new Cid, Beethoven a new symphony in la, or a wise man like Laplace solving one of those uselessly sought resolutions like the quadrature of the circle, for example, I will then be able to believe in the reality of the Spirits. But how do you want me to believe when I see seriously signed works by Racine with poetries that a fourth grader student could correct; the attribution of badly finalized verses, without soul and salt, attributed to Béranger, or lending the language of a cook to Voltaire and Chateaubriand?”
There is a serious side in that objection contained in the last part but that does not indicate less ignorance about the fundamental principles of Spiritism. If those that make such objection did not judge it, before they had studied it, they would spare themselves a useless task.
It is a known fact that the identity of the Spirits is one of the great difficulties of practical Spiritism. It cannot be considered positively unless it is done to contemporary Spirits whose character and habits are known. They are then revealed by a number of particulars, in facts and language that would not leave room for any doubt. These are the ones whose identities are more interesting to us for the links that we have with them. Frequently a sign, a word is enough to attest their presence and these details are the more significant the more similarity is found in the series of familiar conversations that we have with the Spirits. Besides, we must consider that the closer the Spirits are to us, since their earthly death, the lesser they will have changed in character, habits and personal ideas that they made known to us.
That is different with respect to Spirits that somehow are only known through History. For those there is no material proof of identity; there could be presumption but not absolute certainty of personality. The more the Spirits are away from us considering the time in which they lived, the less the certainty since their ideas and character may have modified with time.
Second, those that achieved a certain elevation form a family of similar by their thoughts and by the degree of advancement; we are far from knowing all of their members. If one of them communicates he will utilize a name known to us, as an indication of his category. If, for example, Plato is evoked it is possible that he responds to the appeal but if he cannot, a Spirit of the same class will respond in his name. This Spirit will be his thought but not his individuality. That is what one needs to understand well.
As a matter of fact the superior Spirits come to instruct us. Their absolute identity is secondary. What they say is good or bad, rational or illogical, worthy or undeserving of the signature, and that is the whole issue. In the first case it is accepted; in the second it is rejected as apocryphal.
Here enters a big obstacle with the meddling of frivolous and ignorant Spirits that decorate themselves with great names to have their foolishness and utopias accepted. In this case the distinction requires caution, observation and almost always special knowledge. In order to assess something one must have competency. How can someone that is not educated in literature and poetry appreciate the qualities and defects of communications of that kind? Ignorance in this case make take emphasis, flowery language and sound words that hide the emptiness of ideas by sublime beauties; it cannot identify the particular genius of the writer to assess what can or what cannot be from him. Consequently we frequently see mediums that are proud of receiving verses with the signature of Racine, Voltaire or Béranger having no difficulty in considering them authentic, however bad they may be. Happy are those that do not get upset with persons that allow themselves to question those productions.
We therefore consider perfectly fair the criticism that opposes similar things because such criticism is in agreement with our opinion. The error is not with Spiritism but with those that very easily accept what comes from the Spirits. If those that have transformed this into a weapon against the Doctrine had studied it before they would know what the Doctrine admits, not attributing to the Doctrine what it rejects nor the exaggerations of a blind and unthoughtful credulity. The mistake is even greater when they publish things with known names, unworthy of the origin that are attributed to them. That is the same as offering an unguarded flank to founded criticism, damaging Spiritism.
One must know that rational Spiritism absolutely does not sponsor such productions and does not bear responsibility for publications carried out with more enthusiasm than caution.
Do the uncertainty about the identity of the Spirits, in certain cases, and the frequency of meddling of frivolous Spirits prove anything against the reality of the manifestations? Not at all because the fact of the manifestations is as well proven by inferior Spirits as it is by the superior ones. The abundance of the former demonstrates the moral inferiority of our planet and the need to work for our betterment, leaving it behind as soon as possible.
There still remains the main question: Why don’t the Spirits of geniuses produce masterpieces in mediumistic way?
Before anything else we must see the utility of things. What good would that do? People will say that it would convince the incredulous. But when we see them resisting to the most tangible evidence, a masterpiece would not be better to convince them about the existence of the Spirits because they would attribute it to the super excitation of the brain. A familiar Spirit, a father, a mother, a son, a friend that comes to reveal unknown circumstances to the medium, that comes to say words that touch the heart say much more than a masterpiece that could have come from one’s own brain. Doesn’t a crying father, that attests the presence and love of a missing son, become more convinced than if Homer had come to bring a new Iliad or Racine a new Phaedra? Why then requesting prodigies of power from them that would be more astonishing than convincing, when they reveal themselves by thousands of private signs to everybody?
The Spirits seek to convince the crowds and not this or that individual because the opinion of the masses makes law whereas the individuals are lost units in the multitude. That is why they give little importance to the stubborn ones that want to take it by force. They know well that sooner or later they will have to bow before the force of public opinion. The Spirits yield to the caprices of no one. They employ the means of their choice to be convincing, according to the individuals and circumstances. Too bad for those that are not happy with that; their time will come later. That is also why we tell the followers: Be with the people of good faith because you will not fail, but do not waste your time with the blind ones that do not wish to see and the deaf that do not wish to hear. Is that a lack of charity? No, because this is just a delay to them. While wasting your time with them you miss the opportunity of giving consolation to many others in need and that would gladly accept the bread of life that you offer. In addition consider that the refractory ones, that resist to your words and the proofs that you give them, will one day give in to the ascendant of public opinion that will form around them. Their self-love will suffer less with that.
The theme of the masterpieces is connected to the principle that governs the relationships between incarnate and discarnate. Its solution depends on the knowledge of that principle. Below the answers given about it at the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies.
January 6th, 1865 – medium Sr. d’Ambel
“There are mediums that, thanks to their previous acquisitions and by their particular studies carried out in the present existence, became more capable or if not more useful than the others. The moral issue plays no role here; it is a simple question of intellectual capacity. But one must not ignore the fact that there aren’t many of these mediums and that if they receive messages of an elevated order it must be beneficial to them only. More than one masterpiece of art and literature is the product of an unconscious mediumship. Without that where would the inspiration come from? You dare say that the communications received by Delphine de Girardin, Auguste Vaquerie and others were up to what one would expect from the Spirits that communicated with them. On those occasions, unfortunately very rare in Spiritism, the souls that wanted to communicate had good, excellent instruments in their hands, or even better, mediums whose intellectual capacity provided all the elements of words and thoughts needed to the manifestation of the inspiring Spirits. Now, in the majority of the cases when the Spirits communicate, the great Spirits I mean, they are far from having at hand the elements necessary to the emission of their thoughts in the same way as they would have done when alive. Is that a reason for not receiving their instructions? Certainly not because if the form is sometimes lacking the substance is always worthy of the signee of the communications. Besides, these are disputes of words. Does the communication exist or not? That is all. If it does exist never mind the Spirit and the name that is taken! If they do not exist it is even less important to worry about that. The Spirits work to convince; when they don’t, it is an unimportant inconvenience; it only happens because the incarnate is not yet prepared to be convinced. Nonetheless, I feel at ease here to affirm that among one hundred of individuals of good faith that experience it themselves or through mediums that are strange to them, more than two thirds become sincere followers of the Spiritist Doctrine, because in these exceptional times the action of the Spirits is not circumscribed to the action of the medium only but it also manifests through a thousand material or spiritual facets upon the one that evokes himself. In short, nothing is absolute and there will be a more fecund, more productive time that the preceding hour. These are in two words my answer to the question raised by your president.”
Erastus
January 20th, 1865 – medium Ms. M.C.
You question is why have the Spirits excelled on Earth by their genius but do not give the mediums communications at the same level as their earthly productions, when in reality they should give superior ones considering the time span since their deaths their knowledge should have grown. Here is the reason:
To make themselves heard the Spirits must act upon the instruments that are at the level of their fluidic resonance. What can a good musician do with a broken instrument? Nothing. Well? Many, if not the majority, of the mediums are imperfect instruments to us. You need to understand that everything requires similarity, be it with the spiritual fluids be it with the material ones. In order for the superior Spirits to communicate with you they require mediums capable of vibrating with them in synchronization; in the same way with the physical manifestations, it is necessary that the incarnate have the same type of material fluids as the Spirits in erraticity that still have action upon matter. Hence, Galileo cannot really manifest but through an Astronomer capable of understanding him and transmitting astronomical data without mistakes; Alfred de Musset and other poets will need a medium that loves and understand poetry; Beethoven and Mozart will seek musicians worthy of transcribing their musical thoughts; the instructor Spirits that unveil to you the secrets of nature, secrets that a little known or still ignored, need mediums that have already understood the magnetic effect and that have studied mediumship well.
You must understand, my friends, that you don’t order an outfit from a hat maker nor your hair style to a tailor. You need to understand that we need good interpreters and that some of us, for not finding such interpreters, deny communication. But the place is then taken. Do not forget that frivolous Spirits are in large number and that they take advantage of your faculties with so much facility as so many among you, proud by receiving notable signatures, not much concerned with investigating the true source, confronting what is obtained with which should have be obtained. General rule: when you want a mathematician do not address a dancer.
A protector Spirit
Observation: This communication rests on a true principle that perfectly addresses the issue from a scientific point of view but that could not be taken in a more absolute sense. At first sight the principle seems to contradict the so many examples of mediums that deal with subjects beyond their knowledge, apparently implying that the superior Spirits could only communicate with mediums at their level.
Well, this can only apply to special matters and of a high importance. It is conceivable that if Galileo wants to treat a scientific issue; if a great poet wants to dictate a poetic work they have the need of an instrument that responds to their thoughts but that does not mean that to handle other subjects, a simple moral issue for example, a good advice to be given, they won’t need a medium that is a scientist or a poet. When a medium easily handles matters of superior importance that are alien to them it is an indication that the Spirit of the medium has an innate development and latent faculties, beyond the education that was received.
Why don’t the Spirits of the great geniuses that were renowned on Earth produce masterpieces through mediumship, as they did when alive and considering that they did not lose anything in intelligence?
That question is at the same time one of those whose solution interests the Spiritist science, as a matter of study, and an objection opposed by certain deniers to the reality of the manifestations. “Such superior art work, they say, would be a proper proof of identity to convince the most reluctant one, whereas the mediumistic production signed by the most illustrious names is hardly positioned above vulgarity. Up until now there hasn’t been any fundamental work that can be close to the great scholars and great artists. When I see, some add, the Spirit of Homer bringing a new Iliad, Virgil bringing a new Aeneid, Cornelius a new Cid, Beethoven a new symphony in la, or a wise man like Laplace solving one of those uselessly sought resolutions like the quadrature of the circle, for example, I will then be able to believe in the reality of the Spirits. But how do you want me to believe when I see seriously signed works by Racine with poetries that a fourth grader student could correct; the attribution of badly finalized verses, without soul and salt, attributed to Béranger, or lending the language of a cook to Voltaire and Chateaubriand?”
There is a serious side in that objection contained in the last part but that does not indicate less ignorance about the fundamental principles of Spiritism. If those that make such objection did not judge it, before they had studied it, they would spare themselves a useless task.
It is a known fact that the identity of the Spirits is one of the great difficulties of practical Spiritism. It cannot be considered positively unless it is done to contemporary Spirits whose character and habits are known. They are then revealed by a number of particulars, in facts and language that would not leave room for any doubt. These are the ones whose identities are more interesting to us for the links that we have with them. Frequently a sign, a word is enough to attest their presence and these details are the more significant the more similarity is found in the series of familiar conversations that we have with the Spirits. Besides, we must consider that the closer the Spirits are to us, since their earthly death, the lesser they will have changed in character, habits and personal ideas that they made known to us.
That is different with respect to Spirits that somehow are only known through History. For those there is no material proof of identity; there could be presumption but not absolute certainty of personality. The more the Spirits are away from us considering the time in which they lived, the less the certainty since their ideas and character may have modified with time.
Second, those that achieved a certain elevation form a family of similar by their thoughts and by the degree of advancement; we are far from knowing all of their members. If one of them communicates he will utilize a name known to us, as an indication of his category. If, for example, Plato is evoked it is possible that he responds to the appeal but if he cannot, a Spirit of the same class will respond in his name. This Spirit will be his thought but not his individuality. That is what one needs to understand well.
As a matter of fact the superior Spirits come to instruct us. Their absolute identity is secondary. What they say is good or bad, rational or illogical, worthy or undeserving of the signature, and that is the whole issue. In the first case it is accepted; in the second it is rejected as apocryphal.
Here enters a big obstacle with the meddling of frivolous and ignorant Spirits that decorate themselves with great names to have their foolishness and utopias accepted. In this case the distinction requires caution, observation and almost always special knowledge. In order to assess something one must have competency. How can someone that is not educated in literature and poetry appreciate the qualities and defects of communications of that kind? Ignorance in this case make take emphasis, flowery language and sound words that hide the emptiness of ideas by sublime beauties; it cannot identify the particular genius of the writer to assess what can or what cannot be from him. Consequently we frequently see mediums that are proud of receiving verses with the signature of Racine, Voltaire or Béranger having no difficulty in considering them authentic, however bad they may be. Happy are those that do not get upset with persons that allow themselves to question those productions.
We therefore consider perfectly fair the criticism that opposes similar things because such criticism is in agreement with our opinion. The error is not with Spiritism but with those that very easily accept what comes from the Spirits. If those that have transformed this into a weapon against the Doctrine had studied it before they would know what the Doctrine admits, not attributing to the Doctrine what it rejects nor the exaggerations of a blind and unthoughtful credulity. The mistake is even greater when they publish things with known names, unworthy of the origin that are attributed to them. That is the same as offering an unguarded flank to founded criticism, damaging Spiritism.
One must know that rational Spiritism absolutely does not sponsor such productions and does not bear responsibility for publications carried out with more enthusiasm than caution.
Do the uncertainty about the identity of the Spirits, in certain cases, and the frequency of meddling of frivolous Spirits prove anything against the reality of the manifestations? Not at all because the fact of the manifestations is as well proven by inferior Spirits as it is by the superior ones. The abundance of the former demonstrates the moral inferiority of our planet and the need to work for our betterment, leaving it behind as soon as possible.
There still remains the main question: Why don’t the Spirits of geniuses produce masterpieces in mediumistic way?
Before anything else we must see the utility of things. What good would that do? People will say that it would convince the incredulous. But when we see them resisting to the most tangible evidence, a masterpiece would not be better to convince them about the existence of the Spirits because they would attribute it to the super excitation of the brain. A familiar Spirit, a father, a mother, a son, a friend that comes to reveal unknown circumstances to the medium, that comes to say words that touch the heart say much more than a masterpiece that could have come from one’s own brain. Doesn’t a crying father, that attests the presence and love of a missing son, become more convinced than if Homer had come to bring a new Iliad or Racine a new Phaedra? Why then requesting prodigies of power from them that would be more astonishing than convincing, when they reveal themselves by thousands of private signs to everybody?
The Spirits seek to convince the crowds and not this or that individual because the opinion of the masses makes law whereas the individuals are lost units in the multitude. That is why they give little importance to the stubborn ones that want to take it by force. They know well that sooner or later they will have to bow before the force of public opinion. The Spirits yield to the caprices of no one. They employ the means of their choice to be convincing, according to the individuals and circumstances. Too bad for those that are not happy with that; their time will come later. That is also why we tell the followers: Be with the people of good faith because you will not fail, but do not waste your time with the blind ones that do not wish to see and the deaf that do not wish to hear. Is that a lack of charity? No, because this is just a delay to them. While wasting your time with them you miss the opportunity of giving consolation to many others in need and that would gladly accept the bread of life that you offer. In addition consider that the refractory ones, that resist to your words and the proofs that you give them, will one day give in to the ascendant of public opinion that will form around them. Their self-love will suffer less with that.
The theme of the masterpieces is connected to the principle that governs the relationships between incarnate and discarnate. Its solution depends on the knowledge of that principle. Below the answers given about it at the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies.
January 6th, 1865 – medium Sr. d’Ambel
“There are mediums that, thanks to their previous acquisitions and by their particular studies carried out in the present existence, became more capable or if not more useful than the others. The moral issue plays no role here; it is a simple question of intellectual capacity. But one must not ignore the fact that there aren’t many of these mediums and that if they receive messages of an elevated order it must be beneficial to them only. More than one masterpiece of art and literature is the product of an unconscious mediumship. Without that where would the inspiration come from? You dare say that the communications received by Delphine de Girardin, Auguste Vaquerie and others were up to what one would expect from the Spirits that communicated with them. On those occasions, unfortunately very rare in Spiritism, the souls that wanted to communicate had good, excellent instruments in their hands, or even better, mediums whose intellectual capacity provided all the elements of words and thoughts needed to the manifestation of the inspiring Spirits. Now, in the majority of the cases when the Spirits communicate, the great Spirits I mean, they are far from having at hand the elements necessary to the emission of their thoughts in the same way as they would have done when alive. Is that a reason for not receiving their instructions? Certainly not because if the form is sometimes lacking the substance is always worthy of the signee of the communications. Besides, these are disputes of words. Does the communication exist or not? That is all. If it does exist never mind the Spirit and the name that is taken! If they do not exist it is even less important to worry about that. The Spirits work to convince; when they don’t, it is an unimportant inconvenience; it only happens because the incarnate is not yet prepared to be convinced. Nonetheless, I feel at ease here to affirm that among one hundred of individuals of good faith that experience it themselves or through mediums that are strange to them, more than two thirds become sincere followers of the Spiritist Doctrine, because in these exceptional times the action of the Spirits is not circumscribed to the action of the medium only but it also manifests through a thousand material or spiritual facets upon the one that evokes himself. In short, nothing is absolute and there will be a more fecund, more productive time that the preceding hour. These are in two words my answer to the question raised by your president.”
Erastus
January 20th, 1865 – medium Ms. M.C.
You question is why have the Spirits excelled on Earth by their genius but do not give the mediums communications at the same level as their earthly productions, when in reality they should give superior ones considering the time span since their deaths their knowledge should have grown. Here is the reason:
To make themselves heard the Spirits must act upon the instruments that are at the level of their fluidic resonance. What can a good musician do with a broken instrument? Nothing. Well? Many, if not the majority, of the mediums are imperfect instruments to us. You need to understand that everything requires similarity, be it with the spiritual fluids be it with the material ones. In order for the superior Spirits to communicate with you they require mediums capable of vibrating with them in synchronization; in the same way with the physical manifestations, it is necessary that the incarnate have the same type of material fluids as the Spirits in erraticity that still have action upon matter. Hence, Galileo cannot really manifest but through an Astronomer capable of understanding him and transmitting astronomical data without mistakes; Alfred de Musset and other poets will need a medium that loves and understand poetry; Beethoven and Mozart will seek musicians worthy of transcribing their musical thoughts; the instructor Spirits that unveil to you the secrets of nature, secrets that a little known or still ignored, need mediums that have already understood the magnetic effect and that have studied mediumship well.
You must understand, my friends, that you don’t order an outfit from a hat maker nor your hair style to a tailor. You need to understand that we need good interpreters and that some of us, for not finding such interpreters, deny communication. But the place is then taken. Do not forget that frivolous Spirits are in large number and that they take advantage of your faculties with so much facility as so many among you, proud by receiving notable signatures, not much concerned with investigating the true source, confronting what is obtained with which should have be obtained. General rule: when you want a mathematician do not address a dancer.
A protector Spirit
Observation: This communication rests on a true principle that perfectly addresses the issue from a scientific point of view but that could not be taken in a more absolute sense. At first sight the principle seems to contradict the so many examples of mediums that deal with subjects beyond their knowledge, apparently implying that the superior Spirits could only communicate with mediums at their level.
Well, this can only apply to special matters and of a high importance. It is conceivable that if Galileo wants to treat a scientific issue; if a great poet wants to dictate a poetic work they have the need of an instrument that responds to their thoughts but that does not mean that to handle other subjects, a simple moral issue for example, a good advice to be given, they won’t need a medium that is a scientist or a poet. When a medium easily handles matters of superior importance that are alien to them it is an indication that the Spirit of the medium has an innate development and latent faculties, beyond the education that was received.
Ramanenjana
What is Ramanenjana?
The “Annales de la propagacion de la foi”, Septembre 1864, #216, contain a detailed report of events that took place in Tananarive, Madagascar, during the year of 1863, among others that of the death of King Radama II. We find the following story there:
“The most serious event that took place in Tananarive in 1863 is, without doubt, the death of Radama II. But before telling the story of the tragic end of that unfortunate prince it is necessary to remember another event that had almost the same repercussion of the first one, that was witnessed by more than two hundred thousand men and that may be seen as a prelude or prologue of the attempt to the life of the poor Radama. I want to mention the Ramanenjana.”
This word means tension and expresses a strange disease that first broke out in the South of Emirne. One month earlier people heard about it in Tananarive. It seems certain that numerous groups of men and women affected by the mysterious illness moved from the South to the Capital to speak to the King, from the part of his mother, the deceased Queen. People said that those groups traveled short distances, each night camping in the villages and increasing in number along the way, with all that were claimed on their path. But nobody thought that the Ramanenjana was so close to the royal city when it suddenly showed up, a few days before Palm Sunday.
Here is what they wrote to us about it:
“When we thought that it was still too far away, Ramanenjana or Ramena-bé as others call it, fell like a bomb. The only rumors in town are about convulsions and Convulsionaries. They are all over the place; their number estimated in more than two thousands. At this time they are camped in Machamasina, champ de Mars near the Capital. The noise they make is so much that we cannot sleep. Imagine the volume of that noise that can disturb our sleep more than four kilometers away! On Holy Tuesday a great review was supposed to take place in Soanerana. When the drums were played more than a thousand soldier suddenly left their ranks and started to dance to the Ramanenjana. Regardless of how much the leaders screamed and threatened the soldiers, they had to renounce the review.”
Characteristics of Ramanenjana?
“The disease affects specially the nerve system upon which it exerts such a pressure that soon provokes convulsions and hallucinations that can only be identified by science. Sick people initially feel splitting headaches, pain in neck followed by the stomach. After a while the convulsive fits begin; that is when the living ones enter into communication with the dead: they see Queen Ranavalona, Radama I, Adrian Ampoinemerina and others that speak with them and give them things to do. The majority of the messages are addressed to Radama II. The Ramanenjana seem specially deputies by the old Ranavalone, to indicate Radama that he must return to the old system, stop the prayers, fire the whites, prohibit pigs in the sacred city, etc.; otherwise big problems threat him and that she will be renegade him as her son.
Another effect of those hallucinations is that the majority of those that are affected imagine themselves carrying heavy loads and following the dead; imagine also a box of soap or a safe on their heads, a mattress, a rifle, keys, silver bows, etc. The apparitions must move really fast because the unfortunate ones that obey them make a real effort to follow them, always in a fast pace.
They did not receive their beyond the grave missions earlier because they dance, scream, ask for grace, agitate their heads and arms, shaking the tip of the lamba[1] or a piece of cloth that covers their body. Then they throw themselves, always shouting, dancing, jumping and agitating convulsively. Their most common shout is: Ekala! And also this one: Izahay maikia (we are in a hurry). Most of the time a crowd follows them singing, clapping their hands and playing drums. They say that it is to agitate them even more and to speed up the end of the crisis like the horseman that loosens up the reins of the impetuous horse, and far from trying to stop it the rider stimulates the horse with screams and spurs until it trembles under the conducting hands, snorting, covered in sweat and stopping on its own, exhausted.
Although the disease affects the slaves in particular, it spares nobody. That is how a son of Radama and Maria, his concubine, suddenly fell victim of the hallucinations of Ramanenjana, screaming, agitating, dancing and running like the others.
In the beginning, at the first moment of horror, the King himself chased him but with the precipitation of the run he got one leg hurt, giving then orders to have a saddled horse just in case of a new accident.
The rush of those barbarians has nothing of well determined. Once impelled by God knows which kind of irresistible force they spread in the field, some to one side, and others to another. Before Easter they used to go to the tombs where they danced and offered a coin. But on the very Palm Day, coincidently, a new fashion seemed to have gained their preference: going to the lower side of town and cut a sugar cane plant. They carry it triumphantly on their shoulder and deposit it onto the sacred stone of Mahamasin, as a tribute to Ranavalona. Then they dance, agitate with all sorts of usual convulsions and contortions; then they deposit the cane and a coin and return running, dancing, and jumping as they came. Some take a bottle of water on their heads to drink and refresh, and something amazing! Despite all the agitation and convulsions the bottle remains balanced; one would say that they are glued to the skull.
A new fantasy has taken them over, we heard, the demand for people to take their hats off when they pass by. Unfortunate the ones that refuse to obey, however absurd it may be. Many fights resulted from that already and the poor Radama believed to be able to stop with the imposition of a 150 francs fine to those that did not abide. To avoid breaching the new kind of royal determination the majority of the whites decided to go out without their hats. One of our vicars was exposed to a much more serious situation. They wanted nothing less from him than taking his soutane off since the Ramanenjana pretended that the black color would obfuscate them. Fortunately the priest was able to escape and get home without the need to go shirtless.
The fits of the Convulsionaries are not continuous. Many, after having done their pirouettes before the sacred stone to which they make the heir of the throne climb to have him introduced to the people, throw themselves to the water and then return calmly to rest until the new crisis. Others sometimes fall exhausted on their path or in the streets, falling asleep and waking up cured. There are those that remain sick for two or three days before they are completely freed. Sometimes the sickness is tenacious and stays on for something like fifteen days.
During the crisis the individual that is taken by Ramanenjana recognizes no one. Almost does not respond questions addressed to him. After the crisis they vaguely remember something, like in a dream.
A remarkable particularity is that amidst their most tiring evolutions, their hands and feet are cold like ice whereas the rest of the body sweats in profusion and the head in on fire.
Now, what could be the cause of such a singular disease? Everybody is in agreement here. Several simply attribute it to the devil that revealed itself like before in the turning, thinking tables, etc. That is why many resigned to go without hats to avoid revering such diabolic majesty.”
[1] traditional garment worn by men and women that live in Madagascar (TN)
“The most serious event that took place in Tananarive in 1863 is, without doubt, the death of Radama II. But before telling the story of the tragic end of that unfortunate prince it is necessary to remember another event that had almost the same repercussion of the first one, that was witnessed by more than two hundred thousand men and that may be seen as a prelude or prologue of the attempt to the life of the poor Radama. I want to mention the Ramanenjana.”
This word means tension and expresses a strange disease that first broke out in the South of Emirne. One month earlier people heard about it in Tananarive. It seems certain that numerous groups of men and women affected by the mysterious illness moved from the South to the Capital to speak to the King, from the part of his mother, the deceased Queen. People said that those groups traveled short distances, each night camping in the villages and increasing in number along the way, with all that were claimed on their path. But nobody thought that the Ramanenjana was so close to the royal city when it suddenly showed up, a few days before Palm Sunday.
Here is what they wrote to us about it:
“When we thought that it was still too far away, Ramanenjana or Ramena-bé as others call it, fell like a bomb. The only rumors in town are about convulsions and Convulsionaries. They are all over the place; their number estimated in more than two thousands. At this time they are camped in Machamasina, champ de Mars near the Capital. The noise they make is so much that we cannot sleep. Imagine the volume of that noise that can disturb our sleep more than four kilometers away! On Holy Tuesday a great review was supposed to take place in Soanerana. When the drums were played more than a thousand soldier suddenly left their ranks and started to dance to the Ramanenjana. Regardless of how much the leaders screamed and threatened the soldiers, they had to renounce the review.”
Characteristics of Ramanenjana?
“The disease affects specially the nerve system upon which it exerts such a pressure that soon provokes convulsions and hallucinations that can only be identified by science. Sick people initially feel splitting headaches, pain in neck followed by the stomach. After a while the convulsive fits begin; that is when the living ones enter into communication with the dead: they see Queen Ranavalona, Radama I, Adrian Ampoinemerina and others that speak with them and give them things to do. The majority of the messages are addressed to Radama II. The Ramanenjana seem specially deputies by the old Ranavalone, to indicate Radama that he must return to the old system, stop the prayers, fire the whites, prohibit pigs in the sacred city, etc.; otherwise big problems threat him and that she will be renegade him as her son.
Another effect of those hallucinations is that the majority of those that are affected imagine themselves carrying heavy loads and following the dead; imagine also a box of soap or a safe on their heads, a mattress, a rifle, keys, silver bows, etc. The apparitions must move really fast because the unfortunate ones that obey them make a real effort to follow them, always in a fast pace.
They did not receive their beyond the grave missions earlier because they dance, scream, ask for grace, agitate their heads and arms, shaking the tip of the lamba[1] or a piece of cloth that covers their body. Then they throw themselves, always shouting, dancing, jumping and agitating convulsively. Their most common shout is: Ekala! And also this one: Izahay maikia (we are in a hurry). Most of the time a crowd follows them singing, clapping their hands and playing drums. They say that it is to agitate them even more and to speed up the end of the crisis like the horseman that loosens up the reins of the impetuous horse, and far from trying to stop it the rider stimulates the horse with screams and spurs until it trembles under the conducting hands, snorting, covered in sweat and stopping on its own, exhausted.
Although the disease affects the slaves in particular, it spares nobody. That is how a son of Radama and Maria, his concubine, suddenly fell victim of the hallucinations of Ramanenjana, screaming, agitating, dancing and running like the others.
In the beginning, at the first moment of horror, the King himself chased him but with the precipitation of the run he got one leg hurt, giving then orders to have a saddled horse just in case of a new accident.
The rush of those barbarians has nothing of well determined. Once impelled by God knows which kind of irresistible force they spread in the field, some to one side, and others to another. Before Easter they used to go to the tombs where they danced and offered a coin. But on the very Palm Day, coincidently, a new fashion seemed to have gained their preference: going to the lower side of town and cut a sugar cane plant. They carry it triumphantly on their shoulder and deposit it onto the sacred stone of Mahamasin, as a tribute to Ranavalona. Then they dance, agitate with all sorts of usual convulsions and contortions; then they deposit the cane and a coin and return running, dancing, and jumping as they came. Some take a bottle of water on their heads to drink and refresh, and something amazing! Despite all the agitation and convulsions the bottle remains balanced; one would say that they are glued to the skull.
A new fantasy has taken them over, we heard, the demand for people to take their hats off when they pass by. Unfortunate the ones that refuse to obey, however absurd it may be. Many fights resulted from that already and the poor Radama believed to be able to stop with the imposition of a 150 francs fine to those that did not abide. To avoid breaching the new kind of royal determination the majority of the whites decided to go out without their hats. One of our vicars was exposed to a much more serious situation. They wanted nothing less from him than taking his soutane off since the Ramanenjana pretended that the black color would obfuscate them. Fortunately the priest was able to escape and get home without the need to go shirtless.
The fits of the Convulsionaries are not continuous. Many, after having done their pirouettes before the sacred stone to which they make the heir of the throne climb to have him introduced to the people, throw themselves to the water and then return calmly to rest until the new crisis. Others sometimes fall exhausted on their path or in the streets, falling asleep and waking up cured. There are those that remain sick for two or three days before they are completely freed. Sometimes the sickness is tenacious and stays on for something like fifteen days.
During the crisis the individual that is taken by Ramanenjana recognizes no one. Almost does not respond questions addressed to him. After the crisis they vaguely remember something, like in a dream.
A remarkable particularity is that amidst their most tiring evolutions, their hands and feet are cold like ice whereas the rest of the body sweats in profusion and the head in on fire.
Now, what could be the cause of such a singular disease? Everybody is in agreement here. Several simply attribute it to the devil that revealed itself like before in the turning, thinking tables, etc. That is why many resigned to go without hats to avoid revering such diabolic majesty.”
[1] traditional garment worn by men and women that live in Madagascar (TN)
Studies about the phenomenon Ramanenjana
It would be a big surprise if the name of Spiritism had not been involved in this case. Much fortunate still the followers for not having been accused of their causers. What people would not have said if those poor Malagasy had read The Spirits’ Book! They would have affirmed that the book had twisted their heads. Who, then, without Spiritism taught them to believe in Spirits and in the communications between the living ones and the soul of the dead? What is in nature is produced so well among the savage as it is with civilized people; with the ignorant as with the wise man and at the village as in town. Since there are Spirits everywhere, manifestations take place all over, with the difference that in those closer to nature pride has not yet stained the intuitive ideas, that are lively and in its whole ingenuity, the reason why naivety based on systems are not found there. They can judge things badly given the limitation of their intelligences, but the belief in the invisible world in them is innate and entertained by facts that they observe. Hence everything demonstrates that there, like in Morzine, the phenomena are the result of a collective obsession or possession, true epidemic of bad Spirits, like it was produced at the time of Jesus and in many other times. Each population must provide similar spirits to the invisible world, who, from space, react to these same populations, whose habits, inclinations, and prejudices have been preserved as a result of their inferiority. The savage and barbarian peoples are thus surrounded by a mass of Spirits still savage and barbarian until progress has led them to incarnate themselves in a more advanced environment. This is the result of the following communication. The report above was read in a private meeting, and one of the spiritual guides of the family spontaneously dictated the following:
Paris, January 12th, 1865 – medium Mrs. Delanne
“Tonight I heard you reading the events of obsession that took place in Madagascar. If you allow, I will give you my opinion about the subject.”
Observation: The Spirit had not been evoked. He was then among us at the Society, hearing what was been said but without being seen. That is how we constantly have unsuspected invisible witnesses to our actions.
“The hallucinations, as the newspaper correspondent calls them, are not but an obsession, although of a different kind compared to the ones you know. Here it is a collective obsession, produced by a group of delayed Spirits, that by preserving their former political views, come to try to disturb their fellow citizens through the manifestations, so that the latter do not dare try to incorporate the new ideas of civilization that begin to implant in countries in which progress begins to shine.
The obsessing Spirits that lead those poor people to so many ridiculous manifestations are those of the former Malagasy that get furious, I repeat, by seeing the inhabitants of those regions admitting the ideas of civilization that some advanced incarnate have the mission of implanting among them. That is why you frequently hear them saying: - No prayers! Done with the whites, etc. You must understand that they are reactive to anything that comes from the Europeans that is the intellectual center.
Aren’t those manifestations, to the eyes of everybody, a confirmation of your principles? They are produced less for the sanction of more or less savage people than to the sanction of your works. The possessions of Morzine have a more particular character, or even better, a more restrictive. One can study the phases of each Spirit on the spot. Observing the details each individuality offers a special study, whereas the manifestations of Madagascar have the spontaneity and character of the national seal. It is a whole population of old and delayed Spirits that see with spite their homeland enduring the impulse of progress. Since they have not progressed they seek to block the course of the Providence.
The Spirits of Morzine are comparatively more advanced. Although brute the assess things better than the Malagasy; distinguish the good from the bad, recognizing that the form of the prayer is nothing but that the thought is everything. In fact you will later see through your studies that they are not as delayed as they seem at first sight. Here it is to demonstrate that science is powerless to heal such cases through its material means. There it is to attract attention and confirm the principle.”
A protector Spirit
Paris, January 12th, 1865 – medium Mrs. Delanne
“Tonight I heard you reading the events of obsession that took place in Madagascar. If you allow, I will give you my opinion about the subject.”
Observation: The Spirit had not been evoked. He was then among us at the Society, hearing what was been said but without being seen. That is how we constantly have unsuspected invisible witnesses to our actions.
“The hallucinations, as the newspaper correspondent calls them, are not but an obsession, although of a different kind compared to the ones you know. Here it is a collective obsession, produced by a group of delayed Spirits, that by preserving their former political views, come to try to disturb their fellow citizens through the manifestations, so that the latter do not dare try to incorporate the new ideas of civilization that begin to implant in countries in which progress begins to shine.
The obsessing Spirits that lead those poor people to so many ridiculous manifestations are those of the former Malagasy that get furious, I repeat, by seeing the inhabitants of those regions admitting the ideas of civilization that some advanced incarnate have the mission of implanting among them. That is why you frequently hear them saying: - No prayers! Done with the whites, etc. You must understand that they are reactive to anything that comes from the Europeans that is the intellectual center.
Aren’t those manifestations, to the eyes of everybody, a confirmation of your principles? They are produced less for the sanction of more or less savage people than to the sanction of your works. The possessions of Morzine have a more particular character, or even better, a more restrictive. One can study the phases of each Spirit on the spot. Observing the details each individuality offers a special study, whereas the manifestations of Madagascar have the spontaneity and character of the national seal. It is a whole population of old and delayed Spirits that see with spite their homeland enduring the impulse of progress. Since they have not progressed they seek to block the course of the Providence.
The Spirits of Morzine are comparatively more advanced. Although brute the assess things better than the Malagasy; distinguish the good from the bad, recognizing that the form of the prayer is nothing but that the thought is everything. In fact you will later see through your studies that they are not as delayed as they seem at first sight. Here it is to demonstrate that science is powerless to heal such cases through its material means. There it is to attract attention and confirm the principle.”
A protector Spirit
Spiritist Poetry
Inspiration of a nonbeliever with respect to The Spirits’ Book
By Dr. Niéger, December 27th, 1864
Like the unfortunate victim of a wreckage
Amidst the debris, swimming for his life,
Broken by fatigue, optimism is vanished,
Seeking land, no longer in sight,
Last hope is praying for his soul;
When suddenly sees through the waves, there is light!
From an unknown land, the edges appear,
The nearly dead strength recovers,
Soon stepping onto the safe hangar,
Promptly sends the Lord a prayer,
Feeling his faith just reborn,
Promises the Savior to his law conform!
That is how I felt when reading your works,
In my devastated chest, courage returns.
Always concerned with unveiling the secrets
Of the human body, only defects I found,
But I had never seen the unknown cause,
Always, always escaping my grasp.
Your book, new horizons to my sight,
Suddenly new objective to my work.
I then saw myself on the wrong path;
From my heart, doubt expelled by faith.
When man leaves the hands of the Creator
It cannot be to fall in disgrace,
For a sacred law of the same God
Governs the fate of the infinite space!
That law is called progress
Around which mankind must unite.
What a wonderful image on brilliant pages
In the book that follows human ages!
Mankind seeking its well-being
First through manual labor.
Instinct is the only guiding
Force that later on becomes the mastermind!
Taken by the sacred fire
The Spirit now inspires,
Leaving behind a defeated evil.
Firmly marches the field
At gigantic strides!
The fragile boat sails
Away, brave men inside
Facing the rage of the waters that unveil.
Success! Waves retrieved
Oceans dominated,
Next come the skies
The old dream to fly.
With the laws of the universe known
Man shall soon dominate the planet,
A new King shown!
That is not the whole endeavor,
Steam is now compressed
And man rides the dragon in vapor!
Hard work in a toy revealed.
The trace of genius is all over,
Death dominated, life is reborn!
The advance seems to be over.
But the inflexible law
Demands even more.
Soon the master of Earth
From the clouds shall claim the thunder
Transforming its fury in docile instrument.
The bolt becomes a humble servant.
Human knowledge sees no bounds.
The universe is the God given grounds.
It is now time to seek, by a personal struggle,
The wonderful relationships between body and soul!
It is up to him, moving away from the beaten path,
To bring up the shine of a diamond unknown,
For so long hidden from his sight.
Let us then raise the glossy symbol
With no delay let us face the great and ample
Mine open to our efforts: love and prayer.
The sacred words on our banner!
Under this aegis, friends, let us continue our work.
If one day we have to succumb to the fight,
Oh Lord, May at least our fall
Inspire our sons with courage and faith,
Ensuring the reign of your law, after all!
Eulogy by Victor Hugo
At the tomb of a young lady
Although this touching funereal prayer had been published by several journals it equally finds space in this Spiritist Review, given the nature of the thoughts that it contains and whose reach can be appreciated by everyone. The paper from which we took it reports the ceremony in the following terms:
“A said ceremony had a crowd gathered last Thursday, painfully touched at the cemetery of the independent, in Guernsey. It was the funeral of a young lady that death caught by surprise during a joyful time in which the family celebrated the wedding of a sister that had married a few days earlier. She was a happy young lady to whom the son of the great poet, Mr. François Hugo, had dedicated the fourteenth volume of his translation of Shakespeare. She died on the eve of the release of that book. As we have just mentioned, the assistance in such funerals was large and sympathetic and it is with a heartfelt sadness and tears dropped by friendship that she heard the last words of farewell, pronounced upon that prematurely open grave by the illustrious exiled of Guernsey, Victor Hugo himself. Here the speech given by the poet:
“In a few weeks we dealt with two sisters. We married one and buried the other. Such is the perpetual movement of life. Let us bow, my brothers, before the severe judgment of destiny but let us bend with hope. Our eyes are made to cry, but to see; our heart is made to suffer, but to believe. Faith in another existence comes out of the capacity of love. Do not forget, those in this life worried and reassured by love, it is the heart that believes. The son intends to find his father; the mother does not consent to losing her child forever. This refusal of nothingness is the greatness of man. Heart cannot be mistaken. Flesh is a dream because it dissipates. If such disappearance were the end of mankind, it would remove any sanction of life. We are not satisfied with this smoke that is matter; we need certainty. Whoever loves, knows and feels that none of the points of support of man is on earth. Love is to live beyond life. Without this faith, no perfect gift of the heart would be possible; love, the goal of man, would be his torment. This paradise would be hell. No! Let's say, no, out loud because the loving creature requires the immortal creature. Heart needs soul. There is a heart in this coffin and this heart is alive. At this very moment it hears my words.
Emily de Putron was the sweet pride of a respectable and patriarchal family. Her friends and loved ones loved her grace; her smile a party to them. She was like a flower of joy blossoming in the house. From the cradle, she was surrounded by kindness, had a happy upbringing and gave back that happiness. A loved person that loved. She has just left.
Where did she go? To the shadows? No. We are the ones in darkness. She? She is in the dawn. She is in glory, truth, reality and reward. These young dead ladies, who did no harm in life, are welcome in the grave, their heads stick slightly out of the tomb to a mysterious crown.
Emily de Putron seeks the supreme serenity up there, the complement of innocent lives. She is gone: youth to eternity; beauty to the ideal; hope to uncertainty; love to infinity; pearl to ocean and Spirit to God.
Go, soul!
The prodigy of this great celestial farewell called death is that those that depart do not move away. They are in a world of clarity, but watch our world of darkness like loving witnesses. They are high up and very close. Oh any of you that has seen a loved one disappearing in the tomb do not believe that you are abandoned. She is always here. More than ever she is closer to you. Presence is the beauty of death. An inexpressible presence of the loved souls, smiling to our eyes covered in tears. The mourned creature disappeared but did not leave. We know longer see their kind face… The dead are invisible but not absent.
Let us be fair with death. Let us not be ungrateful. Death is not an annihilation, as they say, a trap. It is a mistake to believe that here, in the obscurity of the open grave, everything is lost. Everything reunites here. The tomb is a place of restitution. Here the soul recovers infinity; here it recovers its plenitude; here it takes over its mysterious nature; here it is disconnected from the body, disconnected from the burden and disconnected from fatality. Death is the greatest of all freedoms. It is also the greatest of all progresses. Death is the ascension of everything that was lived on a superior level. Dazzling and sacred ascension. Each one receives their addition. Everything transfigures in light and by light. The one that was only honest on Earth becomes beautiful; the one that was only beautiful becomes sublime and the one that was only sublime becomes good.
And how about me, why Am I here? What do I bring to this sump? How dare I speak to death? Who am I? Nothing. I am mistaken, I am something. I am an exile. Forced exile yesterday, voluntary exile today. An exile is a defeated, a slandered, a persecuted, harmed by fate and disinherited by the homeland. An exile is an innocent under the weight of a malediction. His blessings must be good. I bless this tomb.
I bless the noble and gracious creature in this grave. We find oasis in the desert; in the exile we find souls. Emily de Putron was one of those charming found souls. I came to pay her with the debt of a reassured exile. I bless her in the somber depth. In the name of the sufferings upon which she shone kindly; in the name of the atonements of destiny determined to her; in the name of everything that she hoped for in the past and everything that she got today, in the name of everything that she loved, I bless this dead young lady, I bless her in her beauty, in her youth, in her sweetness, in her life and death; and bless her in her white sepulchral dress; in her house that she left devastated; in her coffin, covered in flowers by her mother and that God shall fill with stars!”
There is nothing missing in these remarkable words but the word Spiritism. They are not only the expression of a vague belief in the soul and its survival; even more the cold nothingness, succeeding life, burying forever under the cold mantle of ice the Spirit, the grace, the beauty and qualities of the heart. Neither is it the soul lost in the ocean of infinity called the universal whole. It is effectively the real being, individual, present in our environment, smiling to the loved ones, seeing them, hearing them and talking to them through their thoughts. Nothing more beautiful and truer than these words: “Love is to live beyond life. Without this faith, no perfect gift of the heart would be possible; love, the goal of man, would be his torment. This paradise would be hell. No! Let's say, no, out loud because the loving creature requires the immortal creature. Heart needs soul.”
Which idea of death is fairer than this: “The prodigy of this great celestial farewell called death is that those that depart do not move away. They are in a world of clarity, but watch our world of darkness like loving witnesses. They are high up and very close. Oh any of you that has seen a loved one disappearing in the tomb do not believe that you are abandoned. She is always here. More than ever she is closer to you. Presence is the beauty of death. An inexpressible presence of the loved souls, smiling to our eyes covered in tears. The mourned creature disappeared but did not leave. We know longer see their kind face… The dead are invisible but not absent. Let us be fair with death. Let us not be ungrateful. Death is not an annihilation, as they say, a trap. It is a mistake to believe that here, in the obscurity of the open grave, everything is lost. Everything reunites here. The tomb is a place of restitution. Here the soul recovers infinity; here it recovers its plenitude”.
Isn’t that exactly what is taught by Spiritism? But to those that could believe to be victims of a delusion he adds the sanction of the material fact to the theory by the communication between those that left with the ones that stayed. Why is it then strange to believe that those very creatures by our side, like in an ethereal body, can enter into communication with us? Oh you, skeptical, that laugh at our beliefs, laugh then at these words of the poet-philosopher whose intelligence you know! Would you say that he hallucinates? Would you say that he is mad when believe in the manifestation of the Spirits? Is the person that writes this mad: “Let us have compassion of the punished ones? Ah who are we, ourselves? Who am I, speaking with you? Who are you that listen to me? Where do we come from? Is it certain that we did not do anything before we were born? Earth is similar to a prison. Who knows that mankind is formed by reincident in the breach of the divine justice? Watch life closely. It is such that punishment can be found everywhere.” (The Miserable, Volume 7, Book VII, Chapter 1).
Isn’t that the preexistence of the soul; the reincarnation on Earth, the world of atonement? (See the Imitation of the Gospels, #27, 46 and 47). Those that deny the future, what a strange satisfaction you find in the idea of annihilation of your own being and your loved ones? Oh! You are right by fearing death since for you it is the end of all hopes.
After reading the speech above in the session on January 27th, 1865 at the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, the Spirit of the young Emily de Putron, that undoubtedly heard him and shared the emotion of the assembly, manifested spontaneously through Mrs. Costel, dictating the following words:
“The words of the poet fell onto this assembly like a sonorous breath. They shook the Spirits and evoked my soul that still floats uncertain in the infinity of space! Oh poet, revealer of life, you know death well, for you do not crown with cypress the ones you mourn but you attach to their heads the trembling violets of hope! I passed lightly and fast, just flowering the comforting joys of life, and at the end of the day I was taken away by the shaking bolt that faded away at the heart of the waves.
Oh mother, sister, my friends, great poet! No more crying, but remains alert! The caressing whisper in your ears is mine; the perfume of the withered flower is my breath. I join the great life to better feel your love. We are eternal! What has no beginning cannot end and your genius, oh poet, like the river that flows to the ocean, will fill eternity with the power that is force and love!”
Emily
“A said ceremony had a crowd gathered last Thursday, painfully touched at the cemetery of the independent, in Guernsey. It was the funeral of a young lady that death caught by surprise during a joyful time in which the family celebrated the wedding of a sister that had married a few days earlier. She was a happy young lady to whom the son of the great poet, Mr. François Hugo, had dedicated the fourteenth volume of his translation of Shakespeare. She died on the eve of the release of that book. As we have just mentioned, the assistance in such funerals was large and sympathetic and it is with a heartfelt sadness and tears dropped by friendship that she heard the last words of farewell, pronounced upon that prematurely open grave by the illustrious exiled of Guernsey, Victor Hugo himself. Here the speech given by the poet:
“In a few weeks we dealt with two sisters. We married one and buried the other. Such is the perpetual movement of life. Let us bow, my brothers, before the severe judgment of destiny but let us bend with hope. Our eyes are made to cry, but to see; our heart is made to suffer, but to believe. Faith in another existence comes out of the capacity of love. Do not forget, those in this life worried and reassured by love, it is the heart that believes. The son intends to find his father; the mother does not consent to losing her child forever. This refusal of nothingness is the greatness of man. Heart cannot be mistaken. Flesh is a dream because it dissipates. If such disappearance were the end of mankind, it would remove any sanction of life. We are not satisfied with this smoke that is matter; we need certainty. Whoever loves, knows and feels that none of the points of support of man is on earth. Love is to live beyond life. Without this faith, no perfect gift of the heart would be possible; love, the goal of man, would be his torment. This paradise would be hell. No! Let's say, no, out loud because the loving creature requires the immortal creature. Heart needs soul. There is a heart in this coffin and this heart is alive. At this very moment it hears my words.
Emily de Putron was the sweet pride of a respectable and patriarchal family. Her friends and loved ones loved her grace; her smile a party to them. She was like a flower of joy blossoming in the house. From the cradle, she was surrounded by kindness, had a happy upbringing and gave back that happiness. A loved person that loved. She has just left.
Where did she go? To the shadows? No. We are the ones in darkness. She? She is in the dawn. She is in glory, truth, reality and reward. These young dead ladies, who did no harm in life, are welcome in the grave, their heads stick slightly out of the tomb to a mysterious crown.
Emily de Putron seeks the supreme serenity up there, the complement of innocent lives. She is gone: youth to eternity; beauty to the ideal; hope to uncertainty; love to infinity; pearl to ocean and Spirit to God.
Go, soul!
The prodigy of this great celestial farewell called death is that those that depart do not move away. They are in a world of clarity, but watch our world of darkness like loving witnesses. They are high up and very close. Oh any of you that has seen a loved one disappearing in the tomb do not believe that you are abandoned. She is always here. More than ever she is closer to you. Presence is the beauty of death. An inexpressible presence of the loved souls, smiling to our eyes covered in tears. The mourned creature disappeared but did not leave. We know longer see their kind face… The dead are invisible but not absent.
Let us be fair with death. Let us not be ungrateful. Death is not an annihilation, as they say, a trap. It is a mistake to believe that here, in the obscurity of the open grave, everything is lost. Everything reunites here. The tomb is a place of restitution. Here the soul recovers infinity; here it recovers its plenitude; here it takes over its mysterious nature; here it is disconnected from the body, disconnected from the burden and disconnected from fatality. Death is the greatest of all freedoms. It is also the greatest of all progresses. Death is the ascension of everything that was lived on a superior level. Dazzling and sacred ascension. Each one receives their addition. Everything transfigures in light and by light. The one that was only honest on Earth becomes beautiful; the one that was only beautiful becomes sublime and the one that was only sublime becomes good.
And how about me, why Am I here? What do I bring to this sump? How dare I speak to death? Who am I? Nothing. I am mistaken, I am something. I am an exile. Forced exile yesterday, voluntary exile today. An exile is a defeated, a slandered, a persecuted, harmed by fate and disinherited by the homeland. An exile is an innocent under the weight of a malediction. His blessings must be good. I bless this tomb.
I bless the noble and gracious creature in this grave. We find oasis in the desert; in the exile we find souls. Emily de Putron was one of those charming found souls. I came to pay her with the debt of a reassured exile. I bless her in the somber depth. In the name of the sufferings upon which she shone kindly; in the name of the atonements of destiny determined to her; in the name of everything that she hoped for in the past and everything that she got today, in the name of everything that she loved, I bless this dead young lady, I bless her in her beauty, in her youth, in her sweetness, in her life and death; and bless her in her white sepulchral dress; in her house that she left devastated; in her coffin, covered in flowers by her mother and that God shall fill with stars!”
There is nothing missing in these remarkable words but the word Spiritism. They are not only the expression of a vague belief in the soul and its survival; even more the cold nothingness, succeeding life, burying forever under the cold mantle of ice the Spirit, the grace, the beauty and qualities of the heart. Neither is it the soul lost in the ocean of infinity called the universal whole. It is effectively the real being, individual, present in our environment, smiling to the loved ones, seeing them, hearing them and talking to them through their thoughts. Nothing more beautiful and truer than these words: “Love is to live beyond life. Without this faith, no perfect gift of the heart would be possible; love, the goal of man, would be his torment. This paradise would be hell. No! Let's say, no, out loud because the loving creature requires the immortal creature. Heart needs soul.”
Which idea of death is fairer than this: “The prodigy of this great celestial farewell called death is that those that depart do not move away. They are in a world of clarity, but watch our world of darkness like loving witnesses. They are high up and very close. Oh any of you that has seen a loved one disappearing in the tomb do not believe that you are abandoned. She is always here. More than ever she is closer to you. Presence is the beauty of death. An inexpressible presence of the loved souls, smiling to our eyes covered in tears. The mourned creature disappeared but did not leave. We know longer see their kind face… The dead are invisible but not absent. Let us be fair with death. Let us not be ungrateful. Death is not an annihilation, as they say, a trap. It is a mistake to believe that here, in the obscurity of the open grave, everything is lost. Everything reunites here. The tomb is a place of restitution. Here the soul recovers infinity; here it recovers its plenitude”.
Isn’t that exactly what is taught by Spiritism? But to those that could believe to be victims of a delusion he adds the sanction of the material fact to the theory by the communication between those that left with the ones that stayed. Why is it then strange to believe that those very creatures by our side, like in an ethereal body, can enter into communication with us? Oh you, skeptical, that laugh at our beliefs, laugh then at these words of the poet-philosopher whose intelligence you know! Would you say that he hallucinates? Would you say that he is mad when believe in the manifestation of the Spirits? Is the person that writes this mad: “Let us have compassion of the punished ones? Ah who are we, ourselves? Who am I, speaking with you? Who are you that listen to me? Where do we come from? Is it certain that we did not do anything before we were born? Earth is similar to a prison. Who knows that mankind is formed by reincident in the breach of the divine justice? Watch life closely. It is such that punishment can be found everywhere.” (The Miserable, Volume 7, Book VII, Chapter 1).
Isn’t that the preexistence of the soul; the reincarnation on Earth, the world of atonement? (See the Imitation of the Gospels, #27, 46 and 47). Those that deny the future, what a strange satisfaction you find in the idea of annihilation of your own being and your loved ones? Oh! You are right by fearing death since for you it is the end of all hopes.
After reading the speech above in the session on January 27th, 1865 at the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, the Spirit of the young Emily de Putron, that undoubtedly heard him and shared the emotion of the assembly, manifested spontaneously through Mrs. Costel, dictating the following words:
“The words of the poet fell onto this assembly like a sonorous breath. They shook the Spirits and evoked my soul that still floats uncertain in the infinity of space! Oh poet, revealer of life, you know death well, for you do not crown with cypress the ones you mourn but you attach to their heads the trembling violets of hope! I passed lightly and fast, just flowering the comforting joys of life, and at the end of the day I was taken away by the shaking bolt that faded away at the heart of the waves.
Oh mother, sister, my friends, great poet! No more crying, but remains alert! The caressing whisper in your ears is mine; the perfume of the withered flower is my breath. I join the great life to better feel your love. We are eternal! What has no beginning cannot end and your genius, oh poet, like the river that flows to the ocean, will fill eternity with the power that is force and love!”
Emily
Bibliographic News
La Luce
Journal of Spiritism in Bologna, Italy
Spiritism counts on a new organization in Italy. The Light is a monthly journal of Spiritism in Bologna (10 francs per year in Italy). Here the translation of its program:
“It is the dawn of a great day that already shines in the skies. Spiritism, this surprising occurrence that is unbelievable to many, made its debut in all parts of the world and marches on with an irresistible force. Today it counts on millions of followers, spread everywhere.
Important works and numerous specialized journals, attributed to renowned intelligences, are published about this sublime philosophy, mainly in France where multiple societies are involved with the matter. Several towns in Italy also have their Spiritist gatherings; societies of scientists exist in Naples and Turin; the one in Turin publishes the excellent journal Annals of Spiritism in Turin.
The ones that ignore the principles of this new science uselessly struggle to ridicule it and have its followers taken by dreamers and hallucinated. The communications between the visible and invisible worlds are in the nature of things; they have taken place at all times. That is why their traces are found in all peoples and all epochs. The communications today are more general, spread out, positive to everybody and have one objective: the Spirits come to announce that the times predicted by the Providence for a general manifestation have come; that their mission is to enlighten mankind, opening up a new era for the regeneration of humanity.
The Pharisees of our days agitate uselessly, as well as incredulity that sketches a proud smile for they will not deter Spiritism. The more they advance the more the power of Spiritism grows, abating the proud materialism that threatens to invade all classes of society.
If these phenomena are studied with great interest and for years in the most intelligent centers, in the larger cities and capitals it is because their reality has been recognized and the action of a free and intelligent cause has been acknowledged.
The journal The Light was founded with the objective of propagating this new science, supported by the most special and instructive books, among which and in the first line the works by Mr. Allan Kardec, the honorable president of the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, that will provide us with the material for the philosophical part and the theory for the experimental one. Study and good will are the two necessary conditions to experiment by oneself.
The second part of the journal will carry instructions of the Spirits, some about the most reassuring philosophy and the purest moral, the others, although familiar, will be chosen among the most adequate to inspire faith, love and hope. Besides, after reviewing the Spiritist books and magazines, we will publish every event that may be of interest to our readers. No discussion will be established with persons that ignore the principles of Spiritism.
Faith and courage shall make our effort less painful and facilitate the path to get to the truth.”
“It is the dawn of a great day that already shines in the skies. Spiritism, this surprising occurrence that is unbelievable to many, made its debut in all parts of the world and marches on with an irresistible force. Today it counts on millions of followers, spread everywhere.
Important works and numerous specialized journals, attributed to renowned intelligences, are published about this sublime philosophy, mainly in France where multiple societies are involved with the matter. Several towns in Italy also have their Spiritist gatherings; societies of scientists exist in Naples and Turin; the one in Turin publishes the excellent journal Annals of Spiritism in Turin.
The ones that ignore the principles of this new science uselessly struggle to ridicule it and have its followers taken by dreamers and hallucinated. The communications between the visible and invisible worlds are in the nature of things; they have taken place at all times. That is why their traces are found in all peoples and all epochs. The communications today are more general, spread out, positive to everybody and have one objective: the Spirits come to announce that the times predicted by the Providence for a general manifestation have come; that their mission is to enlighten mankind, opening up a new era for the regeneration of humanity.
The Pharisees of our days agitate uselessly, as well as incredulity that sketches a proud smile for they will not deter Spiritism. The more they advance the more the power of Spiritism grows, abating the proud materialism that threatens to invade all classes of society.
If these phenomena are studied with great interest and for years in the most intelligent centers, in the larger cities and capitals it is because their reality has been recognized and the action of a free and intelligent cause has been acknowledged.
The journal The Light was founded with the objective of propagating this new science, supported by the most special and instructive books, among which and in the first line the works by Mr. Allan Kardec, the honorable president of the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, that will provide us with the material for the philosophical part and the theory for the experimental one. Study and good will are the two necessary conditions to experiment by oneself.
The second part of the journal will carry instructions of the Spirits, some about the most reassuring philosophy and the purest moral, the others, although familiar, will be chosen among the most adequate to inspire faith, love and hope. Besides, after reviewing the Spiritist books and magazines, we will publish every event that may be of interest to our readers. No discussion will be established with persons that ignore the principles of Spiritism.
Faith and courage shall make our effort less painful and facilitate the path to get to the truth.”
Musical World
Journal of Arts and Literature
Published under the direction of Mr. Malibran and Mr. Roselli
Office in Brussels, Rue de la Montagne, 51
This journal that we mentioned in our issue of December 1864 has just turned into limited partnership society with a capital of 60,000 francs, divided into 2,400 shares of 25 francs. Interest on shares 6% per year; part of the annual dividend of 40% from profit. It is issued every Sunday with the format of large newspapers. Subscription: Belgium, 4 francs per year; 10 cents each issue. France, 10 francs per year. Subscription at Rue Ribouté, 8.
The sympathy of that journal towards Spiritism recommends it to every follower. Each issue contains an excellent article about the Doctrine. Although we are strangers to its direction, the administration of the Spiritist Review is authorized to receiving subscriptions of signatures and shares.
The sympathy of that journal towards Spiritism recommends it to every follower. Each issue contains an excellent article about the Doctrine. Although we are strangers to its direction, the administration of the Spiritist Review is authorized to receiving subscriptions of signatures and shares.
Correspondence
Our thanks to the anonymous Spiritist of St. Petersburg that sent us 50 francs to the poor worker of Lyon, by request of Cárita. If his name is not known by men it is by God.
March
Where are the skies?[1]The word sky is used, in general, to describe the indefinite space that surrounds Earth, and in particular the part that is above the horizon. It originates from the Latin coelum, formed from the Greek coilos, hollow, concave, because to our eyes the sky is like an immense concavity. Old peoples belived in the existence of multiple, superimposed skies, made of solid and transparent, forming concentric spheres in which Earth would be in the center. These turning spheres would carrying the globes along its circles.
Due to the insufficiency of knowedge regarding astronomy this idea was adopted by all teogonies that turned the escalonated skies into the several levels of beatification. The last was the dwelling of supreme happiness. According to the most common opinion there were seven and hence the utilization of the expression “to be in the seventh sky” to express perfect happiness. The Muslims admit nine and each one increases the happiness of the believer.
Ptolomy,[2] the astronomer, considered the existence of eleven, the last of which was called Empireo[3] due to the extreme light that shines there. It is even today the name given to the place of beatitude. Christian teology recognizes three skies: the first is the region of air and clouds; the second is the space where the globes move around; the third, beyond the region of the globes, is the dwelling of the Almighty, the home of the elected that contemplate God face to face. That is the reason why St. Paul was taken to the third sky.
The multiple doctrines related to the dwelling of the blessed ones are all based on the double error of considering Earth as the center of the universe and the region of the globes limited. They all placed the happy home of the Almigty beyond that imaginary limit. Singular anomaly that places the author of all things at the end of creation instead of being placed at the center from where the radiated thoughts could reach everything. With the inexorable logic of facts and observation, science took its lights up to the depth of space showing the emptiness of those theories. Earth is no longer the pivot of the universe but one of the smallest globes moving in the infinite. The Sun itself is only the center of a planetary maelstrom. The stars are uncountable Suns around which countless planets orbit, separated by distances only conceived by thoughts although seemingly touching one another. In such a system, governed by eternal laws that reveal the omnipotence and wisdom of the Creator, Earth is not but an imperceptible point and one of the least favored to be inhabited. Given that we ask why would God have turned Earth the only place capable of entertaining life and to that place he would have sent his favorite creatures? Everything, on the contrary, indicates that life is everywhere and that humanity is infinite like the universe. Science reveals planets like Earth and God could not have created them without an objective. God must have populated them with creatures capable of governing them.
Peoples’s ideas are in proportion to their knowledge. Like every important discovery the one about the constitution of the globes must have given them another course. Under the empire of these new knowledge their belief must have changed. Sky was displaced and the region of the stars, having no boundaries, isn’t of any use anymore. Where is he? All religions go quiet before such a question. Spiritism comes to resolve it by demonstrating the true destiny of mankind. Starting from the nature of men and the attributes of God the conclusion is the consequence.
Man is composed of body and Spirit. The Spirit is the principal, rational and intelligent being; the body is the material envelope that momentarily covers the Spirit for the execution of their mission on Earth and for the necessary work of development. Once worn the body is destroyed and the Spirit outlives the destruction. Without the Spirit the body is only inert matter like an instrument without the managing arm; without the body the Spirit is everything: life and intelligence. Leaving the body the Spirit returns to the spiritual world from where he had come before incarnating.
There is, however, the corporeal world composed of incarnate Spirits, and the spiritual world, formed by the discarnate Spirits. The beings of the corporeal world, as a consequence of its material envelope, are detained on Earth or any other planet. The spiritual world is everywhere, around us and in space. It is boundless. Given the fluid nature of its envelope, the beings that constitute it transpose distances with the speed of thought, instead of painfully dragging their bodies on the ground. The death of the body is the rupture of the links that maintain the Spirit captive.
The Spirits are created simple and ignorant but with aptitude to acquire everything and advance as a result of its free-will. Through progress they acquire new knowledge, new facutlites, new perceptions, and consequently new pleasures that are unknown to inferior Spirits. They see, hear, feel and understand what inferior Spirits cannot see, hear or understand. Happiness is proportional to the achieved progress, so that given two Spirits one may not be as happy as the other simply because one may not be as much advanced intellectual and morally with no need to have them placed in different places. Athought they may be close to one another it is possible that one may be in darkness whereas the other is surrounded by light, exactly like a person of normal sight walked hand in hand with a blind person: one sees the light has no effect on the neighbor. Happiness to the Spirits is inherent to their qualities. Therefore they enjoy it wherever they are, on the surface of Earth among the incarnate or in space.
A common comparison may be even better to explain this situation. Consider two persons in a concert; one of them is a good musician with an educated ear whereas the other has no musical knowledge and poor ears skills for music; the first one feels pleasure whereas the second remains insensible because what one understands and feels causes no impression on the other. That is what happens to all sensations of the Spirits that are in proportion to their aptitude to feel them. The spiritual world has splendors everywhere, harmonies and sensations that the inferior Spirits, still under the influence of matter, cannot even foresee for they are only accessible to depurated Spirits.
The progress of the Spirits is the result of their own work. However, since they are free they work with more or less intenstity or neglect, according to their will. Therefore they speed up or delay their progress, and for that same reason, their happiness. While some advace quickly others drag their feet for centuries in inferior categories. Hence they are the own artifices of their condition, happy or unhappy, according to these words of Jesus Christ: “everyone rewarded according to their work”. Every Spirit that falls behind cannot complain but of oneself by the same way that the one that advances has the whole merit of their own effort. A conquered happiness is worth more to our eyes.
Supreme happiness is only enjoyed by perfect Spirits, that is, pure Spirits. They only achieve that after progressing in intelligence and morality. Intelectual and moral progress rarely march together but what is done by the Spirit in one period will be done in another so that both progresses end up by reaching the same level. That is why we sometimes see persons that are intelligent and educated but little advanced morally, and vice-versa. The incarnation is necessary to the double progress of the Spirit, moral and intellectual: the intellectual progress by the activity that the Spirit is forced with work; moral progress by the need that people have of each other. Social life is the touchstone of the good as well as bad qualities. Goodness, badness, kindness, violence, benevolence, charity, selfishness, greed, pride, humility, sincerity, honesty, loyalty, bad faith, hypocrisy, in a word, everything that constitute a good or a perverse person, whose drive and objective is the relationship between man and his fellow human beings. For that reason someone that lived alone would not have vices or virtues. Such a person is preserved from evil by the isolation as she is precluded from doing good as well.
A single corporeal existence is positively insufficient so that the Spirit may acquire everything that is lacked in good and to remove everything that is bad. Could the savage, for example, achieve in only one existence the moral and intellectual level of the most advanced European? That is physically impossible. Should that savage remain eternally in barbarism, deprived from the pleasures that only the development of the faculties allow? Simple commonsense refutes such hypothesis that would be at the same time the denial of God’s justice and goodness, as well as the progressive law of nature. That is why the sovereignly good and just God provides the Spirit with as many incarnations as necessary so that the objective of perfection is achieved.
In each new existence the Spirit brings what was acquired in the preceding one in aptitude, intuitive knowledge, intelligence and morality. Each existence is like that, one step forward on the path of progress, unless the Spirit does not take advantage of that out of laziness, carelessness or obstination in evilness, in which case a reestart is needed. Hence it is up to the Spirit to reduce or increase the number of required incarnations, always more or less painful and laborious.
In the interval of the physical existences the Spirit returns to the spiritual world, for a more or less lengthy period of time, where the Spirit is happy or unhappy according to the good or bad that had been done. The spiritual state is the normal state of the Spirit since this must be its definite state considering that the spiritual body does not die. The corporeal state is just fleeting and transient. It is particularly in the spiritual state that the Spirit picks the fruits of the realized progress for the work done in the incarnation. It is also in this state that the Spirit prepares for the new endeavors and make the resolutions that struggles to carry out on returning to humanity.
Reincarnation can take place on Earth or in other worlds. Among the worlds there are some more advanced than others and there the existence takes place in less painful conditions than on Earth, physically and morally, but where only the Spirits that have attained a compatible level of perfection with those worlds are accepted. Life in the superior worlds is already a reward because there the Spirit is exempt from the diseases and vicissitudes found here. There the less material bodies, almost fluidic, are not subjected to illnesses and needs. Since the bad Spirits are excluded, people live in peace there with the only concern of their own advancement by work and intelligence. True fraternity reigns there since there is no selfishness; there is true freedom since there is no disturbance to restrain or ambitious persons trying to oppress the weak.
Compared to Earth these worlds are true paradises. They are the stages of the route of progress that leads to the definite dwelling. Since Earth is an inferior world destined to the depuration of imperfect Spirits, that is the reason why evil dominates here until God wishes to make it the residence of more advanced Spirits.
That is how the Spirit, by progressing gradually, reaches the apogee of happiness. However, before achieving the summit of perfection, the Spirit enjoys a level of happiness that is relative to the actual advancement, like the child that likes the pleasures of the first infancy, later on ejoying those of the youth and finally the more solid ones of maturity.
Happiness to the blessed Spirits is not in the contemplative idleness that would be, as said many times, an eternal and boring inutility. At all levels the spiritual life is, on the contrary, constant activity and free from fatigue. Supreme happiness consists on the enjoyment of all splendors of creations, that no human language could depict and that the most prolific imagination cannot conceive; on the knowledge and understanding of everything; on the absence of any physical and mental fatigue; on an intimate satisfaction, an unalterable serenity of the soul; on the love that unites all creatures in the absence of any friction with evil, and above all consists on the vision of God and the comprehension of the mysteries that are revealed to the more worthy ones. That happiness is also on the functions that are assigned to them and make them happy. The pure Spirits are the Messiah or the messengers of God for the transmission and execution of God’s wills. The carry out the great missions, preside the formation of the worlds and the general harmony of the universe, a glorious task only achieved by perfection. Only those in a more elevated order understand the secrets of God and are inspired by God’s thoughts from which they are the direct representatives.
The tribulations of the Spirits are proportional to their advancement, their enlightenment, to their capacity, their experience and the degree of confidence inspired on the sovereign Teacher. For that there is no privilege or favor that is not sponsored by merit. Everything is measured by the criteria of strict justice. The most important missions are assigned only to those that are knowingly capable of accomplishing them, incapable of failure or of compromising them. While the more worthy ones compose the supreme council, superior leaders are assigned with the direction of a planetary maelstrom; others are assigned with a special world. Next in the order of advancement and hierarchical subordination, the more restricted assignments to the representatives to the march of peoples, families and individuals, to the impulse to each branch of progress, the multiple operations of nature, up to the minimal details of creation. In that vast and harmonious setting there are activities to every capacity, every aptitude, every good-will, occupations that are accepted with pleasure, eagerly requested because these are means of advancement to the requesting Spirits that aspire for their elevation.
Reincarnation is inherent to the inferiority of the Spirits. It is no longer necessary to those that have transposed its limit and that progress in the spiritual world or in corporeal existences in superior worlds that do not keep the materiality of Earth. To them reincarnation is voluntary, aiming at the exercise of a direct action upon the incarnate for the accomplishment of the missions that they were assigned with respect to them. Out of devotion they accept the vicissitudes and sufferings.
Side by side with the great missions assigned to superior Spirits there others of every level of importance, assigned to Spirits of all orders, from which one can say that every incarnate soul has their own, that is, they have their duties with respect to the well-being of their fellow human beings, from the father whose duty is to ensure the progress of his children up to the genius that casts upon society the new embryos of progress. It is in these secondary missions that many times we find failures, evasions and resignations that only harm the individual and not the group.
Therefore all intelligences concur to the general work, irrespective of the level that they may have achieved, and each one according to their forces, some in the incarnate state and some as Spirit. It is activity all over the place, from the bottom to the top of the scale, everybody learning, helping one another, giving mutual help, hand in hand to get to the top.
That is how the solidarity between the spiritual and corporeal worlds is established, that is, among humans and the Spirits, among free and captive Spirits. That is how true sympathies and sacred affections perpetuate and consolidate through the depuration and continuity of the relationships.
Hence there is life and movement everywhere. There isn’t a single corner of the infinite space that is not inhabited; not a single region that is not incessantly visited by uncountable legions of radiant beings, invisible to the crude senses of the incarnate but whose sight dazzles with joy and admiration the souls that are detached from matter. Finally, there is a relative happiness everywhere, according to the progress and duties that are carried out. Each one carrying along the elements of their own happiness, in proportion to the category in which they are placed by their own advancement.
Happiness depends on the own qualities of the individuals and not on the material state of the environment where they are placed; it is then everywhere where there are Spirits capbale of being happy; they have no circumscribed space in the universe. The pure Spirits may contemplate the divine majesty everywhere because God is everywhere.
Happiness, however, is not personal. It it were only in ourselves and if we could not share it with others it would be selfish and sad. It is also in the communion of thoughts that unite sympathetic beings. Happy Spirits, attracted to one another by the similarity of ideas, tastes and feelings form vast homogeneous groups or families, in which each individual irradiates their own qualities and receives the serene and beneficient breaths that emanate from the whole whose members both disperse to carry out their own missions and get together in a given region in space to share the results of their work, or even meet around a Spirit of even an more elevated order to receive instructions and advices.
Although the Spirits are everywhere they preferably meet in planets given the similarity between them and the ones that inhabit thaose planets. The superior Spirits gravitate around advanced worlds; the inferior ones around delayed planets. Earth is still one of these. Hence, each globe in a certain way has its own kind of population of incarnate and discarnate Spirits that feed one another in its majority through the incarnation and discarnation of the same Spirits. That population is more stable in inferior worlds in which the Spirits are more attached to matter; it is more variable in superior worlds. But Spirits from globes that are the focus of light and happiness are detached to inferior worlds to disseminate the seeds of progress, and to deliver consolation and hope; to lift up the abated courage after the trials of life. They sometimes incarnate in these planets to better accomplish their missions. In such a boundless space then where are the skies? Everywhere. There is no wall limiting them. Happy worlds are their final stations. Virtues open up the avenues to them where vices block them. Before such a magnificent image that populates all corners of the universe, that provides every oject of creation with an objective and a reason for being, how petty is the doctrine that circumscribe humanity to an imperceptible place in space; that shows it to us as beginning at a given time to equally end on a day with the world that carries it, not embracing therefore a single minute in eternity! How sad, cold and glacial when it shows us the universe before, during and after our earthly humanity, lifeless, motionless, like an immense desert surrounded by silence!
How desperate it is, with the image of a small number of elected ones devoted to eternal contemplation, while the vast majority is condemned to the endless suffering! How pungent it is to the loving hearts, for the barrier that is interposed between the dead and the living ones! They say that the happy souls only care about their own happiness and the unhappy ones about their pains. Should we be surprised by the kingdom of egotism on Earth when we are presented with the skies? How narrow, therefore, is the idea that it gives of the greatness, the power and the goodness of our Creator!
The one presented by Spiritism, on the contrary, how sublime that is! How its doctrine amplifies the ideas and broadens the thought! But, who can tell it is true? First reason, then the revelation and finally the agreement with the progress of science! From two doctrines from which one diminishes and the other auguments the attributes of God; from which one is in disagreement and the other in harmony with progress; from which one remains behind and the other advances, common sense points to the side of truth. Given the presence of both may each person internally question their own aspirations and an intimate voice will respond. The aspirations are the voice of God that cannot deceive mankind. But then, why hasn’t God revealed the truth from the beginning? For the same reason that a child is not taught what she will learn at a mature age. A restrict revelation was enough during a certain period of humanity. God provides it according to the forces of the Spirit. Those that today receive a more complete revelations are the same Spirits that on other times received just a fraction, but that later on grew in intelligence. Before science had revealed to them the lively forces of nature, the constitution of the globes, the true role and the formation of Earth, would they have understood the infinite space and the plurality of the worlds? Could they have identified with a spiritual life? Could they have conceived a happy or unfortunate life after death, unless restricted to a place and with a material form? No. Understanding more by the senses than thoughts the universe was too much to their brains. It was necessary to have it reduced to smaller proportions appropriate to their point of view, having the possibility of amplifying it later on. A partial revelation had its utility then. It was wise. Today it is insufficient. The mistake is with those that do not take into account the progress of the ideas and believe to be able to govern mankind with baby walkers.
Allan Kardec
Note: This article, as well as the one from the preceding issue about the fear of death, were extracted from the new book to be soon published by Mr. Allan Kardec. The two following events come to confirm such an image of the skies.
[1] See the book Heavens and Hell, Part I, Chap. III
[2]Ptolomy lived in Alexandria, Egypt, in the second century of the Christian era
[3]From the Greek pur, pyr = fire
Due to the insufficiency of knowedge regarding astronomy this idea was adopted by all teogonies that turned the escalonated skies into the several levels of beatification. The last was the dwelling of supreme happiness. According to the most common opinion there were seven and hence the utilization of the expression “to be in the seventh sky” to express perfect happiness. The Muslims admit nine and each one increases the happiness of the believer.
Ptolomy,[2] the astronomer, considered the existence of eleven, the last of which was called Empireo[3] due to the extreme light that shines there. It is even today the name given to the place of beatitude. Christian teology recognizes three skies: the first is the region of air and clouds; the second is the space where the globes move around; the third, beyond the region of the globes, is the dwelling of the Almighty, the home of the elected that contemplate God face to face. That is the reason why St. Paul was taken to the third sky.
The multiple doctrines related to the dwelling of the blessed ones are all based on the double error of considering Earth as the center of the universe and the region of the globes limited. They all placed the happy home of the Almigty beyond that imaginary limit. Singular anomaly that places the author of all things at the end of creation instead of being placed at the center from where the radiated thoughts could reach everything. With the inexorable logic of facts and observation, science took its lights up to the depth of space showing the emptiness of those theories. Earth is no longer the pivot of the universe but one of the smallest globes moving in the infinite. The Sun itself is only the center of a planetary maelstrom. The stars are uncountable Suns around which countless planets orbit, separated by distances only conceived by thoughts although seemingly touching one another. In such a system, governed by eternal laws that reveal the omnipotence and wisdom of the Creator, Earth is not but an imperceptible point and one of the least favored to be inhabited. Given that we ask why would God have turned Earth the only place capable of entertaining life and to that place he would have sent his favorite creatures? Everything, on the contrary, indicates that life is everywhere and that humanity is infinite like the universe. Science reveals planets like Earth and God could not have created them without an objective. God must have populated them with creatures capable of governing them.
Peoples’s ideas are in proportion to their knowledge. Like every important discovery the one about the constitution of the globes must have given them another course. Under the empire of these new knowledge their belief must have changed. Sky was displaced and the region of the stars, having no boundaries, isn’t of any use anymore. Where is he? All religions go quiet before such a question. Spiritism comes to resolve it by demonstrating the true destiny of mankind. Starting from the nature of men and the attributes of God the conclusion is the consequence.
Man is composed of body and Spirit. The Spirit is the principal, rational and intelligent being; the body is the material envelope that momentarily covers the Spirit for the execution of their mission on Earth and for the necessary work of development. Once worn the body is destroyed and the Spirit outlives the destruction. Without the Spirit the body is only inert matter like an instrument without the managing arm; without the body the Spirit is everything: life and intelligence. Leaving the body the Spirit returns to the spiritual world from where he had come before incarnating.
There is, however, the corporeal world composed of incarnate Spirits, and the spiritual world, formed by the discarnate Spirits. The beings of the corporeal world, as a consequence of its material envelope, are detained on Earth or any other planet. The spiritual world is everywhere, around us and in space. It is boundless. Given the fluid nature of its envelope, the beings that constitute it transpose distances with the speed of thought, instead of painfully dragging their bodies on the ground. The death of the body is the rupture of the links that maintain the Spirit captive.
The Spirits are created simple and ignorant but with aptitude to acquire everything and advance as a result of its free-will. Through progress they acquire new knowledge, new facutlites, new perceptions, and consequently new pleasures that are unknown to inferior Spirits. They see, hear, feel and understand what inferior Spirits cannot see, hear or understand. Happiness is proportional to the achieved progress, so that given two Spirits one may not be as happy as the other simply because one may not be as much advanced intellectual and morally with no need to have them placed in different places. Athought they may be close to one another it is possible that one may be in darkness whereas the other is surrounded by light, exactly like a person of normal sight walked hand in hand with a blind person: one sees the light has no effect on the neighbor. Happiness to the Spirits is inherent to their qualities. Therefore they enjoy it wherever they are, on the surface of Earth among the incarnate or in space.
A common comparison may be even better to explain this situation. Consider two persons in a concert; one of them is a good musician with an educated ear whereas the other has no musical knowledge and poor ears skills for music; the first one feels pleasure whereas the second remains insensible because what one understands and feels causes no impression on the other. That is what happens to all sensations of the Spirits that are in proportion to their aptitude to feel them. The spiritual world has splendors everywhere, harmonies and sensations that the inferior Spirits, still under the influence of matter, cannot even foresee for they are only accessible to depurated Spirits.
The progress of the Spirits is the result of their own work. However, since they are free they work with more or less intenstity or neglect, according to their will. Therefore they speed up or delay their progress, and for that same reason, their happiness. While some advace quickly others drag their feet for centuries in inferior categories. Hence they are the own artifices of their condition, happy or unhappy, according to these words of Jesus Christ: “everyone rewarded according to their work”. Every Spirit that falls behind cannot complain but of oneself by the same way that the one that advances has the whole merit of their own effort. A conquered happiness is worth more to our eyes.
Supreme happiness is only enjoyed by perfect Spirits, that is, pure Spirits. They only achieve that after progressing in intelligence and morality. Intelectual and moral progress rarely march together but what is done by the Spirit in one period will be done in another so that both progresses end up by reaching the same level. That is why we sometimes see persons that are intelligent and educated but little advanced morally, and vice-versa. The incarnation is necessary to the double progress of the Spirit, moral and intellectual: the intellectual progress by the activity that the Spirit is forced with work; moral progress by the need that people have of each other. Social life is the touchstone of the good as well as bad qualities. Goodness, badness, kindness, violence, benevolence, charity, selfishness, greed, pride, humility, sincerity, honesty, loyalty, bad faith, hypocrisy, in a word, everything that constitute a good or a perverse person, whose drive and objective is the relationship between man and his fellow human beings. For that reason someone that lived alone would not have vices or virtues. Such a person is preserved from evil by the isolation as she is precluded from doing good as well.
A single corporeal existence is positively insufficient so that the Spirit may acquire everything that is lacked in good and to remove everything that is bad. Could the savage, for example, achieve in only one existence the moral and intellectual level of the most advanced European? That is physically impossible. Should that savage remain eternally in barbarism, deprived from the pleasures that only the development of the faculties allow? Simple commonsense refutes such hypothesis that would be at the same time the denial of God’s justice and goodness, as well as the progressive law of nature. That is why the sovereignly good and just God provides the Spirit with as many incarnations as necessary so that the objective of perfection is achieved.
In each new existence the Spirit brings what was acquired in the preceding one in aptitude, intuitive knowledge, intelligence and morality. Each existence is like that, one step forward on the path of progress, unless the Spirit does not take advantage of that out of laziness, carelessness or obstination in evilness, in which case a reestart is needed. Hence it is up to the Spirit to reduce or increase the number of required incarnations, always more or less painful and laborious.
In the interval of the physical existences the Spirit returns to the spiritual world, for a more or less lengthy period of time, where the Spirit is happy or unhappy according to the good or bad that had been done. The spiritual state is the normal state of the Spirit since this must be its definite state considering that the spiritual body does not die. The corporeal state is just fleeting and transient. It is particularly in the spiritual state that the Spirit picks the fruits of the realized progress for the work done in the incarnation. It is also in this state that the Spirit prepares for the new endeavors and make the resolutions that struggles to carry out on returning to humanity.
Reincarnation can take place on Earth or in other worlds. Among the worlds there are some more advanced than others and there the existence takes place in less painful conditions than on Earth, physically and morally, but where only the Spirits that have attained a compatible level of perfection with those worlds are accepted. Life in the superior worlds is already a reward because there the Spirit is exempt from the diseases and vicissitudes found here. There the less material bodies, almost fluidic, are not subjected to illnesses and needs. Since the bad Spirits are excluded, people live in peace there with the only concern of their own advancement by work and intelligence. True fraternity reigns there since there is no selfishness; there is true freedom since there is no disturbance to restrain or ambitious persons trying to oppress the weak.
Compared to Earth these worlds are true paradises. They are the stages of the route of progress that leads to the definite dwelling. Since Earth is an inferior world destined to the depuration of imperfect Spirits, that is the reason why evil dominates here until God wishes to make it the residence of more advanced Spirits.
That is how the Spirit, by progressing gradually, reaches the apogee of happiness. However, before achieving the summit of perfection, the Spirit enjoys a level of happiness that is relative to the actual advancement, like the child that likes the pleasures of the first infancy, later on ejoying those of the youth and finally the more solid ones of maturity.
Happiness to the blessed Spirits is not in the contemplative idleness that would be, as said many times, an eternal and boring inutility. At all levels the spiritual life is, on the contrary, constant activity and free from fatigue. Supreme happiness consists on the enjoyment of all splendors of creations, that no human language could depict and that the most prolific imagination cannot conceive; on the knowledge and understanding of everything; on the absence of any physical and mental fatigue; on an intimate satisfaction, an unalterable serenity of the soul; on the love that unites all creatures in the absence of any friction with evil, and above all consists on the vision of God and the comprehension of the mysteries that are revealed to the more worthy ones. That happiness is also on the functions that are assigned to them and make them happy. The pure Spirits are the Messiah or the messengers of God for the transmission and execution of God’s wills. The carry out the great missions, preside the formation of the worlds and the general harmony of the universe, a glorious task only achieved by perfection. Only those in a more elevated order understand the secrets of God and are inspired by God’s thoughts from which they are the direct representatives.
The tribulations of the Spirits are proportional to their advancement, their enlightenment, to their capacity, their experience and the degree of confidence inspired on the sovereign Teacher. For that there is no privilege or favor that is not sponsored by merit. Everything is measured by the criteria of strict justice. The most important missions are assigned only to those that are knowingly capable of accomplishing them, incapable of failure or of compromising them. While the more worthy ones compose the supreme council, superior leaders are assigned with the direction of a planetary maelstrom; others are assigned with a special world. Next in the order of advancement and hierarchical subordination, the more restricted assignments to the representatives to the march of peoples, families and individuals, to the impulse to each branch of progress, the multiple operations of nature, up to the minimal details of creation. In that vast and harmonious setting there are activities to every capacity, every aptitude, every good-will, occupations that are accepted with pleasure, eagerly requested because these are means of advancement to the requesting Spirits that aspire for their elevation.
Reincarnation is inherent to the inferiority of the Spirits. It is no longer necessary to those that have transposed its limit and that progress in the spiritual world or in corporeal existences in superior worlds that do not keep the materiality of Earth. To them reincarnation is voluntary, aiming at the exercise of a direct action upon the incarnate for the accomplishment of the missions that they were assigned with respect to them. Out of devotion they accept the vicissitudes and sufferings.
Side by side with the great missions assigned to superior Spirits there others of every level of importance, assigned to Spirits of all orders, from which one can say that every incarnate soul has their own, that is, they have their duties with respect to the well-being of their fellow human beings, from the father whose duty is to ensure the progress of his children up to the genius that casts upon society the new embryos of progress. It is in these secondary missions that many times we find failures, evasions and resignations that only harm the individual and not the group.
Therefore all intelligences concur to the general work, irrespective of the level that they may have achieved, and each one according to their forces, some in the incarnate state and some as Spirit. It is activity all over the place, from the bottom to the top of the scale, everybody learning, helping one another, giving mutual help, hand in hand to get to the top.
That is how the solidarity between the spiritual and corporeal worlds is established, that is, among humans and the Spirits, among free and captive Spirits. That is how true sympathies and sacred affections perpetuate and consolidate through the depuration and continuity of the relationships.
Hence there is life and movement everywhere. There isn’t a single corner of the infinite space that is not inhabited; not a single region that is not incessantly visited by uncountable legions of radiant beings, invisible to the crude senses of the incarnate but whose sight dazzles with joy and admiration the souls that are detached from matter. Finally, there is a relative happiness everywhere, according to the progress and duties that are carried out. Each one carrying along the elements of their own happiness, in proportion to the category in which they are placed by their own advancement.
Happiness depends on the own qualities of the individuals and not on the material state of the environment where they are placed; it is then everywhere where there are Spirits capbale of being happy; they have no circumscribed space in the universe. The pure Spirits may contemplate the divine majesty everywhere because God is everywhere.
Happiness, however, is not personal. It it were only in ourselves and if we could not share it with others it would be selfish and sad. It is also in the communion of thoughts that unite sympathetic beings. Happy Spirits, attracted to one another by the similarity of ideas, tastes and feelings form vast homogeneous groups or families, in which each individual irradiates their own qualities and receives the serene and beneficient breaths that emanate from the whole whose members both disperse to carry out their own missions and get together in a given region in space to share the results of their work, or even meet around a Spirit of even an more elevated order to receive instructions and advices.
Although the Spirits are everywhere they preferably meet in planets given the similarity between them and the ones that inhabit thaose planets. The superior Spirits gravitate around advanced worlds; the inferior ones around delayed planets. Earth is still one of these. Hence, each globe in a certain way has its own kind of population of incarnate and discarnate Spirits that feed one another in its majority through the incarnation and discarnation of the same Spirits. That population is more stable in inferior worlds in which the Spirits are more attached to matter; it is more variable in superior worlds. But Spirits from globes that are the focus of light and happiness are detached to inferior worlds to disseminate the seeds of progress, and to deliver consolation and hope; to lift up the abated courage after the trials of life. They sometimes incarnate in these planets to better accomplish their missions. In such a boundless space then where are the skies? Everywhere. There is no wall limiting them. Happy worlds are their final stations. Virtues open up the avenues to them where vices block them. Before such a magnificent image that populates all corners of the universe, that provides every oject of creation with an objective and a reason for being, how petty is the doctrine that circumscribe humanity to an imperceptible place in space; that shows it to us as beginning at a given time to equally end on a day with the world that carries it, not embracing therefore a single minute in eternity! How sad, cold and glacial when it shows us the universe before, during and after our earthly humanity, lifeless, motionless, like an immense desert surrounded by silence!
How desperate it is, with the image of a small number of elected ones devoted to eternal contemplation, while the vast majority is condemned to the endless suffering! How pungent it is to the loving hearts, for the barrier that is interposed between the dead and the living ones! They say that the happy souls only care about their own happiness and the unhappy ones about their pains. Should we be surprised by the kingdom of egotism on Earth when we are presented with the skies? How narrow, therefore, is the idea that it gives of the greatness, the power and the goodness of our Creator!
The one presented by Spiritism, on the contrary, how sublime that is! How its doctrine amplifies the ideas and broadens the thought! But, who can tell it is true? First reason, then the revelation and finally the agreement with the progress of science! From two doctrines from which one diminishes and the other auguments the attributes of God; from which one is in disagreement and the other in harmony with progress; from which one remains behind and the other advances, common sense points to the side of truth. Given the presence of both may each person internally question their own aspirations and an intimate voice will respond. The aspirations are the voice of God that cannot deceive mankind. But then, why hasn’t God revealed the truth from the beginning? For the same reason that a child is not taught what she will learn at a mature age. A restrict revelation was enough during a certain period of humanity. God provides it according to the forces of the Spirit. Those that today receive a more complete revelations are the same Spirits that on other times received just a fraction, but that later on grew in intelligence. Before science had revealed to them the lively forces of nature, the constitution of the globes, the true role and the formation of Earth, would they have understood the infinite space and the plurality of the worlds? Could they have identified with a spiritual life? Could they have conceived a happy or unfortunate life after death, unless restricted to a place and with a material form? No. Understanding more by the senses than thoughts the universe was too much to their brains. It was necessary to have it reduced to smaller proportions appropriate to their point of view, having the possibility of amplifying it later on. A partial revelation had its utility then. It was wise. Today it is insufficient. The mistake is with those that do not take into account the progress of the ideas and believe to be able to govern mankind with baby walkers.
Allan Kardec
Note: This article, as well as the one from the preceding issue about the fear of death, were extracted from the new book to be soon published by Mr. Allan Kardec. The two following events come to confirm such an image of the skies.
[1] See the book Heavens and Hell, Part I, Chap. III
[2]Ptolomy lived in Alexandria, Egypt, in the second century of the Christian era
[3]From the Greek pur, pyr = fire
Necrology
Mrs. Widow FoulonThe journal Siècle on February 13th, 1865 in the necrology section, published the following note reproduced by the Havre and the Antibes:
“A well liked and appreciated artist in the Havre, Mrs. Widow Foulon, a skillful miniaturist, died on February 3rd in Antibes where she had gone looking for the recovery of her health, altered by work and age, in a more pleasant climate.”
Since we personally knew Mrs. Foulon and enjoyed her friendship we feel happy to complete the very short notice above. It is a duty of friendship and a deserved tribute payed to her unknown virtues and a healthy example to everyone, and to the Spiritists in particular, that will find precious teachings here.
As an artist, Mrs. Foulon was remarkably talented. Her works, fairly appreciated in many exhibitions, were granted multiple honorofic rewards. It is certainly a merit but that is not exception. What actually made her loved and esteemed, what turns her memory dear to all of those that knew her, is the kindness of her character; her private qualities whose reach could only be apprecitated by those that shared her private life because as with all those that have an inate feeling of good, she did not exhibited them and not even was suspicious of them. If there was someone that had no influence of pride that was undoubtedly her. The feeling of personal abnegation had not perhaps ever gone so far as with her. She was always ready to sacrifice her rest, her health and her interests for those that could benefit from her help; her life was not but a long series of dedications as it was, since her youth, a long series of tough and painful trials bedore which her courage, resignation and perseverance have never failed her.
Her talent was the only thing left by the setbacks of life and it was the the brushes that she raised a large family, ensuring an honorable position to all children through her teachings and paintings. Only by knowing her private life one can realize everything that she had to endure in fatigues and deprivations, all difficulties against which she had to fight to reach her objective. But ah! Her sight, worn out by the demanding work of miniatures, was fading away on a daily basis; still sometime more and her already advanced blindness would have been complete.
When Mrs. Foulon learned about the Spiritist Doctrine some years ago, it was like a beam of light to her. She felt like having a veil lifted up from something that was not unknown to ther but that she only had a vague intuition about.
She then studied it with eargerness but at the same time with that lucidity of Spirit and fairness of appreciation that was peculiar to her elevated intelligence. It is necessary to get to know the perplexities of her life, perplexities that instead of affecting her always affected the loved ones, to understand all the consolations that she obtained from this sublime revelation that gave her an umbreakable faith in the future, and showed her the insignificance of the earthly things.
Without the respect due to the intimate things, great teachings would come out of the last period of this life so fruitful in emotions! So the assistance of good spirits did not fail her; the instructions and teachings which they were pleased to bring to this honorable soul form the most edifying collection, but very private, of which we are pleased to have been the provocative agent more than once. Her death was also worthy of her life. She saw the moment approaching without any painful apprehension: to her it was the deliverance of the terrestrial bonds which was to open to her the blessed spiritual life with which she had identified herself by the study of Spiritism.
She died calmly because she was mindful of having accomplished her mission, a mission that she accepted before coming to Earth; of having scrupulously done her duties of wife and mother because also during her life she had abjured every resentiment against those that she could have hard feelings and that had payed her with ungratefulness. She always payed bad with good and left her life with everybody forgiven, delivering herself to the justice and goodness of God. Finally, she died with the serenity that is given by a pure conscience and the certainty of being less separated from her children than during her material life since from now on she could be with them in Spirit in any point of the globe where they could be; help them with her advices and extend her protection to them. Now, what is her fate in the world where she is now? The Spiritists present that already. Let us allow her to report her impressions.
As before, she died on February 3rd. We received the news on the 6th and our first wish was to communicate with her, if possible. At the time we were experiencing a serious illness what explains some of her words. It is important to mention that the medium did not know her and knew nothing about the particularities of her life, of which she speaks spontaneously. Here her first communication on February 6th:
February 6th, 1865 – medium Mrs. Cazemajour
“I was certain that you would like to evoke me just after my passing and therefore I was ready to respond to you since I did not experience disturbance. It is only those that have fear that are involved in its thick darkness. Then, my friend, I am happy now. These poor weakened eyes that only left me with the memory of prisms that had colored my youth with their changing shine, have now opened and found again the splendid horizons that some of your artists idealize in their vague reproductions, but whose majestic and strict reality, and yet full of enchantment, is marked by the most thorough reality. I have been dead for three days only and I feel that I am an artist. My aspirations towards the ideal of beauty in art were not but the intuition of a faculty that I had studied and acquired on other existences, and that developed on the last one. However, what can I do to reproduce a masterpiece worthy of the great scene that impresses the Spirit when arrives at the region of light? Brushes! Brushes! And I will prove to the world that the Spiritst art is the crowning of the Pagan art, of the endangered Christian art that is reserved to the glory of making it revive in its full shine in yor disowned world. Done with the artist. It is time for the friend.
Why, my dear friend (Mrs. Allan Kardec) to suffer so much for my death? Particularly you that know the deceptions and bitterness of my life, you must, on the contrary, rejoice for seeing that I no longer have to drink from the bitter chalice of the earthly pains, a chalice that I drank to the end. Believe me, the dead are happier than the living ones and crying for them is to doubt the truth of Spiritism. Rest assured that you will see me again; I left first because my task was over down here; each one has their own to carry out on Earth and when yours is over you shall come to rest a bit by my side, to restart again if necessary considering that idleness is not part of nature. Each one carries their own tendencies and bows before them; it is a supreme law that demonstrates the power of free-will. Therefore, good friend, indulgence and charity that all of us need mutually be it in the visible as well as in the invisible world. With such a banner everything is alright. Do not ask me to stop talking. Know this, it is the first time I speak! I leave you there.
It is now time for my excellent friend Mr. Kardec. I want to thank him for the kind words that he was so good to address to the friend that preceded him in the tomb, because we did not depart together to the world where I am, my good friend (we had fallen sick on January 31st). What would you have told the beloved companion of your days if the Spirits had not followed a good order on this? She would then have groaned and cried! I understand it, but it is also necessary that you watch him so that he is not exposed to the danger again before finishing the work of Spiritist initiation, without which you take the risk of arriving to our place too early, and like Moses only see the Promised Land from far away. Therefore, remain on guard. It is a friend that advises.
I must go now. I return to my dear children; I will then check, beyond the oceans, if my traveling sheep has finally gotten to the port or if she is a toy to the storms. May the good Spirits protect her! I will join them for that. I will come back to talk to you because I am an untiring speaker. You remember that. So long, good and dear friends. So long.”
Widow Foulon
Observation: Her traveling sheep is one of her daughters, residing in America, and that had just gone through a long and painful journey. Death is only feared by the uncertainty about what happens at that supreme moment and of what is coming next and beyond. The vague belief in future life is not always enough to appease the apprehension of the unknown. Every communication that aims at our initiation in the details and the impressions of the passage tend to mitigate that fear as they gradually make us familiar and identify us with the transition that takes place in us. From that point of view the communication from Mrs. Foulon and Dr. Demeure, that come later, are eminently instructive. The condition of the Spirits after death is essentially variable, according to the diversity of aptitudes, skills and character of each one. Hence, it is through the multiplicity of examples that one may come to understand the real state in the invisible world.
February 8th, 1865
Spontaneous: Here I am among you, sooner than you thought and very happy to see you again, particularly now that you are better and that you will be soon completely recovered, I hope. But I want you to ask me the questions that are of your interest because then I can respond better. Without that there is the risk that I will speak too much and it is necessary that we speak of truly serious things. Isn’t that the case my good Spiritist teacher?
Q. – Dear Mrs. Foulon, I was very happy with the communication you gave the other day with the promise to continue our conversations. I recognized you perfectly well in the communication. You spoke of things that are unknown to the medium and that could only have come from you. Besides, your kind language towards us is very characteristic of your loving soul, but there is in your language a security, a straightness, a firmness that I ignored when you were alive. You know that I allowed myself more than one reprimand in some cases. A. – It is true but since I saw myself seriously ill I recoved the fimness of Spirit, lost by the griefs and vicissitudes that sometimes made me fearful in life. I said to myself: You are Spirit. Forget Earth and prepare yourself to the transformation of your being and see through your thouhgts the luminous path that your soul must follow when you leave the body, and that shall lead you happy and free to the celestial spheres that you shall henceforth inhabit. You will say that it was a bit presumptuous on my side to count on a perfect happiness on leaving Earth but I had suffered so much that I must have atoned my faults from this life and from the preceding ones. Such intuition had not deceived me and it was that intuition that gave me courage, calmness and determination in my last moments. Such determination naturally increased when I saw my hopes come true after my passing.
Q. – Can you describe to us now your passage, awakening and first impressions? A. – I did suffer but my Spirit was stronger than the material suffering caused by the detachment. After the supreme breath I found myself like the syncope patient, unconscious, thinking of nothing, and in a vague sleepiness that wasn’t either the sleepness of the body or the wakening of the soul. I remained like that for a long time. Then, as if coming out of a long faint, I slowly woke up among brothers that were unknown to me. They were all care and kindness towards me; they showed me a point in space that looked like a shiny star and said: “there is the place you are going with us since you no longer belong to Earth.” I then recovered my memory, leaned on them and like a graceful group that shoots towards unknown stars, but certain to find happiness there, we climbed, climbed and the star grew before us: it was a happy world, a superior world where your friend will finally fint rest. I mean rest with respect to the physical fatigues that I endured and the vicissitudes of earthly life but not the indolence of the Spirit because the activity of the Spirit is a pleasure.
Q. – Have you left Earth definitely? A. – I leave here many creatures that are dear to me to leave it definitely. As a Spirit I will then return here because I have a mission to accomplish together with my grandchildren. As a matter of fact you must know well that there is no obstacle to Spirits that live on superior worlds to come and visit Earth.
Q. – It seems that your current position must weaken the relationships that you left here. A. – No, my friend. Love gets the souls together. Belive me, on Earth it is possible to be closer to those that have reached perfection than to those whose inferiority and egotism cause uproar around the terrestrial sphere. Charity and love are two engines of a powerful attraction. They are the link that bonds the union of souls to one another that remains, in spite of distances and places. There is distance only to material bodies. It does not exist to the Spirits.
Q. – According to what you said in your previous communication about your artistic instincts and about the development of the Spiritist art, I thought that you would be one of its main interpreters in a new existence. A. – No. It is like a guide and protector Spirit that I must give the world demonstrations of the possibility of producing masterpieces in the Spiritist art. Children will be painting mediums, and in an age when only fuzzy sketches are produced, they will paint but not things from Earth, they will paint things from worlds where art has reached its full perfection.
Q. – What is your idea now about my works with Spiritism? A. – I think you have the work of souls and that the burden is difficult to carry but I see the objective and know that you will reach it. If possible I will help you out with my advices so that you can overcome the difficulties that will come, by the way inducing you to take some adequate measures to activate, in life, the renovating movement enticed by Spiritism. Your friend, Demeure, together with the Spirit of Truth, will give you an even more useful help. He is wiser and more serious than I am but since I know that the assistance of the good Spirits strengthen you and sustain your work, believe me that you can always and everywhere count on my help.
Q. – Could we conclude from some of your words that you will not give me a personal and very active cooperation to the works of Spiritism? A. – You are mistaken. But I see so many Spirits more capable than me to handle such important question that an invencible feeling of shyness precludes me from responding to you at this time, according to your wishes. It might come. I shall have more courage and wisdom but I need to get to know them better. I died less than four days ago and still am baffled by the dazzling surroundings. Would you understand, my friend? I cannot express the new sensations that I feel. I had to force myself to set aside the fascination that the admirable wonders exert on me. I can only praise and worship God in his works. But that will pass. The Spirits assure me that soon I will be used to all these magnificences and that I will be able to handle all questions related to the earthly renovation with my lucidity of Spirit. Besides all that, keep in mind that I have a family to reassure. Enthusiams has invaded my soul and I hope that it mitigates a bit to be able to handle serious Spiritism with you and not a poetic Spiritism, something that is not good to mankind since they would not understand it.
Good-bye, so long,
From your good friend that loves you and will always love you, my teacher, for she owes you the only lasting and true consolation she had on Earth.
Widow Foulon
Observation: Every serious and enlightened Spiritist will easily find the teachings that stick out from these communications. We will then call your attention to two points only. The first one is the fact that this example shows us the possibility of no longer incarnating on Earth and to move from here to a superior world, without being separated from our loved ones that we left here, because of that. Those that fear reincarnation due to the miseries of life may free themselves from them by doing what is necessary to do, that is, work for their own betterment. The one that does not want to stagnate in inferior layers must instruct oneself and work to move upwards. The second point is the confirmation of this truth: After death we are less separated from those that are dear to us than during life. Just a few days back Mrs. Foulon, restrained by her disease in a little town of the South, only had part of her family by her side. The majority of her children and friends were disperse and far away so that material obstacles precluded them from seeing each other as frequently as they wished. The great distance made even correspondence rare and difficult to some. Just separated from her heavy envelope, she now moves quickly close to each one, transposing distances without fatigue, with the speed of a bolt, she sees them, attend her friendly gatherings, surrounds them with her protection and can, through mediumship, communicate with them any time, as when alive. If we think that some prefer an indefinite separation to this reassuring thought!
Note: It was too late when we received the detailed and interesting necrology published in the Journal du Havre, on Frebruary 10th. Our issue was already composed and complete, ready for publication.
“A well liked and appreciated artist in the Havre, Mrs. Widow Foulon, a skillful miniaturist, died on February 3rd in Antibes where she had gone looking for the recovery of her health, altered by work and age, in a more pleasant climate.”
Since we personally knew Mrs. Foulon and enjoyed her friendship we feel happy to complete the very short notice above. It is a duty of friendship and a deserved tribute payed to her unknown virtues and a healthy example to everyone, and to the Spiritists in particular, that will find precious teachings here.
As an artist, Mrs. Foulon was remarkably talented. Her works, fairly appreciated in many exhibitions, were granted multiple honorofic rewards. It is certainly a merit but that is not exception. What actually made her loved and esteemed, what turns her memory dear to all of those that knew her, is the kindness of her character; her private qualities whose reach could only be apprecitated by those that shared her private life because as with all those that have an inate feeling of good, she did not exhibited them and not even was suspicious of them. If there was someone that had no influence of pride that was undoubtedly her. The feeling of personal abnegation had not perhaps ever gone so far as with her. She was always ready to sacrifice her rest, her health and her interests for those that could benefit from her help; her life was not but a long series of dedications as it was, since her youth, a long series of tough and painful trials bedore which her courage, resignation and perseverance have never failed her.
Her talent was the only thing left by the setbacks of life and it was the the brushes that she raised a large family, ensuring an honorable position to all children through her teachings and paintings. Only by knowing her private life one can realize everything that she had to endure in fatigues and deprivations, all difficulties against which she had to fight to reach her objective. But ah! Her sight, worn out by the demanding work of miniatures, was fading away on a daily basis; still sometime more and her already advanced blindness would have been complete.
When Mrs. Foulon learned about the Spiritist Doctrine some years ago, it was like a beam of light to her. She felt like having a veil lifted up from something that was not unknown to ther but that she only had a vague intuition about.
She then studied it with eargerness but at the same time with that lucidity of Spirit and fairness of appreciation that was peculiar to her elevated intelligence. It is necessary to get to know the perplexities of her life, perplexities that instead of affecting her always affected the loved ones, to understand all the consolations that she obtained from this sublime revelation that gave her an umbreakable faith in the future, and showed her the insignificance of the earthly things.
Without the respect due to the intimate things, great teachings would come out of the last period of this life so fruitful in emotions! So the assistance of good spirits did not fail her; the instructions and teachings which they were pleased to bring to this honorable soul form the most edifying collection, but very private, of which we are pleased to have been the provocative agent more than once. Her death was also worthy of her life. She saw the moment approaching without any painful apprehension: to her it was the deliverance of the terrestrial bonds which was to open to her the blessed spiritual life with which she had identified herself by the study of Spiritism.
She died calmly because she was mindful of having accomplished her mission, a mission that she accepted before coming to Earth; of having scrupulously done her duties of wife and mother because also during her life she had abjured every resentiment against those that she could have hard feelings and that had payed her with ungratefulness. She always payed bad with good and left her life with everybody forgiven, delivering herself to the justice and goodness of God. Finally, she died with the serenity that is given by a pure conscience and the certainty of being less separated from her children than during her material life since from now on she could be with them in Spirit in any point of the globe where they could be; help them with her advices and extend her protection to them. Now, what is her fate in the world where she is now? The Spiritists present that already. Let us allow her to report her impressions.
As before, she died on February 3rd. We received the news on the 6th and our first wish was to communicate with her, if possible. At the time we were experiencing a serious illness what explains some of her words. It is important to mention that the medium did not know her and knew nothing about the particularities of her life, of which she speaks spontaneously. Here her first communication on February 6th:
February 6th, 1865 – medium Mrs. Cazemajour
“I was certain that you would like to evoke me just after my passing and therefore I was ready to respond to you since I did not experience disturbance. It is only those that have fear that are involved in its thick darkness. Then, my friend, I am happy now. These poor weakened eyes that only left me with the memory of prisms that had colored my youth with their changing shine, have now opened and found again the splendid horizons that some of your artists idealize in their vague reproductions, but whose majestic and strict reality, and yet full of enchantment, is marked by the most thorough reality. I have been dead for three days only and I feel that I am an artist. My aspirations towards the ideal of beauty in art were not but the intuition of a faculty that I had studied and acquired on other existences, and that developed on the last one. However, what can I do to reproduce a masterpiece worthy of the great scene that impresses the Spirit when arrives at the region of light? Brushes! Brushes! And I will prove to the world that the Spiritst art is the crowning of the Pagan art, of the endangered Christian art that is reserved to the glory of making it revive in its full shine in yor disowned world. Done with the artist. It is time for the friend.
Why, my dear friend (Mrs. Allan Kardec) to suffer so much for my death? Particularly you that know the deceptions and bitterness of my life, you must, on the contrary, rejoice for seeing that I no longer have to drink from the bitter chalice of the earthly pains, a chalice that I drank to the end. Believe me, the dead are happier than the living ones and crying for them is to doubt the truth of Spiritism. Rest assured that you will see me again; I left first because my task was over down here; each one has their own to carry out on Earth and when yours is over you shall come to rest a bit by my side, to restart again if necessary considering that idleness is not part of nature. Each one carries their own tendencies and bows before them; it is a supreme law that demonstrates the power of free-will. Therefore, good friend, indulgence and charity that all of us need mutually be it in the visible as well as in the invisible world. With such a banner everything is alright. Do not ask me to stop talking. Know this, it is the first time I speak! I leave you there.
It is now time for my excellent friend Mr. Kardec. I want to thank him for the kind words that he was so good to address to the friend that preceded him in the tomb, because we did not depart together to the world where I am, my good friend (we had fallen sick on January 31st). What would you have told the beloved companion of your days if the Spirits had not followed a good order on this? She would then have groaned and cried! I understand it, but it is also necessary that you watch him so that he is not exposed to the danger again before finishing the work of Spiritist initiation, without which you take the risk of arriving to our place too early, and like Moses only see the Promised Land from far away. Therefore, remain on guard. It is a friend that advises.
I must go now. I return to my dear children; I will then check, beyond the oceans, if my traveling sheep has finally gotten to the port or if she is a toy to the storms. May the good Spirits protect her! I will join them for that. I will come back to talk to you because I am an untiring speaker. You remember that. So long, good and dear friends. So long.”
Widow Foulon
Observation: Her traveling sheep is one of her daughters, residing in America, and that had just gone through a long and painful journey. Death is only feared by the uncertainty about what happens at that supreme moment and of what is coming next and beyond. The vague belief in future life is not always enough to appease the apprehension of the unknown. Every communication that aims at our initiation in the details and the impressions of the passage tend to mitigate that fear as they gradually make us familiar and identify us with the transition that takes place in us. From that point of view the communication from Mrs. Foulon and Dr. Demeure, that come later, are eminently instructive. The condition of the Spirits after death is essentially variable, according to the diversity of aptitudes, skills and character of each one. Hence, it is through the multiplicity of examples that one may come to understand the real state in the invisible world.
February 8th, 1865
Spontaneous: Here I am among you, sooner than you thought and very happy to see you again, particularly now that you are better and that you will be soon completely recovered, I hope. But I want you to ask me the questions that are of your interest because then I can respond better. Without that there is the risk that I will speak too much and it is necessary that we speak of truly serious things. Isn’t that the case my good Spiritist teacher?
Q. – Dear Mrs. Foulon, I was very happy with the communication you gave the other day with the promise to continue our conversations. I recognized you perfectly well in the communication. You spoke of things that are unknown to the medium and that could only have come from you. Besides, your kind language towards us is very characteristic of your loving soul, but there is in your language a security, a straightness, a firmness that I ignored when you were alive. You know that I allowed myself more than one reprimand in some cases. A. – It is true but since I saw myself seriously ill I recoved the fimness of Spirit, lost by the griefs and vicissitudes that sometimes made me fearful in life. I said to myself: You are Spirit. Forget Earth and prepare yourself to the transformation of your being and see through your thouhgts the luminous path that your soul must follow when you leave the body, and that shall lead you happy and free to the celestial spheres that you shall henceforth inhabit. You will say that it was a bit presumptuous on my side to count on a perfect happiness on leaving Earth but I had suffered so much that I must have atoned my faults from this life and from the preceding ones. Such intuition had not deceived me and it was that intuition that gave me courage, calmness and determination in my last moments. Such determination naturally increased when I saw my hopes come true after my passing.
Q. – Can you describe to us now your passage, awakening and first impressions? A. – I did suffer but my Spirit was stronger than the material suffering caused by the detachment. After the supreme breath I found myself like the syncope patient, unconscious, thinking of nothing, and in a vague sleepiness that wasn’t either the sleepness of the body or the wakening of the soul. I remained like that for a long time. Then, as if coming out of a long faint, I slowly woke up among brothers that were unknown to me. They were all care and kindness towards me; they showed me a point in space that looked like a shiny star and said: “there is the place you are going with us since you no longer belong to Earth.” I then recovered my memory, leaned on them and like a graceful group that shoots towards unknown stars, but certain to find happiness there, we climbed, climbed and the star grew before us: it was a happy world, a superior world where your friend will finally fint rest. I mean rest with respect to the physical fatigues that I endured and the vicissitudes of earthly life but not the indolence of the Spirit because the activity of the Spirit is a pleasure.
Q. – Have you left Earth definitely? A. – I leave here many creatures that are dear to me to leave it definitely. As a Spirit I will then return here because I have a mission to accomplish together with my grandchildren. As a matter of fact you must know well that there is no obstacle to Spirits that live on superior worlds to come and visit Earth.
Q. – It seems that your current position must weaken the relationships that you left here. A. – No, my friend. Love gets the souls together. Belive me, on Earth it is possible to be closer to those that have reached perfection than to those whose inferiority and egotism cause uproar around the terrestrial sphere. Charity and love are two engines of a powerful attraction. They are the link that bonds the union of souls to one another that remains, in spite of distances and places. There is distance only to material bodies. It does not exist to the Spirits.
Q. – According to what you said in your previous communication about your artistic instincts and about the development of the Spiritist art, I thought that you would be one of its main interpreters in a new existence. A. – No. It is like a guide and protector Spirit that I must give the world demonstrations of the possibility of producing masterpieces in the Spiritist art. Children will be painting mediums, and in an age when only fuzzy sketches are produced, they will paint but not things from Earth, they will paint things from worlds where art has reached its full perfection.
Q. – What is your idea now about my works with Spiritism? A. – I think you have the work of souls and that the burden is difficult to carry but I see the objective and know that you will reach it. If possible I will help you out with my advices so that you can overcome the difficulties that will come, by the way inducing you to take some adequate measures to activate, in life, the renovating movement enticed by Spiritism. Your friend, Demeure, together with the Spirit of Truth, will give you an even more useful help. He is wiser and more serious than I am but since I know that the assistance of the good Spirits strengthen you and sustain your work, believe me that you can always and everywhere count on my help.
Q. – Could we conclude from some of your words that you will not give me a personal and very active cooperation to the works of Spiritism? A. – You are mistaken. But I see so many Spirits more capable than me to handle such important question that an invencible feeling of shyness precludes me from responding to you at this time, according to your wishes. It might come. I shall have more courage and wisdom but I need to get to know them better. I died less than four days ago and still am baffled by the dazzling surroundings. Would you understand, my friend? I cannot express the new sensations that I feel. I had to force myself to set aside the fascination that the admirable wonders exert on me. I can only praise and worship God in his works. But that will pass. The Spirits assure me that soon I will be used to all these magnificences and that I will be able to handle all questions related to the earthly renovation with my lucidity of Spirit. Besides all that, keep in mind that I have a family to reassure. Enthusiams has invaded my soul and I hope that it mitigates a bit to be able to handle serious Spiritism with you and not a poetic Spiritism, something that is not good to mankind since they would not understand it.
Good-bye, so long,
From your good friend that loves you and will always love you, my teacher, for she owes you the only lasting and true consolation she had on Earth.
Widow Foulon
Observation: Every serious and enlightened Spiritist will easily find the teachings that stick out from these communications. We will then call your attention to two points only. The first one is the fact that this example shows us the possibility of no longer incarnating on Earth and to move from here to a superior world, without being separated from our loved ones that we left here, because of that. Those that fear reincarnation due to the miseries of life may free themselves from them by doing what is necessary to do, that is, work for their own betterment. The one that does not want to stagnate in inferior layers must instruct oneself and work to move upwards. The second point is the confirmation of this truth: After death we are less separated from those that are dear to us than during life. Just a few days back Mrs. Foulon, restrained by her disease in a little town of the South, only had part of her family by her side. The majority of her children and friends were disperse and far away so that material obstacles precluded them from seeing each other as frequently as they wished. The great distance made even correspondence rare and difficult to some. Just separated from her heavy envelope, she now moves quickly close to each one, transposing distances without fatigue, with the speed of a bolt, she sees them, attend her friendly gatherings, surrounds them with her protection and can, through mediumship, communicate with them any time, as when alive. If we think that some prefer an indefinite separation to this reassuring thought!
Note: It was too late when we received the detailed and interesting necrology published in the Journal du Havre, on Frebruary 10th. Our issue was already composed and complete, ready for publication.
Dr. Demeure
Deceased in Albi, Tarn, January 26th, 1865
Another soul of excellence has just left Earth! Mr. Demeure was a very distinguished homeopathy doctor in Albi. His character, as well as his knowledge, had granted him the regard and veneration of his fellow citizens. We only knew him from his correspondence and that of his friends but that was enough to reveal all the greatness and nobility of his feelings. His goodness and charity were unquestionable, and despite his advanced age he would tirelessly help his poor patients. The price of his consultations were the least of his concerns. He was more worried about the unfortunate ones than with those that could pay because, he used to say, in his absence the latter could always find another doctor. To the former he not only gave the medication for free but also many ttimes left them with the sufficient to face their material needs, what sometimes is the most useful medicine. We can say that he was the healing Vicar D’Ars of medicine.
Mr. Demeure had embraced the Spiritist Doctrine with enthusiasm where he had found the key to the most serious problems whose solution he had uselessly asked science and all philosophies. His profound and investigative Spirit made him immediately understand its whole reach and therefore became one of its most dedicated promoters. Although we had never met face to face he mentioned in one of his letters that he was certain that we were not strangers to one another and that there was previous relationships between us. His rush to come to us as soon as he died, his solicitude and care towards us in the situation, the role that he seems to have been called to play, all seem to confirm his forecast that we have not yet been able to verify. We learned about his death on January 30th and our first thought was to communicate with him. Here the communication that he did on that same evening through the intermediary of Mrs. Cazemajour, medium.
“I am here. When alive I had promised myself that as soon as I was dead I would come, if allowed, to shake hands with my dear teacher and friend Mr. Allan Kardec. Death had given my soul this heavy sleep that we call lethargy, but my mind waked. I shook off that dismal torpor that prolongates the confusion following death, then I woke up and all of a sudden I traveled here. Oh happiness! I am no longer old or sick. My body was only an imposed disguise. I am young and handsome, handsome of this eternal youth of the Spirits whose faces are not wrinkled and whose hairs are not withened by the action of time. I am light like a bird that crosses the horizon in a short flight over your cloudy skies and I admire, contemplate, praise, love and bow, an atom before the greatness, wisdom and science of our Creator, before the wonders that sourround me. I was near you, dear and vererable friend, when Mr. Sabò talked about doing my evocation and I followed him. I am happy! I am in glory! Ah who could ever translate the splendid beauties of the land of the elected: the skies, the worlds, the suns and their role in the great concert of universal harmony? Well, I will try my teacher. I will do your study and will come to bring you the tribute of my works of Spirit that, in anticipation, I dedicate to you. So long.”
Demeure
Observation: The two following communications from February 1st and 2nd are relative to our sudden illness on January 1st. Although personal we reproduce them here because they demonstrate that Dr. Demeure is as good a Spirit as he was a man and because they offer a teaching in addition. It is a testimony of gratitude for his solicitude towards us in that circumstance:
“My good friend, have confidence in us and much courage. The current crisis, although tyring and painful, will not take long and with the prescribed care you will be able to complete, according to you wishes, the work that has been the main objective of your life. However, I am the one here by your side with the Spirit of Truth that allows me to have the word in his name, like the last of your friends among the Spirits! They honor me with their welcome. Dear teacher, I am so happy to have died in time to be with them at this time! If I had died earlier I could perhaps have avoided this crisis that I did not foresee. It was only a short while since I discarnate to be occupied with anything else other than spiritual things, but now I will watch your back, dear teacher. It is your brother and friend, a Spirit happy to be near you and take care of your disease. However, you know the proverb: “Help yourself and the skies will help you”. Help therefore the good Spirits in their care for you, strictly following their prescriptions. It is too hot here. This charcoal is too much. While you are sick do not burn that because it raises your pressure. Its fumes are deleterious.”
Your friend, Demeure.
“It is me, Demeure, Mr. Allan Kardec’s friend. I come to tell him that I was by his side when the accident happened, an accident that could have been really bad without an efficient intervention which I had the honor to contribute. According to my observations and the teachings that I collected from a respectable source, it is evident that the sooner his discarnation may occur the sooner his reincarnation may take place so that he may complete his work. However, before departing he needs to do the final touches to his works that must complete the doctrinary theory that he initiated, and he will be considered a case of voluntary suicide for excess of work, causing the deficiency of his physical organization that threatens him with a sudden departure to our world. One must have no fear to tell him the whole truth so that he can take care of himself and strictly follow the prescriptions.”
Demeure
The communication below was obtained in Moltalban on February 1st, in the circle of Spiritist friends that he had there.
“Antoine Demeure. I am not dead to you my good friends, but to those that unlike you do not know this sacred doctrine that reunites those that loved one another on Earth and that shared the same thoughts, the same feelings of love and charity. I am happy. I am happier than I could expect since I enjoy a rare lucidity among the Spirits that have separated from matter a short while ago. Have courage, good friends! I will be near you many times and will certainly instruct you about many things that we ignore when bonded to matter that hides from us so many magnificences and pleasures. Pray fro those that are precluded from such a happiness for they do not know how much they hurt themselves. I will not stay long today but I tell you that I find nothing strange in this world of the Spirits. It seems to me that I have always inhabited it. I feel happy here because I see my friends and can communicate with them whenever I desire. Do not cry, friends. You would make me feel sorry for having met you. Allow time to follow its course and God will lead you to this dwelling where we shall all reunite. Good night, my friends. God bless you. I am here by your side.”
Demeure
Observation: The situation of Mr. Demeure as a Spirit is exactly the one that he could foresee from his so dignified and usefully lived life but another not less instructive aspect sticks out of his communications that is the activity that he develops to be useful, almost immediately after his death. For his intelligence and moral qualities he belongs to the order of the well advanced Spirits. He is very happy but his happiness is not idleness. A few days back and he was taking care of patients as a doctor and as soon as he died he promptly begins to look after them as a Spirit. What is the benefit then of being in the spiritual world if one cannot enjoy some rest there? We reply with this question: isn’t that much the fact that there is no more concerns and needs or the illnesses of life; being free and being able to travel the space without fatigue and with the speed of the thought, and see one’s friends at any time, irrespective of the distance that separates them? We then add: When you are on the other world nothing will force you to do anything. You shall be perfectly free to remain in a pious indolence, as long as you wish, but you shall soon get tired of that selfish idleness. I will be the first one to request something to do. You will then hear: if you are bored for not be doing anything you must seek something to do yourself. There is no lack of opportunity to do good both among mankind and the Spirits. That is how the spiritual activity is not an embarassement. It is a necessity, a satisfaction to the Spirits that look for them in accordance to their tastes and aptitudes, and preferably choose the ones that may help in their advancement.
Mr. Demeure had embraced the Spiritist Doctrine with enthusiasm where he had found the key to the most serious problems whose solution he had uselessly asked science and all philosophies. His profound and investigative Spirit made him immediately understand its whole reach and therefore became one of its most dedicated promoters. Although we had never met face to face he mentioned in one of his letters that he was certain that we were not strangers to one another and that there was previous relationships between us. His rush to come to us as soon as he died, his solicitude and care towards us in the situation, the role that he seems to have been called to play, all seem to confirm his forecast that we have not yet been able to verify. We learned about his death on January 30th and our first thought was to communicate with him. Here the communication that he did on that same evening through the intermediary of Mrs. Cazemajour, medium.
“I am here. When alive I had promised myself that as soon as I was dead I would come, if allowed, to shake hands with my dear teacher and friend Mr. Allan Kardec. Death had given my soul this heavy sleep that we call lethargy, but my mind waked. I shook off that dismal torpor that prolongates the confusion following death, then I woke up and all of a sudden I traveled here. Oh happiness! I am no longer old or sick. My body was only an imposed disguise. I am young and handsome, handsome of this eternal youth of the Spirits whose faces are not wrinkled and whose hairs are not withened by the action of time. I am light like a bird that crosses the horizon in a short flight over your cloudy skies and I admire, contemplate, praise, love and bow, an atom before the greatness, wisdom and science of our Creator, before the wonders that sourround me. I was near you, dear and vererable friend, when Mr. Sabò talked about doing my evocation and I followed him. I am happy! I am in glory! Ah who could ever translate the splendid beauties of the land of the elected: the skies, the worlds, the suns and their role in the great concert of universal harmony? Well, I will try my teacher. I will do your study and will come to bring you the tribute of my works of Spirit that, in anticipation, I dedicate to you. So long.”
Demeure
Observation: The two following communications from February 1st and 2nd are relative to our sudden illness on January 1st. Although personal we reproduce them here because they demonstrate that Dr. Demeure is as good a Spirit as he was a man and because they offer a teaching in addition. It is a testimony of gratitude for his solicitude towards us in that circumstance:
“My good friend, have confidence in us and much courage. The current crisis, although tyring and painful, will not take long and with the prescribed care you will be able to complete, according to you wishes, the work that has been the main objective of your life. However, I am the one here by your side with the Spirit of Truth that allows me to have the word in his name, like the last of your friends among the Spirits! They honor me with their welcome. Dear teacher, I am so happy to have died in time to be with them at this time! If I had died earlier I could perhaps have avoided this crisis that I did not foresee. It was only a short while since I discarnate to be occupied with anything else other than spiritual things, but now I will watch your back, dear teacher. It is your brother and friend, a Spirit happy to be near you and take care of your disease. However, you know the proverb: “Help yourself and the skies will help you”. Help therefore the good Spirits in their care for you, strictly following their prescriptions. It is too hot here. This charcoal is too much. While you are sick do not burn that because it raises your pressure. Its fumes are deleterious.”
Your friend, Demeure.
“It is me, Demeure, Mr. Allan Kardec’s friend. I come to tell him that I was by his side when the accident happened, an accident that could have been really bad without an efficient intervention which I had the honor to contribute. According to my observations and the teachings that I collected from a respectable source, it is evident that the sooner his discarnation may occur the sooner his reincarnation may take place so that he may complete his work. However, before departing he needs to do the final touches to his works that must complete the doctrinary theory that he initiated, and he will be considered a case of voluntary suicide for excess of work, causing the deficiency of his physical organization that threatens him with a sudden departure to our world. One must have no fear to tell him the whole truth so that he can take care of himself and strictly follow the prescriptions.”
Demeure
The communication below was obtained in Moltalban on February 1st, in the circle of Spiritist friends that he had there.
“Antoine Demeure. I am not dead to you my good friends, but to those that unlike you do not know this sacred doctrine that reunites those that loved one another on Earth and that shared the same thoughts, the same feelings of love and charity. I am happy. I am happier than I could expect since I enjoy a rare lucidity among the Spirits that have separated from matter a short while ago. Have courage, good friends! I will be near you many times and will certainly instruct you about many things that we ignore when bonded to matter that hides from us so many magnificences and pleasures. Pray fro those that are precluded from such a happiness for they do not know how much they hurt themselves. I will not stay long today but I tell you that I find nothing strange in this world of the Spirits. It seems to me that I have always inhabited it. I feel happy here because I see my friends and can communicate with them whenever I desire. Do not cry, friends. You would make me feel sorry for having met you. Allow time to follow its course and God will lead you to this dwelling where we shall all reunite. Good night, my friends. God bless you. I am here by your side.”
Demeure
Observation: The situation of Mr. Demeure as a Spirit is exactly the one that he could foresee from his so dignified and usefully lived life but another not less instructive aspect sticks out of his communications that is the activity that he develops to be useful, almost immediately after his death. For his intelligence and moral qualities he belongs to the order of the well advanced Spirits. He is very happy but his happiness is not idleness. A few days back and he was taking care of patients as a doctor and as soon as he died he promptly begins to look after them as a Spirit. What is the benefit then of being in the spiritual world if one cannot enjoy some rest there? We reply with this question: isn’t that much the fact that there is no more concerns and needs or the illnesses of life; being free and being able to travel the space without fatigue and with the speed of the thought, and see one’s friends at any time, irrespective of the distance that separates them? We then add: When you are on the other world nothing will force you to do anything. You shall be perfectly free to remain in a pious indolence, as long as you wish, but you shall soon get tired of that selfish idleness. I will be the first one to request something to do. You will then hear: if you are bored for not be doing anything you must seek something to do yourself. There is no lack of opportunity to do good both among mankind and the Spirits. That is how the spiritual activity is not an embarassement. It is a necessity, a satisfaction to the Spirits that look for them in accordance to their tastes and aptitudes, and preferably choose the ones that may help in their advancement.
Hillaire Trial
An issue that we have kept understandably reserved has just found a turnaround that places it in public domain. Since it has been published by several local newpapers we thought it was okay to talk about it to prevent false interpretations from maledicence with respect to the Spiritist Doctrine, and demonstrate that the Doctrine does not cover reproachable things with its mantle. Besides, since our name is involved in this it is important that our way of looking at this be known. The matter concerns the medium Hillaire, from Sonnac (Charente-Inférieure), that we have already introduced to our readers.
Hillaire is a young married family man, a simple worker, almost illiterate. Providence gifted him with a remarkable mediumistic faculty of multiple facets whose details may be found in the book by Mr. Bez entitled “Les miracles de nos jours”; his mediumship has a lot of similarity with that of Mr. Home. Such faculty called people’s attention to him. He became a local celebrity that granted him the sympaty of some and the animosity of others. The somehow exaggerated praises that he received produced the habitual bad influence. Mr. Home’s success got to him as attested by the letters that he wrote. He dreamed of a theater bigger than his village, however despite his offers to come to Paris we never wanted to reach out to him.
If we had seen any kind of utility in that we would have have facilitated it, but based on what we knew about his ideas and character we were convinced that he did not had the necessary qualifications to play a significant role in his own interest. In fact, we had very recently seen one of those ambitions that push people to the capital and end up in bitter deceptions. They did damage him by putting him on a pedestal. His mission was local. In a limited circle and with a certain population he could do great services to the cause of Spiritism with the help of the outstanding phenomena that took place under his influence. He did that by propagating the Spiritist ideas in his land, but he could have done even more if he had remained restricted to his modest sphere, without abandoning his bread winning work, and if he had more prudently conciliated his work with the exercise of mediumship. Unfortunately to him the importance that he attributed to himself made him little accessible to the advices of experience. Like many people, he would have accepted them if in agreement with his own ideas. His letters made that clear to us! Several indications pointed out to a forecast of his downfall but we were far from guessing the cause that would lead to that. Our spiritual guides warned us more than once to be careful with him and to not act prematurely by bringing him to Paris. With too much presumption on one side and too much weakness on the other he destroyed his mission at a time when it could shine the most. Yielding to dangerous invitations and perhaps, we are led to belive, to perfidious insinutations, he then made a mistake, left the region and later on had to face justice. Far from suffering from that, as boasted by our adversaries, Spiritism left the trial safe and sound, as it will be seen shortly. Unnecessary to say that they tried to turn every manifestation through the unfortunate Mr. Hillaire into gross deception. In that sad episode, the aggrieved, one of those that had acclaimed him the most in his transient glory and that had favored him with his sponsorship, wrote to us after the guilty ones had escaped, giving us detailed description of what had happened, asking for our help and our correspondents to have them arrested. He finished by saying: “It is necessary to remove everything from them, forcing them to return to France, and we will then be able to have them punished by human justice, hoping that the merciful God also punish them since they do a great harm to Spiritism. Looking for a handwritten answer from you I will pray to God to have them found. I remain truly yours… etc.”
Here the answer we gave him, not suspecting that it would become one of the exhibits in the process:
Dear Sir,
Returning from a long trip that I have just finished I found the letter that you sent me about Hillaire. Like anyone else I deplore the sad event for which, however, Spiritism cannot be attacked for it cannot be blamed for the actions of those that do not understand it well. As for yourself, the most damaged in the case, I understand your outrage and the first moment of reaction that must have taken you, but I hope that your soul may have found calmness in more reflection. If you are really a Spiritist you must know that we must accept with resignation every trial that God believes to be adequate to send our way, being themselves atonements of previous faults. It is not by asking God, as you do, to avenge us against our oponents that we acquire merit in our God sent trials. By doing so we, on the contrary, we lose the fruits and attract even harder trials. Isn’t that a contradiction from your side to ask the God of mercy to bring the guilty ones to prison, having them delivered to human justice? Sending similar prayers to God is offensive when we, ourselves, need more of less of his mercy, forgetting what he said: you shall be forgiven as you forgave others. Such language is not Christian or Spiritist because Spiritism, like Jesus Christ, teaches us the indulgence and forgiveness of offenses. This is to us a beautiful opportunity to show greatness and nobility and demonstrate that you are above human miseries. To your own benefit I wish you do not let it go.
You believe this event will harm Spiritism. I repeat that it will not affect Spiritism, despite the eagerness of the adversaries in exploiting this circumstance to their benefit. If it could do any harm it would be momentary and on a local level and for that you would have given your contribution, given the enthusiasm with which you propagate the issue. You should have done whatever was in your power to avoid the scandal, out of charity, and as you say in the interest of the doctrine. Instead, given the repercussion that you gave the matter, you gave weapons to our adversaries. The sincere Spiritists would have appreciated your moderation and God would have taken your good feelings into account.
I am sorry if you thought that I could help your wishes of vengeance in any form, by acting in a way to bring the guilty to justice. It would be a huge misconception of my role, my character and my understanding of the true interests of Spiritism. If, like you say, you are my true brother in God then you must beg for his clemency and not rage, for the one that demands rage onto another takes the risk of having that same rage returning to oneself. I have the honor of greeting you with cordiality, in hopes that you may come back to thoughts that are more worthy of a sincere Spiritist.
Allan Kardec
Here the report sent to you:
“The case Hillaire began on Friday and ended on Saturday at midnight. Vitet withdrew his complaint at the time when the sentence was to be announced so that his wife was acquitted. Only Hillaire remained under the sword of justice. The prosecutor’s office concluded that he was guilty, claiming the application of articles 336, 337, 338, etc. of the criminal code. The court declared itself incompentent to assess the transportation effects and other mediumistic facts, applying article 463 to condemn Hillaire to one year in prison with fines. To us the judgment was a fair application of the written law, although considered a bit too harsh by persons that were not absolutely Spiritists. If on one hand we witnessed the development of sad events that human weakeness can lead to, on another we watched a beautiful spectacle when we heard the solemn proclamation of the Spiritist Doctrine when, during the intervals and at the exit of the audience, we heard these words repeated in public: - we must envy the happiness of those whose faith constantly place them in the presence of the loved ones that cannot be kept away even by the grave.
In fact, look at that crowd that even the praetoreum will not be able to hold up. Members of all social positions elbowing one another, from the lowest to the highest echelon. Do you believe that those people come here only to watch common debates about a sordid occurrence brought up by police? Watch the shame of two confessed miserable ones that describe all the details of their fault? Oh No. The matter at hand has a much higher reach. Spiritism is in jeopardy. They come to hear the revelations made by an inquiry that lasted three months. They come to mock the ridicule that would certainly fall onto those poor hallucinated ones, but their not much charitable hopes were dispersed by the wisdom of the court.
The President begins by stating the most absolute freedom of conscience. To everyone he recommends respect to the religious belief of each person, and he himself walks that path all the way. There comes the time when the letter from our teacher to Vitet (published above) will be read. He holds it in his hands and after reading it he mentions that he found in that letter a voice worthy of the first fathers of the Church; that such a beautiful moral had never been preached before with that kind of beautiful language.
Twenty witnesses unanimously confirmed the truth of the phenomena of transportation; none had the tinest doubt. Hence the declaration of incompentence by the court. Only Vitet and his servant objected the miraculous argument but, at the same time, it was countered by a handwritten declaration signed by Vitet and his servant. Two members of our Society were heard. The President was not worried about eventual discussions that could take place as a result of his comments about certain points of the Doctrine. One and the other responded correctly to the satisfaction of every Spiritist.
Hillaire’s lawyer was very succinct with respect to the central theme of the accusation and that could not have been different. But regarding the Doctrine, its teachings, consequences and its progress around the world; about the perseverance of those men from the village, at least our equals with respect to knowledge, intelligence, morality and social position, he said; about the facts that were published everyday in the media; about the multiplicity of works, of the specialized journals, always speaking with eloquence and conviction. His last blow was the reading of a letter from Mr. Jaubert. In the letter Mr. Jaubert says that he and his friends involved with physical manifestations saw, and saw well, with the lights on as well as at daylight, similar events to those obtained by Hillaire, facts that are report in their minor details.
The reading was followed by a solemn profession of faith from Mr. Jaubert himself, a magistrate, active vice-President of a civilian court in the capital city of the Department, a reading that touched the whole audience. (The Journal of Saint-Jean-d’Angély, February 12th, analysis this remarkable defense. See also the Revue de l’Ouest, from Niort, February 18th).
The prosecutor naturally defamed the accused. He explains the events of manifestations through vulgar means. Anybody can produce them in their living room, at will and very easily; it only requires some minimum skills. He cites historic mediumistic facts attributed to hallucination. With respect to the Doctrine he was always honorable and respectful towards the followers. In particular he enthusiastically applauded the courage, honesty and good-faith of the witnesses that came to attest their belief, not stopping before the the fear of mockery and sarcasm, or with their own material interests that can be damaged by all that.”
Spiritism did not leave that trial safe and sound only but also with the honors of war. It is true that the trial did not attest the reality of the manifestations of Hillaire but kept them out of question, given the declaration of incompetence of the court, and for that very reason did not declare them to be fraudulent. As for the Doctrine it was granted a brilliant suffrage. To us, that is the essential point because Spiritism is less in the material phenomena than it is in their moral consequences. Never mind if they deny facts that are daily attested in all corners of the world, because it is not far the day in which everybody will be forced to give in to the evidence. The most important point is that the doctrine that will follow from that be recognized as worthy of the Gospel, on which it is founded. Certainly Mr. Substitute is not Spiritist; the President is not either, as far as we know, but we are pleased to verify that their personal opinion does not affect their impartiality.
The praises to the witnesses are a fantastic tribute to the courage of opinion and to the honesty of belief. Those firm supports of our faith deserve a special tribute. We give it right now throught the following message to them.
Paris, January 21st, 1865
From Mr. Allan Kardec, to the devout Spiritists in the Hillaire case
Dear brothers in Spiritism,
In my name and in the name of the Spiritist Society of Paris, I come to pay a deserved homage of praises to all of those sustained their faith and defended truth with courage, dignity and firmness, in the said event that has shaken us all. They were payed a brilliant and solemn tribute by justice. They cannot go without an acknowledgement from their brothers in belief. I requested a complete and as much as possible accurate list of their names, to have them side by side with the others that deserve a tribute of Spiritism. This is not to give them publicity, something that would damage their modesty, and in fact at this very moment it would be more harmful than helpful, but our century is so much worried that it is forgotten. It is necessary that the memory of the true loved ones, free from any second intention of interest, does not remain lost to those that will come after us. The archives of Spiritism will let them get to know the ones that have a legitimate right to such recognition. I take the opportunity, dear brothers, to take a moment to talk about something of concern to us. Before anything else, one could fear the consequences of this case to Spiritism. I was never worried about it, as you know, because it could only produce a local and momentary commotion; because our Doctrine, as with religion, cannot be blamed by the faults of those that do not understand it. It is in vain that our adversaries struggle to present it as evil and immoral; they would have to demonstrate that the Doctrine provokes, excuses or justifies a single reproachable act, or that besides the positively known teachings it also has secretive ones that may accommodate the consciences.
However and since with Spiritism everything happens in the open daylight, and it only preaches the moral of the Gospel, leading mankind to its practice, and in particular the ones that move away from that, only a malicious intention could attribute pernicious tendencies to Spiritism. Considering that each person can pass their own judgement about its highly propagated and clearly formulated principles in books at everyone’s reach, only ignorance or ill-faith could alter it as they did to the first Christians accused of all sorts of disgraces and indignities that hit Rome, and also of corruption of customs. Christianity, with the Gospel in hand, could only come out victorious from all of those accusations and from the terrible struggle that was set up against it. It is the same with Spiritism whose banner is also the Gospel. To justify it one only needs to say this: See what Spiritism teaches, what is recommended and condemned by it. What is it that is condemned? Every action contrary to charity that is the law taught by Jesus Christ.
Spiritism is not only in the belief on the manifestation of the Spirits. The mistake made those by those that condemn Spiritism is to believe that it only consist on the production of strange phenomena, and that because they only see the surface for not taking the burden of studying it. Such phenonema are only strange to those that do not know their cause. But any person that study them with profundity will see the effect of a law, of a force of nature that was unknown and that, for that very reason, are not wonderful or supernatural. The phenomena demonstrate the existence of the Spirits that are not but the soul of those that lived. They consequently prove the existence of the soul, its survival to the body, and future life with all of its moral consequences. Faith in the future is then based on material proofs, becoming unshakable and defeating disbelief. That is why, when Spiritism becomes a general belief, there will be no skeptical or materialist or atheist. Its mission is to fight disbelief, doubt and indifference. Hence it does not address those that have faith and to whom their faith is enough, but those that believe in nothing or that doubt. It does not demand anybody to leave their religion; it respects every belief, when they are sincere. To its eyes freedom of conscience is a sacred right; if it did not respect that freedom it would default its first principle that is charity. Neutral among all cults it will be the link that will unite them all under the same flag, that of universal fraternity. One day they will walk hand in hand instead of saying anathema to one another.
Far from being the essential part of Spiritism the phenomena are only an accessory, an auxiliary employed by God to defeat the disbelief that invades society, and that consists above all in the application of his moral principles. That is how the sincere Spiritists are recognized. The examples of moral reformation led by Spiritism are in large number already, allowing to foresee the results that it will produce with time. It is necessary that its moralizing force be really great to be able to defeat the inveterate habits of age and the lightheartedness of youth. The primary cause of the moralizing effect of Spiritism, therefore, is the phenomenon of the manifestations that led to faith. If those phenomena were an illusion, as pretended by the the nonbelievers, it would be necessary to bless an illusion that give people the power to defeat their bad leanings.
But, if after eighteen centuries we still see so many people that profess Christianity and practice it so little, does it come as a surprise that in less than ten years all those that believe in Spiritism have not taken full advantage yet as wished? Among them there are some that have only seen physical manifestations, touched more by curiosity than heart. That is why not all Spiritists are perfect. There is nothing remarkable about that in principle and if there is something that must cause admiration is the number of changes that took place in this short interval. If Spiritism does not always thoroughly defeats bad tendencies, a partial result is still a progress to be taken into account, and since each one of us has their own weaknesses, it must make us indulgent. Time and new existences will finish what has been initiated. Fortunate are those that spare themselves of new trials!
Hillaire belongs to that class that Spiritism makes only surface, in a way, and for that he failed. Providence gifted him with a remarkable faculty with which he did a lot of good. He could have done much more if he had not ruined his mission, out of his weakness. We cannot condemn or acquit him for it is only up to God to have him judged for not having fully carried out his task. May the atonement that he endures and a serious setback on himself deserve God’s mercy!
Brothers, let us reach out to him with our compassionate hands and pray for him.
Hillaire is a young married family man, a simple worker, almost illiterate. Providence gifted him with a remarkable mediumistic faculty of multiple facets whose details may be found in the book by Mr. Bez entitled “Les miracles de nos jours”; his mediumship has a lot of similarity with that of Mr. Home. Such faculty called people’s attention to him. He became a local celebrity that granted him the sympaty of some and the animosity of others. The somehow exaggerated praises that he received produced the habitual bad influence. Mr. Home’s success got to him as attested by the letters that he wrote. He dreamed of a theater bigger than his village, however despite his offers to come to Paris we never wanted to reach out to him.
If we had seen any kind of utility in that we would have have facilitated it, but based on what we knew about his ideas and character we were convinced that he did not had the necessary qualifications to play a significant role in his own interest. In fact, we had very recently seen one of those ambitions that push people to the capital and end up in bitter deceptions. They did damage him by putting him on a pedestal. His mission was local. In a limited circle and with a certain population he could do great services to the cause of Spiritism with the help of the outstanding phenomena that took place under his influence. He did that by propagating the Spiritist ideas in his land, but he could have done even more if he had remained restricted to his modest sphere, without abandoning his bread winning work, and if he had more prudently conciliated his work with the exercise of mediumship. Unfortunately to him the importance that he attributed to himself made him little accessible to the advices of experience. Like many people, he would have accepted them if in agreement with his own ideas. His letters made that clear to us! Several indications pointed out to a forecast of his downfall but we were far from guessing the cause that would lead to that. Our spiritual guides warned us more than once to be careful with him and to not act prematurely by bringing him to Paris. With too much presumption on one side and too much weakness on the other he destroyed his mission at a time when it could shine the most. Yielding to dangerous invitations and perhaps, we are led to belive, to perfidious insinutations, he then made a mistake, left the region and later on had to face justice. Far from suffering from that, as boasted by our adversaries, Spiritism left the trial safe and sound, as it will be seen shortly. Unnecessary to say that they tried to turn every manifestation through the unfortunate Mr. Hillaire into gross deception. In that sad episode, the aggrieved, one of those that had acclaimed him the most in his transient glory and that had favored him with his sponsorship, wrote to us after the guilty ones had escaped, giving us detailed description of what had happened, asking for our help and our correspondents to have them arrested. He finished by saying: “It is necessary to remove everything from them, forcing them to return to France, and we will then be able to have them punished by human justice, hoping that the merciful God also punish them since they do a great harm to Spiritism. Looking for a handwritten answer from you I will pray to God to have them found. I remain truly yours… etc.”
Here the answer we gave him, not suspecting that it would become one of the exhibits in the process:
Dear Sir,
Returning from a long trip that I have just finished I found the letter that you sent me about Hillaire. Like anyone else I deplore the sad event for which, however, Spiritism cannot be attacked for it cannot be blamed for the actions of those that do not understand it well. As for yourself, the most damaged in the case, I understand your outrage and the first moment of reaction that must have taken you, but I hope that your soul may have found calmness in more reflection. If you are really a Spiritist you must know that we must accept with resignation every trial that God believes to be adequate to send our way, being themselves atonements of previous faults. It is not by asking God, as you do, to avenge us against our oponents that we acquire merit in our God sent trials. By doing so we, on the contrary, we lose the fruits and attract even harder trials. Isn’t that a contradiction from your side to ask the God of mercy to bring the guilty ones to prison, having them delivered to human justice? Sending similar prayers to God is offensive when we, ourselves, need more of less of his mercy, forgetting what he said: you shall be forgiven as you forgave others. Such language is not Christian or Spiritist because Spiritism, like Jesus Christ, teaches us the indulgence and forgiveness of offenses. This is to us a beautiful opportunity to show greatness and nobility and demonstrate that you are above human miseries. To your own benefit I wish you do not let it go.
You believe this event will harm Spiritism. I repeat that it will not affect Spiritism, despite the eagerness of the adversaries in exploiting this circumstance to their benefit. If it could do any harm it would be momentary and on a local level and for that you would have given your contribution, given the enthusiasm with which you propagate the issue. You should have done whatever was in your power to avoid the scandal, out of charity, and as you say in the interest of the doctrine. Instead, given the repercussion that you gave the matter, you gave weapons to our adversaries. The sincere Spiritists would have appreciated your moderation and God would have taken your good feelings into account.
I am sorry if you thought that I could help your wishes of vengeance in any form, by acting in a way to bring the guilty to justice. It would be a huge misconception of my role, my character and my understanding of the true interests of Spiritism. If, like you say, you are my true brother in God then you must beg for his clemency and not rage, for the one that demands rage onto another takes the risk of having that same rage returning to oneself. I have the honor of greeting you with cordiality, in hopes that you may come back to thoughts that are more worthy of a sincere Spiritist.
Allan Kardec
Here the report sent to you:
“The case Hillaire began on Friday and ended on Saturday at midnight. Vitet withdrew his complaint at the time when the sentence was to be announced so that his wife was acquitted. Only Hillaire remained under the sword of justice. The prosecutor’s office concluded that he was guilty, claiming the application of articles 336, 337, 338, etc. of the criminal code. The court declared itself incompentent to assess the transportation effects and other mediumistic facts, applying article 463 to condemn Hillaire to one year in prison with fines. To us the judgment was a fair application of the written law, although considered a bit too harsh by persons that were not absolutely Spiritists. If on one hand we witnessed the development of sad events that human weakeness can lead to, on another we watched a beautiful spectacle when we heard the solemn proclamation of the Spiritist Doctrine when, during the intervals and at the exit of the audience, we heard these words repeated in public: - we must envy the happiness of those whose faith constantly place them in the presence of the loved ones that cannot be kept away even by the grave.
In fact, look at that crowd that even the praetoreum will not be able to hold up. Members of all social positions elbowing one another, from the lowest to the highest echelon. Do you believe that those people come here only to watch common debates about a sordid occurrence brought up by police? Watch the shame of two confessed miserable ones that describe all the details of their fault? Oh No. The matter at hand has a much higher reach. Spiritism is in jeopardy. They come to hear the revelations made by an inquiry that lasted three months. They come to mock the ridicule that would certainly fall onto those poor hallucinated ones, but their not much charitable hopes were dispersed by the wisdom of the court.
The President begins by stating the most absolute freedom of conscience. To everyone he recommends respect to the religious belief of each person, and he himself walks that path all the way. There comes the time when the letter from our teacher to Vitet (published above) will be read. He holds it in his hands and after reading it he mentions that he found in that letter a voice worthy of the first fathers of the Church; that such a beautiful moral had never been preached before with that kind of beautiful language.
Twenty witnesses unanimously confirmed the truth of the phenomena of transportation; none had the tinest doubt. Hence the declaration of incompentence by the court. Only Vitet and his servant objected the miraculous argument but, at the same time, it was countered by a handwritten declaration signed by Vitet and his servant. Two members of our Society were heard. The President was not worried about eventual discussions that could take place as a result of his comments about certain points of the Doctrine. One and the other responded correctly to the satisfaction of every Spiritist.
Hillaire’s lawyer was very succinct with respect to the central theme of the accusation and that could not have been different. But regarding the Doctrine, its teachings, consequences and its progress around the world; about the perseverance of those men from the village, at least our equals with respect to knowledge, intelligence, morality and social position, he said; about the facts that were published everyday in the media; about the multiplicity of works, of the specialized journals, always speaking with eloquence and conviction. His last blow was the reading of a letter from Mr. Jaubert. In the letter Mr. Jaubert says that he and his friends involved with physical manifestations saw, and saw well, with the lights on as well as at daylight, similar events to those obtained by Hillaire, facts that are report in their minor details.
The reading was followed by a solemn profession of faith from Mr. Jaubert himself, a magistrate, active vice-President of a civilian court in the capital city of the Department, a reading that touched the whole audience. (The Journal of Saint-Jean-d’Angély, February 12th, analysis this remarkable defense. See also the Revue de l’Ouest, from Niort, February 18th).
The prosecutor naturally defamed the accused. He explains the events of manifestations through vulgar means. Anybody can produce them in their living room, at will and very easily; it only requires some minimum skills. He cites historic mediumistic facts attributed to hallucination. With respect to the Doctrine he was always honorable and respectful towards the followers. In particular he enthusiastically applauded the courage, honesty and good-faith of the witnesses that came to attest their belief, not stopping before the the fear of mockery and sarcasm, or with their own material interests that can be damaged by all that.”
Spiritism did not leave that trial safe and sound only but also with the honors of war. It is true that the trial did not attest the reality of the manifestations of Hillaire but kept them out of question, given the declaration of incompetence of the court, and for that very reason did not declare them to be fraudulent. As for the Doctrine it was granted a brilliant suffrage. To us, that is the essential point because Spiritism is less in the material phenomena than it is in their moral consequences. Never mind if they deny facts that are daily attested in all corners of the world, because it is not far the day in which everybody will be forced to give in to the evidence. The most important point is that the doctrine that will follow from that be recognized as worthy of the Gospel, on which it is founded. Certainly Mr. Substitute is not Spiritist; the President is not either, as far as we know, but we are pleased to verify that their personal opinion does not affect their impartiality.
The praises to the witnesses are a fantastic tribute to the courage of opinion and to the honesty of belief. Those firm supports of our faith deserve a special tribute. We give it right now throught the following message to them.
Paris, January 21st, 1865
From Mr. Allan Kardec, to the devout Spiritists in the Hillaire case
Dear brothers in Spiritism,
In my name and in the name of the Spiritist Society of Paris, I come to pay a deserved homage of praises to all of those sustained their faith and defended truth with courage, dignity and firmness, in the said event that has shaken us all. They were payed a brilliant and solemn tribute by justice. They cannot go without an acknowledgement from their brothers in belief. I requested a complete and as much as possible accurate list of their names, to have them side by side with the others that deserve a tribute of Spiritism. This is not to give them publicity, something that would damage their modesty, and in fact at this very moment it would be more harmful than helpful, but our century is so much worried that it is forgotten. It is necessary that the memory of the true loved ones, free from any second intention of interest, does not remain lost to those that will come after us. The archives of Spiritism will let them get to know the ones that have a legitimate right to such recognition. I take the opportunity, dear brothers, to take a moment to talk about something of concern to us. Before anything else, one could fear the consequences of this case to Spiritism. I was never worried about it, as you know, because it could only produce a local and momentary commotion; because our Doctrine, as with religion, cannot be blamed by the faults of those that do not understand it. It is in vain that our adversaries struggle to present it as evil and immoral; they would have to demonstrate that the Doctrine provokes, excuses or justifies a single reproachable act, or that besides the positively known teachings it also has secretive ones that may accommodate the consciences.
However and since with Spiritism everything happens in the open daylight, and it only preaches the moral of the Gospel, leading mankind to its practice, and in particular the ones that move away from that, only a malicious intention could attribute pernicious tendencies to Spiritism. Considering that each person can pass their own judgement about its highly propagated and clearly formulated principles in books at everyone’s reach, only ignorance or ill-faith could alter it as they did to the first Christians accused of all sorts of disgraces and indignities that hit Rome, and also of corruption of customs. Christianity, with the Gospel in hand, could only come out victorious from all of those accusations and from the terrible struggle that was set up against it. It is the same with Spiritism whose banner is also the Gospel. To justify it one only needs to say this: See what Spiritism teaches, what is recommended and condemned by it. What is it that is condemned? Every action contrary to charity that is the law taught by Jesus Christ.
Spiritism is not only in the belief on the manifestation of the Spirits. The mistake made those by those that condemn Spiritism is to believe that it only consist on the production of strange phenomena, and that because they only see the surface for not taking the burden of studying it. Such phenonema are only strange to those that do not know their cause. But any person that study them with profundity will see the effect of a law, of a force of nature that was unknown and that, for that very reason, are not wonderful or supernatural. The phenomena demonstrate the existence of the Spirits that are not but the soul of those that lived. They consequently prove the existence of the soul, its survival to the body, and future life with all of its moral consequences. Faith in the future is then based on material proofs, becoming unshakable and defeating disbelief. That is why, when Spiritism becomes a general belief, there will be no skeptical or materialist or atheist. Its mission is to fight disbelief, doubt and indifference. Hence it does not address those that have faith and to whom their faith is enough, but those that believe in nothing or that doubt. It does not demand anybody to leave their religion; it respects every belief, when they are sincere. To its eyes freedom of conscience is a sacred right; if it did not respect that freedom it would default its first principle that is charity. Neutral among all cults it will be the link that will unite them all under the same flag, that of universal fraternity. One day they will walk hand in hand instead of saying anathema to one another.
Far from being the essential part of Spiritism the phenomena are only an accessory, an auxiliary employed by God to defeat the disbelief that invades society, and that consists above all in the application of his moral principles. That is how the sincere Spiritists are recognized. The examples of moral reformation led by Spiritism are in large number already, allowing to foresee the results that it will produce with time. It is necessary that its moralizing force be really great to be able to defeat the inveterate habits of age and the lightheartedness of youth. The primary cause of the moralizing effect of Spiritism, therefore, is the phenomenon of the manifestations that led to faith. If those phenomena were an illusion, as pretended by the the nonbelievers, it would be necessary to bless an illusion that give people the power to defeat their bad leanings.
But, if after eighteen centuries we still see so many people that profess Christianity and practice it so little, does it come as a surprise that in less than ten years all those that believe in Spiritism have not taken full advantage yet as wished? Among them there are some that have only seen physical manifestations, touched more by curiosity than heart. That is why not all Spiritists are perfect. There is nothing remarkable about that in principle and if there is something that must cause admiration is the number of changes that took place in this short interval. If Spiritism does not always thoroughly defeats bad tendencies, a partial result is still a progress to be taken into account, and since each one of us has their own weaknesses, it must make us indulgent. Time and new existences will finish what has been initiated. Fortunate are those that spare themselves of new trials!
Hillaire belongs to that class that Spiritism makes only surface, in a way, and for that he failed. Providence gifted him with a remarkable faculty with which he did a lot of good. He could have done much more if he had not ruined his mission, out of his weakness. We cannot condemn or acquit him for it is only up to God to have him judged for not having fully carried out his task. May the atonement that he endures and a serious setback on himself deserve God’s mercy!
Brothers, let us reach out to him with our compassionate hands and pray for him.
Bibliographic News
An angel from heavens on Earth[1]
Here the report given at the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies by our lawyer colleague, Mr. Feyteau:
“With that title Mr. Benjamin Mossé wrote a book full of poetry in which charity is progressively taught by the most touching, from a doble point of view. The subject of this little poem in prose begins in heavens, develops on Earth and ends in heavens, where it started. The angels, the archangels, the seraphims, the ofanins and all sacred creatures, in Mr. Mossé’s expression, are together and sing praises to the Almighty that gathered them to assign them with the mission of walking among the earthly souls to lead them to good, incessantly deviating their earthly apetites and passions.
The purest of these angels was the only one to stay after all others left. It is Zadécia. Prostated before the feet of the throne of the Eternal she begs for the personal favor of one exception to the general rule imposed to the brothers. She said: - Lord, hear my prayer before I obey your voice! I shall descend to Earth, according to your will. I preclude myself from the happiness that inundates us, by your commandment; I will talk about it to the inhabitants of the inferior dwelling; I shall inspire in them hope to sustain them in their painful journey. But allow me the grace that I implore! Allow me, oh God, to never forget your pleasantries. Never allow the envelope that will cover me to be an obstacle to my elevations to you! May I always be in control of myself and that nothing impure may alter my nobility! Allow me, my Lord, not to be long away from my blessed dwelling! May I promptly accomplish my mission; warm up a generous heart with my own flame; captivate a heart already blessed by your hands; my love elevate, complement, and perfect his virtues so that he can receive my inspirations, accept my message and become a consolation and a light to humanity; may I be able to, oh my God, to return to my celestial home, proud for leaving on Earth an honorable continuator of my mission, driven by and worshiping my image, always coming to me to find the strength necessary to continue his work, always finding the encouragement of my love for its accomplishment, up until the time when your will brings him back to my arms, and by the feet of your throne receive your eternal blessings.”
- I receive your prayer, oh my daughter! Go to fearlessly deliver the treasures of your flame to mankind. The fire that drives you shall lose nothing of its holiness on Earth, where you stay shall be short, where a worthy soul has already taken the terrestrial envelope to accomplish the great mission that you wish to entrust him with. With enthusiasm and purity he shall find nobility in your love. He shall be sanctified by your presence and by the links that will bond him to your immortal destiny. In that union, which I bless in anticipation, that soul will find the mission that will be her recovery, like it will be yours as well. You will then return to these supreme regions from which you shall wake for your beloved husband on Earth that will become your beloved husband in heavens, when your mission is over.
Following these words Zadecia came down from the infinite dwellings to the heart of mankind; she kissed the head of the boy that later on she would attract to her in marriage; then, submitting herself to the necessary conditions of life on Earth, she was involved in a material form in which her beauty should shine, blossoming her virtues and charms.
It is in these particularly blessed conditions that Zadecia’s soul starts its mission whose first phase is the incarnation in a being painfully delivered by a young and generous mother. In the second phase of her mission she is an angel of innocence and her beauty, irradiating like a divine emanation, purifies everything around her. In her third phase Zadecia is an angel of resignation and patience through which she endures physical sufferings. In the fourth she is an angel of mercy through the examples of charity and abnegation that she gives. In the fifth she is an angel of love through the mutual feelings of sympathy that she develops with the young Azariel. In the sixth she is the angel of marital love with Azariel. In the seventh she is the angel of maternal love. The eight phase is finally her return to heavens, leaving behing her husband and her daughter to continue her work of sanctification.”
Those multiple images certainly contain honorable examples and constitute attractive reading but the very much foreseen victory of Zadecia over all trials of her life subtracts the actual character of teaching since it can only result from the struggles of the fight. The condition of Zadecia when she leaves heavens, keeping the purity and virtuousness of the angels, makes her almost unnatractive, only changed by the interest brought up by the author in the form and expression of thoughts during her journey on Earth. Hence, after having read this book and given it the fair tribute of praise deserved by the style and harmonious work about the subject, one is forced to regret the fact that the author seems to be alien to the real principles of the nature of the Spirits, never giving any thought to the influence that they exert upon the diverse conditions of humanity, through the progressive improvement allowed by multiple incarnations.
A serious person has a natural concern. May the author probe the multiple lights of philosophy, the multiple facets of human life; may the author probe with the torch of religion the profound mysteries of death! The concern is to find the conclusion that may bring enlightenment about one’s true destiny, showing the path to follow. The path is not always the true path but each person follows the groove of the will, in the field of thoughts, according to the bad or good principles that were developed.
To some, preconceived ideas take the place of truths; they turn them into law, feeding interminable discussions to have it imposed; others have the pretension of translating God himself, interpreting and commenting them in as many ways and painful debates as bloodthirsty, burying the sacred texts of the divine word under their disputes.
Although Mr. Mossé’s book does not reveal the concern that we would like to see about the nature of the Spirits, it does not show either any of those that deny or combat it. We even say that it is closer than farther away and that a single step forward they would march shoulder to shoulder, for they tend to a common end: the practice of charity as a condition to a blessed life. It is therefore a good book that Spiritism must welcome as an ally that can become a brother.”
It is in these particularly blessed conditions that Zadecia’s soul starts its mission whose first phase is the incarnation in a being painfully delivered by a young and generous mother. In the second phase of her mission she is an angel of innocence and her beauty, irradiating like a divine emanation, purifies everything around her. In her third phase Zadecia is an angel of resignation and patience through which she endures physical sufferings. In the fourth she is an angel of mercy through the examples of charity and abnegation that she gives. In the fifth she is an angel of love through the mutual feelings of sympathy that she develops with the young Azariel. In the sixth she is the angel of marital love with Azariel. In the seventh she is the angel of maternal love. The eight phase is finally her return to heavens, leaving behing her husband and her daughter to continue her work of sanctification.”
Those multiple images certainly contain honorable examples and constitute attractive reading but the very much foreseen victory of Zadecia over all trials of her life subtracts the actual character of teaching since it can only result from the struggles of the fight. The condition of Zadecia when she leaves heavens, keeping the purity and virtuousness of the angels, makes her almost unnatractive, only changed by the interest brought up by the author in the form and expression of thoughts during her journey on Earth. Hence, after having read this book and given it the fair tribute of praise deserved by the style and harmonious work about the subject, one is forced to regret the fact that the author seems to be alien to the real principles of the nature of the Spirits, never giving any thought to the influence that they exert upon the diverse conditions of humanity, through the progressive improvement allowed by multiple incarnations.
A serious person has a natural concern. May the author probe the multiple lights of philosophy, the multiple facets of human life; may the author probe with the torch of religion the profound mysteries of death! The concern is to find the conclusion that may bring enlightenment about one’s true destiny, showing the path to follow. The path is not always the true path but each person follows the groove of the will, in the field of thoughts, according to the bad or good principles that were developed.
To some, preconceived ideas take the place of truths; they turn them into law, feeding interminable discussions to have it imposed; others have the pretension of translating God himself, interpreting and commenting them in as many ways and painful debates as bloodthirsty, burying the sacred texts of the divine word under their disputes.
Although Mr. Mossé’s book does not reveal the concern that we would like to see about the nature of the Spirits, it does not show either any of those that deny or combat it. We even say that it is closer than farther away and that a single step forward they would march shoulder to shoulder, for they tend to a common end: the practice of charity as a condition to a blessed life. It is therefore a good book that Spiritism must welcome as an ally that can become a brother.”
Feyteau, Lawyer
[1] By Benjamin Mossé, Rabi in Avignon – 1 vol., in-12; 3.5 francs. In Avignon, Bonnet & Sons
April
Mutual Destruction of Living BeingsThe destruction of living creatures by one another is one of the laws of nature that, at first sight, seems not to reconcile much with the goodness of God. The question is why would have God established the need for one to destroy the other to be fed as a law. To the one that only sees matter that limits one’s vision to present life it seesm, in fact, an imperfection in the divine work and from that the nonbelievers conclude that since God is not perfect, there is no God. The reason for that is the fact that they judge God’s perfection from their point of view. Their own judgment is the measure of their wisdom, considering that God could not do better than they would do themselves. Since their short sight does not allow them to see the whole, they do not understand that a real good may derive from an apparent harm. It is only the knowledge of the spiritual principle, considered in its true essence, and the great law of unity that constitutes the harmony of creation, that can give mankind the key to that mystery, showing the providential wisdom and harmony where only anomaly and contradiction were seen. It happens to this truth the same that happens to many others for mankind is not ready to probe certain depths but when the Spirit reaches a sufficient level of maturity.
True life of both, man and animal, is not more in the corporeal envelope than on the clothes. It is in the intelligent principle that preexists and outlives the body. That principle needs the body to develop through work that must be realized on the brute matter. The body wears out in the process but not the Spirit; on the contrary it leaves the body stronger, more lucid and capable. What does it matter then if the Spirit changes more or less its envelope? It does not affect the fact that it is still Spirit. It is absolutely like a person that would change the wardrobe a hundred times in one year. The person would still remain the same. Through the unstoppable spectacle of destruction God teaches humanity the little importance of the material envelope and draws the attention to the idea of the spiritual life, persuading mankind to desire it as a compensation. Some will ask if God could not reach the same result by other means, not submitting the living creatures to a mutual destruction. Very smart the one that wanted to penetrate the mysteries of God’s designs! If everything is wisdom in God’s work we must suppose that such wisdom is not more absent in this point than on the others. We should blame our lack of advancement for not understanding it. However, we can try to find the reason for that by following this principle: God must be infinitely just and wise. Let us then seek justice and wisdom in everything. A first utility that stems out of such destruction is this purely physical utility: organic bodies can only feed out of organic matter, the only capable of providing the necessary nutrients to its transformation. Since the bodies, instruments of action of the intelligent principle, must necessarily be renovated, the Providence makes them serve their mutual maintenance. That is why the beings feed one another, that is, that the body is fed by the body. The Spirit, however, is not annihilated or altered. It only loses its envelope.
The struggle is necessary to the development of the Spirit because it is through the struggle that the Spirit exercises the faculties. The one that attacks to find its food as well as the one that defends itself to preserve life exercise their astuteness and intelligence and consequently increasing their intellectual strengths. One of the two falls. But what was in reality taken by the stronger or more capable from the weaker one? The garment of flesh, nothing else. The outliving Spirit will take another one later.
With the inferior beings of creation where there is no moral sense and intelligence is not even in an instinctive state, the only drive of the struggle is the satisfaction of a material need. Feeding is one of the most pressing material needs. Therefore they only fight for their survival or defend a prey since they could not have a more elevated stimulus. It is in that phase that the soul expands and prepares for life. When it reaches the level of maturity necessary to its transformation it receives new skills from God: the free-will and the moral sense, in a word a divine flame that provides the Spirit with new horizons with the new perceptions. But the new moral faculties only develop gradually for nothing is sudden in nature; there is a transition period in which mankind can hardly be distinguished from the brute. In the first ages the animal instinct prevails and the struggle is still driven by the satisfaction of material needs. Later on there is a balance between the animal instinct and moral feeling; people then fight not only to feed themselves but also to satisfy their ambition, pride and the need to dominate. The need for destruction is no longer there; it becomes hateful and fades away. Blood becomes a horror. The struggle, however, is always necessary to the development of the Spirit because, even at that stage that is apparently the top, the Spirit is far from perfect; it is only at the price of a lot of activity that the Spirit acquires knowledge and experience and leaves behind the last vestiges of animality. The fight that was brutal and bloody becomes purely intellectual. People then fight against difficulties rather than their fellow human beings.
Note: As it can be seen, this explanation is related to the serious problem of animals’ future. We will soon treat this matter in depth because it seems to us that it has been sufficiently elaborated and we believe that it can be, in principle, considered resolved at this stage by the agreement of the teachings.
True life of both, man and animal, is not more in the corporeal envelope than on the clothes. It is in the intelligent principle that preexists and outlives the body. That principle needs the body to develop through work that must be realized on the brute matter. The body wears out in the process but not the Spirit; on the contrary it leaves the body stronger, more lucid and capable. What does it matter then if the Spirit changes more or less its envelope? It does not affect the fact that it is still Spirit. It is absolutely like a person that would change the wardrobe a hundred times in one year. The person would still remain the same. Through the unstoppable spectacle of destruction God teaches humanity the little importance of the material envelope and draws the attention to the idea of the spiritual life, persuading mankind to desire it as a compensation. Some will ask if God could not reach the same result by other means, not submitting the living creatures to a mutual destruction. Very smart the one that wanted to penetrate the mysteries of God’s designs! If everything is wisdom in God’s work we must suppose that such wisdom is not more absent in this point than on the others. We should blame our lack of advancement for not understanding it. However, we can try to find the reason for that by following this principle: God must be infinitely just and wise. Let us then seek justice and wisdom in everything. A first utility that stems out of such destruction is this purely physical utility: organic bodies can only feed out of organic matter, the only capable of providing the necessary nutrients to its transformation. Since the bodies, instruments of action of the intelligent principle, must necessarily be renovated, the Providence makes them serve their mutual maintenance. That is why the beings feed one another, that is, that the body is fed by the body. The Spirit, however, is not annihilated or altered. It only loses its envelope.
The struggle is necessary to the development of the Spirit because it is through the struggle that the Spirit exercises the faculties. The one that attacks to find its food as well as the one that defends itself to preserve life exercise their astuteness and intelligence and consequently increasing their intellectual strengths. One of the two falls. But what was in reality taken by the stronger or more capable from the weaker one? The garment of flesh, nothing else. The outliving Spirit will take another one later.
With the inferior beings of creation where there is no moral sense and intelligence is not even in an instinctive state, the only drive of the struggle is the satisfaction of a material need. Feeding is one of the most pressing material needs. Therefore they only fight for their survival or defend a prey since they could not have a more elevated stimulus. It is in that phase that the soul expands and prepares for life. When it reaches the level of maturity necessary to its transformation it receives new skills from God: the free-will and the moral sense, in a word a divine flame that provides the Spirit with new horizons with the new perceptions. But the new moral faculties only develop gradually for nothing is sudden in nature; there is a transition period in which mankind can hardly be distinguished from the brute. In the first ages the animal instinct prevails and the struggle is still driven by the satisfaction of material needs. Later on there is a balance between the animal instinct and moral feeling; people then fight not only to feed themselves but also to satisfy their ambition, pride and the need to dominate. The need for destruction is no longer there; it becomes hateful and fades away. Blood becomes a horror. The struggle, however, is always necessary to the development of the Spirit because, even at that stage that is apparently the top, the Spirit is far from perfect; it is only at the price of a lot of activity that the Spirit acquires knowledge and experience and leaves behind the last vestiges of animality. The fight that was brutal and bloody becomes purely intellectual. People then fight against difficulties rather than their fellow human beings.
Note: As it can be seen, this explanation is related to the serious problem of animals’ future. We will soon treat this matter in depth because it seems to us that it has been sufficiently elaborated and we believe that it can be, in principle, considered resolved at this stage by the agreement of the teachings.
Sermon on Progress
We got the following letter from Montauban:
“A few days back something happened that impressed the population of our town in different ways. Mr. Rewile, a Protestand preacher, Chaplain of the King of Holland, affirmed in a speech before two thousand people that he shared the new ideas. We were happy to hear these sublime truths proclaimed for the first time from a Christian pulpit, and developed with extraordinary talent and eloquence. He must have been brilliant because the fanatics promptly called him the anti-Christ. I am sorry for not being able to transmit the whole sermon but I will try to analyze a few passages.
The speaker used the following text as his theme: - I did not come to destroy the law and the prophets, but to fulfill it. Love yourself with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your thought, and your neighbor as yourself.
According to Mr. Rewile Christ’s mission among mankind was that of charity and spirituality; his doctrine, therefore, seemed contrary to that of the Jewish people whose principle was: strict observation of the law, a principle that would lead to selfishness. Nonetheless, the expression “fulfill it” explains that apparent contradiction because it means complement, makes more perfect. Replacing egotism by charity and the cult to matter by spirituality was a fulfillment, a complement to the law.
Christ tried in vain to make this nation break the chains of matter, elevating the thoughts and making everyone look at their destinies from a higher point of view. The depth of his moral has never been understood. Hence, when he tried to attack the abuse of all kinds, the exterior practices and to mitigate the rigor of Moses’ law he was accused and cowardly condemned. The Jews expected a conqueror Messiah that would give them the transient power with his iron stick, not understanding what could be great and sublime to humanity in that weak walking stick in his hand, bringing as a gift from his spiritual power the law of love and charity.
But God’s designs always come true, despite the resistances, and if the Jewish, as the workers of bad will, refused to work in his vines it was not enough to deny humanity its advancement, sweeping away in its movement everything that could constitute obstacle to progress. The Christian Church must follow that ascending march or else fail, because humanity was not made for the Church but the Church for humanity. The unfortunate ones that resisted would be smashed by the hand of progress. Wasn’t the past built to respond to the future?
May the children of the nineteenth century, contrary to the behavior of the former Jewish, understand and do their work! Don’t they already experience that involuntary excitement that agitates every distinct intelligence and that spontaneously drive them towards the acquisition of spiritual ideas, the only guarantee of happiness to humanity, since without spirituality there is only matter and without freedom only slavery?
Why then resisting to these noble impulses of the soul by attributing those new signs of modern times to the devil? Why can’t we see there the inspirations from God’s celestial messengers of love and charity, announcing to us the renovation of humanity?
Christian Church must return to the Spirit. In fact what is the Church without the Spirit if not a cadaver, a true corpse in the actual meaning of the word? He who has ears to hear, let him hear! True Church in these critical days has the right to count on its children… Let us go, stand up and hands on! May each one do their job! That is what God wishes! God wishes!
If Jesus came to complement, that is, to fulfil the law by the practice of love towards God and mankind it is because such a precept was the summary of human perfection. The law of love towards God and mankind is, like Jesus himself teaches himself, a greater law to which all others are subordinated. Therefore it is necessary to practice that law in its broadest sense to be closer to him and consequently closer to God that Jesus was the greatest expression on Earth. To love God it is necessary to love the truth, the beauty and the good; it is necessary to internally feel transported to these attributes of moral perfection, but it is also necessary to love one’s brothers and fellow human beings, since they reflect God’s truth, beauty and good.
Why did Jesus love humanity to the point of giving his own life for that? Because since he was also the highest expression of human perfection he felt the effects of that law of love towards God and his neighbors in its highest degree, having to practice it in a sublime way… Practicing charity and love is the same as marching large strides on the path of truth, beauty and good. It is a walk to God! Loving is living and advancing to immortality!
__
From what I learned Mr. Rewile successfully discussed the issue of manifestations in two conferences to students of the Faculty. He would have responded correctly to all objections. I am sorry for not having heard them in such an interesting occasion.”
Observation: The Spirits had told us that Spiritism would find defenders in the ranks of the adversaries. Such a speech from the mouth of a minister of religion and given from the pulpit is a serious event. We should expect to see others because the example of courage of opinion is contagious. The new ideas will not take long to find confess champions in science, literature and in the press. They already have more sympathy there than one may believe. It is only the first step that is difficult. Up until today we can say that with the exception of the special organizations of Spiritism, that do not address the indifferent masses, only our adversaries have been given the word and God knows if they made use of that! Now the struggle takes place. What will they say when they see that honorable and dear names leave their ranks to openly hold the flag of the Doctrine in their own hands? It was said that all will be accomplished.
“A few days back something happened that impressed the population of our town in different ways. Mr. Rewile, a Protestand preacher, Chaplain of the King of Holland, affirmed in a speech before two thousand people that he shared the new ideas. We were happy to hear these sublime truths proclaimed for the first time from a Christian pulpit, and developed with extraordinary talent and eloquence. He must have been brilliant because the fanatics promptly called him the anti-Christ. I am sorry for not being able to transmit the whole sermon but I will try to analyze a few passages.
The speaker used the following text as his theme: - I did not come to destroy the law and the prophets, but to fulfill it. Love yourself with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your thought, and your neighbor as yourself.
According to Mr. Rewile Christ’s mission among mankind was that of charity and spirituality; his doctrine, therefore, seemed contrary to that of the Jewish people whose principle was: strict observation of the law, a principle that would lead to selfishness. Nonetheless, the expression “fulfill it” explains that apparent contradiction because it means complement, makes more perfect. Replacing egotism by charity and the cult to matter by spirituality was a fulfillment, a complement to the law.
Christ tried in vain to make this nation break the chains of matter, elevating the thoughts and making everyone look at their destinies from a higher point of view. The depth of his moral has never been understood. Hence, when he tried to attack the abuse of all kinds, the exterior practices and to mitigate the rigor of Moses’ law he was accused and cowardly condemned. The Jews expected a conqueror Messiah that would give them the transient power with his iron stick, not understanding what could be great and sublime to humanity in that weak walking stick in his hand, bringing as a gift from his spiritual power the law of love and charity.
But God’s designs always come true, despite the resistances, and if the Jewish, as the workers of bad will, refused to work in his vines it was not enough to deny humanity its advancement, sweeping away in its movement everything that could constitute obstacle to progress. The Christian Church must follow that ascending march or else fail, because humanity was not made for the Church but the Church for humanity. The unfortunate ones that resisted would be smashed by the hand of progress. Wasn’t the past built to respond to the future?
May the children of the nineteenth century, contrary to the behavior of the former Jewish, understand and do their work! Don’t they already experience that involuntary excitement that agitates every distinct intelligence and that spontaneously drive them towards the acquisition of spiritual ideas, the only guarantee of happiness to humanity, since without spirituality there is only matter and without freedom only slavery?
Why then resisting to these noble impulses of the soul by attributing those new signs of modern times to the devil? Why can’t we see there the inspirations from God’s celestial messengers of love and charity, announcing to us the renovation of humanity?
Christian Church must return to the Spirit. In fact what is the Church without the Spirit if not a cadaver, a true corpse in the actual meaning of the word? He who has ears to hear, let him hear! True Church in these critical days has the right to count on its children… Let us go, stand up and hands on! May each one do their job! That is what God wishes! God wishes!
If Jesus came to complement, that is, to fulfil the law by the practice of love towards God and mankind it is because such a precept was the summary of human perfection. The law of love towards God and mankind is, like Jesus himself teaches himself, a greater law to which all others are subordinated. Therefore it is necessary to practice that law in its broadest sense to be closer to him and consequently closer to God that Jesus was the greatest expression on Earth. To love God it is necessary to love the truth, the beauty and the good; it is necessary to internally feel transported to these attributes of moral perfection, but it is also necessary to love one’s brothers and fellow human beings, since they reflect God’s truth, beauty and good.
Why did Jesus love humanity to the point of giving his own life for that? Because since he was also the highest expression of human perfection he felt the effects of that law of love towards God and his neighbors in its highest degree, having to practice it in a sublime way… Practicing charity and love is the same as marching large strides on the path of truth, beauty and good. It is a walk to God! Loving is living and advancing to immortality!
__
From what I learned Mr. Rewile successfully discussed the issue of manifestations in two conferences to students of the Faculty. He would have responded correctly to all objections. I am sorry for not having heard them in such an interesting occasion.”
Observation: The Spirits had told us that Spiritism would find defenders in the ranks of the adversaries. Such a speech from the mouth of a minister of religion and given from the pulpit is a serious event. We should expect to see others because the example of courage of opinion is contagious. The new ideas will not take long to find confess champions in science, literature and in the press. They already have more sympathy there than one may believe. It is only the first step that is difficult. Up until today we can say that with the exception of the special organizations of Spiritism, that do not address the indifferent masses, only our adversaries have been given the word and God knows if they made use of that! Now the struggle takes place. What will they say when they see that honorable and dear names leave their ranks to openly hold the flag of the Doctrine in their own hands? It was said that all will be accomplished.
Extracted from the Journal from Saint-Jean D’Angély
March 5th, 1865
Saint-Jean D’Angely Society of Spiritist Studies
Spiritism and its Consequences at a Glance
“There is a secret continuous harmony between the visible world and the world of the Spirits. Such harmony and its possible manifestations is, without contradiction, one of the great themes of our time. That is what we propose to discuss in the columns of our journal. We address everybody, no doubt, but more particularly those whose day to day activities preclude them from dedicating to a continuous study in the great books of facts that, for being so touching and occurring all over the world, are proclaimed and attested by the most enlightened persons. Our objective is many fold: to demonstrate the possibility of those facts by the revelation of natural laws, unknown up until now; to remove from them the ironic label of pretense miracles that intend to see them diminished to the eyes of those that know nothing about it and to initiate them in the knowledge of the Doctrine that is the result of those facts and deduce from that Doctrine its very reassuring consequences.
They speak of miracles. If there is one that is incomprehensible to our eyes is that of the coldness and indifference, real or simulated, of intelligent and honorable persons before the manifestations that take place in all corners of the globe and that are plentifully published every day.
We would understand their disdain and inappropriate use of the language if the reproduction of what had been seen by so many would only lead to a childish curiosity or if their only useful result were the utilization of time in the absence of anything better to do. It can no longer be the case when we think that it is not only the most important objective of our existences, that is the solution, by a positive proof, of the issue of immortality of the soul and the for so long discussed issue of our future destinies, but also and above all the call, by the conviction of these truths, to those that stay away from their duties to God, their fellow human beings and themselves.
Notice this: you are the members of a grand jury. Witnesses that are unknown to you, that you have never seen before come to affirm the most unbelievable fact to you: the murder of a father by the son or the son by a father. You believe and condemn the miserable author of such a crime and you are right. But let us analyze the issue by touching our conscience.
They speak of miracles. If there is one that is incomprehensible to our eyes is that of the coldness and indifference, real or simulated, of intelligent and honorable persons before the manifestations that take place in all corners of the globe and that are plentifully published every day.
We would understand their disdain and inappropriate use of the language if the reproduction of what had been seen by so many would only lead to a childish curiosity or if their only useful result were the utilization of time in the absence of anything better to do. It can no longer be the case when we think that it is not only the most important objective of our existences, that is the solution, by a positive proof, of the issue of immortality of the soul and the for so long discussed issue of our future destinies, but also and above all the call, by the conviction of these truths, to those that stay away from their duties to God, their fellow human beings and themselves.
Notice this: you are the members of a grand jury. Witnesses that are unknown to you, that you have never seen before come to affirm the most unbelievable fact to you: the murder of a father by the son or the son by a father. You believe and condemn the miserable author of such a crime and you are right. But let us analyze the issue by touching our conscience.
Suppose that the unfortunate man had believed in a powerful and fair God; since long ago he had understood that such a horrible act would infallibly have punishment on another life. Would you believe that he would not have stepped back before the perpetration of that crime? No, you do not believe so. Like us, you say: yes, the belief, but a strong and unrestricted belief, the absolute belief in a fair God, in the penalties and rewards in another life where each will receive according to their work here, that is the brake that must be the most difficult to destroy and you are still right.
Such beliefs, unfortunately, and to the great majority of people, are the unknowns of the great problem of universal morality. Wait, screams the majority! We are no longer in agreement. Our intelligence and our studies have long ago given us the solution that you indicated. Your pretense new proofs are useless to us. We are and have always be believers.
It is precisely that language that connects us to every martyr. You say that you have always believed, at least that is what you state. Good for your, ladies and gentlemen. If it is necessary to confess it, we do not doubt. Our sincere congratulations. We would be really happy if we could affirm something more.
We frankly agree that despite the favor of all of the good conditions that have contributed to elevate our thoughts, there was still a long way to cover so that we could do as much as you did. How many of your brothers, with even more reason and for their social positions, fell behind for being precluded from the advantages of study and eventually from some good examples?
Yes, faith is dead. Every doctor of the law agrees and moans about it. Despite their efforts, disbelief has never been so profound and more general. For some time follow that long line of people that have just taken one of their own to the last dwelling, as they say, and in ninety five percent of the time you will hear they saying: one more at the end of penalties. Said words, said and at the same time a great proof of the insufficiency of the means employed today for the propagation of the only and true happiness that people could enjoy on Earth, for the propagation of faith.
Praise the Lord! A new light shines to all. Out with privileges! A place to those in good will! Without struggles of the mind, without expensive and difficult studies, the humblest, the least educated, as with all of his brothers, may contemplate, if so wished, the divine light. Only those that do not want to see will not see it. If that is the case, we repeat, the most honest and educated persons, whose names will be cited in phalanxes, give the most authentic testimony. If that is the case, we ask, why venture into placing the light below the lamp? Why, for the simple reason that we feel no need for ourselves, rejecting without examination the phenomena whose knowledge and understanding may, if not always, at least many times stop the person at the border of a fatal cliff, to which she was impelled by doubt and disbelief; if they always and for so little can reassure through hope and courage what is about to succumb to the weight of misery?
These are, for example, the benefits that we can so easily spread around us but whose progress and diffusion may be delayed by indifference as much as opposition.”
Such beliefs, unfortunately, and to the great majority of people, are the unknowns of the great problem of universal morality. Wait, screams the majority! We are no longer in agreement. Our intelligence and our studies have long ago given us the solution that you indicated. Your pretense new proofs are useless to us. We are and have always be believers.
It is precisely that language that connects us to every martyr. You say that you have always believed, at least that is what you state. Good for your, ladies and gentlemen. If it is necessary to confess it, we do not doubt. Our sincere congratulations. We would be really happy if we could affirm something more.
We frankly agree that despite the favor of all of the good conditions that have contributed to elevate our thoughts, there was still a long way to cover so that we could do as much as you did. How many of your brothers, with even more reason and for their social positions, fell behind for being precluded from the advantages of study and eventually from some good examples?
Yes, faith is dead. Every doctor of the law agrees and moans about it. Despite their efforts, disbelief has never been so profound and more general. For some time follow that long line of people that have just taken one of their own to the last dwelling, as they say, and in ninety five percent of the time you will hear they saying: one more at the end of penalties. Said words, said and at the same time a great proof of the insufficiency of the means employed today for the propagation of the only and true happiness that people could enjoy on Earth, for the propagation of faith.
Praise the Lord! A new light shines to all. Out with privileges! A place to those in good will! Without struggles of the mind, without expensive and difficult studies, the humblest, the least educated, as with all of his brothers, may contemplate, if so wished, the divine light. Only those that do not want to see will not see it. If that is the case, we repeat, the most honest and educated persons, whose names will be cited in phalanxes, give the most authentic testimony. If that is the case, we ask, why venture into placing the light below the lamp? Why, for the simple reason that we feel no need for ourselves, rejecting without examination the phenomena whose knowledge and understanding may, if not always, at least many times stop the person at the border of a fatal cliff, to which she was impelled by doubt and disbelief; if they always and for so little can reassure through hope and courage what is about to succumb to the weight of misery?
These are, for example, the benefits that we can so easily spread around us but whose progress and diffusion may be delayed by indifference as much as opposition.”
(To be continued.)
- Chaigneau
Observation: Our prediction given in the preceding article regarding the sermon of Montauban begins to become reality. Here we have a journal that is not an organ of Spiritism and that today accepts would certainly would not have been a year ago, and not the report of events but articles of substance that develop the principles of the Doctrine. And who author them? Someone unknown? An ignorant person? No. They are authored by a doctor that enjoys a deserved reputation of knowledge and consideration in the region for his renowned qualities.
We know more than one journal that would not have problem in speaking favorably about Spiritism; that would even speak out of good-will if not for the fear of displeasing certain readers thus compromising their own interests. Such a fear could have some foundation some time ago but not today. General opinion has changed a lot about Spiritism. It is no longer something unknown. It is talked about everywhere and people no longer laugh at it as much. The idea is so much spread out that if there is something surprising is the fact that the press is indifferent to an issue that concerns the masses and that counts on millions of followers in every country of the world and in the most educated layers of society; the surprise is above all in seeing intelligent people criticizing the idea without knowing its basics. Is it then a futile issue that raises the rage of an entire party? Would that party be touched if found in the idea just a myth without consequences? That party would laugh at it but considering that the party gets upset, that rages against it and that fires up its auto-da-fe in hopes of killing that idea, it means that there is something serious there. Ah! If all those that pretend to be the representatives of progress would have taken the burden of studying the issue and they would likely not treat it with disdain.
Nonetheless our objective here is not to make their apology. We just want to register as an attested fact that the Spiritist idea has taken position among the philosophical doctrines; that it constitutes an opinion whose representatives multiply in such a way that the adversaries are the first to acknowledge that. The natural consequence is that the journals that are openly sympathetic to this cause will be granted the sympathy of its followers and these are in number large enough to compensate for some desertion that could take place, if any.
From the point of view of the Spiritist idea the public is divided in three categories: the followers, the indifferent and the antagonists. It is obvious that the two first ones form the majority. The followers will seek it for their sympathy; the indifferent ones will be satisfied by finding an impartial discussion through which they have the means of learning about what they ignore. As for the adversaries, most will be happy for not reading the articles that are not of their interest but for that they will not renounce to a journal that pleases them in other aspects: its political tendencies, editorial, columns or a variety of multiple types of news. In fact the natural adversaries of Spiritism have their special journals. In short it is certain that in the current state of affairs they would gain more than lose.
People will certainly say, and with reason, that conviction is not imposed and that a journal, much like an individual, cannot embrace ideas that they do not share. This is very true but it does not hamper impartiality. Up until today and with very rare exceptions, the journals have opened up their columns to criticism, as broadly as possible, as well as to the attacks, to the defamation of a large class of citizens, without scruples casting ridicule and neglect onto people, pitilessly closing their ranks to any defense. How many times haven’t the courts granted the right of replica that was ignored before? Would it then be necessary to resource to the courts, filling law suits? These would have accounted for thousands over the last ten years. We ask if there is impartiality, justice from the part of journals that permanently proclaim the freedom of speech, equality of rights and fraternity. It is understandable the refutation of a doctrine that one does not share; the reasoned and in good faith discussion of its principles but what is not fair or loyal is to denature that doctrine and pretend to have it saying the opposite of what it does say with the objective of having it discredited. That is what the adversaries of Spiritism do on a daily basis.
The admission of a defense after the attack, or the rectification of inaccuracies is not the same as sharing the principles. It would only be impartiality and loyalty. A journal could even go further. Without renouncing to its convictions and with full reservation of its personal opinions, it could admit to discuss the pros and cons. It would, therefore, position its readers to be able to discuss an issue that is worthwhile given the repercussion that it finds every day.
We must then praise the journal that welcomes Mr. Chaigeau’s articles for its impartiality. We must also praise the author for being one of the first to enter the arena of official publicity, sustaining our cause there with the authority of a man of science. The article mentioned above is just the introduction to his work. The number 12, March issue, contains the introduction to the subject. It is a wisely founded historical of modern Spiritism. We are sorry for not being able to reproduce it here given its extension.
We know more than one journal that would not have problem in speaking favorably about Spiritism; that would even speak out of good-will if not for the fear of displeasing certain readers thus compromising their own interests. Such a fear could have some foundation some time ago but not today. General opinion has changed a lot about Spiritism. It is no longer something unknown. It is talked about everywhere and people no longer laugh at it as much. The idea is so much spread out that if there is something surprising is the fact that the press is indifferent to an issue that concerns the masses and that counts on millions of followers in every country of the world and in the most educated layers of society; the surprise is above all in seeing intelligent people criticizing the idea without knowing its basics. Is it then a futile issue that raises the rage of an entire party? Would that party be touched if found in the idea just a myth without consequences? That party would laugh at it but considering that the party gets upset, that rages against it and that fires up its auto-da-fe in hopes of killing that idea, it means that there is something serious there. Ah! If all those that pretend to be the representatives of progress would have taken the burden of studying the issue and they would likely not treat it with disdain.
Nonetheless our objective here is not to make their apology. We just want to register as an attested fact that the Spiritist idea has taken position among the philosophical doctrines; that it constitutes an opinion whose representatives multiply in such a way that the adversaries are the first to acknowledge that. The natural consequence is that the journals that are openly sympathetic to this cause will be granted the sympathy of its followers and these are in number large enough to compensate for some desertion that could take place, if any.
From the point of view of the Spiritist idea the public is divided in three categories: the followers, the indifferent and the antagonists. It is obvious that the two first ones form the majority. The followers will seek it for their sympathy; the indifferent ones will be satisfied by finding an impartial discussion through which they have the means of learning about what they ignore. As for the adversaries, most will be happy for not reading the articles that are not of their interest but for that they will not renounce to a journal that pleases them in other aspects: its political tendencies, editorial, columns or a variety of multiple types of news. In fact the natural adversaries of Spiritism have their special journals. In short it is certain that in the current state of affairs they would gain more than lose.
People will certainly say, and with reason, that conviction is not imposed and that a journal, much like an individual, cannot embrace ideas that they do not share. This is very true but it does not hamper impartiality. Up until today and with very rare exceptions, the journals have opened up their columns to criticism, as broadly as possible, as well as to the attacks, to the defamation of a large class of citizens, without scruples casting ridicule and neglect onto people, pitilessly closing their ranks to any defense. How many times haven’t the courts granted the right of replica that was ignored before? Would it then be necessary to resource to the courts, filling law suits? These would have accounted for thousands over the last ten years. We ask if there is impartiality, justice from the part of journals that permanently proclaim the freedom of speech, equality of rights and fraternity. It is understandable the refutation of a doctrine that one does not share; the reasoned and in good faith discussion of its principles but what is not fair or loyal is to denature that doctrine and pretend to have it saying the opposite of what it does say with the objective of having it discredited. That is what the adversaries of Spiritism do on a daily basis.
The admission of a defense after the attack, or the rectification of inaccuracies is not the same as sharing the principles. It would only be impartiality and loyalty. A journal could even go further. Without renouncing to its convictions and with full reservation of its personal opinions, it could admit to discuss the pros and cons. It would, therefore, position its readers to be able to discuss an issue that is worthwhile given the repercussion that it finds every day.
We must then praise the journal that welcomes Mr. Chaigeau’s articles for its impartiality. We must also praise the author for being one of the first to enter the arena of official publicity, sustaining our cause there with the authority of a man of science. The article mentioned above is just the introduction to his work. The number 12, March issue, contains the introduction to the subject. It is a wisely founded historical of modern Spiritism. We are sorry for not being able to reproduce it here given its extension.
Correspondence from Beyond the Grave
Mediumistic studyFor better understanding of the main subject we extracted the following passage from a letter sent by a subscriber. Besides, it is a simple and touching expression of the consolations found in Spiritism by those in suffering.
“Allow me to tell you how much relief Spiritism has given me with the certainty of meeting again and in a better world someone that I loved with a boundless love, a dear brother that died in his early days. How reassuring the thought that the one whose death we cry is many times near us, giving us support when we are in pain, making us rejoice when the faith in the future allows us to foresee a certain encounter! Initiated in the remarkable principles of Spiritism a few years back I had accepted all of its truths and had strived to live here in a way that could speed up my advancement. I had made my resolutions very sincerely, however, I confess that since I did not have the necessary elements to fortify and entertain my belief in the communication with the Spirits, I gradually got used not to reject them but to see them with indifference. The fact of the matter is that up until then misfortune was unknown to me. Today God thought appropriate to send me a painful trial and I found in Spiritism the precious consolations and I see the need to thank you very particularly as the first preacher of the sacred Doctrine. Since the doctrine of Spiritism is not a simple hypothesis but stands on positive facts to the reach of everybody, its consolations not only consist on the certainty of meeting again the loved ones but also and above all, on the possibility of corresponding with them and obtaining healthy teachings from them.”
With that conviction the living brother wrote this letter to the dead brother, requesting his answer through a medium.
N… March 14th, 1865
“My beloved brother,
I lack words to tell you about my happiness when I read your letter addressed to me through the medium from C… I forwarded it to our poor parents that suffered a lot because of your unexpected departure. They asked me to write back to you, asking for more details about your current life, so that they can believe by new proofs that you will easily give in the reality of the teaching of the Spirits. But, before anything else, come close to them many times; inspire in them resignation and faith in the future; give them consolation for they need it in their pain, hurt like by an unforeseen blow. As for myself, my beloved brother, I shall be always happy whenever you are allowed to send me news about you. Today once more I ask you for details of your disease, your death and wake up in the world of the Spirits.
Who were the Spirits that came to welcome you at the entry point of the invisible world? Have you seen our grandpa yet? Is he happy? Have you seen again our relatives that died before you, even the ones that you had not met on Earth? Have you watched your own funeral? What was your impression? I ask you for details of that said ceremony that would not allow our parents to doubt your identity. Could you tell us if any member of our family could become a medium? Wouldn’t you like to communicate through someone among us?
I don’t believe you don’t want to continue your studies in music, something that was much dear to you here on Earth. It would be a great consolation to us if you wanted to finish the psalms whose music you began in Paris. You can see the enormous emptiness that your death brought to our hearts. I beg you to inspire in our parents the courage to not fail before such a terrible test. Be often with them and give them news about you. As for myself, God knows how much I suffered. Despite my belief in Spiritism, there are times when I cannot bear the fact that I will no longer see you in this life and that I would give my own life to be able to embrace you in my heart.
Good-bye my honorable friend. Think sometimes of the one whose thoughts are always with you and that would do anything possible to one day be considered worthy of being with you.
I hug you now and bring you close to my heart.
From your much devout brother, B…”
Note: In a previous communication given to the parents through another medium it was said that the young man did not want to continue his studies with music in the world of the Spirits.
“Allow me to tell you how much relief Spiritism has given me with the certainty of meeting again and in a better world someone that I loved with a boundless love, a dear brother that died in his early days. How reassuring the thought that the one whose death we cry is many times near us, giving us support when we are in pain, making us rejoice when the faith in the future allows us to foresee a certain encounter! Initiated in the remarkable principles of Spiritism a few years back I had accepted all of its truths and had strived to live here in a way that could speed up my advancement. I had made my resolutions very sincerely, however, I confess that since I did not have the necessary elements to fortify and entertain my belief in the communication with the Spirits, I gradually got used not to reject them but to see them with indifference. The fact of the matter is that up until then misfortune was unknown to me. Today God thought appropriate to send me a painful trial and I found in Spiritism the precious consolations and I see the need to thank you very particularly as the first preacher of the sacred Doctrine. Since the doctrine of Spiritism is not a simple hypothesis but stands on positive facts to the reach of everybody, its consolations not only consist on the certainty of meeting again the loved ones but also and above all, on the possibility of corresponding with them and obtaining healthy teachings from them.”
With that conviction the living brother wrote this letter to the dead brother, requesting his answer through a medium.
N… March 14th, 1865
“My beloved brother,
I lack words to tell you about my happiness when I read your letter addressed to me through the medium from C… I forwarded it to our poor parents that suffered a lot because of your unexpected departure. They asked me to write back to you, asking for more details about your current life, so that they can believe by new proofs that you will easily give in the reality of the teaching of the Spirits. But, before anything else, come close to them many times; inspire in them resignation and faith in the future; give them consolation for they need it in their pain, hurt like by an unforeseen blow. As for myself, my beloved brother, I shall be always happy whenever you are allowed to send me news about you. Today once more I ask you for details of your disease, your death and wake up in the world of the Spirits.
Who were the Spirits that came to welcome you at the entry point of the invisible world? Have you seen our grandpa yet? Is he happy? Have you seen again our relatives that died before you, even the ones that you had not met on Earth? Have you watched your own funeral? What was your impression? I ask you for details of that said ceremony that would not allow our parents to doubt your identity. Could you tell us if any member of our family could become a medium? Wouldn’t you like to communicate through someone among us?
I don’t believe you don’t want to continue your studies in music, something that was much dear to you here on Earth. It would be a great consolation to us if you wanted to finish the psalms whose music you began in Paris. You can see the enormous emptiness that your death brought to our hearts. I beg you to inspire in our parents the courage to not fail before such a terrible test. Be often with them and give them news about you. As for myself, God knows how much I suffered. Despite my belief in Spiritism, there are times when I cannot bear the fact that I will no longer see you in this life and that I would give my own life to be able to embrace you in my heart.
Good-bye my honorable friend. Think sometimes of the one whose thoughts are always with you and that would do anything possible to one day be considered worthy of being with you.
I hug you now and bring you close to my heart.
From your much devout brother, B…”
Note: In a previous communication given to the parents through another medium it was said that the young man did not want to continue his studies with music in the world of the Spirits.
Answer from the dead to the living brother
“I am here, my good brother, but you ask too much. With all good will I cannot answer the multiple questions that you ask me in a single evocation. Don’t you know that sometimes is very difficult to a Spirit to transmit the thoughts through certain mediums that are not much capable of receiving clearly in their brains the photographic impression of the thoughts of certain Spirits, and that by altering those thoughts they give them a certain falsity that leads the majority of the interested parties to the most formal denial of the manifestations, something that is little encouraging and that brings a profound sadness to those that in the absence of more adequate instruments are powerless to provide sufficient signs of identity?
Believe me, good brother, have me evoked in family and you yourself with some good will and persistent trials will be able to speak with me at will. I am always by your side because I know that you are a Spiritist and I have hopes in you. It is true that sympathy attracts sympathy and that we cannot expect much with a medium that we meet for the first time. I will, nonetheless, try to satisfy you.
My death that makes you suffer was the end of captivity to my soul. Your love, support and kindness had soothed my exile on Earth. However, in my most beautiful moments of musical inspiration my eyes were driven to regions where everything is harmony, and I would forget myself by hearing the far away chords of celestial melodies that inundated my soul in their sweet vibrations. How many times was I left in such ecstatic reveries to which I owned the success of my studies in music that I continue here!
It would be a strange mistake to believe that individual aptitudes are lost in the spiritual world. On the contrary, it gets perfected to later on serve other planets where the Spirits are led to inhabit.
Cry no more, all of you my beloved relatives! What are the tears for? To make you upset. To discourage the souls. I departed first but you will meet me. Isn’t that certainty enough to reassure you? The rose that spread its perfume on the oak dies like I did, after having lived for a short while, sowing the soil with its withered petals. The oak, in turn, dies also and meets the fate of the rose for which the oak cried and whose lively colors harmonize with its somber foliage. Still some time and you shall come to me. We will then sing the song of the songs and praise God in his works because together we shall be happy if you resign to the trial that comes to you.
The one that was your brother on Earth and that always loves you.
B…”
Several important teachings stem out of this communication. The first is the difficulty that the Spirit has to express with the help of an instrument that was provided. We personally know that medium that has given proof of strength and flexibility of his faculty, particularly in the case of private evocations; it is what can be called a confident and well assisted medium. What is then the origin of the difficulty? Fact is that the easiness of communication depends on the degree of fluidic affinity between the Spirit and the medium. Each medium is therefore more or less apt to receive the impression or the impulsion of the thought of this or that Spirit. The medium can be a good instrument to one and a bad to another and that does not allow any conclusion with respect to the mediumistic qualities since the condition is more physical than moral. The Spirits therefore preferably seek the instruments with which they vibrate in synchronism. Imposing to the Spirit the first medium that shows up is to believe that they can utilize the instrument irrespectively, like imposing a pianist to play violin with the allegation that he knows music and must therefore play every instrument.
Without such harmony, the only that can produce fluidic assimilation, as much needed in tiptology as in writing, the communications are either incomplete, impossible or false. In the absence of the Spirit that we cannot see, if he cannot communicate freely there will always be others ready to take advantage of the occasion, not much interested in the truth of what they say. That fluidic similarity is sometimes totally impossible between certain Spirits and certain mediums; on other occasions, and that is the more common case, it only occurs gradually and with time, and that is what explains the fact that the Spirits that communicate through a medium do so with more facility and why the first communications almost always attest a certain difficulty and are less explicit.
It is, consequently, demonstrated both by theory and experience that there is no universal medium to the evocations but only by their aptitude to the several kinds of manifestation. The one that pretended to be able to receive at will and at a given set time communications from all Spirits and, consequently, is capable of the legitimate wishes of anyone that wishes to communicate with their loved ones, would be giving proof of radical ignorance of the most elemental principles of the science or of charlatanism, and in all cases proof of a presumption incompatible with the essential qualities of a good medium. We could believe that for some time but today the advances of the theoretical and practical science demonstrate that it is, in principle, impossible. When a Spirit communicates for the first time through a medium, and without any difficulty, that is due to an exceptional or previous fluidic affinity between the Spirit and the interpreter.
It is therefore a mistake to impose a medium to the Spirit that one wishes to evoke. It is necessary to allow the Spirit the freedom of choice of the instrument. However, people will ask, how to proceed when there is only one medium available, something that is very frequent? To begin with accept one we have and what we do not have. It is not in the scope of the Spiritist science to change the normal conditions of the manifestations as it is not in the scope of Chemistry to change the combination of the elements.
Nonetheless, there is here a means of attenuating the difficulties. In principle, when dealing with a new evocation, the medium must always evoke her spiritual guide first and ask if that evocation is possible. If positive, ask the Spirit if the medium provides the necessary aptitude to receive and transmit his thought. If there is any difficulty or if it is impossible then ask the Spirit to do it through the guide of the medium or have the Spirit accepting the guide’s assistance. In such a case the thoughts of the Spirit only arrive as a second hand, in other words, after having transposing two media.
It becomes then clear the importance of the medium to be well guided because if the assistance is given by an obsessing, ignorant or proud Spirit the communication will be altered. Here the moral qualities of the medium forcibly play an important role regarding the nature of the Spirit that the medium attracts to oneself. The most unfit mediums may have powerful faculties but the most confident ones are those that add the best sympathies in the invisible world to that strength. Now, those sympathies are not absolutely guaranteed by the more or less imposing names of the Spirits that sign the communications but by the constantly good nature of the communications that are received. Such principles are founded simultaneously on logic and experience. The very difficulties that they present demonstrate that the practice of Spiritism must not be treated lightheartedly. Another aspect sticks out from the communication above. It is the confirmation of the principle that intelligent Spirits continue in the spiritual world the works and studies that they undertook during their corporeal life. That is why we give preference, in the communications that we publish, to those that may lead to a useful lesson.
As for the letter from the living to the dead brother it is a naive and touching expression of the sincere faith in the survival of the soul, in the presence of the beings who are dear to us, and the possibility of continuing with those relationships of affection that united us to them.
The incredulous, no doubt, will laugh at what, in their eyes, is a puerile credulity. However much they try, the nothingness that they promote will never appeal to the masses because it breaks the heart and the most sacred relationships; it freezes instead of warming up; it brings fear and desperation instead of strength and consolation.
The keystone of their diatribes against Spiritism is this terrifying doctrine of the void and because of that it comes as no surprise its impotence to deviate the crowds form the new ideas. Between a doctrine of desperation and another one of reassurance there could be no doubt about the choice of the majority.
After the astonishing catastrophe of the Church of Santiago del Chile in 1864, they found a box with letters that the followers wrote to Hail Mary. Would there be any similarity between the letter above and the latter ones that have excited the verve of mockery? Certainly not. However, the mistake was not with those that believed in the possibility of communicating with the other world but with those that exploited such belief, giving answers compatible with the payments that were made with the letters of request. There are only a few superstitions that have not started from a truth altered by ignorance. Accused of resurrecting them, Spiritism on the contrary comes to bring them back to their fair value.
Believe me, good brother, have me evoked in family and you yourself with some good will and persistent trials will be able to speak with me at will. I am always by your side because I know that you are a Spiritist and I have hopes in you. It is true that sympathy attracts sympathy and that we cannot expect much with a medium that we meet for the first time. I will, nonetheless, try to satisfy you.
My death that makes you suffer was the end of captivity to my soul. Your love, support and kindness had soothed my exile on Earth. However, in my most beautiful moments of musical inspiration my eyes were driven to regions where everything is harmony, and I would forget myself by hearing the far away chords of celestial melodies that inundated my soul in their sweet vibrations. How many times was I left in such ecstatic reveries to which I owned the success of my studies in music that I continue here!
It would be a strange mistake to believe that individual aptitudes are lost in the spiritual world. On the contrary, it gets perfected to later on serve other planets where the Spirits are led to inhabit.
Cry no more, all of you my beloved relatives! What are the tears for? To make you upset. To discourage the souls. I departed first but you will meet me. Isn’t that certainty enough to reassure you? The rose that spread its perfume on the oak dies like I did, after having lived for a short while, sowing the soil with its withered petals. The oak, in turn, dies also and meets the fate of the rose for which the oak cried and whose lively colors harmonize with its somber foliage. Still some time and you shall come to me. We will then sing the song of the songs and praise God in his works because together we shall be happy if you resign to the trial that comes to you.
The one that was your brother on Earth and that always loves you.
B…”
Several important teachings stem out of this communication. The first is the difficulty that the Spirit has to express with the help of an instrument that was provided. We personally know that medium that has given proof of strength and flexibility of his faculty, particularly in the case of private evocations; it is what can be called a confident and well assisted medium. What is then the origin of the difficulty? Fact is that the easiness of communication depends on the degree of fluidic affinity between the Spirit and the medium. Each medium is therefore more or less apt to receive the impression or the impulsion of the thought of this or that Spirit. The medium can be a good instrument to one and a bad to another and that does not allow any conclusion with respect to the mediumistic qualities since the condition is more physical than moral. The Spirits therefore preferably seek the instruments with which they vibrate in synchronism. Imposing to the Spirit the first medium that shows up is to believe that they can utilize the instrument irrespectively, like imposing a pianist to play violin with the allegation that he knows music and must therefore play every instrument.
Without such harmony, the only that can produce fluidic assimilation, as much needed in tiptology as in writing, the communications are either incomplete, impossible or false. In the absence of the Spirit that we cannot see, if he cannot communicate freely there will always be others ready to take advantage of the occasion, not much interested in the truth of what they say. That fluidic similarity is sometimes totally impossible between certain Spirits and certain mediums; on other occasions, and that is the more common case, it only occurs gradually and with time, and that is what explains the fact that the Spirits that communicate through a medium do so with more facility and why the first communications almost always attest a certain difficulty and are less explicit.
It is, consequently, demonstrated both by theory and experience that there is no universal medium to the evocations but only by their aptitude to the several kinds of manifestation. The one that pretended to be able to receive at will and at a given set time communications from all Spirits and, consequently, is capable of the legitimate wishes of anyone that wishes to communicate with their loved ones, would be giving proof of radical ignorance of the most elemental principles of the science or of charlatanism, and in all cases proof of a presumption incompatible with the essential qualities of a good medium. We could believe that for some time but today the advances of the theoretical and practical science demonstrate that it is, in principle, impossible. When a Spirit communicates for the first time through a medium, and without any difficulty, that is due to an exceptional or previous fluidic affinity between the Spirit and the interpreter.
It is therefore a mistake to impose a medium to the Spirit that one wishes to evoke. It is necessary to allow the Spirit the freedom of choice of the instrument. However, people will ask, how to proceed when there is only one medium available, something that is very frequent? To begin with accept one we have and what we do not have. It is not in the scope of the Spiritist science to change the normal conditions of the manifestations as it is not in the scope of Chemistry to change the combination of the elements.
Nonetheless, there is here a means of attenuating the difficulties. In principle, when dealing with a new evocation, the medium must always evoke her spiritual guide first and ask if that evocation is possible. If positive, ask the Spirit if the medium provides the necessary aptitude to receive and transmit his thought. If there is any difficulty or if it is impossible then ask the Spirit to do it through the guide of the medium or have the Spirit accepting the guide’s assistance. In such a case the thoughts of the Spirit only arrive as a second hand, in other words, after having transposing two media.
It becomes then clear the importance of the medium to be well guided because if the assistance is given by an obsessing, ignorant or proud Spirit the communication will be altered. Here the moral qualities of the medium forcibly play an important role regarding the nature of the Spirit that the medium attracts to oneself. The most unfit mediums may have powerful faculties but the most confident ones are those that add the best sympathies in the invisible world to that strength. Now, those sympathies are not absolutely guaranteed by the more or less imposing names of the Spirits that sign the communications but by the constantly good nature of the communications that are received. Such principles are founded simultaneously on logic and experience. The very difficulties that they present demonstrate that the practice of Spiritism must not be treated lightheartedly. Another aspect sticks out from the communication above. It is the confirmation of the principle that intelligent Spirits continue in the spiritual world the works and studies that they undertook during their corporeal life. That is why we give preference, in the communications that we publish, to those that may lead to a useful lesson.
As for the letter from the living to the dead brother it is a naive and touching expression of the sincere faith in the survival of the soul, in the presence of the beings who are dear to us, and the possibility of continuing with those relationships of affection that united us to them.
The incredulous, no doubt, will laugh at what, in their eyes, is a puerile credulity. However much they try, the nothingness that they promote will never appeal to the masses because it breaks the heart and the most sacred relationships; it freezes instead of warming up; it brings fear and desperation instead of strength and consolation.
The keystone of their diatribes against Spiritism is this terrifying doctrine of the void and because of that it comes as no surprise its impotence to deviate the crowds form the new ideas. Between a doctrine of desperation and another one of reassurance there could be no doubt about the choice of the majority.
After the astonishing catastrophe of the Church of Santiago del Chile in 1864, they found a box with letters that the followers wrote to Hail Mary. Would there be any similarity between the letter above and the latter ones that have excited the verve of mockery? Certainly not. However, the mistake was not with those that believed in the possibility of communicating with the other world but with those that exploited such belief, giving answers compatible with the payments that were made with the letters of request. There are only a few superstitions that have not started from a truth altered by ignorance. Accused of resurrecting them, Spiritism on the contrary comes to bring them back to their fair value.
Healing Power of Spiritual Magnetism
Spirit of Dr. Demeure
In our last month’s article about Dr. Demeure we paid a well-deserved tribute to his eminent qualities of man and Spirit. The following fact is a new proof of his benevolence while, at the same time, it demonstrates the healing power of spiritual magnetization. This letter was sent from Montauban:
“The Spirit of our good father Demeure, coming to join the number of invisible friends that watch over our mind and body, wanted to manifest since the first days through a benefit. The news about his death was not yet known to our brothers in Montauban when he spontaneously and directly produced the cure of one of them through spiritual magnetism just by the fluidic action. Notice that he wasted no time and continued as a Spirit, as you say, his relief work onto the suffering humanity. There is, however, an important distinction to be made here. Certain Spirits remain attached to their earthly activities, unaware of their condition and believing to be still alive. That is typical of little advanced Spirits whereas Mr. Demeure immediately acknowledged himself and as a Spirit he acts voluntarily knowing that he has even more power in that state.
We had kept the information about Mr. Demeure’s death from Mrs. G…, a very lucid clairvoyant and somnambulistic medium, to spare her extreme sensitivity and the good doctor, undoubtedly aware of our intent, avoided the manifestation through her. On the last February 10th we gathered by the invitation of our guides to, according to them, alleviate Mr. G… from a painful strain that affected her since the day before. That was all that we knew, far from expecting the surprise that would come our way. Immediately after having fallen in a state of trance the lady produced lancinating screams pointing to her foot. Here is what happened: Mrs. G… saw a Spirit leaning onto her leg but she could not distinguish the face. The Spirit massaged the leg and from time to time produced a longitudinal tension on the sick part exactly like a doctor would have done. The operation was so painful that the patient sometimes screamed followed by jerky movements. The episode did not last long though. After ten minutes all traces of sprain had disappeared. There was no inflammation and the foot had gone back to normal appearance. Mrs. G… was healed.
When we think that to heal an injury of such a kind the best and most experienced magnetizers, not to mention the official medicine that has not yet come to a conclusion about such cases, need a long lasting treatment of at least thirty six hours, with three daily sessions of one hour, an compare to the above ten minutes procedure by the spiritual fluid, it can well be considered as an instantaneous cure, even more when in particular we take into account the fact that it was the first experience of the Spirit carried out with the objective of a future application in case this one would be successful, as it is explained by the Spirit in a communication that follows. Nonetheless the Spirit continued to be unknown to the medium and persisted in staying anonymous. The Spirit even gave the impression that he was running away when the patient who could not move one step forward minutes ago suddenly jumps in the middle of the room to shake hands with her spiritual doctor. Still this time the Spirit moved his face away only allowing her to shake hands. At that point in time Mrs. G… screams out and falls on the floor extenuated. She had just recognized the healing Spirit as Mr. Demeure. During her fit she was attended by several sympathetic Spirits. When she finally recovered her somnambulistic lucidity she talked to several Spirits, exchanged warm handshakes particularly with the Spirit of the doctor that was receptive to her demonstrations of sympathy and affection, involving her in a healing fluid. Isn’t that an exciting and dramatic scene in which we see several players representing their roles in human life? Isn’t that one among thousands of proofs that the Spirits are perfectly real, having a body and acting as they did on Earth? We were happy for finding our spiritualized friend with his excellent heart and kindness. In his life he had been the medium’s doctor; he knew her extreme sensitivity and had taken care of her like to a daughter. Isn’t that proof of identity given by a Spirit to a loved one touching, making us see our future life in a reassuring way? Here is the communication given by Dr. Demeure on the day following the above session:
“My good friends I am by your side and love you as I always did in the past. What a happiness to be able to communicate with those that are dear to me! I was really happy last night for being useful and alleviate the pain of our clairvoyant medium. It is an experience that will be useful to me and that will help me out in the future whenever there is a favorable occasion. Today her son is very sick but I hope that we will soon have him cured. All that will serve him to persevere in the study of the development of his faculty (Mrs. G…son was really cured of an inflammatory angina through homeopathic medication prescribed by the Spirit). In the near future we will give you the opportunity to witness phenomena still unknown to you and that shall be of great utility to the Spiritist science. I am happy to be able to personally contribute to those manifestations that would have given me a lot of pleasure when alive; thank God today I witness them in a very particular way that evidently demonstrates to me the reality of what happens among you. Believe me, good friends that I feel real pleasure in being useful to my fellow human beings and in helping them to propagate these beautiful truths that must change the world giving rise to better feelings.
Good bye my friends. So long.
Antoine Demeure.”
Isn’t that interesting to see an already wise soul on Earth to carry out studies and experiments as a Spirit to become more skillful in the relief of people’s pains? There is a commendable modesty in that confession that entails true merit whereas pseudo-wise Spirits are generally presumptuous. The last issue of the Spiritist Review cites a communication given by Mr. Demeure as if given in Montauban on February 1st. He gave it actually on January 26th. In my opinion this date is somewhat important because it was the day after his death. He says in the second paragraph: “… I enjoy a rare lucidity for Spirits recently separated from matter.” In fact that lucidity demonstrates a fast separation that is typical of morally well advanced Spirits.
Observation: The cure reported above is an example of pure spiritual magnetic action, without any mixture with human magnetism. The Spirits sometimes utilize the help of special mediums as conductors of their fluids. These are the healing Spirits whose faculties present a variety of energy levels, according to their personal aptitudes and the nature of the Spirits that assist them. We met a person eight months ago in Paris who suffered of painful exostosis in the hip and knee, keeping that person slaved to a bed. One of her young friends was a medium of that kind and treated him by the simple imposition of hands for a few minutes and by prayer that was followed by the patient with noble feelings. On the occasion the patient was having a very painful crisis analogous to the one endured by Mrs. G…, soon followed by a perfect calmness. He then had the impression of several hands giving him a massage and straightening his leg that would elongate 10 or 12 centimeters. He then feels a significant improvement and starts to walk but the longevity and seriousness of the disease turn the healing process very difficult and requiring a longer time than a simple sprain. We must emphasize that, as far as we know, the healing mediumship is not yet presented with generic and universal features but, on the contrary, restricted by application, meaning that the medium has a more powerful action upon certain individuals than on others and that not all diseases are cured. This is understandable when considering the fundamental role played by fluidic affinity in all mediumistic phenomena. Some people only enjoy that by accident and for a specific case. Hence it would be a mistake to believe that for the fact that a cure was obtained all others could also be obtained for the reason that the medium’s fluid is refractory to the own fluid of certain patients. The more natural the fluid assimilation the easier the healing process. It is then remarkable that certain fragile and delicate persons may exert a powerful influence upon strong and robust individuals. In such cases the persons are good conductors of the spiritual fluid whereas strong persons may be bad conductors. They only have their personal, human fluid that never has the purity and healing strength of the purified fluid of the good Spirits. From that one can understand the main reasons that oppose transforming healing mediumship into a profession. One would have to be gifted with a universal faculty to make it an occupation. Only incarnate Spirits of the highest order could have it in such a degree. Such presumption, even if employed selflessly and out of pure philanthropy, would be a demonstration of pride that by itself is a demonstration of moral inferiority. True superiority is humble. It does good without ostentation and hides away instead of looking for shine. The noble person seeks that modesty while the arrogant seeks the laurel that frequently escapes. Jesus used to say to those that were cured by him: “Go, thank God and tell nobody.” It is a great lesson to the healing mediums. We remind everyone here that the healing mediumship is exclusively in the fluidic action more or less instantaneous; that it must not be confused with human magnetism or with the faculty that certain mediums have to receive the prescription of medicine from the Spirits. These latter are only “prescriptive mediums” like others are poets or painters.
“The Spirit of our good father Demeure, coming to join the number of invisible friends that watch over our mind and body, wanted to manifest since the first days through a benefit. The news about his death was not yet known to our brothers in Montauban when he spontaneously and directly produced the cure of one of them through spiritual magnetism just by the fluidic action. Notice that he wasted no time and continued as a Spirit, as you say, his relief work onto the suffering humanity. There is, however, an important distinction to be made here. Certain Spirits remain attached to their earthly activities, unaware of their condition and believing to be still alive. That is typical of little advanced Spirits whereas Mr. Demeure immediately acknowledged himself and as a Spirit he acts voluntarily knowing that he has even more power in that state.
We had kept the information about Mr. Demeure’s death from Mrs. G…, a very lucid clairvoyant and somnambulistic medium, to spare her extreme sensitivity and the good doctor, undoubtedly aware of our intent, avoided the manifestation through her. On the last February 10th we gathered by the invitation of our guides to, according to them, alleviate Mr. G… from a painful strain that affected her since the day before. That was all that we knew, far from expecting the surprise that would come our way. Immediately after having fallen in a state of trance the lady produced lancinating screams pointing to her foot. Here is what happened: Mrs. G… saw a Spirit leaning onto her leg but she could not distinguish the face. The Spirit massaged the leg and from time to time produced a longitudinal tension on the sick part exactly like a doctor would have done. The operation was so painful that the patient sometimes screamed followed by jerky movements. The episode did not last long though. After ten minutes all traces of sprain had disappeared. There was no inflammation and the foot had gone back to normal appearance. Mrs. G… was healed.
When we think that to heal an injury of such a kind the best and most experienced magnetizers, not to mention the official medicine that has not yet come to a conclusion about such cases, need a long lasting treatment of at least thirty six hours, with three daily sessions of one hour, an compare to the above ten minutes procedure by the spiritual fluid, it can well be considered as an instantaneous cure, even more when in particular we take into account the fact that it was the first experience of the Spirit carried out with the objective of a future application in case this one would be successful, as it is explained by the Spirit in a communication that follows. Nonetheless the Spirit continued to be unknown to the medium and persisted in staying anonymous. The Spirit even gave the impression that he was running away when the patient who could not move one step forward minutes ago suddenly jumps in the middle of the room to shake hands with her spiritual doctor. Still this time the Spirit moved his face away only allowing her to shake hands. At that point in time Mrs. G… screams out and falls on the floor extenuated. She had just recognized the healing Spirit as Mr. Demeure. During her fit she was attended by several sympathetic Spirits. When she finally recovered her somnambulistic lucidity she talked to several Spirits, exchanged warm handshakes particularly with the Spirit of the doctor that was receptive to her demonstrations of sympathy and affection, involving her in a healing fluid. Isn’t that an exciting and dramatic scene in which we see several players representing their roles in human life? Isn’t that one among thousands of proofs that the Spirits are perfectly real, having a body and acting as they did on Earth? We were happy for finding our spiritualized friend with his excellent heart and kindness. In his life he had been the medium’s doctor; he knew her extreme sensitivity and had taken care of her like to a daughter. Isn’t that proof of identity given by a Spirit to a loved one touching, making us see our future life in a reassuring way? Here is the communication given by Dr. Demeure on the day following the above session:
“My good friends I am by your side and love you as I always did in the past. What a happiness to be able to communicate with those that are dear to me! I was really happy last night for being useful and alleviate the pain of our clairvoyant medium. It is an experience that will be useful to me and that will help me out in the future whenever there is a favorable occasion. Today her son is very sick but I hope that we will soon have him cured. All that will serve him to persevere in the study of the development of his faculty (Mrs. G…son was really cured of an inflammatory angina through homeopathic medication prescribed by the Spirit). In the near future we will give you the opportunity to witness phenomena still unknown to you and that shall be of great utility to the Spiritist science. I am happy to be able to personally contribute to those manifestations that would have given me a lot of pleasure when alive; thank God today I witness them in a very particular way that evidently demonstrates to me the reality of what happens among you. Believe me, good friends that I feel real pleasure in being useful to my fellow human beings and in helping them to propagate these beautiful truths that must change the world giving rise to better feelings.
Good bye my friends. So long.
Antoine Demeure.”
Isn’t that interesting to see an already wise soul on Earth to carry out studies and experiments as a Spirit to become more skillful in the relief of people’s pains? There is a commendable modesty in that confession that entails true merit whereas pseudo-wise Spirits are generally presumptuous. The last issue of the Spiritist Review cites a communication given by Mr. Demeure as if given in Montauban on February 1st. He gave it actually on January 26th. In my opinion this date is somewhat important because it was the day after his death. He says in the second paragraph: “… I enjoy a rare lucidity for Spirits recently separated from matter.” In fact that lucidity demonstrates a fast separation that is typical of morally well advanced Spirits.
Observation: The cure reported above is an example of pure spiritual magnetic action, without any mixture with human magnetism. The Spirits sometimes utilize the help of special mediums as conductors of their fluids. These are the healing Spirits whose faculties present a variety of energy levels, according to their personal aptitudes and the nature of the Spirits that assist them. We met a person eight months ago in Paris who suffered of painful exostosis in the hip and knee, keeping that person slaved to a bed. One of her young friends was a medium of that kind and treated him by the simple imposition of hands for a few minutes and by prayer that was followed by the patient with noble feelings. On the occasion the patient was having a very painful crisis analogous to the one endured by Mrs. G…, soon followed by a perfect calmness. He then had the impression of several hands giving him a massage and straightening his leg that would elongate 10 or 12 centimeters. He then feels a significant improvement and starts to walk but the longevity and seriousness of the disease turn the healing process very difficult and requiring a longer time than a simple sprain. We must emphasize that, as far as we know, the healing mediumship is not yet presented with generic and universal features but, on the contrary, restricted by application, meaning that the medium has a more powerful action upon certain individuals than on others and that not all diseases are cured. This is understandable when considering the fundamental role played by fluidic affinity in all mediumistic phenomena. Some people only enjoy that by accident and for a specific case. Hence it would be a mistake to believe that for the fact that a cure was obtained all others could also be obtained for the reason that the medium’s fluid is refractory to the own fluid of certain patients. The more natural the fluid assimilation the easier the healing process. It is then remarkable that certain fragile and delicate persons may exert a powerful influence upon strong and robust individuals. In such cases the persons are good conductors of the spiritual fluid whereas strong persons may be bad conductors. They only have their personal, human fluid that never has the purity and healing strength of the purified fluid of the good Spirits. From that one can understand the main reasons that oppose transforming healing mediumship into a profession. One would have to be gifted with a universal faculty to make it an occupation. Only incarnate Spirits of the highest order could have it in such a degree. Such presumption, even if employed selflessly and out of pure philanthropy, would be a demonstration of pride that by itself is a demonstration of moral inferiority. True superiority is humble. It does good without ostentation and hides away instead of looking for shine. The noble person seeks that modesty while the arrogant seeks the laurel that frequently escapes. Jesus used to say to those that were cured by him: “Go, thank God and tell nobody.” It is a great lesson to the healing mediums. We remind everyone here that the healing mediumship is exclusively in the fluidic action more or less instantaneous; that it must not be confused with human magnetism or with the faculty that certain mediums have to receive the prescription of medicine from the Spirits. These latter are only “prescriptive mediums” like others are poets or painters.
Family Conversations from Beyond the Grave
Pierre Legay, said the Great Pierrot
(Continuation – see Spiritist Review, November 1864)
Pierre Legay, Mrs. Delanne’s relative, offered us with the singular spectacle of a Spirit that considered himself to be alive even two years after his death, taking care of his businesses, traveling by car, paying for the train ticket, visiting Paris for the first time, etc. We give today the conclusion of that case that would be difficult to understand if we did not resource to the details given in the Spiritist Review, November 1864. Mr. and Mrs. Delanne tried unsuccessfully to elucidate his mistake. Their spiritual guide had asked them to wait since the moment had right yet. In the first days of March they addressed the following question to their guide:
Q. – After the last visit of Pierre Legay mentioned in the Spiritist Review we were unable to obtain any answer from him. You told us that when the time was right he would give us his impressions. Do you think he can do it now? A. – Yes, my children. Time has come. He will be able to answer you and provide you with material for study and teachings. God has his own points of view.
Q. – (To Pierre Legay). Dear friend, are you here? A. – Yes, my friend.
Q. – Do you see my point in evoking you today? A. – Yes, for I have by my side friends that have instructed me about everything that is happening right now on Earth. My God! What a strange thing all that!
Q. – You said that you have friends around you that give you instructions. Can you tell us who they are? A. – Yes, they are my friends but I only met them after I woke up. Did you know that I slept? I call sleep what you call death.
Q. – Can you tell the name of some of those friends? A. – I always have by my side a man that I should call an angel because he is so kind, so good and nice that all angels must be like this one. Then there is Didelot (Mrs. Delanne’s father) that is also here; then your parents, my friend. Oh! They are so nice! It is funny the way me meet up; there is also our Abbess. For example, she is always the same; she hasn’t changed. But it is all so strange!
NOTE: The nun mentioned by the Spirit used to live at Treveray commune and had given her first instructions to Mrs. Delanne. She communicated only once, about three years ago.
Q. – After the last visit of Pierre Legay mentioned in the Spiritist Review we were unable to obtain any answer from him. You told us that when the time was right he would give us his impressions. Do you think he can do it now? A. – Yes, my children. Time has come. He will be able to answer you and provide you with material for study and teachings. God has his own points of view.
Q. – (To Pierre Legay). Dear friend, are you here? A. – Yes, my friend.
Q. – Do you see my point in evoking you today? A. – Yes, for I have by my side friends that have instructed me about everything that is happening right now on Earth. My God! What a strange thing all that!
Q. – You said that you have friends around you that give you instructions. Can you tell us who they are? A. – Yes, they are my friends but I only met them after I woke up. Did you know that I slept? I call sleep what you call death.
Q. – Can you tell the name of some of those friends? A. – I always have by my side a man that I should call an angel because he is so kind, so good and nice that all angels must be like this one. Then there is Didelot (Mrs. Delanne’s father) that is also here; then your parents, my friend. Oh! They are so nice! It is funny the way me meet up; there is also our Abbess. For example, she is always the same; she hasn’t changed. But it is all so strange!
NOTE: The nun mentioned by the Spirit used to live at Treveray commune and had given her first instructions to Mrs. Delanne. She communicated only once, about three years ago.
- – Look now. You too Gardner! (A familiar name given to one of Mrs. Dellane’s uncle that had never manifested). How silly of me! We are in the house of your niece. I am glad to see you. That makes me feel good because, my word, I have been transported for some time and I don’t know how; I travel faster than the train and cover spaces not knowing how I do it. Are you like that, Didelot? He seems to find all that natural. It seems that he is used to that. In fact he has been doing that longer than I have (He had died six years earlier) and I understand that he is less stunned. But how funny is that! It is really funny! Tell me, cousin, you know and with you I feel at ease. Now, frankly, tell me what is it called “dying”?
Mr. Delanne: - My friend, the word die refers to leaving behind on Earth the heavy body, giving the soul the freedom it requires to enter the real life, the great life of the Spirit. Yes, you are there, my dear, in that still unknown world to many people from Earth. There you are leaving the lethargy or numbness that follows the separation of the soul from the body. Look around and see your guardian angel and friends surrounding you. They were the ones that brought you here to demonstrate to you the immortality and individuality of your soul. Be proud and happy because, as you see now, death is life. That is also why you cover spaces with the speed of light and are able to talk to us in Paris as if you had a material body like ours. You no longer have such a body. Now you only have a fluidic and light envelope that no longer attaches you to Earth.
P. Legay: Singular expression: dying! Then you should use another word for the moment when the soul leaves behind its body on Earth for such a moment is not death… I remember… I had just been released from the links that bonded me to the body and my sufferings instead of diminishing only worsened. I saw my children fighting for the piece of what I left them. I saw them not taking care of the inherited land and saw myself working stronger than ever. I was there, sorry for seeing that they did not understand me. I was not dead then. I assure you that I felt the same concerns and fatigue I used to have with my body and yet I had no body any more. Explain that to me. If that is death it is a funny way of dying. Give me your thoughts about that and then I will tell you what I think because now these good friends have the kindness of telling me. Go on, cousin, tell me.
Mr. Delanne: My friend, when the Spirits leave their bodies they are covered by a second body as I told you; this is fluidic and always remains with the Spirit. It is, therefore, with that body that you thought you were working like with the other one when you were alive. You can depurate that semi-material body through your moral progress. And if you are not okay with the word “death” to identify that moment you can then call it “transformation, if you wish to do so. If you went through some painful things that is because you might have been too attached to material things in your life, neglecting the spiritual ones that were important to your future. (He was very much interested). It is a slight punishment that God thought convenient for you to recover from your faults, giving you the means of instruction and finding light.
P. Legay: Then, my dear friend, that is not the time that should be called “transformation” because the Spirit does not change so rapidly if not immediately helped to acknowledge oneself through prayer and if the Spirit is not enlightened about the true situation, as I have just mentioned, by prayer and evocation. That is there are so many Spirits like mine that remain stationary. For those of my category there is transition but not transformation; the Spirit is not aware of what is going on. I dragged around, or better, I thought I did, a body with the same illnesses that I had when on Earth. Do you know what I felt when I was separated from my body? Something like a confusion that follows a fall or after someone passes out and people help you come back by inhaling a substance like vinegar. I woke up unaware that I had no body anymore. I came here to Paris thinking that I was still flesh and blood and you would not be able to convince me otherwise if I were not dead since then.
Yes, we die but that is not at the time when the body is left behind; it is when the Spirit acknowledges its true situation and is taken by a vertigo, no longer understanding what is said or seeing what is shown in the same way; it is a state of confusion. The Spirit perceives that he is no longer understood and like the blind person that is suddenly hurt the Spirit wants a guide that does not attend immediately, not at all. A time in darkness is needed where it is all confusion. The Spirit is disturbed and only a keen desire for light can change that but not before the agony is over and the time for freedom is right. Then, cousin, that is the time of death because we can no longer recognize ourselves. We must be helped, I repeat, by prayer and the time of liberation is the one that must be called death to the Spirits of my category.
Thank you for your prayers, my friend. You know how much I loved you and will continue to do so and much more from now on. Continue to send your prayers on my behalf, for my own advancement. Thank you to the man that was capable of bringing to light these true and sacred truths, taken for granted by so many others before him.
Yes, many thanks for having brought up my name together with so many others. They prayed for me reading some lines that I was supposed to give you. Thank you all of those that prayed for me and today, thanks to your prayer, I began to understand their reach. As for myself I will try to be useful to you all. That is what I had to tell you and be cool. Today I no longer have money to worry about but I have all the time to be dedicated to you. Aren’t your surprised by such a change? Well, from now on that is how it is going to be since I can see clearly here and from far away.
Pierre Legay
Observation: The new state in which Pierre Legay is in by no longer seeing himself as part of this world may be considered as a second wake up of the Spirit. This is related to the broader issue of the spiritual death that is under study right now. We thank the Spiritists that followed our report with prayers to the Spirit. They can see that it was noticed and the Spirit feels good.
P. Legay: Singular expression: dying! Then you should use another word for the moment when the soul leaves behind its body on Earth for such a moment is not death… I remember… I had just been released from the links that bonded me to the body and my sufferings instead of diminishing only worsened. I saw my children fighting for the piece of what I left them. I saw them not taking care of the inherited land and saw myself working stronger than ever. I was there, sorry for seeing that they did not understand me. I was not dead then. I assure you that I felt the same concerns and fatigue I used to have with my body and yet I had no body any more. Explain that to me. If that is death it is a funny way of dying. Give me your thoughts about that and then I will tell you what I think because now these good friends have the kindness of telling me. Go on, cousin, tell me.
Mr. Delanne: My friend, when the Spirits leave their bodies they are covered by a second body as I told you; this is fluidic and always remains with the Spirit. It is, therefore, with that body that you thought you were working like with the other one when you were alive. You can depurate that semi-material body through your moral progress. And if you are not okay with the word “death” to identify that moment you can then call it “transformation, if you wish to do so. If you went through some painful things that is because you might have been too attached to material things in your life, neglecting the spiritual ones that were important to your future. (He was very much interested). It is a slight punishment that God thought convenient for you to recover from your faults, giving you the means of instruction and finding light.
P. Legay: Then, my dear friend, that is not the time that should be called “transformation” because the Spirit does not change so rapidly if not immediately helped to acknowledge oneself through prayer and if the Spirit is not enlightened about the true situation, as I have just mentioned, by prayer and evocation. That is there are so many Spirits like mine that remain stationary. For those of my category there is transition but not transformation; the Spirit is not aware of what is going on. I dragged around, or better, I thought I did, a body with the same illnesses that I had when on Earth. Do you know what I felt when I was separated from my body? Something like a confusion that follows a fall or after someone passes out and people help you come back by inhaling a substance like vinegar. I woke up unaware that I had no body anymore. I came here to Paris thinking that I was still flesh and blood and you would not be able to convince me otherwise if I were not dead since then.
Yes, we die but that is not at the time when the body is left behind; it is when the Spirit acknowledges its true situation and is taken by a vertigo, no longer understanding what is said or seeing what is shown in the same way; it is a state of confusion. The Spirit perceives that he is no longer understood and like the blind person that is suddenly hurt the Spirit wants a guide that does not attend immediately, not at all. A time in darkness is needed where it is all confusion. The Spirit is disturbed and only a keen desire for light can change that but not before the agony is over and the time for freedom is right. Then, cousin, that is the time of death because we can no longer recognize ourselves. We must be helped, I repeat, by prayer and the time of liberation is the one that must be called death to the Spirits of my category.
Thank you for your prayers, my friend. You know how much I loved you and will continue to do so and much more from now on. Continue to send your prayers on my behalf, for my own advancement. Thank you to the man that was capable of bringing to light these true and sacred truths, taken for granted by so many others before him.
Yes, many thanks for having brought up my name together with so many others. They prayed for me reading some lines that I was supposed to give you. Thank you all of those that prayed for me and today, thanks to your prayer, I began to understand their reach. As for myself I will try to be useful to you all. That is what I had to tell you and be cool. Today I no longer have money to worry about but I have all the time to be dedicated to you. Aren’t your surprised by such a change? Well, from now on that is how it is going to be since I can see clearly here and from far away.
Pierre Legay
Observation: The new state in which Pierre Legay is in by no longer seeing himself as part of this world may be considered as a second wake up of the Spirit. This is related to the broader issue of the spiritual death that is under study right now. We thank the Spiritists that followed our report with prayers to the Spirit. They can see that it was noticed and the Spirit feels good.
Spontaneous Manifestations in Marseille
The Poitiers manifestations are now replicated in Marseille. Should we conclude that the so called jokers that shook the first town without being caught have now moved to the second one where again they are not found? One must realize that these are very skillful con artists to frustrate the investigation carried out by the police and all others that were interested in catching them. The Gazette du Midi carried this short news about the subject on March, 5th:
“On Friday, during the day, the “Chave” neighborhood was shaken with several groups of people gathered near the house number 80 at the boulevard with the same name. The rumor around was that several strange things happened in that house, scaring away the residents of the spellbound home. Ghosts wandered around there, they said; strange noises are heard at certain times and invisible hands throw pieces of furniture against one another, as they do to kitchen set pieces. The police was called in to control and keep the cool of those groups that grew continually. As a matter of fact it seems that the construction is not to code, built on a terrain that is undermined by water. Some cracks were heard and fear transformed them into rumors of witchcraft that will soon dissipate.”
Cauvière
Below the detailed report sent by Dr. Chavaux, from Marseille, dated March 14th:
“A couple of weeks ago I had the honor of sending you some details about manifestations that took place for over a month at number 80 of Boulevard Chave. I only reported what I heard; today I will tell you what I witnessed myself.
After being granted permission to visit the home there I was on Friday, March 10th, at an apartment on the first floor occupied by Mrs. A… and her two daughters, one eight years old and the other sixteen. At 1pm sharp there was a huge noise of detonation at the apartment, followed by nine others every forty five minutes. After the second detonation that seemed to have come from within the facility where we were, I saw the formation of a light mist and then I felt a strong smell of gunpowder. Mrs. R… joined in at about the eighth detonation and said that she could detect a smell of gunpowder. I was pleased to hear that and learn that it was not a product of my imagination.
On Tuesday, the 13th, I went there again at 8:30 pm. The first detonation was heard at 9 pm, followed by thirty eight others within the hour. Mrs. C… then said: if these noises are produced by Spirits may they produce two more to account for forty. At that very moment two others were heard, one after the other with a frightening sound. We all looked to one another in astonishment, even fear. Mrs. C… still said: I start to understand that there are Spirits behind this thing; to be totally convinced I would like the Spirits to make that sound another ten times, adding up to fifty. The ten detonations took place in less than fifteen minutes. Those noises are sometimes like from a cannon of small caliber, inside a house; doors and windows were shaken, as were walls and the floor; objects hanging on walls were vividly affected; one could say that the house was shaken from all sides and that it would fall but none of that happened. After the shooting there isn’t a single crack, nothing is damaged and everything goes back to normal. The shots sometimes happen at one to five minutes intervals, but on other occasions up to six shots are heard one immediately following the other. The police showed up but nothing was found. There you have, dear Master, the whole and the most accurate truth.
Yours, sincerely…”
Chavaux, D.M.P.
Rue de Petit Saint-Jean, 24.
Another letter dated March 17th, brings the following:
“Yesterday we spent part of the evening at the home Boulevard Chave, 80. The meeting was attended by seven people. The sounds of detonation started at 11pm and accounted for a total of twenty two in a ten minute interval. It is like the sound of a small cannon. It could be heard from a great distance to the home. Contrary to what the Gazette du Midi says, the building is in very good condition. I was told that four other detonations were heard in another house in the same boulevard and that those were even stronger.
Yours, etc.”
Carrier
They will say that the cause is entirely found out: one can see the smoke and feel the smell of gunpowder, but cannot guess the means employed by the deceivers?
It seems to us that the con artists utilize gunpowder to produce those detonations in the very apartment where the witnesses are; that they are complacent to repeat them at the expressed will. They cannot be far away nor hidden. How come they were not discovered? But then, what is the origin of the smell? That is another issue that will be handled in time. While we wait, the noises are a fact and a fact must have a cause. Will you attribute it to slander? But then find the slanders.
“On Friday, during the day, the “Chave” neighborhood was shaken with several groups of people gathered near the house number 80 at the boulevard with the same name. The rumor around was that several strange things happened in that house, scaring away the residents of the spellbound home. Ghosts wandered around there, they said; strange noises are heard at certain times and invisible hands throw pieces of furniture against one another, as they do to kitchen set pieces. The police was called in to control and keep the cool of those groups that grew continually. As a matter of fact it seems that the construction is not to code, built on a terrain that is undermined by water. Some cracks were heard and fear transformed them into rumors of witchcraft that will soon dissipate.”
Cauvière
Below the detailed report sent by Dr. Chavaux, from Marseille, dated March 14th:
“A couple of weeks ago I had the honor of sending you some details about manifestations that took place for over a month at number 80 of Boulevard Chave. I only reported what I heard; today I will tell you what I witnessed myself.
After being granted permission to visit the home there I was on Friday, March 10th, at an apartment on the first floor occupied by Mrs. A… and her two daughters, one eight years old and the other sixteen. At 1pm sharp there was a huge noise of detonation at the apartment, followed by nine others every forty five minutes. After the second detonation that seemed to have come from within the facility where we were, I saw the formation of a light mist and then I felt a strong smell of gunpowder. Mrs. R… joined in at about the eighth detonation and said that she could detect a smell of gunpowder. I was pleased to hear that and learn that it was not a product of my imagination.
On Tuesday, the 13th, I went there again at 8:30 pm. The first detonation was heard at 9 pm, followed by thirty eight others within the hour. Mrs. C… then said: if these noises are produced by Spirits may they produce two more to account for forty. At that very moment two others were heard, one after the other with a frightening sound. We all looked to one another in astonishment, even fear. Mrs. C… still said: I start to understand that there are Spirits behind this thing; to be totally convinced I would like the Spirits to make that sound another ten times, adding up to fifty. The ten detonations took place in less than fifteen minutes. Those noises are sometimes like from a cannon of small caliber, inside a house; doors and windows were shaken, as were walls and the floor; objects hanging on walls were vividly affected; one could say that the house was shaken from all sides and that it would fall but none of that happened. After the shooting there isn’t a single crack, nothing is damaged and everything goes back to normal. The shots sometimes happen at one to five minutes intervals, but on other occasions up to six shots are heard one immediately following the other. The police showed up but nothing was found. There you have, dear Master, the whole and the most accurate truth.
Yours, sincerely…”
Chavaux, D.M.P.
Rue de Petit Saint-Jean, 24.
Another letter dated March 17th, brings the following:
“Yesterday we spent part of the evening at the home Boulevard Chave, 80. The meeting was attended by seven people. The sounds of detonation started at 11pm and accounted for a total of twenty two in a ten minute interval. It is like the sound of a small cannon. It could be heard from a great distance to the home. Contrary to what the Gazette du Midi says, the building is in very good condition. I was told that four other detonations were heard in another house in the same boulevard and that those were even stronger.
Yours, etc.”
Carrier
They will say that the cause is entirely found out: one can see the smoke and feel the smell of gunpowder, but cannot guess the means employed by the deceivers?
It seems to us that the con artists utilize gunpowder to produce those detonations in the very apartment where the witnesses are; that they are complacent to repeat them at the expressed will. They cannot be far away nor hidden. How come they were not discovered? But then, what is the origin of the smell? That is another issue that will be handled in time. While we wait, the noises are a fact and a fact must have a cause. Will you attribute it to slander? But then find the slanders.
Spiritist Poetry
SpiritismSpiritism is the development of the Gospel,
the extension and expansion of life,
it is the truth! The loving shadow that follows
and comes to help and sustain the might
of my songs, casting an infinite joy
onto the happy space of my feelings.
Like a spark that involves my soul,
its noble Spirit, light spreading beams,
fulfills my days with an invisible glow
and my nights with enchanted dreams.
And when I scan the ages, from heavens
its breath delivers a memory that I nurture,
dissipating the clouds of the present,
transforming my past into my future.
“Child”, I hear, “abandon this Earth;
and your past shall be reborn,
and that father of yours is now by your
side, eternal love henceforth!”
Marie-Caroline Quillet
Member of the Writers Society
Pont-L’Évêque (Calvados)
Mrs. Quillet, author of Églantine, has just published as small and charming book with the title “Une heure de poèsie”, that will be certainly appreciated by those that love good verses. Since the work is alien to the Spiritist Doctrine, although absolutely not opposing it, its appreciation is beyond the scope of this Spiritist Review. We limit ourselves to say that the author demonstrates that, contrary to the opinion of some of her comrades in literature, one can have a Spirit and believe in the Spirits. Mrs. Quillet sent us the following words about the communications of Mrs. Foulon published in our March issue: “Mrs. Foulon believes that people would not understand the poetry of Spiritism. She must be right from her enlightened point of view. The winds of the poets certainly feel the weight of our dark atmosphere. But the instinct, the double vision that gifts them, come along to help their intelligence. I believe everyone is called to help the great task of regeneration of humanity according to one’s aptitudes: poets and philosophers, by the inspiration of the Spirits; the martyrs and workers by the invitation of the genius of the philosopher and the songs of the poets. Just sighs, it is true, but the basis and the complement of the concert is formed in the exile of the sighs.”
She adds the following verses to support the thoughts:
To the Poets
Wake up, apostles and poets;
Hear now the oracles of time.
The breath of the prophets
like Hosannas, wings in flight!
The Sinai is covered in clouds;
The Etna roars the horrors of the fire;
The Almighty, however, dissipates darkness
casting on Earth the heavenly lights!
Truth rises from the parables;
we are touched by their pure gleam.
A new light is brought by the tales
that warms up the rays of our dreams.
Faith, love, the very spark of ourselves,
to the most hidden dark spots, shows clarity,
looks around and feeds the blazes
with work and charity.
Come now, martyrs of the sublime music;
Show your voice to the strange fighters.
In all corners and from the noble summits
go and plant the humble cross of Jesus.
Mrs. Quillet is right when she says that everybody is called to concur to the works of the terrestrial renovation. Nobody denies the influence of poetry but she is wrong with respect to Mrs. Foulon’s thoughts when she says: “My soul was taken by the enthusiasm and I hope it is a bit too late to entertain you with serious Spiritism and not with poetic Spiritism that is not good to humanity. People would not understand it.”
The Spirit here does not see the poetic Spiritism as the Spiritist ideas translated by poetry but the ideal Spiritism, the product of an enthusiastic imagination; and by serious Spiritism the scientific Spiritism, based on facts and logic, that is best suited to the positive nature of the people of our time and that is the object of our studies.
The Spirit here does not see the poetic Spiritism as the Spiritist ideas translated by poetry but the ideal Spiritism, the product of an enthusiastic imagination; and by serious Spiritism the scientific Spiritism, based on facts and logic, that is best suited to the positive nature of the people of our time and that is the object of our studies.
Spiritist Funeral
With that title the Monde Musical of Brussels reports, on March 5th, 1865, the eulogies of Mrs. Vauchez, mother of one of our excellent brothers in Spiritism, in the following terms:
“Friends and collaborators, our Vauchez’ brothers lost their mother a few days back. The care taken by one and the other in the final days of that respectable lady were the signs of an indescribable love.
Both brothers are Spiritists. They took their mother’s body to the grave followed by brothers in faith. There the oldest Vauches payed tribute to the Spirit of their mother, with as much simple as fair words, and that according to the Spiritists’ belief she was present and heard them. The separation was a cause of sadness although he must have been persuaded that she was entering a better life and that she would still communicate with them and give them inspiration, strengthening them in the path of good. He confirmed that her last wishes would be accomplished by making donations to two charities by the savings on a purely civil funeral, without any pageantry. Her chosen charities were: a foundation in favor of the Saint-Josse-ten-Noode daycare and a contribution towards poor old people’s home.
After that kind of conversation between son and the soul of his mother, Mr. Herezka, one of the Spiritist friends of the family, expressed in verses and with the same simplicity feelings whose transcription here will explain one part of the good that there is in a belief that daily and everywhere embraces a larger number of enlightened people. Here the words of Mr. Herezka to the dead woman’s soul:”
“Friends and collaborators, our Vauchez’ brothers lost their mother a few days back. The care taken by one and the other in the final days of that respectable lady were the signs of an indescribable love.
Both brothers are Spiritists. They took their mother’s body to the grave followed by brothers in faith. There the oldest Vauches payed tribute to the Spirit of their mother, with as much simple as fair words, and that according to the Spiritists’ belief she was present and heard them. The separation was a cause of sadness although he must have been persuaded that she was entering a better life and that she would still communicate with them and give them inspiration, strengthening them in the path of good. He confirmed that her last wishes would be accomplished by making donations to two charities by the savings on a purely civil funeral, without any pageantry. Her chosen charities were: a foundation in favor of the Saint-Josse-ten-Noode daycare and a contribution towards poor old people’s home.
After that kind of conversation between son and the soul of his mother, Mr. Herezka, one of the Spiritist friends of the family, expressed in verses and with the same simplicity feelings whose transcription here will explain one part of the good that there is in a belief that daily and everywhere embraces a larger number of enlightened people. Here the words of Mr. Herezka to the dead woman’s soul:”
The ground is widely open;
Soon your remains shall
descend to the darkness of the tomb;
free from the sick burden, you will
gain the infinity of space
following the path of progress.
No more doubts nor pain!
The evil torrent is now in distress;
before goodness, your heart claim!
Hatred lies with the dead body.
May charity and love
be your guides in eternity!
Take our fraternal vows
to our brothers in your new world.
Tell them that fecund souls,
ripping fruits, blossom unfold,
revealed to you on this Earth
the gentle mystery of death.
Tell them: “Your friends in advance
will join the mortal battle
against pride and ignorance;
for that glorious effort,
Spirits, they invoke your support!”
Come always to sooth our pain;
yes, come to tell us about heavens
casting lights onto our dreams,
making that luminous spark
shine from the eternal cradle!
After those words the Vauchez brothers and their friends left quietly, without ostentation, without painful emotion, as if they had come to follow someone that was about the initiate a long journey but every requirement of safety and well-being. Despite the fact that we were not Spiritists we did attend the ceremony. We are just the reporter of the event: an as touching as remarkable ceremony for its simplicity and sincerity of belief and intentions.”
Roselli
Mrs. Vauchez died after thirty two years of a disease that kept her on a sick bed for twenty others. She had gladly accepted the Spiritist beliefs and found great consolation in them in her lengthy and tough suffering. We saw her during our last trip to Brussels and we were touched by her courage, resignation and confidence in God’s mercy. Here her first words given to her sons soon after her last breath:
“The veil that still covers the terrestrial planet has just been lifted for me. I see, I feel and live! Thank you Almighty! Thank you my guides, my guardian angels and protectors! You, my children, you my daughter, resignation for you are Spiritists. Do not cry for me. I live the eternal life, I live in the ethereal light; I live and suffer no more; no more pain, my trial is over. Thank you my friends for having thought of evoking me so early. Do that often. I will assist you and be with you.
God was merciful with my sufferings. Oh my friends, the life of the soul is so beautiful when detached from matter! Good Spirits are watching over you. Be worthy of their protection. At this very moment I count on the assistance of your protector, St. Vincent de Paul.”
Roselli
Mrs. Vauchez died after thirty two years of a disease that kept her on a sick bed for twenty others. She had gladly accepted the Spiritist beliefs and found great consolation in them in her lengthy and tough suffering. We saw her during our last trip to Brussels and we were touched by her courage, resignation and confidence in God’s mercy. Here her first words given to her sons soon after her last breath:
“The veil that still covers the terrestrial planet has just been lifted for me. I see, I feel and live! Thank you Almighty! Thank you my guides, my guardian angels and protectors! You, my children, you my daughter, resignation for you are Spiritists. Do not cry for me. I live the eternal life, I live in the ethereal light; I live and suffer no more; no more pain, my trial is over. Thank you my friends for having thought of evoking me so early. Do that often. I will assist you and be with you.
God was merciful with my sufferings. Oh my friends, the life of the soul is so beautiful when detached from matter! Good Spirits are watching over you. Be worthy of their protection. At this very moment I count on the assistance of your protector, St. Vincent de Paul.”
Marguerite Vauchez
Bibliographic News
Confusion in Satan’s Empireby L.A.G. Salgues (from Angers)
Small brochure in-8th with 150 pages. In Angers at Lemesle & Co. In Paris, Palais Royal. Price 2 fr.
Proofs to the religious fanaticism that the Spirits are not demons in response to the conversations about the Spirits by the Jesuit Father Xavier Pailloux. A historic digression provoked by him with the demonstration that Satan and hell of the Satan believers are a myth, followed by Spirits data about the posthumous state of mankind and after death impressions.
We shall discuss this work later.
Proofs to the religious fanaticism that the Spirits are not demons in response to the conversations about the Spirits by the Jesuit Father Xavier Pailloux. A historic digression provoked by him with the demonstration that Satan and hell of the Satan believers are a myth, followed by Spirits data about the posthumous state of mankind and after death impressions.
We shall discuss this work later.
Echo from beyond the grave
Spiritist journal published in Marseille under the direction of Mr. Gilet, with circulation every Sunday. Office in Marseille, Boulevard Chave, 81. Price 10 francs per year.
This journal holds the following banner: There is no salvation but through charity. We are glad to see it raising a flag that it the symbol of connection between every sincere Spiritist. Following that route we are certain that it shall not detour. As we said about the evangelic medium of Toulouse, like with nobility, the title obliges. Spiritism therefore counts on another organ in one of the most important cities in France.
This journal holds the following banner: There is no salvation but through charity. We are glad to see it raising a flag that it the symbol of connection between every sincere Spiritist. Following that route we are certain that it shall not detour. As we said about the evangelic medium of Toulouse, like with nobility, the title obliges. Spiritism therefore counts on another organ in one of the most important cities in France.
Agreement between faith and religion
by Mr. J. B.
dedicated to the clergy
Small brochure, 100 pages – Paris, Didier & Co. Price 1.5 francs.
This brochure is by the same author of Lettres sur le Spiritisme ecrites a des ecclesiatiques. This more recent work deals more specifically with the religious aspect and we are glad to verify that the author did it with remarkable logic while applying commendable moderation in his refutation. In an elegant and correct style he says the greatest truths without hurting anyone. It is the best means of persuasion. We recommend it to our readers who will find excellent arguments there.
May
Manifestation of the Spirit of AnimalsWe got this in a letter from Dieppe:
“…Dear Sir, I believe that we come to a time in which unbelievable things are to happen. I do not know what to think of a phenomenon that just took place in my house. Given the current skepticism of our days I would dare not speak to anyone about it for I fear to be taken by a mad person. But, dear Sir, even at the risk of making you laugh I would like to tell you about the fact. Although apparently futile, it may perhaps
be more serious after all. My poor son, deceased in Boulogne-sur-Mer where he carried out his studies, had a charming little greyhound given to him by some friends and that we had trained with extreme care. It was the most adorable little creature of that breed. We did love her very much as anything beautiful and good can be loved. She understood us from our gestures and looks. She showed such a vivacity in her eyes that it seemed that she would respond back to us when we talked to her.
After the death of the young owner, the little Mika – her name – was brought back to me in Dieppe and according to her habits she would sleep by the feet of my bed. In the winter, with the inclement weather, she would stand, produce a sweet groan as if asking for something; I would then invite her closer, allowing her to be with me. She would then tuck in between two pieces of cloth and stick her nose into under my neck that she used as her pillow; she would then sleep like the fortunate ones on Earth, feeling the warmth of my body and allowing me to feel hers and that was not unpleasant to me. The poor little one spent happy days with me. She missed nothing but last September she fell sick and died, despite everything that was done by the vet that I had assigned to her. My wife and I frequently talked about her, missing her almost as much as if a child of ours, for the amount of fidelity and affection that she had intelligently and kindly given us.
A short while ago I heard, in the middle of the night, in bed but not asleep, from the feet of my bed, that little groaning that my dear little dog used to do when she wanted something. I was so shocked that I reached out with my arm as if calling her, truly believing that I would feel her caress. When I woke up in the morning I told the story to my wife who said: I heard the same thing, not once but twice. It seemed to come from the door of the room. My first thought was that our little dog was not dead and that it had escaped from the vet’s house, returning to her own home. My sweet daughter that sleeps near her mom also affirm to have heard the same groaning. The sound to her was not coming from the door but from the bed itself near the door. I must say dear Sir that my wife’s bedroom is above mine. Would such strange sounds come from the street, as my wife believes since she does not share my Spiritist ideas? That is impossible. If they came from the street I would not be able to hear them since I am going deaf and even at night I cannot hardly hear the sound of a passing-by carriage. During a storm I don’t hear the sound of a thunder. On another hand if the sound came from the street how can we explain the fact that my wife heard it from the other side of the house and my daughter from her bed? I confess, dear Sir, that although these events refer to an irrational being, they make me think indeed. What to think about it? I cannot make up my mind and cannot elaborate much more. But I ask myself if the immaterial principle that must outlive the animals as it does to men, wouldn’t acquire the faculty of communication with human souls, up to a certain degree. Who knows! Do we know all secrets of nature? Evidently not. Who can explain the law of affinities? The laws of repulsion? Nobody! If affection that is in the domain of feelings, as feelings are in the domain of the soul, has an attractive power in itself, what would be the surprise if a little animal were be dragged by its own affection in the immaterial state? But some may ask how about the sound? How can that be admitted? And if one can hear that once, twice why not every day? Such an objection may seem serious, however would it be unreasonable to believe that such sounds could be produced by certain combinations of fluids that react in a given direction, like in Chemistry there are certain effervescences, certain explosions that take place due to the mixture of x and y elements? I will not discuss if such a hypothesis has merit or not. I will just say that I believe it to be among possible things and without pushing it any further I say that I attest a fact witnessed by three persons and that if the fact took place it is because it can happen. Besides, we want to give time and wait to hear about other phenomena of the same kind.”
Our honorable correspondent does well in not considering the matter definitely resolved. He does not propose an absolute conclusion based on a unique event which, in fact, is just a probability. He observes and attests, waiting for further enlightenment. That is what prudence requires. Facts of such a kind are not yet in significant numbers nor sufficiently demonstrated so that one can deduce a positive or negative theory from them. The issue of the principle and fate of the Spirits of the animals just begins to materialize and the event above is essentially related to that. If it is not an illusion, it at least attests the link of affinity that exists among the Spirits of the animals, or better saying, of certain animals and people. As a matter of fact, it seems that it has been positively demonstrated that the animals see the Spirits and are impressed by them. We have reported several examples in the Spiritist Review, among others the Spirit and the Little Dog in our June 1860 issue. If the animals do see the Spirits that evidently cannot be done by the eyes of the body. In that case they also have a spiritual vision.
Up until now science has only attested the physiological relationship between people and the animals. It shows us all the links of the chain in the body, without a solution of continuity. Nonetheless, between the spiritual principles of both Spirits there was an abyss. If the better observed psychological facts lay down a bridge onto that chasm then it will be a new step to the unity of the scale of the beings of creation. Such a serious issue will not be solved by systems but by facts. Spiritism, by creating the experimental psychology, is the only one to provide the means for that. In any case if there are points of contact between the animal soul and the human soul that cannot be, in the case of the soul of the animal, from the part of the most advanced ones. An important fact to be attested is that among the creatures of the spiritual world there has never been an indication that there are Spirits of animals. That seems to indicate that they do not maintain their individuality after death and the manifestation of the little dog above seems to contradict it.
From all the above it can be seen that the issue is still not much understood and its solution must not be hurriedly established. Once the letter above was read at the Parisian Society, the following communication was given about the subject:
Paris, April 21st, 1865 – Medium Mr. E.Vézy
Tonight I will touch on a serious matter by speaking about the relationships that may exist between the animal world and humanity. In this room, however, when for the first time I taught you about the solidarity that does exist between all existences and the affinities among them there was an uproar here and I went silent. Should I do the same today, despite your question? No, because I finally see you entering the path that I showed you. But it is not at all limited to the belief in the unstoppable progress of the Spirit, an embryo in matter, developing through the sieve of the mineral, vegetal and animal, arriving at humanity where it begins to proudly test the soul that will reincarnate and carry out its mission with the human race. Between those multiple phases there are important links that must be understood and that I call latent or intermediary periods because it is when the successive transformations take place. Later I will talk about the links that unit the mineral to the vegetal and the vegetal to the animal. Since the subject that caught your attention is the bonds between the animal and mankind I will now discuss this matter.
The affinity between domesticated animals and people is produced by the fluidic charges that surround you and involve them. It is somewhat like humanity influencing the animal world, not affect the colors of one or the other. Hence the superior intelligence of the dog against the brutal instinct of the wild animal and that is the only cause that may explain the manifestations that were just read to you. Therefore, they were not mistaken when they heard the happy sounds of the animal, acknowledging the love of its owner, coming to bring them a memory before transitioning to the intermediary state between two phases of development. Thus, the manifestation may occur but it is momentarily because in order to move up another step the animal needs a latent work that eliminates any sign of exterior life to all of them. That is like a spiritual cocoon where the soul is elaborated, a shapeless perispirit, without any trace of a material body, breaking up in a mature state, dragged by the carrying currents, like the embryos of souls that will blossom from that. It would, therefore, be difficult to us to talk about the Spirits of animals because they do not exist, or even better, their passage is so fast that it is like it was null, and they could not be described in their state of chrysalis. You know already that nothing dies from succumbing matter. When a body dissolves it breaks into the multiple composing elements. Oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen and carbon return to their primitive state to feed other bodies. The same happens to the spiritual body: during the passage, the organized spiritual fluids take colors, perfume, and instincts, up to the final constitution of the soul. Do you understand that well? I would certainly need to explain all that better but to finish tonight and not allowing you to suppose the impossible, I assure you that what belongs to the domain of animal intelligence cannot reproduce in human intelligence. Their ideas are rudimentary only. In order to express itself as a person would do the animal would need ideas and knowledge that it does not have and it cannot have. Be assured that neither dog, nor the cat, the donkey, the horse nor the elephant may manifest through mediumistic means. The Spirits that arrived at the humanity level, and only them, can do it and still in proportion to their level of development because the Spirit of a savage cannot speak like the one of a civilized person.
OBSERVATION: The late observations by the Spirit were motivated by comments made during the session about people that pretended to have received communications from animals. As an explanation of the fact mentioned above, the theory given by the Spirit is rational and its bottom line is in agreement with the one that prevails today and is given in the majority of the centers. When we have gathered enough documents we will summarize them in a methodical body of doctrine that will be submitted to the universal control. Until then they are only guidelines given to clarify the path.
“…Dear Sir, I believe that we come to a time in which unbelievable things are to happen. I do not know what to think of a phenomenon that just took place in my house. Given the current skepticism of our days I would dare not speak to anyone about it for I fear to be taken by a mad person. But, dear Sir, even at the risk of making you laugh I would like to tell you about the fact. Although apparently futile, it may perhaps
be more serious after all. My poor son, deceased in Boulogne-sur-Mer where he carried out his studies, had a charming little greyhound given to him by some friends and that we had trained with extreme care. It was the most adorable little creature of that breed. We did love her very much as anything beautiful and good can be loved. She understood us from our gestures and looks. She showed such a vivacity in her eyes that it seemed that she would respond back to us when we talked to her.
After the death of the young owner, the little Mika – her name – was brought back to me in Dieppe and according to her habits she would sleep by the feet of my bed. In the winter, with the inclement weather, she would stand, produce a sweet groan as if asking for something; I would then invite her closer, allowing her to be with me. She would then tuck in between two pieces of cloth and stick her nose into under my neck that she used as her pillow; she would then sleep like the fortunate ones on Earth, feeling the warmth of my body and allowing me to feel hers and that was not unpleasant to me. The poor little one spent happy days with me. She missed nothing but last September she fell sick and died, despite everything that was done by the vet that I had assigned to her. My wife and I frequently talked about her, missing her almost as much as if a child of ours, for the amount of fidelity and affection that she had intelligently and kindly given us.
A short while ago I heard, in the middle of the night, in bed but not asleep, from the feet of my bed, that little groaning that my dear little dog used to do when she wanted something. I was so shocked that I reached out with my arm as if calling her, truly believing that I would feel her caress. When I woke up in the morning I told the story to my wife who said: I heard the same thing, not once but twice. It seemed to come from the door of the room. My first thought was that our little dog was not dead and that it had escaped from the vet’s house, returning to her own home. My sweet daughter that sleeps near her mom also affirm to have heard the same groaning. The sound to her was not coming from the door but from the bed itself near the door. I must say dear Sir that my wife’s bedroom is above mine. Would such strange sounds come from the street, as my wife believes since she does not share my Spiritist ideas? That is impossible. If they came from the street I would not be able to hear them since I am going deaf and even at night I cannot hardly hear the sound of a passing-by carriage. During a storm I don’t hear the sound of a thunder. On another hand if the sound came from the street how can we explain the fact that my wife heard it from the other side of the house and my daughter from her bed? I confess, dear Sir, that although these events refer to an irrational being, they make me think indeed. What to think about it? I cannot make up my mind and cannot elaborate much more. But I ask myself if the immaterial principle that must outlive the animals as it does to men, wouldn’t acquire the faculty of communication with human souls, up to a certain degree. Who knows! Do we know all secrets of nature? Evidently not. Who can explain the law of affinities? The laws of repulsion? Nobody! If affection that is in the domain of feelings, as feelings are in the domain of the soul, has an attractive power in itself, what would be the surprise if a little animal were be dragged by its own affection in the immaterial state? But some may ask how about the sound? How can that be admitted? And if one can hear that once, twice why not every day? Such an objection may seem serious, however would it be unreasonable to believe that such sounds could be produced by certain combinations of fluids that react in a given direction, like in Chemistry there are certain effervescences, certain explosions that take place due to the mixture of x and y elements? I will not discuss if such a hypothesis has merit or not. I will just say that I believe it to be among possible things and without pushing it any further I say that I attest a fact witnessed by three persons and that if the fact took place it is because it can happen. Besides, we want to give time and wait to hear about other phenomena of the same kind.”
Our honorable correspondent does well in not considering the matter definitely resolved. He does not propose an absolute conclusion based on a unique event which, in fact, is just a probability. He observes and attests, waiting for further enlightenment. That is what prudence requires. Facts of such a kind are not yet in significant numbers nor sufficiently demonstrated so that one can deduce a positive or negative theory from them. The issue of the principle and fate of the Spirits of the animals just begins to materialize and the event above is essentially related to that. If it is not an illusion, it at least attests the link of affinity that exists among the Spirits of the animals, or better saying, of certain animals and people. As a matter of fact, it seems that it has been positively demonstrated that the animals see the Spirits and are impressed by them. We have reported several examples in the Spiritist Review, among others the Spirit and the Little Dog in our June 1860 issue. If the animals do see the Spirits that evidently cannot be done by the eyes of the body. In that case they also have a spiritual vision.
Up until now science has only attested the physiological relationship between people and the animals. It shows us all the links of the chain in the body, without a solution of continuity. Nonetheless, between the spiritual principles of both Spirits there was an abyss. If the better observed psychological facts lay down a bridge onto that chasm then it will be a new step to the unity of the scale of the beings of creation. Such a serious issue will not be solved by systems but by facts. Spiritism, by creating the experimental psychology, is the only one to provide the means for that. In any case if there are points of contact between the animal soul and the human soul that cannot be, in the case of the soul of the animal, from the part of the most advanced ones. An important fact to be attested is that among the creatures of the spiritual world there has never been an indication that there are Spirits of animals. That seems to indicate that they do not maintain their individuality after death and the manifestation of the little dog above seems to contradict it.
From all the above it can be seen that the issue is still not much understood and its solution must not be hurriedly established. Once the letter above was read at the Parisian Society, the following communication was given about the subject:
Paris, April 21st, 1865 – Medium Mr. E.Vézy
Tonight I will touch on a serious matter by speaking about the relationships that may exist between the animal world and humanity. In this room, however, when for the first time I taught you about the solidarity that does exist between all existences and the affinities among them there was an uproar here and I went silent. Should I do the same today, despite your question? No, because I finally see you entering the path that I showed you. But it is not at all limited to the belief in the unstoppable progress of the Spirit, an embryo in matter, developing through the sieve of the mineral, vegetal and animal, arriving at humanity where it begins to proudly test the soul that will reincarnate and carry out its mission with the human race. Between those multiple phases there are important links that must be understood and that I call latent or intermediary periods because it is when the successive transformations take place. Later I will talk about the links that unit the mineral to the vegetal and the vegetal to the animal. Since the subject that caught your attention is the bonds between the animal and mankind I will now discuss this matter.
The affinity between domesticated animals and people is produced by the fluidic charges that surround you and involve them. It is somewhat like humanity influencing the animal world, not affect the colors of one or the other. Hence the superior intelligence of the dog against the brutal instinct of the wild animal and that is the only cause that may explain the manifestations that were just read to you. Therefore, they were not mistaken when they heard the happy sounds of the animal, acknowledging the love of its owner, coming to bring them a memory before transitioning to the intermediary state between two phases of development. Thus, the manifestation may occur but it is momentarily because in order to move up another step the animal needs a latent work that eliminates any sign of exterior life to all of them. That is like a spiritual cocoon where the soul is elaborated, a shapeless perispirit, without any trace of a material body, breaking up in a mature state, dragged by the carrying currents, like the embryos of souls that will blossom from that. It would, therefore, be difficult to us to talk about the Spirits of animals because they do not exist, or even better, their passage is so fast that it is like it was null, and they could not be described in their state of chrysalis. You know already that nothing dies from succumbing matter. When a body dissolves it breaks into the multiple composing elements. Oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen and carbon return to their primitive state to feed other bodies. The same happens to the spiritual body: during the passage, the organized spiritual fluids take colors, perfume, and instincts, up to the final constitution of the soul. Do you understand that well? I would certainly need to explain all that better but to finish tonight and not allowing you to suppose the impossible, I assure you that what belongs to the domain of animal intelligence cannot reproduce in human intelligence. Their ideas are rudimentary only. In order to express itself as a person would do the animal would need ideas and knowledge that it does not have and it cannot have. Be assured that neither dog, nor the cat, the donkey, the horse nor the elephant may manifest through mediumistic means. The Spirits that arrived at the humanity level, and only them, can do it and still in proportion to their level of development because the Spirit of a savage cannot speak like the one of a civilized person.
OBSERVATION: The late observations by the Spirit were motivated by comments made during the session about people that pretended to have received communications from animals. As an explanation of the fact mentioned above, the theory given by the Spirit is rational and its bottom line is in agreement with the one that prevails today and is given in the majority of the centers. When we have gathered enough documents we will summarize them in a methodical body of doctrine that will be submitted to the universal control. Until then they are only guidelines given to clarify the path.
Considerations about the noises in Poitiers
Extracted from the Journal de la Vienne, November 22nd, 1864
The logic of the adversaries of Spiritism is well known. The summary below signed by David (from Thiais) gives us a sample of that.
“Dear reader, like myself you must have a copy of the little brochure by Mr. Boreau from Niort with the title Why and How I become a Spiritist, with a facsimile of the autograph of direct writing by a familiar Spirit. It is a very curious story of a sincere, devout man, a person with elevated thoughts but that deifies his illusions and incessantly chases his own dreams and believing to become true. Seeking a buried treasure with Jeanne, the somnambulist, in a former battle field in Vendee, he finds malevolent, noisy Spirits instead, bringing upon him and his companion great fear and painful anguish. He suddenly turns into a Spiritist as if the apparitions that obsess him had renovated the miracle of the wonder lamp and, at the same time, provided all the benefits of the soul and the body.
Fiction needs to be one of the greatest needs of the human mind to make such beliefs possible. There are deceiving geniuses making fun there; cruel Spirits that threat and make noise; rude and bad mouthed Spirits that make us ask what are they doing down here since they were not depurated by the crucible of death?
There are also the verses and poems of a good angel that has not opened up the secrets of heavens with her poetry, demonstrating to us how far a preconceived idea may take us on the path of illusions. When it comes to Spiritism Mr. Boreau’s faith is like that of the coalman; he even loves those that bother and bash him. We have nothing to add other than the fact that the brochure contains funny episodes, demonstrating that he can go without other Spirits since his own suits him very well. We only say that the facts that he reports are not form yesterday.
We still remember the commotion that took over the city of Poitiers when the house at Rue St. Paul had its formidable artillery heard. A long procession of curious people surrounded that home haunted by the devil for eight days; the police established its headquarters there stalking the flight of the Spirits, taking their chances to catch the secrets of the other world by surprise but only finding fire. The Spirits only reveal themselves to the believers, making all the noise of the world (Spiritist Review, February, March and May 1864). That is strange, dear reader. It seems that those regions have the monopoly of that noisy and mockery lot.
Gorre, a renowned German doctor deceased in 1836, in the Vol. III of his Mystique, tells the story of Guillaume d’Auvergne, deceased in 1249, bishop of Paris, that in those days reported a rapping Spirit that had moved in to a house in the neighborhood of St. Paul in Poitiers; it was about a Spirit that threw stones and broke glasses.
Pierre Mamoris, professor of theology in our University, author of Flagellum Maleficorum, reports the events that took place in 1447 at St. Paul Rd., at a house in which the Spirit dragged furniture, broke glasses and even gently hit people, without revealing how all that was done.
The story goes that Jean Delorme, priest of St. Paul, a man of great education and regard, visited the theater of those strange events and accompanied by other persons he carried lit candles and sprinkled Gregorian water to exorcize the rooms. But the exorcism proved useless. Not a single demon showed up. The malignant Spirit, however, no longer manifested after that.[1]
Therefore, with a few centuries of interval, the same Spiritist phenomena take place three times in the same town and neighborhood. What can we conclude from that? Absolutely nothing. In fact, there is not a single important consequence resulting from useless noises, from puerile jokes or regrettable acts of violence that evidently cannot be attributed to Spirits, weightless bodies that float around the world, certainly avoiding human diseases and continuously approaching the light and God’s benevolence.
As a matter of fact this issue is not for discussion. Every person is free to choose their own Spirits and worship them as they wish, give them the virtues they will, a power and a character that are in agreement with their own beliefs. Instead of the geniuses somewhat material of the modern school we prefer the creations that stem out of the old poetry and that shake hands, walking side by side with the human fraternity at the border between the two worlds, bringing them closer to the sources of immortal life and endless happiness. To us no single rapping Spirit is worth these adorable images painted by the genius of Ossian, on the fluid clouds of the North, whose melancholic harps still vibrate the inner most fibers of the heart. It is the flight of the soul relieving its wings from any heavy load.”
We must thank the author of this article for letting us know about this remarkable event that we were not aware of, about the same phenomenon that has been reproduced for centuries in the same place. That could not be unsuspectedly better to our cause since he pretends to use such a repetition as an argument against the manifestations. It seems to us that when a fact is unique and isolated there is no absolute consequence that may be deduced since it may be due to an eventual cause whereas when it repeated in identical circumstances it follows that it must be due to the same cause, that is, a law. The search for such a law is the duty of any serious observer since it may lead to important findings.
It is, up to a certain extent, understandable that despite the duration, the special character and accessory circumstances of the noises in Poitier, some people persisted in the idea that they were originated by malevolence. But then, if that is the third time that they take place, separated by centuries, there is certainly food for thought because if they are not in good faith it is highly unlikely that they would have chosen precisely the same place to occur with such long intervals. Nonetheless, what can we conclude from that?
The author says: absolutely nothing. That is to say, if something happens repeatedly and touches a whole population several times there is nothing to learn from that? That would be a truly singular madness! These are “useless noises, from puerile jokes or regrettable acts of violence that evidently cannot be attributed to Spirits, weightless bodies that flow around the world, certainly avoiding human diseases and continuously approaching the light and God’s benevolence.” Mr. David then believes in the Spirits since he describes their attributes with such accuracy. Where has he taken such knowledge from? Who told him that the Spirits are like that? Has he studied them to solve the issue like that?
He says that “they must escape human diseases.” The bodily illnesses, undoubtedly, but the moral ones as well? Will he believe that the bad person, the murderer, the bandit, the worst of all evils and himself will be on the same level when Spirits? What benefit can they take from being honest in life if they will be the same after death? Considering that the Spirits approach light and God’s benevolence continuously, something that is perhaps truer that the author actually believes, then there was a time when the Spirits were further away because in order to approach an objective one must be distant first. Where was the starting point? This cannot be but in opposition to perfection, that is imperfection. The Spirits that make fun of similar things cannot certainly be perfect but if there are imperfect Spirits where is the surprise with similar actions? Since the float around the world will it follow that they cannot get closer? It would be useless to carry on with this refutations. The arguments of our adversaries, all more or less with the same strength, would not have taken us to transcribe the article if they did not carry a precious teaching, for which we again thank the author.
[1] See brochure by Mr. Bonsergent, Imperial Library.
“Dear reader, like myself you must have a copy of the little brochure by Mr. Boreau from Niort with the title Why and How I become a Spiritist, with a facsimile of the autograph of direct writing by a familiar Spirit. It is a very curious story of a sincere, devout man, a person with elevated thoughts but that deifies his illusions and incessantly chases his own dreams and believing to become true. Seeking a buried treasure with Jeanne, the somnambulist, in a former battle field in Vendee, he finds malevolent, noisy Spirits instead, bringing upon him and his companion great fear and painful anguish. He suddenly turns into a Spiritist as if the apparitions that obsess him had renovated the miracle of the wonder lamp and, at the same time, provided all the benefits of the soul and the body.
Fiction needs to be one of the greatest needs of the human mind to make such beliefs possible. There are deceiving geniuses making fun there; cruel Spirits that threat and make noise; rude and bad mouthed Spirits that make us ask what are they doing down here since they were not depurated by the crucible of death?
There are also the verses and poems of a good angel that has not opened up the secrets of heavens with her poetry, demonstrating to us how far a preconceived idea may take us on the path of illusions. When it comes to Spiritism Mr. Boreau’s faith is like that of the coalman; he even loves those that bother and bash him. We have nothing to add other than the fact that the brochure contains funny episodes, demonstrating that he can go without other Spirits since his own suits him very well. We only say that the facts that he reports are not form yesterday.
We still remember the commotion that took over the city of Poitiers when the house at Rue St. Paul had its formidable artillery heard. A long procession of curious people surrounded that home haunted by the devil for eight days; the police established its headquarters there stalking the flight of the Spirits, taking their chances to catch the secrets of the other world by surprise but only finding fire. The Spirits only reveal themselves to the believers, making all the noise of the world (Spiritist Review, February, March and May 1864). That is strange, dear reader. It seems that those regions have the monopoly of that noisy and mockery lot.
Gorre, a renowned German doctor deceased in 1836, in the Vol. III of his Mystique, tells the story of Guillaume d’Auvergne, deceased in 1249, bishop of Paris, that in those days reported a rapping Spirit that had moved in to a house in the neighborhood of St. Paul in Poitiers; it was about a Spirit that threw stones and broke glasses.
Pierre Mamoris, professor of theology in our University, author of Flagellum Maleficorum, reports the events that took place in 1447 at St. Paul Rd., at a house in which the Spirit dragged furniture, broke glasses and even gently hit people, without revealing how all that was done.
The story goes that Jean Delorme, priest of St. Paul, a man of great education and regard, visited the theater of those strange events and accompanied by other persons he carried lit candles and sprinkled Gregorian water to exorcize the rooms. But the exorcism proved useless. Not a single demon showed up. The malignant Spirit, however, no longer manifested after that.[1]
Therefore, with a few centuries of interval, the same Spiritist phenomena take place three times in the same town and neighborhood. What can we conclude from that? Absolutely nothing. In fact, there is not a single important consequence resulting from useless noises, from puerile jokes or regrettable acts of violence that evidently cannot be attributed to Spirits, weightless bodies that float around the world, certainly avoiding human diseases and continuously approaching the light and God’s benevolence.
As a matter of fact this issue is not for discussion. Every person is free to choose their own Spirits and worship them as they wish, give them the virtues they will, a power and a character that are in agreement with their own beliefs. Instead of the geniuses somewhat material of the modern school we prefer the creations that stem out of the old poetry and that shake hands, walking side by side with the human fraternity at the border between the two worlds, bringing them closer to the sources of immortal life and endless happiness. To us no single rapping Spirit is worth these adorable images painted by the genius of Ossian, on the fluid clouds of the North, whose melancholic harps still vibrate the inner most fibers of the heart. It is the flight of the soul relieving its wings from any heavy load.”
We must thank the author of this article for letting us know about this remarkable event that we were not aware of, about the same phenomenon that has been reproduced for centuries in the same place. That could not be unsuspectedly better to our cause since he pretends to use such a repetition as an argument against the manifestations. It seems to us that when a fact is unique and isolated there is no absolute consequence that may be deduced since it may be due to an eventual cause whereas when it repeated in identical circumstances it follows that it must be due to the same cause, that is, a law. The search for such a law is the duty of any serious observer since it may lead to important findings.
It is, up to a certain extent, understandable that despite the duration, the special character and accessory circumstances of the noises in Poitier, some people persisted in the idea that they were originated by malevolence. But then, if that is the third time that they take place, separated by centuries, there is certainly food for thought because if they are not in good faith it is highly unlikely that they would have chosen precisely the same place to occur with such long intervals. Nonetheless, what can we conclude from that?
The author says: absolutely nothing. That is to say, if something happens repeatedly and touches a whole population several times there is nothing to learn from that? That would be a truly singular madness! These are “useless noises, from puerile jokes or regrettable acts of violence that evidently cannot be attributed to Spirits, weightless bodies that flow around the world, certainly avoiding human diseases and continuously approaching the light and God’s benevolence.” Mr. David then believes in the Spirits since he describes their attributes with such accuracy. Where has he taken such knowledge from? Who told him that the Spirits are like that? Has he studied them to solve the issue like that?
He says that “they must escape human diseases.” The bodily illnesses, undoubtedly, but the moral ones as well? Will he believe that the bad person, the murderer, the bandit, the worst of all evils and himself will be on the same level when Spirits? What benefit can they take from being honest in life if they will be the same after death? Considering that the Spirits approach light and God’s benevolence continuously, something that is perhaps truer that the author actually believes, then there was a time when the Spirits were further away because in order to approach an objective one must be distant first. Where was the starting point? This cannot be but in opposition to perfection, that is imperfection. The Spirits that make fun of similar things cannot certainly be perfect but if there are imperfect Spirits where is the surprise with similar actions? Since the float around the world will it follow that they cannot get closer? It would be useless to carry on with this refutations. The arguments of our adversaries, all more or less with the same strength, would not have taken us to transcribe the article if they did not carry a precious teaching, for which we again thank the author.
[1] See brochure by Mr. Bonsergent, Imperial Library.
Conversations from beyond the grave
Dr. Vignal
Parisian Society, March 31st, 1865 – medium Mr. Desliens
The readers undoubtedly remember the interesting studies about the Spirits of living persons published in the Spiritist Review, January and March 1860, to which Count of R… and Dr. Vignal were submitted. The later one has been away for several years and died on March 25th last. On the eve of the funerals we asked a very lucid somnambulist that could see the Spirits if he could see him. He then said: “I see a cadaver upon which there is an extraordinary work taking place. It is like an agitating body, as if something was struggling to detach from that body, just having to overcome the resistance. I cannot see a well-defined shape of a Spirit.” On March 31st he was evoked at the Society in Paris. The same somnambulist attended the session and fell asleep during the activities. He then saw and described the Spirit perfectly well while communicating with a medium of his choice.
We say medium of his choice because experience demonstrates the inconvenience of trying to impose a medium to a Spirit that may not find the necessary conditions for the free communication. When the evocation of a Spirit occurs for the first time it is convenient that all mediums that are present be prepared for their manifestation. There were eleven mediums at that session.
Question – Dear Mr. Vignal, all of your former colleagues at the Parisian Society kept their best memories of yours and myself, in particular, the best relationship that was not broken between us. By calling you to our session we intend to testify our sympathy to you and would be very glad if you could kindly come and communicate with us.
Answer – Dear friend and honorable professor, your memory and sympathy are very dear to me. If I can come to attend this session with you today, free and detached, with all these friends and Spiritist brothers, it is thanks to your good thoughts and the assistance of your prayers that brought me here. As my young secretary correctly said I was impatient to communicate. I employed all the strength of my soul to dominate myself since the beginning of this evening. Your conversations and the serious matters that were discussed made my wait less painful given the interest they attracted. Forgive me, dear friend, but my recognition had to be manifested.
Note: As soon as the medium detected that it was Mr. Vignal he really felt the need that the Spirit had to communicate.
Q – To begin with, kindly tell us about your situation in the spiritual world. At the same time please describe the work of separation, your sensations and how long did it take for you to be aware of yourself.
A – I feel as happy as one can be when we see the realization of every secret thought about this reassuring and healing doctrine. I am happy! Yes, I am because now I see before my eyes and without any obstacle the future of the Spiritist science and philosophy. For the moment let us keep aside such uncalled for essays. I shall come back to this matter, knowing that my presence gives you the same pleasure that I feel with you. The separation was really quick, faster than I could expect with my little merit. I was powerfully helped by you and your somnambulist gave you a very clear idea of the phenomenon of separation, making it unnecessary for me to insist on that. It was a kind of discontinued oscillation, with a movement in two opposing directions. The Spirit succeeded since I am here. I only left the body completely when it was laid down on the ground. I am back with you.
Q – What is your impression of your funeral services? I felt the need to be with you, like a duty. Were you sufficiently detached at that moment and have our prayers reached you at that time?
A – Yes. As I said, your assistance helped with a seamless transition and here I am with you, completely abandoning the old cocoon. Material things do not have much importance to me, as you know. I only thought of God and the soul.
Q – Do you remember your own request about five years ago, in 1860, when we did a study about you, when still alive? At that time your Spirit separated to come to talk to us. Can you describe, as much as possible, the difference that exists between your current detachment and the separation at that time?
A – Yes, certainly. I do remember. But what a difference between my state then and now! At that time matter still restricted me with its inflexible system; I wanted to separate in a more absolute terms but could not. Today I am free. A vast field, that of the unknown, unfolds before my eyes, and I expect, with your help and that of the good Spirits, to whom I entrust myself, to advance and to penetrate as soon as possible the atmosphere of feelings that I must experiment, and the actions that I must carry out to succeed and deserve the rewards. It is majestic! It is great! It is almost an astonishment that takes us over when we face sublime clarities!
Q – On another occasion we shall have the pleasure to continue our conversation as you wish.
A – I responded your questions succinctly and not following a given order. Do not expect much yet from your faithful disciple, for I am not completely free yet. Talk to you even further would be reason for my own happiness. My guide moderates my enthusiasm and I have already learned about his goodness and fairness to submit entirely to his will, however much I may feel sorry for being interrupted. I have the consolation of being able to come many times incognito to attend your sessions. I will speak with you many times; I love you and want to demonstrate that. But other more advanced Spirits request priority and I must appreciate the opportunity given to me to express the torrent of thoughts that were accumulated. I leave you now friends, and must thank you both, not only the Spiritists that called me but also this Spirit that allowed me to take his place and that when alive used the name Pascal. From the one that was and will always be your most dedicated follower. – Dr. Vignal.
Note: In fact the Spirit Pascal gave then the communication that follows later in this issue with the title Intellectual Progress.
We say medium of his choice because experience demonstrates the inconvenience of trying to impose a medium to a Spirit that may not find the necessary conditions for the free communication. When the evocation of a Spirit occurs for the first time it is convenient that all mediums that are present be prepared for their manifestation. There were eleven mediums at that session.
Question – Dear Mr. Vignal, all of your former colleagues at the Parisian Society kept their best memories of yours and myself, in particular, the best relationship that was not broken between us. By calling you to our session we intend to testify our sympathy to you and would be very glad if you could kindly come and communicate with us.
Answer – Dear friend and honorable professor, your memory and sympathy are very dear to me. If I can come to attend this session with you today, free and detached, with all these friends and Spiritist brothers, it is thanks to your good thoughts and the assistance of your prayers that brought me here. As my young secretary correctly said I was impatient to communicate. I employed all the strength of my soul to dominate myself since the beginning of this evening. Your conversations and the serious matters that were discussed made my wait less painful given the interest they attracted. Forgive me, dear friend, but my recognition had to be manifested.
Note: As soon as the medium detected that it was Mr. Vignal he really felt the need that the Spirit had to communicate.
Q – To begin with, kindly tell us about your situation in the spiritual world. At the same time please describe the work of separation, your sensations and how long did it take for you to be aware of yourself.
A – I feel as happy as one can be when we see the realization of every secret thought about this reassuring and healing doctrine. I am happy! Yes, I am because now I see before my eyes and without any obstacle the future of the Spiritist science and philosophy. For the moment let us keep aside such uncalled for essays. I shall come back to this matter, knowing that my presence gives you the same pleasure that I feel with you. The separation was really quick, faster than I could expect with my little merit. I was powerfully helped by you and your somnambulist gave you a very clear idea of the phenomenon of separation, making it unnecessary for me to insist on that. It was a kind of discontinued oscillation, with a movement in two opposing directions. The Spirit succeeded since I am here. I only left the body completely when it was laid down on the ground. I am back with you.
Q – What is your impression of your funeral services? I felt the need to be with you, like a duty. Were you sufficiently detached at that moment and have our prayers reached you at that time?
A – Yes. As I said, your assistance helped with a seamless transition and here I am with you, completely abandoning the old cocoon. Material things do not have much importance to me, as you know. I only thought of God and the soul.
Q – Do you remember your own request about five years ago, in 1860, when we did a study about you, when still alive? At that time your Spirit separated to come to talk to us. Can you describe, as much as possible, the difference that exists between your current detachment and the separation at that time?
A – Yes, certainly. I do remember. But what a difference between my state then and now! At that time matter still restricted me with its inflexible system; I wanted to separate in a more absolute terms but could not. Today I am free. A vast field, that of the unknown, unfolds before my eyes, and I expect, with your help and that of the good Spirits, to whom I entrust myself, to advance and to penetrate as soon as possible the atmosphere of feelings that I must experiment, and the actions that I must carry out to succeed and deserve the rewards. It is majestic! It is great! It is almost an astonishment that takes us over when we face sublime clarities!
Q – On another occasion we shall have the pleasure to continue our conversation as you wish.
A – I responded your questions succinctly and not following a given order. Do not expect much yet from your faithful disciple, for I am not completely free yet. Talk to you even further would be reason for my own happiness. My guide moderates my enthusiasm and I have already learned about his goodness and fairness to submit entirely to his will, however much I may feel sorry for being interrupted. I have the consolation of being able to come many times incognito to attend your sessions. I will speak with you many times; I love you and want to demonstrate that. But other more advanced Spirits request priority and I must appreciate the opportunity given to me to express the torrent of thoughts that were accumulated. I leave you now friends, and must thank you both, not only the Spiritists that called me but also this Spirit that allowed me to take his place and that when alive used the name Pascal. From the one that was and will always be your most dedicated follower. – Dr. Vignal.
Note: In fact the Spirit Pascal gave then the communication that follows later in this issue with the title Intellectual Progress.
Correspondence
Mr. Salgues’ letters from Angers
Mr. Salgues sent us his brochure Confusion in Satan’s Empire, announced in our previous issue and with that he added the following letter that we have the pleasure to publish with his authorization. Everyone will be able to, like ourselves, assess the feelings expressed there.
Angers, March 9th, 1865
“Dear Sir. and brother in God,
It is under the impression caused by the reading of the communications given by the Spirits of Mrs. Foulon and Mr. Demeure (Spiritist Review, March 1865) that I have the honor of writing to you to express all the pleasure that I found in them, and I can say the much interest frequently produced by your pen. I have just sent you a small brochure that I ask you to accept. To you and to all my readers it will be a very modest piece of work; but an eighty year old man that is going blind out of excessive work and studies, and for that reason incapable of reexamining the writings as I would like to, that old man must count on the indulgence of public opinion.
The Catholic adversaries of pneumatology feed the apostolic fanatics with the opinion that the Spirits are demons, that Satan is a reality, consequently harming the development of good doctrines, like the precious and so reassuring moral teachings of the supposed elves. It is useless that reasonable people deny them out of pure and persistent rejection. It is necessary to prove to the devil phobic with details and circumstances that they are mistaken and that the Christian hell is a myth. That is what led me to write this little book, without any intent of occupying the place of a writer.
As a subscriber to the Spiritist publications of Bordeaux I have just sent an exemplar of my book to each of their authors. Should I do differently with you Sir, whose books I read with great interest since their inception? You may think, however, that I do so timidly because I was an adversary of Spiritism, and not of the much honorable Spiritists. Not in absolute terms but for being dragged to it and for having to repeal a language that was attributed to me for having abused the subscription. I then blocked every criticism, wanting to be friends with everybody. I therefore only want to observe, approach, compare, wait and judge in the silence of my office. I still believe today that we are farm from knowing everything; that with respect to Spiritism as with Spiritualism there would be a place for discussion with the Spirits of certain issues of doctrine that I reserve to myself. With patience we shall all get to the same place, to the absolute happiness of the eternal life. I in fact see Spiritism making people happy everywhere. It is your glorious work and I do my best to stimulate as much as possible the study of the texts that are so spread out today, reassuring morality and religious feelings through a more rational path. Those that are enlightened should, with me, pray for God to give you long days in perfect health. I also believe that he manifested about me through three Spirits that, without having me thinking about it and in three different places, I was told that I would live a long life and that was already eight years ago. It may well be for the fact that I was always zealous and tireless on the propagation of the ideas since 1853 and that, despite my eyes that were greatly sacrificed, I have the strength, the energy, the physical promptness and attitude of a young man, and that my appearance does not reveal my age. Kindly accept, dear brother, my highest admiration and respect with my cordial greetings,”
Salgues
A second letter from Mr. Salgues, dated April 11th, 1865 contains the following passage:
“A journal to which I had sent a volume of my book made an announcement about it. I had to criticize the author for having called me a ruthless adversary of Spiritism. Given the impression caused by the data provided a short while ago to Victor Hennequin by a bad Spirit, I did fight, in good faith, the doctrine of the reincarnations, but after having acknowledged a large number of spiritualist inconsistences and since I detected certain details in Spiritism that did not captivated my trust, I limited myself to a detailed observation, patiently waiting for the day when, with a more perfect nature, I would be able to acknowledge the truth about our destinies after this material life. With respect to the facts and communications, for the moment I am satisfied with the certainty that there is a second life in the spiritual world.”
Our response
My dear Sir,
I received the letter that you kindly sent me with the brochure that followed for which I thank you so much. I have not had the time to read the book yet but I have no doubt that you gave our adversaries a lot to do. The issue of the devil is the last fighting horse that they hold back but that horse is weak and the rope that keeps all that afloat is worn out and will soon let that boat astray. I am glad, Sir, for the excellent and kind words addressed to me and for finding in your soul the hallmark of moderation and impartiality. I confess that I would be surprised if it were otherwise and that it makes me really happy to see that I was induced in error by false appearances. We may hold different opinions about certain points of the doctrine but it gives me satisfaction to attest that we are united by the principle that “There is no salvation but through charity.
Sincerely yours,
Angers, March 9th, 1865
“Dear Sir. and brother in God,
It is under the impression caused by the reading of the communications given by the Spirits of Mrs. Foulon and Mr. Demeure (Spiritist Review, March 1865) that I have the honor of writing to you to express all the pleasure that I found in them, and I can say the much interest frequently produced by your pen. I have just sent you a small brochure that I ask you to accept. To you and to all my readers it will be a very modest piece of work; but an eighty year old man that is going blind out of excessive work and studies, and for that reason incapable of reexamining the writings as I would like to, that old man must count on the indulgence of public opinion.
The Catholic adversaries of pneumatology feed the apostolic fanatics with the opinion that the Spirits are demons, that Satan is a reality, consequently harming the development of good doctrines, like the precious and so reassuring moral teachings of the supposed elves. It is useless that reasonable people deny them out of pure and persistent rejection. It is necessary to prove to the devil phobic with details and circumstances that they are mistaken and that the Christian hell is a myth. That is what led me to write this little book, without any intent of occupying the place of a writer.
As a subscriber to the Spiritist publications of Bordeaux I have just sent an exemplar of my book to each of their authors. Should I do differently with you Sir, whose books I read with great interest since their inception? You may think, however, that I do so timidly because I was an adversary of Spiritism, and not of the much honorable Spiritists. Not in absolute terms but for being dragged to it and for having to repeal a language that was attributed to me for having abused the subscription. I then blocked every criticism, wanting to be friends with everybody. I therefore only want to observe, approach, compare, wait and judge in the silence of my office. I still believe today that we are farm from knowing everything; that with respect to Spiritism as with Spiritualism there would be a place for discussion with the Spirits of certain issues of doctrine that I reserve to myself. With patience we shall all get to the same place, to the absolute happiness of the eternal life. I in fact see Spiritism making people happy everywhere. It is your glorious work and I do my best to stimulate as much as possible the study of the texts that are so spread out today, reassuring morality and religious feelings through a more rational path. Those that are enlightened should, with me, pray for God to give you long days in perfect health. I also believe that he manifested about me through three Spirits that, without having me thinking about it and in three different places, I was told that I would live a long life and that was already eight years ago. It may well be for the fact that I was always zealous and tireless on the propagation of the ideas since 1853 and that, despite my eyes that were greatly sacrificed, I have the strength, the energy, the physical promptness and attitude of a young man, and that my appearance does not reveal my age. Kindly accept, dear brother, my highest admiration and respect with my cordial greetings,”
Salgues
A second letter from Mr. Salgues, dated April 11th, 1865 contains the following passage:
“A journal to which I had sent a volume of my book made an announcement about it. I had to criticize the author for having called me a ruthless adversary of Spiritism. Given the impression caused by the data provided a short while ago to Victor Hennequin by a bad Spirit, I did fight, in good faith, the doctrine of the reincarnations, but after having acknowledged a large number of spiritualist inconsistences and since I detected certain details in Spiritism that did not captivated my trust, I limited myself to a detailed observation, patiently waiting for the day when, with a more perfect nature, I would be able to acknowledge the truth about our destinies after this material life. With respect to the facts and communications, for the moment I am satisfied with the certainty that there is a second life in the spiritual world.”
Our response
My dear Sir,
I received the letter that you kindly sent me with the brochure that followed for which I thank you so much. I have not had the time to read the book yet but I have no doubt that you gave our adversaries a lot to do. The issue of the devil is the last fighting horse that they hold back but that horse is weak and the rope that keeps all that afloat is worn out and will soon let that boat astray. I am glad, Sir, for the excellent and kind words addressed to me and for finding in your soul the hallmark of moderation and impartiality. I confess that I would be surprised if it were otherwise and that it makes me really happy to see that I was induced in error by false appearances. We may hold different opinions about certain points of the doctrine but it gives me satisfaction to attest that we are united by the principle that “There is no salvation but through charity.
Sincerely yours,
Multiple Manifestations
Cures, raining tablets - letter from Mr. Delanne
Our colleague Mr. Delanne writes on April 2nd last:
“Dear master, I met our brothers from Barcelona again. There, like in France, the Doctrine propagates and the followers are passionate and enthusiastic. In a group that I visited I saw worthy competitors of that Mr. Dombre from Marmande. I attested the thorough cure of a lady that suffered from a terrible obsession for at least fifteen years, well before one had heard about the Spirits. Doctors, priests and exorcists, everything had been tried uselessly. Today that mom has gone back home, embraced by her loved ones that constantly thank God for such a miraculous cure. That result needed only two months to be achieved by both the evocation of the obsessing Spirit as well as the collective and sympathetic prayers.
In another session there was the evocation of a Spirit called Joseph that obsessed a driver for eighteen years and that now is about to be cured. I had never before been touched as much by the pain experimented by the patient during the evocation. He starts calmly and then he is suddenly overwhelmed by jerky movements and nervous trembling; he is taken by an invisible enemy, becoming agitated by terrible convulsions; his chest inflates and he seems to suffocate; he then recovers his breath and contorts his body like a serpent, rolls over on the floor, suddenly stands up and hits his own head. He only pronounced broken words, in particular repeated no, no! The lady medium remained in prayer. Soon the invisible lets his prey go for a moment and takes her hand over; he would have hurt her if he was allowed to.
That worst kind of Spirit has been evoked for about fifteen days; he had never, however, declared the reason for his vengeance. After being pressured by me he finally confessed that the so called Joseph had stolen his other half. I made him understand that if he stopped and showed the slightest sign of regret God would allow him to see her again. I do anything for her, he said. Then, repeat: God, forgive my sins. After some hesitation he said: I will try but watch him if I am not allowed to see her. He then wrote: God, forgive my mistakes. Time was critical. What would follow next? We then consulted our guides who said: You did well by placing the whole trust in God and in us; that is the key to bring him to you and later on he will see his loved one; have no fear; it is a promise that will bring him to good.
After that scene Joseph, worn out like a fighter, extenuated by the fatigue, feels bad about the terrible possession of his invisible enemy. Mr. B… then applied energetic magnetic passes that ended up by calming him down completely. May God allow this cure to be as brilliant as the preceding one!
That is what those dear brothers were up to. What energy, conviction and courage are needed to achieve such cures! It is only faith, hope and charity in particular that can surpass similar obstacles and face so fearlessly such kind of terrible adversaries. I was exhausted!
A few days later in Carcassonne I experienced emotions of a different kind. I was visiting Mr. President Jaubert. We have had several manifestations for some time, he said. I will take you to the young lady that is the object of such manifestations. As if on purpose the woman was not feeling well. Her stomach was inflated to the point that she could not dress properly. The guides were consulted and the session postponed to the next day at 8 pm. Mr. C…, a retired Captain, offered his salon to us. It was a large and empty room, with carpet only. There was only a mirror on the fireplace, a chest and chairs; there was no paintings, curtains or cloths; truly, the apartment of a man. We were nine persons in total, all keen followers.
As soon as we moved in a lot of tablets fell noisily in one corner of the room! It would be hard to describe my feelings because the honorability of the attendees and the emptiness of the chosen room were kind of done by design by the Spirits to eliminate any doubt or anything that could be suspicious or a fraudulent maneuver. And despite that prodigy I never stopped watching and examining the walls, asking around if they were part of some kind of plot.
The young lady medium took a pencil and wrote this: - Tell Delanne to place a hand on his stomach and the inflammation will cease. Pray before that – We were all praying then. I was at one end of the room when suddenly another fall of candies happened at the opposite corner from where the first one had occurred. You can imagine our astonishment. I approached the patient; the swelling was much less significant than on the day before. I imposed my hand and it totally disappeared as if magic. I am cured, she said. Her tight dress became loose. It was attested by everyone. We joined our thoughts and thanked the Spirits for such goodness. A third fall of tablets took place. I shall never forget that in my life. Although the other participants were used to such manifestations, they were all amazed. Each one of them has an object that has been given by the Spirits. Mr. Jaubert told me that he had seen his desk moving and lifting several times, without the support of any hands; his hat taken to one place or another in the room. A similar event of instantaneous cure had also been produced some months before, by the hand of Mr. Jaubert.
The young lady medium that is also a very lucid somnambulist, was asleep. I then told her: Do you want to come along to Paris? – Yes. I would like you to go to my house. I see you wife, she said; she is pleasantly lying down and reading. She then described the apartment with great accuracy. Here the conversation she established with my wife: Ma’am, do you know that your husband is with us? – No, but tell my husband to write to me. Low and Behold! I had not seen your son. He is nice. Your wife tells me that she has another very nice son also. Ask her to tell you his age. Nine months, she says. – That is correct.
Since I knew that there was a gathering at your house, dear President, I asked her to go and visit you. She dared not enter given that there was a multitude of people and great Spirits. She described you very well as with several of our colleagues.”
Observation: Let us pay, for starter, a fair tribute of praise to our brothers from Barcelona for their zeal and dedication. As Mr. Delanne says, to carry out such things one needs the courage and perseverance that only faith and charity may give. May they receive here the demonstration of fraternal sympathy from the Parisian Society!
The events in Carcassonne will make the unbelievers smile and they will certainly say that this is a comedy; if not they would say that they are miracles but the times of miracles are over. The response to that is that there isn’t any miracle there and that these are only natural phenomena whose theory they will understand when they take the burden of studying them. That is why we do not take that of explaining it to them. As for the comedy one needs to understand who would have benefited from that representation. Prestidigitation can certainly produce things that are as impressive as those, even the simulated cure of a swollen bladder. But once again, who would benefit from that? One is always strong when capable of opposing the most absolute selflessness to the accusation of charlatanism; this would no longer hold if there were the slightest suspicion of material interest. And also, who would play a role in such a comedy? A young woman from a good family that does not join the spectacle, that does not give sessions at home or elsewhere and does not speak of herself? That is not in the interest of swindlers. Will that be the businesses of the Vice-President of a Court, honorable businessmen and the most honorable officers, all well positioned in society? Can such suspicion reach them? Some will say that yes, this is in the interest of the doctrine and aims at soliciting followers. But wouldn’t that be a strange way of founding a doctrine on pillars of charlatanism and by honest people? But our adversaries do not look closely at this when it comes to contradictions; logic is the least of their concerns.
There is, however, an important point make here. Who was attending the session reported by Mr. Delanne? Was there any nonbeliever that they were trying to convince? No, not one. They were all followers that had already witnessed those facts several times. Would they have then tried to deceive one another by such a deception? However much you try, gentlemen, the Spirits do that in so many ways to attest their presence that those that laugh will definitely not be on our side. You can verify it but the always growing number of followers. Had you found a single serious argument you would not have forgotten that; but you attack precisely the charlatans and exploiters that are never endorsed by Spiritism and with whom we always declare to have nothing in common. You support us there instead of causing us harm. You point out the fraud whenever you find it; we ask for no more. You have never seen us defending them nor supporting those that out of their own weaknesses fell in the hands of justice or placed themselves on the opposite side of the law. Every sincere Spiritist that strictly follows the duties outlined by the doctrine conciliates respect and consideration and has nothing to fear.
“Dear master, I met our brothers from Barcelona again. There, like in France, the Doctrine propagates and the followers are passionate and enthusiastic. In a group that I visited I saw worthy competitors of that Mr. Dombre from Marmande. I attested the thorough cure of a lady that suffered from a terrible obsession for at least fifteen years, well before one had heard about the Spirits. Doctors, priests and exorcists, everything had been tried uselessly. Today that mom has gone back home, embraced by her loved ones that constantly thank God for such a miraculous cure. That result needed only two months to be achieved by both the evocation of the obsessing Spirit as well as the collective and sympathetic prayers.
In another session there was the evocation of a Spirit called Joseph that obsessed a driver for eighteen years and that now is about to be cured. I had never before been touched as much by the pain experimented by the patient during the evocation. He starts calmly and then he is suddenly overwhelmed by jerky movements and nervous trembling; he is taken by an invisible enemy, becoming agitated by terrible convulsions; his chest inflates and he seems to suffocate; he then recovers his breath and contorts his body like a serpent, rolls over on the floor, suddenly stands up and hits his own head. He only pronounced broken words, in particular repeated no, no! The lady medium remained in prayer. Soon the invisible lets his prey go for a moment and takes her hand over; he would have hurt her if he was allowed to.
That worst kind of Spirit has been evoked for about fifteen days; he had never, however, declared the reason for his vengeance. After being pressured by me he finally confessed that the so called Joseph had stolen his other half. I made him understand that if he stopped and showed the slightest sign of regret God would allow him to see her again. I do anything for her, he said. Then, repeat: God, forgive my sins. After some hesitation he said: I will try but watch him if I am not allowed to see her. He then wrote: God, forgive my mistakes. Time was critical. What would follow next? We then consulted our guides who said: You did well by placing the whole trust in God and in us; that is the key to bring him to you and later on he will see his loved one; have no fear; it is a promise that will bring him to good.
After that scene Joseph, worn out like a fighter, extenuated by the fatigue, feels bad about the terrible possession of his invisible enemy. Mr. B… then applied energetic magnetic passes that ended up by calming him down completely. May God allow this cure to be as brilliant as the preceding one!
That is what those dear brothers were up to. What energy, conviction and courage are needed to achieve such cures! It is only faith, hope and charity in particular that can surpass similar obstacles and face so fearlessly such kind of terrible adversaries. I was exhausted!
A few days later in Carcassonne I experienced emotions of a different kind. I was visiting Mr. President Jaubert. We have had several manifestations for some time, he said. I will take you to the young lady that is the object of such manifestations. As if on purpose the woman was not feeling well. Her stomach was inflated to the point that she could not dress properly. The guides were consulted and the session postponed to the next day at 8 pm. Mr. C…, a retired Captain, offered his salon to us. It was a large and empty room, with carpet only. There was only a mirror on the fireplace, a chest and chairs; there was no paintings, curtains or cloths; truly, the apartment of a man. We were nine persons in total, all keen followers.
As soon as we moved in a lot of tablets fell noisily in one corner of the room! It would be hard to describe my feelings because the honorability of the attendees and the emptiness of the chosen room were kind of done by design by the Spirits to eliminate any doubt or anything that could be suspicious or a fraudulent maneuver. And despite that prodigy I never stopped watching and examining the walls, asking around if they were part of some kind of plot.
The young lady medium took a pencil and wrote this: - Tell Delanne to place a hand on his stomach and the inflammation will cease. Pray before that – We were all praying then. I was at one end of the room when suddenly another fall of candies happened at the opposite corner from where the first one had occurred. You can imagine our astonishment. I approached the patient; the swelling was much less significant than on the day before. I imposed my hand and it totally disappeared as if magic. I am cured, she said. Her tight dress became loose. It was attested by everyone. We joined our thoughts and thanked the Spirits for such goodness. A third fall of tablets took place. I shall never forget that in my life. Although the other participants were used to such manifestations, they were all amazed. Each one of them has an object that has been given by the Spirits. Mr. Jaubert told me that he had seen his desk moving and lifting several times, without the support of any hands; his hat taken to one place or another in the room. A similar event of instantaneous cure had also been produced some months before, by the hand of Mr. Jaubert.
The young lady medium that is also a very lucid somnambulist, was asleep. I then told her: Do you want to come along to Paris? – Yes. I would like you to go to my house. I see you wife, she said; she is pleasantly lying down and reading. She then described the apartment with great accuracy. Here the conversation she established with my wife: Ma’am, do you know that your husband is with us? – No, but tell my husband to write to me. Low and Behold! I had not seen your son. He is nice. Your wife tells me that she has another very nice son also. Ask her to tell you his age. Nine months, she says. – That is correct.
Since I knew that there was a gathering at your house, dear President, I asked her to go and visit you. She dared not enter given that there was a multitude of people and great Spirits. She described you very well as with several of our colleagues.”
Observation: Let us pay, for starter, a fair tribute of praise to our brothers from Barcelona for their zeal and dedication. As Mr. Delanne says, to carry out such things one needs the courage and perseverance that only faith and charity may give. May they receive here the demonstration of fraternal sympathy from the Parisian Society!
The events in Carcassonne will make the unbelievers smile and they will certainly say that this is a comedy; if not they would say that they are miracles but the times of miracles are over. The response to that is that there isn’t any miracle there and that these are only natural phenomena whose theory they will understand when they take the burden of studying them. That is why we do not take that of explaining it to them. As for the comedy one needs to understand who would have benefited from that representation. Prestidigitation can certainly produce things that are as impressive as those, even the simulated cure of a swollen bladder. But once again, who would benefit from that? One is always strong when capable of opposing the most absolute selflessness to the accusation of charlatanism; this would no longer hold if there were the slightest suspicion of material interest. And also, who would play a role in such a comedy? A young woman from a good family that does not join the spectacle, that does not give sessions at home or elsewhere and does not speak of herself? That is not in the interest of swindlers. Will that be the businesses of the Vice-President of a Court, honorable businessmen and the most honorable officers, all well positioned in society? Can such suspicion reach them? Some will say that yes, this is in the interest of the doctrine and aims at soliciting followers. But wouldn’t that be a strange way of founding a doctrine on pillars of charlatanism and by honest people? But our adversaries do not look closely at this when it comes to contradictions; logic is the least of their concerns.
There is, however, an important point make here. Who was attending the session reported by Mr. Delanne? Was there any nonbeliever that they were trying to convince? No, not one. They were all followers that had already witnessed those facts several times. Would they have then tried to deceive one another by such a deception? However much you try, gentlemen, the Spirits do that in so many ways to attest their presence that those that laugh will definitely not be on our side. You can verify it but the always growing number of followers. Had you found a single serious argument you would not have forgotten that; but you attack precisely the charlatans and exploiters that are never endorsed by Spiritism and with whom we always declare to have nothing in common. You support us there instead of causing us harm. You point out the fraud whenever you find it; we ask for no more. You have never seen us defending them nor supporting those that out of their own weaknesses fell in the hands of justice or placed themselves on the opposite side of the law. Every sincere Spiritist that strictly follows the duties outlined by the doctrine conciliates respect and consideration and has nothing to fear.
Varieties
Smoke and madness
On April 15th last the Siècle reports the following:
“The cases of paralysis and mental alienation have grown in France in direct proportion to the taxation of tobacco. From 1812 to 1832 the resources brought in by tobacco tax amounted to 28 million and the hospices of the alienated counted on 8,000 patients. Today that tax amounts to 180 million and the mentally ill or paralyzed patients sum up to 44,000 in special hospitals.
Those comparisons provided by Mr. Jolly in the last session of the Academy of Sciences must offer food for thought to the lovers of nicotine vapors. Mr. Jolly finished his presentation by this scaring statement to the current generation: - The unrestrained use of tobacco, particularly pipes, results in a brain disease and in the spinal cord that produces madness.”
If it were still necessary to provide a refutation, after everything that was said, to those that pretend that Spiritism fills up the homes of the mentally ill, those numbers would offer an argument without replica since they not only are based on a material fact and a logical scientific principle but also attest that the increase in the number of patients goes back more than twenty years before Spiritism was in the picture.
Well, it is not logical to admit that the effect preceded the cause. The Spiritists are not sheltered from material causes that may affect the brain as well as from accidents that may break arms and legs. There is no surprise then to find Spiritists among the mentally ill. But, side by side with material causes there are the moral ones. It is against the latter that the Spiritists have a strong antidote in their beliefs. Therefore, if one day it is possible to have accurate statistics done without prejudices about the cases of madness from moral reasons one will undoubtedly see the number diminish with the propagation of Spiritism. It will also diminish the number of cases caused by excesses and abuse of alcohol but will not preclude fever and the delirious states caused by disruptions in reason.
It is remarkable the number of educated persons that died mad as a consequence of the abuse of immoderate use of absinth[1]whose negative effects upon the brain and on the spinal cord are demonstrated today. If those persons had been associated to Spiritism they would say that it was the cause of their disease. As for ourselves, we have no doubt in affirming that had they been seriously involved with Spiritism they would have become more moderate in everything and would not have exposed themselves to those sad consequences of overindulgence.
A similar parallel to the case made by Mr. Jolly could, for the same reason and perhaps more, be made between the proportions of mentally ill persons and the consumption of absinth.
But here is another cause indicated by the Siècle on April 21th, with the following fact:
“The Droit reads: Josephine-Sophie D…, nineteen years old, polish worker, residing with her parents at Rue Bourbon-Villeneuve, used to devour popular novels purchased by the price of five cents. The exaggerated feelings, flamboyant characters and unrealistic events that are generally portrayed is such books had influenced her mind negatively. She thought that she was called up to the highest destines. Her parents that hardly made ends meet and made lots of sacrifices for her education, to her eyes they were poor creatures, incapable of understanding her and to reach out to her at the same level that she had aspired to position herself. Sophie had been given to that kind of thoughts for a long time. Finally acknowledging that there wasn’t any supernatural creature that would take care of her and that her life would go on as it would with the other workers, involved with her job and family affairs, she then decided to end her own life, undoubtedly expecting that her dreams would come true in the next life. Yesterday, in the morning, noticing that she did not show up at work, her sister was sent for her. When she opened the door she was horrified by the scene of her sister hanging from a hook installed on the ceiling towards the back of her bed. She called her parents that promptly cut the rope but every attempt to bring their daughter back to life was useless.”
There we have a cause of madness and suicide caused by the very ones that accuse Spiritism of filling up hospices of the mentally ill. Can romances then exalt imagination to the point that reason is disturbed? A good number of similar cases could be cited, not to mention the mad persons created by fear of the devil against weak souls. But enters Spiritism and everyone tried to make it the scape goat of their own evils.
[1] Aromatic liqueur with elevated alcohol content, now banned in most western countries (TN)
“The cases of paralysis and mental alienation have grown in France in direct proportion to the taxation of tobacco. From 1812 to 1832 the resources brought in by tobacco tax amounted to 28 million and the hospices of the alienated counted on 8,000 patients. Today that tax amounts to 180 million and the mentally ill or paralyzed patients sum up to 44,000 in special hospitals.
Those comparisons provided by Mr. Jolly in the last session of the Academy of Sciences must offer food for thought to the lovers of nicotine vapors. Mr. Jolly finished his presentation by this scaring statement to the current generation: - The unrestrained use of tobacco, particularly pipes, results in a brain disease and in the spinal cord that produces madness.”
If it were still necessary to provide a refutation, after everything that was said, to those that pretend that Spiritism fills up the homes of the mentally ill, those numbers would offer an argument without replica since they not only are based on a material fact and a logical scientific principle but also attest that the increase in the number of patients goes back more than twenty years before Spiritism was in the picture.
Well, it is not logical to admit that the effect preceded the cause. The Spiritists are not sheltered from material causes that may affect the brain as well as from accidents that may break arms and legs. There is no surprise then to find Spiritists among the mentally ill. But, side by side with material causes there are the moral ones. It is against the latter that the Spiritists have a strong antidote in their beliefs. Therefore, if one day it is possible to have accurate statistics done without prejudices about the cases of madness from moral reasons one will undoubtedly see the number diminish with the propagation of Spiritism. It will also diminish the number of cases caused by excesses and abuse of alcohol but will not preclude fever and the delirious states caused by disruptions in reason.
It is remarkable the number of educated persons that died mad as a consequence of the abuse of immoderate use of absinth[1]whose negative effects upon the brain and on the spinal cord are demonstrated today. If those persons had been associated to Spiritism they would say that it was the cause of their disease. As for ourselves, we have no doubt in affirming that had they been seriously involved with Spiritism they would have become more moderate in everything and would not have exposed themselves to those sad consequences of overindulgence.
A similar parallel to the case made by Mr. Jolly could, for the same reason and perhaps more, be made between the proportions of mentally ill persons and the consumption of absinth.
But here is another cause indicated by the Siècle on April 21th, with the following fact:
“The Droit reads: Josephine-Sophie D…, nineteen years old, polish worker, residing with her parents at Rue Bourbon-Villeneuve, used to devour popular novels purchased by the price of five cents. The exaggerated feelings, flamboyant characters and unrealistic events that are generally portrayed is such books had influenced her mind negatively. She thought that she was called up to the highest destines. Her parents that hardly made ends meet and made lots of sacrifices for her education, to her eyes they were poor creatures, incapable of understanding her and to reach out to her at the same level that she had aspired to position herself. Sophie had been given to that kind of thoughts for a long time. Finally acknowledging that there wasn’t any supernatural creature that would take care of her and that her life would go on as it would with the other workers, involved with her job and family affairs, she then decided to end her own life, undoubtedly expecting that her dreams would come true in the next life. Yesterday, in the morning, noticing that she did not show up at work, her sister was sent for her. When she opened the door she was horrified by the scene of her sister hanging from a hook installed on the ceiling towards the back of her bed. She called her parents that promptly cut the rope but every attempt to bring their daughter back to life was useless.”
There we have a cause of madness and suicide caused by the very ones that accuse Spiritism of filling up hospices of the mentally ill. Can romances then exalt imagination to the point that reason is disturbed? A good number of similar cases could be cited, not to mention the mad persons created by fear of the devil against weak souls. But enters Spiritism and everyone tried to make it the scape goat of their own evils.
[1] Aromatic liqueur with elevated alcohol content, now banned in most western countries (TN)
Spiritist Dissertations
Preconceived ideasI
Lyon, November 1863 – Medium Mr. X…
We have asked you many times to examine the communications that are given to you, submitting them to the crucible of reason, and that you must not take the inspirations that agitate your minds without analysis, under the influence of causes that are sometimes difficult to verify by the incarnate, affected by all sorts of mockery.
Pure ideas that, say, float around (according to Plato’s thoughts) and carried by the Spirits are not always capable of locating themselves alone and isolated onto the minds of your mediums. They frequently find the places occupied by preconceived ideas that are modified by the streams of inspiration, that unconsciously disturb and modify them, that is certain, but sometimes in a very profound way so that the spiritual idea is completely altered.
Inspiration is formed by two elements: thought and the fluidic heat that is supposed to embrace the medium’s soul, providing what you call the verve of composition. If inspiration finds the place occupied by a preconceived idea that the medium cannot or does not wish to separate from then the thought remains without an interpreter and the fluidic warmth is worn out by trying to excite a thought that is not ours. How many times have we come to bring that warmth and the idea to this selfish and passionate world of yours? You neglect the idea that should be acknowledged by your conscience and you use that warmth to the benefit of your own terrestrial passions, sometimes dilapidating God’s benevolence in favor of evil. How accountable will one day be all the defenders of the lost causes!
I would be, no doubt, desirable that the good inspirations could always dominate the preconceived ideas but in that case we would preclude human free-will and people would then escape the responsibility that is theirs. Nonetheless, since we are only the auxiliary advisors of humanity, how many times shouldn’t we congratulate ourselves when our ideas knock on the door of righteous consciences, overcoming preconceived ideas and modifying the conviction of the inspired ones! Make no mistake, however, and rest assured that the bad use of our help may have positive effects. Serious belief establishes a heart to heart connection; simulated conviction may vibrate in sync with passions and have them satisfied but it still carries a particular coldness that leaves a blank in the mind, pointing out to a doubtful origin. Would you like to know where the mediumistic inspiration comes from? The answer is easy: the idea comes from the extra-terrestrial world, directly from the Spirit. As for the fluidic warmth of inspiration, we find and utilize it from you; it is the emanation of the quintessential element of the vital fluid. We sometimes take it from the inspired person herself, when a certain fluidic power (or mediumistic, as you say) is available; we more frequently take it from the environment that surrounds the medium. That is why one can correctly say that sympathy has power.
If you give serious thoughts to that you will find the explanation of many events that may cause surprise at first sight but from which you have a certain intuition. The idea itself would not suffice mankind if the power of expression was not employed. The warmth is to the idea what the perispirit is to the Spirit and what your body is to the soul. Without the body the soul would be powerless to act upon matter; without the warmth the idea would be powerless to touch the hearts.
The conclusion of this communication is that you must never resign to your reason in the examination of the inspirations that you may receive. The more a medium has acquired own ideas the more she is susceptible to preconceived ones; also, the more she must put aside her ideas making room for those that arrive to her and giving her the assurance of a good communication.
Pascal
Pure ideas that, say, float around (according to Plato’s thoughts) and carried by the Spirits are not always capable of locating themselves alone and isolated onto the minds of your mediums. They frequently find the places occupied by preconceived ideas that are modified by the streams of inspiration, that unconsciously disturb and modify them, that is certain, but sometimes in a very profound way so that the spiritual idea is completely altered.
Inspiration is formed by two elements: thought and the fluidic heat that is supposed to embrace the medium’s soul, providing what you call the verve of composition. If inspiration finds the place occupied by a preconceived idea that the medium cannot or does not wish to separate from then the thought remains without an interpreter and the fluidic warmth is worn out by trying to excite a thought that is not ours. How many times have we come to bring that warmth and the idea to this selfish and passionate world of yours? You neglect the idea that should be acknowledged by your conscience and you use that warmth to the benefit of your own terrestrial passions, sometimes dilapidating God’s benevolence in favor of evil. How accountable will one day be all the defenders of the lost causes!
I would be, no doubt, desirable that the good inspirations could always dominate the preconceived ideas but in that case we would preclude human free-will and people would then escape the responsibility that is theirs. Nonetheless, since we are only the auxiliary advisors of humanity, how many times shouldn’t we congratulate ourselves when our ideas knock on the door of righteous consciences, overcoming preconceived ideas and modifying the conviction of the inspired ones! Make no mistake, however, and rest assured that the bad use of our help may have positive effects. Serious belief establishes a heart to heart connection; simulated conviction may vibrate in sync with passions and have them satisfied but it still carries a particular coldness that leaves a blank in the mind, pointing out to a doubtful origin. Would you like to know where the mediumistic inspiration comes from? The answer is easy: the idea comes from the extra-terrestrial world, directly from the Spirit. As for the fluidic warmth of inspiration, we find and utilize it from you; it is the emanation of the quintessential element of the vital fluid. We sometimes take it from the inspired person herself, when a certain fluidic power (or mediumistic, as you say) is available; we more frequently take it from the environment that surrounds the medium. That is why one can correctly say that sympathy has power.
If you give serious thoughts to that you will find the explanation of many events that may cause surprise at first sight but from which you have a certain intuition. The idea itself would not suffice mankind if the power of expression was not employed. The warmth is to the idea what the perispirit is to the Spirit and what your body is to the soul. Without the body the soul would be powerless to act upon matter; without the warmth the idea would be powerless to touch the hearts.
The conclusion of this communication is that you must never resign to your reason in the examination of the inspirations that you may receive. The more a medium has acquired own ideas the more she is susceptible to preconceived ones; also, the more she must put aside her ideas making room for those that arrive to her and giving her the assurance of a good communication.
Pascal
God does not avenge
II
The preceding is just a preamble to the introduction of other ideas. I talked about preconceived ideas that there are others beyond those that come from the own inclinations of the inspired person; there are those that come from a bad learning, from an interpretation that was given more or less long ago and that were justified in times when human reason was insufficiently developed; those interpretations became chronic and can only be modified through enormous efforts, particularly when their only authority comes from religious teachings and hidden books. One of those ideas is this: God avenges. One may conceive the thought that a person that is attacked in her pride, in her interests avenges. Such vengeance, although wrong, it is within the limits of human imperfection; but a father that seeks vengeance against his own children causes general astonishment because everybody feels that his duty is that of educating his children and therefore guide them and move them away from mistakes and correct their actions by all possible means; vengeance, however, is not acceptable and would even be strange to paternity rights.
From the point of view of public vendetta the society that is disappearing revenges guilty persons; the frequently cruel punishment was its vengeance against a perverse person. There was no concern with rehabilitation of such person and forgiveness or punishment was left to God. It was enough to threaten future offenders with terror that was considered positive.
The oncoming society no longer believes that; it may not yet act in the correction of the criminal but it least it already sees that vengeance is hateful; it is now enough to be protected against the actions of the criminal and measures are taken to avoid legal mistakes. Capital punishment will soon disappear from our codes.
If society today is great enough to avoid vengeance against a criminal, avoiding to be carried away by rage, how come you wish to see God sharing your own weaknesses and hurting a guilty person out of pure wrath? The belief in God’s fury comes from human pride that believes to have a great saying in God’s judgment. If the plant in your garden does not develop well will you become angry and seek vengeance? No; you will do what you can to have it fixed, giving it the necessary support to develop and to avoid deviations, even transplanting it to another location if needed so. But you will not avenge. That is what God does. God’s vengeance, what a blasphemy! What a minimization of God’s greatness! What ignorance about the infinite distance between creation and creature! How can you forget God’s benevolence and justice?
Would God claim a high price from you to be paid for your previous faults in an existence in which you have no memory of the past? No, no. God does not act like that. God precludes the impulse of a bad passion, corrects the inherent pride through a forced humility, fixes the egotism of the past by a present need, leading to the development of a feeling that mankind has not experienced yet. God corrects like a father does and also like a father God does not seek vengeance.
Stay away from these preconceived ideas of heavenly vengeance, disparate remains of an old mistake. Stay away from those fatalist tendencies that abounds amongst new doctrines and that would take you directly to the oriental Quietism. Human freedom is not great enough yet to have it diminished even further by wrong beliefs. The more you feel free the greater your responsibility and the more you shall move forward dragged by the efforts of your own will, on the path of progress.
Pascal
From the point of view of public vendetta the society that is disappearing revenges guilty persons; the frequently cruel punishment was its vengeance against a perverse person. There was no concern with rehabilitation of such person and forgiveness or punishment was left to God. It was enough to threaten future offenders with terror that was considered positive.
The oncoming society no longer believes that; it may not yet act in the correction of the criminal but it least it already sees that vengeance is hateful; it is now enough to be protected against the actions of the criminal and measures are taken to avoid legal mistakes. Capital punishment will soon disappear from our codes.
If society today is great enough to avoid vengeance against a criminal, avoiding to be carried away by rage, how come you wish to see God sharing your own weaknesses and hurting a guilty person out of pure wrath? The belief in God’s fury comes from human pride that believes to have a great saying in God’s judgment. If the plant in your garden does not develop well will you become angry and seek vengeance? No; you will do what you can to have it fixed, giving it the necessary support to develop and to avoid deviations, even transplanting it to another location if needed so. But you will not avenge. That is what God does. God’s vengeance, what a blasphemy! What a minimization of God’s greatness! What ignorance about the infinite distance between creation and creature! How can you forget God’s benevolence and justice?
Would God claim a high price from you to be paid for your previous faults in an existence in which you have no memory of the past? No, no. God does not act like that. God precludes the impulse of a bad passion, corrects the inherent pride through a forced humility, fixes the egotism of the past by a present need, leading to the development of a feeling that mankind has not experienced yet. God corrects like a father does and also like a father God does not seek vengeance.
Stay away from these preconceived ideas of heavenly vengeance, disparate remains of an old mistake. Stay away from those fatalist tendencies that abounds amongst new doctrines and that would take you directly to the oriental Quietism. Human freedom is not great enough yet to have it diminished even further by wrong beliefs. The more you feel free the greater your responsibility and the more you shall move forward dragged by the efforts of your own will, on the path of progress.
Pascal
Truth
III
Truth, my friend, is one of those abstractions to which the human mind moves towards all the time but never reaching the target. Such tendency is a necessity for it is one of the pre conditions of progress but the imperfect human nature cannot achieve it. Mankind follows the providential path by moving in the direction of truth but its term cannot be seen.
You shall understand me better when you learn that truth is like time, divided in two parts by the inappreciable moment called present, that is: past and future. There are also two truths, the relative and the absolute. Relative truth is what it is; absolute truth is what it should be. Since what it should be steps up onto levels up to the absolute perfection, that is God, it follows that the creatures only see relative truths in the ascending march of progress. But because a relative truth is not immutable it does not follow that it is less sacred to the creature.
Your laws, your customs and institutions are essentially perfectible and hence they are imperfect for that very reason, but such imperfections do not exempt you from the respect that is due to them. One must not move ahead in time and create laws that are outside of the social organization. Humanity is a collective being that must march at least in groups, if not as a whole, towards future progress. The one that separates from earthly society to walk like a stray child towards new truths always suffer the backlash of impatience.
Let the initiators, inspired by the Spirit of Truth, work to proclaim the laws of the future by submitting you to those of the present. Let God judge when the time is right for a new transition, measuring you by your own efforts to become better, but never breach any law until it is withdrawn.
Do not expect a cataclysm of social institutions just because Spiritism has been revealed to you; up until now it has being working underground and unconsciously to those that are its instruments. Today it blossoms out and sees daylight but the march of progress will still nonetheless be slow and steady.
Be suspicious of impatient Spirits that throw you into the dangerous avenues of the unknown. Your promised eternity must guide you to have pity for the ephemeral ambitions of life. Be always analytical before the voice of the manifesting Spirits. Remember this: mankind always moves under the influence of three factors: thoughts, inspiration and revelation. Your thoughts are the richness of your memories that you voluntarily produce. People find there what is strictly necessary to satisfy the needs of their current stationary position. Inspiration comes from the extraterrestrial minds that are more of less mixed with your own reflections, pushing you to move forward as the better complement given the insufficiency of the present; it is a now force, joining the existing and acquired force, to take you further away from the present; it is the irrefutable proof of a hidden cause that helps you to move ahead and without which you would stay put because that is the moral and physical rule that the effect cannot be greater than its own cause; that is what happens in social progress when an unknown cause adds up to your own efforts.
Revelation is the most elevated of the forces that agitates the human spirit because it comes from God and cannot manifest out of God’s express will; it is rare and sometimes even unnoticed, sometimes obvious to the ones that experience it to the point of involuntarily be taken by a sacred reverence. I repeat, this is rare and ordinarily given as a reward to the sincere faith and devout heart but I repeat do not take by revelation everything that comes to your heart. Humanity brags about the friendship of the great; the Spirits exhibit a special permission from God that they many times lack. Sometimes the Spirits make promises that are not ratified by God because it is only God that knows what needs to be.
That is, my friend, all I can tell you about truth. Humble yourself before the great Being by whom everything lives and moves in the infinity of the worlds that are governed by his power. Believe that if every wisdom, every justice and every power are in God then it is also in God every truth.
Pascal
You shall understand me better when you learn that truth is like time, divided in two parts by the inappreciable moment called present, that is: past and future. There are also two truths, the relative and the absolute. Relative truth is what it is; absolute truth is what it should be. Since what it should be steps up onto levels up to the absolute perfection, that is God, it follows that the creatures only see relative truths in the ascending march of progress. But because a relative truth is not immutable it does not follow that it is less sacred to the creature.
Your laws, your customs and institutions are essentially perfectible and hence they are imperfect for that very reason, but such imperfections do not exempt you from the respect that is due to them. One must not move ahead in time and create laws that are outside of the social organization. Humanity is a collective being that must march at least in groups, if not as a whole, towards future progress. The one that separates from earthly society to walk like a stray child towards new truths always suffer the backlash of impatience.
Let the initiators, inspired by the Spirit of Truth, work to proclaim the laws of the future by submitting you to those of the present. Let God judge when the time is right for a new transition, measuring you by your own efforts to become better, but never breach any law until it is withdrawn.
Do not expect a cataclysm of social institutions just because Spiritism has been revealed to you; up until now it has being working underground and unconsciously to those that are its instruments. Today it blossoms out and sees daylight but the march of progress will still nonetheless be slow and steady.
Be suspicious of impatient Spirits that throw you into the dangerous avenues of the unknown. Your promised eternity must guide you to have pity for the ephemeral ambitions of life. Be always analytical before the voice of the manifesting Spirits. Remember this: mankind always moves under the influence of three factors: thoughts, inspiration and revelation. Your thoughts are the richness of your memories that you voluntarily produce. People find there what is strictly necessary to satisfy the needs of their current stationary position. Inspiration comes from the extraterrestrial minds that are more of less mixed with your own reflections, pushing you to move forward as the better complement given the insufficiency of the present; it is a now force, joining the existing and acquired force, to take you further away from the present; it is the irrefutable proof of a hidden cause that helps you to move ahead and without which you would stay put because that is the moral and physical rule that the effect cannot be greater than its own cause; that is what happens in social progress when an unknown cause adds up to your own efforts.
Revelation is the most elevated of the forces that agitates the human spirit because it comes from God and cannot manifest out of God’s express will; it is rare and sometimes even unnoticed, sometimes obvious to the ones that experience it to the point of involuntarily be taken by a sacred reverence. I repeat, this is rare and ordinarily given as a reward to the sincere faith and devout heart but I repeat do not take by revelation everything that comes to your heart. Humanity brags about the friendship of the great; the Spirits exhibit a special permission from God that they many times lack. Sometimes the Spirits make promises that are not ratified by God because it is only God that knows what needs to be.
That is, my friend, all I can tell you about truth. Humble yourself before the great Being by whom everything lives and moves in the infinity of the worlds that are governed by his power. Believe that if every wisdom, every justice and every power are in God then it is also in God every truth.
Pascal
Study of Mediumship
Parisian Society, April 7th, 1865 – medium Mr. Costel
One must not create systems out of badly conceived and equally badly expressed essays that absolutely change the mediumistic inspiration if that had ever existed at all. I will let others explain the theory of progress since it is useless that all mediums deal with the same subject. I will talk about mediumship, that never ending matter of serious studies and research.
Mediumship is a faculty inherent to human nature. It is neither an exception nor a favor; it is part of the human whole and as such it is subjected to physical variations e moral inequalities; it endures the terrible duality between instinct and intelligence. It has its own geniuses, crowds and abortions.
Those meaningless and shapeless essays must never be attributed to the Spirits, I mean the elevated Spirits, dictations that add the ridicule of being signed by illustrious names. Serious mediumship only takes place with minds that are provided with sufficient instruction or, at least, tested by the trials of the heart. The best mediums are the only ones to connect to the spiritual waves; the others may only feel the material fluidic impulse that drags their hands, not affecting their minds that can only produce what they were capable of doing in their latent state. They must be encouraged to work but not to initiate the crowds in their elucubrations.
The Spiritist manifestations must take place with the greatest reservation. When necessary to protect one’s personal dignity then collect all the necessary proofs of a perfect good-faith regarding physical manifestations, precluding the spiritual communications from the ridicule of being easily associated to systems and ideas undersigned by famous names that are and will continue to be totally alien to such productions. I do not question people’s honesty when they say they receive the influence of the electric shock, confounding it with mediumistic inspiration. Science has its own pseudo-wise men and mediumship its false mediums, in the spiritual order I must clarify.
Here I try to establish the difference between mediums inspired by the spiritual fluid and those that only act by the influence of the corporeal fluid, that is, between those that vibrate intellectually and those whose physical resonance only leads to an unconscious and confusing production coming out of their own ideas, or ideas that are common and without elevation. There is, therefore, a dividing line that is perfectly outlined between the writing mediums: some obeying a spiritual influence that only lead to the writing of useful and elevated things; the others suffering a material influence that only acts upon their organs, like the physical fluids that act upon inert matter. This first classification is absolute but allows for a large number of intermediary variations. I only point out to the main aspects of an important study that other Spirits shall complement. We are the pioneers of the terrestrial progress, in solidarity with one another. In the spiritual phalanx we form the core of the future.
Georges
Observation: The statement by the Spirit in which he allow others to take on the work of explaining the theory of progress was motivated by several questions that had been proposed about the subject during the session. When he says that mediumship is an endless source of research and serious investigations he is perfectly correct.
Although the study of this part of Spiritism is far from complete, we are already far from the time in which people believed that it was only necessary to receive the influence of a mechanical impulse to be called medium and believe to be capable of receiving communications of every Spirit. This would be equivalent to believing that someone that could play a short aria at the piano must necessarily be an excellent musician. The progress of the Spiritist science that progresses daily with new observations shows us the up until recently unsuspected abundance of possible causes and subtle influences onto the intelligent relationships with the spiritual world. The Spirits could not have taught us everything at once. But, like skillful teachers, they give us more details as the ideas are better developed and unfold the principles that if given prematurely would not have been understood and would have created confusion in our minds.
Hence mediumship requires a serious study from the part of whoever sees a serious thing in Spiritism. As the true mechanisms of that faculty are better understood we shall be less exposed to deception because we will all know what it can produce and under which conditions it can happen. And the more people we have enlightened about that point the less people will fall victim of charlatanism.
Mediumship is a faculty inherent to human nature. It is neither an exception nor a favor; it is part of the human whole and as such it is subjected to physical variations e moral inequalities; it endures the terrible duality between instinct and intelligence. It has its own geniuses, crowds and abortions.
Those meaningless and shapeless essays must never be attributed to the Spirits, I mean the elevated Spirits, dictations that add the ridicule of being signed by illustrious names. Serious mediumship only takes place with minds that are provided with sufficient instruction or, at least, tested by the trials of the heart. The best mediums are the only ones to connect to the spiritual waves; the others may only feel the material fluidic impulse that drags their hands, not affecting their minds that can only produce what they were capable of doing in their latent state. They must be encouraged to work but not to initiate the crowds in their elucubrations.
The Spiritist manifestations must take place with the greatest reservation. When necessary to protect one’s personal dignity then collect all the necessary proofs of a perfect good-faith regarding physical manifestations, precluding the spiritual communications from the ridicule of being easily associated to systems and ideas undersigned by famous names that are and will continue to be totally alien to such productions. I do not question people’s honesty when they say they receive the influence of the electric shock, confounding it with mediumistic inspiration. Science has its own pseudo-wise men and mediumship its false mediums, in the spiritual order I must clarify.
Here I try to establish the difference between mediums inspired by the spiritual fluid and those that only act by the influence of the corporeal fluid, that is, between those that vibrate intellectually and those whose physical resonance only leads to an unconscious and confusing production coming out of their own ideas, or ideas that are common and without elevation. There is, therefore, a dividing line that is perfectly outlined between the writing mediums: some obeying a spiritual influence that only lead to the writing of useful and elevated things; the others suffering a material influence that only acts upon their organs, like the physical fluids that act upon inert matter. This first classification is absolute but allows for a large number of intermediary variations. I only point out to the main aspects of an important study that other Spirits shall complement. We are the pioneers of the terrestrial progress, in solidarity with one another. In the spiritual phalanx we form the core of the future.
Georges
Observation: The statement by the Spirit in which he allow others to take on the work of explaining the theory of progress was motivated by several questions that had been proposed about the subject during the session. When he says that mediumship is an endless source of research and serious investigations he is perfectly correct.
Although the study of this part of Spiritism is far from complete, we are already far from the time in which people believed that it was only necessary to receive the influence of a mechanical impulse to be called medium and believe to be capable of receiving communications of every Spirit. This would be equivalent to believing that someone that could play a short aria at the piano must necessarily be an excellent musician. The progress of the Spiritist science that progresses daily with new observations shows us the up until recently unsuspected abundance of possible causes and subtle influences onto the intelligent relationships with the spiritual world. The Spirits could not have taught us everything at once. But, like skillful teachers, they give us more details as the ideas are better developed and unfold the principles that if given prematurely would not have been understood and would have created confusion in our minds.
Hence mediumship requires a serious study from the part of whoever sees a serious thing in Spiritism. As the true mechanisms of that faculty are better understood we shall be less exposed to deception because we will all know what it can produce and under which conditions it can happen. And the more people we have enlightened about that point the less people will fall victim of charlatanism.
Intellectual Progress
Parisian Society, March 31st, 1865 – medium Mr. Desliens
Nothing is lost in this world, not only regarding matter where everything is incessantly renovated and perfected according to the immutable laws of the Creator applied to all things, but also in the domain of intelligence. Humanity is like a single person that lived forever and endlessly acquired new knowledge. This is not an image but an actual fact because the Spirit is immortal. It is only the body, an envelope or dress for the Spirit, that falls when it is worn out and then replaced by another one. That very matter endures changes. As the Spirit progresses new values are acquired and, if I can say so, a more luxurious, more pleasant and accommodating outfit is deserved for the expression of your earthly language.
Matter depurates and becomes lighter and lighter but never disappearing completely, at least in the intermediary regions; be it as a body or as a perispirit, matter always follows intelligence providing that point of contact in the communications with the inferior, the equal and the superior to instruct, meditate and learn. We said that nothing is lost in nature. We must add that nothing is useless. Everything, even the most dangerous beasts and the subtlest poisonous substances have their reasons for being. How many things were earlier considered useless or harmful to later on have their usefulness acknowledged? There are some, therefore, that you do not understand. Without much detail I will only say that harmful things force you to be cautious and vigilant, exercising your intelligence, whereas if on the contrary mankind had nothing to fear it would lead to laziness and to the impairment of progress. If need is the mother of technology, technology is also the daughter of intelligence.
As some object, God could undoubtedly have spared us from trials and difficulties that seem superfluous; but if the obstacles are imposed on us it is to awake the sleeping resources in our souls; it is to drive the impulses of the treasures of intelligence that would remain buried in our minds if there would be no need or danger to avoid, forcing you to watch out for your own preservation. Instinct is born, followed by intelligence; the thoughts are linked, and reasoning is invented. If I reason I judge, good or bad, that is true, but it is through wrong reasoning that one is led to learn or acknowledge truth. When one is deceived several times, one ends up by learning and that truth, that intelligence obtained after so much work becomes an invaluable asset.
You are afraid of losing your own discoveries. What is it that you do then? You educate your children, your friends, developing their own intelligence by sowing and fructifying there what you have acquired out of your own intellectual efforts.
That is how everything is linked, that progress is a natural law and that human knowledge that is developed progressively is transmitted from generation to generation. After that let them come and say that everything is matter!
Materialistic persons, in their majority, only repeal spirituality because otherwise they would have to renounce to their own mistakes, their way of living and habits. It would be too painful and hence they prefer to deny everything.
Pascal
Matter depurates and becomes lighter and lighter but never disappearing completely, at least in the intermediary regions; be it as a body or as a perispirit, matter always follows intelligence providing that point of contact in the communications with the inferior, the equal and the superior to instruct, meditate and learn. We said that nothing is lost in nature. We must add that nothing is useless. Everything, even the most dangerous beasts and the subtlest poisonous substances have their reasons for being. How many things were earlier considered useless or harmful to later on have their usefulness acknowledged? There are some, therefore, that you do not understand. Without much detail I will only say that harmful things force you to be cautious and vigilant, exercising your intelligence, whereas if on the contrary mankind had nothing to fear it would lead to laziness and to the impairment of progress. If need is the mother of technology, technology is also the daughter of intelligence.
As some object, God could undoubtedly have spared us from trials and difficulties that seem superfluous; but if the obstacles are imposed on us it is to awake the sleeping resources in our souls; it is to drive the impulses of the treasures of intelligence that would remain buried in our minds if there would be no need or danger to avoid, forcing you to watch out for your own preservation. Instinct is born, followed by intelligence; the thoughts are linked, and reasoning is invented. If I reason I judge, good or bad, that is true, but it is through wrong reasoning that one is led to learn or acknowledge truth. When one is deceived several times, one ends up by learning and that truth, that intelligence obtained after so much work becomes an invaluable asset.
You are afraid of losing your own discoveries. What is it that you do then? You educate your children, your friends, developing their own intelligence by sowing and fructifying there what you have acquired out of your own intellectual efforts.
That is how everything is linked, that progress is a natural law and that human knowledge that is developed progressively is transmitted from generation to generation. After that let them come and say that everything is matter!
Materialistic persons, in their majority, only repeal spirituality because otherwise they would have to renounce to their own mistakes, their way of living and habits. It would be too painful and hence they prefer to deny everything.
Pascal
About the Seriousness of the Sessions
Parisian Society, March 17th, 1865 – medium Mr. Desliens
As you have already witnessed, the serious attitude of the members of a group shocks the strangers that attend the sessions with the intention of exposing them to ridicule. It transforms their intent from kidding to involuntary respect to a serious study and consequently their transition to faith is imperceptible. As a matter of fact, the ones that do not leave such meetings convinced at least take away a favorable impression and if they are not immediately associated with you at least they are no longer your bloodthirsty adversaries.
That is the first reason that must persuade you to be serious and reverential. What would you in fact want from people that leave a meeting in which matters worthy of respect are handled carelessly and lightheartedly? Even considering that the Spiritists that act like that are not ill-intentioned they are not less harmful, not to the future but to the rapid development of the doctrine. Had all meetings been serious and carried out in a proper way it would be much more advanced, although it is already significantly advanced. Such action is not that of a true Spiritist or in the true interest of the doctrine because the enemies take advantage of that to ridicule the doctrine. It is therefore a duty of those that understand its importance not to support events of such a frivolous nature. It is not only to the doctrine that they do harm but to themselves because if every good deed carries its reward every bad action leaves a bad impression behind, sometimes followed by a physical punishment whose minor consequence could be the suspension of the mediumship or, at least, the impossibility of the communication with the Spirits.
One must be serious not only with the benevolent and enlightened Spirits that come to give you wise instructions and that would be kept away from your lack of reverence but also with the Spirits in suffering or even the bad ones that come to you to ask for consolations or to mystify you. I even say that the latter ones in particular are the ones that require seriousness, here seasoned by benevolence. That is the best way of imposing yourselves on them and keeping them at a distance, forcing them to be respectful. If you step down to the level of familiarity with those that are inferior to you, from a moral and intellectual stand point, you shall soon give rise to their perverse influence, translated in the beginning by their mystifications and later on by their cruel and tenacious obsessions.
You must then remain on guard. Adapt your language in accordance with the Spirits that communicate in your groups but never exclude seriousness and benevolence. Never send away those that present themselves with an imperfect appearance. You may perhaps always prefer shrewd communications that do not require your feeling and judgement to assess their value but understand that your judgment may only progress through exercise. All communications have their utility for those that know how to take advantage of them.
A mystification that is recognized and demonstrated may act more efficiently upon your souls, helping you to better acknowledge aspects that need to be reinforced, than instructions that you would gladly admire but hardly practice.
Work with courage and honesty and the Spirit of the Lord shall be with you.
MOKI.
That is the first reason that must persuade you to be serious and reverential. What would you in fact want from people that leave a meeting in which matters worthy of respect are handled carelessly and lightheartedly? Even considering that the Spiritists that act like that are not ill-intentioned they are not less harmful, not to the future but to the rapid development of the doctrine. Had all meetings been serious and carried out in a proper way it would be much more advanced, although it is already significantly advanced. Such action is not that of a true Spiritist or in the true interest of the doctrine because the enemies take advantage of that to ridicule the doctrine. It is therefore a duty of those that understand its importance not to support events of such a frivolous nature. It is not only to the doctrine that they do harm but to themselves because if every good deed carries its reward every bad action leaves a bad impression behind, sometimes followed by a physical punishment whose minor consequence could be the suspension of the mediumship or, at least, the impossibility of the communication with the Spirits.
One must be serious not only with the benevolent and enlightened Spirits that come to give you wise instructions and that would be kept away from your lack of reverence but also with the Spirits in suffering or even the bad ones that come to you to ask for consolations or to mystify you. I even say that the latter ones in particular are the ones that require seriousness, here seasoned by benevolence. That is the best way of imposing yourselves on them and keeping them at a distance, forcing them to be respectful. If you step down to the level of familiarity with those that are inferior to you, from a moral and intellectual stand point, you shall soon give rise to their perverse influence, translated in the beginning by their mystifications and later on by their cruel and tenacious obsessions.
You must then remain on guard. Adapt your language in accordance with the Spirits that communicate in your groups but never exclude seriousness and benevolence. Never send away those that present themselves with an imperfect appearance. You may perhaps always prefer shrewd communications that do not require your feeling and judgement to assess their value but understand that your judgment may only progress through exercise. All communications have their utility for those that know how to take advantage of them.
A mystification that is recognized and demonstrated may act more efficiently upon your souls, helping you to better acknowledge aspects that need to be reinforced, than instructions that you would gladly admire but hardly practice.
Work with courage and honesty and the Spirit of the Lord shall be with you.
MOKI.
Immigration of Superior Spirits to Earth
Parisian Society, October 7th, 1864 – medium Mr. Delanne
Tonight, I will talk about the immigration of advanced Spirits that come to incarnate on Earth. Those new messengers have already taken the walking stick of the pilgrims; they already count on thousands spread around the globe; they are allocated by Spirits that guide the movement of transformation by groups. Earth already trembles before the vision of those that one day were seen amongst the newborn humanity. The planet rejoices with such an image, anticipating that they should lead her to perfection by guiding ordinary Spirits that need the encouragement of the good examples. Yes, great messengers among you. They are the ones to sustain the forthcoming generation. As Spiritism grows and progresses, Spirits of a more elevated order shall come to support the works imposed by the needs of the cause. God has sowed supporting trunks to the doctrine, all over. They shall come when the time is right at the right place. Wait with patience and faith since everything that was predicted shall happen, up to the last jot, as it is in the sacred book.
If the present transition, as just mentioned by the teacher, has raised passions and brought up the scum of the incarnate and discarnate Spirits, it also has awakened the strong desire from a large number of Spirits in a superior position in many worlds in the stellar clouds, to come again to serve God’s designs towards this great event. That is why a short while ago I said that the immigration of superior Spirits was taking place to operate the ascending march of your Earth. Therefore, have courage, be zealous and passionate about the sacred cause. Know that nothing can stop the progressive march of Spiritism for powerful guardians shall continue your work.
Mesmer
If the present transition, as just mentioned by the teacher, has raised passions and brought up the scum of the incarnate and discarnate Spirits, it also has awakened the strong desire from a large number of Spirits in a superior position in many worlds in the stellar clouds, to come again to serve God’s designs towards this great event. That is why a short while ago I said that the immigration of superior Spirits was taking place to operate the ascending march of your Earth. Therefore, have courage, be zealous and passionate about the sacred cause. Know that nothing can stop the progressive march of Spiritism for powerful guardians shall continue your work.
Mesmer
About Fluidic Creations
Parisian Society, October 14th, 1864 – medium Mr. Delanne
I brought you a few words about the great messengers that are sent among you to carry out their mission of intellectual and moral progress in your globe. If, in that order, the movement unfolds and takes proportions that you observe daily, there is another one taking place not only in the world of the Spirits that left matter but also important in the material world. I refer to the laws of fluidic depuration.
Mankind must not only elevate their soul by the practice of virtue but also depurate matter. Each area of knowledge provides its contribution to that general work because each one leads to mixtures of all species. Those species exhale fluids that more depurated will join the atmosphere of similar fluids that become useful to the manifestations of the Spirits that you mentioned earlier.
Yes, objects that are created instantaneously by the will-power, the richest of all gifts of the Spirit, are collected in the semi-material fluids, analogous to the semi material constitution of the body called perispirit, of the inhabitants of the spiritual world. That is why they can create objects according to their own will.
The invisible world is like yours. Instead of material and rough, it is fluidic, ethereal, of the same nature as the perispirit that is the true body of the Spirit, obtained from molecular structures like yours that forms more tangible, material things.
The world of the Spirits is not a reflex of yours; it is your world that is a rudimentary and very imperfect image of the world beyond the grave. The relationships between these two worlds have always existed but today it is time to have their affinity revealed, demonstrated and palpable to you.
When you understand the laws of relationships between the fluidic beings and those that you know, God’s law shall be close to be practiced because each incarnate person will understand their immortality and from there on shall become not only a keen worker of the great cause but also a worthy server of their works.
Mesmer
Mankind must not only elevate their soul by the practice of virtue but also depurate matter. Each area of knowledge provides its contribution to that general work because each one leads to mixtures of all species. Those species exhale fluids that more depurated will join the atmosphere of similar fluids that become useful to the manifestations of the Spirits that you mentioned earlier.
Yes, objects that are created instantaneously by the will-power, the richest of all gifts of the Spirit, are collected in the semi-material fluids, analogous to the semi material constitution of the body called perispirit, of the inhabitants of the spiritual world. That is why they can create objects according to their own will.
The invisible world is like yours. Instead of material and rough, it is fluidic, ethereal, of the same nature as the perispirit that is the true body of the Spirit, obtained from molecular structures like yours that forms more tangible, material things.
The world of the Spirits is not a reflex of yours; it is your world that is a rudimentary and very imperfect image of the world beyond the grave. The relationships between these two worlds have always existed but today it is time to have their affinity revealed, demonstrated and palpable to you.
When you understand the laws of relationships between the fluidic beings and those that you know, God’s law shall be close to be practiced because each incarnate person will understand their immortality and from there on shall become not only a keen worker of the great cause but also a worthy server of their works.
Mesmer
June
Treasure Report of SpiritismTo the Parisian Society, May 5th, 1865 by Mr. Allan Kardec
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Some time ago I announced new explanations about the budget of Spiritism. The start of a new social year naturally offers me such occasion. In the following report I apologize for having to talk about myself, something that I minimize, but in this situation, I could not help it and that is why I apologize in advance.
I will give you a summary of the report about the subject presented to you two years ago.
In February 1860 a donation of 10,000 francs was made available to me to be used at will in the interest of Spiritism. On the occasion the Parisian Society did not have a headquarter and that was of grave concern. The importance that the doctrine was taking gave rise to the idea of finding an adequate place for the sessions and for the reception of visitors whose number grew constantly, making it also necessary to have someone at the office of the Society. I chose this place that had both good condition and central location. As a matter of fact, the choice was not easy given the need for rooms that were appropriate to the objective and expensive rentals. The lease of this place amounts to 2,930 francs. The Society only counted on 1,200 francs with a deficit of 1,130 francs. The application of the donation to cover for the difference was still within the requirements of the donor since it was in the interest of the doctrine and one must acknowledge, particularly today, the importance of having this center of convergence of so many groups and to have my own shelter here. I must emphasize, however, that it is not a personal advantage to me to be able to live here since I have another apartment that costs me nothing and where it would be more enjoyable for me to live and such double residence is to me reason for more expenses instead of a relief, as I will demonstrate soon.
The amount of 10,000 francs was then the first budget of Spiritism and that has always been, as you know, a matter of separate accounting, never mixed up with my personal matters. Such a budget should be enough to account for, give or take, about six years of lease, according to the detailed expense report presented last time. Well, the contract is about to expire in one year and the resources are at the end. It is true that the capital was increased with several sums and it is formed like so:
Some time ago I announced new explanations about the budget of Spiritism. The start of a new social year naturally offers me such occasion. In the following report I apologize for having to talk about myself, something that I minimize, but in this situation, I could not help it and that is why I apologize in advance.
I will give you a summary of the report about the subject presented to you two years ago.
In February 1860 a donation of 10,000 francs was made available to me to be used at will in the interest of Spiritism. On the occasion the Parisian Society did not have a headquarter and that was of grave concern. The importance that the doctrine was taking gave rise to the idea of finding an adequate place for the sessions and for the reception of visitors whose number grew constantly, making it also necessary to have someone at the office of the Society. I chose this place that had both good condition and central location. As a matter of fact, the choice was not easy given the need for rooms that were appropriate to the objective and expensive rentals. The lease of this place amounts to 2,930 francs. The Society only counted on 1,200 francs with a deficit of 1,130 francs. The application of the donation to cover for the difference was still within the requirements of the donor since it was in the interest of the doctrine and one must acknowledge, particularly today, the importance of having this center of convergence of so many groups and to have my own shelter here. I must emphasize, however, that it is not a personal advantage to me to be able to live here since I have another apartment that costs me nothing and where it would be more enjoyable for me to live and such double residence is to me reason for more expenses instead of a relief, as I will demonstrate soon.
The amount of 10,000 francs was then the first budget of Spiritism and that has always been, as you know, a matter of separate accounting, never mixed up with my personal matters. Such a budget should be enough to account for, give or take, about six years of lease, according to the detailed expense report presented last time. Well, the contract is about to expire in one year and the resources are at the end. It is true that the capital was increased with several sums and it is formed like so:
- Donation of 10,000 francs in February 1860
- Loan obtained previously in the interest of Spiritism – 600 francs
- Donation granted in 1862 – 500 francs
- Donation in September 1864 – 1,000 francs
- Another donation, October 1864 – 2,000 francs
The last two donations had a special destination and only 11,100 francs were allocated to the rent and are not entirely sufficient. Rent, nonetheless, is not the only expense due to Spiritism. I am not talking about charitable work that we shall comment in due course. I talk about another issue and it is here that I need your indulgence towards myself for the reason that I need to talk about me.
A lot was said about the profit that I had with my books. Not a single serious person believes in my millions, despite those that stated that had good information and that I led a luxurious life; that I had carriages of four horses and that my house was covered in rugs from Aubusson.
Besides all that was said by the author of a brochure that you know well, that demonstrates by hyperbolic calculations that the revenues of my publications were beyond the civil list of the most powerful sovereign of Europe (38 million, Spiritist Review, June 1862 and June 1863) – something that in passing must be said would testify an incredible expansion of the doctrine – there is something more authentic than his calculations: it is the fact that I have never asked for anything to anybody; nobody has even given me anything for my personal use and no collection of a single cent has ever attended my personal needs. In one words, I do not live on anybody else’s expenses and as for the moneys that were entrusted in me for the benefit of Spiritism I have never used a single fraction to my own benefit, besides the fact that one can see the actual numbers that are involved.
My immense fortune then must have come from my Spiritist books. Although those works had an unexpected success one only needs to have a slight knowledge of matters related to publishing that one cannot accumulate millions in five or six years by publishing philosophical books, particularly considering that one only gets a few cents per book in copyrights. Nonetheless, if that is a lot or too little, if that is the result of my own work it is none of anybody’s business how I employ those resources. Even if they were in the millions, considering that both the purchase of the books as well as the subscription to the Spiritist Review are facultative and not imposed to anyone, under any circumstance, not even to attend the sessions at the Society, it is of nobody’s business. Speaking in business terms I am in the position of any person that collects the proceeds of their own work: I take the risk of every writer that is success or failure. Although I do not have to provide any report in that particular, I believe it to be in the very interest of the cause to which I have devoted myself.
To begin with I say that my works are not my exclusive property and that I am forced to purchase them from my editor and pay them, like a bookstore does, with the exception of the Spiritist Review, from which I kept the rights of ownership; that the profits are significantly diminished by the books that are not sold and by the free distributions done in the interest of the doctrine to persons that would otherwise go without them. A very simple calculation demonstrates that the cost of ten donated or lost books that must be paid for are enough to erase the profits of one hundred sold units. This said as information and between brackets. In the end, when it is all settled and done, there is something left. You can imagine the number you like. What I do with that? That is what concerns certain people.
Any person that had shared our intimacy before and sees the way we live today may attest that there has been no change since I started working with Spiritism. It is as simple now as it was before because a luxurious life is not part of our tastes. Then, it is certain that whatever the profits I make they don’t serve to give us the pleasures of luxury. We have no children hence we do not save for them and our indirect heirs are, in their majority, much wealthier than we are. It would be really naïve for me to get exhausted from my work on their behalf. Would I then accumulate treasures to have the pleasure of contemplating my money? I believe that my character and my habits have never allowed such assumption. Those that attribute me with such ideas know very little of my own principles in matter of Spiritism because they believe me to be too attached to the earthly means.
Why are things like that? Considering that I don’t take advantage of that, the more fabulous the amount, more embarrassing is the answer. One day the exact amount will be known as well as its detailed application and those that create stories will be able to spare their own imagination; today I limit myself to some generic data to end ridiculous suppositions. In order to do so I need to give you some personal information for which I count on your forgiveness because they are necessary.
At all times we have led a simple life, it is true, but what would be too little to certain persons was enough to us, thanks to our tastes and habits according to our means. Our small income was added by the proceeds of the books that I published before Spiritism and that of a simple job that I had to leave when the works of the doctrine totally absorbed my time.
My own property is what is left to me from all that could not be taken away from me by ill-faith and we could leave there in peace and far from the turmoil of businesses. Spiritism took me away from obscurity and sent me into a new path. Soon I saw myself dragged by a movement that I could hardly foresee. When I conceived The Spirits’ Book my intention was to remain unknown and not to come out in the open but rapidly overloaded by work that was no longer possible. I had to resign to my own solitude or see the failure of work that I had just initiated and that was already progressing prodigiously. I had to follow the torrent and take the reins.
If now I enjoy some popularity I had not absolutely sought that for it is notorious that such popularity was not due to the press or to the propaganda and I have never taken advantage of my personal relationships to throw myself into the world at a time when such a thing would have been easy for me to do. The more the work progressed, though, a broader horizon unfolded before me and its limits moved further and further away. I then understood the gigantic task I had and the importance of the work that I had to complete to accomplish that.
Far from scaring me away, the obstacles and difficulties doubled my energy; I saw the objective and decided to achieve it with the assistance of the good Spirits. I felt that there was not time to waste and did not waste it in useless visits and ceremonies. It was the works of my life. I dedicated all my time to that; I sacrificed my rest and my own health for that because the future to me was written with irrefutable letters. I did it all out of my own impulse and my wife, who is not more ambitious or more self-serving than I am, totally agreed with my points of view and seconded me with the hard work all the way, as she still does, with tasks that sometimes are beyond her own strength, selflessly sacrificing the pleasures and distractions of the world to which she was used from her family upbringing.
Although we did not move away from our life style the new exceptional position created new needs that were still covered by my own resources. It is difficult to imagine the multiplicity of expenses that were generated and without those activities I would have avoided them. The need to live in two places is, as I have already mentioned, additional expenses for the obligation of having double furniture and a number of smaller expenses that are created for such a double residence and the losses that result from the negligence of my own personal interests left aside for a series of activities that absorb my whole time. This is not a complaint since my current activities are voluntary; it is an attested fact in response to those that say that Spiritism is all profit to me. As for the expenses generated by my position it would impossible to list them but if you take into account that I spend more than 800 francs annually in postage, not to mention the travels, and that I need the assistance of someone to help and other small indispensable expenses, you will understand that I do not exaggerate when I say that may annual expenses that have always grown are today more than three times as before. One can estimate the annual addition by considering an annual average of 6,000 francs over the last eight years. Now, the utility of such expenses for the success of the doctrine is unquestionable and that would have been weakened of course had I remained in my personal retreat, not seeing anyone and without the multiples contacts that I make daily. That is what I would have been forced to do if I had not had any additional resource coming in to help.
Well then, ladies and gentlemen, what gave me that supplement was precisely the product of my works. It gives me pleasure to say that it was the result of my own work and long hours of work that I provided for, at least partially, the material needs for the installation of the doctrine. I therefore brought my own contribution to the budget of Spiritism. It was God’s wishes that Spiritism would find its initial means of action in itself. In the beginning I used to feel sorry for the fact that my limited means did not allow me to do what I wanted to do for the good of the cause but today I see the finger of Providence in that and the realization of this prediction so many times repeated by the Spirits: “Do not worry about anything. God knows your needs and they shall be provided for.”
Had I employed the proceeds of my books to my own personal pleasure and that would have resulted in a loss to Spiritism, but nonetheless nobody could have objected to that because the utilization of those resources were entirely up to me and only me; but since I did not have them before I continued not to have them afterwards; I also think that by applying them to the task nobody will see it as a badly employed money and those that help with the propagation of the books cannot say that they work to make me rich.
The provision of the present was not all. It was necessary to think about the future and prepare the foundation that could help the one that will replace me in the great mission to be accomplished after me. The foundation that I cannot disclose yet is linked to my own property and that is why I apply some of my own resources to have it improved. Since I am far for the millions that are attributed to me I sincerely doubt that, despite the savings that I have, my own resources are sufficient to provide that foundation with the complement that I wanted to give it while alive. But considering that If I am not successful in that such target is in the plans of my spiritual guides and it is likely that sooner or later it shall be accomplished. I make the plans on the paper while I wait.
Far from me, ladies and gentlemen, the idea of boasting about what I have just exposed to you. It was the persistence of certain diatribes that pushed me to break the silence about certain facts, against my own will. Later on, all of those facts that were stained by malevolence shall come out and be cleared by authentic documents, but the time of such explanations has not come yet. The only think I wanted you to learn from me now was about the destination of the resources that the Providence brought to my hands, regardless of their origin. I consider myself a simple trustee of those values and even more so of those that are entrusted in me for which I will provide a strict expense report. I summarize by saying that I do not need them for myself meaning that I do not take advantage of them.
I still have to talk about the budget of beneficence, ladies and gentlemen. You know that it was formed without a preconceived destination, with some quantities passed on to me to the works of charity but without any special destination; from time to time I add to these resources some others that do not have specified application. The first donation made in that class was in the amount of 200 francs, delivered on August 20th, 1863. The same person sent another money order of 200 francs in the following year on August 17th. On September 1st another person sent an order of 100 francs during my trip. As for the subscriptions published in the Spiritist Review several persons added smaller contributions to the others also with discretionary application. More recently, on April 28th last, someone sent me an order of 500 francs. The total donation so far amounts to 1,317 francs. The total expenses in several charitable works, donations and loans not yet repaid amount to 1,060 francs. The balance today is 257 francs.
One day someone asked me, naturally and out of pure interest for the cause, what I would do if I had one million today. I answered that today I would give it a totally different application that I would have in the beginning. In those days I would have made a lot of propaganda through a large network of publicity; now I acknowledge that it would have been useless because our adversaries did it for us on their own. By not bringing a lot of resources to me the Spirits wanted to demonstrate that Spiritism would own its success to itself, to its own strength and not to the application of common resources.
Today, with a wider horizon and an unfolded future, the needs are of a different order. That hypothetical capital could have a more useful application. Not going into premature details I will only say that a portion of that would serve to convert my own property into a Spiritist retreat whose inhabitants would collect the benefits of our moral doctrine; the other portion would be converted into an inalienable resource to be employed: 1) for the maintenance of the establishment; 2) to ensure an independent life to the one that shall succeed me and to those that will help him; 3) to cover current expenses of Spiritism, without the need to reach out to other eventual resources like I am forced to do since the majority of the resources are the result of my own work that shall end. That is what I would do. But if that is not granted to me I don’t care if it is granted to others. As a matter of fact, I do know that in a way or another all needs will be provided on time by the Spirits that supervise the movement. That is why I am not troubled by that and that I dedicate myself to what I believe to be essential: the conclusion of the works that I still have to finish. After that I will depart when God believes to be the right time.
People are surprised by the fact that certain highly placed persons, notoriously sympathetic to the Spiritist cause, do not openly and officially take it in their own hands. Some say that it would be their duty since Spiritism is an essentially moralizing and humanitarian doctrine. They forget that such persons, given their own positions, have to fight more than others against prejudices that only time will erase and that shall fall before the ascendant of general opinion. In addition, let us consider the fact that Spiritism is still in its outlined stage and that the final word has not been said yet. The general principles are established by their consequences are hardly foreseen and they are not and cannot be clearly defined. Up until now it is no more than a philosophical doctrine whose application to the great issues of general interest must still wait. It will be only then that certain persons will understand its true reach and utility. Before Spiritism has completed its mission the good it does is limited; it can only be an individual belief and a general and public adhesion would be premature and impossible. Then yes, many of those that today consider it futile will forcibly change their point of view and be dragged to study it seriously by the force of things. Let us then let it grow and do not request it to be an adult before it is a child; and let us not ask childhood what only adulthood can provide.
A.K.
NOTE: This explanation had only been given to the Society but since there was a unanimous request to have it inserted at the Spiritist Review we thought it would be right to attend the wishes.
A lot was said about the profit that I had with my books. Not a single serious person believes in my millions, despite those that stated that had good information and that I led a luxurious life; that I had carriages of four horses and that my house was covered in rugs from Aubusson.
Besides all that was said by the author of a brochure that you know well, that demonstrates by hyperbolic calculations that the revenues of my publications were beyond the civil list of the most powerful sovereign of Europe (38 million, Spiritist Review, June 1862 and June 1863) – something that in passing must be said would testify an incredible expansion of the doctrine – there is something more authentic than his calculations: it is the fact that I have never asked for anything to anybody; nobody has even given me anything for my personal use and no collection of a single cent has ever attended my personal needs. In one words, I do not live on anybody else’s expenses and as for the moneys that were entrusted in me for the benefit of Spiritism I have never used a single fraction to my own benefit, besides the fact that one can see the actual numbers that are involved.
My immense fortune then must have come from my Spiritist books. Although those works had an unexpected success one only needs to have a slight knowledge of matters related to publishing that one cannot accumulate millions in five or six years by publishing philosophical books, particularly considering that one only gets a few cents per book in copyrights. Nonetheless, if that is a lot or too little, if that is the result of my own work it is none of anybody’s business how I employ those resources. Even if they were in the millions, considering that both the purchase of the books as well as the subscription to the Spiritist Review are facultative and not imposed to anyone, under any circumstance, not even to attend the sessions at the Society, it is of nobody’s business. Speaking in business terms I am in the position of any person that collects the proceeds of their own work: I take the risk of every writer that is success or failure. Although I do not have to provide any report in that particular, I believe it to be in the very interest of the cause to which I have devoted myself.
To begin with I say that my works are not my exclusive property and that I am forced to purchase them from my editor and pay them, like a bookstore does, with the exception of the Spiritist Review, from which I kept the rights of ownership; that the profits are significantly diminished by the books that are not sold and by the free distributions done in the interest of the doctrine to persons that would otherwise go without them. A very simple calculation demonstrates that the cost of ten donated or lost books that must be paid for are enough to erase the profits of one hundred sold units. This said as information and between brackets. In the end, when it is all settled and done, there is something left. You can imagine the number you like. What I do with that? That is what concerns certain people.
Any person that had shared our intimacy before and sees the way we live today may attest that there has been no change since I started working with Spiritism. It is as simple now as it was before because a luxurious life is not part of our tastes. Then, it is certain that whatever the profits I make they don’t serve to give us the pleasures of luxury. We have no children hence we do not save for them and our indirect heirs are, in their majority, much wealthier than we are. It would be really naïve for me to get exhausted from my work on their behalf. Would I then accumulate treasures to have the pleasure of contemplating my money? I believe that my character and my habits have never allowed such assumption. Those that attribute me with such ideas know very little of my own principles in matter of Spiritism because they believe me to be too attached to the earthly means.
Why are things like that? Considering that I don’t take advantage of that, the more fabulous the amount, more embarrassing is the answer. One day the exact amount will be known as well as its detailed application and those that create stories will be able to spare their own imagination; today I limit myself to some generic data to end ridiculous suppositions. In order to do so I need to give you some personal information for which I count on your forgiveness because they are necessary.
At all times we have led a simple life, it is true, but what would be too little to certain persons was enough to us, thanks to our tastes and habits according to our means. Our small income was added by the proceeds of the books that I published before Spiritism and that of a simple job that I had to leave when the works of the doctrine totally absorbed my time.
My own property is what is left to me from all that could not be taken away from me by ill-faith and we could leave there in peace and far from the turmoil of businesses. Spiritism took me away from obscurity and sent me into a new path. Soon I saw myself dragged by a movement that I could hardly foresee. When I conceived The Spirits’ Book my intention was to remain unknown and not to come out in the open but rapidly overloaded by work that was no longer possible. I had to resign to my own solitude or see the failure of work that I had just initiated and that was already progressing prodigiously. I had to follow the torrent and take the reins.
If now I enjoy some popularity I had not absolutely sought that for it is notorious that such popularity was not due to the press or to the propaganda and I have never taken advantage of my personal relationships to throw myself into the world at a time when such a thing would have been easy for me to do. The more the work progressed, though, a broader horizon unfolded before me and its limits moved further and further away. I then understood the gigantic task I had and the importance of the work that I had to complete to accomplish that.
Far from scaring me away, the obstacles and difficulties doubled my energy; I saw the objective and decided to achieve it with the assistance of the good Spirits. I felt that there was not time to waste and did not waste it in useless visits and ceremonies. It was the works of my life. I dedicated all my time to that; I sacrificed my rest and my own health for that because the future to me was written with irrefutable letters. I did it all out of my own impulse and my wife, who is not more ambitious or more self-serving than I am, totally agreed with my points of view and seconded me with the hard work all the way, as she still does, with tasks that sometimes are beyond her own strength, selflessly sacrificing the pleasures and distractions of the world to which she was used from her family upbringing.
Although we did not move away from our life style the new exceptional position created new needs that were still covered by my own resources. It is difficult to imagine the multiplicity of expenses that were generated and without those activities I would have avoided them. The need to live in two places is, as I have already mentioned, additional expenses for the obligation of having double furniture and a number of smaller expenses that are created for such a double residence and the losses that result from the negligence of my own personal interests left aside for a series of activities that absorb my whole time. This is not a complaint since my current activities are voluntary; it is an attested fact in response to those that say that Spiritism is all profit to me. As for the expenses generated by my position it would impossible to list them but if you take into account that I spend more than 800 francs annually in postage, not to mention the travels, and that I need the assistance of someone to help and other small indispensable expenses, you will understand that I do not exaggerate when I say that may annual expenses that have always grown are today more than three times as before. One can estimate the annual addition by considering an annual average of 6,000 francs over the last eight years. Now, the utility of such expenses for the success of the doctrine is unquestionable and that would have been weakened of course had I remained in my personal retreat, not seeing anyone and without the multiples contacts that I make daily. That is what I would have been forced to do if I had not had any additional resource coming in to help.
Well then, ladies and gentlemen, what gave me that supplement was precisely the product of my works. It gives me pleasure to say that it was the result of my own work and long hours of work that I provided for, at least partially, the material needs for the installation of the doctrine. I therefore brought my own contribution to the budget of Spiritism. It was God’s wishes that Spiritism would find its initial means of action in itself. In the beginning I used to feel sorry for the fact that my limited means did not allow me to do what I wanted to do for the good of the cause but today I see the finger of Providence in that and the realization of this prediction so many times repeated by the Spirits: “Do not worry about anything. God knows your needs and they shall be provided for.”
Had I employed the proceeds of my books to my own personal pleasure and that would have resulted in a loss to Spiritism, but nonetheless nobody could have objected to that because the utilization of those resources were entirely up to me and only me; but since I did not have them before I continued not to have them afterwards; I also think that by applying them to the task nobody will see it as a badly employed money and those that help with the propagation of the books cannot say that they work to make me rich.
The provision of the present was not all. It was necessary to think about the future and prepare the foundation that could help the one that will replace me in the great mission to be accomplished after me. The foundation that I cannot disclose yet is linked to my own property and that is why I apply some of my own resources to have it improved. Since I am far for the millions that are attributed to me I sincerely doubt that, despite the savings that I have, my own resources are sufficient to provide that foundation with the complement that I wanted to give it while alive. But considering that If I am not successful in that such target is in the plans of my spiritual guides and it is likely that sooner or later it shall be accomplished. I make the plans on the paper while I wait.
Far from me, ladies and gentlemen, the idea of boasting about what I have just exposed to you. It was the persistence of certain diatribes that pushed me to break the silence about certain facts, against my own will. Later on, all of those facts that were stained by malevolence shall come out and be cleared by authentic documents, but the time of such explanations has not come yet. The only think I wanted you to learn from me now was about the destination of the resources that the Providence brought to my hands, regardless of their origin. I consider myself a simple trustee of those values and even more so of those that are entrusted in me for which I will provide a strict expense report. I summarize by saying that I do not need them for myself meaning that I do not take advantage of them.
I still have to talk about the budget of beneficence, ladies and gentlemen. You know that it was formed without a preconceived destination, with some quantities passed on to me to the works of charity but without any special destination; from time to time I add to these resources some others that do not have specified application. The first donation made in that class was in the amount of 200 francs, delivered on August 20th, 1863. The same person sent another money order of 200 francs in the following year on August 17th. On September 1st another person sent an order of 100 francs during my trip. As for the subscriptions published in the Spiritist Review several persons added smaller contributions to the others also with discretionary application. More recently, on April 28th last, someone sent me an order of 500 francs. The total donation so far amounts to 1,317 francs. The total expenses in several charitable works, donations and loans not yet repaid amount to 1,060 francs. The balance today is 257 francs.
One day someone asked me, naturally and out of pure interest for the cause, what I would do if I had one million today. I answered that today I would give it a totally different application that I would have in the beginning. In those days I would have made a lot of propaganda through a large network of publicity; now I acknowledge that it would have been useless because our adversaries did it for us on their own. By not bringing a lot of resources to me the Spirits wanted to demonstrate that Spiritism would own its success to itself, to its own strength and not to the application of common resources.
Today, with a wider horizon and an unfolded future, the needs are of a different order. That hypothetical capital could have a more useful application. Not going into premature details I will only say that a portion of that would serve to convert my own property into a Spiritist retreat whose inhabitants would collect the benefits of our moral doctrine; the other portion would be converted into an inalienable resource to be employed: 1) for the maintenance of the establishment; 2) to ensure an independent life to the one that shall succeed me and to those that will help him; 3) to cover current expenses of Spiritism, without the need to reach out to other eventual resources like I am forced to do since the majority of the resources are the result of my own work that shall end. That is what I would do. But if that is not granted to me I don’t care if it is granted to others. As a matter of fact, I do know that in a way or another all needs will be provided on time by the Spirits that supervise the movement. That is why I am not troubled by that and that I dedicate myself to what I believe to be essential: the conclusion of the works that I still have to finish. After that I will depart when God believes to be the right time.
People are surprised by the fact that certain highly placed persons, notoriously sympathetic to the Spiritist cause, do not openly and officially take it in their own hands. Some say that it would be their duty since Spiritism is an essentially moralizing and humanitarian doctrine. They forget that such persons, given their own positions, have to fight more than others against prejudices that only time will erase and that shall fall before the ascendant of general opinion. In addition, let us consider the fact that Spiritism is still in its outlined stage and that the final word has not been said yet. The general principles are established by their consequences are hardly foreseen and they are not and cannot be clearly defined. Up until now it is no more than a philosophical doctrine whose application to the great issues of general interest must still wait. It will be only then that certain persons will understand its true reach and utility. Before Spiritism has completed its mission the good it does is limited; it can only be an individual belief and a general and public adhesion would be premature and impossible. Then yes, many of those that today consider it futile will forcibly change their point of view and be dragged to study it seriously by the force of things. Let us then let it grow and do not request it to be an adult before it is a child; and let us not ask childhood what only adulthood can provide.
A.K.
NOTE: This explanation had only been given to the Society but since there was a unanimous request to have it inserted at the Spiritist Review we thought it would be right to attend the wishes.
Spiritism from Top to Bottom of Scale
We say nothing new to our brothers in belief or to our adversaries when we say that Spiritism invades every echelon of Society. The main objective of the two letters transcribed here is to point out the similarity of feelings driven by the doctrine in the extreme poles of the social scale on individuals that have no contact between them, that we have never met and nonetheless find themselves at the same place, without any other guide but the books. One is an authority of the Russian Empire and the other a simple shepherd of Touraine. Here is the first letter:
“Dear Sir,
A Spiritist group was formed in our town beginning October 23rd under the protection of St. Peter. Since you are our teacher in Spiritism it is my duty to inform you as a President of that group. Our main objective is to alleviate the pain of the suffering Spirits, incarnate and discarnate. We hold two meetings per week. We strive to reach unity of intent and for that each one of the attendees remains in profound and reverent silence and when a question is addressed to the Spirits out loud each one of us mentally ask their guardian angel for their help to obtain a true answer. In our evocation, frequently dealing with obsessing Spirits of inferior order and knowing the efficacy of a joint prayer, we almost always resource to that to obtain clarification and relief of the unfortunate creatures. Our group counts on many mediums but frequently only two or three write in every session. We have besides a hearing and clairvoyant and a magnetizing medium. We were promised a painting medium but and I cannot appreciate that faculty since I have not seen him yet. We already count on forty members. There are several other Spiritist meetings in St. Petersburg, but they have no regulation. Ours is the first one regularly organized, and we hope that God willing our example will be followed. I am pleased to let you know that the first Spiritist brochure has finally appeared in Russia, printed in St. Petersburg, with the authorization of the censorship. The article that Mr. Debolsky inserted in the journal Radougaf (the rainbow). Up until now censorship would only authorize the publication of articles against Spiritism. I thought your book Spiritism in its simplest expression was the best answer to the article and I had it published in that journal. Kindly allow me, Sir, to send you the most important communications that we obtained, in particular those that came to support the truth and the sublimity of our doctrine.
Sincerely yours,
General A. de B.”
The group’s attitude, the proposed objective of charity are the best proofs that Spiritism is understood there in its true essence and seen on its most practical and serious aspect. There is nothing there that is out of pure curiosity or futile requests but the application of the doctrine in its most elevated principle. A person that attended many of those sessions told us that people leave the place feeling enlightened with the seriousness, the reverence and the feeling of true compassion that reign there.
-o-
The letter below was not sent to us but to the President of a Spiritist group of Tours. We transcribe it literally with the exception of the spelling hat was corrected.
“Dear Mr. Rebondin and our brother in God,
Forgive me Sir if I take the liberty in writing to you. I wanted to do that long ago to thank you for your hospitality last year, allowing me to attend two of your sessions. You will surely not remember me, but I will tell you who I am. I visited you with my former boss, Mr. T… I was his Pastor for eleven years. He has just married today and his relatives when noticed that I was involved with Spiritism had him firing me. I suffered a lot with that separation, dear Sir, but I want to follow the precepts of our sacred doctrine; it is my duty to pray for the unfortunate ones that offend the divine master of all of us. Since the time I met the doctrine I do my best to attract followers. I may have found obstacles, but I also had the pleasure of leading many people to get to know Spiritism, that explains every atonement that we endure in this earth of suffering and miseries. Ah the sweetness of being a Spiritist and to practice its virtues! My only happiness. As for you, dear Sir, the most devoted to the sacred cause, I hope you will not deny me with a place in your heart. I am happy for having met you and having felt so welcomed. I have been to Tours twice in the company of my two friends that study Spiritism with the intention of attending your sessions to learn that they no longer happen on Sundays. Please let me know the time of your gathering so that I can attend it with my friends and share the spiritual benefit. It will be a great source of happiness to us. I count on your friendship and remain waiting for the day when we shall get together again to practice the law of love and charity.
Fraternally from your dear friend,
Pierre Houdée, Pastor”
As we can see one does not need a diploma to understand the doctrine. The fact is that despite its elevated reach it is so much clear and logical that it reaches every intelligence effortlessly, a condition without which no idea can spread and popularize. It touches the heart: that is its greatest secret and there is a heart in the chest of the worker as there is one in the noble man. The great, as the little one, has his pains, sufferings and moral ulcers for which requests balms and consolations that one and the other find in the certainty of the future, because one and the other are equal before the pain and the death, that hurts both the rich and the poor. We doubt very much that the doctrine of the demon and the eternal flames will ever get sufficient attraction to overcome that. That same Pastor often walked several miles to get to Tours to attend a Spiritist session and the same on the way back. When we speak of the elevated reach of the doctrine and the consolations that it entails we speak a language that is not understood by those that believe that Spiritism is entirely in the turning tables, or in a more or less authentic phenomenon that attracts curious people, but that is perfectly understood by those that in large number did not stop at the surface and were not led by rumors.
“Dear Sir,
A Spiritist group was formed in our town beginning October 23rd under the protection of St. Peter. Since you are our teacher in Spiritism it is my duty to inform you as a President of that group. Our main objective is to alleviate the pain of the suffering Spirits, incarnate and discarnate. We hold two meetings per week. We strive to reach unity of intent and for that each one of the attendees remains in profound and reverent silence and when a question is addressed to the Spirits out loud each one of us mentally ask their guardian angel for their help to obtain a true answer. In our evocation, frequently dealing with obsessing Spirits of inferior order and knowing the efficacy of a joint prayer, we almost always resource to that to obtain clarification and relief of the unfortunate creatures. Our group counts on many mediums but frequently only two or three write in every session. We have besides a hearing and clairvoyant and a magnetizing medium. We were promised a painting medium but and I cannot appreciate that faculty since I have not seen him yet. We already count on forty members. There are several other Spiritist meetings in St. Petersburg, but they have no regulation. Ours is the first one regularly organized, and we hope that God willing our example will be followed. I am pleased to let you know that the first Spiritist brochure has finally appeared in Russia, printed in St. Petersburg, with the authorization of the censorship. The article that Mr. Debolsky inserted in the journal Radougaf (the rainbow). Up until now censorship would only authorize the publication of articles against Spiritism. I thought your book Spiritism in its simplest expression was the best answer to the article and I had it published in that journal. Kindly allow me, Sir, to send you the most important communications that we obtained, in particular those that came to support the truth and the sublimity of our doctrine.
Sincerely yours,
General A. de B.”
The group’s attitude, the proposed objective of charity are the best proofs that Spiritism is understood there in its true essence and seen on its most practical and serious aspect. There is nothing there that is out of pure curiosity or futile requests but the application of the doctrine in its most elevated principle. A person that attended many of those sessions told us that people leave the place feeling enlightened with the seriousness, the reverence and the feeling of true compassion that reign there.
-o-
The letter below was not sent to us but to the President of a Spiritist group of Tours. We transcribe it literally with the exception of the spelling hat was corrected.
“Dear Mr. Rebondin and our brother in God,
Forgive me Sir if I take the liberty in writing to you. I wanted to do that long ago to thank you for your hospitality last year, allowing me to attend two of your sessions. You will surely not remember me, but I will tell you who I am. I visited you with my former boss, Mr. T… I was his Pastor for eleven years. He has just married today and his relatives when noticed that I was involved with Spiritism had him firing me. I suffered a lot with that separation, dear Sir, but I want to follow the precepts of our sacred doctrine; it is my duty to pray for the unfortunate ones that offend the divine master of all of us. Since the time I met the doctrine I do my best to attract followers. I may have found obstacles, but I also had the pleasure of leading many people to get to know Spiritism, that explains every atonement that we endure in this earth of suffering and miseries. Ah the sweetness of being a Spiritist and to practice its virtues! My only happiness. As for you, dear Sir, the most devoted to the sacred cause, I hope you will not deny me with a place in your heart. I am happy for having met you and having felt so welcomed. I have been to Tours twice in the company of my two friends that study Spiritism with the intention of attending your sessions to learn that they no longer happen on Sundays. Please let me know the time of your gathering so that I can attend it with my friends and share the spiritual benefit. It will be a great source of happiness to us. I count on your friendship and remain waiting for the day when we shall get together again to practice the law of love and charity.
Fraternally from your dear friend,
Pierre Houdée, Pastor”
As we can see one does not need a diploma to understand the doctrine. The fact is that despite its elevated reach it is so much clear and logical that it reaches every intelligence effortlessly, a condition without which no idea can spread and popularize. It touches the heart: that is its greatest secret and there is a heart in the chest of the worker as there is one in the noble man. The great, as the little one, has his pains, sufferings and moral ulcers for which requests balms and consolations that one and the other find in the certainty of the future, because one and the other are equal before the pain and the death, that hurts both the rich and the poor. We doubt very much that the doctrine of the demon and the eternal flames will ever get sufficient attraction to overcome that. That same Pastor often walked several miles to get to Tours to attend a Spiritist session and the same on the way back. When we speak of the elevated reach of the doctrine and the consolations that it entails we speak a language that is not understood by those that believe that Spiritism is entirely in the turning tables, or in a more or less authentic phenomenon that attracts curious people, but that is perfectly understood by those that in large number did not stop at the surface and were not led by rumors.
The Spirits in Spain
The cure of an obsessed in Barcelona
In September 1864 we published an article with the above title in which it was demonstrated by authentic facts that there was no Pyrenees and that they even laughed at the “auto-de-fé”.[1]Mr. Delanne’s letter published in our previous issue is a new proof of that. It shows the cure of an obsession obtained by the zeal and perseverance of some sincere and devout Spiritists from Barcelona. We got the detailed report of that cure that we thought to be our duty to have it published along with that letter that followed.
“Dear Sir and teacher,
We were lucky to have among us our dear friend and brother in belief Mr. Delanne to whom we provided some news about our weak contributions as well as our efforts to bring relief to some poor patients that God brought to our hands. Among them there was a woman that was trapped by a terrible obsession for fifteen years and that God had her cured through us. We definitely did not want to mention her because we work quietly not attributing any merit to ourselves. Nonetheless, Mr. Delanne convinced us that the report of such a cure would certainly give encouragement to other believers that, like ourselves, are devoted to this work of charity and for that matter we had no hesitation in bringing that to your attention. Blessed be the hand of the Lord that allows us to taste the flavor of the fruit of our works, rewarding us still here on Earth. During the Easter Holidays several sermons were given against Spiritism from which there was one that stuck out for the absurd. The preacher asked the followers if they would be happy if they knew that the souls of their relatives were reborn in the bodies of a cow, a donkey, a pig or any other animal. That is Spiritism, he said, my dear brothers; it is perfect for the lighthearted spirit of the French but not to you, the Spanish, too serious to believe in such a thing.
Yours sincerely,
JMF ”
Rose N... married in 1850, was affected by spasmodic fits just after the wedding that repeated many times and more violently up until the time that she got pregnant. She felt nothing during pregnancy, but the fits returned after she gave birth. The episodes would sometimes last for three or four hours during which she would do all sorts of strange things, requiring three or four persons to control her. Some of the doctors invited to attend her said that it was a nervous disease; others that it was madness. The same phenomenon took place in every pregnancy, stopping during the period and starting again after delivery.
It was all the same for years. The poor husband was tired of consulting with multiple people and applying all sorts of medicine that never worked. The courageous family was at the limit of their patience and resources for the poor woman would remain ill for months, not being able to attend her domestic chores. Sometimes she felt better giving the impression that she was cured but after a few weeks of break the illness would return even more painfully.
Some people convinced them that such a terrible disease was the works of the devil, resourcing to exorcisms and taking her to a sanctuary place located twenty leagues[2] away, from where she returned apparently tranquil. A few days later, however, the problem returned with renewed intensity. She then went to a small church where she stayed for four months during which she felt so good that people considered her cured. She returned to her happy family that thought her to be free from the cruel disease. A few weeks later, however, their hopes vanished. The episodes returned with increased energy. Husband and wife were desperate.
We heard about this case from one of our friends and brothers in faith in 1864, asking us to try to help alleviate or perhaps cure the poor woman since he believed it to be an obsession of the worst kind. The patient was undergoing a magnetic treatment that had given her some relief but the magnetizer, although Spiritist, had no means of evoking the obsessing Spirit due to the lack of mediums and, despite his wishes, he could not produce the desired effect. We gladly accepted the opportunity of doing a good deed, gathered a number of sincere followers and sent for the patient.
Only a few minutes were enough to recognize the cause of Rosa’s illness. It was, in fact, one of the worst kind of obsession. It was very hard to have the obsessing Spirit attending our call. He was very violent, responded with some meaningless words and furiously attacked his victim, provoking a violent crisis that was soon appeased by the magnetizer.
In the second session, a few days later, we were able to keep the obsessing Spirit longer that nonetheless was always relentless and cruel toward his victim. The third evocation was better; the Spirit talked to us in an amicable tone. We made him see all the harm he was causing to the poor woman, but he did not want to acknowledge his mistake, saying that he was forcing her to pay an old debt. In the fourth evocation we prayed with us and said he was sorry to have been brought to us against his will. He would rather have come on his own. That is what he did in the following session. Gradually and at each new evocation we developed an ascendency upon him, being then able to have him renouncing to his bad actions, something that was already happening since the fourth session. We were then glad to see that her episodes stopped at the ninth session. A magnetization process of about 12-15min used to totally appease Rose, making her thoroughly tranquil. For nine months now, since August, the patient has not presented any symptom and there was no interruption in her normal daily activity. From time to time, though, she was helplessly shaken as a result of some upsetting situations, but those were like lightning strikes without a storm; they demonstrated to her, in practice, that she should not move away from her commitments with God and her fellow human beings. It must also be said that she gave a powerful contribution to her own cure by her faith, eagerness and trust in God, and by restraining her naturally impulsive character. All that contributed to give the obsessing Spirit control upon himself, since he needed that in order to definitely change; he was afraid of the atonement that he would have to endure to deserve forgiveness. Thank God, however, and with the powerful support of the good spiritual guides, he is now in the good path and does whatever it takes to be forgiven. Today he gives good advices to the very one that he persecuted for such a long time, a person that today is robust and joyful, as if she had never suffered anything. Yet, every week she comes to a magnetization and from time to time we evoke her former persecutor, to reinforce his good resolutions. Here is his last communication given in April 1865: “I am here. I come to thank you for your perseverance in my case. Without you and without these good and benevolent Spirits present here I would have never found the happiness that I feel now; I would still be dragged by bad things, in my misery; yes, misery, since one cannot be more unfortunate than I was; always doing and willing to do harm! How many times have I told you that I was not suffering? It is only now that I can see how much I suffered. Even now I still suffer the consequences of all that, but not as before; today it is regret and not the need to do evil things. No, no! May the God of goodness keep me from that and that I have the strength to not fall in disgrace again. No more those tortures, the acidic feelings that provide no resting place to the soul. That is what hell is about, it is with the evil one, like I was. I did evil things out of resentment, vengeance and ambition. What did I take from that? Oh! I was repelled by the good Spirits that I could not understand when they approached me; I heard their voices, but I was not allowed to see them. Today, thank God, I can see and that is why I experience such good feelings that I had never had before, because even if I suffer a lot I can foresee the future and I withstand my sufferings with patience and resignation, begging for God’s forgiveness and the assistance of the good Spirits to the one that I chased for such a long time. May she forgive me. There will be a time, perhaps soon, that I will be able to useful to her. I finish by thanking your and asking you to persist on your prayers for me and on the good friendship that you showed, forgiving me for all the trouble. Thank you, thank you! I cannot thank you enough for my recognition and all the good you did to me. Pray to God to forgive me and to the good Spirits to stay with me, giving me strength.
So long,
Pedro.
After that communication we received the following from our spiritual guides:
The process of cure is over. Thank God for the honor of having your prayers heard and for using your service to convert a bloodthirsty enemy into a friend, because, rest assured, one day that Spirit will do everything in his power to help the poor family that he tormented for so long. But you, my children, do not abandon the persecutor or his prey. Both still need your assistance; one to remain in the good path that has been found and that will have his courage reinforced by the evocation; the other to completely dissipate the bad fluids that involved her for such a long time; from time to time have her going through magnetization sessions (John, it is about “magnetic pass”) without which she would still fall under the influence of other malevolent Spirits that are unfortunately abundant, as you know. Courage! Finish that and be prepared for the next ones that are still reserved to you. Be strong! Your task is hard, it is true, but if you work hard there will be great compensation to you!
Your guides.
-o-
Just the report of more or less interesting facts is not enough. We need to take a lesson from them otherwise they are useless. It is true the facts that Spiritism becomes a science and a doctrine; but if we had stopped at the observation and registration we would not be more advanced than we were on day one. In Spiritism, as with every science, there is always something to learn; it is then by the observation, by the study and deduction of the facts that one may learn. That is why, when there is a call, we follow the facts with some suggested reflections from our side that either may confirm a known principle or serve to support a new one. It is, in our opinion, a means of attracting the attention of serious persons.
A first observation to make about the letter above is that like in the case of those that understand the doctrine in its purity, its followers make abstraction of any self-love; they make no exhibition or do not seek celebrity; they do good without ostentation and without bragging about the cures that are obtained because they know that they do not come from their own talent or personal merit and that such a favor may be subtracted by God at will; it is not reputation or clientele that they are after. They find compensation in the satisfaction of having relieved a sufferer and not in the vanity of men’s approval. It is a means of reconciling the support of the good Spirits that leave pride to the proud ones.
The cases of cure like the ones here, like those of Marmande and others with no less merit, are undoubtedly an encouragement; they are also excellent practical lessons showing the kind of results that can be achieved by faith, perseverance and by a wise and intelligent direction. However, something that is not less of a teaching is the example of modesty, humility and total material and moral selflessness. Such wonderful results are found in centers that are governed by those feelings because there one is truly strong against bad Spirits. It is not less notable the fact that when proud finds room in those places and when good is not done exclusively for the good and when personal satisfaction of self-love is found there, then force declines.
It is equally remarkable the fact that the majority of serious followers are made in those really serious centers because the new comers are touched by the good impression that they have, whereas in the frivolous and lighthearted centers one is only attracted by a not always satisfied curiosity. The good done to the incarnate as well as the discarnate means the understanding of the true objective of the doctrine. It is not much fun to certain persons, we realize, but it is more meritorious to those that are devoted to that. We therefore gladly see the multiplication of centers that are dedicated to such useful works. There people learn while doing service and there is no lack of material for study. These are the strongest supports of the doctrine.
Isn’t that a characteristic fact when we see in both ends of Europe, Russia in the north and Spain in the south, Spiritist meetings animated by the same desire of doing good, and a charitable feeling towards their fellow human beings? Isn’t that an indication of the irresistible moral strength of the doctrine that overcomes every obstacle and knows no barrier? In fact one must really lack any real point to combat the doctrine in order to appeal to the kind of argument employed by the preacher of Barcelona mentioned above; it would be a lack of time to refute them; one can only feel sorry for those that are led by such aberrations that only demonstrate the blindest ignorance or the most remarkable bad faith. But that still calls for an important teaching. Suppose that Mrs. Rose had believed in the statements of the preacher and had repelled Spiritism. What would have happened? She would not have been cured; she would have fallen in misery since she could not have continued to work; she and her husband could have bad mouthed God whereas now they praise him, and the bad Spirit would not have converted to good. From a theological point of view Spiritism saved three souls that would otherwise have been allowed to go lost by the preacher.
From the initial symptoms is understandable that science could have gone wrong because it had all the features of a pathological case. However, it wasn’t any of that. It was only Spiritism that could have found the true cause and the proof of that is that science was powerless with its medication for many years whereas Spiritism was successful without medicine in a few days only through the moralization of the perverse creature that was behind it all.
The fact is out there together with thousands of similar other facts. What do the unbelievers say about it? It is chance, it is the force of nature; the patient was to be cured. How about certain preaches? We say “certain preaches” on purpose because not all of them share the same thoughts. The woman was cured by the devil, they would say, and it would have been better to her soul if she had remained sick. Mrs. Rose does not share that opinion. Since she thanks God for her salvation and not the devil, she prays and do good deeds, she absolutely does not believe that her salvation is compromised. Besides, she prefers to have been cured and been able to work to feed her children than seen them die of hunger. In our opinion God is the source of all good.
But if the devil is the true actor in all cases of obsession that how come exorcism is so powerless against it? It is a positive fact that not only exorcism has always failed in similar situations but also that there is a recrudescence of the problem after ceremonies of such a kind. Morzine offered memorable examples of that. Is then the devil more powerful than God since it overcomes God’s ministers with their offerings of sacred things? Who do the Spiritists invoke then? Whose support they request? God’s. But why do they succeed with the same assistance when the others fail? Here the reasons:
To begin with having the obsessing Spirit back to the good side, and consequently the cure of the patient, a material fact, demonstrates that it is not about the devil but a bad Spirit susceptible of improving. Second, in the exorcism they are only offered words and material signs believed to carry virtues by faith, but that are not taken into account by the Spirit. They irritate, curse and threaten the Spirit with the eternal flames of hell; they want to dominate the Spirit by force and since he is unreachable he laughs and wants to prove that he is stronger. Through Spiritism we reach out to the Spirit with kindness; we try to make the cord of feelings vibrate inside that soul; we offer the mercy of God; we help the Spirit to foresee hope and very kindly lead him to good. That is the whole secret.
The fact above presents a particular case, that is the suspension of the crises during pregnancy. Where does it come from? Have science explaining that, if possible. Here is the explanation given by Spiritism:
The disease was neither madness nor a nervous illness. The cure is a proof of that. It was an obsession, no doubt. The obsessing Spirit was acting out of vengeance. God allowed that to serve as an atonement and test to the mother, and also that later on her own cure would lead the Spirit to improve. But the crisis could harm the child during pregnancy. God wanted the mother to be punished for her wrong doing but not the innocent child that she was carrying. That is why any persecution was withdrawn during that time.
The things that Spiritism explains to those that want to observe and study! How many horizons to be opened to science when science takes into account the spiritual element! How far from understanding it are those that only see curious manifestations in that element!
[1] Ritual of public penance of condemned heretics and apostates by the inquisition in Europe (TN)
[2] About 60 miles (TN)
“Dear Sir and teacher,
We were lucky to have among us our dear friend and brother in belief Mr. Delanne to whom we provided some news about our weak contributions as well as our efforts to bring relief to some poor patients that God brought to our hands. Among them there was a woman that was trapped by a terrible obsession for fifteen years and that God had her cured through us. We definitely did not want to mention her because we work quietly not attributing any merit to ourselves. Nonetheless, Mr. Delanne convinced us that the report of such a cure would certainly give encouragement to other believers that, like ourselves, are devoted to this work of charity and for that matter we had no hesitation in bringing that to your attention. Blessed be the hand of the Lord that allows us to taste the flavor of the fruit of our works, rewarding us still here on Earth. During the Easter Holidays several sermons were given against Spiritism from which there was one that stuck out for the absurd. The preacher asked the followers if they would be happy if they knew that the souls of their relatives were reborn in the bodies of a cow, a donkey, a pig or any other animal. That is Spiritism, he said, my dear brothers; it is perfect for the lighthearted spirit of the French but not to you, the Spanish, too serious to believe in such a thing.
Yours sincerely,
JMF ”
Rose N... married in 1850, was affected by spasmodic fits just after the wedding that repeated many times and more violently up until the time that she got pregnant. She felt nothing during pregnancy, but the fits returned after she gave birth. The episodes would sometimes last for three or four hours during which she would do all sorts of strange things, requiring three or four persons to control her. Some of the doctors invited to attend her said that it was a nervous disease; others that it was madness. The same phenomenon took place in every pregnancy, stopping during the period and starting again after delivery.
It was all the same for years. The poor husband was tired of consulting with multiple people and applying all sorts of medicine that never worked. The courageous family was at the limit of their patience and resources for the poor woman would remain ill for months, not being able to attend her domestic chores. Sometimes she felt better giving the impression that she was cured but after a few weeks of break the illness would return even more painfully.
Some people convinced them that such a terrible disease was the works of the devil, resourcing to exorcisms and taking her to a sanctuary place located twenty leagues[2] away, from where she returned apparently tranquil. A few days later, however, the problem returned with renewed intensity. She then went to a small church where she stayed for four months during which she felt so good that people considered her cured. She returned to her happy family that thought her to be free from the cruel disease. A few weeks later, however, their hopes vanished. The episodes returned with increased energy. Husband and wife were desperate.
We heard about this case from one of our friends and brothers in faith in 1864, asking us to try to help alleviate or perhaps cure the poor woman since he believed it to be an obsession of the worst kind. The patient was undergoing a magnetic treatment that had given her some relief but the magnetizer, although Spiritist, had no means of evoking the obsessing Spirit due to the lack of mediums and, despite his wishes, he could not produce the desired effect. We gladly accepted the opportunity of doing a good deed, gathered a number of sincere followers and sent for the patient.
Only a few minutes were enough to recognize the cause of Rosa’s illness. It was, in fact, one of the worst kind of obsession. It was very hard to have the obsessing Spirit attending our call. He was very violent, responded with some meaningless words and furiously attacked his victim, provoking a violent crisis that was soon appeased by the magnetizer.
In the second session, a few days later, we were able to keep the obsessing Spirit longer that nonetheless was always relentless and cruel toward his victim. The third evocation was better; the Spirit talked to us in an amicable tone. We made him see all the harm he was causing to the poor woman, but he did not want to acknowledge his mistake, saying that he was forcing her to pay an old debt. In the fourth evocation we prayed with us and said he was sorry to have been brought to us against his will. He would rather have come on his own. That is what he did in the following session. Gradually and at each new evocation we developed an ascendency upon him, being then able to have him renouncing to his bad actions, something that was already happening since the fourth session. We were then glad to see that her episodes stopped at the ninth session. A magnetization process of about 12-15min used to totally appease Rose, making her thoroughly tranquil. For nine months now, since August, the patient has not presented any symptom and there was no interruption in her normal daily activity. From time to time, though, she was helplessly shaken as a result of some upsetting situations, but those were like lightning strikes without a storm; they demonstrated to her, in practice, that she should not move away from her commitments with God and her fellow human beings. It must also be said that she gave a powerful contribution to her own cure by her faith, eagerness and trust in God, and by restraining her naturally impulsive character. All that contributed to give the obsessing Spirit control upon himself, since he needed that in order to definitely change; he was afraid of the atonement that he would have to endure to deserve forgiveness. Thank God, however, and with the powerful support of the good spiritual guides, he is now in the good path and does whatever it takes to be forgiven. Today he gives good advices to the very one that he persecuted for such a long time, a person that today is robust and joyful, as if she had never suffered anything. Yet, every week she comes to a magnetization and from time to time we evoke her former persecutor, to reinforce his good resolutions. Here is his last communication given in April 1865: “I am here. I come to thank you for your perseverance in my case. Without you and without these good and benevolent Spirits present here I would have never found the happiness that I feel now; I would still be dragged by bad things, in my misery; yes, misery, since one cannot be more unfortunate than I was; always doing and willing to do harm! How many times have I told you that I was not suffering? It is only now that I can see how much I suffered. Even now I still suffer the consequences of all that, but not as before; today it is regret and not the need to do evil things. No, no! May the God of goodness keep me from that and that I have the strength to not fall in disgrace again. No more those tortures, the acidic feelings that provide no resting place to the soul. That is what hell is about, it is with the evil one, like I was. I did evil things out of resentment, vengeance and ambition. What did I take from that? Oh! I was repelled by the good Spirits that I could not understand when they approached me; I heard their voices, but I was not allowed to see them. Today, thank God, I can see and that is why I experience such good feelings that I had never had before, because even if I suffer a lot I can foresee the future and I withstand my sufferings with patience and resignation, begging for God’s forgiveness and the assistance of the good Spirits to the one that I chased for such a long time. May she forgive me. There will be a time, perhaps soon, that I will be able to useful to her. I finish by thanking your and asking you to persist on your prayers for me and on the good friendship that you showed, forgiving me for all the trouble. Thank you, thank you! I cannot thank you enough for my recognition and all the good you did to me. Pray to God to forgive me and to the good Spirits to stay with me, giving me strength.
So long,
Pedro.
After that communication we received the following from our spiritual guides:
The process of cure is over. Thank God for the honor of having your prayers heard and for using your service to convert a bloodthirsty enemy into a friend, because, rest assured, one day that Spirit will do everything in his power to help the poor family that he tormented for so long. But you, my children, do not abandon the persecutor or his prey. Both still need your assistance; one to remain in the good path that has been found and that will have his courage reinforced by the evocation; the other to completely dissipate the bad fluids that involved her for such a long time; from time to time have her going through magnetization sessions (John, it is about “magnetic pass”) without which she would still fall under the influence of other malevolent Spirits that are unfortunately abundant, as you know. Courage! Finish that and be prepared for the next ones that are still reserved to you. Be strong! Your task is hard, it is true, but if you work hard there will be great compensation to you!
Your guides.
-o-
Just the report of more or less interesting facts is not enough. We need to take a lesson from them otherwise they are useless. It is true the facts that Spiritism becomes a science and a doctrine; but if we had stopped at the observation and registration we would not be more advanced than we were on day one. In Spiritism, as with every science, there is always something to learn; it is then by the observation, by the study and deduction of the facts that one may learn. That is why, when there is a call, we follow the facts with some suggested reflections from our side that either may confirm a known principle or serve to support a new one. It is, in our opinion, a means of attracting the attention of serious persons.
A first observation to make about the letter above is that like in the case of those that understand the doctrine in its purity, its followers make abstraction of any self-love; they make no exhibition or do not seek celebrity; they do good without ostentation and without bragging about the cures that are obtained because they know that they do not come from their own talent or personal merit and that such a favor may be subtracted by God at will; it is not reputation or clientele that they are after. They find compensation in the satisfaction of having relieved a sufferer and not in the vanity of men’s approval. It is a means of reconciling the support of the good Spirits that leave pride to the proud ones.
The cases of cure like the ones here, like those of Marmande and others with no less merit, are undoubtedly an encouragement; they are also excellent practical lessons showing the kind of results that can be achieved by faith, perseverance and by a wise and intelligent direction. However, something that is not less of a teaching is the example of modesty, humility and total material and moral selflessness. Such wonderful results are found in centers that are governed by those feelings because there one is truly strong against bad Spirits. It is not less notable the fact that when proud finds room in those places and when good is not done exclusively for the good and when personal satisfaction of self-love is found there, then force declines.
It is equally remarkable the fact that the majority of serious followers are made in those really serious centers because the new comers are touched by the good impression that they have, whereas in the frivolous and lighthearted centers one is only attracted by a not always satisfied curiosity. The good done to the incarnate as well as the discarnate means the understanding of the true objective of the doctrine. It is not much fun to certain persons, we realize, but it is more meritorious to those that are devoted to that. We therefore gladly see the multiplication of centers that are dedicated to such useful works. There people learn while doing service and there is no lack of material for study. These are the strongest supports of the doctrine.
Isn’t that a characteristic fact when we see in both ends of Europe, Russia in the north and Spain in the south, Spiritist meetings animated by the same desire of doing good, and a charitable feeling towards their fellow human beings? Isn’t that an indication of the irresistible moral strength of the doctrine that overcomes every obstacle and knows no barrier? In fact one must really lack any real point to combat the doctrine in order to appeal to the kind of argument employed by the preacher of Barcelona mentioned above; it would be a lack of time to refute them; one can only feel sorry for those that are led by such aberrations that only demonstrate the blindest ignorance or the most remarkable bad faith. But that still calls for an important teaching. Suppose that Mrs. Rose had believed in the statements of the preacher and had repelled Spiritism. What would have happened? She would not have been cured; she would have fallen in misery since she could not have continued to work; she and her husband could have bad mouthed God whereas now they praise him, and the bad Spirit would not have converted to good. From a theological point of view Spiritism saved three souls that would otherwise have been allowed to go lost by the preacher.
From the initial symptoms is understandable that science could have gone wrong because it had all the features of a pathological case. However, it wasn’t any of that. It was only Spiritism that could have found the true cause and the proof of that is that science was powerless with its medication for many years whereas Spiritism was successful without medicine in a few days only through the moralization of the perverse creature that was behind it all.
The fact is out there together with thousands of similar other facts. What do the unbelievers say about it? It is chance, it is the force of nature; the patient was to be cured. How about certain preaches? We say “certain preaches” on purpose because not all of them share the same thoughts. The woman was cured by the devil, they would say, and it would have been better to her soul if she had remained sick. Mrs. Rose does not share that opinion. Since she thanks God for her salvation and not the devil, she prays and do good deeds, she absolutely does not believe that her salvation is compromised. Besides, she prefers to have been cured and been able to work to feed her children than seen them die of hunger. In our opinion God is the source of all good.
But if the devil is the true actor in all cases of obsession that how come exorcism is so powerless against it? It is a positive fact that not only exorcism has always failed in similar situations but also that there is a recrudescence of the problem after ceremonies of such a kind. Morzine offered memorable examples of that. Is then the devil more powerful than God since it overcomes God’s ministers with their offerings of sacred things? Who do the Spiritists invoke then? Whose support they request? God’s. But why do they succeed with the same assistance when the others fail? Here the reasons:
To begin with having the obsessing Spirit back to the good side, and consequently the cure of the patient, a material fact, demonstrates that it is not about the devil but a bad Spirit susceptible of improving. Second, in the exorcism they are only offered words and material signs believed to carry virtues by faith, but that are not taken into account by the Spirit. They irritate, curse and threaten the Spirit with the eternal flames of hell; they want to dominate the Spirit by force and since he is unreachable he laughs and wants to prove that he is stronger. Through Spiritism we reach out to the Spirit with kindness; we try to make the cord of feelings vibrate inside that soul; we offer the mercy of God; we help the Spirit to foresee hope and very kindly lead him to good. That is the whole secret.
The fact above presents a particular case, that is the suspension of the crises during pregnancy. Where does it come from? Have science explaining that, if possible. Here is the explanation given by Spiritism:
The disease was neither madness nor a nervous illness. The cure is a proof of that. It was an obsession, no doubt. The obsessing Spirit was acting out of vengeance. God allowed that to serve as an atonement and test to the mother, and also that later on her own cure would lead the Spirit to improve. But the crisis could harm the child during pregnancy. God wanted the mother to be punished for her wrong doing but not the innocent child that she was carrying. That is why any persecution was withdrawn during that time.
The things that Spiritism explains to those that want to observe and study! How many horizons to be opened to science when science takes into account the spiritual element! How far from understanding it are those that only see curious manifestations in that element!
[1] Ritual of public penance of condemned heretics and apostates by the inquisition in Europe (TN)
[2] About 60 miles (TN)
The Two Spies
One of our corresponding members from St. Petersburgh sent us the translation of an article published against Spiritism in a religious journal of that city called Doukhownaia Beceda (religious practices).
It is a report done by two young men from Moscow, Messrs. XX that were introduced to us last November with the appearance of people from the best society, saying that they were sympathetic to Spiritism and that were duly welcomed with the due attention given to foreigners. Nothing in their words and actions betrayed their real intention. This was necessary in their role playing and for the accomplishment of their mission. The adversaries of Spiritism in France have certainly made us used to reports that are not exactly accurate, but truth be said, as far as we know none of them have gone so far with their calumnies. That would have been difficult in a French newspaper given the laws that protect against such abuse and also for the fact that many witnesses would come out with the truth. But hundreds of miles away in a foreign country and in a language that is unknown here it would be easier.
We owe the Russian followers a refutation to that shameful brochure whose authors are much reproachable for having abused people’s trust. They sneaked in in disguise, supposedly sent by a party, into a private home and gathering that is never opened to the general public and that only accepts people with recommendation, then giving publicity to an altered and disgusting report, placing themselves in a lower position when compared to spies because those at least give an accurate account of what they saw.
Besides, it is also regrettable that such things are done in the name of religion and that they are considered to be necessary to the very support of religion. Spiritism shall not be ruined by such means. Their hatred actually helps its growth. That is what happened to Christianity in the beginning. The adversaries worked for its propagation through their persecution. Truth is readily revealed nowadays, and when they maliciously say that something is black everyone can see that it is white and the hatred that is carried by calumny falls upon their own authors. The thoughts in that paper are like those of every detractor that share the same opinion. They have been refuted so many times that it would be useless to go back there. We will, nonetheless, mention the following passage:
“Are the Spiritists, in fact, in direct communication with the world of the Spirits, so much so that the most renowned personalities and the most sacred ones hear their appeals ad libitum, at the mediums’ will, as if attending the bell’s ringing? Isn’t that charlatanism and gross deception, not from the part of the Spirits that Mr. Allan Kardec teaches to distinguish so well, but from the part of the very chief of this new sect, so attractive to the imagination of its inexperienced followers? The two attached letters from Paris, coming from trustworthy persons that wanted to remain anonymous, may give a thorough answer to such a delicate question.”
Spiritism has never said that the Spirits, whoever they are, attend any mediums’ will. On the contrary, it says that the Spirits are not there to obey anyone’s orders; that they come when they wish and can. Spiritism goes further and explains the material causes that oppose the manifestation of a Spirit through the first one that shows up. If the communication of the Spirits is nothing more than a hopeless idea and a role playing, then only one person would have its monopoly. How come it has been attested by thousands of individuals of all social classes and ages and in all countries? Is everybody then play a role in a comedy, from the prince to the pawn, and all that to the benefit of whom? Something that is even more remarkable is that the comedy redirect nonbelievers to God, making those that laughed at prayers pray. A deception with such serious results has never been seen before. As for the letters of the two envoys, it would be superfluous to respond to their gross lies; it would be enough to mention a couple of material mistakes to show the their report about the rest deserves.
“At the scheduled time we met Mr. Allan Kardec. He resides at a passage always taken by a multitude of people. A big billboard announces that the great mysteries of Spiritism take place there.”
At the bottom of the stairs there is a small notice that reads: Spiritist Review, 2nd floor because that is where the office of the journal stays and since it is accessible to the public it must point to its office. Below it reads: Classroom, because the sessions room was formerly used for several courses that had never taken place since we moved there. That is the first invention of those very trustworthy gentlemen.
“It was 5pm. It was dark and the Spiritist carried no light. We were led to his office through snaking corridors.”
The visitors were never shown to my office but to a reception room that certainly is not that of a palace, but those that do not find it worthwhile are always free not to return there.
“After having invited us to sit down he continued to talk to a young man that was unknown to us. The words said by the latter allowed us to conclude that he was an obsessed rookie medium, under the influence of impure forces that gave him answers under the disguise of pure Spirits; in the beginning the answers were masked by a perfect innocence and soon after the devil would betray himself. Everything in that young man showed agitation, from the voice to the scared face. The Spiritist responded that one needed a pure moral life and moderation to communicate with the Spirits and even more: that in the beginning the medium is commonly persecuted by bad Spirits but later the good ones arrive. The speech had a professorial tone. All that was undoubtedly a comic act played before us.”
That young man, we remember, was a simple worker that had come to us for advices, as it frequently happens. We continued our conversation with him because to us the humbler the position of an honest worker the more consideration he deserves from us. It is possible that those gentlemen did not share such an opinion, but they will get there when, in another existence, they find themselves in the same conditions as those that they look down today. As for the comedy that undoubtedly was played by them, it is remarkable that it had been prepared for them since their visit was not expected. When they arrived, the young man was alone; we only continued the conversation because we had it initiated already. The comedy was then played by the two of us. In any case that conversation was not very interesting and when a lot is done something better gets done too.
“Thanks to an interesting darkness, the teacher was not visible. He asked us something that wanted to probe our belief in Spiritism, its development in Moscow and so forth. He moved with caution until he realized our intent. A lamp was brought in. We then saw a very big man in front of us, elderly, with a very pleasant expression in his face and singular eyes; one could say that his eyes would go through a person; that was his first look; it then showed a certain nostalgia. I observed those outstanding eyes on a common physiognomy for a long time. I don’t know why I got his attention but for several times he asked me if I was not a medium. After demonstrating our knowledge of Spiritism through the conversation he then became more talkative.”
One can see the kind of knowledge they had about Spiritism. Thinking that they had deceived us with their smart language, they were the ones playing the comedy.
“He started talking in an obscure way about the soul and the Spirits. In the beginning his voice was calm but he finished his speech with a singular emphasis. After we asked him how to distinguish between the bad and good Spirits he said that each Spirit had to go through an examination phase before anything else; if the Spirit was not in contradiction with the moral and religious beliefs of the Spiritists they were considered pure. Following my question why he was only concerned with moral issues and not did not touch scientific and political matters, something that visibly displeased him, he responded something like this: The Spirits do not get involved with these things.”
Politics is generally the danger terrain to which false brothers try to bring the Spiritists. According to them the moral principle is something really banal and vulgar; that is much of the same; something positive is needed. A rewarded individual sneaked into a group of workers in Lyon where there were also some military personnel, proposing the following question: “What do the Spirits think of Henry V?” The answer given by the Spirits and by the followers discouraged him to go back.
“After certain hesitation he allowed us to attend the Spiritist session on Friday. He wanted to question a colonel of the guard, a medium that had died a short while ago. We then left. I am interested in the Friday session and will tell you everything about it. People say, however, that he charges one hundred francs per session. If that is true let it be clear that I will not be able to see or hear anything. I can sacrifice ten francs, no more.
Paris, 2/14 November 1864”
Regardless of our well-known principles, clearly stated in our books with respect to the exploitation of Spiritism in any form or shape, the more than six thousands of attendees that were given access to our sessions at the Spiritist Society of Paris, since its foundation on January 1st, 1858, may give account to any contribution, compulsory or optional, or even if any condition was imposed for the attendance of the meetings, like the purchase of a single book or subscription to the Spiritist Review. When someone exploits the general public, the choice is not difficult; one aims at the quantity. How to conceive then our hesitation to accept those gentlemen? Instead of allowing them to join we would have invited them. They betray themselves by these words alone but they did not think of that.
From the time they heard that they would be charged a hundred francs per person and would be prepared to pay only ten, how come they did not make a confirmation beforehand? It would have been very natural, even necessary, to have asked us in order to avoid surprises. There is here a perfidious but awkward insinuation. In the report below, they talk about the session that they attended but mention no payment. Well, since they would sacrifice ten francs it means that it costed them nothing. They stepped back before their own statement but then said to themselves: “Let us just throw the idea there; something may come out of it”. But when there isn’t anything then nothing may come out. Yes, there is something, the shame of the liar.
As a matter of fact, this is not the first time that malevolence and envy employ such means to try to belie the Spiritist Society before public opinion. Not long ago a person in Nantes affirmed that the ticket to attend the sessions were sold for five francs per person. It would be remarkable that after eight years in operation people don’t know yet if the Society charges eight francs or one hundred francs. Truly, one must be really blind by the intent of causing harm in order to try to deceive the public about something as material as this and that is belied every day, be it by the persons that do attend the sessions or by the principles that are professed by the Society and that are unequivocally formulated in our writings.
Such a calumny, however, leads to a teaching. Since our adversaries believe to cast shame upon our Society, saying that it demands a contribution from the visitors, it means that they consider to be more honorable not charging anything. Now, considering that the Society demands nothing; that instead of seeking quantity of attendees it restricts that number as much as possible, it means that the Society does not speculate with them; it therefore eliminates any suspicion of charlatanism.
The circumstance involving the colonel that was supposed to be evoked gave us the hint to determine the session that those gentlemen attended. Since their names were not in the list of attendees it means that they utilized false names. This was very easy to confirm because the session on that day was private and only accessible to the members of the Society, and to which only four or five foreigners in visit to Paris had been exceptionally allowed. By sending us their true names our corresponding member reveals that they are the sons of a high commissioner of the Russian clergy.
“At 8pm last Friday we attended the session at the Spiritist Society. We arrived early; there wasn’t many members yet so that we were able to carefully examine the environment. A very large room contained several rows of chairs. Near one of the walls there was a table covered with a green cloth, surrounded by chairs that were to be occupied by the main members of the Society. On table there was a pile of blank paper with a number of sharpened pencils. Nothing else. Above the table there was the image of the blessed Savior.”
Such a detailed analysis, to the point of examining the papers, is very indiscrete from the part of persons that supposedly kind men admitted as a favor in a private place and in a meeting that has nothing of public. There isn’t absolutely nothing above the table. Near the table there is a statue of St. Louis, the spiritual President of the Society, wearing Kings’ garments, and that those gentlemen took by that of Christ.
“The walls were covered by singular paintings. I examined them in detail. The largest is an oil painting, representing a casket with chains falling around; an original site with fantastic plants surrounding the casket. A caption explains that the image was painted by Allan Kardec.”
That allegoric painting is the one we talked about in the Spiritist Review, 1862. There is no chain or plants of any kind. Below there is an explanatory note attached to the painting, saying: “Mediumistic painting. Allegoric image of the beginning and victory of Spiritism; painted by Mr. V…, young Pharmacy student, without any knowledge of painting. Lyon.” We do not know how come those gentlemen could see in those words that the painted was done by Allan Kardec. That gives a measure of the accuracy of their report and the confidence that the remaining deserves.
“Further away all kinds of paintings and drawings, I do not even know how to call them, done by several persons under the influence of the Spirits. I cannot tell you the impression that all those paintings had on me. I examined myself over again and concluded that I was calm at that time, cold blooded, so that the impression that those paintings had on me were independent of my imagination. The paintings or drawings show an INSOLITO set of lines, points, circles, an original gathering, without any resemblance of anything. All have a particular and common style, but entirely indefinable. One could say that there isn’t anything particular about those lines and points, however, they still leave a very unpleasant feeling, like that of a nightmare. In a word, those drawings are not like anything that you have ever seen and to me they are very unpleasant.”
That collection of mediumistic drawings contains: Mozart’s house, published in the Spiritist Review, August 1858, known by everybody; a head of Christ, done in Mexico, of a kind that is admired by the experts; another Christ, crowned with spokes, molded in clay at the Spiritist Society of Madrid, and of a remarkable execution; two incredible heads of women, of a Greek profile, drawn at the Spiritist Society of Constantinople; the portrait of sightseeing drawn with a pen by Mr. Jaubert, Vice President of the Court of Carcassone and that any renowned artist would sign, etc. These are the lines and the points that disturbed the eyes of those gentlemen in such an unpleasant and disgusting way. We would really be tempted to believe that a malignant Spirit fascinated them making them see everything upside down, turning their report picturesque.
“Finally, there are about seventy members of the Society gathered. Like in the true societies, they also have a secretary. They began by reading a chapter of the Gospel; then the minutes of the preceding session. I confess that I could not hear everything without taking risk. For example, in Lyon a Spirit was saying silly things because he had been excluded from the group of well-behaved Spirits. They then read the necrology of the Spiritist colonel that should be evoked during that session. Before, he had been a Saint-Simonianist. One of the attendees wanted to ask a few questions but the teacher stated that the others should not get involved with what not of their competence. I thought they would bring the device that was supposed to write but I was mistaken. Allan Kardec rang the bell and a young man with the appearance of a con man came from the adjacent room, ready in a word to say all kinds of memorized absurd for half of a ruble. We were told that he was a medium.”
Here is not only about inaccuracies. It is cynicism and lies. One only needs to mention such words to belie them. In France the authors would have been brought to the courts. Regarding inaccuracies we must only say that since the Society was established there has never been a bell in its office, and consequently, we could not have rung it. The ears of those gentlemen were vibrating like their eyes when they saw the drawings and the statue of St. Louis.
“The public, mostly old persons, was characteristic; almost half of them were mad people. The young ones were high and untidy, focused on the movements of the medium. Some were blind believers that would be a sin to laugh at them. One could only feel sorry for them.”
It seems that lying is a lesser sin. It is true that certain persons believe that any lie told with good intention is excusable. Well, staining Spiritism is an excellent motive to some.
“What did the Spirit respond? The Spirit responded by the chatting box of Mr. Allan Kardec that can be found in his books.”
The Spirit in question here is that of Mr. Bruneau, member of the Spiritist Society, former pupil of the Polytechnic Institute and colonel of the artillery, recently deceased. The minutes of his evocation can be found in the Spiritist Review, December 1864.
“Allan Kardec proposed the evocation of a Saint-Simonianist boy”.
There were eight mediums that day and not one at the table. Since we had just evoked Mr. Bruneau, that had been a Saint-Simonianist, and we had spoken about that doctrine, its former leader Père Enfantin, communicated spontaneously and without an evocation, through one of the mediums, and took part in the discussion. It was therefore Père Enfantin that the faithful reporter toke by a Saint-Simonianist boy.[1]
“As for ourselves, we were as much bored as displeased with the type of people there. We stood up and left. That is how our Spiritist visit ended. Yet, I cannot say if it is deception or madness. But that is enough!
Paris, 9/21 November 1864”
The editor of the journal adds: “The person that provided us with those interesting letters finishes with this observation: - A conscious report of the witness is very important, although it cannot explain everything. That is why we believe the present summary to be useful to the keen believers in the communication with the Spirits.”
The thoughts that are brought up by events of such a nature are summarized in the following article.
[1] Saint-Simonianism was a French political and social movement of the first half of the 19th century, inspired by the ideas of Claude Henri de Rouvroy, comte de Saint-Simon (1760–1825)
It is a report done by two young men from Moscow, Messrs. XX that were introduced to us last November with the appearance of people from the best society, saying that they were sympathetic to Spiritism and that were duly welcomed with the due attention given to foreigners. Nothing in their words and actions betrayed their real intention. This was necessary in their role playing and for the accomplishment of their mission. The adversaries of Spiritism in France have certainly made us used to reports that are not exactly accurate, but truth be said, as far as we know none of them have gone so far with their calumnies. That would have been difficult in a French newspaper given the laws that protect against such abuse and also for the fact that many witnesses would come out with the truth. But hundreds of miles away in a foreign country and in a language that is unknown here it would be easier.
We owe the Russian followers a refutation to that shameful brochure whose authors are much reproachable for having abused people’s trust. They sneaked in in disguise, supposedly sent by a party, into a private home and gathering that is never opened to the general public and that only accepts people with recommendation, then giving publicity to an altered and disgusting report, placing themselves in a lower position when compared to spies because those at least give an accurate account of what they saw.
Besides, it is also regrettable that such things are done in the name of religion and that they are considered to be necessary to the very support of religion. Spiritism shall not be ruined by such means. Their hatred actually helps its growth. That is what happened to Christianity in the beginning. The adversaries worked for its propagation through their persecution. Truth is readily revealed nowadays, and when they maliciously say that something is black everyone can see that it is white and the hatred that is carried by calumny falls upon their own authors. The thoughts in that paper are like those of every detractor that share the same opinion. They have been refuted so many times that it would be useless to go back there. We will, nonetheless, mention the following passage:
“Are the Spiritists, in fact, in direct communication with the world of the Spirits, so much so that the most renowned personalities and the most sacred ones hear their appeals ad libitum, at the mediums’ will, as if attending the bell’s ringing? Isn’t that charlatanism and gross deception, not from the part of the Spirits that Mr. Allan Kardec teaches to distinguish so well, but from the part of the very chief of this new sect, so attractive to the imagination of its inexperienced followers? The two attached letters from Paris, coming from trustworthy persons that wanted to remain anonymous, may give a thorough answer to such a delicate question.”
Spiritism has never said that the Spirits, whoever they are, attend any mediums’ will. On the contrary, it says that the Spirits are not there to obey anyone’s orders; that they come when they wish and can. Spiritism goes further and explains the material causes that oppose the manifestation of a Spirit through the first one that shows up. If the communication of the Spirits is nothing more than a hopeless idea and a role playing, then only one person would have its monopoly. How come it has been attested by thousands of individuals of all social classes and ages and in all countries? Is everybody then play a role in a comedy, from the prince to the pawn, and all that to the benefit of whom? Something that is even more remarkable is that the comedy redirect nonbelievers to God, making those that laughed at prayers pray. A deception with such serious results has never been seen before. As for the letters of the two envoys, it would be superfluous to respond to their gross lies; it would be enough to mention a couple of material mistakes to show the their report about the rest deserves.
“At the scheduled time we met Mr. Allan Kardec. He resides at a passage always taken by a multitude of people. A big billboard announces that the great mysteries of Spiritism take place there.”
At the bottom of the stairs there is a small notice that reads: Spiritist Review, 2nd floor because that is where the office of the journal stays and since it is accessible to the public it must point to its office. Below it reads: Classroom, because the sessions room was formerly used for several courses that had never taken place since we moved there. That is the first invention of those very trustworthy gentlemen.
“It was 5pm. It was dark and the Spiritist carried no light. We were led to his office through snaking corridors.”
The visitors were never shown to my office but to a reception room that certainly is not that of a palace, but those that do not find it worthwhile are always free not to return there.
“After having invited us to sit down he continued to talk to a young man that was unknown to us. The words said by the latter allowed us to conclude that he was an obsessed rookie medium, under the influence of impure forces that gave him answers under the disguise of pure Spirits; in the beginning the answers were masked by a perfect innocence and soon after the devil would betray himself. Everything in that young man showed agitation, from the voice to the scared face. The Spiritist responded that one needed a pure moral life and moderation to communicate with the Spirits and even more: that in the beginning the medium is commonly persecuted by bad Spirits but later the good ones arrive. The speech had a professorial tone. All that was undoubtedly a comic act played before us.”
That young man, we remember, was a simple worker that had come to us for advices, as it frequently happens. We continued our conversation with him because to us the humbler the position of an honest worker the more consideration he deserves from us. It is possible that those gentlemen did not share such an opinion, but they will get there when, in another existence, they find themselves in the same conditions as those that they look down today. As for the comedy that undoubtedly was played by them, it is remarkable that it had been prepared for them since their visit was not expected. When they arrived, the young man was alone; we only continued the conversation because we had it initiated already. The comedy was then played by the two of us. In any case that conversation was not very interesting and when a lot is done something better gets done too.
“Thanks to an interesting darkness, the teacher was not visible. He asked us something that wanted to probe our belief in Spiritism, its development in Moscow and so forth. He moved with caution until he realized our intent. A lamp was brought in. We then saw a very big man in front of us, elderly, with a very pleasant expression in his face and singular eyes; one could say that his eyes would go through a person; that was his first look; it then showed a certain nostalgia. I observed those outstanding eyes on a common physiognomy for a long time. I don’t know why I got his attention but for several times he asked me if I was not a medium. After demonstrating our knowledge of Spiritism through the conversation he then became more talkative.”
One can see the kind of knowledge they had about Spiritism. Thinking that they had deceived us with their smart language, they were the ones playing the comedy.
“He started talking in an obscure way about the soul and the Spirits. In the beginning his voice was calm but he finished his speech with a singular emphasis. After we asked him how to distinguish between the bad and good Spirits he said that each Spirit had to go through an examination phase before anything else; if the Spirit was not in contradiction with the moral and religious beliefs of the Spiritists they were considered pure. Following my question why he was only concerned with moral issues and not did not touch scientific and political matters, something that visibly displeased him, he responded something like this: The Spirits do not get involved with these things.”
Politics is generally the danger terrain to which false brothers try to bring the Spiritists. According to them the moral principle is something really banal and vulgar; that is much of the same; something positive is needed. A rewarded individual sneaked into a group of workers in Lyon where there were also some military personnel, proposing the following question: “What do the Spirits think of Henry V?” The answer given by the Spirits and by the followers discouraged him to go back.
“After certain hesitation he allowed us to attend the Spiritist session on Friday. He wanted to question a colonel of the guard, a medium that had died a short while ago. We then left. I am interested in the Friday session and will tell you everything about it. People say, however, that he charges one hundred francs per session. If that is true let it be clear that I will not be able to see or hear anything. I can sacrifice ten francs, no more.
Paris, 2/14 November 1864”
Regardless of our well-known principles, clearly stated in our books with respect to the exploitation of Spiritism in any form or shape, the more than six thousands of attendees that were given access to our sessions at the Spiritist Society of Paris, since its foundation on January 1st, 1858, may give account to any contribution, compulsory or optional, or even if any condition was imposed for the attendance of the meetings, like the purchase of a single book or subscription to the Spiritist Review. When someone exploits the general public, the choice is not difficult; one aims at the quantity. How to conceive then our hesitation to accept those gentlemen? Instead of allowing them to join we would have invited them. They betray themselves by these words alone but they did not think of that.
From the time they heard that they would be charged a hundred francs per person and would be prepared to pay only ten, how come they did not make a confirmation beforehand? It would have been very natural, even necessary, to have asked us in order to avoid surprises. There is here a perfidious but awkward insinuation. In the report below, they talk about the session that they attended but mention no payment. Well, since they would sacrifice ten francs it means that it costed them nothing. They stepped back before their own statement but then said to themselves: “Let us just throw the idea there; something may come out of it”. But when there isn’t anything then nothing may come out. Yes, there is something, the shame of the liar.
As a matter of fact, this is not the first time that malevolence and envy employ such means to try to belie the Spiritist Society before public opinion. Not long ago a person in Nantes affirmed that the ticket to attend the sessions were sold for five francs per person. It would be remarkable that after eight years in operation people don’t know yet if the Society charges eight francs or one hundred francs. Truly, one must be really blind by the intent of causing harm in order to try to deceive the public about something as material as this and that is belied every day, be it by the persons that do attend the sessions or by the principles that are professed by the Society and that are unequivocally formulated in our writings.
Such a calumny, however, leads to a teaching. Since our adversaries believe to cast shame upon our Society, saying that it demands a contribution from the visitors, it means that they consider to be more honorable not charging anything. Now, considering that the Society demands nothing; that instead of seeking quantity of attendees it restricts that number as much as possible, it means that the Society does not speculate with them; it therefore eliminates any suspicion of charlatanism.
The circumstance involving the colonel that was supposed to be evoked gave us the hint to determine the session that those gentlemen attended. Since their names were not in the list of attendees it means that they utilized false names. This was very easy to confirm because the session on that day was private and only accessible to the members of the Society, and to which only four or five foreigners in visit to Paris had been exceptionally allowed. By sending us their true names our corresponding member reveals that they are the sons of a high commissioner of the Russian clergy.
“At 8pm last Friday we attended the session at the Spiritist Society. We arrived early; there wasn’t many members yet so that we were able to carefully examine the environment. A very large room contained several rows of chairs. Near one of the walls there was a table covered with a green cloth, surrounded by chairs that were to be occupied by the main members of the Society. On table there was a pile of blank paper with a number of sharpened pencils. Nothing else. Above the table there was the image of the blessed Savior.”
Such a detailed analysis, to the point of examining the papers, is very indiscrete from the part of persons that supposedly kind men admitted as a favor in a private place and in a meeting that has nothing of public. There isn’t absolutely nothing above the table. Near the table there is a statue of St. Louis, the spiritual President of the Society, wearing Kings’ garments, and that those gentlemen took by that of Christ.
“The walls were covered by singular paintings. I examined them in detail. The largest is an oil painting, representing a casket with chains falling around; an original site with fantastic plants surrounding the casket. A caption explains that the image was painted by Allan Kardec.”
That allegoric painting is the one we talked about in the Spiritist Review, 1862. There is no chain or plants of any kind. Below there is an explanatory note attached to the painting, saying: “Mediumistic painting. Allegoric image of the beginning and victory of Spiritism; painted by Mr. V…, young Pharmacy student, without any knowledge of painting. Lyon.” We do not know how come those gentlemen could see in those words that the painted was done by Allan Kardec. That gives a measure of the accuracy of their report and the confidence that the remaining deserves.
“Further away all kinds of paintings and drawings, I do not even know how to call them, done by several persons under the influence of the Spirits. I cannot tell you the impression that all those paintings had on me. I examined myself over again and concluded that I was calm at that time, cold blooded, so that the impression that those paintings had on me were independent of my imagination. The paintings or drawings show an INSOLITO set of lines, points, circles, an original gathering, without any resemblance of anything. All have a particular and common style, but entirely indefinable. One could say that there isn’t anything particular about those lines and points, however, they still leave a very unpleasant feeling, like that of a nightmare. In a word, those drawings are not like anything that you have ever seen and to me they are very unpleasant.”
That collection of mediumistic drawings contains: Mozart’s house, published in the Spiritist Review, August 1858, known by everybody; a head of Christ, done in Mexico, of a kind that is admired by the experts; another Christ, crowned with spokes, molded in clay at the Spiritist Society of Madrid, and of a remarkable execution; two incredible heads of women, of a Greek profile, drawn at the Spiritist Society of Constantinople; the portrait of sightseeing drawn with a pen by Mr. Jaubert, Vice President of the Court of Carcassone and that any renowned artist would sign, etc. These are the lines and the points that disturbed the eyes of those gentlemen in such an unpleasant and disgusting way. We would really be tempted to believe that a malignant Spirit fascinated them making them see everything upside down, turning their report picturesque.
“Finally, there are about seventy members of the Society gathered. Like in the true societies, they also have a secretary. They began by reading a chapter of the Gospel; then the minutes of the preceding session. I confess that I could not hear everything without taking risk. For example, in Lyon a Spirit was saying silly things because he had been excluded from the group of well-behaved Spirits. They then read the necrology of the Spiritist colonel that should be evoked during that session. Before, he had been a Saint-Simonianist. One of the attendees wanted to ask a few questions but the teacher stated that the others should not get involved with what not of their competence. I thought they would bring the device that was supposed to write but I was mistaken. Allan Kardec rang the bell and a young man with the appearance of a con man came from the adjacent room, ready in a word to say all kinds of memorized absurd for half of a ruble. We were told that he was a medium.”
Here is not only about inaccuracies. It is cynicism and lies. One only needs to mention such words to belie them. In France the authors would have been brought to the courts. Regarding inaccuracies we must only say that since the Society was established there has never been a bell in its office, and consequently, we could not have rung it. The ears of those gentlemen were vibrating like their eyes when they saw the drawings and the statue of St. Louis.
“The public, mostly old persons, was characteristic; almost half of them were mad people. The young ones were high and untidy, focused on the movements of the medium. Some were blind believers that would be a sin to laugh at them. One could only feel sorry for them.”
It seems that lying is a lesser sin. It is true that certain persons believe that any lie told with good intention is excusable. Well, staining Spiritism is an excellent motive to some.
“What did the Spirit respond? The Spirit responded by the chatting box of Mr. Allan Kardec that can be found in his books.”
The Spirit in question here is that of Mr. Bruneau, member of the Spiritist Society, former pupil of the Polytechnic Institute and colonel of the artillery, recently deceased. The minutes of his evocation can be found in the Spiritist Review, December 1864.
“Allan Kardec proposed the evocation of a Saint-Simonianist boy”.
There were eight mediums that day and not one at the table. Since we had just evoked Mr. Bruneau, that had been a Saint-Simonianist, and we had spoken about that doctrine, its former leader Père Enfantin, communicated spontaneously and without an evocation, through one of the mediums, and took part in the discussion. It was therefore Père Enfantin that the faithful reporter toke by a Saint-Simonianist boy.[1]
“As for ourselves, we were as much bored as displeased with the type of people there. We stood up and left. That is how our Spiritist visit ended. Yet, I cannot say if it is deception or madness. But that is enough!
Paris, 9/21 November 1864”
The editor of the journal adds: “The person that provided us with those interesting letters finishes with this observation: - A conscious report of the witness is very important, although it cannot explain everything. That is why we believe the present summary to be useful to the keen believers in the communication with the Spirits.”
The thoughts that are brought up by events of such a nature are summarized in the following article.
[1] Saint-Simonianism was a French political and social movement of the first half of the 19th century, inspired by the ideas of Claude Henri de Rouvroy, comte de Saint-Simon (1760–1825)
New Tactics by the Adversaries of Spiritism.
Never has a philosophical doctrine of modern times caused as much emotion as Spiritism. Never has anyone of them been attacked as fiercely as Spiritism has. That is an evident proof that its vitality and more profound roots than the others have been acknowledged, since nobody takes a pickaxe to remove a little grass. Far from being scared by this, the Spiritists must rejoice for it is the demonstration of the importance and truthfulness of the doctrine. If it were just an ephemeral idea and without consistency, like a fly, it would not be attacked so viciously; if it were false it would be attacked with solid arguments that would have already been successful against it. Nonetheless, since none of the opposing arguments could have it stopped, it means that nobody found a hole on its armor. However, there has been no lack of will or talent from the part of the antagonists.
In this vast tournament of ideas where the past fights the future and whose battle field is the whole world, the grand jury is public opinion. It hears the pros and cons; it judges the means of attack and defense and comes out in favor of the one that provides the best reasons. If one of the two champions employs disloyal weapons, he is condemned in anticipation. Well, would there be more disloyal weapons than lies, calumny and treason? When someone reaches out to such means it is a self-proclamation of defeat by logic, and any cause that is reduced to such expedient is a lost cause; it will not be a man or a few men that will pronounce the sentence: it will be humanity, that the force of things and the conscience of good drag to what is more just and rational.
Observe in the history of the world if a single great and true idea has not always succeeded against anything that was tried to stop it. Spiritism shows us something new with that respect: it is the speed of propagation, second to none. That is speed is so significant that the adversaries were stunned; they attack with the blind rage of the combatant that lose their coolness and are hurt by their own weapons.
The struggle, however, is far from reaching its end. Much to the contrary, one needs to wait until it acquires greater proportions and another character. It would be very unusual and incompatible with the current state of humanity that a doctrine that carries the embryo of the whole regeneration would establish itself peacefully in a few years. Once more, let us not regret that. The tougher the fight the more brilliant the triumph. Nobody doubts that Spiritism grew out of the opposition that was brought upon it. Let that opposition exhaust its resources. It will grow even further when its weakness is revealed to everyone. The battle field of the recently born Christianity was restricted whereas that of Spiritism spreads all over the face of Earth. Christianity could not be muffled by the waves of blood; it grew through its martyrs, as did people’s freedom, because it was the truth. Spiritism, that is Christianity adequate to the development of intelligence, and free from the abuse, will grow in the same way under persecution, because it is also the truth.
Brute force is knowingly powerless against the Spiritist idea, even in countries where it is freely applied. Experience is there to demonstrate it. When the idea is compressed in one point it resurges all over the place. A general compression would lead to an explosion. Our adversaries, however, have not resigned. While waiting they appeal to another tactic, that is the quiet maneuvers.
They have tried many times and will try again to compromise the doctrine by leading it through a dangerous or ridiculous path to have it discredited. Today, spreading subliminal division and sparks of disagreement they expect to cast doubt and uncertainty in the minds, lead to true or simulated discouragement and provoke disturbance among the followers. But those that would act like that are not confess adversaries. Spiritism that has so many common points with Christianity must also has its own Judas so that it will also have the glory of coming out victorious of that trial. Money sometimes is the argument that replaces logic. Haven’t we seen a woman confessing having been paid 50 francs to simulate madness after having attended a single Spiritist session?
That is why and not without reason that we published an article about the false brothers, in the Spiritist Review, March 1863. The article did not please everybody and more than one wanted us to see more clearly and that we had the eyes of others opened, shaking our hand as a sign of approval as if we were the victims. Never mind! Our duty is to forewarn the sincere Spiritists against the traps that are set up to them. As for those that have alienated us and to whom those principles were too rigorous, with respect to this point as to several others, their sympathy was only superficial and not from the bottom of their heart, and we have no reason to waste our time with them. We have to deal with things that are much more important than their good or bad will towards us. The present is volatile and tomorrow it will no longer exist. To us, it is nothing. The future is everything to us and it is for the future that we work. We know that the true sympathies will follow us and those that serve any material interest or self-love do not deserve that name.
Anyone that places their point of view outside the narrow sphere of the present is no longer disturbed by the petty intrigues that agitate around. That is what we strive to do and it is what we advise to do those that want peace in this world. (The Gospel According to Spiritism, chap. II, item 5).
Like all new ideas, the Spiritist idea could not go without being exploited by people that never had any success in anything given their bad conduct or incompetence and are looking for something new, in hopes of finding a more productive and easier mine. If the success does not correspond to their expectations, they do not accept responsibility but attribute the lack of success to the idea that is then declared bad. These persons only utilize the name Spiritists. We saw such maneuvers better than anyone else, being the target of such exploitations many times, exploitations that we never wanted to support and for that did not grant us many friends.
Let us return to our subject. Spiritism, we repeat, still has to pass tough tests and it is there that God will recognize the true servants, by their courage, firmness and by their perseverance. Those that are shaken by fear or frustration are like those soldiers that only show courage in times of peace and that run away at the first shot. The greatest proof, however, will not be persecution but the conflict of ideas that will come and with which help they intend to break the phalanx of followers and the remarkable unity around the doctrine.
That conflict, although provoked out of ill-intention, may it come from men or bad Spirits, is nonetheless necessary and must bring momentary turmoil to some weak minds, and even if it causes transient disturbance to some, it will have as the definitive result the consolidation of the unity.
As in everything, one must not judge isolated points but look at the broad picture. It is useful that all ideas, even the most contradictories and eccentrics, may come out to day light; it leads to examination and judgement and if they are false, commonsense will a do them justice: they will forcibly fall before the decisive universal control, as have many others already. That was the great criterium that led to the current unity; that is what will conclude it because it is the crucible that must separate the good from the bad grain, and truth shall shine stronger when it is out, free from any attachment. Spiritism is still in ebullition; let then the foam come up to the surface and overflow and then depurate. Leave that to the adversaries the malevolent and puerile joy of blowing the fire to provoke such ebullition because they will unwillingly speed up its depuration and its triumph, and they themselves shall be burnt by their own fire. God wants everything to be useful to the cause, even what is done with the intention of harming it. Let us not forget that Spiritism is not complete. It has only planted the milestones, but to advance safely it must be done gradually, as the terrain is better prepared to receive it and consolidated enough to safely set foot there. The impatient ones that cannot wait the appropriate time compromise the harvest, as they do with the outcome of the battles.
There are certainly among the impatient ones those that are in good faith; they would like to see things moving even faster but they are like those creatures that believe to be able to advance time by advancing the clock. Others, not less sincere, are led by self-love to get there first; the sow before the season and only harvest aborted fruits. There are others, unfortunately, that push the car backwards, expecting to see it overturn.
It is understandable that certain individuals, that would like to have been the first ones, reproach us for having moved too fast; that others, for opposite reasons, censor us for moving slowly; but something that is less explainable, sometimes, is to see that double censorship carried out by the same individual, something that is not proof of much logic. If we are attacked for walking on the right or on the left that will not stop us and we will still move as we have done so far, following the guidelines traced to us, seeking the objective that we want to achieve at the end. We shall move forward or wait; we shall speed up our pace or delay it, according to the circumstances and not according to the opinion of this or that one.
Spiritism marches despite its numerous adversaries that were not capable of taking it down by force and now try to take it down by intelligence; they sneak in everywhere, with all kinds of masks and even in private gatherings, in hopes of spreading a rumor or a word that they many times have provoked and that they expect to exploit to their own benefit. Compromise Spiritism and make it ridiculous, that is the tactic that they believe will discredit it in the beginning for, later on, have a pretext to, if possible, stop its public exercise. That is the trap against which it is necessary to be vigilant because it is set up all around us and to which, unwillingly, follow hand in hand those that allow themselves to be led by the suggestion of deceiving and mystifying Spirits. The means of avoiding such maneuvers is to follow as close as possible the line of conduct traced by the doctrine; its moral teaching, its essential part, is unreachable; by practicing it one does not allow any unfounded criticism and the aggression becomes more hateful. Catching the Spiritists at fault and in contradiction would be a huge strike to its adversaries; just watch how much they do to accuse Spiritism of every aberration and eccentricity for which it could never be blamed. The doctrine is not ambiguous in any of its parts; it is clear, precise, categorical in the minimal details; it is only ignorance and ill-faith that can be mistaken about what the doctrine approves or condemn. It is therefore a duty of every devout and sincere Spiritist to repudiate and openly deauthorize, in their name, the abuse of any kind that may compromise the doctrine, so that it must not accept responsibility; going along with the abuse would be the same as being an accomplice and provide weapons to our adversaries.
Periods of transition are always difficult to go through. Spiritism is in that period; the more the followers are careful the less difficulties one will have to overcome it. We are at war; the enemy is out there, watching, ready to exploit the least misstep in their own benefit and ready to destroy everything if they can.
However, let us not raise suspicion hastily or lightheartedly and based on appearances that may be misleading. Moderation, in fact, is a duty of charity, even with respect to those that are against us. Nonetheless, sincerity will prevail, even in its mistakes, and falsehood can never simulate that because sooner or later they will show their face. God and the good Spirits allow it to be betrayed by its own actions. If a doubt crosses someone’s mind it must only be a reason for cautionary and civil attitude.
In this vast tournament of ideas where the past fights the future and whose battle field is the whole world, the grand jury is public opinion. It hears the pros and cons; it judges the means of attack and defense and comes out in favor of the one that provides the best reasons. If one of the two champions employs disloyal weapons, he is condemned in anticipation. Well, would there be more disloyal weapons than lies, calumny and treason? When someone reaches out to such means it is a self-proclamation of defeat by logic, and any cause that is reduced to such expedient is a lost cause; it will not be a man or a few men that will pronounce the sentence: it will be humanity, that the force of things and the conscience of good drag to what is more just and rational.
Observe in the history of the world if a single great and true idea has not always succeeded against anything that was tried to stop it. Spiritism shows us something new with that respect: it is the speed of propagation, second to none. That is speed is so significant that the adversaries were stunned; they attack with the blind rage of the combatant that lose their coolness and are hurt by their own weapons.
The struggle, however, is far from reaching its end. Much to the contrary, one needs to wait until it acquires greater proportions and another character. It would be very unusual and incompatible with the current state of humanity that a doctrine that carries the embryo of the whole regeneration would establish itself peacefully in a few years. Once more, let us not regret that. The tougher the fight the more brilliant the triumph. Nobody doubts that Spiritism grew out of the opposition that was brought upon it. Let that opposition exhaust its resources. It will grow even further when its weakness is revealed to everyone. The battle field of the recently born Christianity was restricted whereas that of Spiritism spreads all over the face of Earth. Christianity could not be muffled by the waves of blood; it grew through its martyrs, as did people’s freedom, because it was the truth. Spiritism, that is Christianity adequate to the development of intelligence, and free from the abuse, will grow in the same way under persecution, because it is also the truth.
Brute force is knowingly powerless against the Spiritist idea, even in countries where it is freely applied. Experience is there to demonstrate it. When the idea is compressed in one point it resurges all over the place. A general compression would lead to an explosion. Our adversaries, however, have not resigned. While waiting they appeal to another tactic, that is the quiet maneuvers.
They have tried many times and will try again to compromise the doctrine by leading it through a dangerous or ridiculous path to have it discredited. Today, spreading subliminal division and sparks of disagreement they expect to cast doubt and uncertainty in the minds, lead to true or simulated discouragement and provoke disturbance among the followers. But those that would act like that are not confess adversaries. Spiritism that has so many common points with Christianity must also has its own Judas so that it will also have the glory of coming out victorious of that trial. Money sometimes is the argument that replaces logic. Haven’t we seen a woman confessing having been paid 50 francs to simulate madness after having attended a single Spiritist session?
That is why and not without reason that we published an article about the false brothers, in the Spiritist Review, March 1863. The article did not please everybody and more than one wanted us to see more clearly and that we had the eyes of others opened, shaking our hand as a sign of approval as if we were the victims. Never mind! Our duty is to forewarn the sincere Spiritists against the traps that are set up to them. As for those that have alienated us and to whom those principles were too rigorous, with respect to this point as to several others, their sympathy was only superficial and not from the bottom of their heart, and we have no reason to waste our time with them. We have to deal with things that are much more important than their good or bad will towards us. The present is volatile and tomorrow it will no longer exist. To us, it is nothing. The future is everything to us and it is for the future that we work. We know that the true sympathies will follow us and those that serve any material interest or self-love do not deserve that name.
Anyone that places their point of view outside the narrow sphere of the present is no longer disturbed by the petty intrigues that agitate around. That is what we strive to do and it is what we advise to do those that want peace in this world. (The Gospel According to Spiritism, chap. II, item 5).
Like all new ideas, the Spiritist idea could not go without being exploited by people that never had any success in anything given their bad conduct or incompetence and are looking for something new, in hopes of finding a more productive and easier mine. If the success does not correspond to their expectations, they do not accept responsibility but attribute the lack of success to the idea that is then declared bad. These persons only utilize the name Spiritists. We saw such maneuvers better than anyone else, being the target of such exploitations many times, exploitations that we never wanted to support and for that did not grant us many friends.
Let us return to our subject. Spiritism, we repeat, still has to pass tough tests and it is there that God will recognize the true servants, by their courage, firmness and by their perseverance. Those that are shaken by fear or frustration are like those soldiers that only show courage in times of peace and that run away at the first shot. The greatest proof, however, will not be persecution but the conflict of ideas that will come and with which help they intend to break the phalanx of followers and the remarkable unity around the doctrine.
That conflict, although provoked out of ill-intention, may it come from men or bad Spirits, is nonetheless necessary and must bring momentary turmoil to some weak minds, and even if it causes transient disturbance to some, it will have as the definitive result the consolidation of the unity.
As in everything, one must not judge isolated points but look at the broad picture. It is useful that all ideas, even the most contradictories and eccentrics, may come out to day light; it leads to examination and judgement and if they are false, commonsense will a do them justice: they will forcibly fall before the decisive universal control, as have many others already. That was the great criterium that led to the current unity; that is what will conclude it because it is the crucible that must separate the good from the bad grain, and truth shall shine stronger when it is out, free from any attachment. Spiritism is still in ebullition; let then the foam come up to the surface and overflow and then depurate. Leave that to the adversaries the malevolent and puerile joy of blowing the fire to provoke such ebullition because they will unwillingly speed up its depuration and its triumph, and they themselves shall be burnt by their own fire. God wants everything to be useful to the cause, even what is done with the intention of harming it. Let us not forget that Spiritism is not complete. It has only planted the milestones, but to advance safely it must be done gradually, as the terrain is better prepared to receive it and consolidated enough to safely set foot there. The impatient ones that cannot wait the appropriate time compromise the harvest, as they do with the outcome of the battles.
There are certainly among the impatient ones those that are in good faith; they would like to see things moving even faster but they are like those creatures that believe to be able to advance time by advancing the clock. Others, not less sincere, are led by self-love to get there first; the sow before the season and only harvest aborted fruits. There are others, unfortunately, that push the car backwards, expecting to see it overturn.
It is understandable that certain individuals, that would like to have been the first ones, reproach us for having moved too fast; that others, for opposite reasons, censor us for moving slowly; but something that is less explainable, sometimes, is to see that double censorship carried out by the same individual, something that is not proof of much logic. If we are attacked for walking on the right or on the left that will not stop us and we will still move as we have done so far, following the guidelines traced to us, seeking the objective that we want to achieve at the end. We shall move forward or wait; we shall speed up our pace or delay it, according to the circumstances and not according to the opinion of this or that one.
Spiritism marches despite its numerous adversaries that were not capable of taking it down by force and now try to take it down by intelligence; they sneak in everywhere, with all kinds of masks and even in private gatherings, in hopes of spreading a rumor or a word that they many times have provoked and that they expect to exploit to their own benefit. Compromise Spiritism and make it ridiculous, that is the tactic that they believe will discredit it in the beginning for, later on, have a pretext to, if possible, stop its public exercise. That is the trap against which it is necessary to be vigilant because it is set up all around us and to which, unwillingly, follow hand in hand those that allow themselves to be led by the suggestion of deceiving and mystifying Spirits. The means of avoiding such maneuvers is to follow as close as possible the line of conduct traced by the doctrine; its moral teaching, its essential part, is unreachable; by practicing it one does not allow any unfounded criticism and the aggression becomes more hateful. Catching the Spiritists at fault and in contradiction would be a huge strike to its adversaries; just watch how much they do to accuse Spiritism of every aberration and eccentricity for which it could never be blamed. The doctrine is not ambiguous in any of its parts; it is clear, precise, categorical in the minimal details; it is only ignorance and ill-faith that can be mistaken about what the doctrine approves or condemn. It is therefore a duty of every devout and sincere Spiritist to repudiate and openly deauthorize, in their name, the abuse of any kind that may compromise the doctrine, so that it must not accept responsibility; going along with the abuse would be the same as being an accomplice and provide weapons to our adversaries.
Periods of transition are always difficult to go through. Spiritism is in that period; the more the followers are careful the less difficulties one will have to overcome it. We are at war; the enemy is out there, watching, ready to exploit the least misstep in their own benefit and ready to destroy everything if they can.
However, let us not raise suspicion hastily or lightheartedly and based on appearances that may be misleading. Moderation, in fact, is a duty of charity, even with respect to those that are against us. Nonetheless, sincerity will prevail, even in its mistakes, and falsehood can never simulate that because sooner or later they will show their face. God and the good Spirits allow it to be betrayed by its own actions. If a doubt crosses someone’s mind it must only be a reason for cautionary and civil attitude.
Varieties—Letter from Dante to Mr. Thiers.
With the title above, it reads in the Charivari:
“Florence, May 20th, 1865
Dear Sir and Comrade,
I could not remain indifferent to the celebration parties that would be thrown on my behalf, and for that I requested an eight-day license period so that my shadow could come and attend the inauguration of a monument dedicated to me. It is then from Florence that I send you this letter, still moved by the ceremony that I have just witnessed. If I am at liberty of doing this, dear Sir and comrade, it is for the fact that I consider myself ready to provide you with useful information.
Although deceased five centuries ago, I never stopped following what happens and matters to the future of Italy, always with the same attention and patriotism. You know as much as I do how much pain that has brought to me, and how much my heart has been overloaded you can also have an idea…”
(This is followed by long reflections about the events in Italy and the opinions of Mr. Thiers. We do not publish it here for the double reason of being strange to our objectives and for the fact that politics is alien to the principles of this journal).
The letter ends like this:
“If, as I was told, you are supposed to travel to Italy, please visit Florence and come to talk a few minutes with my statue. It will have very interesting things to tell you.
“Florence, May 20th, 1865
Dear Sir and Comrade,
I could not remain indifferent to the celebration parties that would be thrown on my behalf, and for that I requested an eight-day license period so that my shadow could come and attend the inauguration of a monument dedicated to me. It is then from Florence that I send you this letter, still moved by the ceremony that I have just witnessed. If I am at liberty of doing this, dear Sir and comrade, it is for the fact that I consider myself ready to provide you with useful information.
Although deceased five centuries ago, I never stopped following what happens and matters to the future of Italy, always with the same attention and patriotism. You know as much as I do how much pain that has brought to me, and how much my heart has been overloaded you can also have an idea…”
(This is followed by long reflections about the events in Italy and the opinions of Mr. Thiers. We do not publish it here for the double reason of being strange to our objectives and for the fact that politics is alien to the principles of this journal).
The letter ends like this:
“If, as I was told, you are supposed to travel to Italy, please visit Florence and come to talk a few minutes with my statue. It will have very interesting things to tell you.
Your sincerely, etc.”
Dante Alighieri
Faithful copy by: Pierre Véron
Dante Alighieri
Faithful copy by: Pierre Véron
We doubt very much that Mr. Pierre Véron is sympathetic to the Spiritist idea, considering his several articles published in the Charivari.
One must not see, therefore, anything more than the product of imagination appropriate to the circumstance, unless the Spirit of Dante had come to dictate such a letter without the knowledge of the author. It is very witty for him not to deny it, but it can only be appreciated as a whole since it loses a lot when partitioned.
It was an ingenious thought to have the Spirit of Dante intervening is such occasion. Except for certain details, a Spirit would not have spoken differently. For us, there is no doubt that Dante attended that powerful manifestation, unless he is reincarnate, attracted by the strong evocation of a whole nation in one only thought. If the veil that hides the spiritual world to the eyes of the incarnate had been lifted, what a huge entourage of great men would have been seen, floating in space and mingled with the multitude, applauding the regeneration of Italy! What a great subject to a painter or a poet inspired by the Spiritist faith!
Allan Kardec
July
Aria and Henry III WordsThe Grand Journal of June 4th, 1865 reports the following event:
“All editors and all music lovers in Paris know Mr. N. G. Bach, pupil of Zimmermann, first prize winner at the piano conservatory in the 1819 contest, one of our most respected and cherished piano teachers, great grandson of the great Sebastian Bach, whose illustrious name he dignifies.
“Informed by our common friend, Mr. Dollingen, administrator of the Grand Journal, that Mr. N. G. Bach’s apartment had been the stage of a true prodigy on the evening of May 5th last, I then asked Dollingen to lead me to Mr. Bach, being welcomed at 8 Rue de Castellane with great courtesy. I believe to be unnecessary to mention that I only allowed myself to tell the readers this marvelous story after the proper consent of its hero.
On May 4th last Mr. Leon Bach, a curious stuntman of an artist, gave his father a harpsichord remarkably carved. After long and detailed research, he found inside the historical details of that instrument: it was from April 1564, manufactured in Rome. Mr. Bach spent part of his day contemplating the precious harpsichord. He fell asleep thinking about that. Not surprisingly, his dream was like this:
In the depth of his dream he saw a man with a long beard at the headboard of his bed; he was wearing round shoes with large laces on top, large breeches, a long sleeve shirt, pleated at the top, a large collar and a steep hat with large rims. That person leaned over Mr. Bach and said: - The harpsichord that you have now has once belonged to me. It served me many times to entertain my master, King Henry III. When he was very young he composed an Aria with lyrics that he liked to sing and that I played for him many times. He composed the Aria and the lyrics to a woman that he met during a hunting trip and with whom he fell in love. She was kept away from him; people say that she was poisoned and that the King suffered a lot. Every time when he was said he used to sing that song. Then, in order to distract him, I used to play a Sarabande[1] in my harpsichord, that I had created and that he liked very much. I then used to play those two compositions, always one after the other. I will play them for you.
Next the man in the dream approached the harpsichord, played a few chords and sang the Aria with so much feeling that Mr. Bach woke up crying. He lit a candle and check the time; it was 2am. He soon fell asleep again. It is here that the extraordinary begins.
When he woke up in the morning Mr. Bach was surprised by finding a page with the music on the bed, written with a very fine letter and microscopic notes. Since Mr. Bach is short sighted he had great difficulty to read all that and had to utilize a magnifying glass to decipher the scribbles.
A few moments later the successor of Sebastian Bach sat at the piano and executed the music without difficulties. The words and the Sarabande were exactly like the ones that the man in the dream had played for him! But Mr. Bach is not a somnambulist. He had never written a single verse in his entire life and the rules of poetry were totally strange to him. Here a passage of the music that we transcribed from the manuscript. We kept the orthography that, truth be said, is totally unknown to Mr. Bach.
I lost her,
The one I loved so much,
The dream of a lover,
Everyday a new touch,
A new desire.
Without her, life expires!
One day, in a faraway expedition, hunting,
I had that first sight.
An angel on the grounds, I thought!
I was the happiest of the Kings!
I would give my whole kingdom
to hold her once again,
To have her in the little cabin,
From my heart she would feel the rhythm.
Oh! They took her away from me,
Her final days secluded still;
My own life can only be
Bitter; she no longer suffers, no longer feels!
In that crying romantic song, as in the joyful Sarabande that follows, the musical staff is not less archaic than the writing. The clefs are different from those that are used today. The bass is written in one tone and the song in another. Mr. Bach was kind enough to allow me to hear the passages that have a simple, original and penetrating melody. In fact, our readers will soon be able to judge it themselves since they are in the hands of producers that are supposed to have it out with the editor Legouix, at the Boulevard Poissonnière, 27.
The journal Etoile tells us that King Henry III had a great passion for Marie de Cleves, Marquess of Isles, deceased at an early age in an Abby, on October 15th, 1574. Wouldn’t that be the beautiful, sad and secluded lady that the verses mention? The same paper tells us that an Italian musician by the name Baltazzarini came to France in those days and that he was one of the King’s favorites. Had the harpsichord belonged to Baltazzarini? Was the Spirit of Baltazzarini that wrote the Sarabande? A mystery that we dare not investigate!”
Albéric Second
-o-
After the lyrics the Grand Jounal inserted the song that unfortunately we cannot reproduce here. But since it is available for sale those that wish will be able to acquire it. (see Bibliographic News). Mr. Albéric Second finishes his article saying: “A mystery that we dare not investigate!” And why you dare not? That is a fact whose authenticity is demonstrated to you, as you acknowledge it yourself, and because it touches the mysterious life of beyond the grave you dare not search for its cause! You tremble when you face it! Then, despite all that, are you afraid of the apparitions or you fear to find the proofs that not everything ends with the life of the body? It is true that to a skeptical person that sees nothing and believes in nothing beyond the present, such a cause is very difficult to find. However, the more something is strange and seems not to conform to the known laws the more it should lead to analysis or at least raise curiosity.
It is true that certain persons are afraid of seeing very clearly because they would have to accept that they were wrong. Let us see, however, the deductions that every serious person may find in the fact, abstraction made of any Spiritist idea.
Mr. Bach receives an instrument that he attested to be an antique, something that is a reason for great satisfaction on his part. Influenced by that idea it is natural that it provoked a dream. In the dream he sees a man dressed in antique costumes, playing that instrument and singing an Aria of that time; nothing there that, rigorously speaking, cannot be attributed to a super excited imagination by the emotion and memory of the evening, particularly in a musician. But the phenomenon gets complicated here. The melody and the lyrics cannot be a recollection since Mr. Bach did not know them. Who then would have it revealed to Mr. Bach, if the man that he saw was nothing more than a fantasy? It is understandable that a super excited mind may lead to the recollection of forgotten things, but could it bring new ideas; could it teach us things that we did not know, have never learned and with which we have never dealt with? That on itself would be a fact of the highest relevance that deserved be examined because it would be a proof that the Spirit acts, perceives and conceives beyond matter. Let us keep it quiet, if you will. These considerations are of such an elevated and abstract order that not everybody can scrutinize them or not even give some thought to that.
Let us then move to the more material, more positive fact, that is the written song with the staff. Is that the result of imagination? The thing is there, touchable, and visible. Here is the place for an indispensable and scrupulous examination of the circumstances. Before we move further and to avoid hypothetical discussions, let us say that Mr. Bach, who we did not have the honor of knowing before, was kind enough to come to us and bring along the original piece in question. We could then hear from his own mouth all the details necessary to the clarification of the issue, at the time when he also confirmed some points reported by the journal.
Everything that was said about the dream was correct but the paper with the music was not brought to him on that same evening. In the morning of the following day Mr. Bach tried to remember the Aria that he had heard; he sat at the harpsichord and even tried to write the music, although imperfectly. About three weeks later the same individual appeared to him a second time; this time he sang the lyrics and said that he would give him the means of memorizing it. That is when he found the piece of paper on his bed when he woke up. He got up, played the music on the instrument and acknowledged that it was exactly the one he had heard, as well as the lyrics from which he only had a confusing memory. He also recognized the paper that belonged to him. It was a double face common musical paper on which he had written several things himself, in one of the faces. That piece of paper, with many others, was locked away inside a drawer in a desk located in another room of the house. One would have to had it removed from there and brought to his bed while he was asleep. Nobody could have done it in his household as far as he knew it. Who then? That is the terrible mystery that Mr. Albéric Second dare not scrutinize.
He found the Aria written on the clear face of the paper and according to the techniques and method of that time. The words were written with extreme precision, each syllable placed exactly under the corresponding musical note. Everything written with a pencil. The characters are really thin, but very clear and readable. The shape of the characters is typical of manuscripts of that time.
Mr. Bach was not skeptical or materialistic and even less atheist, but like a lot of people, he was in the large rank of the indifferent, not much interested in philosophical things. He only knew Spiritism by name. What he had just experienced got his attention; far from not willing to scrutinize the matter he said to himself: let us investigate it. He read Spiritist books and began to understand it and willing to get more insights into the matter he honored us with his visit. Today the fact is no longer a mystery to him and even seems very natural; besides, he is now very happy with the faith and knowledge that the circumstances led him to acquire. That is what he gained.
He knows perfectly well that neither the music nor the lyrics could have come from him. He had no doubt that they had been dictated to him by the person that had appeared to him; but he asked himself who had actually written them, if that could be him in a somnambulistic state, even if he had never been a somnambulist. That was possible but if it was admitted as such then it would just prove even better the independence of the soul, like every event of that kind; these are very curious and numerous events with which science has never not get involved.
A particular detail seems to destroy that opinion and that is the fact that the handwriting has no relationship with that of Mr. Bach. In a somnambulistic state he would have to change the way he writes regularly and utilize that of the sixteenth century, something that is not plausible. Could that be a prank from someone in his household? Even admitting that hypothesis he guarantees that nobody there has the necessary knowledge to execute that. Well, if he was the one that had the dream and he only had an insufficient recollection to transcribe the words and the music, how come someone strange to all that would have a better memory? The carefully written characters would have required a long time and a great practical skill.
Another important point to clarify was the historical fact of that first passion of the King, not mentioned in history and that inspired such a melancholic music. Mr. Bach’s son asked one of his friends that works at the Imperial Library about the existence of any historical document about it; the answer was that if there was any indication it should be in the Estoile Jounal that was published in those days. The search immediately led to the discovery of the passage reported above. Henry III mother feared that such a woman of a superior soul could exert influence upon her son and had her sent away to be secluded and later on killed. The King did not accept that loss and remained broken heart for his entire life. Isn’t that a remarkable fact that the music refers to an event that was unknown to everybody, and consequently unknown to Mr. Bach, and that later on it was confirmed by a document of those days, hidden in a library?
That circumstance has fundamental importance since it demonstrates in a irrefutable way that the lyrics cannot be authored by Mr. Bach or by anyone else in the house. Every hypothesis of charlatanism falls before such material fact.
Only Spiritism could provide the key to this fact by the knowledge of the law that governs the relationships between the corporeal and the invisible worlds. There is nothing marvelous or super natural there. The whole mystery is in the existence of the invisible world formed by the souls of those that lived on Earth and that do not break their relationships with those that outlived them. Show someone that does not know electricity that one may correspond with someone else hundreds of miles away in a matter of minutes[2] and that will seem miraculous; have that person learned the laws of electricity and it will become natural. That is what happens to the Spiritist phenomena.
In a session of the Spiritist Society of Paris in which Mr. Bach was present, the Spirit that had appeared to him gave the following explanations about the events that we have just reported.
Spiritist Society of Paris, June 9th, 1865 – Medium Mr. Morin
Question to the spiritual guide to the medium – Can we call the Spirit that manifested to Mr. Bach?
Answer – My son, the serious issue raised by that spontaneous manifestation is very natural. Starting this evening it must be resolved so that there will not be doubt remaining about the way the music was made. The Spirit is here and will respond very clearly to the questions addressed to him.
Q – (to the Spirit that manifested to Mr. Bach) Considering that you wanted to come to us, anticipating our appeal, we would be grateful if you could give us explanations about the event that took place with your intervention. We also would like to know why Mr. Bach was chosen for the manifestation and what was his participation in the phenomenon.
A. – Thank you for your benevolence and for having me with you. I understand the importance you give to this fact; however, you must not be surprised since such kind of phenomenon is today almost generally spread and known by many people. To begin with I answer your first question. Mr. Bach was chosen for two reasons: first the sympathy that unites us; the second is totally in the interest of the Spiritist Doctrine. Given his position in the world, his age and long career honorably accomplished, his relationships with the press and the educated society made him the best instrument to give publicity to events that only the Spiritist press gives publicity. You were told many times that there would come a time when Spiritism would conquer its right to citizenship wherever there is reason, logic and common sense, being accepted even in journals that have denigrated it. Regarding the second question: Yes, you are right to seek the answer so that you avoid misunderstandings. The contribution – it is about contribution – has been made and it had the participation of the Spirit (me) and Mr. Bach, in the pure dream and in relation to the Spirits only.
Note: This last phrase has its explanation in the article that follows about dreams
I brought the piece of paper to Mr. Bach after taking it from a piece of furniture adjacent to his bedroom and the music was written by Mr. Bach himself that used his own body as a means of transmission. I wrote the words since I knew them, and the work may then be considered completely spiritual since Mr. Bach, in his dream, was almost completely dematerialized.
Q. – Any person that is a medium could have served in that case? A. – Certainly not because if Mr. Bach did not have the required skills it is likely that both of us would not have been chosen for that propagation.
Q. – How did Mr. Bach utilized his own body to write the music? Did he do that in somnambulistic state? A. – I said that he used his own body as a means of transmission because his is still incarnate and cannot act like a discarnate Spirit. An incarnate Spirit can only utilize the limbs and not the perispirit since it is the perispirit itself that keeps the Spirit bonded to the body.
Q. – Can you tell us who composed the lyrics? A. – If I had been the one I have a good dose of pride to keep the honor, but no. I clearly explained it saying that I knew the words. Those words as well as the music are really the composition and inspiration of my then master King Henry.
Q. – Would that be an indiscretion to ask you about your personality and to tell us what was your position under Henry III? A. – There is no indiscretion as long as there is general interest. I respond by saying that I left my homeland, Florence, coming to France and was introduced to the court by a princess that heard me singing and wanted to please the still infant, making him hear the poor minstrel. There was so much pleasure that they decided to have me at his disposal and I spent a long time by his side as a musician, but in reality, I was a friend that he liked a lot and that felt good with me. The fact that I died before him made me see how much he was attached based on his grief with the loss. My name was mentioned here: I was Baltazzarini.
Mrs. Delanne was present at the session and received identical answers given to Mr. Morin by hearing. The next day she wrote the communication below in her house that confirms and complements that of Baltazzarini:
“When the time is right God employs all means to have the divine science penetrating the layers of Society. Regardless of the opinion that one may have about the new ideas, each one must serve the cause, even if in spite of oneself, in the place where each one is placed. Since the Spirit of Mr. Bach lived in the domains of Henry III and personally related to the King as a close friend, he liked very much to hear those verses and in particular the music. The harpsichord was his favorite instrument. That is why the Spirit of Baltazzarini appeared to him and used that instrument to bring the Spirit of Bach back to the time in which he lived and to show him, as to science, that the doctrine of reincarnation is everyday confirmed by new proofs. The music alone would not have been sufficient to bring Mr. Bach to light immediately. He needed a phenomenon that he could not explain on his own, an entirely unconscious participation. He must promote the doctrine by telling this story, seeking to understand the means by which it was produced, asking the help of the minds that like him seek the truth. His respectable age, honorable position and reputation in the world and in literature, he is one of the first milestones planted in the rebellious world, considering his trustworthy good-faith; he cannot be taken by a mad person or have the authenticity of the manifestation denied. Besides, rest assured that all this happened by design. As you can see the press abstained from commenting and yet the article was produced by a non-believer, a jester of science that is the only one that could give a plausible explanation for the fact. God has his own points of view; he sows the divine see onto the hearts when he thinks it is appropriate. This event shall have more repercussion than you think. Work always quietly and wait confidently.
We have told you many times; at the right time and place God will solicit people and events that will lift the obstacles and give you the confirmation that the bases of the doctrine have received the sanction of the Spirit of Truth. Spiritism grows and expands; the branches of the gigantic and blessed tree reach out all over the globe. Spiritism daily conquers new followers in all classes and new phalanxes come to join the ranks of the discarnate. The more difficult your work becomes the greater the assistance of the good Spirits.
St. Benedict”
[1] A dance music in triple metric (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarabande)
[2] Reference to the newly developed telegraph, in the first part of the nineteenth century (TN)
“All editors and all music lovers in Paris know Mr. N. G. Bach, pupil of Zimmermann, first prize winner at the piano conservatory in the 1819 contest, one of our most respected and cherished piano teachers, great grandson of the great Sebastian Bach, whose illustrious name he dignifies.
“Informed by our common friend, Mr. Dollingen, administrator of the Grand Journal, that Mr. N. G. Bach’s apartment had been the stage of a true prodigy on the evening of May 5th last, I then asked Dollingen to lead me to Mr. Bach, being welcomed at 8 Rue de Castellane with great courtesy. I believe to be unnecessary to mention that I only allowed myself to tell the readers this marvelous story after the proper consent of its hero.
On May 4th last Mr. Leon Bach, a curious stuntman of an artist, gave his father a harpsichord remarkably carved. After long and detailed research, he found inside the historical details of that instrument: it was from April 1564, manufactured in Rome. Mr. Bach spent part of his day contemplating the precious harpsichord. He fell asleep thinking about that. Not surprisingly, his dream was like this:
In the depth of his dream he saw a man with a long beard at the headboard of his bed; he was wearing round shoes with large laces on top, large breeches, a long sleeve shirt, pleated at the top, a large collar and a steep hat with large rims. That person leaned over Mr. Bach and said: - The harpsichord that you have now has once belonged to me. It served me many times to entertain my master, King Henry III. When he was very young he composed an Aria with lyrics that he liked to sing and that I played for him many times. He composed the Aria and the lyrics to a woman that he met during a hunting trip and with whom he fell in love. She was kept away from him; people say that she was poisoned and that the King suffered a lot. Every time when he was said he used to sing that song. Then, in order to distract him, I used to play a Sarabande[1] in my harpsichord, that I had created and that he liked very much. I then used to play those two compositions, always one after the other. I will play them for you.
Next the man in the dream approached the harpsichord, played a few chords and sang the Aria with so much feeling that Mr. Bach woke up crying. He lit a candle and check the time; it was 2am. He soon fell asleep again. It is here that the extraordinary begins.
When he woke up in the morning Mr. Bach was surprised by finding a page with the music on the bed, written with a very fine letter and microscopic notes. Since Mr. Bach is short sighted he had great difficulty to read all that and had to utilize a magnifying glass to decipher the scribbles.
A few moments later the successor of Sebastian Bach sat at the piano and executed the music without difficulties. The words and the Sarabande were exactly like the ones that the man in the dream had played for him! But Mr. Bach is not a somnambulist. He had never written a single verse in his entire life and the rules of poetry were totally strange to him. Here a passage of the music that we transcribed from the manuscript. We kept the orthography that, truth be said, is totally unknown to Mr. Bach.
I lost her,
The one I loved so much,
The dream of a lover,
Everyday a new touch,
A new desire.
Without her, life expires!
One day, in a faraway expedition, hunting,
I had that first sight.
An angel on the grounds, I thought!
I was the happiest of the Kings!
I would give my whole kingdom
to hold her once again,
To have her in the little cabin,
From my heart she would feel the rhythm.
Oh! They took her away from me,
Her final days secluded still;
My own life can only be
Bitter; she no longer suffers, no longer feels!
In that crying romantic song, as in the joyful Sarabande that follows, the musical staff is not less archaic than the writing. The clefs are different from those that are used today. The bass is written in one tone and the song in another. Mr. Bach was kind enough to allow me to hear the passages that have a simple, original and penetrating melody. In fact, our readers will soon be able to judge it themselves since they are in the hands of producers that are supposed to have it out with the editor Legouix, at the Boulevard Poissonnière, 27.
The journal Etoile tells us that King Henry III had a great passion for Marie de Cleves, Marquess of Isles, deceased at an early age in an Abby, on October 15th, 1574. Wouldn’t that be the beautiful, sad and secluded lady that the verses mention? The same paper tells us that an Italian musician by the name Baltazzarini came to France in those days and that he was one of the King’s favorites. Had the harpsichord belonged to Baltazzarini? Was the Spirit of Baltazzarini that wrote the Sarabande? A mystery that we dare not investigate!”
Albéric Second
-o-
After the lyrics the Grand Jounal inserted the song that unfortunately we cannot reproduce here. But since it is available for sale those that wish will be able to acquire it. (see Bibliographic News). Mr. Albéric Second finishes his article saying: “A mystery that we dare not investigate!” And why you dare not? That is a fact whose authenticity is demonstrated to you, as you acknowledge it yourself, and because it touches the mysterious life of beyond the grave you dare not search for its cause! You tremble when you face it! Then, despite all that, are you afraid of the apparitions or you fear to find the proofs that not everything ends with the life of the body? It is true that to a skeptical person that sees nothing and believes in nothing beyond the present, such a cause is very difficult to find. However, the more something is strange and seems not to conform to the known laws the more it should lead to analysis or at least raise curiosity.
It is true that certain persons are afraid of seeing very clearly because they would have to accept that they were wrong. Let us see, however, the deductions that every serious person may find in the fact, abstraction made of any Spiritist idea.
Mr. Bach receives an instrument that he attested to be an antique, something that is a reason for great satisfaction on his part. Influenced by that idea it is natural that it provoked a dream. In the dream he sees a man dressed in antique costumes, playing that instrument and singing an Aria of that time; nothing there that, rigorously speaking, cannot be attributed to a super excited imagination by the emotion and memory of the evening, particularly in a musician. But the phenomenon gets complicated here. The melody and the lyrics cannot be a recollection since Mr. Bach did not know them. Who then would have it revealed to Mr. Bach, if the man that he saw was nothing more than a fantasy? It is understandable that a super excited mind may lead to the recollection of forgotten things, but could it bring new ideas; could it teach us things that we did not know, have never learned and with which we have never dealt with? That on itself would be a fact of the highest relevance that deserved be examined because it would be a proof that the Spirit acts, perceives and conceives beyond matter. Let us keep it quiet, if you will. These considerations are of such an elevated and abstract order that not everybody can scrutinize them or not even give some thought to that.
Let us then move to the more material, more positive fact, that is the written song with the staff. Is that the result of imagination? The thing is there, touchable, and visible. Here is the place for an indispensable and scrupulous examination of the circumstances. Before we move further and to avoid hypothetical discussions, let us say that Mr. Bach, who we did not have the honor of knowing before, was kind enough to come to us and bring along the original piece in question. We could then hear from his own mouth all the details necessary to the clarification of the issue, at the time when he also confirmed some points reported by the journal.
Everything that was said about the dream was correct but the paper with the music was not brought to him on that same evening. In the morning of the following day Mr. Bach tried to remember the Aria that he had heard; he sat at the harpsichord and even tried to write the music, although imperfectly. About three weeks later the same individual appeared to him a second time; this time he sang the lyrics and said that he would give him the means of memorizing it. That is when he found the piece of paper on his bed when he woke up. He got up, played the music on the instrument and acknowledged that it was exactly the one he had heard, as well as the lyrics from which he only had a confusing memory. He also recognized the paper that belonged to him. It was a double face common musical paper on which he had written several things himself, in one of the faces. That piece of paper, with many others, was locked away inside a drawer in a desk located in another room of the house. One would have to had it removed from there and brought to his bed while he was asleep. Nobody could have done it in his household as far as he knew it. Who then? That is the terrible mystery that Mr. Albéric Second dare not scrutinize.
He found the Aria written on the clear face of the paper and according to the techniques and method of that time. The words were written with extreme precision, each syllable placed exactly under the corresponding musical note. Everything written with a pencil. The characters are really thin, but very clear and readable. The shape of the characters is typical of manuscripts of that time.
Mr. Bach was not skeptical or materialistic and even less atheist, but like a lot of people, he was in the large rank of the indifferent, not much interested in philosophical things. He only knew Spiritism by name. What he had just experienced got his attention; far from not willing to scrutinize the matter he said to himself: let us investigate it. He read Spiritist books and began to understand it and willing to get more insights into the matter he honored us with his visit. Today the fact is no longer a mystery to him and even seems very natural; besides, he is now very happy with the faith and knowledge that the circumstances led him to acquire. That is what he gained.
He knows perfectly well that neither the music nor the lyrics could have come from him. He had no doubt that they had been dictated to him by the person that had appeared to him; but he asked himself who had actually written them, if that could be him in a somnambulistic state, even if he had never been a somnambulist. That was possible but if it was admitted as such then it would just prove even better the independence of the soul, like every event of that kind; these are very curious and numerous events with which science has never not get involved.
A particular detail seems to destroy that opinion and that is the fact that the handwriting has no relationship with that of Mr. Bach. In a somnambulistic state he would have to change the way he writes regularly and utilize that of the sixteenth century, something that is not plausible. Could that be a prank from someone in his household? Even admitting that hypothesis he guarantees that nobody there has the necessary knowledge to execute that. Well, if he was the one that had the dream and he only had an insufficient recollection to transcribe the words and the music, how come someone strange to all that would have a better memory? The carefully written characters would have required a long time and a great practical skill.
Another important point to clarify was the historical fact of that first passion of the King, not mentioned in history and that inspired such a melancholic music. Mr. Bach’s son asked one of his friends that works at the Imperial Library about the existence of any historical document about it; the answer was that if there was any indication it should be in the Estoile Jounal that was published in those days. The search immediately led to the discovery of the passage reported above. Henry III mother feared that such a woman of a superior soul could exert influence upon her son and had her sent away to be secluded and later on killed. The King did not accept that loss and remained broken heart for his entire life. Isn’t that a remarkable fact that the music refers to an event that was unknown to everybody, and consequently unknown to Mr. Bach, and that later on it was confirmed by a document of those days, hidden in a library?
That circumstance has fundamental importance since it demonstrates in a irrefutable way that the lyrics cannot be authored by Mr. Bach or by anyone else in the house. Every hypothesis of charlatanism falls before such material fact.
Only Spiritism could provide the key to this fact by the knowledge of the law that governs the relationships between the corporeal and the invisible worlds. There is nothing marvelous or super natural there. The whole mystery is in the existence of the invisible world formed by the souls of those that lived on Earth and that do not break their relationships with those that outlived them. Show someone that does not know electricity that one may correspond with someone else hundreds of miles away in a matter of minutes[2] and that will seem miraculous; have that person learned the laws of electricity and it will become natural. That is what happens to the Spiritist phenomena.
In a session of the Spiritist Society of Paris in which Mr. Bach was present, the Spirit that had appeared to him gave the following explanations about the events that we have just reported.
Spiritist Society of Paris, June 9th, 1865 – Medium Mr. Morin
Question to the spiritual guide to the medium – Can we call the Spirit that manifested to Mr. Bach?
Answer – My son, the serious issue raised by that spontaneous manifestation is very natural. Starting this evening it must be resolved so that there will not be doubt remaining about the way the music was made. The Spirit is here and will respond very clearly to the questions addressed to him.
Q – (to the Spirit that manifested to Mr. Bach) Considering that you wanted to come to us, anticipating our appeal, we would be grateful if you could give us explanations about the event that took place with your intervention. We also would like to know why Mr. Bach was chosen for the manifestation and what was his participation in the phenomenon.
A. – Thank you for your benevolence and for having me with you. I understand the importance you give to this fact; however, you must not be surprised since such kind of phenomenon is today almost generally spread and known by many people. To begin with I answer your first question. Mr. Bach was chosen for two reasons: first the sympathy that unites us; the second is totally in the interest of the Spiritist Doctrine. Given his position in the world, his age and long career honorably accomplished, his relationships with the press and the educated society made him the best instrument to give publicity to events that only the Spiritist press gives publicity. You were told many times that there would come a time when Spiritism would conquer its right to citizenship wherever there is reason, logic and common sense, being accepted even in journals that have denigrated it. Regarding the second question: Yes, you are right to seek the answer so that you avoid misunderstandings. The contribution – it is about contribution – has been made and it had the participation of the Spirit (me) and Mr. Bach, in the pure dream and in relation to the Spirits only.
Note: This last phrase has its explanation in the article that follows about dreams
I brought the piece of paper to Mr. Bach after taking it from a piece of furniture adjacent to his bedroom and the music was written by Mr. Bach himself that used his own body as a means of transmission. I wrote the words since I knew them, and the work may then be considered completely spiritual since Mr. Bach, in his dream, was almost completely dematerialized.
Q. – Any person that is a medium could have served in that case? A. – Certainly not because if Mr. Bach did not have the required skills it is likely that both of us would not have been chosen for that propagation.
Q. – How did Mr. Bach utilized his own body to write the music? Did he do that in somnambulistic state? A. – I said that he used his own body as a means of transmission because his is still incarnate and cannot act like a discarnate Spirit. An incarnate Spirit can only utilize the limbs and not the perispirit since it is the perispirit itself that keeps the Spirit bonded to the body.
Q. – Can you tell us who composed the lyrics? A. – If I had been the one I have a good dose of pride to keep the honor, but no. I clearly explained it saying that I knew the words. Those words as well as the music are really the composition and inspiration of my then master King Henry.
Q. – Would that be an indiscretion to ask you about your personality and to tell us what was your position under Henry III? A. – There is no indiscretion as long as there is general interest. I respond by saying that I left my homeland, Florence, coming to France and was introduced to the court by a princess that heard me singing and wanted to please the still infant, making him hear the poor minstrel. There was so much pleasure that they decided to have me at his disposal and I spent a long time by his side as a musician, but in reality, I was a friend that he liked a lot and that felt good with me. The fact that I died before him made me see how much he was attached based on his grief with the loss. My name was mentioned here: I was Baltazzarini.
Mrs. Delanne was present at the session and received identical answers given to Mr. Morin by hearing. The next day she wrote the communication below in her house that confirms and complements that of Baltazzarini:
“When the time is right God employs all means to have the divine science penetrating the layers of Society. Regardless of the opinion that one may have about the new ideas, each one must serve the cause, even if in spite of oneself, in the place where each one is placed. Since the Spirit of Mr. Bach lived in the domains of Henry III and personally related to the King as a close friend, he liked very much to hear those verses and in particular the music. The harpsichord was his favorite instrument. That is why the Spirit of Baltazzarini appeared to him and used that instrument to bring the Spirit of Bach back to the time in which he lived and to show him, as to science, that the doctrine of reincarnation is everyday confirmed by new proofs. The music alone would not have been sufficient to bring Mr. Bach to light immediately. He needed a phenomenon that he could not explain on his own, an entirely unconscious participation. He must promote the doctrine by telling this story, seeking to understand the means by which it was produced, asking the help of the minds that like him seek the truth. His respectable age, honorable position and reputation in the world and in literature, he is one of the first milestones planted in the rebellious world, considering his trustworthy good-faith; he cannot be taken by a mad person or have the authenticity of the manifestation denied. Besides, rest assured that all this happened by design. As you can see the press abstained from commenting and yet the article was produced by a non-believer, a jester of science that is the only one that could give a plausible explanation for the fact. God has his own points of view; he sows the divine see onto the hearts when he thinks it is appropriate. This event shall have more repercussion than you think. Work always quietly and wait confidently.
We have told you many times; at the right time and place God will solicit people and events that will lift the obstacles and give you the confirmation that the bases of the doctrine have received the sanction of the Spirit of Truth. Spiritism grows and expands; the branches of the gigantic and blessed tree reach out all over the globe. Spiritism daily conquers new followers in all classes and new phalanxes come to join the ranks of the discarnate. The more difficult your work becomes the greater the assistance of the good Spirits.
St. Benedict”
[1] A dance music in triple metric (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarabande)
[2] Reference to the newly developed telegraph, in the first part of the nineteenth century (TN)
Gontran, the Winner of Chantilly’s Races
The fact below, as well as the song of Henry III that we reported above, is equally published in the Grand Journal of June 4th, 1865, forming one single article signed by Albéric Second.
“Those that give us the honor of reading our material know, no doubt, that we profess a radical skepticism about Spiritism, the Spiritists and the mediums. – Show me the facts, we asked those that struggled to convert us to their theories and doctrines. Since none was given we persisted in the denial and mockery.
Before we start the one that signs these chronicles is a writer in good-faith. Therefore, one does not want to light a lamp and put it under the bowl. Each one must make their own conclusions, and that is not anyone’s problem. Like the president of a court, one should reproduce the facts in a quick and impartial summary, leaving to the readers the work of pronouncing the verdict at will.”
After this preamble of an honest man, as we wished were all of our adversaries, the author tells a story, in a very peculiar and typical way, of one of his friends that was in the house of a medium, then asking the Spirit if he could indicate who was going to be the winner of the races in Chantilly. The lady medium was, according to him, a recently arrived peasant from the mountains of Jura, meaning that she was not much educated and not at all into that kind of sport; she evoked the Spirit of one of our renowned sportsman and obtained, through knocks, the designation of the letters forming the name Gontran.
“Those that give us the honor of reading our material know, no doubt, that we profess a radical skepticism about Spiritism, the Spiritists and the mediums. – Show me the facts, we asked those that struggled to convert us to their theories and doctrines. Since none was given we persisted in the denial and mockery.
Before we start the one that signs these chronicles is a writer in good-faith. Therefore, one does not want to light a lamp and put it under the bowl. Each one must make their own conclusions, and that is not anyone’s problem. Like the president of a court, one should reproduce the facts in a quick and impartial summary, leaving to the readers the work of pronouncing the verdict at will.”
After this preamble of an honest man, as we wished were all of our adversaries, the author tells a story, in a very peculiar and typical way, of one of his friends that was in the house of a medium, then asking the Spirit if he could indicate who was going to be the winner of the races in Chantilly. The lady medium was, according to him, a recently arrived peasant from the mountains of Jura, meaning that she was not much educated and not at all into that kind of sport; she evoked the Spirit of one of our renowned sportsman and obtained, through knocks, the designation of the letters forming the name Gontran.
- Is there a horse with that name among the competitors? Mr. Albéric Second asked.
- To tell you the truth, his friend responded, I don’t know but if there is one you can count on it I will place my bet.
“Well, last Sunday was May 28th. The Derby of Chantilly took place and the winner was Gontran, from the stud of Major Fridolin (pseudo name of Messrs. Charles Laffitte and Nivière).
These facts are widely known by a large number of people in the world of gambling. Mr. Emile T. was generously compensated by the result and his absolute trust in the prediction of the peasant of Jura, and his friends that share his faith made also good profit. When I think that this servant of yours lost such a rare occasion of easily winning 1,000-1,5000 francs that would have been welcomed! Isn’t that stupid?”
Events of that kind are not the best ones to support the cause of Spiritism, first because they are very rare and second because they would deceive its principle, leading people to believe that mediumship is a means of foretelling.
If such an idea deserved credit a multitude of people would be seeing consulting the Spirits, as people do with the cards, and the mediums would be transformed in fortune tellers! That would give others reason to invoke the law of Moses that expels the “foretellers, the enchanters and those that have the Spirit of Piton”. It is for the sake of avoid such serious inconvenient that would tremendously harmful to the doctrine that we always stand against the exploitation of mediumship.
We will not repeat here what has been said hundreds of times and amply developed about the disturbance that the knowledge of the future would cause, a knowledge that is hidden from mankind by the divine wisdom. Spiritism is not destined to reveal it. The Spirits come to make us better and not to reveal or indicate means of making money with certainty and without risks, as the hero of the adventure says, or to get involved in our material interests, placed by the divine Providence under the protection of our own intelligence, prudence, reason and activity. Therefore, all those that by a premediated design, believe to find in Spiritism a new element of speculation, at any given denomination, are mistaken. The ridiculous mystifications, and sometimes bankruptcy instead of fortune, are the fruit of their mistake. That is what every serious Spiritist must strive to propagate, if willing to serve the cause with utility. We have said many times that those that aspire to obtain fortune with the support of the Spirits, under the articulated pretext that the confirmation of such an event would convert everybody into believers, if successful they would throw a mortal blow against the doctrine, exciting greed instead of love for the good. That is why the attempts to achieve that kind of thing, encouraged by mystifying Spirits, have always been followed by frustration.
A few years back someone wrote to us from Hamburg saying that he had lost everything in gambling and that since he was broken he had the idea of asking a Spirit that gave him a number in which he bet his last mark and won, and that helped him out of the hardship. The person asked us to have the fact published in the Spiritist Review, as a proof of the intervention of the Spirits. Supposing the action of a Spirit the person did not see the lesson that was given by the simple fact that he was given the means of going away and be relieved from difficulty. In reality it is a very poor judgment of ourselves or the assumption that we are really stupid to be capable of utilizing similar tactics to promote the doctrine because that would certainly favor the casinos but not Spiritism. It would be interesting to see us making apology of the Spirits favoring gamblers, and in particular deception, because winning with certainty with biased cards or by the indication of someone is a true fraud.
An individual that was not Spiritist, we must promptly say, but that absolutely did not deny the intervention of the Spirits, one day came to us with the following unique proposal:
“The casinos are profoundly immoral; a way of extinguishing them is to demonstrate that one can safely fight them. I found through a new combination an infallible way of destroying them all. When they are ruined and incapable of fighting back they will be forced to close and the world will be free from this ulcer that is the organized crime. But for that we need certain capital that I am far from having. Could you perhaps point me to someone that can help, with the support of the Spirits? Imagine the result of that when everybody finds out that such a great achievement was done with the help of the Spirits! Who could doubt it? The most skeptical and non-believers would give in to evidence. As you see, my objective is honorable, and I would not complain if I had the advice of the Spirits to obtain such combination.”
Without consulting the Spirits, I can tell you their opinion. Here is what they would tell you: “You believe that winning in the casinos is illicit and an organized crime. To remediate the evil, you want an infallible way to get that bad money. In other words, you want to steal from the thieve, and that is not more honorable. We have another means of reaching the same result that you propose: Instead of making the gamblers win let us lead them to bankruptcy, so that they are broken. The disasters caused by that vice would lead to more casinos being closed than one could do with happier gamblers. It is the excess of evilness that opens the eyes and leads to healthy transformation, here as in everything else. To promote the belief in Spiritism we equally have more efficient ways, and particularly more honorable; it is the good that it does, the consolations that it promotes and the courage that it gives to the unfortunate ones. This is what we say to all those that wish the progress of the doctrine: Do you want to be useful to the cause and make a truly positive propaganda? Show that Spiritism made you better; by seeing you as a changed person, let them say: it is a miracle of that doctrine; hence must be a good thing. However, if in addition to your profession of faith, they see you always addicted, ambitions, hateful, greedy, envious and senseless, they will give reason to those that ask what is Spiritism for? The true propaganda of an essentially moral doctrine is done by touching the hearts and not the wallets. That is why we favor some and frustrate the calculations of others.”
Let us return to Gontran. Facts of predictions of that kind, although real, are nonetheless very rare and may be considered exceptional; they are in fact always serendipitous and never the result of a premeditated calculation. When they do happen, they must be seen as isolated events, but someone that would really trust such accomplishment would be mad and truly unwise.
One must not confound that kind of revelation with the predictions that sometimes the Spirits make about great events of the future, whose realization they may make us present in the general interest. That has its utility to keep us vigilant and to lead us to the good path. But predictions with certain dates or with a character of high accuracy must be considered suspicious.
In the case mentioned above the little fact had a utility; it was a means, perhaps the only one capable of calling peoples’ attention to the Spirits and their intervention in the world, much more than through a serious event; that is needed to all characters. Among them some would have said: “That was impressive”. But others may have wanted to scrutinize the thing and would have found the serious side and the one that is really useful. Even if the latter accounted for ten percent of them, these would be new elements of gain and propaganda. As for the others, the idea that was sowed in their souls will germinate one day.
By reporting the fact that had great publicity we only wanted to point out to its consequences, but we would not have done so without comments and simply as an anecdote. Spiritism is an inextinguishable mine of issues, observations and study due to its uncountable application.
The author says in the preamble: “Show us the facts”. He undoubtedly thinks that the Spirits obey our orders and that the phenomena are obtained at will, like the experiments in a laboratory or magic tricks. Well, that is not the case. The one that wishes phenomena must not ask for them but seek them, personally observe them and accept those that are presented to them. Those phenomena are of two kinds: those that are produced by the mediums themselves and that may be provoked, at certain extent, and the spontaneous phenomena. To the skeptical the latter ones have the advantage of not being suspicious of preparation; these occur in large number and in an infinite variety of types, as in: apparitions, visions, presentiments, double sight, strange noises, disturbances, obsessions, etc. The case of Mr. Bach belongs to this category and that of Gontran to the first one. For those that sincerely want to be convinced there is no lack of events and those that request them, perhaps more than once, may have witnessed them unnoticeably; to the majority of people, though, the mistake is in the desire of wanting something to occur their way, at a scheduled time and not to be content with those that the Providence places before their eyes. The uncertainty in the occurrence of the phenomena and the impossibility of provoking them at will are the proofs of their reality, because if they were the product of charlatanism or fraud they would never fail.
It is patience and good will that certain persons lack and not facts when seeking and studying the ones that do occur.
These facts are widely known by a large number of people in the world of gambling. Mr. Emile T. was generously compensated by the result and his absolute trust in the prediction of the peasant of Jura, and his friends that share his faith made also good profit. When I think that this servant of yours lost such a rare occasion of easily winning 1,000-1,5000 francs that would have been welcomed! Isn’t that stupid?”
Events of that kind are not the best ones to support the cause of Spiritism, first because they are very rare and second because they would deceive its principle, leading people to believe that mediumship is a means of foretelling.
If such an idea deserved credit a multitude of people would be seeing consulting the Spirits, as people do with the cards, and the mediums would be transformed in fortune tellers! That would give others reason to invoke the law of Moses that expels the “foretellers, the enchanters and those that have the Spirit of Piton”. It is for the sake of avoid such serious inconvenient that would tremendously harmful to the doctrine that we always stand against the exploitation of mediumship.
We will not repeat here what has been said hundreds of times and amply developed about the disturbance that the knowledge of the future would cause, a knowledge that is hidden from mankind by the divine wisdom. Spiritism is not destined to reveal it. The Spirits come to make us better and not to reveal or indicate means of making money with certainty and without risks, as the hero of the adventure says, or to get involved in our material interests, placed by the divine Providence under the protection of our own intelligence, prudence, reason and activity. Therefore, all those that by a premediated design, believe to find in Spiritism a new element of speculation, at any given denomination, are mistaken. The ridiculous mystifications, and sometimes bankruptcy instead of fortune, are the fruit of their mistake. That is what every serious Spiritist must strive to propagate, if willing to serve the cause with utility. We have said many times that those that aspire to obtain fortune with the support of the Spirits, under the articulated pretext that the confirmation of such an event would convert everybody into believers, if successful they would throw a mortal blow against the doctrine, exciting greed instead of love for the good. That is why the attempts to achieve that kind of thing, encouraged by mystifying Spirits, have always been followed by frustration.
A few years back someone wrote to us from Hamburg saying that he had lost everything in gambling and that since he was broken he had the idea of asking a Spirit that gave him a number in which he bet his last mark and won, and that helped him out of the hardship. The person asked us to have the fact published in the Spiritist Review, as a proof of the intervention of the Spirits. Supposing the action of a Spirit the person did not see the lesson that was given by the simple fact that he was given the means of going away and be relieved from difficulty. In reality it is a very poor judgment of ourselves or the assumption that we are really stupid to be capable of utilizing similar tactics to promote the doctrine because that would certainly favor the casinos but not Spiritism. It would be interesting to see us making apology of the Spirits favoring gamblers, and in particular deception, because winning with certainty with biased cards or by the indication of someone is a true fraud.
An individual that was not Spiritist, we must promptly say, but that absolutely did not deny the intervention of the Spirits, one day came to us with the following unique proposal:
“The casinos are profoundly immoral; a way of extinguishing them is to demonstrate that one can safely fight them. I found through a new combination an infallible way of destroying them all. When they are ruined and incapable of fighting back they will be forced to close and the world will be free from this ulcer that is the organized crime. But for that we need certain capital that I am far from having. Could you perhaps point me to someone that can help, with the support of the Spirits? Imagine the result of that when everybody finds out that such a great achievement was done with the help of the Spirits! Who could doubt it? The most skeptical and non-believers would give in to evidence. As you see, my objective is honorable, and I would not complain if I had the advice of the Spirits to obtain such combination.”
Without consulting the Spirits, I can tell you their opinion. Here is what they would tell you: “You believe that winning in the casinos is illicit and an organized crime. To remediate the evil, you want an infallible way to get that bad money. In other words, you want to steal from the thieve, and that is not more honorable. We have another means of reaching the same result that you propose: Instead of making the gamblers win let us lead them to bankruptcy, so that they are broken. The disasters caused by that vice would lead to more casinos being closed than one could do with happier gamblers. It is the excess of evilness that opens the eyes and leads to healthy transformation, here as in everything else. To promote the belief in Spiritism we equally have more efficient ways, and particularly more honorable; it is the good that it does, the consolations that it promotes and the courage that it gives to the unfortunate ones. This is what we say to all those that wish the progress of the doctrine: Do you want to be useful to the cause and make a truly positive propaganda? Show that Spiritism made you better; by seeing you as a changed person, let them say: it is a miracle of that doctrine; hence must be a good thing. However, if in addition to your profession of faith, they see you always addicted, ambitions, hateful, greedy, envious and senseless, they will give reason to those that ask what is Spiritism for? The true propaganda of an essentially moral doctrine is done by touching the hearts and not the wallets. That is why we favor some and frustrate the calculations of others.”
Let us return to Gontran. Facts of predictions of that kind, although real, are nonetheless very rare and may be considered exceptional; they are in fact always serendipitous and never the result of a premeditated calculation. When they do happen, they must be seen as isolated events, but someone that would really trust such accomplishment would be mad and truly unwise.
One must not confound that kind of revelation with the predictions that sometimes the Spirits make about great events of the future, whose realization they may make us present in the general interest. That has its utility to keep us vigilant and to lead us to the good path. But predictions with certain dates or with a character of high accuracy must be considered suspicious.
In the case mentioned above the little fact had a utility; it was a means, perhaps the only one capable of calling peoples’ attention to the Spirits and their intervention in the world, much more than through a serious event; that is needed to all characters. Among them some would have said: “That was impressive”. But others may have wanted to scrutinize the thing and would have found the serious side and the one that is really useful. Even if the latter accounted for ten percent of them, these would be new elements of gain and propaganda. As for the others, the idea that was sowed in their souls will germinate one day.
By reporting the fact that had great publicity we only wanted to point out to its consequences, but we would not have done so without comments and simply as an anecdote. Spiritism is an inextinguishable mine of issues, observations and study due to its uncountable application.
The author says in the preamble: “Show us the facts”. He undoubtedly thinks that the Spirits obey our orders and that the phenomena are obtained at will, like the experiments in a laboratory or magic tricks. Well, that is not the case. The one that wishes phenomena must not ask for them but seek them, personally observe them and accept those that are presented to them. Those phenomena are of two kinds: those that are produced by the mediums themselves and that may be provoked, at certain extent, and the spontaneous phenomena. To the skeptical the latter ones have the advantage of not being suspicious of preparation; these occur in large number and in an infinite variety of types, as in: apparitions, visions, presentiments, double sight, strange noises, disturbances, obsessions, etc. The case of Mr. Bach belongs to this category and that of Gontran to the first one. For those that sincerely want to be convinced there is no lack of events and those that request them, perhaps more than once, may have witnessed them unnoticeably; to the majority of people, though, the mistake is in the desire of wanting something to occur their way, at a scheduled time and not to be content with those that the Providence places before their eyes. The uncertainty in the occurrence of the phenomena and the impossibility of provoking them at will are the proofs of their reality, because if they were the product of charlatanism or fraud they would never fail.
It is patience and good will that certain persons lack and not facts when seeking and studying the ones that do occur.
Theory About Dreams
It is really strange that such a vulgar phenomenon such as the dreams have been the object of such indifference from the part of science and that we are still asking ourselves about the causes of such visions. The issue is not solved when someone says that they are the result of imagination; this is one of those words that are used to explain something that is not understood and that remains unexplained. Nonetheless, imagination is the result of knowledge. Well, since imagination cannot be admitted in brute matter, it must follow that the soul has some role in that. If the dreams are still a mystery to science it is for the fact that science has adamantly closed its eyes to their spiritual cause.
The soul is sought in the intricacies of the brain while it stands before us constantly, free and independent, in a number of phenomena that go inexplicable by the laws of matter, notably in the dreams, natural and induced somnambulism and in the double vision; they are not necessarily in the rare and subtle phenomena that require painstaking research from scholars and philosophers but rather in the most vulgar phenomena.
The soul is right there, seemingly saying: Look and see me; I am here before your eyes and yet you cannot see; I am with you every day; children can see me; the wise man and the most ignorant person see me but you do not acknowledge that!
There are people, however, that seem to be afraid of facing it and finding the proof of its existence. As for those that seek it in good faith they have so far missed the only key that could have it unveiled to them. That key has just been given to them by Spiritism in revealing the laws that govern the relationships between the corporeal and spiritual world. With the help of that law and with the observations that support it, Spiritism provides the most logical and never before given explanation. It demonstrates that the dreams, somnambulism, the double vision, presentiment, intuition of the future and the mind reading are not but variants and degrees of the same principle: the emancipation of the soul, more or less detached from matter.
Regarding the dreams, has Spiritism given precise explanations about all varieties that do exist? No. Not yet. We have the principle and that is a lot already. The ones that can be explained will give us the lead for the others; some elements are certainly still missing but those will be acquired later. There is not a single science that has explained everything from the beginning with their consequences and applications; it is only through successive observations that they can be complemented.
Spiritism was born yesterday and like in Chemistry, it is still in the hands of its Lavoisier and Berthollet, its initiators; they found the fundamental laws; the first landmarks led to further discoveries.
There are some dreams whose positive character cannot rationally be attributed to a simple game of imagination; those are dreams that find their proofs when wakening and that people were not absolutely thinking about before. The most difficult to explain are those that present incoherent, fantastic and unrealistic images. A more thorough investigation of the singular phenomenon of fluidic creations will undoubtedly give us the direction. While we wait, here a theory that seems to move us a step ahead in the subject. We do not provide it as the absolute truth but founded in logic and that can be submitted to a study. It was given to us by one of our best mediums in a somnambulistic but lucid state, during the following occurrence:
“A mother had asked him to provide her with news about her daughter that was in Lyon; he saw her lying down, asleep, and described with great accuracy the apartment where she was. The seventeen-year-old young lady is a writing medium; her mother asked him if she had the ability to become a clairvoyant medium; Wait, the somnambulistic medium said, I need to follow the wake left by her Spirit that at this point in time is not with the body. She is here, at Ville Ségur, in this room where we are, attracted by your thoughts; she sees and hears us. To her it is a dream that she will not remember when she wakes up.
We can divide the dreams in three categories, he adds, characterized by the degree of recollection that remains in the state of detachment of the Spirit. These are:
The soul is sought in the intricacies of the brain while it stands before us constantly, free and independent, in a number of phenomena that go inexplicable by the laws of matter, notably in the dreams, natural and induced somnambulism and in the double vision; they are not necessarily in the rare and subtle phenomena that require painstaking research from scholars and philosophers but rather in the most vulgar phenomena.
The soul is right there, seemingly saying: Look and see me; I am here before your eyes and yet you cannot see; I am with you every day; children can see me; the wise man and the most ignorant person see me but you do not acknowledge that!
There are people, however, that seem to be afraid of facing it and finding the proof of its existence. As for those that seek it in good faith they have so far missed the only key that could have it unveiled to them. That key has just been given to them by Spiritism in revealing the laws that govern the relationships between the corporeal and spiritual world. With the help of that law and with the observations that support it, Spiritism provides the most logical and never before given explanation. It demonstrates that the dreams, somnambulism, the double vision, presentiment, intuition of the future and the mind reading are not but variants and degrees of the same principle: the emancipation of the soul, more or less detached from matter.
Regarding the dreams, has Spiritism given precise explanations about all varieties that do exist? No. Not yet. We have the principle and that is a lot already. The ones that can be explained will give us the lead for the others; some elements are certainly still missing but those will be acquired later. There is not a single science that has explained everything from the beginning with their consequences and applications; it is only through successive observations that they can be complemented.
Spiritism was born yesterday and like in Chemistry, it is still in the hands of its Lavoisier and Berthollet, its initiators; they found the fundamental laws; the first landmarks led to further discoveries.
There are some dreams whose positive character cannot rationally be attributed to a simple game of imagination; those are dreams that find their proofs when wakening and that people were not absolutely thinking about before. The most difficult to explain are those that present incoherent, fantastic and unrealistic images. A more thorough investigation of the singular phenomenon of fluidic creations will undoubtedly give us the direction. While we wait, here a theory that seems to move us a step ahead in the subject. We do not provide it as the absolute truth but founded in logic and that can be submitted to a study. It was given to us by one of our best mediums in a somnambulistic but lucid state, during the following occurrence:
“A mother had asked him to provide her with news about her daughter that was in Lyon; he saw her lying down, asleep, and described with great accuracy the apartment where she was. The seventeen-year-old young lady is a writing medium; her mother asked him if she had the ability to become a clairvoyant medium; Wait, the somnambulistic medium said, I need to follow the wake left by her Spirit that at this point in time is not with the body. She is here, at Ville Ségur, in this room where we are, attracted by your thoughts; she sees and hears us. To her it is a dream that she will not remember when she wakes up.
We can divide the dreams in three categories, he adds, characterized by the degree of recollection that remains in the state of detachment of the Spirit. These are:
- Dreams that are provoked by the action of matter and the senses upon the Spirit, that is, those in which the physical organization plays a dominant role by the intimate connection between body and Spirit. We remember them clearly, and however little developed ones’ memory may be, we keep a lasting impression of them;
- Dreams that could be called mixed. Matter and Spirit take simultaneous part in them. The detachment is more complete. We remember them when we wake up to almost immediately forget, unless a given particularity excites our memory;
- The ethereal or purely spiritual dreams. These are only the product of the Spirit that is detached from matter as much as it is possible to life in the body. We do not remember or if much we have a slight memory of the dream and nothing could unveil the details of the dream.
The current dream of the young lady belongs to this third category. She will not remember. She was brought here by a very well-known Spirit of the Spiritist world of Lyon, and even of the Spiritist world of Europe – the somnambulistic medium then describes the Spirit Cáritas. The Spirit brought her with the objective of allowing her to keep a presentiment of the good that she can find in a firm, pure and sacred belief, and the good she can do to others, by doing it to herself. She tells her mother that if she remembered her preceding incarnations as well as she can do it now she would not remain much longer in the stationary state in which she is right now because she sees clearly and can advance without hesitation, whereas in the ordinary state we are like blindfolded. She tells the audience: - Thank you for your concern with me. She then kisses her mom. She feels happy – the medium adds at the end. She feels happy in this dream that she will not remember but that will leave her with a nice impression!”
These are the unconscious dreams from which we keep undefinable sensations of happiness and joy and that we cannot explain and that are a presentiment of what happy Spirits feel.
It turns out that the incarnate Spirit may suffer transformations that change their aptitudes. There is something that may not have been sufficiently observed and that supports the theory above. It is a known fact that one of the features of somnambulism is the forgetfulness of the dream. From the first level of lucidity the Spirit sometimes moves to another more elevated degree that is not ecstasy, and in which acquires new ideas and more subtle perceptions. When returning from such a level to the first level the Spirit does not remember what was said or seen. From this level to the wake state there is more memory loss. It is remarkable that there is some memory from the superior to the inferior level whereas there is almost no memory from the inferior to the superior level. It is then evident that between the two somnambulistic states that we just mentioned there is something analogous between the states of vigil and the first degree of lucidity. One could say that from the state of vigil to the first degree the Spirit has a veil removed from the eyes and that from the first to the second degree the Spirit has a second veil removed. At the superior levels the Spirit, now without those veils, sees and remember what is below; going down the levels the veils are recovered successively thus hiding what is above and the memory is lost. Sometimes the magnetizer (hypnotizer) may dissipate that fluidic veil and recover the memory.
As it can be seen, there is a strong analogy between these two somnambulistic states and the different categories of dream described above. It seems to us that it is more than likely that in one case as in the other the Spirit is in a similar situation. At each degree above the misty layer dissipates and the vision is clearer.
These are the unconscious dreams from which we keep undefinable sensations of happiness and joy and that we cannot explain and that are a presentiment of what happy Spirits feel.
It turns out that the incarnate Spirit may suffer transformations that change their aptitudes. There is something that may not have been sufficiently observed and that supports the theory above. It is a known fact that one of the features of somnambulism is the forgetfulness of the dream. From the first level of lucidity the Spirit sometimes moves to another more elevated degree that is not ecstasy, and in which acquires new ideas and more subtle perceptions. When returning from such a level to the first level the Spirit does not remember what was said or seen. From this level to the wake state there is more memory loss. It is remarkable that there is some memory from the superior to the inferior level whereas there is almost no memory from the inferior to the superior level. It is then evident that between the two somnambulistic states that we just mentioned there is something analogous between the states of vigil and the first degree of lucidity. One could say that from the state of vigil to the first degree the Spirit has a veil removed from the eyes and that from the first to the second degree the Spirit has a second veil removed. At the superior levels the Spirit, now without those veils, sees and remember what is below; going down the levels the veils are recovered successively thus hiding what is above and the memory is lost. Sometimes the magnetizer (hypnotizer) may dissipate that fluidic veil and recover the memory.
As it can be seen, there is a strong analogy between these two somnambulistic states and the different categories of dream described above. It seems to us that it is more than likely that in one case as in the other the Spirit is in a similar situation. At each degree above the misty layer dissipates and the vision is clearer.
Questions and Issues
Moral healing of the incarnate
We frequently see Spirits of a really bad nature yielding promptly under a moralizing influence and becoming better. Can we act upon the incarnate in a similar fashion but with more work? Why is it that the moral education of the incarnate is easier than that of the incarnate?
This question was raised by the following fact. A young man that had been blind for twelve years had been sheltered by a devout Spiritist that had endeavored to have him cured by magnetization since the Spirits had said that it was possible. But the young man, instead of showing recognition by the goodness of others and without which he would have gone without shelter and bread, was only ingratitude and bad behavior, giving proofs of the worst character. The Spirit of St. Louis was consulted about it and gave the following answer:
“This young man, like many others, is punished where he sinned and endures the punishment of his own bad behavior. His illness is not incurable and a spiritual magnetization with faith and dedication would certainly succeed, supported by a medical treatment necessary to recover his contaminated blood. There should already be a significant improvement in his vision, that is not completely extinct, if the good fluids were not opposed by the saturation of bad fluids around him, that in a way repel them. In his current condition the magnetic action will be powerless while he does not get rid of those harmful fluids by himself. Hence, he needs a moral healing before a physical one is sought. The only thing that can make his magnetic treatment successful is a change in his behavior, supported by the good Spirits. The flip side of that is that he may lose the remaining light that he has and be subjected to new and terrible tests. Do to him what you do to the bad and discarnate Spirits that you want to bring to the good path. He is not under the influence of an obsession; his own nature is bad, and he got perverted in the environment where he lived. The bad Spirits that harass him are only attracted with their similarities. They shall move away as he becomes better. It is only then that the magnetic action will be efficient. Give him advices; explain his position; may several heartful and good people unite and pray for him, attracting good influences upon him. If he takes advantage of that he will soon feel the good effects because he shall be rewarded by a significant improvement in his condition.”
The instruction above shows us an important fact, that is the obstacle imposed by the moral state in certain cases to the cure of physical diseases. The explanation is of an unquestionable logic but that could not be understood by those that only see the exclusive action of matter in all things. In the specific case the moral cure of the patient found serious obstacles; that is what motivated the question at the top, proposed at the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies. Six answers were given, all in perfect agreement with one another. We shall mention only tow to avoid useless repetition. We chose those that gave the issue a more thorough development.
I
Since the discarnate Spirit clearly sees what happens and the terrible examples of life, that Spirit more promptly understands what others say and lead to believe and do, and that is why it is not rare to see discarnate Spirits writing sensible essays about issues that they were far from being touched in life. Hardship matures one’s thoughts. This is a true statement, in particular to the discarnate Spirits that closely see the consequences of their past life.
Carelessness and prejudice, on the contrary, abound among the incarnate Spirits; the seductions and even the misconceptions give them a misanthropy or complete indifference to people and divine things. Flesh makes them forget the soul. Some that are naturally honest people do good, avoiding evilness, for the love of good, but their spiritual life is almost null; others, on the contrary, consider life a comedy and forget their role in humanity; and finally there are those completely blind and in the last degree of mankind, capable of seeing nothing beyond, foreseeing nothing and allowing themselves to live the animal life only, indulging themselves in a life of crime and barbarism, forgetting their own origin. These are dragged by life whereas the discarnate see, listen and voluntarily regret.
Lamennais, medium Mr. A. Didier
II
How many problems and issues to solve before the human transformation takes place according to the Spiritist ideas! Among them, the moral education of the incarnate and discarnate Spirits. The discarnate are free from the material links and no longer suffer their inferior limitations, whereas the incarnate, chained to an unforgiven matter, from a personal point of view, allowing themselves to be carried away by the trials that they must endure. The difference between the two conditions explains the easiness with which the Spirits may get the initiation and advices from those that have such a mission. Matter no longer imposes its laws on them and there is no more means of satisfying their material appetites, and consequently no more unconfessed desires, being then more prone to accept the advices. Perhaps another question may arise, with good reason: Why don’t they hear the advices of their spiritual guides in space, waiting for the teachings of incarnate people? Because it is necessary that both worlds interact, visible and invisible, and that both react on to the other, and that the action of humans be useful to those that lived, as the action of their majority is beneficial to the ones that live among you. It is a double current, double action, equally satisfying to both worlds that go united by so many bonds. That is my answer to your President.
Erastus, medium Mr. d’Ambel
This question was raised by the following fact. A young man that had been blind for twelve years had been sheltered by a devout Spiritist that had endeavored to have him cured by magnetization since the Spirits had said that it was possible. But the young man, instead of showing recognition by the goodness of others and without which he would have gone without shelter and bread, was only ingratitude and bad behavior, giving proofs of the worst character. The Spirit of St. Louis was consulted about it and gave the following answer:
“This young man, like many others, is punished where he sinned and endures the punishment of his own bad behavior. His illness is not incurable and a spiritual magnetization with faith and dedication would certainly succeed, supported by a medical treatment necessary to recover his contaminated blood. There should already be a significant improvement in his vision, that is not completely extinct, if the good fluids were not opposed by the saturation of bad fluids around him, that in a way repel them. In his current condition the magnetic action will be powerless while he does not get rid of those harmful fluids by himself. Hence, he needs a moral healing before a physical one is sought. The only thing that can make his magnetic treatment successful is a change in his behavior, supported by the good Spirits. The flip side of that is that he may lose the remaining light that he has and be subjected to new and terrible tests. Do to him what you do to the bad and discarnate Spirits that you want to bring to the good path. He is not under the influence of an obsession; his own nature is bad, and he got perverted in the environment where he lived. The bad Spirits that harass him are only attracted with their similarities. They shall move away as he becomes better. It is only then that the magnetic action will be efficient. Give him advices; explain his position; may several heartful and good people unite and pray for him, attracting good influences upon him. If he takes advantage of that he will soon feel the good effects because he shall be rewarded by a significant improvement in his condition.”
The instruction above shows us an important fact, that is the obstacle imposed by the moral state in certain cases to the cure of physical diseases. The explanation is of an unquestionable logic but that could not be understood by those that only see the exclusive action of matter in all things. In the specific case the moral cure of the patient found serious obstacles; that is what motivated the question at the top, proposed at the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies. Six answers were given, all in perfect agreement with one another. We shall mention only tow to avoid useless repetition. We chose those that gave the issue a more thorough development.
I
Since the discarnate Spirit clearly sees what happens and the terrible examples of life, that Spirit more promptly understands what others say and lead to believe and do, and that is why it is not rare to see discarnate Spirits writing sensible essays about issues that they were far from being touched in life. Hardship matures one’s thoughts. This is a true statement, in particular to the discarnate Spirits that closely see the consequences of their past life.
Carelessness and prejudice, on the contrary, abound among the incarnate Spirits; the seductions and even the misconceptions give them a misanthropy or complete indifference to people and divine things. Flesh makes them forget the soul. Some that are naturally honest people do good, avoiding evilness, for the love of good, but their spiritual life is almost null; others, on the contrary, consider life a comedy and forget their role in humanity; and finally there are those completely blind and in the last degree of mankind, capable of seeing nothing beyond, foreseeing nothing and allowing themselves to live the animal life only, indulging themselves in a life of crime and barbarism, forgetting their own origin. These are dragged by life whereas the discarnate see, listen and voluntarily regret.
Lamennais, medium Mr. A. Didier
II
How many problems and issues to solve before the human transformation takes place according to the Spiritist ideas! Among them, the moral education of the incarnate and discarnate Spirits. The discarnate are free from the material links and no longer suffer their inferior limitations, whereas the incarnate, chained to an unforgiven matter, from a personal point of view, allowing themselves to be carried away by the trials that they must endure. The difference between the two conditions explains the easiness with which the Spirits may get the initiation and advices from those that have such a mission. Matter no longer imposes its laws on them and there is no more means of satisfying their material appetites, and consequently no more unconfessed desires, being then more prone to accept the advices. Perhaps another question may arise, with good reason: Why don’t they hear the advices of their spiritual guides in space, waiting for the teachings of incarnate people? Because it is necessary that both worlds interact, visible and invisible, and that both react on to the other, and that the action of humans be useful to those that lived, as the action of their majority is beneficial to the ones that live among you. It is a double current, double action, equally satisfying to both worlds that go united by so many bonds. That is my answer to your President.
Erastus, medium Mr. d’Ambel
Death of Spiritists
For some time now, death has taken away a large number of devout and keen Spiritists, whose support would have been useful to the cause. Which consequence can be seen from this fact?
This question was motivated by the recent passing of Mr. Geoffroy, from Saint-Jean-d’Angely, honorary member of the Spiritist Society of Paris.
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, May 26th, 1865 – medium Mrs. B…
“As your President has just said, a large number of followers of our beautiful doctrine left your world from a short while ago. Do not be sorry for that. After having contributed with the first pickaxes in this field that you are going to prepare they are now resting for a few hours, preparing themselves for a new task; they are re-seasoning their virile souls in that source of life and progress that must more and more its blessed waves spill upon your Earth. As new athletes, soon they will reappear in the field with more strength and more perfected charity, because the soul that foresaw the splendors of the eternal truth cannot back up; more faithful to the divine attraction, follow their path without further deviation. Ah my friends, the dwelling that is in preparation for you is so beautiful! Free yourselves from those undignified susceptibilities, that are still frequently found among you. These are the remainders of the roots of pride, so difficult to unroot in your world. Nonetheless that is the reason why Christ came to you because there will be no happiness while pride resides in you.
The remarkable doctrine of Christ has been preached to you for eighteen centuries now and it has not been understood yet, but Spiritism, helping you to develop your moral values and giving you good direction, opens up a new era that was still left in the primitive teachings.
You must then study, in a serious and dignified way such a sacred matter, but above all change the imperfections in you because the master told us all: “Become perfect because your father in heavens is perfect”. Your depurated soul will then elevate to the glorious and splendid regions where evil has no place and everything is harmony.”
St. Louis
This question was motivated by the recent passing of Mr. Geoffroy, from Saint-Jean-d’Angely, honorary member of the Spiritist Society of Paris.
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, May 26th, 1865 – medium Mrs. B…
“As your President has just said, a large number of followers of our beautiful doctrine left your world from a short while ago. Do not be sorry for that. After having contributed with the first pickaxes in this field that you are going to prepare they are now resting for a few hours, preparing themselves for a new task; they are re-seasoning their virile souls in that source of life and progress that must more and more its blessed waves spill upon your Earth. As new athletes, soon they will reappear in the field with more strength and more perfected charity, because the soul that foresaw the splendors of the eternal truth cannot back up; more faithful to the divine attraction, follow their path without further deviation. Ah my friends, the dwelling that is in preparation for you is so beautiful! Free yourselves from those undignified susceptibilities, that are still frequently found among you. These are the remainders of the roots of pride, so difficult to unroot in your world. Nonetheless that is the reason why Christ came to you because there will be no happiness while pride resides in you.
The remarkable doctrine of Christ has been preached to you for eighteen centuries now and it has not been understood yet, but Spiritism, helping you to develop your moral values and giving you good direction, opens up a new era that was still left in the primitive teachings.
You must then study, in a serious and dignified way such a sacred matter, but above all change the imperfections in you because the master told us all: “Become perfect because your father in heavens is perfect”. Your depurated soul will then elevate to the glorious and splendid regions where evil has no place and everything is harmony.”
St. Louis
Moral Studies
The commune of Koenigsfeld, model of a future world
The Galneur de Colmar brings the following: “The commune of Koenigsfeld, near Villingen, in the Black Forest, with about 400 inhabitants, forms a miniature model state. For fifty years, since the formation of the commune, there has not been a single event involving any crime or police; there has never been any file suit or legal dispute in the commune. There is no beggar there.”
This interesting news was read at the Parisian Society and gave rise to the following spontaneous communication:
“It is nice to see virtue in a small and poor region; everyone knows everyone there, everyone sees everyone; charity there is simple and great. Isn’t that the most expressive example of universal solidarity given in that little commune? Isn’t that a model of what one day will result from true charity practiced by every human being? Everything comes down to this, Spiritists: charity and tolerance. Among you, with the exception of help to those in need that is practicable, the intelligent relationships are always exempt of envy, hardness and indifference.
Lamennais, medium Mr. A. Didier
What is behind the majority of evil events on Earth other than the permanent contact with bad and perverse people? Egotism kills benevolence, condescendence, indulgence, devotion, selfless affection and every quality that brings enchantment and confidence to social relationships. In a society of egotists nobody is safe because each one will sacrifice the neighbor for their own interests. Many people believe to be perfectly honest because incapable of killing or assaulting anyone in the streets. But the one that for greed or cold blood causes the bankrupt of an individual, leading that person to suicide; that reduces a whole family to misery and despair, isn’t that person worse than a murderer or a thief? A person like that kills with slow fire and since he is not condemned by law and is applauded by his peers for his skills and way of proceeding, that person believes to be exempt from censorship and walks with the head up! Besides, people are always suspicious of one another and life is a never-ending anxiety; if they are not afraid of the sword or poison they are concerned with astuteness, envy, jealousy and calumny, in a word, with a moral assassination. What would take to end such a state of affairs? The practice of charity. Everything comes down to that, as Lamennais says.
The commune of Koenigsfeld offers us a model of a regenerated world? Is it possible to have in large scale what happens in a smaller one? To doubt it would be the same as denying progress. There will come a day when mankind, defeated by the evilness of egotism, will understand that the wrong path is followed and that God wants them to find the right path on their own, because that is the reason for the free-will. The excess of bad will bring the need for good and people will turn to this side as their safe line. Who is going to drive humanity there? The serious faith in the future and not a belief in the nothingness; the trust in a God that is good and merciful and not the fear for the eternal punishments.
Everything is subject to the law of progress; the globes also progress physically and morally; but, if the transformation of humanity must wait for the improvement of the individual; if no force comes to speed up that transformation, how many centuries, how many thousands of years are still needed? Having Earth arrived at one of those progressive phases it will be enough not to allow inferior Spirits to incarnate here and that, at the measure of the extinctions, more advanced Spirits come to take the place of those that leave, so that in one or two generations the general character of humanity may change. Let us then suppose that instead of selfish Spirits humanity is, in a given time, formed by Spirits that embrace the feelings of charity. Instead of harming, they help one another. No more tyrant governs. Instead of judgement, justice and no more revolutions. No more the strong crushing the weak. Voluntary equity in all transactions, and therefore no more disputes and deception. That shall be the state of the world after its transformation. From a world of atonement and trials, from a place of exile to imperfect Spirits to a happy world, a resting place to good souls; from a world of punishment it will become a world of reward.
The commune of Koenigsfeld is formed by advanced Spirits, at least morally, if not scientifically, and that practice the law of charity and love towards their neighbor. Those Spirits gather by sympathy in that small corner of Earth, to leave in peace there, expecting that the same would happen all over the place. Now suppose that some deceiving, selfish and malevolent Spirits come to incarnate here. They will soon sow disturbance and confusion; the rebirth of disputes, processes and crimes. That is what would happen to Earth after its transformation if God opened the gates to the bad Spirits. Once Earth progresses they would be misplaced. That is why they will atone their hardening and be morally re-educated in less advanced worlds.
This interesting news was read at the Parisian Society and gave rise to the following spontaneous communication:
“It is nice to see virtue in a small and poor region; everyone knows everyone there, everyone sees everyone; charity there is simple and great. Isn’t that the most expressive example of universal solidarity given in that little commune? Isn’t that a model of what one day will result from true charity practiced by every human being? Everything comes down to this, Spiritists: charity and tolerance. Among you, with the exception of help to those in need that is practicable, the intelligent relationships are always exempt of envy, hardness and indifference.
Lamennais, medium Mr. A. Didier
What is behind the majority of evil events on Earth other than the permanent contact with bad and perverse people? Egotism kills benevolence, condescendence, indulgence, devotion, selfless affection and every quality that brings enchantment and confidence to social relationships. In a society of egotists nobody is safe because each one will sacrifice the neighbor for their own interests. Many people believe to be perfectly honest because incapable of killing or assaulting anyone in the streets. But the one that for greed or cold blood causes the bankrupt of an individual, leading that person to suicide; that reduces a whole family to misery and despair, isn’t that person worse than a murderer or a thief? A person like that kills with slow fire and since he is not condemned by law and is applauded by his peers for his skills and way of proceeding, that person believes to be exempt from censorship and walks with the head up! Besides, people are always suspicious of one another and life is a never-ending anxiety; if they are not afraid of the sword or poison they are concerned with astuteness, envy, jealousy and calumny, in a word, with a moral assassination. What would take to end such a state of affairs? The practice of charity. Everything comes down to that, as Lamennais says.
The commune of Koenigsfeld offers us a model of a regenerated world? Is it possible to have in large scale what happens in a smaller one? To doubt it would be the same as denying progress. There will come a day when mankind, defeated by the evilness of egotism, will understand that the wrong path is followed and that God wants them to find the right path on their own, because that is the reason for the free-will. The excess of bad will bring the need for good and people will turn to this side as their safe line. Who is going to drive humanity there? The serious faith in the future and not a belief in the nothingness; the trust in a God that is good and merciful and not the fear for the eternal punishments.
Everything is subject to the law of progress; the globes also progress physically and morally; but, if the transformation of humanity must wait for the improvement of the individual; if no force comes to speed up that transformation, how many centuries, how many thousands of years are still needed? Having Earth arrived at one of those progressive phases it will be enough not to allow inferior Spirits to incarnate here and that, at the measure of the extinctions, more advanced Spirits come to take the place of those that leave, so that in one or two generations the general character of humanity may change. Let us then suppose that instead of selfish Spirits humanity is, in a given time, formed by Spirits that embrace the feelings of charity. Instead of harming, they help one another. No more tyrant governs. Instead of judgement, justice and no more revolutions. No more the strong crushing the weak. Voluntary equity in all transactions, and therefore no more disputes and deception. That shall be the state of the world after its transformation. From a world of atonement and trials, from a place of exile to imperfect Spirits to a happy world, a resting place to good souls; from a world of punishment it will become a world of reward.
The commune of Koenigsfeld is formed by advanced Spirits, at least morally, if not scientifically, and that practice the law of charity and love towards their neighbor. Those Spirits gather by sympathy in that small corner of Earth, to leave in peace there, expecting that the same would happen all over the place. Now suppose that some deceiving, selfish and malevolent Spirits come to incarnate here. They will soon sow disturbance and confusion; the rebirth of disputes, processes and crimes. That is what would happen to Earth after its transformation if God opened the gates to the bad Spirits. Once Earth progresses they would be misplaced. That is why they will atone their hardening and be morally re-educated in less advanced worlds.
Varieties
Several spontaneous manifestations
A letter from one of our corresponding members tells this story:
“I begin by a memory of my childhood that I never forgot, although it goes back a long time. Around 1819-20 in Saumur, there was a lot of talk about an apparition to an officer of the guard of that city. The officer was in the house of a distinct family and lied down in the morning to rest, after a whole night on duty. A few hours later he opened the eyes and noticed a shadow in the room, dressing white. He thought it was a prank from one of his comrades and stood up, moving towards the funny guy. The shadow stepped back, slid in the room and disappeared. The door that he had closed not to be disturbed remained locked and a young lady of the household that had been sick for some time had just died at that very moment.
The kind of fantastic event reminded one of his comrades, lieutenant Mr. R…, an extraordinary dream that he had had and that he told the story then. He was in the barrack of Versailles and dreamed that there was a man cutting his throat and collecting the blood in a jar. He woke up at five in the morning and still worried about the dream he went to the cavalry, since he was on duty. Walking on a deserted street he noticed a group of people observing something with great attention. He approached and learned that a man had just killed himself and, behold, he was told that the man had cut his own throat and let the blood leak into a bucket. Mr. R… recognized by the appearance of the man that he was the same that he had seen last night. I only heard about these events and never met any of the officers.
Here some others that are almost personal to me:
My mother was a truly enlightened and devout lady that frequently expressed sincere charity, as required by Spiritism, but without any superstitious or weak mind. On several occasions she told me about a memory of her early days. When she was a young woman she had a sick friend that she used to help by staying by her side part of the evenings. One day she was really tired, and the father of her sick friend insisted that she should go and rest, promising her that if her friend needed he would call her. My mother accepted and went to bed after locking the room. Around two in the morning she was awakened by the contact of two cold fingers on her shoulder. She got really impressed and could no longer sleep. She then got dressed to go and check her dear friend. She was about to open the door when someone knocked from the street. It was a servant that came to tell her that her friend had just died.
One day in 1851 I was browsing the gallery of family pictures in the magnificent castle of C…, led by Dr. B…, a family doctor. I stopped for some time in front of the image of a man, apparently forty something years old, dressed, if I am not wrong, with a blue costume, with red and black stripes and grey pants. Mr. B… approached and said: - That is how I saw Count C…, fifteen days after his death.
I asked for explanation and here is what he said: Fifteen days approximately after the death of Count C…, night was falling when I left the bedroom of the Countess. In order to leave I had to walk through a long corridor that also gave access to the office of the Count C… When I passed that door it opened and Count C… left, came in my direction and walked me out.
Mr. B… attributed that fact to a mere hallucination, but in any case, it should not have lasted long because I believe there was another room to pass at the end of the corridor before the external door.
Finally, this is an event that touches me personally:
Around 1829, I believe, in Hagueneau, Alsace, I was in charge of a patient ward from the large barrack of Strasbourg, then much affected by intermittent fevers. Among the patients there was a young drum player that every evening, after midnight, felt someone sliding on his bed, embracing him and biting his chest near the left nipple. His inmates told me that they were wakened by his screams for eight days now; that approaching him they would find him agitated, scared and were only able to calm him down by passing the sword under his bed to demonstrate to him that there was nobody there or nearby. I found the young soldier with a somewhat swollen and tender chest on the left side and then I attributed his condition to his imagination; but the effect would only take place a few instants every twenty-four hours and always at the same time. I happened a few more times but after that I never heard about that case anymore.”
Observation: It is well-known that events of such a nature are numerous. Spiritism keeps their record because it provides the only possible rational explanation. There are certainly among them some that could be attributed to what is conventionally called hallucination, or a preoccupation of the mind, but they could no longer be considered so when followed by some sort of material effect. The more their authenticity is acknowledged the more important they are and could not be taken by charlatanism, as we said in a preceding article.
“I begin by a memory of my childhood that I never forgot, although it goes back a long time. Around 1819-20 in Saumur, there was a lot of talk about an apparition to an officer of the guard of that city. The officer was in the house of a distinct family and lied down in the morning to rest, after a whole night on duty. A few hours later he opened the eyes and noticed a shadow in the room, dressing white. He thought it was a prank from one of his comrades and stood up, moving towards the funny guy. The shadow stepped back, slid in the room and disappeared. The door that he had closed not to be disturbed remained locked and a young lady of the household that had been sick for some time had just died at that very moment.
The kind of fantastic event reminded one of his comrades, lieutenant Mr. R…, an extraordinary dream that he had had and that he told the story then. He was in the barrack of Versailles and dreamed that there was a man cutting his throat and collecting the blood in a jar. He woke up at five in the morning and still worried about the dream he went to the cavalry, since he was on duty. Walking on a deserted street he noticed a group of people observing something with great attention. He approached and learned that a man had just killed himself and, behold, he was told that the man had cut his own throat and let the blood leak into a bucket. Mr. R… recognized by the appearance of the man that he was the same that he had seen last night. I only heard about these events and never met any of the officers.
Here some others that are almost personal to me:
My mother was a truly enlightened and devout lady that frequently expressed sincere charity, as required by Spiritism, but without any superstitious or weak mind. On several occasions she told me about a memory of her early days. When she was a young woman she had a sick friend that she used to help by staying by her side part of the evenings. One day she was really tired, and the father of her sick friend insisted that she should go and rest, promising her that if her friend needed he would call her. My mother accepted and went to bed after locking the room. Around two in the morning she was awakened by the contact of two cold fingers on her shoulder. She got really impressed and could no longer sleep. She then got dressed to go and check her dear friend. She was about to open the door when someone knocked from the street. It was a servant that came to tell her that her friend had just died.
One day in 1851 I was browsing the gallery of family pictures in the magnificent castle of C…, led by Dr. B…, a family doctor. I stopped for some time in front of the image of a man, apparently forty something years old, dressed, if I am not wrong, with a blue costume, with red and black stripes and grey pants. Mr. B… approached and said: - That is how I saw Count C…, fifteen days after his death.
I asked for explanation and here is what he said: Fifteen days approximately after the death of Count C…, night was falling when I left the bedroom of the Countess. In order to leave I had to walk through a long corridor that also gave access to the office of the Count C… When I passed that door it opened and Count C… left, came in my direction and walked me out.
Mr. B… attributed that fact to a mere hallucination, but in any case, it should not have lasted long because I believe there was another room to pass at the end of the corridor before the external door.
Finally, this is an event that touches me personally:
Around 1829, I believe, in Hagueneau, Alsace, I was in charge of a patient ward from the large barrack of Strasbourg, then much affected by intermittent fevers. Among the patients there was a young drum player that every evening, after midnight, felt someone sliding on his bed, embracing him and biting his chest near the left nipple. His inmates told me that they were wakened by his screams for eight days now; that approaching him they would find him agitated, scared and were only able to calm him down by passing the sword under his bed to demonstrate to him that there was nobody there or nearby. I found the young soldier with a somewhat swollen and tender chest on the left side and then I attributed his condition to his imagination; but the effect would only take place a few instants every twenty-four hours and always at the same time. I happened a few more times but after that I never heard about that case anymore.”
Observation: It is well-known that events of such a nature are numerous. Spiritism keeps their record because it provides the only possible rational explanation. There are certainly among them some that could be attributed to what is conventionally called hallucination, or a preoccupation of the mind, but they could no longer be considered so when followed by some sort of material effect. The more their authenticity is acknowledged the more important they are and could not be taken by charlatanism, as we said in a preceding article.
Spiritist Dissertations
Cardinal Wiseman
The “Patrie” reports the following on March 18, 1865:
“Cardinal Wiseman, that has just passed away in England, believed in Spiritism. This is demonstrated by the event below, cited in the Spiritualist Magazine: A Bishop had banned two members of his church for their tendency towards Spiritism. The Cardinal suspended the ban and allowed the two clergy to continue their studies and operate as mediums, saying: I myself strongly believe in Spiritism and could not be a good member of the Church if slightest in doubt.”
The article above was read and discussed in a Spiritist gathering in Mr. Delanne’s house but people were unsure about the convenience of evoking the Cardinal when he manifested spontaneously by the two communications below.
I
“Your desire to evoke me brought me here and yes, I am glad to come to tell you my dear friends that yes, I was a strong Spiritist believe on Earth. I had come with those aspirations that I could not have developed but I was happy to see them developed on others. I was a Spiritist because Spiritism is the straight path that leads to the true objective and to perfection; I was a Spiritist because I saw the realization of all prophecies in Spiritism, from the beginning of the world up until our days; I was a Spiritist because that doctrine is the development of religion, the clarification of mysteries and the march of whole humanity to God, the unity; I was a Spiritist because I learned that this revelation had come from God and that every serious person should help it to advance so that one day we all can hold each other’s benevolent hands; finally I was a Spiritist because Spiritism casts anathema to nobody and like Jesus Christ, our divine model, it opens its arms to all, without distinction of class or cult. That is why I was a Christian Spiritist.
Ah my beloved brothers! What a huge grace our Lord concedes to mankind by sending them this divine light that opens their eyes, allowing them to irrefutably see that there is for sure life beyond the grave and that, instead of fearing death when one lived according to God’s designs, one should welcome it when it comes to free us from the heavy chains of matter. Yes, that life that constantly is betrayed as horrifying does exist, but it carries nothing painful to the souls that observed the laws of the Lord while on Earth. Yes, there we find those that we loved on Earth; the beloved mother, a kind mother that comes to welcome and congratulate you; friends that come to help you acknowledge yourself, in your true homeland, showing you all the beauties of that true life, that are not more than sad images on Earth. Be perseverant, by beloved friends, in marching on the blessed path of Spiritism; may that not be a vain word to you; may the communications that you receive help you out in climbing the tough Calvary of life so that, when you get at the summit, you can go and harvest the fruits of life that you prepared for yourself. Those are my wishes to all of you that listen to me and to all my brothers in God.
From the one that was Cardinal Wiseman.
Medium Mrs. Delanne.
II
My friends, why wouldn’t I come to you? The feelings I expressed when I was on Earth, and that must be the same to all servants of God and the truth, that must give confidence to every sincere Spiritist, like when I come here by the grace of the Lord to instruct and guide my brothers.
Ah, yes, my friends, I come gladly and thankful to the one to whom we owe everything to exhort you to persevere in this path of struggle, you that were honored to have been admitted amongst the workers of the Lord. That doctrine is, if not the only at least the best one, because if part of humanity may construe their salvation with a blind faith, not falling into the traps and dangers on the way, with even more reason those whose faith are based on reason and on the love of God, that we allow you to see as is, you must conquer that eternal life in the heart of God. My children, bend over and bow your head for your Father blesses you. Glorify and love him in eternity!
Let us pray together.
Wiseman, assisted by St. Augustine. Medium Mr. Erambert, from Aix.
The two communications above were given simultaneously, explaining the assistance of St. Augustine in the last one. While Wiseman had one medium writing, St. Augustine had another one, transmitting the thoughts of the Cardinal. We frequently see less advanced or still confused Spirits that cannot express themselves without the help of a more advanced Spirit; here it is not the same: Wiseman is detached enough to express his own ideas. The two communications that follow were obtained at the Spiritist Society of Paris, on March 24th, without evocation and after reading the preceding messages. The fourth one is an appreciation of the events above by the Spirit Lamennais.
III
“My friends, I come to confirm my communication given on Monday. I am happy to come to a place where I have a lot to say and I am certain I would be well understood. Oh yes, it will be a great satisfaction to me to see the progress of the sacred and regenerative doctrine, developing before the eyes of the Lord, a doctrine that must lead the whole world to its divine destination. Friends, unite your efforts in the task that was assigned to us and be grateful for the role that the Creator of all things assigned to you. You shall never be able to do enough to compensate for the grace you received. But your good will shall be taken into account, with your faith, your charity and love towards your brothers. Bless and love the Lord and you shall have eternal life. Let us pray together, dear friends.
Wiseman, medium Mr. Erambert from Aix.”
IV
“The spiritualist religion is the soul of Christianity, we must not forget. Cardinal Wiseman dared to proclaim the soul before the body, the Spirit before the letter among materialism, Protestant and Catholic faiths. Such a courage is rare in both clergies, an uncommon spectacle, in fact, the Spiritist faith of Cardinal Wiseman. As a matter of fact it would have been strange that such an enlightened Spirit, as elevated as the eminent Cardinal, had seen in Spiritism a rebellious faith to the teachings of the purest Christian moral; we, the Spiritists, would never applaud much such confidence, detached from any human respect and scruple. Isn’t the voice of such distinct and agonizing person an encouragement? Isn’t that an announcement of the future, a certainty that with the good faith preached in the Gospels, there is only one truth in the practice of charity and in the belief of the immortality of the soul? Other not less sacred voices daily proclaim our immortal truth. It is a sublime hosanna that people sing when visited by the Spirit, as much pure and enthusiastic hosanna as the ones sung by the souls visited by Jesus.
We, ourselves, suffering souls, let us not send away the memories that we have and in the purgatory that we endure let us hear the voices that allow us to see beyond.
Lamennais, medium Mr. A. Didier”
“Cardinal Wiseman, that has just passed away in England, believed in Spiritism. This is demonstrated by the event below, cited in the Spiritualist Magazine: A Bishop had banned two members of his church for their tendency towards Spiritism. The Cardinal suspended the ban and allowed the two clergy to continue their studies and operate as mediums, saying: I myself strongly believe in Spiritism and could not be a good member of the Church if slightest in doubt.”
The article above was read and discussed in a Spiritist gathering in Mr. Delanne’s house but people were unsure about the convenience of evoking the Cardinal when he manifested spontaneously by the two communications below.
I
“Your desire to evoke me brought me here and yes, I am glad to come to tell you my dear friends that yes, I was a strong Spiritist believe on Earth. I had come with those aspirations that I could not have developed but I was happy to see them developed on others. I was a Spiritist because Spiritism is the straight path that leads to the true objective and to perfection; I was a Spiritist because I saw the realization of all prophecies in Spiritism, from the beginning of the world up until our days; I was a Spiritist because that doctrine is the development of religion, the clarification of mysteries and the march of whole humanity to God, the unity; I was a Spiritist because I learned that this revelation had come from God and that every serious person should help it to advance so that one day we all can hold each other’s benevolent hands; finally I was a Spiritist because Spiritism casts anathema to nobody and like Jesus Christ, our divine model, it opens its arms to all, without distinction of class or cult. That is why I was a Christian Spiritist.
Ah my beloved brothers! What a huge grace our Lord concedes to mankind by sending them this divine light that opens their eyes, allowing them to irrefutably see that there is for sure life beyond the grave and that, instead of fearing death when one lived according to God’s designs, one should welcome it when it comes to free us from the heavy chains of matter. Yes, that life that constantly is betrayed as horrifying does exist, but it carries nothing painful to the souls that observed the laws of the Lord while on Earth. Yes, there we find those that we loved on Earth; the beloved mother, a kind mother that comes to welcome and congratulate you; friends that come to help you acknowledge yourself, in your true homeland, showing you all the beauties of that true life, that are not more than sad images on Earth. Be perseverant, by beloved friends, in marching on the blessed path of Spiritism; may that not be a vain word to you; may the communications that you receive help you out in climbing the tough Calvary of life so that, when you get at the summit, you can go and harvest the fruits of life that you prepared for yourself. Those are my wishes to all of you that listen to me and to all my brothers in God.
From the one that was Cardinal Wiseman.
Medium Mrs. Delanne.
II
My friends, why wouldn’t I come to you? The feelings I expressed when I was on Earth, and that must be the same to all servants of God and the truth, that must give confidence to every sincere Spiritist, like when I come here by the grace of the Lord to instruct and guide my brothers.
Ah, yes, my friends, I come gladly and thankful to the one to whom we owe everything to exhort you to persevere in this path of struggle, you that were honored to have been admitted amongst the workers of the Lord. That doctrine is, if not the only at least the best one, because if part of humanity may construe their salvation with a blind faith, not falling into the traps and dangers on the way, with even more reason those whose faith are based on reason and on the love of God, that we allow you to see as is, you must conquer that eternal life in the heart of God. My children, bend over and bow your head for your Father blesses you. Glorify and love him in eternity!
Let us pray together.
Wiseman, assisted by St. Augustine. Medium Mr. Erambert, from Aix.
The two communications above were given simultaneously, explaining the assistance of St. Augustine in the last one. While Wiseman had one medium writing, St. Augustine had another one, transmitting the thoughts of the Cardinal. We frequently see less advanced or still confused Spirits that cannot express themselves without the help of a more advanced Spirit; here it is not the same: Wiseman is detached enough to express his own ideas. The two communications that follow were obtained at the Spiritist Society of Paris, on March 24th, without evocation and after reading the preceding messages. The fourth one is an appreciation of the events above by the Spirit Lamennais.
III
“My friends, I come to confirm my communication given on Monday. I am happy to come to a place where I have a lot to say and I am certain I would be well understood. Oh yes, it will be a great satisfaction to me to see the progress of the sacred and regenerative doctrine, developing before the eyes of the Lord, a doctrine that must lead the whole world to its divine destination. Friends, unite your efforts in the task that was assigned to us and be grateful for the role that the Creator of all things assigned to you. You shall never be able to do enough to compensate for the grace you received. But your good will shall be taken into account, with your faith, your charity and love towards your brothers. Bless and love the Lord and you shall have eternal life. Let us pray together, dear friends.
Wiseman, medium Mr. Erambert from Aix.”
IV
“The spiritualist religion is the soul of Christianity, we must not forget. Cardinal Wiseman dared to proclaim the soul before the body, the Spirit before the letter among materialism, Protestant and Catholic faiths. Such a courage is rare in both clergies, an uncommon spectacle, in fact, the Spiritist faith of Cardinal Wiseman. As a matter of fact it would have been strange that such an enlightened Spirit, as elevated as the eminent Cardinal, had seen in Spiritism a rebellious faith to the teachings of the purest Christian moral; we, the Spiritists, would never applaud much such confidence, detached from any human respect and scruple. Isn’t the voice of such distinct and agonizing person an encouragement? Isn’t that an announcement of the future, a certainty that with the good faith preached in the Gospels, there is only one truth in the practice of charity and in the belief of the immortality of the soul? Other not less sacred voices daily proclaim our immortal truth. It is a sublime hosanna that people sing when visited by the Spirit, as much pure and enthusiastic hosanna as the ones sung by the souls visited by Jesus.
We, ourselves, suffering souls, let us not send away the memories that we have and in the purgatory that we endure let us hear the voices that allow us to see beyond.
Lamennais, medium Mr. A. Didier”
Bibliographic News
What is Spiritism? By Allan Kardec. New revised edition and considerably augmented. In-12, about 200 pages, 1 franc; by mail 1.2 francs.
The subjects in this new edition are divided as:
Chap. 1: Small conference
First conversation: The critic
Second conversation: The skeptical
Spiritism and Spiritualism
Dissidences
Simulated Spiritism Phenomena
Impotence of the adversaries
Marvelous and wonderful
Opposition of science
False explanations of the phenomena
The nonbelievers cannot see to be convinced
Origin of the modern Spiritist ideas
Means of communication
Self-serving mediums
Mediums and witches
Spirits’ diversity
Practical utility of manifestations
Madness, suicide and obsession
Forgetfulness of the past
Elements of conviction
Spiritist Society of Paris
Interdiction of Spiritism
Third conversation: The priest. Objections in the name of religion.
Chap. II: Elementary notions of Spiritism
The Spirits
Communications with the invisible world
Providential objective of the Spiritist manifestations
The mediums
Obstacles to the mediums
Quality of the mediums
Charlatanism
Identity of the Spirits
Contradictions
Consequences of Spiritism
Chap. III: Solution of some problems by the Spiritist Doctrine
Plurality of the worlds
The soul
Man, during earthly life
Man, after death
______________________________
In preparation to be issued on August 1st:
Heavens and Hell, or the Divine Justice according to Spiritism, by Allan Kardec. A large volume, in-12. Price 3.5 francs; by mail 4 francs.
__________________________
Vie de Germaine Cousin, by Pibrac, very charitable, given by mediumistic means by herself to Ms. S., in a familiar group. Brochure in-12. Price 1 franc, by mail 1.1 francs. Main bookshops in Toulouse.
The life of Germaine Cousin is, at the same time, dramatic and edifying, but on the other hand eminently interesting given the numerous facts of mediumship that it contains, that without Spiritism would go by fantastic or inexplicable. The phenomena that we witnessed in our days at least demonstrate that they are possible. Anyone without a preconceived idea, and in particular the Spiritists, will read this brochure with interest.
______________
Spiritist Union of Bordeaux
Bordeaux used to have four periodical Spiritist publications: La Ruche, Le Sauveur, la Lumière and la Voix d’Outre-tombe. Since la Lumière and Le Sauveur have the same direction in reality there were three only that have just combined into one under the title The Spiritist Union of Bordeaux, by the direction of Mr. A. Bez, current director of the la Voix d’Outre-tombe. We congratulate those gentlemen for their actions and if our adversaries will make a mistake if consider that an indication of decadence of the doctrine. There are positive facts out there to demonstrate the opposite.
Matters about Spiritism, although in large number, circulate in a more or less uniform fashion, and that would lead to a lack of sufficient variety to the reader that wanted to receive all of them, with large cost and not much compensantion. The new journal in Bordeaux can only win with such a merger from all points of view and we wish for their prosperity. In the initial volumes we read with pleasure a good refutation to the articles by Mr. Fumeaux about the iniquity and disgrace of Spiritism, as much as a report about a new cure in Marmande (see further in several publications).
___________
Music and Lyrics composed by King Henry III in 1574, revealed in a dream in 1865 to Mr. N.C. Bach. Legouix Edition, Boulevard Poissonnière, 27 – Paris. Label price: 3 francs.
The subjects in this new edition are divided as:
Chap. 1: Small conference
First conversation: The critic
Second conversation: The skeptical
Spiritism and Spiritualism
Dissidences
Simulated Spiritism Phenomena
Impotence of the adversaries
Marvelous and wonderful
Opposition of science
False explanations of the phenomena
The nonbelievers cannot see to be convinced
Origin of the modern Spiritist ideas
Means of communication
Self-serving mediums
Mediums and witches
Spirits’ diversity
Practical utility of manifestations
Madness, suicide and obsession
Forgetfulness of the past
Elements of conviction
Spiritist Society of Paris
Interdiction of Spiritism
Third conversation: The priest. Objections in the name of religion.
Chap. II: Elementary notions of Spiritism
The Spirits
Communications with the invisible world
Providential objective of the Spiritist manifestations
The mediums
Obstacles to the mediums
Quality of the mediums
Charlatanism
Identity of the Spirits
Contradictions
Consequences of Spiritism
Chap. III: Solution of some problems by the Spiritist Doctrine
Plurality of the worlds
The soul
Man, during earthly life
Man, after death
______________________________
In preparation to be issued on August 1st:
Heavens and Hell, or the Divine Justice according to Spiritism, by Allan Kardec. A large volume, in-12. Price 3.5 francs; by mail 4 francs.
__________________________
Vie de Germaine Cousin, by Pibrac, very charitable, given by mediumistic means by herself to Ms. S., in a familiar group. Brochure in-12. Price 1 franc, by mail 1.1 francs. Main bookshops in Toulouse.
The life of Germaine Cousin is, at the same time, dramatic and edifying, but on the other hand eminently interesting given the numerous facts of mediumship that it contains, that without Spiritism would go by fantastic or inexplicable. The phenomena that we witnessed in our days at least demonstrate that they are possible. Anyone without a preconceived idea, and in particular the Spiritists, will read this brochure with interest.
______________
Spiritist Union of Bordeaux
Bordeaux used to have four periodical Spiritist publications: La Ruche, Le Sauveur, la Lumière and la Voix d’Outre-tombe. Since la Lumière and Le Sauveur have the same direction in reality there were three only that have just combined into one under the title The Spiritist Union of Bordeaux, by the direction of Mr. A. Bez, current director of the la Voix d’Outre-tombe. We congratulate those gentlemen for their actions and if our adversaries will make a mistake if consider that an indication of decadence of the doctrine. There are positive facts out there to demonstrate the opposite.
Matters about Spiritism, although in large number, circulate in a more or less uniform fashion, and that would lead to a lack of sufficient variety to the reader that wanted to receive all of them, with large cost and not much compensantion. The new journal in Bordeaux can only win with such a merger from all points of view and we wish for their prosperity. In the initial volumes we read with pleasure a good refutation to the articles by Mr. Fumeaux about the iniquity and disgrace of Spiritism, as much as a report about a new cure in Marmande (see further in several publications).
___________
Music and Lyrics composed by King Henry III in 1574, revealed in a dream in 1865 to Mr. N.C. Bach. Legouix Edition, Boulevard Poissonnière, 27 – Paris. Label price: 3 francs.
August
What is taught by Spiritism?Some people ask what is it new that we owe to Spiritism? Since it has not brought to the world a new productive industry, like the steam engine, people conclude that it has not produced anything. The majority of those that ask such a question, not having done the work of studying it, only know the Spiritism of fantasy, created to satisfy the critics and that has nothing to do with serious Spiritism. Hence, there is no surprise there when people ask about its practical and useful side. They should have sought it in its source and not in the caricatures made by those whose sole objective is to smear it.
Another group of people think differently and, on the contrary, see Spiritism marching too slowly for their taste. Those are surprised by the fact that it has not yet probed all mysteries of nature nor all questions that they believe are in its scope; they would like to see it teaching new things every day or enriching itself with some new discovery. Since it has not yet solved the issue of the origin of all beings, the principle and end of all things, the divine essence and a few other similar things, the conclude that it is still an alphabet of letters; that it has not yet entered the true philosophical path and that it still drags on in common places because it permanently preaches humility and charity. They say: “Up until now it has not taught us anything new, because reincarnation, the denial of eternal penalties, the immortality of the soul, the evolution through the periods of intellectual maturity and the perispirit are not properly Spiritist discoveries; it is then necessary to walk towards more truthful and solid discoveries.”
We believe to be appropriate to provide some observations in that regards that are not new either but there are things that must be repeated in several different ways.
It is true that Spiritism has not invented any of that since the real truth is only the one that is eternal and that for that very reason must have been germinated at all times. However, isn’t that something to have taken those ideas if not from the void at least from the forgotten; created a lively plant from a seed; generated a general belief out of an individual idea, lost in the darkness of times or muffled by prejudices; demonstrated what was only hypothetical before; proven the existence of a law in what was only considered exceptional or serendipitous before; created a practical thing of a vague theory and provided useful applications to what was unproductive idea? Nothing is more truthful than the proverb: “Nothing new under the Sun” and even that truth is not new. Hence there is no discovery from which one cannot find vestiges and principles somewhere else.
Based on that Copernicus would not have the merit of his system because there was suspicion of the movement of Earth before the Christian era. It was something so simple, but it was necessary to have it found. The story of Columbus’ egg will always remain as an eternal truth.
Besides, Spiritism undoubtedly still has a lot to teach us. That is what we have repeated tirelessly because we do not pretend that it has already said the final word. Nonetheless, considering that there is still work to be done, will it follow that Spiritism is still in its infancy? The alphabet of letters was the turning tables and since then it seems to us that it has already moved a few steps; it even seems that those steps were large in a few years if we have it compared to other sciences that required centuries to get to their present condition. None has arrived at their apex in a first impulse; they advance not out of peoples’ will but as the circumstances put them on the way of new discoveries. Now, nobody has the power of controlling such circumstances and the proof of that is that whenever an idea is premature it gets aborted, to resurge later when the time is right.
Still, in the absence of new discoveries will the persons of science remain idle? Chemistry will no longer be Chemistry if new elements are not discovered? Will the Astronomers be condemned to cross their arms if new planets are not discovered? The same applies to all fields of science and technology. Before new things are sought, shouldn’t we apply the current knowledge? It is precisely to give people time to assimilate, apply and spread knowledge that the Providence stalls the march forward. History is here to demonstrate that science does not follow a continuous ascending march, at least ostensibly. The great movements that revolutionize an idea only take place at more or less distanced intervals. Therefore, there is no stagnation but elaboration, application and fruitification of what was learned and that is always a sign of progress.
Could the human spirit incessantly absorb new ideas? Doesn’t Earth itself requires a resting time before reproduction? What to tell of a professor that daily teach new ideas to her students without giving them time to practice what they had learn, to familiarize them with those lessons and apply them? Would God be less thoughtful and skillful than a professor?
In all things the new ideas must fit in with the acquired one. If the existing ones are not sufficiently elaborated and consolidated in the brain; if the mind has not assimilated them yet, then the new ones that we would like to implant would not bear roots. We would be sowing in the emptiness.
It is the same with Spiritism. Have the followers taken so much advantage of what has been taught so far that there is nothing else to do? Are they so much charitable, selfless and benevolent to their neighbor; have they controlled so much their passions, denied hatred, envy and jealousy; finally, are thy so much perfect that from now on it would be useless to teach them charity, humility and abnegation, moral in a word? Such pretension on its own would demonstrate how much still they need such elementary lessons that some consider fastidious and puerile. It is, however, only with the support of those instructions, if well utilized, that they will be able to evolve enough to become worthy of receiving a superior teaching.
The objective of Spiritism is the regeneration of humanity: that is an attested fact. Since such regeneration can only occur through a moral progress it thus follows that such essential and providential objective is the individual betterment. They mysteries that it can reveal to us are accessory. We would not be more advanced for our future just because it had opened to us the sanctuary of every knowledge. To have us admitted to the banquet of supreme happiness God dos not ask us what we know or what we have but our worth and what we have done. Hence, every sincere Spiritist must work towards their individual betterment, before anything else. It is only the one that dominated their bad tendencies that took advantage of Spiritism and shall receive their reward. That is why the good Spirits, by the commandment of God, multiple their instructions and repeat them abundantly; only a senseless pride may say: I do not need anything else. Only God knows when they will be useless, and it is only up to God to guide the messengers and fit them to our advancement. Let us see, however, if beyond the purely moral teaching the results of Spiritism are as sterile as some pretend them to be.
Another group of people think differently and, on the contrary, see Spiritism marching too slowly for their taste. Those are surprised by the fact that it has not yet probed all mysteries of nature nor all questions that they believe are in its scope; they would like to see it teaching new things every day or enriching itself with some new discovery. Since it has not yet solved the issue of the origin of all beings, the principle and end of all things, the divine essence and a few other similar things, the conclude that it is still an alphabet of letters; that it has not yet entered the true philosophical path and that it still drags on in common places because it permanently preaches humility and charity. They say: “Up until now it has not taught us anything new, because reincarnation, the denial of eternal penalties, the immortality of the soul, the evolution through the periods of intellectual maturity and the perispirit are not properly Spiritist discoveries; it is then necessary to walk towards more truthful and solid discoveries.”
We believe to be appropriate to provide some observations in that regards that are not new either but there are things that must be repeated in several different ways.
It is true that Spiritism has not invented any of that since the real truth is only the one that is eternal and that for that very reason must have been germinated at all times. However, isn’t that something to have taken those ideas if not from the void at least from the forgotten; created a lively plant from a seed; generated a general belief out of an individual idea, lost in the darkness of times or muffled by prejudices; demonstrated what was only hypothetical before; proven the existence of a law in what was only considered exceptional or serendipitous before; created a practical thing of a vague theory and provided useful applications to what was unproductive idea? Nothing is more truthful than the proverb: “Nothing new under the Sun” and even that truth is not new. Hence there is no discovery from which one cannot find vestiges and principles somewhere else.
Based on that Copernicus would not have the merit of his system because there was suspicion of the movement of Earth before the Christian era. It was something so simple, but it was necessary to have it found. The story of Columbus’ egg will always remain as an eternal truth.
Besides, Spiritism undoubtedly still has a lot to teach us. That is what we have repeated tirelessly because we do not pretend that it has already said the final word. Nonetheless, considering that there is still work to be done, will it follow that Spiritism is still in its infancy? The alphabet of letters was the turning tables and since then it seems to us that it has already moved a few steps; it even seems that those steps were large in a few years if we have it compared to other sciences that required centuries to get to their present condition. None has arrived at their apex in a first impulse; they advance not out of peoples’ will but as the circumstances put them on the way of new discoveries. Now, nobody has the power of controlling such circumstances and the proof of that is that whenever an idea is premature it gets aborted, to resurge later when the time is right.
Still, in the absence of new discoveries will the persons of science remain idle? Chemistry will no longer be Chemistry if new elements are not discovered? Will the Astronomers be condemned to cross their arms if new planets are not discovered? The same applies to all fields of science and technology. Before new things are sought, shouldn’t we apply the current knowledge? It is precisely to give people time to assimilate, apply and spread knowledge that the Providence stalls the march forward. History is here to demonstrate that science does not follow a continuous ascending march, at least ostensibly. The great movements that revolutionize an idea only take place at more or less distanced intervals. Therefore, there is no stagnation but elaboration, application and fruitification of what was learned and that is always a sign of progress.
Could the human spirit incessantly absorb new ideas? Doesn’t Earth itself requires a resting time before reproduction? What to tell of a professor that daily teach new ideas to her students without giving them time to practice what they had learn, to familiarize them with those lessons and apply them? Would God be less thoughtful and skillful than a professor?
In all things the new ideas must fit in with the acquired one. If the existing ones are not sufficiently elaborated and consolidated in the brain; if the mind has not assimilated them yet, then the new ones that we would like to implant would not bear roots. We would be sowing in the emptiness.
It is the same with Spiritism. Have the followers taken so much advantage of what has been taught so far that there is nothing else to do? Are they so much charitable, selfless and benevolent to their neighbor; have they controlled so much their passions, denied hatred, envy and jealousy; finally, are thy so much perfect that from now on it would be useless to teach them charity, humility and abnegation, moral in a word? Such pretension on its own would demonstrate how much still they need such elementary lessons that some consider fastidious and puerile. It is, however, only with the support of those instructions, if well utilized, that they will be able to evolve enough to become worthy of receiving a superior teaching.
The objective of Spiritism is the regeneration of humanity: that is an attested fact. Since such regeneration can only occur through a moral progress it thus follows that such essential and providential objective is the individual betterment. They mysteries that it can reveal to us are accessory. We would not be more advanced for our future just because it had opened to us the sanctuary of every knowledge. To have us admitted to the banquet of supreme happiness God dos not ask us what we know or what we have but our worth and what we have done. Hence, every sincere Spiritist must work towards their individual betterment, before anything else. It is only the one that dominated their bad tendencies that took advantage of Spiritism and shall receive their reward. That is why the good Spirits, by the commandment of God, multiple their instructions and repeat them abundantly; only a senseless pride may say: I do not need anything else. Only God knows when they will be useless, and it is only up to God to guide the messengers and fit them to our advancement. Let us see, however, if beyond the purely moral teaching the results of Spiritism are as sterile as some pretend them to be.
- It initially gives, as everyone knows, a positive proof of the existence and immortality of the soul. True, it is not a discovery, but it is due to a lack of proofs about that point that there are so many nonbelievers or indifferent with respect to the future; it is by demonstrating what was only theory that Spiritism beats materialism and avoids its dismal consequences to society. By transforming the doubt about the future into certainty, it is a whole revolution of ideas and the consequences are incalculable. If this was the only result of the manifestations it would already be huge.
- It exerts a powerful influence upon peoples’ morale through the firm belief that it develops; it lead them to good, provide consolation in their suffering, gives them strength and courage in the trials of life and veer them off from suicidal thoughts.
- It rectifies every false idea formed about the future of the soul, heavens, hell, penalties and rewards; through the irresistible logic of the facts it thoroughly destroys the dogmas of the eternal penalties and the devil; in a word, it unveils a future life, showing it to us as rational and according to God’s justice. It is still something of great value.
- It describes what happen at the time of death. The up until now unfathomable phenomenon has no more mysteries; the minimal details of that much feared passage are known now. Well, since everybody dies, such a knowledge is of general interest.
- By the law of plurality of existences, it opens up a new field to Philosophy; mankind knows where it comes from, where it is going to and its objective on Earth. It explains the cause of all human miseries and all social inequalities; provides the law of nature itself as the basis for the principle of universal solidarity, fraternity, equality and freedom, that before appeared to be only theory. Finally, it casts light upon the most difficult questions of metaphysics, psychology and moral.
- By the theory of spiritual fluids, it allows clarifies the mechanism of sensations and perceptions of the soul; it explains the phenomena of double vision, distant vision and somnambulism, the ecstasy, dreams, visions and apparitions, etc.; it opens up a new field to physiology and pathology.
- By proving the relationships between the corporeal and spiritual worlds, it shows in the latter one of the forces of nature, an intelligent power, revealing a number of effects previously attributed to supernatural causes and that fed most of superstitious ideas.
- By revealing the fact of obsessions, it provides the knowledge of the up until now ignored cause of multiple diseases about which science had avoided in detriment of patients and provides the means of having them cured.
- By allowing us to understand the true conditions of prayer and its action mode; by revealing the reciprocal influence of incarnate and discarnate Spirits, teaching us the power that humans have upon imperfect Spirits to moralize them and to take them away from their suffering condition, inherent to their condition.
- By allowing us to understand spiritual magnetization, unknown until now, opens up a new path to magnetism and brings a new and powerful means of cure.
The merit of an invention is not in the discovery of a principle, almost always known before, but in the application of that principle. Reincarnation, no doubt, is not a new idea, as the perispirit that St. Paul described as the spiritual body, not even the communication with the Spirits. Spiritism, that does not brag about having discovered nature, carefully seeks every trace that can be found in the pre-existence of its ideas and, when found, promptly proclaims them as proof in support of its proposal. Hence, those that invoke such pre-existence as a means of blemishing what Spiritism does go against their own objective and act wrongly since that could raise suspicion of a preconceived idea.
The discovery of reincarnation and perispirit, therefore, does not belong to Spiritism. It is something known. But up until its appearance, what benefit had science, religion, moral taken from those two principles, ignored by the masses, kept in the state of dead letter? Spiritism not only brought it to the open and had them known as laws of nature but also developed them and made them bear fruits; it has already brought fecund and numerous results from that without which one could not understand a large number of things; it daily allows us to understand new ones and we are from exhausting that mine. Taking into account the fact that these two principles were known, why have them remained unproductive for so long? Why, for so many centuries, have all philosophies crashed against so many insolvable questions?
They were brute diamonds that needed to be chiseled; that is what Spiritism has done. It opened up a new path to philosophy, or even better, it created a new philosophy that daily conquers its place in the world. Are then these results so insignificant that we must accelerate the pace towards more truthful and solid discoveries?
In summary, a certain number of fundamental truths, sketched by certain strong minds and kept, in their majority, in a latent state, once studied, developed and demonstrated, from sterile they become fecund from which innumerable secondary principles and applications germinate, opening up a broad field to exploration, new horizons to science, philosophy, religion, moral and social economy.
These are, until today, the main successes of Spiritism, and all we have done is to indicate the most important points. Supposing that it was all we would already be satisfied; now saying that a new science that provides such results in less than ten years is not exactly nullity because it touches every matters vital to humanity, bringing to human knowledge a new contingent that cannot be neglected. Until the time when all those points have received every susceptible application and that people had taken advantage of them, there will still be a long time and the Spiritists that wanted to practice them for themselves and the greater good will not remain idle.
These are focal points from where uncountable secondary truths will irradiate, be developed and applied, as it is done every day because every day facts are revealed that lift up a new tip of the veil. In a few years Spiritism successively provided every foundation of the new edifice. It is now up to its followers to practice that material before new ones are requested. When their mission is accomplished God will know how to have them provided.
Some say that the Spiritists only know the alphabet letters of Spiritism. Be it. To begin with then let us learn how to spell that alphabet but that is not a one day task because even reduced to those small proportions a long time is required before we have exhausted all combinations and harvested all fruits.
Don’t we still have facts to explain? As a matter of fact, don’t the Spiritists still have to teach that alphabet to those that ignore it? Have them already sowed the seed in every possible place? Aren’t there nonbelievers to be converted, obsessed to be cured, consolations to be given and tears to dry? Are we right by saying that there is nothing else to be done when the task is not done, when there are still so many ulcers to be cured? There we have noble occupations that it is worth to get to know better and a bit sooner than the others.
Therefore, let us learn to spell our alphabet letters before we try to read correctly in the great book of nature. God will have it open to us as we advance but it is not up to any one force its way through, anticipating the time of each thing. If the tree of science hangs too high to be reached let us wait to be able to fly up there and that our wings may be ready and strongly fixated so that we do not have the same fate of Icarus.
The discovery of reincarnation and perispirit, therefore, does not belong to Spiritism. It is something known. But up until its appearance, what benefit had science, religion, moral taken from those two principles, ignored by the masses, kept in the state of dead letter? Spiritism not only brought it to the open and had them known as laws of nature but also developed them and made them bear fruits; it has already brought fecund and numerous results from that without which one could not understand a large number of things; it daily allows us to understand new ones and we are from exhausting that mine. Taking into account the fact that these two principles were known, why have them remained unproductive for so long? Why, for so many centuries, have all philosophies crashed against so many insolvable questions?
They were brute diamonds that needed to be chiseled; that is what Spiritism has done. It opened up a new path to philosophy, or even better, it created a new philosophy that daily conquers its place in the world. Are then these results so insignificant that we must accelerate the pace towards more truthful and solid discoveries?
In summary, a certain number of fundamental truths, sketched by certain strong minds and kept, in their majority, in a latent state, once studied, developed and demonstrated, from sterile they become fecund from which innumerable secondary principles and applications germinate, opening up a broad field to exploration, new horizons to science, philosophy, religion, moral and social economy.
These are, until today, the main successes of Spiritism, and all we have done is to indicate the most important points. Supposing that it was all we would already be satisfied; now saying that a new science that provides such results in less than ten years is not exactly nullity because it touches every matters vital to humanity, bringing to human knowledge a new contingent that cannot be neglected. Until the time when all those points have received every susceptible application and that people had taken advantage of them, there will still be a long time and the Spiritists that wanted to practice them for themselves and the greater good will not remain idle.
These are focal points from where uncountable secondary truths will irradiate, be developed and applied, as it is done every day because every day facts are revealed that lift up a new tip of the veil. In a few years Spiritism successively provided every foundation of the new edifice. It is now up to its followers to practice that material before new ones are requested. When their mission is accomplished God will know how to have them provided.
Some say that the Spiritists only know the alphabet letters of Spiritism. Be it. To begin with then let us learn how to spell that alphabet but that is not a one day task because even reduced to those small proportions a long time is required before we have exhausted all combinations and harvested all fruits.
Don’t we still have facts to explain? As a matter of fact, don’t the Spiritists still have to teach that alphabet to those that ignore it? Have them already sowed the seed in every possible place? Aren’t there nonbelievers to be converted, obsessed to be cured, consolations to be given and tears to dry? Are we right by saying that there is nothing else to be done when the task is not done, when there are still so many ulcers to be cured? There we have noble occupations that it is worth to get to know better and a bit sooner than the others.
Therefore, let us learn to spell our alphabet letters before we try to read correctly in the great book of nature. God will have it open to us as we advance but it is not up to any one force its way through, anticipating the time of each thing. If the tree of science hangs too high to be reached let us wait to be able to fly up there and that our wings may be ready and strongly fixated so that we do not have the same fate of Icarus.
Father Dégenettes, medium
Former priest of Notre Dame des Victories, in Paris
The following story was literally taken from the book entitled Month of Mary, by father Défossés:
“This is how it did happen, in the world, in a heavenly and supernatural way, the divine work of the archconfraternity of the most holy and immaculate Heart of Mary. Let's go to Mr. Dégenettes again. Who else could better describe to us what actually happened? The archconfraternity was born on December 3rd, 1836. Many of those that judge us by the appearances believe us to be the founder. Only God has the honor and glory. We did not have the drive of spirit nor the heart to have us prepared for that. We must confess, asking for God’s forgiveness and Mary’s, and as the son of Mary, used to admire and venerate her as the kindest mother, since our early days, we did not understand a thing about the devotion of her sacred heart and we even avoided to think about that. We must add that father McCarty, a saint religious man that one day preached in our charge of the foreign missions about the sacred heart of Mary, caused on special impression on us, although we attested the eloquence of the speaker, despite our boredom supported by our proud prevention since he handled a matter that we thought would not be useful to others or to ourselves. That was our mind frame on the very December 3rd, 1836, the celebration of St. Francis Xavier.
That day, at nine o'clock in the morning, I began the Holy Mass at the foot of the altar of the Blessed Virgin, which we have since consecrated to her most holy and immaculate Heart, and which is today the altar of the archconfraternity. I was in the first verse of Psalm Judica me, when a thought crossed my mind: it was the thought of the uselessness of my ministry in that parish; such a thought was no stranger to me; I had only too many opportunities to conceive it and remind myself of that; but in this occasion it struck me more vividly than usual. Since it was neither the place nor the time to take care of it, I made every effort to keep it away from my mind. I could not manage it, I always seemed to hear a voice coming from inside me saying to me: "Do not do anything, your ministry is nil; See, for more than four years that you have been here, what have you won? All is lost, this people no longer has faith. You should leave, out of common sense!
Despite all my efforts to send that unfortunate thought away, it took me over in such a way that it absorbed all the faculties of my spirit, to the point that I read and recited the prayers without understanding what I was saying.
I was fatigued by the violence that I had imposed on myself and that made me sweat abundantly. I remained like that until the beginning of the canon of the mass. After saying the Sanctus I stopped for a moment and tried to regroup; I was scared of my own state and said to myself: God, what is happening to me? How can I offer the divine sacrifice? My spirit is not free enough to give consecration. Oh my God, keep that distraction away from me. As soon as I said that I clearly heard these words spoken in a solemn fashion: Consecrate your parish to the Holy and Immaculate Heart of Mary. As soon as I heard those words that did not hurt but resonated inside me, I recovered the calm and freedom of spirit. That fatal impression that violently agitated me soon vanished, not leaving any impression. I carried out the sacred ministry without any recollection of my previous distraction. After the thanksgiving I analyzed the way I had offered the sacred sacrifice. It was only then that I remembered having had a distraction, a confusing memory that forced me to dig up for a few moments and find the objective of that. I assured myself, saying: I did not sin. I was not free. I then asked myself how that distraction had ended and the remembrance of the words that I had heard came back to mind. That thought horrified me. I tried to deny the possibility, but my memory confused the thoughts that I repelled. I fought myself for ten minutes. I said to myself: If I stopped there it would bring a huge disgrace upon me; it would affect my morale and I could become a visionary. Tired of that fight I made the decision and said: I cannot stop at that thought; it would bring very unpleasant consequences; besides, it is an illusion; I had a big distraction during the mass, that is all. The essential to me is that fact that I did not sin. I do not want to think about it. I rested my hands on the kneeler where I was. At that very moment, and even before rising (I was alone in the sacristy) I heard these very distinct words: Consecrate your parish to the sacred and immaculate heart of Mary. I fell on my knees, stunned. I tried not to believe for a few moments; I wanted to at least doubt but I couldn’t anymore. I had heard and could not deny it to myself. I felt suddenly sad; the uneasiness that had tormented my soul was back. I then tried to expel all those thoughts; I said: It is still an illusion, resulting from the confusion in your mind since the first impression you had; I did not hear, you could not have heard, and an intimate voice was telling me: you cannot doubt, you heard it twice.
I then decided not to think about it anymore and try to forget. But those words – consecrate your parish to the sacred and immaculate heart of Mary reverberated incessantly in my soul. To get rid of the impression that was tiring me I said: It is always an act of devotion to the St. Virgen that can result in something positive. Let us try. My acknowledgement was not free; it was demanded by my fatigued spirit. I then went to my apartment. To keep those thoughts away I started working on the bylaws of our association. As soon as I started the work the matter was clarified before my eyes and the bylaws were soon written. That is the truth and we did not tell that in the first editions of our manual; we even hid it from the venerable director of our consciences. Up until that they it was kept as a secret, even to the closest friends. We dared not reveal it; and today that the mercy has positively assigned the work of the prodigious propagation of the archconfraternity, and in particular by the remarkable fruits that it produces, my conscience obliges me to reveal the fact. – It is glorious, said Archangel Raphael to Tobias, the revelation of God’s works is glorious, so that all can acknowledge that the whole honor, glory and praise belong to him.”
This is a maximum demonstration of the auditive mediumship. Whoever denied the mediumistic effect and thought it was a miracle I would say that miracle is something exceptional and above the laws of nature and that nobody would consider as such the phenomena that do take place every day; their reproduction is a positive indication that they exist due to a law and that consequently do not escape the natural order of things. Well, events similar to that of father Dégenettes are among the most common of mediumship since phenomena of auditive communication are extremely numerous.
If, according to the opinion of some, the devil is the only agent of the mediumistic phenomena, one would forcibly have to conclude, to be consistent, that the foundation of the so called archconfraternity is the works of the devil because, following the good logic, the absolute analogy of the effects imply the cause.
A more embarrassing point to the partisans of the devil is the endless reproduction of all mediumistic phenomena in the very heart of the clergy and in religious communities, and the perfect similarity between several effects named sacred, with those that are considered diabolic. One must then acknowledge that the bad spirits are not the only ones with the power of manifestation, on the contrary the majority of the saints would be no more than “possessed”, since the beatification of many followed phenomena that today are reproduced by mediums. They ducked by saying that the good Spirits only communicate with the Church or it is only the Church that can differentiate those that come from God from those that come from the devil. Be it. It is a reason, like any other, to be appreciated by everyone but that exclude the exclusive communication of the devil.
Mr. Delanne that kindly reported the event above also added the following communication from father Dégenettes, received by Mrs. Delanne:
“My dear children, I gladly attend to your call. I will provide you with the details that you would like to know because today I am linked to the phalanx of the Spirits whose mission is to lead humanity on the path of truth. When I was on Earth I struggled to bring people back to God, but I only had a slight idea of this great law that entitles everyone to progress. Matter imposes serious blockades and our instincts frequently paralyze the efforts of intelligence. At the time of my hearing, therefore, I did not know, for sure, what to think; but since I continued hearing that voice I concluded it was a miracle. Yet, I saw myself as an instrument and everything I got through that only confirmed my idea. I was in fact an instrument but there was no miracle. I was one of those designated to carry the first stones of the doctrine, offering the proof of spiritual communications. Time is not far when you will be given developments about the so called mysteries and that were supposed to be up until now, because humanity was not yet prepared to understand them! Ah a thousand times happier those that today understand the beautiful mission of propagating the doctrine of revelation, showing a good and merciful God! Yes, my dears, when I was exiled on Earth I carried the precious gift of mediumship; but I repeat, I was not aware of that. When that voice spoke to my heart I acknowledged a more special and visible protection of Mary in all my actions, even the simplest, and if I hid that even from my superiors it was attending the advice of that same voice that made me understand that the time was not right for that revelation. I had the presentiment and a vague intuition of the renovation that is taking place now. I understood that the revelation was not supposed to come from the Church but that one day the Church would be forced to support it, by all facts that it are named miracles and are attributed to supernatural causes. I will continue this on another occasion, my friends. May the peace of the Lord be with you and allow you a peaceful sleep.”
Q – Should we send this communication and the events that led to it to Mr. Allan Kardec? A. – Haven’t I told you that I am one of the propagators of the doctrine? My name does not carry much value but I cannot see why I would not authorize you to proceed. In fact, this is not the first time I communicate. You can, therefore, forward to the master my simple instructions, or even better, my simple report.”
Dégenettes
Observation: Father Dégenettes in fact communicated several times with words that are worthy of the elevation of his soul. As much as we can remember he was the one that told the following story in a sermon given at the Notre-Dame des Victories:
That day, at nine o'clock in the morning, I began the Holy Mass at the foot of the altar of the Blessed Virgin, which we have since consecrated to her most holy and immaculate Heart, and which is today the altar of the archconfraternity. I was in the first verse of Psalm Judica me, when a thought crossed my mind: it was the thought of the uselessness of my ministry in that parish; such a thought was no stranger to me; I had only too many opportunities to conceive it and remind myself of that; but in this occasion it struck me more vividly than usual. Since it was neither the place nor the time to take care of it, I made every effort to keep it away from my mind. I could not manage it, I always seemed to hear a voice coming from inside me saying to me: "Do not do anything, your ministry is nil; See, for more than four years that you have been here, what have you won? All is lost, this people no longer has faith. You should leave, out of common sense!
Despite all my efforts to send that unfortunate thought away, it took me over in such a way that it absorbed all the faculties of my spirit, to the point that I read and recited the prayers without understanding what I was saying.
I was fatigued by the violence that I had imposed on myself and that made me sweat abundantly. I remained like that until the beginning of the canon of the mass. After saying the Sanctus I stopped for a moment and tried to regroup; I was scared of my own state and said to myself: God, what is happening to me? How can I offer the divine sacrifice? My spirit is not free enough to give consecration. Oh my God, keep that distraction away from me. As soon as I said that I clearly heard these words spoken in a solemn fashion: Consecrate your parish to the Holy and Immaculate Heart of Mary. As soon as I heard those words that did not hurt but resonated inside me, I recovered the calm and freedom of spirit. That fatal impression that violently agitated me soon vanished, not leaving any impression. I carried out the sacred ministry without any recollection of my previous distraction. After the thanksgiving I analyzed the way I had offered the sacred sacrifice. It was only then that I remembered having had a distraction, a confusing memory that forced me to dig up for a few moments and find the objective of that. I assured myself, saying: I did not sin. I was not free. I then asked myself how that distraction had ended and the remembrance of the words that I had heard came back to mind. That thought horrified me. I tried to deny the possibility, but my memory confused the thoughts that I repelled. I fought myself for ten minutes. I said to myself: If I stopped there it would bring a huge disgrace upon me; it would affect my morale and I could become a visionary. Tired of that fight I made the decision and said: I cannot stop at that thought; it would bring very unpleasant consequences; besides, it is an illusion; I had a big distraction during the mass, that is all. The essential to me is that fact that I did not sin. I do not want to think about it. I rested my hands on the kneeler where I was. At that very moment, and even before rising (I was alone in the sacristy) I heard these very distinct words: Consecrate your parish to the sacred and immaculate heart of Mary. I fell on my knees, stunned. I tried not to believe for a few moments; I wanted to at least doubt but I couldn’t anymore. I had heard and could not deny it to myself. I felt suddenly sad; the uneasiness that had tormented my soul was back. I then tried to expel all those thoughts; I said: It is still an illusion, resulting from the confusion in your mind since the first impression you had; I did not hear, you could not have heard, and an intimate voice was telling me: you cannot doubt, you heard it twice.
I then decided not to think about it anymore and try to forget. But those words – consecrate your parish to the sacred and immaculate heart of Mary reverberated incessantly in my soul. To get rid of the impression that was tiring me I said: It is always an act of devotion to the St. Virgen that can result in something positive. Let us try. My acknowledgement was not free; it was demanded by my fatigued spirit. I then went to my apartment. To keep those thoughts away I started working on the bylaws of our association. As soon as I started the work the matter was clarified before my eyes and the bylaws were soon written. That is the truth and we did not tell that in the first editions of our manual; we even hid it from the venerable director of our consciences. Up until that they it was kept as a secret, even to the closest friends. We dared not reveal it; and today that the mercy has positively assigned the work of the prodigious propagation of the archconfraternity, and in particular by the remarkable fruits that it produces, my conscience obliges me to reveal the fact. – It is glorious, said Archangel Raphael to Tobias, the revelation of God’s works is glorious, so that all can acknowledge that the whole honor, glory and praise belong to him.”
This is a maximum demonstration of the auditive mediumship. Whoever denied the mediumistic effect and thought it was a miracle I would say that miracle is something exceptional and above the laws of nature and that nobody would consider as such the phenomena that do take place every day; their reproduction is a positive indication that they exist due to a law and that consequently do not escape the natural order of things. Well, events similar to that of father Dégenettes are among the most common of mediumship since phenomena of auditive communication are extremely numerous.
If, according to the opinion of some, the devil is the only agent of the mediumistic phenomena, one would forcibly have to conclude, to be consistent, that the foundation of the so called archconfraternity is the works of the devil because, following the good logic, the absolute analogy of the effects imply the cause.
A more embarrassing point to the partisans of the devil is the endless reproduction of all mediumistic phenomena in the very heart of the clergy and in religious communities, and the perfect similarity between several effects named sacred, with those that are considered diabolic. One must then acknowledge that the bad spirits are not the only ones with the power of manifestation, on the contrary the majority of the saints would be no more than “possessed”, since the beatification of many followed phenomena that today are reproduced by mediums. They ducked by saying that the good Spirits only communicate with the Church or it is only the Church that can differentiate those that come from God from those that come from the devil. Be it. It is a reason, like any other, to be appreciated by everyone but that exclude the exclusive communication of the devil.
Mr. Delanne that kindly reported the event above also added the following communication from father Dégenettes, received by Mrs. Delanne:
“My dear children, I gladly attend to your call. I will provide you with the details that you would like to know because today I am linked to the phalanx of the Spirits whose mission is to lead humanity on the path of truth. When I was on Earth I struggled to bring people back to God, but I only had a slight idea of this great law that entitles everyone to progress. Matter imposes serious blockades and our instincts frequently paralyze the efforts of intelligence. At the time of my hearing, therefore, I did not know, for sure, what to think; but since I continued hearing that voice I concluded it was a miracle. Yet, I saw myself as an instrument and everything I got through that only confirmed my idea. I was in fact an instrument but there was no miracle. I was one of those designated to carry the first stones of the doctrine, offering the proof of spiritual communications. Time is not far when you will be given developments about the so called mysteries and that were supposed to be up until now, because humanity was not yet prepared to understand them! Ah a thousand times happier those that today understand the beautiful mission of propagating the doctrine of revelation, showing a good and merciful God! Yes, my dears, when I was exiled on Earth I carried the precious gift of mediumship; but I repeat, I was not aware of that. When that voice spoke to my heart I acknowledged a more special and visible protection of Mary in all my actions, even the simplest, and if I hid that even from my superiors it was attending the advice of that same voice that made me understand that the time was not right for that revelation. I had the presentiment and a vague intuition of the renovation that is taking place now. I understood that the revelation was not supposed to come from the Church but that one day the Church would be forced to support it, by all facts that it are named miracles and are attributed to supernatural causes. I will continue this on another occasion, my friends. May the peace of the Lord be with you and allow you a peaceful sleep.”
Q – Should we send this communication and the events that led to it to Mr. Allan Kardec? A. – Haven’t I told you that I am one of the propagators of the doctrine? My name does not carry much value but I cannot see why I would not authorize you to proceed. In fact, this is not the first time I communicate. You can, therefore, forward to the master my simple instructions, or even better, my simple report.”
Dégenettes
Observation: Father Dégenettes in fact communicated several times with words that are worthy of the elevation of his soul. As much as we can remember he was the one that told the following story in a sermon given at the Notre-Dame des Victories:
- A poor and unemployed working-class woman that came for her prayers encountered a man, when leaving the church, that approached her and said: You must go to this address to find a job; talk to Miss Jane Roe; she will fix it for you.
- The poor woman then saw a photograph hanging on a wall and then said: Look Ma’am, she said pointing at the picture; this was the gentleman that sent me here!
Father Dégenettes, therefore, believed in the apparition of the souls after their death, with the same looks as they had when alive. Events of such a kind are not unusual and we have numerous examples of them. It is unlikely that father Dégenettes reported this one from the pulpit without authentic proofs. His belief in this point, added to his personal experience, support his own words about his mission in the propagation of the doctrine of the Spirits.
An event like the one reported above would necessarily go among the marvelous and supernatural. It is only Spiritism that can give them a rational explanation by the knowledge of the properties of the perispirit. For that same reason it proves the possibility of Jesus Christ appearing to his disciples after his death.
An event like the one reported above would necessarily go among the marvelous and supernatural. It is only Spiritism that can give them a rational explanation by the knowledge of the properties of the perispirit. For that same reason it proves the possibility of Jesus Christ appearing to his disciples after his death.
Manifestations of Fives, Near Lillie (North)
The Independent of Douai, from July 6th and 8th, 1865 reads about the events that have just taken place in Fives:
I
I
“For about fifteen days some unexplained events have been taking place at Rue de Prieure, events that are causing great commotion in the whole neighborhood. At certain intervals and in the backyard of two houses in that street, there is a rain of projectiles that sometimes break glasses and hit the people, with no indication of the origin or the persons responsible for throwing them. Things got to a point that one of the tenants had to screen his windows out of fear of being hit.
In the beginning those involved observed the phenomenon carefully but later on the call the police that provided a careful investigation for days. That did not stop the abundant throwing of pieces of brick, charcoal, etc. in both backyards. An officer was even hit on his back at the time when he was trying to explain to one of his subordinates the parabola drawn by the objects before they reached the grounds. On the day before the glass-worker that was replacing some of the glasses on the windows was equally hit on his back. He was upset and swore vengeance but, like the others, he could never find the culprit.
More recently there has been a reduction in the volume of the projectiles but they are more frequent, so that the movement continues. Nonetheless the mystery is expected to be sorted out soon.
II
The bizarre phenomena that take place at Rue de Prieure, in Fives, since Thursday June 14th, and that we had already reported since Saturday, are now entering a new phase, says the journal from which we took the first article.
It is no longer just projectiles with an extraordinary noise thrown at doors and windows and less violently against people. Here is what is now happening in one of the two houses we talked about because the other one now is perfectly quiet: Last Saturday saw eight cents and five coins of two Belgium cents falling in the yard. The lady of the house saw several pieces of furniture moving around and chairs falling; she called neighbors to see. They put the chairs back on their feet but they fell again for several times. They also saw a pair of clogs left outside by the servant of the house moving, as if someone were wearing them and dancing. At night a calendar placed on the fireplace jumped and floated in the air; shoes left on the floor were jumping and falling upside down. The owner of the house, Mr. M…, came at night and remained vigilant. As soon as he was alone there was a noise; it was a lamp falling onto the fireplace; while he was picking that up a ladle fell on the ground; he bent to pick that up and another lamp fell on his back. Those events happened for part of the night. Meanwhile the maid that was sleeping on the upper floor screamed for help. She was found so scared that nobody doubted her honesty when she affirmed that someone had slapped her. She was sent downstairs to rest on a adjacent room; soon they heard her crying and even the sounds of the slapping on her. That young lady fell ill and had to return to her parents’ home.
There was still Belgium coins falling on Sunday morning. In the afternoon Mrs. X… left with some friends after having examined the whole house and found nothing unusual. The main door was carefully locked. Nobody could have gotten in. When she returned she found a large number eight drawn with socks and cloths that were locked in a wardrobe.
At night she did a thorough search with her husband, her nephew and a tenant that were the only dwellers, checking every room. Next morning, in the room previously occupied by the maid, she found a strange drawing formed by hats and ten steps of the stairs covered with jackets from her husband, her nephew and the tenant, all extended with a hat on top.
On Tuesday another Belgium cent fell in the yard. They intended to give it to the poor with the others that fell before but suddenly the box where they kept it fell from the furniture and the money disappeared, as well as the key to the desk. While they were sweeping the floor in the dining room they suddenly saw two knives thrown at and stuck on the floor and another one on the ceiling. Then a key fell in the yard. It was from the main door; then came the one from the desk; then shawl and scarves that had been missing for some time appeared folded and tied in knots. In the afternoon they saw a circle formed with clothes on Mr. M… bed, and in the cellar, they found a similar drawing formed with an old jacket and a basket.
All these events, together with the ones we reported on Saturday, are confirmed by the persons that live in the house whose characters are trustworthy and far from delusional. All that seems really strange even more when we consider that it is a nice neighborhood with active surveillance for three weeks.
One can imagine the suffering caused to those in the home. After having locked the windows that look to the backyard they decided to abandon the rooms where the reported phenomena took place, so that they are now camping in two or three remaining rooms, waiting for the end of all that nuisance.
Chronicle by Th. Denis.”
As one can see, these events have a certain analogy with those of Poitiers, the Boulevard Chave in Marseille, of those at Rue des Gres and Rue Noyers in Paris, those of Hoerdt, near Strasbourg, and several other places. The most stringent surveillance was established everywhere, with the support of the police. Thanks to their multiplication they will end up being an eye opener. If they did happen in a single place we would be led to believe that they were due to a local cause but since they occur in so much distant places and at different times, we are forced to acknowledge that the cause is in the invisible world since we cannot find it here. Given these largely multiplied facts that, consequently, have so many witnesses, the denial is no longer possible, and we see the news limited to mere reports. The Spirits had announced that manifestations of all sorts would be produced everywhere. In fact, if we examine what has been happening for some time we will see that they have plenty of information to attest their presence. The skeptical demand facts; the Spirits give it to them all the time, with even more value considering that they have not been provoked and are produced without the help of the commonly known mediums, and in most cases among people that are oblivious to Spiritism. It seems that the Spirits are telling them: You accuse the mediums of deception, fraud, hallucination; we give you facts that are unsuspected. If you do not believe, after all that, it means that you want to keep your eyes and ears closed.
The manifestations of Fives, besides, are reported by Mr. Mallet, from Douai, a high-ranking officer and a man of sciences, that attest their reality locally, together with the persons involved. We can then guarantee their perfect accuracy.
In the beginning those involved observed the phenomenon carefully but later on the call the police that provided a careful investigation for days. That did not stop the abundant throwing of pieces of brick, charcoal, etc. in both backyards. An officer was even hit on his back at the time when he was trying to explain to one of his subordinates the parabola drawn by the objects before they reached the grounds. On the day before the glass-worker that was replacing some of the glasses on the windows was equally hit on his back. He was upset and swore vengeance but, like the others, he could never find the culprit.
More recently there has been a reduction in the volume of the projectiles but they are more frequent, so that the movement continues. Nonetheless the mystery is expected to be sorted out soon.
II
The bizarre phenomena that take place at Rue de Prieure, in Fives, since Thursday June 14th, and that we had already reported since Saturday, are now entering a new phase, says the journal from which we took the first article.
It is no longer just projectiles with an extraordinary noise thrown at doors and windows and less violently against people. Here is what is now happening in one of the two houses we talked about because the other one now is perfectly quiet: Last Saturday saw eight cents and five coins of two Belgium cents falling in the yard. The lady of the house saw several pieces of furniture moving around and chairs falling; she called neighbors to see. They put the chairs back on their feet but they fell again for several times. They also saw a pair of clogs left outside by the servant of the house moving, as if someone were wearing them and dancing. At night a calendar placed on the fireplace jumped and floated in the air; shoes left on the floor were jumping and falling upside down. The owner of the house, Mr. M…, came at night and remained vigilant. As soon as he was alone there was a noise; it was a lamp falling onto the fireplace; while he was picking that up a ladle fell on the ground; he bent to pick that up and another lamp fell on his back. Those events happened for part of the night. Meanwhile the maid that was sleeping on the upper floor screamed for help. She was found so scared that nobody doubted her honesty when she affirmed that someone had slapped her. She was sent downstairs to rest on a adjacent room; soon they heard her crying and even the sounds of the slapping on her. That young lady fell ill and had to return to her parents’ home.
There was still Belgium coins falling on Sunday morning. In the afternoon Mrs. X… left with some friends after having examined the whole house and found nothing unusual. The main door was carefully locked. Nobody could have gotten in. When she returned she found a large number eight drawn with socks and cloths that were locked in a wardrobe.
At night she did a thorough search with her husband, her nephew and a tenant that were the only dwellers, checking every room. Next morning, in the room previously occupied by the maid, she found a strange drawing formed by hats and ten steps of the stairs covered with jackets from her husband, her nephew and the tenant, all extended with a hat on top.
On Tuesday another Belgium cent fell in the yard. They intended to give it to the poor with the others that fell before but suddenly the box where they kept it fell from the furniture and the money disappeared, as well as the key to the desk. While they were sweeping the floor in the dining room they suddenly saw two knives thrown at and stuck on the floor and another one on the ceiling. Then a key fell in the yard. It was from the main door; then came the one from the desk; then shawl and scarves that had been missing for some time appeared folded and tied in knots. In the afternoon they saw a circle formed with clothes on Mr. M… bed, and in the cellar, they found a similar drawing formed with an old jacket and a basket.
All these events, together with the ones we reported on Saturday, are confirmed by the persons that live in the house whose characters are trustworthy and far from delusional. All that seems really strange even more when we consider that it is a nice neighborhood with active surveillance for three weeks.
One can imagine the suffering caused to those in the home. After having locked the windows that look to the backyard they decided to abandon the rooms where the reported phenomena took place, so that they are now camping in two or three remaining rooms, waiting for the end of all that nuisance.
Chronicle by Th. Denis.”
As one can see, these events have a certain analogy with those of Poitiers, the Boulevard Chave in Marseille, of those at Rue des Gres and Rue Noyers in Paris, those of Hoerdt, near Strasbourg, and several other places. The most stringent surveillance was established everywhere, with the support of the police. Thanks to their multiplication they will end up being an eye opener. If they did happen in a single place we would be led to believe that they were due to a local cause but since they occur in so much distant places and at different times, we are forced to acknowledge that the cause is in the invisible world since we cannot find it here. Given these largely multiplied facts that, consequently, have so many witnesses, the denial is no longer possible, and we see the news limited to mere reports. The Spirits had announced that manifestations of all sorts would be produced everywhere. In fact, if we examine what has been happening for some time we will see that they have plenty of information to attest their presence. The skeptical demand facts; the Spirits give it to them all the time, with even more value considering that they have not been provoked and are produced without the help of the commonly known mediums, and in most cases among people that are oblivious to Spiritism. It seems that the Spirits are telling them: You accuse the mediums of deception, fraud, hallucination; we give you facts that are unsuspected. If you do not believe, after all that, it means that you want to keep your eyes and ears closed.
The manifestations of Fives, besides, are reported by Mr. Mallet, from Douai, a high-ranking officer and a man of sciences, that attest their reality locally, together with the persons involved. We can then guarantee their perfect accuracy.
Psychological Problem
Two insane brothers
In a working-class family of Paris there are two children that are mentally ill, presenting the particularity of being perfectly normal until they were five years old. Unless provoked by an accident, insanity[1] in children is almost always the result of an interruption in the development of the organs and, consequently, it manifests since birth. Besides, it is remarkable here the fact that two children were hit by the same disease in identical conditions. Since this double phenomenon can be the object of an interesting study, from a physiological point of view, one of the members of the Parisian Society, Mr. Desliens, was introduced to the family in order to report back to the Society. The result of his observations is as follows:
“When the father learned about the objective of my visit, he said, he went to a bedroom and returned with a being that had the features of an animal rather than showing any spark of intelligence. He also brought a second one, in the same brute state but showing more of human characteristics. None of them would produce any meaningful sound; their only audible manifestation were little screeches and high pitch sounds. Their faces almost always showed an unhuman smile. The oldest is called Alfred and the other one Paulino. Alfred is now seventeen years old and was born with normal intelligence that even manifested prematurely. At the age of three he spoke with fluency and was able to comprehend the tiniest signs. He then fell ill and became verbally impaired and showed mental disability. Medical treatments lead him to a total exhaustion of his vital forces and absolute rickets. That creature, that not even has the appearance of a man, nonetheless has feelings; he loves his parents and brother and is capable of showing sympathy or displeasure for those around him. He understands everything that people say; intelligence shines out of his eyes; he strives to find the resources to respond to things that interest him but all that unsuccessfully. He has an incontrollable fear of death and always hides when he sees a funerary car. One day his aunt jokingly threated to poison him if he were naughty and he understood that perfectly well and for over a year he refused to accept any food from her hands, although he has an extraordinary appetite. Paulino, the fifteen-year-old, physically he has a more human look. His severe mental illness shows on his bruised facial expression. He, nonetheless, loves but that is limited to exterior manifestations. He was equally normal up to the age of six. He cared a lot for his brother. He then fell ill at that age and went through the same process as the oldest. More recently he had a prolonged illness after which he seemed to understand things better. The clerics of the parish said that it was all about demoniac possession and that it was necessary to exorcize the boys. The parents hesitated. However, fatigued by their insistence and afraid of losing the support they had, given the state of the children, they agreed. Those gentlemen than stated that in fact there had been possession but, in another time, and that today there was nothing else that could be done. One must say, with respect to the parents, that they have always shown the greatest care and fondness towards those unfortunate creatures.”
The clerics wisely resigned to the exorcism that would certainly lead to failure. The children do not show any sign of obsession, in the way Spiritism understands it, and it all leads to the belief that the cause is purely pathologic. Both shows mental illness as a consequence of another disease that, undoubtedly, caused the atrophy of the brains. But it is clearly easy to see that there is a thinking mind behind that veil that finds an unbreakable obstacle to its free manifestation. The intelligence of those kids, in their early days of infancy, demonstrates that it is about advanced Spirits that later on had their manifestation hindered. If they were given a normal body they would have been intelligent men, and when death frees them from that impediment, they will recover the full use of their faculties. Such a constriction imposed onto a soul must have a moral and providential cause, and it must be fair since God is the source of all justice. Well, considering that those kids could not have time to do anything wrong in this current life that would lead to such a punishment, one must forcibly admit that they are paying for a debt of a previous life, unless we deny God’s justice. They provide us with a proof of the need for reincarnation, this key that resolves so many problems and daily casts light on to so many still obscure question (see The Gospel According to Spiritism, Chapter V, item 5: Past causes of affliction).
The communication that follows was given at the Parisian Society about this subject, on July 7th, 1865 (medium Mr. Desliens): “The loss of intelligence in the two cases of mental illness is certainly explainable from a scientific point of view. Each one fell ill for a short while; one can then conclude that their brains were affected. But why had that accident occurred after the evident manifestation of their normal faculties, contrary to what generally occurs in cases of insanity? I repeat: every disturbance of intelligence or of the physical functions may be explained physiologically, irrespective of the cause, since the laws established by the Creator for the relationship between intelligence and the organs of its transmission cannot be denied. The disturbance of those relationships is a consequence of those laws and may reach the culprit for their previous faults: that is the atonement. Why are those two beings hurt together? Because they lived a common life; they were connected during the trial and must be reunited in their atonement. Why have they given early signs of intelligence, contrary to what commonly happen in similar cases? From the point of view of the providence, it is one out of thousands of nuances of atonement, that are individual and very difficult to assess by the simple fact that they are individual. One must also see here one of those many elements that daily come to confirm, to the careful observer, the bases of the Spiritist Doctrine, sanctioning by the evidence the principles of reincarnation. In addition, do not forget that the parents also have their part here. To them it is also a great test, for their love and care have no compensation. They must be congratulated for not having failed and the compensation that they do not find in this world they will find later on. Rest assured that the care and affection that they dedicate to those poor beings might well be a reparation to them, a reparation that have even more merit given the embarrassing condition of the whole family.” Moki
[1] Idiocy in the original. The term was medically correct in the times of Allan Kardec and had no negative meaning as it does today (TN)
“When the father learned about the objective of my visit, he said, he went to a bedroom and returned with a being that had the features of an animal rather than showing any spark of intelligence. He also brought a second one, in the same brute state but showing more of human characteristics. None of them would produce any meaningful sound; their only audible manifestation were little screeches and high pitch sounds. Their faces almost always showed an unhuman smile. The oldest is called Alfred and the other one Paulino. Alfred is now seventeen years old and was born with normal intelligence that even manifested prematurely. At the age of three he spoke with fluency and was able to comprehend the tiniest signs. He then fell ill and became verbally impaired and showed mental disability. Medical treatments lead him to a total exhaustion of his vital forces and absolute rickets. That creature, that not even has the appearance of a man, nonetheless has feelings; he loves his parents and brother and is capable of showing sympathy or displeasure for those around him. He understands everything that people say; intelligence shines out of his eyes; he strives to find the resources to respond to things that interest him but all that unsuccessfully. He has an incontrollable fear of death and always hides when he sees a funerary car. One day his aunt jokingly threated to poison him if he were naughty and he understood that perfectly well and for over a year he refused to accept any food from her hands, although he has an extraordinary appetite. Paulino, the fifteen-year-old, physically he has a more human look. His severe mental illness shows on his bruised facial expression. He, nonetheless, loves but that is limited to exterior manifestations. He was equally normal up to the age of six. He cared a lot for his brother. He then fell ill at that age and went through the same process as the oldest. More recently he had a prolonged illness after which he seemed to understand things better. The clerics of the parish said that it was all about demoniac possession and that it was necessary to exorcize the boys. The parents hesitated. However, fatigued by their insistence and afraid of losing the support they had, given the state of the children, they agreed. Those gentlemen than stated that in fact there had been possession but, in another time, and that today there was nothing else that could be done. One must say, with respect to the parents, that they have always shown the greatest care and fondness towards those unfortunate creatures.”
The clerics wisely resigned to the exorcism that would certainly lead to failure. The children do not show any sign of obsession, in the way Spiritism understands it, and it all leads to the belief that the cause is purely pathologic. Both shows mental illness as a consequence of another disease that, undoubtedly, caused the atrophy of the brains. But it is clearly easy to see that there is a thinking mind behind that veil that finds an unbreakable obstacle to its free manifestation. The intelligence of those kids, in their early days of infancy, demonstrates that it is about advanced Spirits that later on had their manifestation hindered. If they were given a normal body they would have been intelligent men, and when death frees them from that impediment, they will recover the full use of their faculties. Such a constriction imposed onto a soul must have a moral and providential cause, and it must be fair since God is the source of all justice. Well, considering that those kids could not have time to do anything wrong in this current life that would lead to such a punishment, one must forcibly admit that they are paying for a debt of a previous life, unless we deny God’s justice. They provide us with a proof of the need for reincarnation, this key that resolves so many problems and daily casts light on to so many still obscure question (see The Gospel According to Spiritism, Chapter V, item 5: Past causes of affliction).
The communication that follows was given at the Parisian Society about this subject, on July 7th, 1865 (medium Mr. Desliens): “The loss of intelligence in the two cases of mental illness is certainly explainable from a scientific point of view. Each one fell ill for a short while; one can then conclude that their brains were affected. But why had that accident occurred after the evident manifestation of their normal faculties, contrary to what generally occurs in cases of insanity? I repeat: every disturbance of intelligence or of the physical functions may be explained physiologically, irrespective of the cause, since the laws established by the Creator for the relationship between intelligence and the organs of its transmission cannot be denied. The disturbance of those relationships is a consequence of those laws and may reach the culprit for their previous faults: that is the atonement. Why are those two beings hurt together? Because they lived a common life; they were connected during the trial and must be reunited in their atonement. Why have they given early signs of intelligence, contrary to what commonly happen in similar cases? From the point of view of the providence, it is one out of thousands of nuances of atonement, that are individual and very difficult to assess by the simple fact that they are individual. One must also see here one of those many elements that daily come to confirm, to the careful observer, the bases of the Spiritist Doctrine, sanctioning by the evidence the principles of reincarnation. In addition, do not forget that the parents also have their part here. To them it is also a great test, for their love and care have no compensation. They must be congratulated for not having failed and the compensation that they do not find in this world they will find later on. Rest assured that the care and affection that they dedicate to those poor beings might well be a reparation to them, a reparation that have even more merit given the embarrassing condition of the whole family.” Moki
[1] Idiocy in the original. The term was medically correct in the times of Allan Kardec and had no negative meaning as it does today (TN)
Varieties
Epitaph of Benjamin Franklin
One of our members, from Joinville, Haute-Marne, sent us the following:
“Since I am aware that you welcome every document that has any relationship with the Spiritist Doctrine, I promptly let you know about a passage in the biography of Franklin, taken from the Mosaique, page 287, 1839. It demonstrates once more that superior minds, at all times, had the intuition of the Spiritist truths. The belief of that great man in the reincarnation and in the progression of the soul is fully revealed in the following few lines, forming the epitaph that he wrote himself. It goes like this:
“Here rests the body of Benjamin Franklin, thrown to the worms; a printer, like the cover of an old book whose pages were torn off, and whose title and graphic decoration were erased. But, as he believed, the work will not be lost, and it will come back in a new and better edition, reviewed and revised by the author”.
One of the most celebrated and honored American citizen therefore believed in reincarnation. He not only believed that he would be reborn on Earth but also believed that he would return improved by his own personal work. That is exactly what Spiritism says.
If we collected all the thousands of excerpts written in many spread out documents in favor of this doctrine we would acknowledge how much it was rooted in thinkers of all times, and we would be less surprised by the easiness with which it is welcomed today, because one can say that it is already latent in the conscience of the majority. Those thoughts, sowed here and there, were the precursor sparks of the fire that would shine later on, indicating the destiny of humanity.
“Since I am aware that you welcome every document that has any relationship with the Spiritist Doctrine, I promptly let you know about a passage in the biography of Franklin, taken from the Mosaique, page 287, 1839. It demonstrates once more that superior minds, at all times, had the intuition of the Spiritist truths. The belief of that great man in the reincarnation and in the progression of the soul is fully revealed in the following few lines, forming the epitaph that he wrote himself. It goes like this:
“Here rests the body of Benjamin Franklin, thrown to the worms; a printer, like the cover of an old book whose pages were torn off, and whose title and graphic decoration were erased. But, as he believed, the work will not be lost, and it will come back in a new and better edition, reviewed and revised by the author”.
One of the most celebrated and honored American citizen therefore believed in reincarnation. He not only believed that he would be reborn on Earth but also believed that he would return improved by his own personal work. That is exactly what Spiritism says.
If we collected all the thousands of excerpts written in many spread out documents in favor of this doctrine we would acknowledge how much it was rooted in thinkers of all times, and we would be less surprised by the easiness with which it is welcomed today, because one can say that it is already latent in the conscience of the majority. Those thoughts, sowed here and there, were the precursor sparks of the fire that would shine later on, indicating the destiny of humanity.
Bibliographic News
The manual of Xéfolius
This book is a proof of the fermentation of the Spiritist ideas much earlier than we were dealing with the Spirits. But here we are not talking about spread out thoughts; it is a series of instructions that we may are based on the current doctrine or, at least, that has drunk from the same spring. The work attributed to Felix de Wimpfen, beheaded in 1793, seems to have been published in 1788. In the beginning only sixty-six books were printed to some friends, according to a note placed at the introduction of the work, and consequently it was very rare. Below it follows the text of the preface dated 1788 and whose very ambiguous form could well be a way of dissimulating the personality of the author:
“If I told the public how the work I deliver today fell in my hands, the extraordinary contained in this story would not satisfy the reader more than my silence would bring uneasiness, adding nothing to the priceless gift that I pass on. Surprised and worried about such a singularity, I read it with a kind of suspicion; but soon the concern was replaced by admiration; I found what no philosopher had ever offered us, a complete system. I found my soul supported, established onto a foundation that corresponded in everything; I felt my soul growing and elevating; my heart felt the warmth of a new love towards my fellow human beings; my imagination hit by an even more profound respect for the author of all things; I saw why so much complaints against the eternal wisdom; since I was better off and happier I thought it was not by chance that I had been chosen and that the Providence wanted me to be the instrument of the publication of this manual, proper to all cults that are respected, to all ages that it instructs, to all states to whom it brings consolation, from the monarch to the beggar. Feeling and reason led me to share with my brothers the encouraging hopes, the peaceful resignation and the impulses towards perfection that took me over. Strengthened by a happiness that was unknow to me until now, I face the ridicule that will fall from me for my weakness, by the hands of the strong ones, and by anticipation I forgive their sorrow with which they will perhaps compensate the happiness for which I invite the reader, and that sooner or later will be their share.”
One of our colleagues from the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, that lives in Gray, in Haute-Saone, found this book on his desk, a short while ago, never knowing why or by whom it was brought there, not knowing anybody that could have done it, and in fact he does not understand the reason to hide it. Among his closest circle nobody ever mentioned that in their conversations, nor did they know anything about the book when he mentioned that. Touched by the ideas he found in the book he informed us about it in his last visit to Paris. We promptly obtained a recently launched publication by Hachette edition. The title unfortunately does not say much and must have contributed to keep it ignored by the public. We believe the Spiritists will thank us for bringing it out from anonymity and calling their attention to the work. Nothing better than citing a few of its passages.
“We all start from the same point to arrive at the same circumference, following different radius; and it is the diversity of types that we have used that provides the diversity of our inclinations to the first prototype. As for the inclinations, for those that have already used several, they have so many different causes and nuances that if we want to indicate them we would get lost in infinity. I will limit myself to say that when we do nothing but to turn around the circle of vanity, we are always similar; but the one that follow the laws cannot conceive how it was possible to act in such different ways, and so much contrary to what one is now.” (page 87)
“Man is no more than a disform or weak prototype when criminally abused the power or the beauty of the one that has just been left, because after the experience we are deprived of the privileges that were abused by us, keeping us away from happiness and salvation, and we then receive again what can lead us closer to them. If, then, it was beauty, we are reborn ugly, disform; if health, weak, ill; if wealth, poor and neglected; if greatness, slaves and deprived; such that it is what the game of the universal laws shows us, down here already, some examples of those that after having abused their transient or conventional means to outrage their brethren, became object of neglect and pity to them.” (page 89)
“When we judge the penalties that a crime deserves we may vary with respect to the measure of punishment but we all agree that the crime must be punished. We are equally in agreement that the punishments imposed on a bad person by a good one would be preferable to the barbarism of the eternal penalties, useless to oneself and to the others, and that since the Almightiness cannot be threatened, offended and disturbed, and cannot seek vengeance; that as a consequence, everything that we experiment is for our enlightenment and change; but the invaluable price that man attaches to material objects of all kinds makes him believe that an infinite power is not less necessary to assign punishment to a fault of his own; then, in his mad passion, he believes that God will revenge as he would if he were god, whereas others try to convince themselves that heavens are oblivious to their crimes. But that is how the corrupted ones reason, each taking their own self-serving interest as basis.” (page 134)
“Had we not limited the universe to our little globe, to an Elysium, a Tartar, all surrounded by candles, we would have been fairer to God and to our brethren. You do not know what to do with the tyrant of Rome, after his uncountable mistakes, dying with the regret of not having achieved all of those in his list. Since you cannot move him to the Elysium, you invent the rages, a Tartar, and throw him into the abyss of eternal penalties. But when you realize that the tyrant, murdered at an early age, still lives; that he went through the most disgusting conditions; that he was punished by the “eye for an eye” law; that he suffered alone everything he made others suffer; when you realize that instructed by disgrace, that great teacher of mankind, modified by the suffering, hopeless and knowledgeable of everything that disturbs; that heart, in which there was abundance of sins and vices, and that vomited the crimes that the universal laws utilized to modify and salvage many of our brothers; when you realize, I say, that that very heart today is an asylum of truth, of the kindest and harmonious virtues, how are you going to feel about that?” (page 131)
“When men imagined a vindictive God, they used their own image for that. Man seeks revenge because believes to have been hurt or to demonstrate that he must be taken seriously, that is, revenge is caused by greed or fear, believing that it is only the demand for justice. Each one of us knows where the lack of harmony in our passions may lead us. But the Almighty, unreachable by our attacks, the Eternal, as good as just, he only carries out justice to the same measure of his goodness. Since his goodness created us for happiness, he ordered the nature of things so that:
“If I told the public how the work I deliver today fell in my hands, the extraordinary contained in this story would not satisfy the reader more than my silence would bring uneasiness, adding nothing to the priceless gift that I pass on. Surprised and worried about such a singularity, I read it with a kind of suspicion; but soon the concern was replaced by admiration; I found what no philosopher had ever offered us, a complete system. I found my soul supported, established onto a foundation that corresponded in everything; I felt my soul growing and elevating; my heart felt the warmth of a new love towards my fellow human beings; my imagination hit by an even more profound respect for the author of all things; I saw why so much complaints against the eternal wisdom; since I was better off and happier I thought it was not by chance that I had been chosen and that the Providence wanted me to be the instrument of the publication of this manual, proper to all cults that are respected, to all ages that it instructs, to all states to whom it brings consolation, from the monarch to the beggar. Feeling and reason led me to share with my brothers the encouraging hopes, the peaceful resignation and the impulses towards perfection that took me over. Strengthened by a happiness that was unknow to me until now, I face the ridicule that will fall from me for my weakness, by the hands of the strong ones, and by anticipation I forgive their sorrow with which they will perhaps compensate the happiness for which I invite the reader, and that sooner or later will be their share.”
One of our colleagues from the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, that lives in Gray, in Haute-Saone, found this book on his desk, a short while ago, never knowing why or by whom it was brought there, not knowing anybody that could have done it, and in fact he does not understand the reason to hide it. Among his closest circle nobody ever mentioned that in their conversations, nor did they know anything about the book when he mentioned that. Touched by the ideas he found in the book he informed us about it in his last visit to Paris. We promptly obtained a recently launched publication by Hachette edition. The title unfortunately does not say much and must have contributed to keep it ignored by the public. We believe the Spiritists will thank us for bringing it out from anonymity and calling their attention to the work. Nothing better than citing a few of its passages.
“We all start from the same point to arrive at the same circumference, following different radius; and it is the diversity of types that we have used that provides the diversity of our inclinations to the first prototype. As for the inclinations, for those that have already used several, they have so many different causes and nuances that if we want to indicate them we would get lost in infinity. I will limit myself to say that when we do nothing but to turn around the circle of vanity, we are always similar; but the one that follow the laws cannot conceive how it was possible to act in such different ways, and so much contrary to what one is now.” (page 87)
“Man is no more than a disform or weak prototype when criminally abused the power or the beauty of the one that has just been left, because after the experience we are deprived of the privileges that were abused by us, keeping us away from happiness and salvation, and we then receive again what can lead us closer to them. If, then, it was beauty, we are reborn ugly, disform; if health, weak, ill; if wealth, poor and neglected; if greatness, slaves and deprived; such that it is what the game of the universal laws shows us, down here already, some examples of those that after having abused their transient or conventional means to outrage their brethren, became object of neglect and pity to them.” (page 89)
“When we judge the penalties that a crime deserves we may vary with respect to the measure of punishment but we all agree that the crime must be punished. We are equally in agreement that the punishments imposed on a bad person by a good one would be preferable to the barbarism of the eternal penalties, useless to oneself and to the others, and that since the Almightiness cannot be threatened, offended and disturbed, and cannot seek vengeance; that as a consequence, everything that we experiment is for our enlightenment and change; but the invaluable price that man attaches to material objects of all kinds makes him believe that an infinite power is not less necessary to assign punishment to a fault of his own; then, in his mad passion, he believes that God will revenge as he would if he were god, whereas others try to convince themselves that heavens are oblivious to their crimes. But that is how the corrupted ones reason, each taking their own self-serving interest as basis.” (page 134)
“Had we not limited the universe to our little globe, to an Elysium, a Tartar, all surrounded by candles, we would have been fairer to God and to our brethren. You do not know what to do with the tyrant of Rome, after his uncountable mistakes, dying with the regret of not having achieved all of those in his list. Since you cannot move him to the Elysium, you invent the rages, a Tartar, and throw him into the abyss of eternal penalties. But when you realize that the tyrant, murdered at an early age, still lives; that he went through the most disgusting conditions; that he was punished by the “eye for an eye” law; that he suffered alone everything he made others suffer; when you realize that instructed by disgrace, that great teacher of mankind, modified by the suffering, hopeless and knowledgeable of everything that disturbs; that heart, in which there was abundance of sins and vices, and that vomited the crimes that the universal laws utilized to modify and salvage many of our brothers; when you realize, I say, that that very heart today is an asylum of truth, of the kindest and harmonious virtues, how are you going to feel about that?” (page 131)
“When men imagined a vindictive God, they used their own image for that. Man seeks revenge because believes to have been hurt or to demonstrate that he must be taken seriously, that is, revenge is caused by greed or fear, believing that it is only the demand for justice. Each one of us knows where the lack of harmony in our passions may lead us. But the Almighty, unreachable by our attacks, the Eternal, as good as just, he only carries out justice to the same measure of his goodness. Since his goodness created us for happiness, he ordered the nature of things so that:
- Not a single crime goes unpunished;
- The punishment, soon or later, becomes a light to the sinner and several others;
- We cannot change or infringe the laws without incurring in an error proportional to our fault and to the harm caused to our current condition.” (page 132)
“The more you advance the more beauty you will find in a heartfelt prayer, because it is through love that we shall be happy and since love is the link between all beings, its good vibe will act upon you. That invisible companion is perhaps the friend that you believe lost, or the other one that you believe to only exist in your desire; one moment more and you will be with him and every loved one, or those that you would had loved preferably, if you had known them.” (page 265)
“When an injustice or a malevolent act is a cause for your outrage, before you think about that injustice or harm, be rational with respect to your feeling, so that it will not become rage. Say to yourself: I need wisdom to withstand this. Wouldn’t this be an old debt that I pay now? If I lose my calm I will soon fall. Aren’t we all under the hand of the Great Worker and doesn’t He know better than I do the instrument to be used? Which advices I would give to a friend if I saw him in my situation? Isn’t that true that I would remind him of the progression of the beings; if a wild tree produces as good fruits as the one in the orchard; if he would like to be as delayed as the bad person, to become the same as him; if the attack that he suffered had not severed a link that he wasn’t able to break? Wouldn’t I finish by guiding his eyes to that eternal happiness, the price of the complement of a harmony in which we cannot progress but at the measure of our enlightenment, and our separation from the miserable interests that originate the continuous conflicts and that we raise above the finite!” (page 310)
These citations are enough to provide an insight into the book and make any comment unnecessary. The guide of the medium, Mr. Desliens, was asked about the possibility of evoking the Spirit of the author. He said: “Yes, certainly, even more because this is not his first communication. Several mediums were already guided by him on several occasions. I will pass to him the task of explaining that, as below.”
Evoked and questioned about the source of the ideas contained in his book, the Spirit then gave the following communication on June 29th, 1865:
“Considering that I do not attribute to me the exclusive merit of the work that you read, you must know that the wellbeing of humanity and the enlightenment of my brethren were my sole objective. That means that I will gladly give you the answers you expect from me. I have already come several times to attend the sessions of the Society not only as a spectator but as an instructor, and do not be surprised when I tell you that the Spirits, in their communications, use a name that is typical for the group to which they belong. Therefore, a Spirit that signs St. Augustine will not necessarily be St. Augustine himself but another one of the same order that arrived at the same level of perfection. Having said that you must know that in my life I was one of those inconscient mediums that frequently are found in your time. Here is why I have spoken in a seemingly premature way: For every moral and scientific acquisition several cornerstones are planted, repelled at first to succeed later, in order to seamlessly prepare the minds for the future developments. Every new idea has little chance of success, arriving at a supposedly wise world, facing the partisanship and opposition of its members. They may recognize the wisdom of the new ideas but to them it would be a sign of weakness to accept them, demonstrating the insanity of their particular systems. The prefer to deny them, out of self-love, human respect or even also out of ambition, until they are forced to acknowledge their mistakes by the evidence or pay the price of ridicule that they want to cast upon the new instrument of the Providence. It has been like that at all times and that is how it was with Spiritism. Hence, do not be surprised by finding several isolated manifestations in former times, preceding the great spiritualist movement, whose agreement with the present instructions demonstrate once more the intervention of the Almighty in all discoveries that humanity mistakenly attribute to any particular genius. No doubt that each one has its own genius; however, what would they do on their own? When someone, gifted by an intelligence capable of propagating new ideas with some chance of success, appear on Earth or somewhere else, that person is chosen by the hierarchy of the invisible beings, assigned by the Providence with the task of propagating the new invention, then receiving their inspiration for the discovery, and progressively making the incidents happen that will ensure its success.
During my incarnation it would have been impossible to have told you what driver of my writing was, the true manifestation of my individuality. Now I clearly see that I was the instrument, partially passive, of the Spirit in charge of guiding me to the harmonious target that should model me, in order to acquire the sum of perfection that I was able to expect from Earth. There are two types of very distinct perfections: the relative perfections, inspired by the guide of the day, a guide that is far away from the summit of the scale of perfectibility, and that are just above their proteges given their current stage of evolution, and the absolute perfection, a still veiled aspiration to me, since I still ignore it, and to which we arrive by the succession of relative perfections.
The soul acquires new moral senses in each world in which it lives, allowing the Spirit to get to know things that were unknown up until then. Could I tell you what I was? What is my position in the scale of the beings? What is the point? What good would that do to me to have some of the earthly glory? I prefer to keep the memory of having been useful to my fellow human beings, to the limit of my forces, and continue the task assigned to me by God when on Earth, out of his benevolence. I learned by teaching others. I do the same here. I can only tell you that I am part of the phalanx of Spirits that you assign the generic name of St. Louis.”
Q. – Could you tell us: 1) were you the person designated by the name Felix Wimpfen in the preface of the re-edition of your book? 2) were you a member of the sect of theosophy whose opinions are very close to ours? 3) if you are supposed to reincarnate soon and join the phalanx of Spirits destined to complete the great movement that we observe? 4) Mr. Allan Kardec would like to promote your book. He also would like to know your opinion about it.
A. – No, I was not Felix Wimpfen, believe me. If it were me I would have no problem and telling you that. He was my friend, as several other philosophers of the eighteenth century; I even followed his painful end. But I repeat, my name will remain unknown since it seems useless to have it revealed. I certainly sympathized with theosophy but did not share the enthusiasm of certain followers of that school. I had several acquaintances among them and my ideas, as you saw, were very similar to theirs. I am totally submiss to the designs of the Providence and if it is in those designs my return to Earth to continue to purify and enlighten myself, that will be out of God’s benevolence. In fact, I have expressed that desire and expect it to happen soon. Since my book support the Spiritist ideas I can only approve our President’s attitude for having thought of that. But I might not have been the first promoter of that preparation, and from my side I am certain that some Spirits familiar to me contributed to have it in your hands and to inspire in you the intentions about me.
You will know it is me when you have me specially evoked but when I come to teach you, like in the past, you will only know that I am one Spirit of the order of St. Louis.
“When an injustice or a malevolent act is a cause for your outrage, before you think about that injustice or harm, be rational with respect to your feeling, so that it will not become rage. Say to yourself: I need wisdom to withstand this. Wouldn’t this be an old debt that I pay now? If I lose my calm I will soon fall. Aren’t we all under the hand of the Great Worker and doesn’t He know better than I do the instrument to be used? Which advices I would give to a friend if I saw him in my situation? Isn’t that true that I would remind him of the progression of the beings; if a wild tree produces as good fruits as the one in the orchard; if he would like to be as delayed as the bad person, to become the same as him; if the attack that he suffered had not severed a link that he wasn’t able to break? Wouldn’t I finish by guiding his eyes to that eternal happiness, the price of the complement of a harmony in which we cannot progress but at the measure of our enlightenment, and our separation from the miserable interests that originate the continuous conflicts and that we raise above the finite!” (page 310)
These citations are enough to provide an insight into the book and make any comment unnecessary. The guide of the medium, Mr. Desliens, was asked about the possibility of evoking the Spirit of the author. He said: “Yes, certainly, even more because this is not his first communication. Several mediums were already guided by him on several occasions. I will pass to him the task of explaining that, as below.”
Evoked and questioned about the source of the ideas contained in his book, the Spirit then gave the following communication on June 29th, 1865:
“Considering that I do not attribute to me the exclusive merit of the work that you read, you must know that the wellbeing of humanity and the enlightenment of my brethren were my sole objective. That means that I will gladly give you the answers you expect from me. I have already come several times to attend the sessions of the Society not only as a spectator but as an instructor, and do not be surprised when I tell you that the Spirits, in their communications, use a name that is typical for the group to which they belong. Therefore, a Spirit that signs St. Augustine will not necessarily be St. Augustine himself but another one of the same order that arrived at the same level of perfection. Having said that you must know that in my life I was one of those inconscient mediums that frequently are found in your time. Here is why I have spoken in a seemingly premature way: For every moral and scientific acquisition several cornerstones are planted, repelled at first to succeed later, in order to seamlessly prepare the minds for the future developments. Every new idea has little chance of success, arriving at a supposedly wise world, facing the partisanship and opposition of its members. They may recognize the wisdom of the new ideas but to them it would be a sign of weakness to accept them, demonstrating the insanity of their particular systems. The prefer to deny them, out of self-love, human respect or even also out of ambition, until they are forced to acknowledge their mistakes by the evidence or pay the price of ridicule that they want to cast upon the new instrument of the Providence. It has been like that at all times and that is how it was with Spiritism. Hence, do not be surprised by finding several isolated manifestations in former times, preceding the great spiritualist movement, whose agreement with the present instructions demonstrate once more the intervention of the Almighty in all discoveries that humanity mistakenly attribute to any particular genius. No doubt that each one has its own genius; however, what would they do on their own? When someone, gifted by an intelligence capable of propagating new ideas with some chance of success, appear on Earth or somewhere else, that person is chosen by the hierarchy of the invisible beings, assigned by the Providence with the task of propagating the new invention, then receiving their inspiration for the discovery, and progressively making the incidents happen that will ensure its success.
During my incarnation it would have been impossible to have told you what driver of my writing was, the true manifestation of my individuality. Now I clearly see that I was the instrument, partially passive, of the Spirit in charge of guiding me to the harmonious target that should model me, in order to acquire the sum of perfection that I was able to expect from Earth. There are two types of very distinct perfections: the relative perfections, inspired by the guide of the day, a guide that is far away from the summit of the scale of perfectibility, and that are just above their proteges given their current stage of evolution, and the absolute perfection, a still veiled aspiration to me, since I still ignore it, and to which we arrive by the succession of relative perfections.
The soul acquires new moral senses in each world in which it lives, allowing the Spirit to get to know things that were unknown up until then. Could I tell you what I was? What is my position in the scale of the beings? What is the point? What good would that do to me to have some of the earthly glory? I prefer to keep the memory of having been useful to my fellow human beings, to the limit of my forces, and continue the task assigned to me by God when on Earth, out of his benevolence. I learned by teaching others. I do the same here. I can only tell you that I am part of the phalanx of Spirits that you assign the generic name of St. Louis.”
Q. – Could you tell us: 1) were you the person designated by the name Felix Wimpfen in the preface of the re-edition of your book? 2) were you a member of the sect of theosophy whose opinions are very close to ours? 3) if you are supposed to reincarnate soon and join the phalanx of Spirits destined to complete the great movement that we observe? 4) Mr. Allan Kardec would like to promote your book. He also would like to know your opinion about it.
A. – No, I was not Felix Wimpfen, believe me. If it were me I would have no problem and telling you that. He was my friend, as several other philosophers of the eighteenth century; I even followed his painful end. But I repeat, my name will remain unknown since it seems useless to have it revealed. I certainly sympathized with theosophy but did not share the enthusiasm of certain followers of that school. I had several acquaintances among them and my ideas, as you saw, were very similar to theirs. I am totally submiss to the designs of the Providence and if it is in those designs my return to Earth to continue to purify and enlighten myself, that will be out of God’s benevolence. In fact, I have expressed that desire and expect it to happen soon. Since my book support the Spiritist ideas I can only approve our President’s attitude for having thought of that. But I might not have been the first promoter of that preparation, and from my side I am certain that some Spirits familiar to me contributed to have it in your hands and to inspire in you the intentions about me.
You will know it is me when you have me specially evoked but when I come to teach you, like in the past, you will only know that I am one Spirit of the order of St. Louis.
Spiritist Dissertations
Key to heavensSociety of Montreuil-Sur-Mer, January 5th, 1865
When we consider that everything comes from God and returns to God it is then impossible not to see that in all things in the divine creation the links that unite them also subject them to a work of general progress, and at the same time to an individual progress. Also, one cannot ignore the fact that the law of solidarity that results from all that does not force us to useless sacrifices of all kinds to one another. In addition, God has shown us the first primordial application of the established principles. It is the solidarity found in those principles that lead us to sympathize with other people’s sufferings, to have compassion and to alleviate them. That is not all. The prophets and the divine Messiah Jesus Christ gave us the example of a second application of the principle of solidarity, initially presented through the symbolic religious ceremonies and more frequently by the authority of their teachings, that is the love to thy neighbor; later on, establishing the practice of charity as a strictly necessary duty, the very expression of solidarity. Charity is the act of our submission to the law of God; it is the sign of our moral greatness; the key to heavens. That is the charity that I want to talk to you about. I will discuss only the material side for a simple reason: it is the aspect that interest people the least.
Neither the Christians nor the Spiritists denied the principle or the law of solidarity but tried to subtract its consequences and for that invoked a thousand pretexts. I will mention a few.
Things of the soul or heart, they say, have an infinitely superior price than the material ones, hence the consolation of sufferings through words or wise advices is infinitely worthier than material help. You are right, ladies and gentlemen, if the suffering that you mention has a moral cause; if its reason is in a ulcer of the heart; but if it is hunger, cold or a disease; if, in a word, are provoked by material causes, will your words of wisdom be enough to minimize them? Allow me to doubt. When God placed you on this Earth, if he had forgotten to provide you with the food to your body, would you have found its equivalent in the spiritual support that you are given? But God is not a man. God is eternal wisdom and infinite goodness. He gave you a body of mud but provided the needs of that body by fertilizing the fields and fecundating Earth’s treasures; God added the material help that your body claims to the spiritual nourishment addressed to your soul.
Since then and perhaps because selfishness deprived the poor from his earthly inheritance, how dare you consider yourself good with him? Just because human justice excluded him from the number of those entitled to temporary wealth, wouldn’t your charity find a more equitable justice to offer him? A renowned thinker of this century was not afraid of expressing himself like this, in his memorable profession of faith: “Each bee is entitled to the portion of honey necessary to its own subsistence, and if there are some people that go without the necessary, it means that justice and charity have vanished from your circle.”
However excessive this language may sound to you it still contains a great truth, a truth that may be incomprehensible to many among you, but evident to us, Spirits that are touched by the effects, who see the whole and the causes that produce them.
Ah, someone says, nobody is sorrier than I am for the tough deprivation of the true poor, of the one whose work is insufficient to maintain his family, despite the fatigue, and incapable of joy and happiness; but I considered to be a case of conscience to encourage, through blind liberalities, laziness or misconduct. In fact, I consider charity indispensable to the salvation of man; however, the impossibility of finding the true needs among so many others that are simulated, seem to justify my abstention.
The impossibility of finding the true needs, my friend, is your justification. Notice, however, my friend, that such justification shall never be sanctioned by your conscience and I do not wish any other proof other than your confession, because from the right that the poor has to your elms – and you acknowledge that right – it follows that it is your duty to find him. Do you look for him? The impossibility stops you. It is obvious! Charity has no limits, it is infinite like God from whom it comes, and it sees no impossibility! Yes, something stops you: it is selfishness and God that probes reason and heart will easily find that out under the fallacious pretexts with what you hide it. You can deceive the world, you can momentarily deceive your conscience, but you will never deceive God. In a hundred of years, in a thousand of years you will come back to Earth; you will certainly live here deprived from your current lavishness, bending to the weight of need. I tell you that you will then feel the neglect of the rich, the indifference that you had yourself shown in the past towards the poor. They say that nobility obliges; solidarity obliges even more. The one that breaches that law loses its benefits. The one that fed their selfish nature will suffer, in turn, the neglect of selfishness. Listen to these words by Rousseau:
“As for myself, I know that the poor are my brothers and that I cannot, without an inexcusable hardness, refuse the little support that they ask me. In the majority they are tramps, I agree; but I know well the toughness of life to be able to ignore the many disgraces that an honest man may find in his fate. I how could I be certain that the unknown person that begs for my assistance in the name of God is not an honest man, soon to perish in his misery, and that my refusal will lead to despair? When the elms that you give is not a real help to them, at least it is the witness that you sympathize with their misery, it is a mitigation of the rigidity of the refusal, a kind of salutation that is made.”
It is a son of Genève, ladies and gentlemen, that speaks of fate; it is a philosopher fed by the dry sources of the eighteenth century, fearing to miss an honest man among the unknown that reach out to him, giving to all. He gives to all because they are all his brothers: he knows that! Do you know less than he did gentlemen? I cannot believe that.
But how much should you give, or better saying, what is the part of your possessions that belongs to you and the one that belongs to the poor? You part, ladies and gentlemen, is the necessary and nothing beyond the necessary, and you must not exaggerate. It is useless to prevail from your position, the responsibilities that follow from that, the luxurious obligations that it entitles. All that is related to the world and if you want to live for the world you will not advance but with the world; you will not move faster than the world.
In vain still you will allege, in order to justify your habits of slackness, a work which is not performed by the poor, and which, practiced at home and by you, makes you a beneficiary of greater ease; In vain will you alleviate this, because every man is bound to work, either for himself or for others, because the carelessness of his neighbor would not absolve him of the abandonment in which he would have abandoned you.
From your patrimony, as from your work, you are not allowed to take in your benefit but what is necessary to you. The rest is to the poor. That is the law. I don’t deny the fact that in certain cases and under certain circumstances this law involves temperament; however, before the divine light and truth there is none of that.
How about family? Are we done just because we help those that we call poor? No, evidently not gentlemen, because as soon as you acknowledge the need to deprive yourself in favor of the poor it is time to establish a hierarchy. Well, your women and your children are you first poor; they are the ones to deserve your first elms. Take care of the future of your children; make sure you help to prepare calm and tranquil days for them amidst this vale of tears; even leave a small inheritance that allows them to continue your good work: that is legitimate. However, do not teach them to live egoistically and to look at things that belong to everyone as if they were theirs. Before and after them, the authors of your days, those that fed and kept you, those that protected your first steps and guided your adolescence, your father and your mother, have the right to your solicitude. Then come the souls that God gave you as your bloody brothers; then your heartily friends; finally, every poor, starting from the most miserable ones.
I saw them, I give you temperaments, establish a hierarchy according to your instincts. Avoid, nonetheless, to favor too much ones with the exclusion of others. It is through the equitable partition of your benefits that you will show your wisdom, and it is still through that equitable partition that you shall obey God’s law with respect to your brothers, that is the law of solidarity.
Lamennais says that “justice is life; charity is also life but a more beautiful and sweet life”. Yes, charity is a beautiful and sweet life, it is the life of the saints, it is the key to heavens.
Lacordaire
When we consider that everything comes from God and returns to God it is then impossible not to see that in all things in the divine creation the links that unite them also subject them to a work of general progress, and at the same time to an individual progress. Also, one cannot ignore the fact that the law of solidarity that results from all that does not force us to useless sacrifices of all kinds to one another. In addition, God has shown us the first primordial application of the established principles. It is the solidarity found in those principles that lead us to sympathize with other people’s sufferings, to have compassion and to alleviate them. That is not all. The prophets and the divine Messiah Jesus Christ gave us the example of a second application of the principle of solidarity, initially presented through the symbolic religious ceremonies and more frequently by the authority of their teachings, that is the love to thy neighbor; later on, establishing the practice of charity as a strictly necessary duty, the very expression of solidarity. Charity is the act of our submission to the law of God; it is the sign of our moral greatness; the key to heavens. That is the charity that I want to talk to you about. I will discuss only the material side for a simple reason: it is the aspect that interest people the least.
Neither the Christians nor the Spiritists denied the principle or the law of solidarity but tried to subtract its consequences and for that invoked a thousand pretexts. I will mention a few.
Things of the soul or heart, they say, have an infinitely superior price than the material ones, hence the consolation of sufferings through words or wise advices is infinitely worthier than material help. You are right, ladies and gentlemen, if the suffering that you mention has a moral cause; if its reason is in a ulcer of the heart; but if it is hunger, cold or a disease; if, in a word, are provoked by material causes, will your words of wisdom be enough to minimize them? Allow me to doubt. When God placed you on this Earth, if he had forgotten to provide you with the food to your body, would you have found its equivalent in the spiritual support that you are given? But God is not a man. God is eternal wisdom and infinite goodness. He gave you a body of mud but provided the needs of that body by fertilizing the fields and fecundating Earth’s treasures; God added the material help that your body claims to the spiritual nourishment addressed to your soul.
Since then and perhaps because selfishness deprived the poor from his earthly inheritance, how dare you consider yourself good with him? Just because human justice excluded him from the number of those entitled to temporary wealth, wouldn’t your charity find a more equitable justice to offer him? A renowned thinker of this century was not afraid of expressing himself like this, in his memorable profession of faith: “Each bee is entitled to the portion of honey necessary to its own subsistence, and if there are some people that go without the necessary, it means that justice and charity have vanished from your circle.”
However excessive this language may sound to you it still contains a great truth, a truth that may be incomprehensible to many among you, but evident to us, Spirits that are touched by the effects, who see the whole and the causes that produce them.
Ah, someone says, nobody is sorrier than I am for the tough deprivation of the true poor, of the one whose work is insufficient to maintain his family, despite the fatigue, and incapable of joy and happiness; but I considered to be a case of conscience to encourage, through blind liberalities, laziness or misconduct. In fact, I consider charity indispensable to the salvation of man; however, the impossibility of finding the true needs among so many others that are simulated, seem to justify my abstention.
The impossibility of finding the true needs, my friend, is your justification. Notice, however, my friend, that such justification shall never be sanctioned by your conscience and I do not wish any other proof other than your confession, because from the right that the poor has to your elms – and you acknowledge that right – it follows that it is your duty to find him. Do you look for him? The impossibility stops you. It is obvious! Charity has no limits, it is infinite like God from whom it comes, and it sees no impossibility! Yes, something stops you: it is selfishness and God that probes reason and heart will easily find that out under the fallacious pretexts with what you hide it. You can deceive the world, you can momentarily deceive your conscience, but you will never deceive God. In a hundred of years, in a thousand of years you will come back to Earth; you will certainly live here deprived from your current lavishness, bending to the weight of need. I tell you that you will then feel the neglect of the rich, the indifference that you had yourself shown in the past towards the poor. They say that nobility obliges; solidarity obliges even more. The one that breaches that law loses its benefits. The one that fed their selfish nature will suffer, in turn, the neglect of selfishness. Listen to these words by Rousseau:
“As for myself, I know that the poor are my brothers and that I cannot, without an inexcusable hardness, refuse the little support that they ask me. In the majority they are tramps, I agree; but I know well the toughness of life to be able to ignore the many disgraces that an honest man may find in his fate. I how could I be certain that the unknown person that begs for my assistance in the name of God is not an honest man, soon to perish in his misery, and that my refusal will lead to despair? When the elms that you give is not a real help to them, at least it is the witness that you sympathize with their misery, it is a mitigation of the rigidity of the refusal, a kind of salutation that is made.”
It is a son of Genève, ladies and gentlemen, that speaks of fate; it is a philosopher fed by the dry sources of the eighteenth century, fearing to miss an honest man among the unknown that reach out to him, giving to all. He gives to all because they are all his brothers: he knows that! Do you know less than he did gentlemen? I cannot believe that.
But how much should you give, or better saying, what is the part of your possessions that belongs to you and the one that belongs to the poor? You part, ladies and gentlemen, is the necessary and nothing beyond the necessary, and you must not exaggerate. It is useless to prevail from your position, the responsibilities that follow from that, the luxurious obligations that it entitles. All that is related to the world and if you want to live for the world you will not advance but with the world; you will not move faster than the world.
In vain still you will allege, in order to justify your habits of slackness, a work which is not performed by the poor, and which, practiced at home and by you, makes you a beneficiary of greater ease; In vain will you alleviate this, because every man is bound to work, either for himself or for others, because the carelessness of his neighbor would not absolve him of the abandonment in which he would have abandoned you.
From your patrimony, as from your work, you are not allowed to take in your benefit but what is necessary to you. The rest is to the poor. That is the law. I don’t deny the fact that in certain cases and under certain circumstances this law involves temperament; however, before the divine light and truth there is none of that.
How about family? Are we done just because we help those that we call poor? No, evidently not gentlemen, because as soon as you acknowledge the need to deprive yourself in favor of the poor it is time to establish a hierarchy. Well, your women and your children are you first poor; they are the ones to deserve your first elms. Take care of the future of your children; make sure you help to prepare calm and tranquil days for them amidst this vale of tears; even leave a small inheritance that allows them to continue your good work: that is legitimate. However, do not teach them to live egoistically and to look at things that belong to everyone as if they were theirs. Before and after them, the authors of your days, those that fed and kept you, those that protected your first steps and guided your adolescence, your father and your mother, have the right to your solicitude. Then come the souls that God gave you as your bloody brothers; then your heartily friends; finally, every poor, starting from the most miserable ones.
I saw them, I give you temperaments, establish a hierarchy according to your instincts. Avoid, nonetheless, to favor too much ones with the exclusion of others. It is through the equitable partition of your benefits that you will show your wisdom, and it is still through that equitable partition that you shall obey God’s law with respect to your brothers, that is the law of solidarity.
Lamennais says that “justice is life; charity is also life but a more beautiful and sweet life”. Yes, charity is a beautiful and sweet life, it is the life of the saints, it is the key to heavens.
Lacordaire
Faith
Spiritist Group of Douai, June 7th, 1865
Plain faith on Earth is searching for a place to dwell and a heart to enlighten. Where will it go? To begin with it will penetrate and take over the soul of the primitive man; it will place a temporary veil onto reason that begins to develop, vacillating in the darkness of the spirit. It will lead mankind through the ages of simplicity and become the master of revelations. However, since reason is not matured enough to distinguish between true and false and judge what comes from God, it will lead humanity out of the right path, hand and hand and with a veil on the eyes. There have been many detours, since that is the flagship of a blind faith with its meaning and utility.
The virtue disappears when the soul, presenting that it can see with its own eyes, keeps the faith away and only marches with reason that helps to erase false beliefs that were adopted without examination. Reason is good for that. But people find many mysteries and obscure truths in their path, getting confused when attempting to unveil them. Their judgment cannot follow it; they are in a hurry, but any progression is gradual. The faith that was repelled is no longer there, as with reason that they wanted to surpass. They then do like the fearful butterfly, burning the wings in the light and getting lost in impossible deviations. That is the origin of the bad philosophy that sought too much and replaced nothing.
It was time for transformation. Man was no longer the blind believer or the believe that rationalize belief; it was a universal crisis represented by the chrysalis. Clarity shines when sought in darkness and many deviated souls find the light, faded by so many useless deviations, then returning as guides and eternal leaders. Faith and reason make us move forward, and their combined beams of light prevent us from getting lost once again. Faith is then founded on the solid basis of reason that in turn is helped by inspiration.
It is your chance, friends. Follow the path. God is at the end.
Demeure
Plain faith on Earth is searching for a place to dwell and a heart to enlighten. Where will it go? To begin with it will penetrate and take over the soul of the primitive man; it will place a temporary veil onto reason that begins to develop, vacillating in the darkness of the spirit. It will lead mankind through the ages of simplicity and become the master of revelations. However, since reason is not matured enough to distinguish between true and false and judge what comes from God, it will lead humanity out of the right path, hand and hand and with a veil on the eyes. There have been many detours, since that is the flagship of a blind faith with its meaning and utility.
The virtue disappears when the soul, presenting that it can see with its own eyes, keeps the faith away and only marches with reason that helps to erase false beliefs that were adopted without examination. Reason is good for that. But people find many mysteries and obscure truths in their path, getting confused when attempting to unveil them. Their judgment cannot follow it; they are in a hurry, but any progression is gradual. The faith that was repelled is no longer there, as with reason that they wanted to surpass. They then do like the fearful butterfly, burning the wings in the light and getting lost in impossible deviations. That is the origin of the bad philosophy that sought too much and replaced nothing.
It was time for transformation. Man was no longer the blind believer or the believe that rationalize belief; it was a universal crisis represented by the chrysalis. Clarity shines when sought in darkness and many deviated souls find the light, faded by so many useless deviations, then returning as guides and eternal leaders. Faith and reason make us move forward, and their combined beams of light prevent us from getting lost once again. Faith is then founded on the solid basis of reason that in turn is helped by inspiration.
It is your chance, friends. Follow the path. God is at the end.
Demeure
Notice
The sessions at the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies will be suspended, like in previous years, from August 1st to October 1st.
September
Healing MediumshipThe following was sent to us from Lyon, on July 12th, 1865:
“Dear Mr. Kardec,
As a Spiritist, I come to appeal to your kindness and request some advices with respect to the practice of healing mediumship by the imposition of hands. I am certain that a simple article about this matter in the Spiritist Review with some developments would be welcomed with great interest, not only by those that like myself are heavily involved with this subject, but also by many others that after reading the article would be inspired to get involved with that. I always remember the words of a somnambulist that I had formed. During her magnetically induced sleep I used to send her to visit a distant patient and when I asked her about the ways we could heal that patient she said: - There is a person in your village, Mr. Joe Doe, that could do it. He is a healing medium, but he is not aware of that.
I do not know how special this faculty is. It is up to you, more than anybody else, to clarify it. But if indeed it is, even more desirable that you would bring this to the attention of the Spiritists. Many out there, even the ones that do not share our opinions, and that could read you would feel no rejection for carrying a faculty that only requires faith in God and prayer. What can be more general and universal? It is not a matter of Spiritism, and everyone may keep their convictions in their own fields. How many sisters in charity, how many country healers, how many thousands of good people of strong faith could be healing mediums! That is a dream I have in all religions and sects. Once accepted everywhere, that faculty, that divine gift from our creator’s goodness, instead of staying as the apanage of some, would in a become of public domain, if I can say so. It would be a great day to those in suffering; and there are so many of them!
But in order to practice that mediumship, in addition to a strong faith and prayer, there could be other conditions to attend, processes to follow, in order to proceed as efficiently as possible. What is the role of the imposition of hands? What is the role of the Spirits? Is a good will needed like in magnetic operations or just the prayer and allowing a hidden influence to act? Is that faculty really special or accessible to all? Does the physical organization play a role there? Which one? Can it be developed? In which sense?
It is here that you long lasting experience, your studies about the fluidic influences, the teaching of the superior Spirits that assist you, and finally the documents that you collect from all corners of the world may allow you to clarify and instruct us. Nobody else is placed in that unique position, but you. All of those that deal with this matter, like myself, would like to have your advices, I am certain about that and I do believe to be the interpreter of them all. What a fecund mine healing mediumship is! The body could be relieved or healed and by that relief or cure the path of the heart is founds, a path many times failed by logic. How resourceful Spiritism is! What a wealth of means to serve! Let us keep them all productive; may everything contribute to elevate and propagate it. You neglect nothing to support all that, dear Kardec, and after God and the good Spirits, Spiritism owes you what it is. You have already been granted your award in this world by the sympathy and affection of millions of followers that pray for you, not to mention the true award that waits for you in the better world.
It has been an honor…etc.”
A.D.
What the honorable corresponding member asks for is nothing short of a treaty about the subject. The subject was sketched in The Mediums’ Book and in many other articles of the Spiritist Review, regarding cases of cure and obsession; it is summarized in The Gospel According to Spiritism, regarding the prayers in favor of ill persons and the healing medium. If a complete and regular treaty has not been produced yet it is due to two causes: the first is that despite all the activity developed in our work, it is impossible to us to do everything at the same time; the second and more serious is the insufficiency of our own knowledge about the subject. The knowledge about healing mediumship is one of the conquests due to Spiritism; but Spiritism that begins cannot have said everything; it just cannot suddenly show us everything that is encompassed; it shows us new things on a daily basis, from which new principles are derived and that come to corroborate or complement the already known ones, but there is a time for everything. Healing mediumship should have its turn. Although a component of Spiritism it is a whole science on its own because it is linked to magnetism, involving not only the so-called diseases but also all the varieties of numerous and complex obsessions that, in turn, influence the body. Therefore, such a vast subject cannot be developed in a few words. We are working on that as in many other parts of Spiritism, but since we would not like to introduce there anything personal or hypothetic, we only follow the path of experience and observation. Since the scope of this article would not allow the development that is required, we summarize a few fundamental principles demonstrated by experience.
As a Spiritist, I come to appeal to your kindness and request some advices with respect to the practice of healing mediumship by the imposition of hands. I am certain that a simple article about this matter in the Spiritist Review with some developments would be welcomed with great interest, not only by those that like myself are heavily involved with this subject, but also by many others that after reading the article would be inspired to get involved with that. I always remember the words of a somnambulist that I had formed. During her magnetically induced sleep I used to send her to visit a distant patient and when I asked her about the ways we could heal that patient she said: - There is a person in your village, Mr. Joe Doe, that could do it. He is a healing medium, but he is not aware of that.
I do not know how special this faculty is. It is up to you, more than anybody else, to clarify it. But if indeed it is, even more desirable that you would bring this to the attention of the Spiritists. Many out there, even the ones that do not share our opinions, and that could read you would feel no rejection for carrying a faculty that only requires faith in God and prayer. What can be more general and universal? It is not a matter of Spiritism, and everyone may keep their convictions in their own fields. How many sisters in charity, how many country healers, how many thousands of good people of strong faith could be healing mediums! That is a dream I have in all religions and sects. Once accepted everywhere, that faculty, that divine gift from our creator’s goodness, instead of staying as the apanage of some, would in a become of public domain, if I can say so. It would be a great day to those in suffering; and there are so many of them!
But in order to practice that mediumship, in addition to a strong faith and prayer, there could be other conditions to attend, processes to follow, in order to proceed as efficiently as possible. What is the role of the imposition of hands? What is the role of the Spirits? Is a good will needed like in magnetic operations or just the prayer and allowing a hidden influence to act? Is that faculty really special or accessible to all? Does the physical organization play a role there? Which one? Can it be developed? In which sense?
It is here that you long lasting experience, your studies about the fluidic influences, the teaching of the superior Spirits that assist you, and finally the documents that you collect from all corners of the world may allow you to clarify and instruct us. Nobody else is placed in that unique position, but you. All of those that deal with this matter, like myself, would like to have your advices, I am certain about that and I do believe to be the interpreter of them all. What a fecund mine healing mediumship is! The body could be relieved or healed and by that relief or cure the path of the heart is founds, a path many times failed by logic. How resourceful Spiritism is! What a wealth of means to serve! Let us keep them all productive; may everything contribute to elevate and propagate it. You neglect nothing to support all that, dear Kardec, and after God and the good Spirits, Spiritism owes you what it is. You have already been granted your award in this world by the sympathy and affection of millions of followers that pray for you, not to mention the true award that waits for you in the better world.
It has been an honor…etc.”
A.D.
What the honorable corresponding member asks for is nothing short of a treaty about the subject. The subject was sketched in The Mediums’ Book and in many other articles of the Spiritist Review, regarding cases of cure and obsession; it is summarized in The Gospel According to Spiritism, regarding the prayers in favor of ill persons and the healing medium. If a complete and regular treaty has not been produced yet it is due to two causes: the first is that despite all the activity developed in our work, it is impossible to us to do everything at the same time; the second and more serious is the insufficiency of our own knowledge about the subject. The knowledge about healing mediumship is one of the conquests due to Spiritism; but Spiritism that begins cannot have said everything; it just cannot suddenly show us everything that is encompassed; it shows us new things on a daily basis, from which new principles are derived and that come to corroborate or complement the already known ones, but there is a time for everything. Healing mediumship should have its turn. Although a component of Spiritism it is a whole science on its own because it is linked to magnetism, involving not only the so-called diseases but also all the varieties of numerous and complex obsessions that, in turn, influence the body. Therefore, such a vast subject cannot be developed in a few words. We are working on that as in many other parts of Spiritism, but since we would not like to introduce there anything personal or hypothetic, we only follow the path of experience and observation. Since the scope of this article would not allow the development that is required, we summarize a few fundamental principles demonstrated by experience.
- – The mediums that receive indications of medicine from the part of the Spirits are not what is called healing medium because they themselves do not heal; these are simply writing mediums that more than others have a special aptitude for that kind of communication, and for that very reason could be called consulting mediums, as others are poets or painters. Healing mediumship is exercised by the direct action of the medium upon the patient, with the support of a kind of true magnetization or through the mind;
- When we say medium, we say intermediary. The difference between the magnetizer per se and the healing medium is that the first utilizes her personal fluid and the second the fluid of the Spirits to whom she serves as a conductor. Magnetism produced by the fluid of a person is human magnetism; the one that comes from the fluid of the Spirits is spiritual magnetism;
- The magnetic fluid therefore has two very distinct sources: the incarnate Spirits and the discarnate ones. That difference in origin produces a great difference in the quality of the fluid and its effects; the human fluid is always more or less impregnated by physical and moral impurities of the incarnate; the fluid of the Spirits is necessarily purer and for that very reason has more active properties, that lead to a faster cure. When the fluid passes through an incarnate Spirit it may be altered, like some crystalline water passing through a dirty reservoir, like every medication that is altered if remains for a long time in inadequate storage, partially losing its good properties. Hence the need that every healing medium has to work their own depuration, that is, their moral betterment following this vulgar principle: clean the recipient before serving, if something good is expected. That alone is enough to show that the first one to show up could not be a healing medium in the true meaning of the expression;
- The purer and more detached from matter the Spirit that provides the fluid, the purer and more efficient it will be. It follows that the fluid from inferior Spirits must approach that o men and may have bad properties if the Spirit is impure and driven by bad intentions. For the same reason the qualities of human fluids present infinite nuances, according to the moral and physical qualities of the individual. It is evident that a sick body may inoculate morbid principles in the magnetized. The moral qualities of the magnetizer, that is the nobility of intentions and feelings, the strong and selfless desire to alleviate a fellow human being, together with the health of the body, give their fluid a healing power that can, in certain cases, approach the qualities of the spiritual fluid. Consequently, it would be a mistake to consider the magnetizer a simple machine of transmissions of fluid. Here, as in everything else, the result is proportional to the instrument and the producing agent. For those reasons it would be unwise to submit oneself to the magnetic action of the first unknown person that presents itself. Abstracting from the indispensable knowledge of practical things, the fluid of the magnetizer is like that of a breast-feeding mother: healthy or insalubrious.
- Since human fluid is less active it requires a more continual magnetization and a sometimes-long treatment. By spending its own fluid, the magnetizer tires and fatigues since she gives away her own vital fluid; that is why this must be recovered from time to time. The spiritual fluid, more powerful in its purity, produces faster effects and sometimes almost instantaneous. Since the fluid does not belong to the magnetizer there is almost no fatigue;
- The Spirit may act directly, without intermediaries, upon an individual, as it was attested on several occasions, be it to bring relief, to cure or to induce a somnambulistic sleep. When the Spirit acts through an intermediary it is then a healing mediumship;
- The healing medium receives the influx of the fluid from the Spirit whereas the magnetizer takes everything from her own. But the healing mediums, in the true meaning of the expression, that is to say, those whose personalities are totally faded before the spiritual action, those are extremely rare because such a faculty, in its highest level, requires a set of moral qualities rarely found on Earth; those are the only ones that can achieve instantaneous cures by the imposition of hands, something that seems prodigious to us. Many people may pretend to have such a favor. Since pride and egotism are the main sources of human imperfection, it follows that the ones that brag about having such a gift, that go about telling marvelous stories of their doing; that seek glory and reputation or advantage, those are the ones in the worst condition to obtain them, because such a gift is an exclusive privilege of modesty, humbleness, devotion and selflessness. Jesus used to say to those that he healed: “Go, thank the Lord and say nothing to anyone.”
- Since healing mediumship is an exception here on Earth it follows that there is always a simultaneous action of the human and spiritual fluid; it means that the healing mediums are more or less magnetizers, acting according to the magnetic processes. The difference is in the predominance of one upon the other fluid and in a more or less rapid cure. Every magnetizer may become a healing medium, if capable of seeking the assistance of the good Spirits. In such cases the Spirits come in their support, cast their fluids upon them and that may multiply manifold the power of the purely human fluid;
- The Spirits attend those that they wish; they cannot be coerced by any will power; they yield to a fervent and sincere prayer but never to an injunction. From that it follows that the simple will may not lead to the healing mediumship and that nobody can become a healing medium by their own choice. A true healing medium is recognized by the results that are obtained and not by their pretension of being one;
- But if the good will is inefficient to entice the support of the Spirits it is very powerful to give the human or spiritual fluid a good direction and a greater energy. The flow is feeble, and the emission is weak in a distracted and apathetic person; the spiritual fluid stops there, without any benefit; in a person of very energetic will the fluids flow like in a shower. One must not confuse energetic will with stubbornness because stubbornness is always the result of pride and selfishness, whereas the humbler person may have the will of devotion. The will is still very powerful to give to the fluids the special qualities of evil. This is a point of capital importance related to a still not much known principle that is everywhere, the fluidic creations and the modifications that the thought may produce in matter. Thought provokes a fluidic emission that may operate certain molecular and atomic transformations, as we see produced by the effect of electricity, light and heat;
- The prayer, that is a thought, when fervent, sincere, with the heart, produces the effect of a magnetization, not only calling for the assistance of the good Spirits but also by directing to the patient a healthy fluidic current. Here we call the attention to the prayers contained in the Gospel According to Spiritism, in favor of ill or obsessed persons;
- If the healing mediumship is a privilege of very elevated souls, the possibility of mitigating certain sufferings, even that of healing certain diseases, although not instantaneously, is up to everybody, without the need of being a magnetizer. The knowledge about magnetic processes is useful in complicated cases but it is not indispensable. Since everybody may appeal to the good Spirits, everybody may pray and wish well, frequently it is enough to impose the hands upon a sore are to calm it down; that is what any individual may do if in good faith, good will and trust in God. It is noticeable that the majority of the unconscious healing mediums, those that are unaware of their gifts, and sometimes found in the humblest positions and without education, they recommend the prayer and by praying they help one another. It is only their ignorance that makes them believe in the influence of this or that formula. They sometimes mix that with superstitious practices that we must keep in the right perspective;
- But by the fact that satisfactory results were obtained one or more times it would be premature to consider one as a heling medium and conclude that one can heal any type of disease. Experience demonstrates that in the strict meaning of the expression there aren’t universal healing mediums even among the most gifted ones. One could cure one patient and not be as successful with another one; the other medium could heal a type of disease in one patient and not to the same with another one carrying the same problem; finally, the other medium may carry the gift today and not have it tomorrow, and may recover it later on, according to the affinities and the on-going fluidic conditions;
- Healing mediumship is an aptitude inherent to the individual, like all other types of mediumship, however the effective result of that mediumship is independent of the mediums’ will. It incontestably develops through exercise, in special through the practice of good deeds and charity; but, since it could not have the regularity and permanence of a talent acquired by education, and that one can always dominate, it could not turn into a profession. It would therefore be abusive someone presenting themselves as a healing medium. Such thoughts do not apply to magnetizers since it is their force and they have the freedom of using it as they wish;
- It is a mistake to believe that those that do not share our ideas will not show disgust by the practice of this faculty. Rational healing mediumship is intimately linked to Spiritism because it essentially rests on the support of the Spirits. Those that do not believe in Spirits, not even in their own souls, and much less in the efficacy of the prayer, would not know how to position themselves in the required conditions, and for that very reason it is not something that one may try automatically. Among those that believe in the soul and in its immortality, how many are there still today that would step back out of fear by the simple appeal to the Spirits, afraid of attracting the devil, and that in good faith still believe that all cures are the works of the devil? Fanaticism is blind; it does not reason. It won’t certainly be always like that, but a long time will still pass before light penetrates certain minds. While we wait, let us do as much good as possible with the help of Spiritism; let us do it even to our enemies, even if paid with ingratitude. It is the best means of succeeding against certain resistances and demonstrate that Spiritism is not as bad as some pretend it to be.
Cure of a Fracture
by spiritual magnetization
The readers will undoubtedly remember the case of an almost instantaneous cure of a sprain operated by the Spirit of Dr. Demeure, a few days after his death, reported in our Spiritist Review of last March, as well as the description of the touching scene that took place on that occasion. That excellent Spirit comes again to reinforce his good will through an even more wonderful cure, in the same person. Here is what was sent to us from Montauban, on July 14th, 1865:
“The Spirit of Dr. Demeure has just given us one more proof of his solicitude and profound knowledge. Here the details of the event.
In the morning of May 26th last, Mrs. Maurel, our clairvoyant and mechanical writing medium, suffered a terrible fall and broke her forearm, a little bit below the elbow. The fracture, complicated by distensions in the wrist and elbow, was well characterized by the cracking of the bones and swelling, the most common signs. Still under the first emotions caused by the event, Mrs. Maurel parents were about to send for the first doctor possible when she stopped them, took a pencil and wrote the following with her left hand: - Do not look for a doctor; I will take care of that. Demeure. They then waited confidently.
Following the instructions of the Spirit, slings and a device were immediately built and applied. It was followed by a spiritual magnetization given by the good Spirits that ordered her to rest momentarily. In the evening of that same day some followers solicited by the Spirits gathered in the home of Mrs. Maurel that entered into a somnambulistic sleep helped by a magnetizing medium. Dr. Demeure then continued the treatment that he had initiated in the morning, acting mechanically upon the fractured arm. Our patient then immediately and without any other help but her left hand removed the first device, leaving only the slings, when we saw the affect limb moving around in a proper way to facilitate the reduction of the fracture. It seemed to be the object of intelligent touches, particularly at the point where the soldering of the bones should take place; after that it extended, by the action of longitudinal tractions. A few moments after that magnetization, Mrs. Maurel herself applied the slings and the device again, a device that consisted of two little wooden boards connected to each other by a strap. It all happened as if an experienced surgeon had operated all that materially; curiously during the works one could hear these words from the patient’s mouth by the effect of pain: - do not tighten so much… you hurt me!... She could see the Spirit of the doctor and was talking to him, begging for him to alleviate her. It was therefore a being invisible to everybody but to her that touched her arm, using unconsciously her own left hand. What was the role of the magnetizing medium during those activities? To us he seemed inactive, however, with his hand resting on her shoulder blade, he contributed to the phenomenon by the emission of fluids that were necessary to the process. In the evenings of the 27th and 28th Mrs. Maurel for the first time presented elevated fever for having disarranged her arm during the sleep. It was an urgent situation that had to be attended. They gathered again on the 28th and after the somnambulistic sleep the magnetic chain was formed once more by request of the good Spirits. After several passes and manipulations, very similar to the described above, the arm returned to good condition, not before the poor lady experienced terrible pains. Despite the new incident the arm was already feeling the healthy effect produced by the earlier magnetizations. What follows below, in fact, demonstrates that.
Momentarily disentangled from the little boards, the arm was resting on some pillows when suddenly it raised a few centimeters horizontally and moved smoothly to the left and to the right; it was then lowered at an angle and was submitted to a traction. The Spirits then started to turn it in all directions, from time to time, making it work correctly the articulations of the wrist and elbow. Such automatic movements, imposed on a fractured and inert arm, contrary to all known laws of gravity and mechanics, they could only be attributed to the fluidic action. If we were not certain about the fracture of that poor lady, as well as hearing her painful screams, I confess that it would have been very hard for me to admit the fact, one of the most impressive that science can register. I can then say, in all honesty, that I am glad for having been able to witness such phenomenon.
On the 29th, 30th, 31st and next days the successive spiritual magnetizations, followed by thousands of varied manipulations, brought a noticeable improvement to the general state of our patient. The arm improved its condition on a daily basis. The 31st in particular marked the first step in the recovery. That evening two Spirits that were noticed by their radiation assisted our friend doctor Demeure. They seemed to give him advices that he promptly applied. One of them, from time to time, worked directly and under his influence there was an observable instantaneous relief. At the end of that night the little boards were definitely removed, and only the slings remained to hold the arm and keep it in a given position. I must add that a device to produce suspension was added to give solidity to the bandage. Finally, after the sixth day of the fracture and despite the relapse of the 27th, the fracture was so much healed that the techniques utilized by doctors for thirty or forty days became useless. We gathered again on June 4that night by the call of the good Spirits and for the reduction of the fracture that had complicated due to distensions. As soon as Mrs. Maurel fell in the somnambulistic sleep she started removing the slings herself, rotating her other hand so fast that was difficult for us to follow her actions. From that moment onwards, she used the arm normally. She was cured. At the end of that session there was a touching scene that needs to be reported here.
The good Spirits, counting thirty of them, in the beginning formed a magnetic chain similar to the one that we formed ourselves. Mrs. Maurel was surrounded by and in the middle of the two magnetic chains, linked by her right arm, receiving their good influence. Radiant of satisfaction she then took the occasion to thank the powerful support she had received for her cure. In turn she received encouragement to continue to persevere on the good path. After that she tried her strength in a thousand ways: she presented her arm to those present, she made them touch the scars at the points of soldered bones; shook their hands with force, happily announcing her cure operated by the good Spirits. When she woke up and seeing that she had recovered all her movements she passed out, taken by profound emotion!
When we witness such facts, we must proclaim them out loud since they do deserve the attention of serious people. Why then, in the intelligent world, there is so much resistance to the acceptance of the idea that the Spirit may exert influence upon matter? Why we find people that believe in the existence and individuality of the soul but refuse the possibility of their manifestation? It is because they are not aware of the material faculties of the Spirit, that seems to be totally immaterial to them. Experience demonstrates, on the contrary, that for its very nature, the Spirit acts upon the imponderable fluids, and consequently upon the ponderable ones, and even upon our tangible bodies. How does an ordinary magnetizer work? Let us suppose, for example that he wants to act upon an arm. He concentrates his whole attention on that limb and by simple movements of his own fingers, executed at a distance and in all directions, acting as if the contact with the hand was real, he directs a fluidic current onto the desired spot. The Spirit does not act differently. Their fluidic action takes place from perispirit to perispirit and from that to the material body. The somnambulistic states facilitate that action considerably, thanks to the detachment of the perispirit that better identifies with the fluidic nature of the Spirit, then suffering the spiritual fluidic influence, elevated to its maximum power.
The whole city was involved with that cure, obtained without the help of the official science, and everyone had their own opinion. Some pretended that the arm was not broken, but the fracture was well attested by several witnesses, among them Dr. D… that visited the patient during the treatment. Others said: - It is really impressive – and stopped there. Useless to say that some believed that Mrs. Maurel had been cured by the devil. If she were not amongst blasphemous hands they would have seen a miracle there. The Spiritists that get the phenomenon simply see the action of a natural force up until now unknown, that Spiritism came to reveal to humanity.”
Observations: If there are Spiritist facts that can be attributed to imagination, as for example the visions, in this case it would not be possible. Mrs. Maurel did not dream that she had broken her arm, as with several other people that followed her treatment; the pain that she felt was not hallucination; her cure in eight days is not an illusion, since she can use her arm. The positive fact is there, before which we must necessarily bend over. It confuses sciences, it is true, because in the current state of affairs it seems impossible, but hasn’t it always been like that when new laws were revealed? Is it the speed of the healing that scares you out? But hasn’t science found so many agents more active than it was known before, to speed up certain cures? Weren’t means of healing certain ulcers almost instantaneously found recently? Weren’t means of activating vegetation and fruitification found? Why couldn’t we have a means of activating the soldering of bones? Do we already know all the agents of nature? Hasn’t God kept any secrete from us? There is no more logic in denying today the possibility of a cure faster than that of the previous century, of denying the possibility of walking in a few hours the path that we used to walk in ten days.
You may say that such a means is not in the codex; it is true; but before the vaccine was introduced there, wasn’t its inventor called a mad man? Homeopathic medications are not there either, but that does not preclude homeopathic doctors to cure and be found everywhere. As a matter of fact, since we are not dealing with a pharmaceutical preparation here, it is more likely that such a means of cure does not enter official science for a long time.
But, some will say, if the doctors exert their profession after death, they come to compete with the living doctors; it is well possible; nonetheless, the latter may rest assured; if they are subtracted from a few patients it is not to overcome them but to demonstrate that they are not absolutely dead, and to offer a selfless help to those interested in accepting it. To help them understand better, to show them that in certain cases one could go without them. There has always and there will always be doctors; only those that take advantage of the novelties brought by the discarnate ones will that a great advantage upon the ones left behind. The Spirits come to help in the development of human science and not to suppress it.
In the cure of Mrs. Maurel, a fact that might perhaps be even more surprising than the quick soldering of the bones is the movement of the fractured limb, that seems to be contrary to all known laws of mechanics and gravity. Contrary or not, the fact is there; it does exist, has a cause; if it repeats it means that it is submitted to a law. Well, that is the law that Spiritism unveils to us by the properties of the spiritual fluids. That arm, once submitted to the laws of gravity only, could not be raised; now supposing it immersed in a fluid whose density is much higher than that of air, even fractured as it is, once it is sustained by that fluid that reduces its weight, it will be able to move effortlessly, and even be raised. That is how during a bath an arm seems to be much lighter inside than outside the water. Replace the liquid by a fluid that has similar properties and you will have the same situation as in the present case, a phenomenon that is based on the same principle of the turning tables and persons that are lifted in the air without a supporting point. That is the perispiritual fluid, that is guided by the will of the Spirit, and whose properties he modifies by the simple action of his will. In the present case one must then imagine Mrs. Maurel’s arm immersed in a fluidic medium that produces the effect of hot air in balloons. Someone asked if in the cure of the fracture in question Dr. Demeure had acted with or without the help of electricity and heat.
We respond to that, as in all cases of spiritual magnetization, that the cure was produced by the action of the fluid emitted by the Spirit; that such a fluid, although ethereal, is still matter; that the current that is produced may impregnate and saturate all molecules of the sick part of the patient; that the Spirit may modify its properties, like the magnetizer modifies that of water, giving it a healing virtue proper to the necessity; that the energy of that current is proportional to the number, the quality and homogeneity of the elements that constitute that chain of people called to provide their portion of fluid. That chain is likely to activate the reaction that produces the soldering effect of the bones and therefore lead to a faster cure than when it is left on its own.
Would electricity and heat play a role in such phenomenon? That is more likely if we take into account that the Spirit did not cure out of a miracle, but through a more judicious application of the laws of nature, given his enlightenment. If, as science must acknowledge, electricity and heat are not special fluids, but modification or properties of an elemental universal fluid, they must be part of the elements that constitute the spiritual fluid. Their action, in the present case, is implicitly understood, absolutely like when one drinks wine one also drinks water and alcohol.
“The Spirit of Dr. Demeure has just given us one more proof of his solicitude and profound knowledge. Here the details of the event.
In the morning of May 26th last, Mrs. Maurel, our clairvoyant and mechanical writing medium, suffered a terrible fall and broke her forearm, a little bit below the elbow. The fracture, complicated by distensions in the wrist and elbow, was well characterized by the cracking of the bones and swelling, the most common signs. Still under the first emotions caused by the event, Mrs. Maurel parents were about to send for the first doctor possible when she stopped them, took a pencil and wrote the following with her left hand: - Do not look for a doctor; I will take care of that. Demeure. They then waited confidently.
Following the instructions of the Spirit, slings and a device were immediately built and applied. It was followed by a spiritual magnetization given by the good Spirits that ordered her to rest momentarily. In the evening of that same day some followers solicited by the Spirits gathered in the home of Mrs. Maurel that entered into a somnambulistic sleep helped by a magnetizing medium. Dr. Demeure then continued the treatment that he had initiated in the morning, acting mechanically upon the fractured arm. Our patient then immediately and without any other help but her left hand removed the first device, leaving only the slings, when we saw the affect limb moving around in a proper way to facilitate the reduction of the fracture. It seemed to be the object of intelligent touches, particularly at the point where the soldering of the bones should take place; after that it extended, by the action of longitudinal tractions. A few moments after that magnetization, Mrs. Maurel herself applied the slings and the device again, a device that consisted of two little wooden boards connected to each other by a strap. It all happened as if an experienced surgeon had operated all that materially; curiously during the works one could hear these words from the patient’s mouth by the effect of pain: - do not tighten so much… you hurt me!... She could see the Spirit of the doctor and was talking to him, begging for him to alleviate her. It was therefore a being invisible to everybody but to her that touched her arm, using unconsciously her own left hand. What was the role of the magnetizing medium during those activities? To us he seemed inactive, however, with his hand resting on her shoulder blade, he contributed to the phenomenon by the emission of fluids that were necessary to the process. In the evenings of the 27th and 28th Mrs. Maurel for the first time presented elevated fever for having disarranged her arm during the sleep. It was an urgent situation that had to be attended. They gathered again on the 28th and after the somnambulistic sleep the magnetic chain was formed once more by request of the good Spirits. After several passes and manipulations, very similar to the described above, the arm returned to good condition, not before the poor lady experienced terrible pains. Despite the new incident the arm was already feeling the healthy effect produced by the earlier magnetizations. What follows below, in fact, demonstrates that.
Momentarily disentangled from the little boards, the arm was resting on some pillows when suddenly it raised a few centimeters horizontally and moved smoothly to the left and to the right; it was then lowered at an angle and was submitted to a traction. The Spirits then started to turn it in all directions, from time to time, making it work correctly the articulations of the wrist and elbow. Such automatic movements, imposed on a fractured and inert arm, contrary to all known laws of gravity and mechanics, they could only be attributed to the fluidic action. If we were not certain about the fracture of that poor lady, as well as hearing her painful screams, I confess that it would have been very hard for me to admit the fact, one of the most impressive that science can register. I can then say, in all honesty, that I am glad for having been able to witness such phenomenon.
On the 29th, 30th, 31st and next days the successive spiritual magnetizations, followed by thousands of varied manipulations, brought a noticeable improvement to the general state of our patient. The arm improved its condition on a daily basis. The 31st in particular marked the first step in the recovery. That evening two Spirits that were noticed by their radiation assisted our friend doctor Demeure. They seemed to give him advices that he promptly applied. One of them, from time to time, worked directly and under his influence there was an observable instantaneous relief. At the end of that night the little boards were definitely removed, and only the slings remained to hold the arm and keep it in a given position. I must add that a device to produce suspension was added to give solidity to the bandage. Finally, after the sixth day of the fracture and despite the relapse of the 27th, the fracture was so much healed that the techniques utilized by doctors for thirty or forty days became useless. We gathered again on June 4that night by the call of the good Spirits and for the reduction of the fracture that had complicated due to distensions. As soon as Mrs. Maurel fell in the somnambulistic sleep she started removing the slings herself, rotating her other hand so fast that was difficult for us to follow her actions. From that moment onwards, she used the arm normally. She was cured. At the end of that session there was a touching scene that needs to be reported here.
The good Spirits, counting thirty of them, in the beginning formed a magnetic chain similar to the one that we formed ourselves. Mrs. Maurel was surrounded by and in the middle of the two magnetic chains, linked by her right arm, receiving their good influence. Radiant of satisfaction she then took the occasion to thank the powerful support she had received for her cure. In turn she received encouragement to continue to persevere on the good path. After that she tried her strength in a thousand ways: she presented her arm to those present, she made them touch the scars at the points of soldered bones; shook their hands with force, happily announcing her cure operated by the good Spirits. When she woke up and seeing that she had recovered all her movements she passed out, taken by profound emotion!
When we witness such facts, we must proclaim them out loud since they do deserve the attention of serious people. Why then, in the intelligent world, there is so much resistance to the acceptance of the idea that the Spirit may exert influence upon matter? Why we find people that believe in the existence and individuality of the soul but refuse the possibility of their manifestation? It is because they are not aware of the material faculties of the Spirit, that seems to be totally immaterial to them. Experience demonstrates, on the contrary, that for its very nature, the Spirit acts upon the imponderable fluids, and consequently upon the ponderable ones, and even upon our tangible bodies. How does an ordinary magnetizer work? Let us suppose, for example that he wants to act upon an arm. He concentrates his whole attention on that limb and by simple movements of his own fingers, executed at a distance and in all directions, acting as if the contact with the hand was real, he directs a fluidic current onto the desired spot. The Spirit does not act differently. Their fluidic action takes place from perispirit to perispirit and from that to the material body. The somnambulistic states facilitate that action considerably, thanks to the detachment of the perispirit that better identifies with the fluidic nature of the Spirit, then suffering the spiritual fluidic influence, elevated to its maximum power.
The whole city was involved with that cure, obtained without the help of the official science, and everyone had their own opinion. Some pretended that the arm was not broken, but the fracture was well attested by several witnesses, among them Dr. D… that visited the patient during the treatment. Others said: - It is really impressive – and stopped there. Useless to say that some believed that Mrs. Maurel had been cured by the devil. If she were not amongst blasphemous hands they would have seen a miracle there. The Spiritists that get the phenomenon simply see the action of a natural force up until now unknown, that Spiritism came to reveal to humanity.”
Observations: If there are Spiritist facts that can be attributed to imagination, as for example the visions, in this case it would not be possible. Mrs. Maurel did not dream that she had broken her arm, as with several other people that followed her treatment; the pain that she felt was not hallucination; her cure in eight days is not an illusion, since she can use her arm. The positive fact is there, before which we must necessarily bend over. It confuses sciences, it is true, because in the current state of affairs it seems impossible, but hasn’t it always been like that when new laws were revealed? Is it the speed of the healing that scares you out? But hasn’t science found so many agents more active than it was known before, to speed up certain cures? Weren’t means of healing certain ulcers almost instantaneously found recently? Weren’t means of activating vegetation and fruitification found? Why couldn’t we have a means of activating the soldering of bones? Do we already know all the agents of nature? Hasn’t God kept any secrete from us? There is no more logic in denying today the possibility of a cure faster than that of the previous century, of denying the possibility of walking in a few hours the path that we used to walk in ten days.
You may say that such a means is not in the codex; it is true; but before the vaccine was introduced there, wasn’t its inventor called a mad man? Homeopathic medications are not there either, but that does not preclude homeopathic doctors to cure and be found everywhere. As a matter of fact, since we are not dealing with a pharmaceutical preparation here, it is more likely that such a means of cure does not enter official science for a long time.
But, some will say, if the doctors exert their profession after death, they come to compete with the living doctors; it is well possible; nonetheless, the latter may rest assured; if they are subtracted from a few patients it is not to overcome them but to demonstrate that they are not absolutely dead, and to offer a selfless help to those interested in accepting it. To help them understand better, to show them that in certain cases one could go without them. There has always and there will always be doctors; only those that take advantage of the novelties brought by the discarnate ones will that a great advantage upon the ones left behind. The Spirits come to help in the development of human science and not to suppress it.
In the cure of Mrs. Maurel, a fact that might perhaps be even more surprising than the quick soldering of the bones is the movement of the fractured limb, that seems to be contrary to all known laws of mechanics and gravity. Contrary or not, the fact is there; it does exist, has a cause; if it repeats it means that it is submitted to a law. Well, that is the law that Spiritism unveils to us by the properties of the spiritual fluids. That arm, once submitted to the laws of gravity only, could not be raised; now supposing it immersed in a fluid whose density is much higher than that of air, even fractured as it is, once it is sustained by that fluid that reduces its weight, it will be able to move effortlessly, and even be raised. That is how during a bath an arm seems to be much lighter inside than outside the water. Replace the liquid by a fluid that has similar properties and you will have the same situation as in the present case, a phenomenon that is based on the same principle of the turning tables and persons that are lifted in the air without a supporting point. That is the perispiritual fluid, that is guided by the will of the Spirit, and whose properties he modifies by the simple action of his will. In the present case one must then imagine Mrs. Maurel’s arm immersed in a fluidic medium that produces the effect of hot air in balloons. Someone asked if in the cure of the fracture in question Dr. Demeure had acted with or without the help of electricity and heat.
We respond to that, as in all cases of spiritual magnetization, that the cure was produced by the action of the fluid emitted by the Spirit; that such a fluid, although ethereal, is still matter; that the current that is produced may impregnate and saturate all molecules of the sick part of the patient; that the Spirit may modify its properties, like the magnetizer modifies that of water, giving it a healing virtue proper to the necessity; that the energy of that current is proportional to the number, the quality and homogeneity of the elements that constitute that chain of people called to provide their portion of fluid. That chain is likely to activate the reaction that produces the soldering effect of the bones and therefore lead to a faster cure than when it is left on its own.
Would electricity and heat play a role in such phenomenon? That is more likely if we take into account that the Spirit did not cure out of a miracle, but through a more judicious application of the laws of nature, given his enlightenment. If, as science must acknowledge, electricity and heat are not special fluids, but modification or properties of an elemental universal fluid, they must be part of the elements that constitute the spiritual fluid. Their action, in the present case, is implicitly understood, absolutely like when one drinks wine one also drinks water and alcohol.
Hallucination in Animals
in the symptoms of rabies
One of our colleagues transmitted to the Society the following summary of a report read in the Academy of Medicine, by Dr. H. Bouley, about the symptoms of canine rabies.
“At the early stage of the disease and when it is completely diagnosed, in intermittent accesses, the dog shows a kind of delirious state that one could call canine rabies delirium, first mentioned by Youatt that described it perfectly. The delirium is characterized by strange movements, indicating that the animal sees things and hear noises that only exist in what we can rightfully call their imagination. In fact, the animal sometimes retreats and remain put, attentive, as if ambushing; it suddenly jumps and bites the air, like a healthy dog does when trying to catch a flying insect. On other occasions it jumps against the wall, furiously and howling, as if it had heard threating sounds from the other side. Reasoning by analogy we are led to admit that these are signs of true hallucination. However, an uninformed person would not give importance to those symptoms that are very quick and just require the voice of command of the owner to disappear. It is then followed by a period of rest; the eyes close slowly, the head falls down, the front legs seem to disappear under the body and the animal is about to collapse. It then suddenly stands, and ghosts come to surround it again; it looks around with angry looks, bites as if reaching something near the teeth and dashes up to the extremity of the chain, towards an enemy that only exists in its imagination.”
That phenomenon, carefully observed by the author of that memory, as we can see, seems to indicate that the dog is tormented by the vision of something invisible to us. Is it a real vision or a fantastic creation of its imagination, or in other words, hallucination? If it is hallucination it cannot certainly be by the eyes of the body, since they are not real objects; if they are fluidic beings or Spirits, since they do not produce any effect upon the senses of vision, it is then a spiritual vision that they perceive. In one case as in the other the dog would then have a sense up to a certain extent similar to that in man. Science had not yet ventured into the imagination of animals. From imagination to a principle that is independent of matter is not a great distance, unless one admits that brute matter like wood, rock, etc. may have imagination.
All the phenomena of visions are attributed to a super excited imagination by science. However, there has been reports of children at an early age and that cannot yet speak running after invisible beings, smiling to them and reaching out the them with their arms, trying to get them. In the rabies analogy, hasn’t this gotten a great similarity with the dog cited above? The boy has not started speaking yet but those that can speak positively tell those around that they see invisible beings. We have seen them describing their dead grandparents that they had not met. Super excitation is understandable in a person that is worried about something, but that is certainly not the case of a little child. A super excited imagination may revive a memory; fear, love, and enthusiasm may create fantastic images, we agree; under the impression of certain beliefs an exalted person may see the appearance of someone that is dear, the virgin or saints, we still agree; but we consider only those cause, how to explain the fact that a three or four year old child describing her grandmother that she never met? It cannot certainly be the product of a memory, nor a concern or not even any belief.
Let us say, in passing and as a corollary to what precedes, that clairvoyant mediumship seems to be frequent and even general in little children. Our guardian angels would come to guide us, like by the hand, taking us to the doorway of life, so that the transition from one life to the other is not too abrupt. As the child grows and is capable of using her own forces, the guardian angel keeps an eye only, allowing the free-will to take over. It is as saying: “I came to be with you at the port, taking you to the ship that will transport you through the sea of the world; now it is time to sail; fly with your own wings; but up there, from heavens, I shall watch you; think of me and when you return I will be there welcoming you.” Happy is the one that does not forget their guardian angel during the crossing!
Let us return to the main subject that lead us to this development. As long as we admit an imagination to the dog we could then say that the illness super excites it to the point of producing hallucinations. But many examples tend to prove that the phenomenon of vision do occur in certain animals, in their normal state, in particular with the dog and the horse. At least it is with them that we have observed more. Thinking by analogy, we can suppose that it is the same with the elephant and other animals whose intelligence is closer to man. It is certain that dogs do dream. Don’t we sometimes see them simulating movements in their sleep that resemble running; moaning or manifesting happiness? Their thoughts are then active, free and independent of their instinct properly saying. What is the dog doing? What is it that they see? What can the dog see in their dreams? Unfortunately, they cannot tell us, but the fact is there.
Up until now we were not much concerned with the intelligent principle of the animals and even less with their affinity with the human species, unless from the exclusive point of view of their material organization. Today one tries to reconcile their state and destiny with Dog’s justice; but with that regards only more or less logical systems were created, that are not always in agreement with the facts. If the question remained undefined for a long time it is for the fact that we lacked the elements necessary to its comprehension, like in many other cases. Spiritism that gives the key to so many misunderstood or badly observed and unnoticed phenomena, cannot go without facilitating the solution of this serious problem, to which we give all the attention that it deserves, because it is the solution of continuity of the chain that connects all beings in the harmonious whole of creation.
Why hasn’t Spiritism then immediately solved the issue? It would be the same as to ask a physics professor why she does not teach the laws of electricity and optics since lesson one. She starts from the fundamental principles of the science, by those principles that must serve as the basis for the understanding of the others, keeping for later the explanation of the subsequent laws. That is how the great Spirits that direct the Spiritist Movement act; in good logic, they start from the beginning and wait until we are educated in one point before touching the next. Now, what should be the starting point of their teaching? The human soul. We must be convinced of their existence and immortality. We must know their true attributes and destiny. In a word, we needed to understand our soul before that of the animals. Spiritism has already taught us a lot about the soul and its faculties; it daily teaches us more and casts light upon a new point. But how much still to be explored!
As we move on in knowledge with respect to our spiritual state, our attention is called to every question that may be related, near or far away, and that of the animals is not of minor interest. Man understands the analogies better; tries to understand what he sees; seeks the consequences; tests theories, one after the other, confirmed or belied by observations. That is how, out of the efforts of his own intelligence, he gradually approaches the objective. Here, as in everything else, the Spirits do not preclude us from the work of research, because we must use our own intelligence; they help, guide and that is a lot already, but they do not provide us with the finished science. As long as it is on the path of truth, they come to clearly reveal, muting uncertainties and annihilating false systems. But while wait, the Spirit is better prepared to understand and accept it, and when truth shows up, there is no surprise since it was already in the depth of thoughts. See the path walked by Spiritism. Has it arrived out of improvisation? Certainly not, and not to mention the facts that are present at all times since it is part of nature. Like electricity, from the point of view of the principle, it had prepared its appearance; Swedenborg, Saint-Martin, the theosophists, Charles Fourier, Jean Reynaud and so many others like Mesmer that brought the knowledge of the fluidic force, Puységur, the first to observe somnambulism, all raising the tip of the veil of the spiritual life; all of them circulated around and got more or less closer to light; all of them paved the way and prepared the spirits, so that in a way Spiritism only had to complete what had already been sketched. That is why it promptly conquered so many sympathizers. We do not speak of the other multiple causes that came in support, proving that certain ideas were no longer at the level of human progress, giving rise to the presentiment of a new order of things, because humanity cannot remain stationary. That is the same with every great idea that change the face of the world. None of them has come as a fascination, like a lightning. Haven’t Socrates and Plato sown the seeds of the Christian ideas five centuries before Christ?
Another reason had made us postpone the solution relative to the animals. This issue touches long lasting and strong prejudices and that would have been unwise to attack, being that the reason why the Spirits did not do it. The subject is discussed now; it is mentioned everywhere, even outside Spiritism; the discarnate take part in the discussion, each one according to their personal opinions; those several theories are discussed, examined; a number of facts, like for example the one in this article, and that would have gone unnoticed in the past, today call our attention, for the very reason of preliminaries studies that have been carried out.
Without adopting an idea or the other we become familiar with the idea of a contact between the animality and humanity, and when the final solution comes, whatever its direction, it will be supported by solid arguments that will not allow any doubt. If the idea is true, it would have been presented; if it is false, it means that we found something more logical to replace it. In nature everything is connected, chained and in harmony. Spiritism came to give a mother-idea and we can see how fecund that idea is. Before the light that Spiritism cast onto psychology we would have difficulty in believing that so many considerations could have been brought about by a raving dog.
After the summary above about the report by Dr. Bouley was read at the Society, a Spirit gave the following communication.
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, June 30th, 1865 – medium Mr. Desliens
Do the dog and some other animals have the vision in which the phenomena described by Mr. Bouley may be produced? To me there is no doubt about it. Yes, the dog and the horse do see the Spirits. Haven’t you ever witnessed the disgust that sometimes these animals show by passing by a place where they did not know there was a buried body? You will say that their senses are excited by the odor of the rotten bodies. Then, why would they go quietly when the body is of another animal? Why is it that they say the dog presents death? Haven’t you heard a dog howling by the window of an agonizing and unknown person? Outside the super excitation of rage, don’t you see several animals refusing to obey their owners, stepping back before an invisible obstacle that seems to block their passage, infuriating them, and later on they will pass calmly through the same path that terrified them before, as if the obstacle had been removed? Animals have been seen saving their owners from imminent danger by refusing to go in a given direction where they could have died. Facts of animal vision are found in antiquity and in the Middle Ages, as they are in our days. Animals, therefore, do see the Spirits. In fact, by saying that they have imagination, isn’t that an assumption that they do have a point of similarity with the human spirit, and isn’t their instinct a rudimentary intelligence appropriate to their needs, before they go through the modifying crucibles that wil transform them and give them new faculties? A man also has instincts that make him act unconsciously, in the interest of one’s own preservation. But as intelligence and free-will are developed, the instinct weakens giving rise to reason, because a blind guide is less necessary.
The instinct that has all of its power in the animal, perpetuating in man where it gradually fades away, is certainly a common trace between the two species. The subtleness of senses in the animal, like in the savage and primitive man, replacing in them the absence of a moral sense, is another point of contact. Finally, the spiritual vision that is evidently common to them, although in some varying degrees, also com to reduce the distance that seemed to erect an unsurpassable barrier. However, do not make any absolute conclusion but carefully analyze the facts because it is from that observation alone that truth will come one day.
Moki
Observation: This is a very wise advice because evidently a solid theory can only be founded on facts. Beyond that it is only opinions and systems. Facts are arguments without replica whose consequences, sooner or later, when they are attested, will have to be accepted. That was the principle that created the foundation of the Spiritist Doctrine and that allows us to say that it is a science of observation.
One of our colleagues transmitted to the Society the following summary of a report read in the Academy of Medicine, by Dr. H. Bouley, about the symptoms of canine rabies.
“At the early stage of the disease and when it is completely diagnosed, in intermittent accesses, the dog shows a kind of delirious state that one could call canine rabies delirium, first mentioned by Youatt that described it perfectly. The delirium is characterized by strange movements, indicating that the animal sees things and hear noises that only exist in what we can rightfully call their imagination. In fact, the animal sometimes retreats and remain put, attentive, as if ambushing; it suddenly jumps and bites the air, like a healthy dog does when trying to catch a flying insect. On other occasions it jumps against the wall, furiously and howling, as if it had heard threating sounds from the other side. Reasoning by analogy we are led to admit that these are signs of true hallucination. However, an uninformed person would not give importance to those symptoms that are very quick and just require the voice of command of the owner to disappear. It is then followed by a period of rest; the eyes close slowly, the head falls down, the front legs seem to disappear under the body and the animal is about to collapse. It then suddenly stands, and ghosts come to surround it again; it looks around with angry looks, bites as if reaching something near the teeth and dashes up to the extremity of the chain, towards an enemy that only exists in its imagination.”
That phenomenon, carefully observed by the author of that memory, as we can see, seems to indicate that the dog is tormented by the vision of something invisible to us. Is it a real vision or a fantastic creation of its imagination, or in other words, hallucination? If it is hallucination it cannot certainly be by the eyes of the body, since they are not real objects; if they are fluidic beings or Spirits, since they do not produce any effect upon the senses of vision, it is then a spiritual vision that they perceive. In one case as in the other the dog would then have a sense up to a certain extent similar to that in man. Science had not yet ventured into the imagination of animals. From imagination to a principle that is independent of matter is not a great distance, unless one admits that brute matter like wood, rock, etc. may have imagination.
All the phenomena of visions are attributed to a super excited imagination by science. However, there has been reports of children at an early age and that cannot yet speak running after invisible beings, smiling to them and reaching out the them with their arms, trying to get them. In the rabies analogy, hasn’t this gotten a great similarity with the dog cited above? The boy has not started speaking yet but those that can speak positively tell those around that they see invisible beings. We have seen them describing their dead grandparents that they had not met. Super excitation is understandable in a person that is worried about something, but that is certainly not the case of a little child. A super excited imagination may revive a memory; fear, love, and enthusiasm may create fantastic images, we agree; under the impression of certain beliefs an exalted person may see the appearance of someone that is dear, the virgin or saints, we still agree; but we consider only those cause, how to explain the fact that a three or four year old child describing her grandmother that she never met? It cannot certainly be the product of a memory, nor a concern or not even any belief.
Let us say, in passing and as a corollary to what precedes, that clairvoyant mediumship seems to be frequent and even general in little children. Our guardian angels would come to guide us, like by the hand, taking us to the doorway of life, so that the transition from one life to the other is not too abrupt. As the child grows and is capable of using her own forces, the guardian angel keeps an eye only, allowing the free-will to take over. It is as saying: “I came to be with you at the port, taking you to the ship that will transport you through the sea of the world; now it is time to sail; fly with your own wings; but up there, from heavens, I shall watch you; think of me and when you return I will be there welcoming you.” Happy is the one that does not forget their guardian angel during the crossing!
Let us return to the main subject that lead us to this development. As long as we admit an imagination to the dog we could then say that the illness super excites it to the point of producing hallucinations. But many examples tend to prove that the phenomenon of vision do occur in certain animals, in their normal state, in particular with the dog and the horse. At least it is with them that we have observed more. Thinking by analogy, we can suppose that it is the same with the elephant and other animals whose intelligence is closer to man. It is certain that dogs do dream. Don’t we sometimes see them simulating movements in their sleep that resemble running; moaning or manifesting happiness? Their thoughts are then active, free and independent of their instinct properly saying. What is the dog doing? What is it that they see? What can the dog see in their dreams? Unfortunately, they cannot tell us, but the fact is there.
Up until now we were not much concerned with the intelligent principle of the animals and even less with their affinity with the human species, unless from the exclusive point of view of their material organization. Today one tries to reconcile their state and destiny with Dog’s justice; but with that regards only more or less logical systems were created, that are not always in agreement with the facts. If the question remained undefined for a long time it is for the fact that we lacked the elements necessary to its comprehension, like in many other cases. Spiritism that gives the key to so many misunderstood or badly observed and unnoticed phenomena, cannot go without facilitating the solution of this serious problem, to which we give all the attention that it deserves, because it is the solution of continuity of the chain that connects all beings in the harmonious whole of creation.
Why hasn’t Spiritism then immediately solved the issue? It would be the same as to ask a physics professor why she does not teach the laws of electricity and optics since lesson one. She starts from the fundamental principles of the science, by those principles that must serve as the basis for the understanding of the others, keeping for later the explanation of the subsequent laws. That is how the great Spirits that direct the Spiritist Movement act; in good logic, they start from the beginning and wait until we are educated in one point before touching the next. Now, what should be the starting point of their teaching? The human soul. We must be convinced of their existence and immortality. We must know their true attributes and destiny. In a word, we needed to understand our soul before that of the animals. Spiritism has already taught us a lot about the soul and its faculties; it daily teaches us more and casts light upon a new point. But how much still to be explored!
As we move on in knowledge with respect to our spiritual state, our attention is called to every question that may be related, near or far away, and that of the animals is not of minor interest. Man understands the analogies better; tries to understand what he sees; seeks the consequences; tests theories, one after the other, confirmed or belied by observations. That is how, out of the efforts of his own intelligence, he gradually approaches the objective. Here, as in everything else, the Spirits do not preclude us from the work of research, because we must use our own intelligence; they help, guide and that is a lot already, but they do not provide us with the finished science. As long as it is on the path of truth, they come to clearly reveal, muting uncertainties and annihilating false systems. But while wait, the Spirit is better prepared to understand and accept it, and when truth shows up, there is no surprise since it was already in the depth of thoughts. See the path walked by Spiritism. Has it arrived out of improvisation? Certainly not, and not to mention the facts that are present at all times since it is part of nature. Like electricity, from the point of view of the principle, it had prepared its appearance; Swedenborg, Saint-Martin, the theosophists, Charles Fourier, Jean Reynaud and so many others like Mesmer that brought the knowledge of the fluidic force, Puységur, the first to observe somnambulism, all raising the tip of the veil of the spiritual life; all of them circulated around and got more or less closer to light; all of them paved the way and prepared the spirits, so that in a way Spiritism only had to complete what had already been sketched. That is why it promptly conquered so many sympathizers. We do not speak of the other multiple causes that came in support, proving that certain ideas were no longer at the level of human progress, giving rise to the presentiment of a new order of things, because humanity cannot remain stationary. That is the same with every great idea that change the face of the world. None of them has come as a fascination, like a lightning. Haven’t Socrates and Plato sown the seeds of the Christian ideas five centuries before Christ?
Another reason had made us postpone the solution relative to the animals. This issue touches long lasting and strong prejudices and that would have been unwise to attack, being that the reason why the Spirits did not do it. The subject is discussed now; it is mentioned everywhere, even outside Spiritism; the discarnate take part in the discussion, each one according to their personal opinions; those several theories are discussed, examined; a number of facts, like for example the one in this article, and that would have gone unnoticed in the past, today call our attention, for the very reason of preliminaries studies that have been carried out.
Without adopting an idea or the other we become familiar with the idea of a contact between the animality and humanity, and when the final solution comes, whatever its direction, it will be supported by solid arguments that will not allow any doubt. If the idea is true, it would have been presented; if it is false, it means that we found something more logical to replace it. In nature everything is connected, chained and in harmony. Spiritism came to give a mother-idea and we can see how fecund that idea is. Before the light that Spiritism cast onto psychology we would have difficulty in believing that so many considerations could have been brought about by a raving dog.
After the summary above about the report by Dr. Bouley was read at the Society, a Spirit gave the following communication.
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, June 30th, 1865 – medium Mr. Desliens
Do the dog and some other animals have the vision in which the phenomena described by Mr. Bouley may be produced? To me there is no doubt about it. Yes, the dog and the horse do see the Spirits. Haven’t you ever witnessed the disgust that sometimes these animals show by passing by a place where they did not know there was a buried body? You will say that their senses are excited by the odor of the rotten bodies. Then, why would they go quietly when the body is of another animal? Why is it that they say the dog presents death? Haven’t you heard a dog howling by the window of an agonizing and unknown person? Outside the super excitation of rage, don’t you see several animals refusing to obey their owners, stepping back before an invisible obstacle that seems to block their passage, infuriating them, and later on they will pass calmly through the same path that terrified them before, as if the obstacle had been removed? Animals have been seen saving their owners from imminent danger by refusing to go in a given direction where they could have died. Facts of animal vision are found in antiquity and in the Middle Ages, as they are in our days. Animals, therefore, do see the Spirits. In fact, by saying that they have imagination, isn’t that an assumption that they do have a point of similarity with the human spirit, and isn’t their instinct a rudimentary intelligence appropriate to their needs, before they go through the modifying crucibles that wil transform them and give them new faculties? A man also has instincts that make him act unconsciously, in the interest of one’s own preservation. But as intelligence and free-will are developed, the instinct weakens giving rise to reason, because a blind guide is less necessary.
The instinct that has all of its power in the animal, perpetuating in man where it gradually fades away, is certainly a common trace between the two species. The subtleness of senses in the animal, like in the savage and primitive man, replacing in them the absence of a moral sense, is another point of contact. Finally, the spiritual vision that is evidently common to them, although in some varying degrees, also com to reduce the distance that seemed to erect an unsurpassable barrier. However, do not make any absolute conclusion but carefully analyze the facts because it is from that observation alone that truth will come one day.
Moki
Observation: This is a very wise advice because evidently a solid theory can only be founded on facts. Beyond that it is only opinions and systems. Facts are arguments without replica whose consequences, sooner or later, when they are attested, will have to be accepted. That was the principle that created the foundation of the Spiritist Doctrine and that allows us to say that it is a science of observation.
An Explanation regarding the revelation of Mr. Bach
The Grand Journal of June 18th, 1865 brings, with the title Letter from an Unknown, the explanation given below about the fact reported in the Spiritist Review, July 1865, with respect to the Aria of Henry III revealed in Mr. Bach’s dream. The author bases his explanation exclusively on somnambulism and seems to completely abstract from the intervention of the Spirits. Although we disagree in that respect, his explanation is not less wisely reasoned; and if it is not accurate in all points, in our opinion, it still contains points that are incontestably true and worth of attention. Contrarily to certain magnetizers, the so called “fluidists”, that only see the effect of a magnetic fluid in all effects, not taking the soul into account, Mr. Bertelius instead gives the soul a fundamental role. He represents the soul in its emancipation state, detached from matter, enjoying faculties that are not present in the vigil state. It is therefore an explanation from a completely spiritual point of view, if not totally Spiritist, and that is something on its own for the possibility of the fact by means that are not purely material, and that from an important journal. It is noticeable that a movement is forming among the detractors at this time, a kind of reaction, or even better, a third opinion that can be considered as a transition. Today many acknowledge the impossibility of explaining certain phenomena only by the laws of matter, but they cannot yet admit the intervention of the Spirits. They seek the causes in the exclusive action of the incarnate soul, acting independently from the material organs. It is incontestably a step forward that must be considered as a first victory against materialism. There isn’t a great distance between the isolated and independent action of the soul during life and the same action after death. They will be led to this by the evidence of the facts and by the impossibility of explaining everything just with the help of the incarnate Spirit.
Here is the article from The Great Journal:
“The issue before the last one of the Great Journal brings the singular case that happened to Mr. G. Bach, with these questions at the end: “- Had the harpsichord belonged to Baltazzarini? Was the Spirit of Baltazzarini that wrote the Sarabande? A mystery that we dare not investigate!”
Please explain to me why a man that has no prejudices, as I believe, steps back before the search for the truth? A mystery, you will say. – No Sir, there is no mystery. It is just a God given faculty to certain persons, like others are gifted with a beautiful voice, others with the genius of poetry, calculation, a rare perspicacity, all faculties that can be awaken, developed and improved by education. On the other hand there is an infinite number of other faculties conferred to mankind that civilization, progress and education annihilate, instead of favoring their development. Isn’t that true, for example, that indigenous peoples have an auditive sensitivity that we do not? That they can distinguish the step of man from several men, a horse from several horses or detect a wild animal at a great distance by holding the ear to the ground? Isn’t that also true that they measure time accurately without a pendulum or a clock? That they walk through virgin forests or navigate the rivers and oceans in their canoes oriented by the stars, with the help of a compass or without notions of Astronomy? Finally, isn’t that also true that the heal their diseases without doctors; cure the bites of the most venous animals with simple herbs, distinguishing them from so many others? Isn’t that a fact that they cure the most dangerous ulcers with clay? A red-skin chief in the middle of nowhere told me in the United States: The Great Being places the medicine by the side of the illness.
Those truths became banal by the force of repetition, but some use them to disguise their ignorance and others, that constitute the majority, use them to feed controversy. It is so easy to play the role of a strong mind just by denying everything! It is so difficult to explain the works of God whose secret we seek in books when the solution would be found in nature! There we have the great book, open to all intelligences; but not all of them are cut to decipher those mysteries because some read it through their preventions and prejudices and others through their insufficiency or the pride of pseudo-wise people.
Use the simplest means to investigate the mysteries of nature and the solution will be found, up to the limits imposed to our human intelligence by a superior one.
You said that Mr. Bach is not a somnambulist. What do you know about it and what does he know about it? Without the honor of having ever met him or known him I affirm that Mr. Bach is a somnambulist. It was in a latent state in him; an exceptional circumstance was necessary, a very lively and persistent sensation, an emotion understood by all of those that love curiosity and search, to have a faculty revealed to himself, a faculty that may have given him many unnoticeable examples in his life, but that he can certainly remember now if he wants to question and think about his past.
According to your report Mr. Bach spent part of his day admiring his precious harpsichord; he found out the age of the instrument (April 1564). He was thinking about it when he lied down and even when he was about to sleep he thought of that.
The somnambulist works in stages. When you want him to see what is going on in London, for example, you must tell him that he is boarding a carriage, then he is taken to the railroad and takes a train that moves, that he boards a ship and crosses the ocean (he will sometimes feel seasick), that he disembark, takes another train and gets to the end of the journey.
Mr. Bach followed the commonly path of the somnambulists. He had checked, disassembled, turned up and down and examined his harpsichord; he was taken by that idea and must have said to himself: whose instrument was this? There was a magnetic connection established between him and the instrument – and the strong minds cannot deny such connection. He fell asleep naturally and that was followed by the somnambulistic state. He then searched, excavated the past and established an intimate relationship with the harpsichord; he must have turned it, touched and placed his hand where three centuries before that the former owner had his own hand. He then questioned the past – something that is infinitely easier than predicting the future – and found himself in contact with a being that no longer exists. He saw him dressed and executing the aria that the instrument had executed so many times; he heard the words and dragged by that magnetic force called electricity Mr. Bach wrote the aria with his own hand, as clearly as one can send a message to Lyon today, written by your hand and with your writing. Mr. Bach wrote it in a somnambulistic state, I repeat, the music and lyrics that he had never heard before. He then woke up tearful and touched by such a lively emotion.
You can go and say that it is impossible. That is okay. But hear this case: I myself sent a somnambulist to England; she traveled not in a complete somnambulistic state but in an intermediary condition between the natural sleep and total somnambulism. I just ordered her to sleep the necessary time in her natural sleep and that she wrote whatever was reachable in her trip. She did not know a word in English. She knew nobody there. It was a serious task… She traveled and every night she wrote what she was supposed to do, the people that she should see and the addresses where she should meet them. She followed strictly the indications that were given to her. She visited the homes of people that she did not know and had never heard about, precisely the ones that could do it all… After eight days her mission was over, a task that would have required years for a complete satisfaction; my somnambulist came back after having accomplished wonders. In her natural state this extraordinary woman is a very common person.
Check this out: in her sleeping state her writing is very different from her natural way of writing. Words were written in English, unknown to her. She talks to me in Italian, but she could not say two words in that language in her vigil state.
Mr. Bach himself wrote and annotated the aria of Henry III with his own hand, although he cannot perhaps recognize his own writing. Something even more extraordinary is that he may doubt his own magnetic faculties, like my somnambulist who is radically skeptical about magnetism, to the point that whenever this is mentioned in her presence she promptly declares to be a non-believer.
And perhaps you may even say that Mr. Bach did not have paper and pen. My somnambulist in London found her indications written in pencil on her desk. She had no pencil… I am certain that she sought the pencil in the hotel, found it and brought it to her room with that almost supernatural and vaporous agility, accuracy and precaution, common to the somnambulists.
I could describe facts that are more remarkable than those of Mr. Bach but that is enough for today. I even hesitate in sending you these notes, serendipitously written by the pen.
For twenty years that I magnetize, I have hidden the result of my discoveries, even from my best friends. It is so easy to charge a man with madness; there are so many people interested in putting the light under the bushel, and above all it must be said, there are so many charlatans who have abused magnetism, that it would require a superhuman courage, to declare that I am involved with that. It would be better to proclaim that one has murdered his own father and mother, than to confess such a belief.
As a general rule, though: never ever believe in public experiments, in somnambulists that give consultation for a fee, that work like the ancient sibyl, speaking at the slightest command and at the scheduled time, in front of a large audience, like a skillfully prepared robot. It's trickery! Nothing is more unpredictable, capricious, voluntary, unstable, suspicious, rancorous than a somnambulist. The tiniest thing paralyzes their faculties of second sight; the tiniest thing makes them lie maliciously; the tiniest thing disturbs them and makes them deviate, and that is conceivable. Is there anything more susceptible than electric current?
I separated myself from an illustrious scientist (Dr. E ..., well-known in London), with whom I began my first magnetic experiments, precisely because I always considered the abuse of magnetism as a serious fault. Driven by the miraculous results we obtained, he one day wished to graft the phrenological system onto magnetism; he claimed that by touching certain bumps in the head, the somnambulist felt the sensation of that seat. By touching the presumed hump of music, the subject sang; that of gluttony, he chewed the emptiness, saying that such food had good or bad taste; and so on. I felt that it was pushing the experience to the point of abuse, sitting the problematic science of phrenology on the real fact of somnambulism. I wanted to extend the field of magnetic discoveries, but not to abuse them, as it is generally done.
I had the irreverence of declaring to my professor that he was going off course, and I maintain that it is the duty of all those who know the magnetic phenomena to rise against all these experiments, whose sole purpose is to satisfy an ignorant curiosity, to exploit some human weaknesses and not to achieve a practical result for humanity and useful to all.
But it is more difficult than one thinks to maintain oneself in these honorable limits, when one has arrived at marvelous results. The strongest magnetizers let themselves be carried away, and an even more remarkable phenomenon, when one gets to the point of always demanding public experiences of his subject, he seems to be out of order, he no longer has this unpredictability, this lucidity, that clairvoyance which distinguished him; the subject becomes an automatic machine, which responds on a given theme, and whose faculties are impoverished to the point of disappearing.
Unfortunately, people who would not dare to attempt a simple experiment in recreational physics, who would admit to being unfit to perform the slightest trick of prestidigitation, never hesitate, without the least preparatory study, to make magnetic experiments.
Ah! If I were not afraid of lulling the readers of your Grand Journal of a less interesting sleep, but louder than that of my sleepwalkers, I will soon be talking about eminently curious facts. But before anything else we must know how you will receive this first letter, and that's what I'll learn on Saturday by flipping the pages of my paper.”
Bertellius
Here is the article from The Great Journal:
“The issue before the last one of the Great Journal brings the singular case that happened to Mr. G. Bach, with these questions at the end: “- Had the harpsichord belonged to Baltazzarini? Was the Spirit of Baltazzarini that wrote the Sarabande? A mystery that we dare not investigate!”
Please explain to me why a man that has no prejudices, as I believe, steps back before the search for the truth? A mystery, you will say. – No Sir, there is no mystery. It is just a God given faculty to certain persons, like others are gifted with a beautiful voice, others with the genius of poetry, calculation, a rare perspicacity, all faculties that can be awaken, developed and improved by education. On the other hand there is an infinite number of other faculties conferred to mankind that civilization, progress and education annihilate, instead of favoring their development. Isn’t that true, for example, that indigenous peoples have an auditive sensitivity that we do not? That they can distinguish the step of man from several men, a horse from several horses or detect a wild animal at a great distance by holding the ear to the ground? Isn’t that also true that they measure time accurately without a pendulum or a clock? That they walk through virgin forests or navigate the rivers and oceans in their canoes oriented by the stars, with the help of a compass or without notions of Astronomy? Finally, isn’t that also true that the heal their diseases without doctors; cure the bites of the most venous animals with simple herbs, distinguishing them from so many others? Isn’t that a fact that they cure the most dangerous ulcers with clay? A red-skin chief in the middle of nowhere told me in the United States: The Great Being places the medicine by the side of the illness.
Those truths became banal by the force of repetition, but some use them to disguise their ignorance and others, that constitute the majority, use them to feed controversy. It is so easy to play the role of a strong mind just by denying everything! It is so difficult to explain the works of God whose secret we seek in books when the solution would be found in nature! There we have the great book, open to all intelligences; but not all of them are cut to decipher those mysteries because some read it through their preventions and prejudices and others through their insufficiency or the pride of pseudo-wise people.
Use the simplest means to investigate the mysteries of nature and the solution will be found, up to the limits imposed to our human intelligence by a superior one.
You said that Mr. Bach is not a somnambulist. What do you know about it and what does he know about it? Without the honor of having ever met him or known him I affirm that Mr. Bach is a somnambulist. It was in a latent state in him; an exceptional circumstance was necessary, a very lively and persistent sensation, an emotion understood by all of those that love curiosity and search, to have a faculty revealed to himself, a faculty that may have given him many unnoticeable examples in his life, but that he can certainly remember now if he wants to question and think about his past.
According to your report Mr. Bach spent part of his day admiring his precious harpsichord; he found out the age of the instrument (April 1564). He was thinking about it when he lied down and even when he was about to sleep he thought of that.
The somnambulist works in stages. When you want him to see what is going on in London, for example, you must tell him that he is boarding a carriage, then he is taken to the railroad and takes a train that moves, that he boards a ship and crosses the ocean (he will sometimes feel seasick), that he disembark, takes another train and gets to the end of the journey.
Mr. Bach followed the commonly path of the somnambulists. He had checked, disassembled, turned up and down and examined his harpsichord; he was taken by that idea and must have said to himself: whose instrument was this? There was a magnetic connection established between him and the instrument – and the strong minds cannot deny such connection. He fell asleep naturally and that was followed by the somnambulistic state. He then searched, excavated the past and established an intimate relationship with the harpsichord; he must have turned it, touched and placed his hand where three centuries before that the former owner had his own hand. He then questioned the past – something that is infinitely easier than predicting the future – and found himself in contact with a being that no longer exists. He saw him dressed and executing the aria that the instrument had executed so many times; he heard the words and dragged by that magnetic force called electricity Mr. Bach wrote the aria with his own hand, as clearly as one can send a message to Lyon today, written by your hand and with your writing. Mr. Bach wrote it in a somnambulistic state, I repeat, the music and lyrics that he had never heard before. He then woke up tearful and touched by such a lively emotion.
You can go and say that it is impossible. That is okay. But hear this case: I myself sent a somnambulist to England; she traveled not in a complete somnambulistic state but in an intermediary condition between the natural sleep and total somnambulism. I just ordered her to sleep the necessary time in her natural sleep and that she wrote whatever was reachable in her trip. She did not know a word in English. She knew nobody there. It was a serious task… She traveled and every night she wrote what she was supposed to do, the people that she should see and the addresses where she should meet them. She followed strictly the indications that were given to her. She visited the homes of people that she did not know and had never heard about, precisely the ones that could do it all… After eight days her mission was over, a task that would have required years for a complete satisfaction; my somnambulist came back after having accomplished wonders. In her natural state this extraordinary woman is a very common person.
Check this out: in her sleeping state her writing is very different from her natural way of writing. Words were written in English, unknown to her. She talks to me in Italian, but she could not say two words in that language in her vigil state.
Mr. Bach himself wrote and annotated the aria of Henry III with his own hand, although he cannot perhaps recognize his own writing. Something even more extraordinary is that he may doubt his own magnetic faculties, like my somnambulist who is radically skeptical about magnetism, to the point that whenever this is mentioned in her presence she promptly declares to be a non-believer.
And perhaps you may even say that Mr. Bach did not have paper and pen. My somnambulist in London found her indications written in pencil on her desk. She had no pencil… I am certain that she sought the pencil in the hotel, found it and brought it to her room with that almost supernatural and vaporous agility, accuracy and precaution, common to the somnambulists.
I could describe facts that are more remarkable than those of Mr. Bach but that is enough for today. I even hesitate in sending you these notes, serendipitously written by the pen.
For twenty years that I magnetize, I have hidden the result of my discoveries, even from my best friends. It is so easy to charge a man with madness; there are so many people interested in putting the light under the bushel, and above all it must be said, there are so many charlatans who have abused magnetism, that it would require a superhuman courage, to declare that I am involved with that. It would be better to proclaim that one has murdered his own father and mother, than to confess such a belief.
As a general rule, though: never ever believe in public experiments, in somnambulists that give consultation for a fee, that work like the ancient sibyl, speaking at the slightest command and at the scheduled time, in front of a large audience, like a skillfully prepared robot. It's trickery! Nothing is more unpredictable, capricious, voluntary, unstable, suspicious, rancorous than a somnambulist. The tiniest thing paralyzes their faculties of second sight; the tiniest thing makes them lie maliciously; the tiniest thing disturbs them and makes them deviate, and that is conceivable. Is there anything more susceptible than electric current?
I separated myself from an illustrious scientist (Dr. E ..., well-known in London), with whom I began my first magnetic experiments, precisely because I always considered the abuse of magnetism as a serious fault. Driven by the miraculous results we obtained, he one day wished to graft the phrenological system onto magnetism; he claimed that by touching certain bumps in the head, the somnambulist felt the sensation of that seat. By touching the presumed hump of music, the subject sang; that of gluttony, he chewed the emptiness, saying that such food had good or bad taste; and so on. I felt that it was pushing the experience to the point of abuse, sitting the problematic science of phrenology on the real fact of somnambulism. I wanted to extend the field of magnetic discoveries, but not to abuse them, as it is generally done.
I had the irreverence of declaring to my professor that he was going off course, and I maintain that it is the duty of all those who know the magnetic phenomena to rise against all these experiments, whose sole purpose is to satisfy an ignorant curiosity, to exploit some human weaknesses and not to achieve a practical result for humanity and useful to all.
But it is more difficult than one thinks to maintain oneself in these honorable limits, when one has arrived at marvelous results. The strongest magnetizers let themselves be carried away, and an even more remarkable phenomenon, when one gets to the point of always demanding public experiences of his subject, he seems to be out of order, he no longer has this unpredictability, this lucidity, that clairvoyance which distinguished him; the subject becomes an automatic machine, which responds on a given theme, and whose faculties are impoverished to the point of disappearing.
Unfortunately, people who would not dare to attempt a simple experiment in recreational physics, who would admit to being unfit to perform the slightest trick of prestidigitation, never hesitate, without the least preparatory study, to make magnetic experiments.
Ah! If I were not afraid of lulling the readers of your Grand Journal of a less interesting sleep, but louder than that of my sleepwalkers, I will soon be talking about eminently curious facts. But before anything else we must know how you will receive this first letter, and that's what I'll learn on Saturday by flipping the pages of my paper.”
Bertellius
An Egotist
Moral Spiritist study
One of our corresponding members from Lyon sent us the following report on January 10th, 1865:
“We know a person from a neighboring town whose name we shall not declare to avoid slander and because the name has nothing to do with the fact. He was a Spiritist and had improved himself by the influence of that belief, however he had not taken the most advantage of that considering his intelligence. He used to live with an aunt that loved him like a son and that would do any work and sacrifice for her dear nephew. She would take care of the house in order to save money. It was all good up to that point. What was not so natural was the fact that the young and healthy nephew would allow her to do painful tasks for her age, like the transportation of heavy loads and similar things. He would not touch a piece of furniture in the house as if he would count on servants at his services. When foreseeing some hard job ahead he would find excuses to be away, afraid that he would be asked to do something that he could not refuse. Nonetheless he had received many lessons about that, not to say reproaches, but he remained insensitive. One day the aunt was extenuated while splitting wood and he calmly smoking his pipe. A neighbor came by and fired at him with his eyes, saying: This is a man’s job, not a woman’s. He then took the axe and began cutting the wood while the other observed. He was considered a righteous man, of good conduct but he did not show empathy and perseverance and for that he was not liked, and the majority of his friends had stayed away. We, the Spiritists, suffered for that lack of feelings and used to say that one day he would pay dearly for that. The forecast did occur recently. We must say that due to the efforts the old lady was taken ill with a very serious hernia that brought her a lot of pain, but she would have enough courage to not complain. During these latest cold days, the nephew left early to avoid the hard work, but he did not return. He was crossing a bridge when he was hit by a vehicle that slid from a hillside and died two hours later. We wanted to have him evoked and here is what our good guides said:
The one you want to call will not be able to communicate for some time. I came to respond in his place and tell you what you want to know. He will confirm this later. At this time, he is very disturbed by the thoughts that agitate him. He sees the aunt and the disease she acquired as a consequence of the physical fatigue and from which she will die. He is tormented by that since he considers himself the murderer. And he is in fact since he could have spared her the work that will be the cause of her death. It is a terrible remorse for him and that will persecute him for a long time, until he has atoned his fault. He wanted to do it now; he is always with her, but his efforts are useless and becomes desperate. His punishment will be to see her dying as a consequence of his indifference for his behavior is a kind of selfishness. Pray for him so that he can bear his regret that later on will save him.
Question – Can our dear guide tell us if other defects that he fixed as a consequence of Spiritism will not be taken into account, and if that has not serve to mitigate his situation?
Answer – There is no doubt that such improvement is taken into account since nothing escapes the in-depth eyes of the divine providence. But that is how each of our good or bad actions have their natural, inevitable consequences, according to these words of Jesus Christ: - For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then shall he render unto every man according to his deeds.[1] The one that corrected oneself from some faults is spared from the punishment that would result from them, receiving, on the contrary, the awards for the qualities that replaced them, but one cannot escape the consequences of the defects that still persist. Therefore, one is not punished but in proportion and according to the seriousness of the latter. The less defects that remain the better one’s position. One quality does not atone another fault; it reduces their number and consequently the total punishment. Those that are corrected form start are the easiest to eliminate and egotism is the hardest to get rid of. People think that they did a lot for moderating their violent character, have resigned to their fate or eliminated a few bad habits. There is no doubt that they will benefit from that, but it does not preclude them from paying the tribute of depuration for the rest.
My friends, selfishness is what we see best in others, because we feel the impact, and the egoist hurts us; but the egoist finds in himself his satisfaction, that is why he does not perceive it. Egoism is always a proof of dryness of the heart; it dulls sensitivity to the sufferings of others. The man of heart, on the contrary, feels the suffering and is moved by it; that is why he devotes himself to spare or mitigate them in others, because he would like others to do the same for him; so he is happy when he spares a pain or suffering to someone; having empathy towards the suffering of a fellow human being, he feels real relief when the suffering no longer exists. Count on his gratitude if you do him a favor; but of the egoist expect only ingratitude; the gratitude in words does not cost him anything, but in action, it would tire him and disturb his rest. He acts for others only when he is forced to do so, but never spontaneously; his attachment is because of the good he expects from people, and this sometimes without his knowledge. The young man of whom we spoke certainly loved his aunt and would get upset if he had been told otherwise, and yet his affection did not go so far as to tire himself for her; it was not a premeditated plan on his side, but an instinctive repulsion, following his native selfishness. The light he could not find in his lifetime appears today, and he regrets not having benefited better from the teachings he has received. Pray for him.
Egotism is the rodent worm of society, and more or less of each one of you. I will soon write a dissertation in which it will be faced in its multiple nuances; it will be a mirror: look at it carefully and try to find in any corner a reflex of your own personality.
Your spiritual guide
[1] Mathews 16:27
One of our corresponding members from Lyon sent us the following report on January 10th, 1865:
“We know a person from a neighboring town whose name we shall not declare to avoid slander and because the name has nothing to do with the fact. He was a Spiritist and had improved himself by the influence of that belief, however he had not taken the most advantage of that considering his intelligence. He used to live with an aunt that loved him like a son and that would do any work and sacrifice for her dear nephew. She would take care of the house in order to save money. It was all good up to that point. What was not so natural was the fact that the young and healthy nephew would allow her to do painful tasks for her age, like the transportation of heavy loads and similar things. He would not touch a piece of furniture in the house as if he would count on servants at his services. When foreseeing some hard job ahead he would find excuses to be away, afraid that he would be asked to do something that he could not refuse. Nonetheless he had received many lessons about that, not to say reproaches, but he remained insensitive. One day the aunt was extenuated while splitting wood and he calmly smoking his pipe. A neighbor came by and fired at him with his eyes, saying: This is a man’s job, not a woman’s. He then took the axe and began cutting the wood while the other observed. He was considered a righteous man, of good conduct but he did not show empathy and perseverance and for that he was not liked, and the majority of his friends had stayed away. We, the Spiritists, suffered for that lack of feelings and used to say that one day he would pay dearly for that. The forecast did occur recently. We must say that due to the efforts the old lady was taken ill with a very serious hernia that brought her a lot of pain, but she would have enough courage to not complain. During these latest cold days, the nephew left early to avoid the hard work, but he did not return. He was crossing a bridge when he was hit by a vehicle that slid from a hillside and died two hours later. We wanted to have him evoked and here is what our good guides said:
The one you want to call will not be able to communicate for some time. I came to respond in his place and tell you what you want to know. He will confirm this later. At this time, he is very disturbed by the thoughts that agitate him. He sees the aunt and the disease she acquired as a consequence of the physical fatigue and from which she will die. He is tormented by that since he considers himself the murderer. And he is in fact since he could have spared her the work that will be the cause of her death. It is a terrible remorse for him and that will persecute him for a long time, until he has atoned his fault. He wanted to do it now; he is always with her, but his efforts are useless and becomes desperate. His punishment will be to see her dying as a consequence of his indifference for his behavior is a kind of selfishness. Pray for him so that he can bear his regret that later on will save him.
Question – Can our dear guide tell us if other defects that he fixed as a consequence of Spiritism will not be taken into account, and if that has not serve to mitigate his situation?
Answer – There is no doubt that such improvement is taken into account since nothing escapes the in-depth eyes of the divine providence. But that is how each of our good or bad actions have their natural, inevitable consequences, according to these words of Jesus Christ: - For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then shall he render unto every man according to his deeds.[1] The one that corrected oneself from some faults is spared from the punishment that would result from them, receiving, on the contrary, the awards for the qualities that replaced them, but one cannot escape the consequences of the defects that still persist. Therefore, one is not punished but in proportion and according to the seriousness of the latter. The less defects that remain the better one’s position. One quality does not atone another fault; it reduces their number and consequently the total punishment. Those that are corrected form start are the easiest to eliminate and egotism is the hardest to get rid of. People think that they did a lot for moderating their violent character, have resigned to their fate or eliminated a few bad habits. There is no doubt that they will benefit from that, but it does not preclude them from paying the tribute of depuration for the rest.
My friends, selfishness is what we see best in others, because we feel the impact, and the egoist hurts us; but the egoist finds in himself his satisfaction, that is why he does not perceive it. Egoism is always a proof of dryness of the heart; it dulls sensitivity to the sufferings of others. The man of heart, on the contrary, feels the suffering and is moved by it; that is why he devotes himself to spare or mitigate them in others, because he would like others to do the same for him; so he is happy when he spares a pain or suffering to someone; having empathy towards the suffering of a fellow human being, he feels real relief when the suffering no longer exists. Count on his gratitude if you do him a favor; but of the egoist expect only ingratitude; the gratitude in words does not cost him anything, but in action, it would tire him and disturb his rest. He acts for others only when he is forced to do so, but never spontaneously; his attachment is because of the good he expects from people, and this sometimes without his knowledge. The young man of whom we spoke certainly loved his aunt and would get upset if he had been told otherwise, and yet his affection did not go so far as to tire himself for her; it was not a premeditated plan on his side, but an instinctive repulsion, following his native selfishness. The light he could not find in his lifetime appears today, and he regrets not having benefited better from the teachings he has received. Pray for him.
Egotism is the rodent worm of society, and more or less of each one of you. I will soon write a dissertation in which it will be faced in its multiple nuances; it will be a mirror: look at it carefully and try to find in any corner a reflex of your own personality.
Your spiritual guide
[1] Mathews 16:27
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Heavens and Hell or the Divine Justice According to Spiritism, by Allan Kardec
Content: compared examination of the doctrines about the passage from the corporeal to the spiritual life, future penalties and rewards, angels and demons, eternal punishments, etc., followed by a large number of examples about the actual condition of the soul during and after death.
Since it is not up to us to praise or criticize this work we limit ourselves to explain its objective and to reproduce a summary of the preface.
The title of the book clearly indicates its objective. We gather there all the elements proper to enlighten people about their destiny. As with the other writings about the Spiritist Doctrine there is nothing there that is the result of a preconceived system or from a personal conception that would have no authority. Everything in the book is deduced from observation and the agreement of facts.
The Spirits’ Book contains the foundations of Spiritism; it is the cornerstone of the edifice; all principles of the doctrine are presented there, up to those that must constitute its coronation; it was necessary, however, to give their developments, deduce all of their consequences and applications, as they were provided by the complementary teaching of the Spirits and by their observations. That is what we did with The Mediums’ Book and the Gospel According to Spiritism, from special points of view; that is what we do with the current book, by another point of view and what we will do successively with those that we still have to publish and that will come when the time is right.
The new ideas will only fructify when the terrain is right to receive them. For prepared terrain one must not understand a few premature minds that would only give isolated fruits, but a certain whole in the general predisposition, leading not only to a more abundant production of fruits but also give those ideas a larger number of supporting points, finding less opposition and being stronger against the attack of the adversaries. The Gospel According to Spiritism was already a step forward; Heavens and Hell According to Spiritism is one step further and its reach will be better understood because it openly discusses certain questions, but it should not have come earlier. If we take into account, the time when Spiritism appeared we shall recognize without much effort that it came at the right time, not too early, not too late. Had it come earlier it would have been aborted, since it would have capitulated before the attack of the enemies for not having gathered enough sympathizers; had it come later, it would have let go the opportunity to spread out; the ideas might have taken a different route, hard to change. It was necessary to allow the old ideas to wear out and demonstrate their insufficiency, before new ones were presented. Premature ideas are aborted because one is not mature to understand them and the need for a change has not been felt yet. Today it is evident to everyone that there is an immense movement of opinion; a formidable reaction takes places, in the progressive direction, against the stagnant or backward spirit of routine; the ones that were satisfied on the eve are the impatient ones on the following day.
It is labor and birth to humanity; there is something in the air, an irresistible force that pushes it forward; it is like a young person just out of adolescence that foresees new horizons but is not able to define them, still shaking the diapers of childhood. We see something better, a more solid food to reason. But that is still in the emptiness; we seek it, everybody works to find it, from the believer to the skeptical, from the worker to the scientist. The universe is a vast seedbed; some build, other destroy; everyone carries a stone to the new edifice, whose definitive plan is only seen by the Great Architect and whose economy will only be understood when it begins to take shape above ground. That was the time when the sovereign wisdom chose for the appearance of Spiritism.
The Spirits that preside upon the great regenerating movement, therefore, act with more wisdom than people would do because they oversee the general march of things, whereas we only see the limited circle of hour horizon. Since the times of renovation have come, according to the divine designs, it was necessary that mankind could foresee the new order of things, amongst the ruins of the old edifice and to avoid losing courage; the sailor had to see the polar star that would guide him to the port. The wisdom of the Spirits since the appearance of Spiritism, revealed almost instantaneously in all corners of Earth, when the time was right, is not less evident in the order and logical succession of the complementary revelations. It is not up to anybody to force their will about it because they do not gauge their teachings by the level of our impatience. We cannot simply say: we would like to know this, to have it given to us; it is even less convenient for us to tell God: “we believe the time is right for you to give is this or that; we believe to be advanced enough to get it”, because that would be the same as saying: “we know better what is the right thing to do”. The impatient ones hear this from the Spirits: “Begin by doing well, understanding well and above all by practicing well what you know, so that God may judge you worth of receiving more; then, when the moment is right, we shall know how to proceed and to choose our instruments.”
The first part of this book, named Doctrine, contains the comparative examination of several beliefs about heavens and hell, angels and demons, future penalties and rewards; the dogma of the eternal penalties is analyzed there in a special way, refuted by arguments taken from the laws of nature themselves, demonstrating not only their logical side, already done hundreds of times, but also its material impossibility. With the eternal penalties fall also the consequences that people believed could have followed them.
The second part contains numerous examples that support the theory, or even better, that served to the establishment of the theory. They found their authority in the diversity of times and places where they were obtained, because had they come from one single source and they could be considered to be produced by the same influence. Besides, they are taken from the agreement that is obtained daily from all over the place where people deal with the Spiritist manifestations, from a serious and philosophical point of view.
These examples could have been multiplied to infinity because there isn’t a Spiritist Center that could not provide a remarkable contingent. We had to choose the most instructive ones to avoid a fastidious repetition. Each one of those examples is a study in which every word has its reach to whoever wants to meditate with attention, because from each point there is a light cast upon a situation of the soul after death, and about the up until now obscure and feared passage from the corporeal to the spiritual life. It is the guide to the traveler, before entering a new country. Life beyond the grave unfolds there in all of its aspects, in a vast portrait; everyone will find reasons for hope and consolation there, and new supports to their faith in the future and in the justice of God.
In those examples, in their majority taken from contemporary facts, we concealed people’s names, whenever considered appropriate, for convenience and obvious reasons. Those touched by those examples will recognize them easily. To the public in general there would be no additional benefit in the instruction by providing names more or less known, sometimes obscure.
These are the titles of the chapters:
FIRST PART: Doctrine. I. The future and the emptiness. II. The apprehension of death. III. Heavens. IV. Hell. V. Comparative chart of the Pagan and Christian hells. VI. The purgatory. VII. The doctrine of the eternal penalties. VIII. Future penalties, according to Spiritism. IX. The angels. X. The demons. XI. Intervention of the demons in modern manifestations. XII. About the prohibition of evoking the dead.
SECOND PART: Examples. I. The passage. II. Happy Spirits. III. Spirits in average condition. IV. Suffering Spirits. V. Suicidal. VI. Regretting criminals. VII. Hardened Spirits. VIII. Earthly atonements.
Heavens and Hell or the Divine Justice According to Spiritism, by Allan Kardec
Content: compared examination of the doctrines about the passage from the corporeal to the spiritual life, future penalties and rewards, angels and demons, eternal punishments, etc., followed by a large number of examples about the actual condition of the soul during and after death.
Since it is not up to us to praise or criticize this work we limit ourselves to explain its objective and to reproduce a summary of the preface.
The title of the book clearly indicates its objective. We gather there all the elements proper to enlighten people about their destiny. As with the other writings about the Spiritist Doctrine there is nothing there that is the result of a preconceived system or from a personal conception that would have no authority. Everything in the book is deduced from observation and the agreement of facts.
The Spirits’ Book contains the foundations of Spiritism; it is the cornerstone of the edifice; all principles of the doctrine are presented there, up to those that must constitute its coronation; it was necessary, however, to give their developments, deduce all of their consequences and applications, as they were provided by the complementary teaching of the Spirits and by their observations. That is what we did with The Mediums’ Book and the Gospel According to Spiritism, from special points of view; that is what we do with the current book, by another point of view and what we will do successively with those that we still have to publish and that will come when the time is right.
The new ideas will only fructify when the terrain is right to receive them. For prepared terrain one must not understand a few premature minds that would only give isolated fruits, but a certain whole in the general predisposition, leading not only to a more abundant production of fruits but also give those ideas a larger number of supporting points, finding less opposition and being stronger against the attack of the adversaries. The Gospel According to Spiritism was already a step forward; Heavens and Hell According to Spiritism is one step further and its reach will be better understood because it openly discusses certain questions, but it should not have come earlier. If we take into account, the time when Spiritism appeared we shall recognize without much effort that it came at the right time, not too early, not too late. Had it come earlier it would have been aborted, since it would have capitulated before the attack of the enemies for not having gathered enough sympathizers; had it come later, it would have let go the opportunity to spread out; the ideas might have taken a different route, hard to change. It was necessary to allow the old ideas to wear out and demonstrate their insufficiency, before new ones were presented. Premature ideas are aborted because one is not mature to understand them and the need for a change has not been felt yet. Today it is evident to everyone that there is an immense movement of opinion; a formidable reaction takes places, in the progressive direction, against the stagnant or backward spirit of routine; the ones that were satisfied on the eve are the impatient ones on the following day.
It is labor and birth to humanity; there is something in the air, an irresistible force that pushes it forward; it is like a young person just out of adolescence that foresees new horizons but is not able to define them, still shaking the diapers of childhood. We see something better, a more solid food to reason. But that is still in the emptiness; we seek it, everybody works to find it, from the believer to the skeptical, from the worker to the scientist. The universe is a vast seedbed; some build, other destroy; everyone carries a stone to the new edifice, whose definitive plan is only seen by the Great Architect and whose economy will only be understood when it begins to take shape above ground. That was the time when the sovereign wisdom chose for the appearance of Spiritism.
The Spirits that preside upon the great regenerating movement, therefore, act with more wisdom than people would do because they oversee the general march of things, whereas we only see the limited circle of hour horizon. Since the times of renovation have come, according to the divine designs, it was necessary that mankind could foresee the new order of things, amongst the ruins of the old edifice and to avoid losing courage; the sailor had to see the polar star that would guide him to the port. The wisdom of the Spirits since the appearance of Spiritism, revealed almost instantaneously in all corners of Earth, when the time was right, is not less evident in the order and logical succession of the complementary revelations. It is not up to anybody to force their will about it because they do not gauge their teachings by the level of our impatience. We cannot simply say: we would like to know this, to have it given to us; it is even less convenient for us to tell God: “we believe the time is right for you to give is this or that; we believe to be advanced enough to get it”, because that would be the same as saying: “we know better what is the right thing to do”. The impatient ones hear this from the Spirits: “Begin by doing well, understanding well and above all by practicing well what you know, so that God may judge you worth of receiving more; then, when the moment is right, we shall know how to proceed and to choose our instruments.”
The first part of this book, named Doctrine, contains the comparative examination of several beliefs about heavens and hell, angels and demons, future penalties and rewards; the dogma of the eternal penalties is analyzed there in a special way, refuted by arguments taken from the laws of nature themselves, demonstrating not only their logical side, already done hundreds of times, but also its material impossibility. With the eternal penalties fall also the consequences that people believed could have followed them.
The second part contains numerous examples that support the theory, or even better, that served to the establishment of the theory. They found their authority in the diversity of times and places where they were obtained, because had they come from one single source and they could be considered to be produced by the same influence. Besides, they are taken from the agreement that is obtained daily from all over the place where people deal with the Spiritist manifestations, from a serious and philosophical point of view.
These examples could have been multiplied to infinity because there isn’t a Spiritist Center that could not provide a remarkable contingent. We had to choose the most instructive ones to avoid a fastidious repetition. Each one of those examples is a study in which every word has its reach to whoever wants to meditate with attention, because from each point there is a light cast upon a situation of the soul after death, and about the up until now obscure and feared passage from the corporeal to the spiritual life. It is the guide to the traveler, before entering a new country. Life beyond the grave unfolds there in all of its aspects, in a vast portrait; everyone will find reasons for hope and consolation there, and new supports to their faith in the future and in the justice of God.
In those examples, in their majority taken from contemporary facts, we concealed people’s names, whenever considered appropriate, for convenience and obvious reasons. Those touched by those examples will recognize them easily. To the public in general there would be no additional benefit in the instruction by providing names more or less known, sometimes obscure.
These are the titles of the chapters:
FIRST PART: Doctrine. I. The future and the emptiness. II. The apprehension of death. III. Heavens. IV. Hell. V. Comparative chart of the Pagan and Christian hells. VI. The purgatory. VII. The doctrine of the eternal penalties. VIII. Future penalties, according to Spiritism. IX. The angels. X. The demons. XI. Intervention of the demons in modern manifestations. XII. About the prohibition of evoking the dead.
SECOND PART: Examples. I. The passage. II. Happy Spirits. III. Spirits in average condition. IV. Suffering Spirits. V. Suicidal. VI. Regretting criminals. VII. Hardened Spirits. VIII. Earthly atonements.
Family Conversations About Spiritism
by Mrs. Émilie Collignon, from Bordeaux
It is with satisfaction and carrying out a duty that we call the attention of our readers to this brochure, just announced in the last issue of our Spiritist Review, that is a pleasure to us to include in the list of the recommended books. It is a complete, although summarized, exposition of the true principles of the Doctrine, in a colloquial language, in an attractive format, reachable by everyone. The analysis of this book would be the same as that of The Spirits’ Book and The Mediums’ Book. We therefore recommend this book not as for containing new ideas but for the propagation of the Doctrine.
It is with satisfaction and carrying out a duty that we call the attention of our readers to this brochure, just announced in the last issue of our Spiritist Review, that is a pleasure to us to include in the list of the recommended books. It is a complete, although summarized, exposition of the true principles of the Doctrine, in a colloquial language, in an attractive format, reachable by everyone. The analysis of this book would be the same as that of The Spirits’ Book and The Mediums’ Book. We therefore recommend this book not as for containing new ideas but for the propagation of the Doctrine.
October
New Studies About the Magic or Psychic Mirrors
The clairvoyant of Zimmerwald forestIn the Spiritist Review of 1864 we gave a detailed report of the observations that we had just carried out of a peasant from the Berne Canton, a person that had the skill of seeing far away things in a glass. New visits done this year allowed us to complete those observations and rectify, in certain points, the theory that we had produced about the objects commonly called magic mirrors, or more precisely, psychic mirrors. Since we seek the truth, before anything else, and since we do not pretend to be infallible, whenever we are in error we do not hesitate in acknowledging that. We know nothing sillier than clinging oneself on a wrong opinion. In order to understand what follows, and to avoid repetition, we urge our readers to report to the article mentioned above, containing detailed news about the clairvoyant and his modus operandi.
We will just remind you that the name magic mirror is given to objects of multiple types and shapes, almost always shiny, like glass, bottles and metallic plates, in which certain persons see remote things. We were convinced by a careful observation that such a vision is not but the double sight or the spiritual or psychic sight, independent of the organic sight, for experience daily demonstrates that such a faculty exists without the support of any object, having then concluded in absolute terms that the objects are useless, thinking that the habit of using them made them necessary, and that every individual that sees with their help could perfectly see without them, if wanted. It is here that we are mistaken, as we shall demonstrate.
We must first give a quick report of the observed events since they are the basis of the instructions that were provided.
We then returned to the home of that man, accompanied by Mr. Commander W… that kindly operated as our interpreter, he promptly dealt with our health; he easily and accurately described its location, the cause, the nature and indicated the necessary medication. Next, and without being asked, he talked about our work, the objective and results, as he did the year before, but he did not keep any memory of that; at this time, he went much deeper into the subject, whose reach he seemed to have understood better. He described in detail the evolution of the idea, and the future of our cause, about the issues that may produce this or that result, about the obstacles that we shall face and the means of overcoming them, about the persons that may play a role in favor or against, those whose devotion and honesty we can or cannot count on, describing them physically and morally, demonstrating that he could see them perfectly well. In a word, he gave us remarkable instructions, extensively elaborated and logically motivated, even more remarkable for confirming and completing, for certain aspects, those given to us by our spiritual guides. The parts that we could assess the accuracy left no doubt about his clairvoyance. After the several conversations we had with him he always returned to the same subject, confirming or denying it, never entering into contraction with himself, even on those things that he said the year before, seemingly continued by the current dialogues.
Since this current instruction is absolutely personal and confidential, we abstain from reporting its details. We just mention it due to the important fact that comes out of that and that is reported next. It is undoubtedly of the highest interest to us, but our main objective in seeing that man again was to develop new studies about his skills, to the interest of the Spiritist science.
We attested the fact that his lucidity cannot be forced. He sees what is presented to him and reports it, but he cannot be led to see what he wants to see, nor something that someone is thinking about, although he can read one’s mind. In the main session dedicated to us we uselessly tried to call his attention to other subjects; despite his efforts he said he could not see anything about that in the glass.
When he is dealing with a subject we can ask him questions about it but it is useless to question him about anything else that may occur to us. Yet, sometimes he abruptly changes from the current subject that he is dealing with to another one completely strange; he then goes back to the first one. When he is asked about the reason for that he answers what he sees and that it does not depend on him.
He spontaneously sees absent people when they are directly connected to the object of examination, but not otherwise. His starting point is the consulting person and her home. From there other facts follow. We then uselessly tried the following experiment: one of our Parisian friends that had just sent us a letter wanted to consult with him about the illness of his daughter. We showed him the letter and had him holding it at the bottom of the glass, thinking that the radiation of the fluid would facilitate the vision of that person. He did not do that because the reflex of the white paper bothered him; he said that the person was too far away, however, a few moments earlier he had just described a person whom we were not absolutely thinking about, as her place of residence, four times more distant. But this person was involved in the matter that we were dealing with whereas the other one was completely strange to the subject. The chain of events would lead him to one and not the other.
Hence, his lucidity is not flexible or manageable and absolutely does not align with the will of the questioner. It is not, in any way, ready to satisfy curiosity. In fact, as he reads the mind, his first act is to investigate the intention of the visitor, in case she is unknown. If the intention is not serious, and if the objective is neither moral nor useless, he refuses to speak and dismisses anyone that comes to him seeking what is called their good luck or asking futile or indiscrete questions. In one word, he is a serious clairvoyant and not a foreteller. His clairvoyance, as we said before, is mostly applicable to the springs and the underground natural water courses. He only handles other things as an accessory or out of condescendence. He is ignorant with respect to sciences but due to his lucidity he has a natural sense that frequently replaces acquired knowledge. Here is an example.
One day, in our presence, someone questioned him about the possibility of having a mine in a given place. There is none, he said, because the terrain is not adequate. We made him realize that the source of certain mineral mines sometimes is far away from where they show up, infiltrating through the earthly layers. “It is true, he said, but there are regions where the layers are flat and others where they are vertical. They are vertical in the one that was asked and that is the obstacle.” Where did he get that idea from about the direction of the earthly layers since he had no clue about geology?
We observed him carefully throughout the course of his activities and here is what we noticed: once he is seated, he takes his glass, as described in our previous article, his eyes move back and forth from the bottom of the glass to the assistants and for about fifteen minutes he talks about uninteresting things, after which he then touches the central subject. At that moment his naturally lively and penetrating eyes are semi-closed, then watchful and agitated; the pupils disappear at the top, showing the whites of the eyes. Once in a while, when staring at someone, the pupils are partially seen again to then completely disappear; he continues, however, to look at the bottom of the glass and to the lines that he draws with a piece of chalk. It is obvious that during that trance he does not see through his eyes. With this only exception there is nothing else abnormal about him. His language is that of a serious and righteous man; his language is simple with emphasis like in an ordinary state instead of in a trance. In the evening of our main session we asked the good Spirits, through a writing medium, to give us instruction about the events that he had just witnessed.
Q – What to think of the spontaneous revelations given to us today by the clairvoyant of the forest? A – We wanted to give you a proof of that man’s faculty. We prepared the subject about which he should speak and that is why he could not respond to the other questions you framed. What he told you was just our opinion. You were surprised with what he said. He spoke for us, unknowingly, and right now he no longer remembers what he said, as he did not remember what he said last year because his spark of intelligence cannot get there. He not even understood the reach of his own words; he spoke better than the medium present here because this one would be afraid of saying too much. That is why we utilized him as a more manageable instrument for the instructions that we wanted to give.
Q – He mentioned a person whose moral and physical profile and position seemed to be such a person. Could you confirm that? A. – He said what you needed to know.
Observation: It is therefore evident that at least by accident the mediumship faculty is added to that man’s natural skills, if not in a permanent way; it means that lucidity is personal to him and not a matter of Spirits, but the Spirits may guide that lucidity as they wish in a given case; they inspire what he must say and only allow him to say what needs to be said. Hence, according to the need, he is an unconscious medium. The faculty of distant vision and the ability to see through opaque bodies do not seem extraordinary or incomprehensible to us since it is a sense that we do not enjoy in our normal state. We are exactly like the born-blind that cannot understand the fact that it is possible to understand reality, the shapes and properties of objects without touching them, and do not understand the fact that the luminous fluid is the means that put us in contact with the faraway objects, bringing their images to us. Without the knowledge of the spiritual fluid we cannot understand vision without the support of the eyes. We are true blinds with that regard. Now, the faculty of far sight with the help of the luminous fluid[1] and without the help of the eyes is not more fantastic or more miraculous than that of seeing the celestial bodies thousands of miles away.
Q. – Could you kindly let us know if the glass used by this man is truly useful to him; could he equally see in any other glass, any other object or even without any object, if he wanted to; if the need and specialty of the glass were not due to habit, that leads him to believe that it is indispensable; and finally if the presence of the glass is truly necessary and which effect does that object has upon his lucidness?
A. – When his eyes are focused on the bottom of the glass the shiny reflex acts there first and then upon his nervous system, provoking a kind of somnambulism, or more precisely, awake somnambulism in which the spirit, detached from matter, acquire a clairvoyance or a vision of the soul that you call second sight. There is a certain relationship between the shape of the bottom of the glass and the external shape of his eyes. That is the reason why he cannot easily find a glass that provides the required conditions (see the article published in the issue of October 1864). Even when the glasses are apparently similar there are nuances in the reflecting power, radiation, form and thickness that you cannot realize and that are appropriate to his individual organism. The glass, therefore, is to him a means of developing and focusing his lucidness. It is necessary to him since his lucidness is not permanent and needs to be provoked; it could not be replaced by another object and that same object that produces such effect on him would produce nothing on someone else, even if that person were a clairvoyant. The means of provoking such lucidness vary from individual to individual.
We will just remind you that the name magic mirror is given to objects of multiple types and shapes, almost always shiny, like glass, bottles and metallic plates, in which certain persons see remote things. We were convinced by a careful observation that such a vision is not but the double sight or the spiritual or psychic sight, independent of the organic sight, for experience daily demonstrates that such a faculty exists without the support of any object, having then concluded in absolute terms that the objects are useless, thinking that the habit of using them made them necessary, and that every individual that sees with their help could perfectly see without them, if wanted. It is here that we are mistaken, as we shall demonstrate.
We must first give a quick report of the observed events since they are the basis of the instructions that were provided.
We then returned to the home of that man, accompanied by Mr. Commander W… that kindly operated as our interpreter, he promptly dealt with our health; he easily and accurately described its location, the cause, the nature and indicated the necessary medication. Next, and without being asked, he talked about our work, the objective and results, as he did the year before, but he did not keep any memory of that; at this time, he went much deeper into the subject, whose reach he seemed to have understood better. He described in detail the evolution of the idea, and the future of our cause, about the issues that may produce this or that result, about the obstacles that we shall face and the means of overcoming them, about the persons that may play a role in favor or against, those whose devotion and honesty we can or cannot count on, describing them physically and morally, demonstrating that he could see them perfectly well. In a word, he gave us remarkable instructions, extensively elaborated and logically motivated, even more remarkable for confirming and completing, for certain aspects, those given to us by our spiritual guides. The parts that we could assess the accuracy left no doubt about his clairvoyance. After the several conversations we had with him he always returned to the same subject, confirming or denying it, never entering into contraction with himself, even on those things that he said the year before, seemingly continued by the current dialogues.
Since this current instruction is absolutely personal and confidential, we abstain from reporting its details. We just mention it due to the important fact that comes out of that and that is reported next. It is undoubtedly of the highest interest to us, but our main objective in seeing that man again was to develop new studies about his skills, to the interest of the Spiritist science.
We attested the fact that his lucidity cannot be forced. He sees what is presented to him and reports it, but he cannot be led to see what he wants to see, nor something that someone is thinking about, although he can read one’s mind. In the main session dedicated to us we uselessly tried to call his attention to other subjects; despite his efforts he said he could not see anything about that in the glass.
When he is dealing with a subject we can ask him questions about it but it is useless to question him about anything else that may occur to us. Yet, sometimes he abruptly changes from the current subject that he is dealing with to another one completely strange; he then goes back to the first one. When he is asked about the reason for that he answers what he sees and that it does not depend on him.
He spontaneously sees absent people when they are directly connected to the object of examination, but not otherwise. His starting point is the consulting person and her home. From there other facts follow. We then uselessly tried the following experiment: one of our Parisian friends that had just sent us a letter wanted to consult with him about the illness of his daughter. We showed him the letter and had him holding it at the bottom of the glass, thinking that the radiation of the fluid would facilitate the vision of that person. He did not do that because the reflex of the white paper bothered him; he said that the person was too far away, however, a few moments earlier he had just described a person whom we were not absolutely thinking about, as her place of residence, four times more distant. But this person was involved in the matter that we were dealing with whereas the other one was completely strange to the subject. The chain of events would lead him to one and not the other.
Hence, his lucidity is not flexible or manageable and absolutely does not align with the will of the questioner. It is not, in any way, ready to satisfy curiosity. In fact, as he reads the mind, his first act is to investigate the intention of the visitor, in case she is unknown. If the intention is not serious, and if the objective is neither moral nor useless, he refuses to speak and dismisses anyone that comes to him seeking what is called their good luck or asking futile or indiscrete questions. In one word, he is a serious clairvoyant and not a foreteller. His clairvoyance, as we said before, is mostly applicable to the springs and the underground natural water courses. He only handles other things as an accessory or out of condescendence. He is ignorant with respect to sciences but due to his lucidity he has a natural sense that frequently replaces acquired knowledge. Here is an example.
One day, in our presence, someone questioned him about the possibility of having a mine in a given place. There is none, he said, because the terrain is not adequate. We made him realize that the source of certain mineral mines sometimes is far away from where they show up, infiltrating through the earthly layers. “It is true, he said, but there are regions where the layers are flat and others where they are vertical. They are vertical in the one that was asked and that is the obstacle.” Where did he get that idea from about the direction of the earthly layers since he had no clue about geology?
We observed him carefully throughout the course of his activities and here is what we noticed: once he is seated, he takes his glass, as described in our previous article, his eyes move back and forth from the bottom of the glass to the assistants and for about fifteen minutes he talks about uninteresting things, after which he then touches the central subject. At that moment his naturally lively and penetrating eyes are semi-closed, then watchful and agitated; the pupils disappear at the top, showing the whites of the eyes. Once in a while, when staring at someone, the pupils are partially seen again to then completely disappear; he continues, however, to look at the bottom of the glass and to the lines that he draws with a piece of chalk. It is obvious that during that trance he does not see through his eyes. With this only exception there is nothing else abnormal about him. His language is that of a serious and righteous man; his language is simple with emphasis like in an ordinary state instead of in a trance. In the evening of our main session we asked the good Spirits, through a writing medium, to give us instruction about the events that he had just witnessed.
Q – What to think of the spontaneous revelations given to us today by the clairvoyant of the forest? A – We wanted to give you a proof of that man’s faculty. We prepared the subject about which he should speak and that is why he could not respond to the other questions you framed. What he told you was just our opinion. You were surprised with what he said. He spoke for us, unknowingly, and right now he no longer remembers what he said, as he did not remember what he said last year because his spark of intelligence cannot get there. He not even understood the reach of his own words; he spoke better than the medium present here because this one would be afraid of saying too much. That is why we utilized him as a more manageable instrument for the instructions that we wanted to give.
Q – He mentioned a person whose moral and physical profile and position seemed to be such a person. Could you confirm that? A. – He said what you needed to know.
Observation: It is therefore evident that at least by accident the mediumship faculty is added to that man’s natural skills, if not in a permanent way; it means that lucidity is personal to him and not a matter of Spirits, but the Spirits may guide that lucidity as they wish in a given case; they inspire what he must say and only allow him to say what needs to be said. Hence, according to the need, he is an unconscious medium. The faculty of distant vision and the ability to see through opaque bodies do not seem extraordinary or incomprehensible to us since it is a sense that we do not enjoy in our normal state. We are exactly like the born-blind that cannot understand the fact that it is possible to understand reality, the shapes and properties of objects without touching them, and do not understand the fact that the luminous fluid is the means that put us in contact with the faraway objects, bringing their images to us. Without the knowledge of the spiritual fluid we cannot understand vision without the support of the eyes. We are true blinds with that regard. Now, the faculty of far sight with the help of the luminous fluid[1] and without the help of the eyes is not more fantastic or more miraculous than that of seeing the celestial bodies thousands of miles away.
Q. – Could you kindly let us know if the glass used by this man is truly useful to him; could he equally see in any other glass, any other object or even without any object, if he wanted to; if the need and specialty of the glass were not due to habit, that leads him to believe that it is indispensable; and finally if the presence of the glass is truly necessary and which effect does that object has upon his lucidness?
A. – When his eyes are focused on the bottom of the glass the shiny reflex acts there first and then upon his nervous system, provoking a kind of somnambulism, or more precisely, awake somnambulism in which the spirit, detached from matter, acquire a clairvoyance or a vision of the soul that you call second sight. There is a certain relationship between the shape of the bottom of the glass and the external shape of his eyes. That is the reason why he cannot easily find a glass that provides the required conditions (see the article published in the issue of October 1864). Even when the glasses are apparently similar there are nuances in the reflecting power, radiation, form and thickness that you cannot realize and that are appropriate to his individual organism. The glass, therefore, is to him a means of developing and focusing his lucidness. It is necessary to him since his lucidness is not permanent and needs to be provoked; it could not be replaced by another object and that same object that produces such effect on him would produce nothing on someone else, even if that person were a clairvoyant. The means of provoking such lucidness vary from individual to individual.
Consequences of the preceding explanation
Here we achieved the core of the proposed discussion. The preceding explanation resolves the issue with perfect clarity. Everything is in contained in these words: lucidness is not permanent in that man. The glass is a means of provoking it by the action of radiation upon his nervous system, but it is necessary that the radiation be in accordance with his physical organization. Hence the variety of objects that may produce such effect, according to the individuals prone to receive them. It follows that:
- For those individuals in which the psychic vision is spontaneous or permanent the use of artificial agents is useless;
- Such agents are necessary when that faculty needs to be super excited;
- Since those agents are appropriate to the individuals, what has an effect upon one does not have upon others.
Certain particularities of our clairvoyant find their reason in that explanation. The letter placed underneath the glass disturbed him instead of facilitating, because it modified the characteristics of the reflex that was specific to that glass.
As we said, in the beginning he talks about frivolous things while he stares at the glare. The reason being that the action is not instantaneous and that preliminary conversation, without an apparent objective, is necessary to give him time for the effect to be produced. As much as the lucidness state only develops gradually, it does stops suddenly either. That is why the man continues to see for a few moments, even after having stopped looking at the glass and that is the reason why we thought that the glass was useless. But since the lucidity is a kind of artificial state, from time to time he goes back to the glass to keep it.
The development of that faculty through a material means is understandable to a certain extent. However, how can the image of someone that is far away be presented in the glass? It is only Spiritism that can resolve this question by the explanation about the nature of the soul, its faculties, the properties of its spiritual envelope, its radiation, its power of emancipation and detachment from the body. In the emancipation state the soul enjoys perceptions that are proper, without the support of material organs; the vision is an attribute of the spiritual being; the soul sees by itself, without the need for the eyes, as it hears without the ears. If the organs of the human senses were indispensable to the perceptions of the soul it would follow that, after death, without such organs the soul would be blind and deaf. The complete separation that takes place after death occurs only partially during life and that is when the phenomenon of spiritual vision takes place or, put differently, the double sight, or second sight, or psychic vision, whose power reaches as far as the radiation of the soul.
In the case above the image is not formed in the body of the glass; it is the soul itself that perceives the object where it is, by its own radiation. However, considering that for that man the glass is the provoking agent of the lucid state, the image appears very naturally to him in the direction of the glass. It is absolutely like the one that requires glasses that see far away what cannot be seen with naked eyes. The image of the object is not in the lenses of the binoculars but in their direction. Once the instrument is removed, nothing can be seen. Still with the comparison, the one that enjoys good vision does not require glasses like the one that enjoys a good psychic vision does not require artificial means to have it provoked.
A few years back a doctor discovered that by placing a cap of a bottle or a crystal ball or a shiny metal at the root of the nose and converging light beams to that object for some time the person would fall into a cataleptic state in which some of the faculties that are observed in somnambulists would manifest like, among others, insensitivity and far sight through opaque bodies, and that such a state would gradually disappear after the object was removed. It was obviously a magnetic effect produced by an inert body. What is the physiologic role of the shiny object in that phenomenon? We do not know. But it was attested that such condition may be necessary in the majority of cases but not always and that the same effect is produced on certain individuals with soft objects.
The phenomenon that was named hypnotism caused uproar in the scientific world. There was experimentation. Some were successful, others were not, as it was meant to be since the aptitudes were not the same among all patients. If the object of study were exceptional it would certainly be worth the study. But, regrettably, once it was noticed that it was a secret door for the penetration of magnetism and somnambulism, with a different name in the sanctuary of the official science, hypnotism was no longer studied (see Spiritist Review, January 1860).
Nature, however, never loses its own rights. If the laws are unknown for some time they come back so many times, presenting themselves in so many ways that forces people to have their eyes open. Spiritism is a proof of that. It can be denied, mocked, repelled; it knocks on all doors in a hundred different ways and willing or not it reaches those who did not want to hear about it.
Comparing this to the phenomenon that we were discussing above we can observe a remarkable analogy in the causes and effects. From that we can conclude that the objects commonly called magic mirrors are not but hypnotic agents, infinitely varied in their form and effects, according to the nature and degree of the aptitudes.
Hence, it would be possible that certain persons spontaneously and accidentally gifted with those faculties would regardless suffer the magnetic influence of exterior objects at which they mechanically stare at. Why wouldn’t the reflex of water, a lake, a swamp, a creek or even a celestial body produce the same effect of a glass of water or a bottle upon certain physical organizations conveniently predisposed? But that is a hypothesis that requires confirmation by experience. Besides, that phenomenon is not a modern discovery. It is found, even in our times, amongst the most delayed peoples, with the confirmation that nature is the privilege of times and all places. In the beginning it is accepted as a fact; the explanation comes later, with the advancement of mankind and the understanding of the laws that govern the world.
These are the consequences that seem to logically follow the observed facts.
[1] As we speak the Siècle publishes an interesting romance by Élie Berthet with the title Double Vision. It is timely. About two years ago Mr. Xavier Saintine had published in the “Constitutionnel” a series of facts based on the plurality of existences and on the spontaneous relationships that are established between the living and the dead. That is how literature helps in the promotion of the new ideas. The only thing missing is the word “Spiritism”.
As we said, in the beginning he talks about frivolous things while he stares at the glare. The reason being that the action is not instantaneous and that preliminary conversation, without an apparent objective, is necessary to give him time for the effect to be produced. As much as the lucidness state only develops gradually, it does stops suddenly either. That is why the man continues to see for a few moments, even after having stopped looking at the glass and that is the reason why we thought that the glass was useless. But since the lucidity is a kind of artificial state, from time to time he goes back to the glass to keep it.
The development of that faculty through a material means is understandable to a certain extent. However, how can the image of someone that is far away be presented in the glass? It is only Spiritism that can resolve this question by the explanation about the nature of the soul, its faculties, the properties of its spiritual envelope, its radiation, its power of emancipation and detachment from the body. In the emancipation state the soul enjoys perceptions that are proper, without the support of material organs; the vision is an attribute of the spiritual being; the soul sees by itself, without the need for the eyes, as it hears without the ears. If the organs of the human senses were indispensable to the perceptions of the soul it would follow that, after death, without such organs the soul would be blind and deaf. The complete separation that takes place after death occurs only partially during life and that is when the phenomenon of spiritual vision takes place or, put differently, the double sight, or second sight, or psychic vision, whose power reaches as far as the radiation of the soul.
In the case above the image is not formed in the body of the glass; it is the soul itself that perceives the object where it is, by its own radiation. However, considering that for that man the glass is the provoking agent of the lucid state, the image appears very naturally to him in the direction of the glass. It is absolutely like the one that requires glasses that see far away what cannot be seen with naked eyes. The image of the object is not in the lenses of the binoculars but in their direction. Once the instrument is removed, nothing can be seen. Still with the comparison, the one that enjoys good vision does not require glasses like the one that enjoys a good psychic vision does not require artificial means to have it provoked.
A few years back a doctor discovered that by placing a cap of a bottle or a crystal ball or a shiny metal at the root of the nose and converging light beams to that object for some time the person would fall into a cataleptic state in which some of the faculties that are observed in somnambulists would manifest like, among others, insensitivity and far sight through opaque bodies, and that such a state would gradually disappear after the object was removed. It was obviously a magnetic effect produced by an inert body. What is the physiologic role of the shiny object in that phenomenon? We do not know. But it was attested that such condition may be necessary in the majority of cases but not always and that the same effect is produced on certain individuals with soft objects.
The phenomenon that was named hypnotism caused uproar in the scientific world. There was experimentation. Some were successful, others were not, as it was meant to be since the aptitudes were not the same among all patients. If the object of study were exceptional it would certainly be worth the study. But, regrettably, once it was noticed that it was a secret door for the penetration of magnetism and somnambulism, with a different name in the sanctuary of the official science, hypnotism was no longer studied (see Spiritist Review, January 1860).
Nature, however, never loses its own rights. If the laws are unknown for some time they come back so many times, presenting themselves in so many ways that forces people to have their eyes open. Spiritism is a proof of that. It can be denied, mocked, repelled; it knocks on all doors in a hundred different ways and willing or not it reaches those who did not want to hear about it.
Comparing this to the phenomenon that we were discussing above we can observe a remarkable analogy in the causes and effects. From that we can conclude that the objects commonly called magic mirrors are not but hypnotic agents, infinitely varied in their form and effects, according to the nature and degree of the aptitudes.
Hence, it would be possible that certain persons spontaneously and accidentally gifted with those faculties would regardless suffer the magnetic influence of exterior objects at which they mechanically stare at. Why wouldn’t the reflex of water, a lake, a swamp, a creek or even a celestial body produce the same effect of a glass of water or a bottle upon certain physical organizations conveniently predisposed? But that is a hypothesis that requires confirmation by experience. Besides, that phenomenon is not a modern discovery. It is found, even in our times, amongst the most delayed peoples, with the confirmation that nature is the privilege of times and all places. In the beginning it is accepted as a fact; the explanation comes later, with the advancement of mankind and the understanding of the laws that govern the world.
These are the consequences that seem to logically follow the observed facts.
[1] As we speak the Siècle publishes an interesting romance by Élie Berthet with the title Double Vision. It is timely. About two years ago Mr. Xavier Saintine had published in the “Constitutionnel” a series of facts based on the plurality of existences and on the spontaneous relationships that are established between the living and the dead. That is how literature helps in the promotion of the new ideas. The only thing missing is the word “Spiritism”.
Departure of an enemy of Spiritism to the world of the Spirits
We got a letter from V…
“Some time ago a vicar died in our neighborhood. He was an open enemy of Spiritism but not one of those lighthearted adversaries, as there are so many, that replace the lack of good reasons by slander. He was an educated man, of superior intelligence. He fought Spiritism with talent and without bitterness and with civility. Unfortunately for him, and despite all of his knowledge and unequivocal merit, he was only able to oppose it with the ordinary arguments and found none that could inexorably convince the masses. His constant idea, at least the one that he allowed to transpire, was that Spiritism had a limited time; that its fast propagation was only a transient enthusiasm and that like any other utopic idea, it would fall. We had the idea of evoking him in our small circle. His communication seemed to us to be instructive in several aspects and that is why we sent it to you. In our opinion it has an incontestable aspect of identity. Below the communication:
Question to the guide of the medium: Can you tell us if we can evoke father D…? A. – Yes. He will come but although convinced of the reality of your teachings, convinced by death, he will still try to demonstrate the uselessness of your efforts to propagate them in a more serious way. He is ready to support his points on the momentary dissensions caused by stray brothers and demonstrate the insanity of your doctrine. Hear him out. His language will give you the lead on how to talk to him.
Evocation: Dear Spirit of Mr. D… we hope that with God’s help and the good Spirits you may kindly come to communicate with us. As you can see we bear no feeling of curiosity in our thoughts. By provoking this communication, we wish to take a useful teaching to us and perhaps to you as well. We then appreciate whatever you can tell us.
– You are right in calling me but wrong by supposing that I could deny attending your call. Believe me that my title of enemy of Spiritism is not another reason to keep silence. I have good reasons to talk. My life is a confession, an affirmation of your teachings. I know that and I acknowledge that. I am convinced of the reality of manifestations that I experience today but that is not enough to recognize its excellence and to accept the as correct the objectives that you propose. Yes, the Spirits communicate and not only the demons, as we teach, for obvious reasons. It is useless to elaborate on that for you know as well as I do the reasons that lead us to act like that. The Spirits of all categories certainly communicate; I am a proof of that and although I do not pretend to be superior both in morality and knowledge, knowing well my own worth to know that I am above of those categories of Spirits subject to all sorts of atonement for their vile imperfections. I am not perfect. As anybody else I may have done wrong, but I am proud to acknowledge that. Yes, I was an opinionated man, but I was also a good man in the broad meaning of the term. Hear me out then. The priest may be wrong in fighting you. I do not know what the future reserves and will not enter the discussion of their truly systematic position; but carefully examining all the consequences of an acceptance they cannot but acknowledge that you would could their social ruin or, at least, such an absolute transformation that every privilege and separation from humanity would be nulled. But nobody joyfully renounces to a coveted royalty, to an uncommon prestige that places them above the ordinary, to the richness that although material is not less necessary to them as compared to common people. With Spiritism there is no more clerical oligarchy; the priest is nobody and someone; he is the good man that teaches truth to his brothers; he is the charitable worker that reaches out to the fallen human being; his priesthood is faith; his hierarchy is the merit and his salary is God! That is great and beautiful, but one must also say that sooner or later that is the downfall not of the man that can only gain from such teachings but of the clerical family. One cannot gladly renounce, and I repeat, to the honor and respect that is already enjoyed. You are right, I give you that, however I cannot reproach our attitude before your teachings. I say ‘our’ because I still hold it despite all that I see and all that you can tell me. Let us hypothetically believe that your doctrine is accepted, heard and spread everywhere among the people and the wealthy; among the artists and the scholars; the latter will help you the most but what shall come from that? Here is what I think: You have already experienced divisions. There are two sects among you: the spiritualists of the American school and the Spiritists of the French school. Let us, however, concentrate on the last one alone. Is it unified? No. On one side the purists or ‘Kardecists’ that only admit the truth after a careful examination and the general agreement; it is the main core but it is not alone; several branches have learned from the teachings of the center and separated to form particular sects; others, not entirely separated from the trunk, issue subversive opinions. Each chief of opposition has their followers; the fields are not yet delineated but are in formation and the scission will soon take place. I tell you that Spiritism, like the philosophical doctrines, could not live long. It was born and raised but has reached its peak and is now descending. It gathers followers everyday but like the Theosophy, and the doctrines of Saint-Simon and Fourier, it will also fall, perhaps to be replaced, but it will follow, I truly believe. Nonetheless, its principle does exist: the Spirit. But, doesn’t it bring along its own dangers? Inferior Spirits can also communicate and that is its downfall. Mankind is, before anything else, dominated by passions and these Spirits are used to excite them. Since there is more imperfection than quality in our humanity, it is therefore evident that the evil Spirit shall be victorious, and the only thing Spiritism will be able to do will be to spread disgrace to all. I therefore conclude that Spiritism is good in its essence but bad in its results, hence it is wise to avoid it.
The medium: Dear Spirit, if Spiritism were a human conception, I would agree with you but if you cannot deny the existence of the Spirits you must also acknowledge the power hand of divinity, in the movement driven by the invisible. Now, unless you deny your own teaching when on Earth, you cannot admit that the action of men might be an obstacle to the will of God, the creator. It must be one of two: Spiritism is a human creation and as such, like every human work, it is subject to failure or it is the works of God, manifestation of God’s will and in such a case there is not a single obstacle capable of delaying its development. If you then believe that there are Spirits and that those Spirits communicate to instruct us, this cannot be beyond the will of God otherwise there would be, besides God, an independent power and God consequently would no longer be Almighty. Spiritism could not be destroyed by some dissensions, brought about by human interesses within.
Answer: You may perhaps be right, my young friend (the medium was a young man) but I keep what I said. I stop any discussion about it. Leaving that aside I am available to any other question that you may have.
The medium: Then, considering that you have allowed, and not proceeding with a subject that may be painful to you right now, we beg you to describe your passage from this life to the one you live now, telling us about a possible confusion and if we can be of any service to you, given your current condition.
Answer: I cannot but acknowledge the excellence of these principles that you teach mankind, about death and the affection given to totally unknown creatures. But… in any case, my dear young man, I will respond to your question. I will not abuse your time and will satisfy your wishes in a few words. I confess that at the time of death I was uptight. Was it matter that made me be sorry for leaving this life? Was it ignorance of the future? I will not hide it, for I was afraid! You asked if I was disorderly. What do you mean by that? If you mean that the violent action of separation took me to a kind of mental lethargy, from which I came out as if from a painful sleep, yes, I was confused. But if you mean a disturbance in intelligence, memory and self-awareness, no. I did not experience that. Nonetheless, the disturbance does happen to certain creatures; may be to me as well, but I do not believe so. I do believe though that such phenomenon must not occur immediately after death. It is true that I was surprised by seeing the existence of the Spirit as you teach but that is not confusion. Here is how I understand that disturbance and how I experienced that. If I were not sure about of my own beliefs; if I had any doubt in my soul about everything I believed until then; If I had experienced a big change in the way I saw things, that would disturb me. In my opinion such disturbance should not occur just after death. If I believe in my reason tells me, at death the creature remains as before passing… It is only later, when isolation and the changes that gradually take place around us is modify their opinion, when the creature experiences a mental commotion, when the primitive assurances shake, and the real confusion begins. You asked if you could be useful to me in any way. My religion tells me that prayer is good; your belief says that too. Therefore, pray for me and be certain of my gratitude. Despite the differences between us it will be a pleasure to come a few times to talk to you.
Father D…”
Our correspondent was right when saying that this communication had a useful instruction. In fact, it is instructive in several ways and our readers will easily understand the serious teachings that come out of that, without the need for our highlights. We see a Spirit here that fought our doctrines when alive and had exhausted the arguments carried by his profound knowledge. Recently deceased, as a Spirit, recognizing the fundamental truths that support us, and yet persisting on his position and for the same motives. It is incontestable that if he had found stronger arguments to combat us, in his spiritual and more lucid state, he would have used them. Far from that, he seems to be afraid of seeing things more clearly, he presents changes in his thoughts that are all connected to earthly ideas that he still carries. He is afraid of the future and therefore, he dares not to face it. We will respond as if he were living and written the message he dictated after his death. We address both the man and the Spirit, responding to those that share his thoughts and that could use the same arguments against us. We then say:
Mr. Priest, although you had been our declared and militant adversary on Earth, none of us thinks the same about you and never thought so when you were alive, first because our faith turns tolerance into law and to us every idea is respectable, when sincere. Freedom of conscience is one of our principles; we wish it to others as we wish it to ourselves. Only God can judge the validity of people’s beliefs and no one has the right to say anathema in the name of God. Freedom of conscience does not exclude discussion and refutation but charity commands not to curse anyone. Second, we do not like you less since your opposition caused no harm to the doctrine. You unwillingly served the cause of Spiritism, as every one that attacks it, helping to promote it and demonstrating, especially due to your personal qualifications, the insufficiency of the weapons used to fight it. Allow me now to discuss a few of your propositions.
One seems to fail logic to me. It is when you say that “Spiritism, fundamentally good, is bad for its results.” I believe you must have forgotten when Jesus said this maxim, that became proverbial by the force of truth: “A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit.”[1] One cannot understand that something essentially good would cause any harm. In another passage you say that the danger of Spiritism is in the manifestation of the bad Spirits, that will exploit human passions to serve evil. Here we have one of the theses that you supported when alive. But side by side with the bad Spirits we have the good ones that stimulate good, whereas according to the doctrine of the Church the power of communication is only given to the demons. If you then consider Spiritism dangerous because it admits the communication of the bad Spirits as well as the good ones, then the doctrine of the Church is much more dangerous because it only admits the bad ones.
As a matter of fact, it was not Spiritism that invented the manifestation of the Spirits, nor it is the cause of their communication. It only attests a fact that has occurred in all times for it is in nature. Spiritism can only cease to exist when the Spirits can no longer manifest. If such manifestation brings about any danger, we must blame nature for that and not Spiritism. Is the science that explains electricity responsible for the damages caused by lightning? Certainly not. It explains the causes and provides the means of deviating them. It is the same with Spiritism. It explains the causes of a bad influence that may unsuspectedly act upon a person, indicating the means of protection against it, whereas by ignoring it the person would still suffer the effect and follow unaware of them.
The influence of the bad Spirits is part of the scourge to which mankind is exposed down here, like the diseases and disasters of all kinds, because we are in a planet of atonement and testing, where we must work for our moral and intellectual advancement. Bod God’s benevolence always places the remedy by the illness; God gave mankind intelligence to find it. That is the result of the progress of sciences. Spiritism comes to indicate the medicine to one of those disasters. It teaches that to avoid and neutralize the influence of the bad Spirits, one must become better, dominate one’s bad inclinations and practice the virtues taught by Jesus Christ: humility and charity. Would you call that bad result?
The manifestation of the Spirits is a positive fact, acknowledged by the Church. Experience today demonstrates that the Spirits are the souls of people and that is the reason why there are so many imperfect ones. If that fact comes to contradict certain dogmas, Spiritism is as much to blame as Geology that demonstrates that Earth was not built in six days. The mistake is in the dogmas that are not in agreement with nature. By these manifestations, as by the discoveries of science, God wishes to lead us to more truthful beliefs. Hence, when we deny progress, we ignore God’s will; it is blasphemy against God to attribute all that to the devil. Trying, in good or bad faith, to keep a belief against the evidence and turn a knowingly false principle into the basis of a doctrine is the same as supporting a house on a rotten foundation. The strut breaks gradually, and the house falls apart.
You say that the opposition of the Church to Spiritism is understandable and that you approve it because it would be the end of clergy, whose separation from the ordinary people would be destroyed. You say: “With Spiritism there is no more clerical oligarchy; the priest is nobody and someone; he is the good man that teaches truth to his brothers; he is the charitable worker that reaches out to the fallen human being; his priesthood is faith; his hierarchy is the merit and his salary is God! That is great and beautiful, but one must also say that sooner or later that is the downfall not of the man that can only gain from such teachings but of the clerical family. One cannot gladly renounce, and I repeat, to the honor and respect that is already enjoyed. But nobody joyfully renounces to a coveted royalty, to an uncommon prestige that places them above the ordinary, to the richness that although material is not less necessary to them as compared to common people” What now! Would the clergy be motivated by such petty feelings? Would it be ignorance of these words by Jesus: “My kingdom is not of this world”,[2] to the point of sacrificing the interest of truth for the satisfaction of pride, ambition and human passions? He then would not believe in that kingdom promised by Jesus since he prefers the earthly one. He therefore would have his supporting point in heavens, just by appearance and to give him prestige, but just to protect his earthly interests. We prefer to believe that it can be the drive of some of their followers but not that of majority. Otherwise his kingdom would be very near its end and his words would be his sentence, because only the celestial kingdom is eternal whereas those on Earth are fragile and unstable. You go to far, Mr. Priest, in your forecasts about the consequences of Spiritism, farther than me and my writings. Not sharing your thoughts on this, I will just say that for the fact that everyone presents it, the inevitable result will be the transformation of society; it will create a new order of things, new habits, new needs; it will modify beliefs, social relationships; it will do, from a moral point of view, what all great discoveries of science and technology do from a material point of view. Such transformation scares you out and that is why, by presenting it, you keep you away from your thoughts; you do not want to believe in that; in one word, you close your eyes so that you cannot see, and shut your ears so that you cannot hear. There are many like that on Earth. However, if such a transformation is in God’s designs, it will take place, do what they will. One would have to accept that in good will or be forced to accept it, like those from the old regimen had to accept the consequences of the Revolution that they also denied and declared impossible, before its realization.
Whoever told them that in less than a quarter of a century every privilege would have been abolished; that a recent born boy would not become a colonel by birth; that an entire regiment could no longer be bought like a herd of oxen, that the soldier could become a general and the last plebeian a minister; that the rights would be the same to everyone, that the peasant would have voice in the important businesses of the country, side by side with the farmer, they would have shaken their heads out of disbelief! However, if you one them had slept for forty years, like Epimenedes,[3] he would have believed to have awaken in another world. It is the fear of the future that makes you say that Spiritism will only have one turn. You try to create an illusion, trying to prove it to yourself, and you ended up believing in good faith because that calms you down. But what is the reason that you present? The least concluding of all, as it is easy to demonstrate.
Ah if you demonstrated unequivocally that Spiritism is a utopia, that is based on a mistaken fact, on a false basis, illusive and hopeless, you would then be right. But, on the contrary, you affirm the existence of the principle and even the excellence of that principle. You acknowledge, and with you the whole Church, the reality of the material fact that is its foundation: the manifestations. Can such a fact be annihilated? No, as one cannot annihilate the movement of Earth.
Considering that it is part of nature, it shall be always produced. Such a fact, misunderstood in the past, but better studied and understood in our days, brings inevitable consequences. If you cannot annihilate it, you are forced to endure its consequences. Follow it step by step in its ramifications and you will inexorably arrive at a transformation in the ideas. Now, a change in the ideas forcibly brings a change in the order of things. (refer to What is Spiritism).
On another hand, Spiritism do not step on people’s intelligence; it does not impose a blind belief; it wishes faith to be supported by understanding. This is the main point, Mr. Priest, of our disagreement. Spiritism gives total freedom of examination of any point, based on the principle that since truth is one, sooner or later it must prevail upon falsehood, and that a principle based on error falls by the force of things. False ideas, when discussed, show their weak spots and fade away before logic. Divergences like these are inevitable in the beginning; they are even necessary because they help the depuration and the establishment of the fundamental idea. It is preferable that they are produced since the beginning for the true doctrine will disentangle sooner. That is why we always tell the followers: Do not worry about contradicting ideas that are issued or published. See how many have been born dead! How many writings are no longer talked about! What is it that we seek? The success of our ideas at any price? No, but the triumph of truth. If, among the contrary ideas, some are more truthful than ours, they shall succeed, and we must follow them; if they are false, they cannot withstand the decisive control of the universal teachings of the Spirits, the only criteria of the surviving idea. The assimilation that you establish between Spiritism and other philosophical doctrines lacks accuracy. It was not people that made Spiritism what it is and what is going to be later; it is the Spirits by their teachings. People only make it move and coordinate the material that is provided. That teaching is not complete yet and what has been given so far can only be considered as the landmarks of the science. It can be compared to the four rules of math and we are still in the equations of first degree. That is why many people still do not understand its importance and reach. But the Spirits regulate the teachings and depend on nobody to make it move slower or faster than they wish; they neither follow those in a hurry nor they fall behind the slow ones.
Spiritism is not the works of a single Spirit or a single man. It is the work of the Spirits in general. If follows that the opinion of a given Spirit about a principle is only considered, by the Spiritists, as an individual opinion, that can be fair or false and only has value when sanctioned by the teaching of the majority, given in several points of the world. It was this universal teaching that made Spiritism what it is and will make it what it is going to be. Before such a powerful criterion, every false idea necessarily falls, as does every particular theory that is the product of systematic ideas, be it from one person or one isolated Spirit. There is no doubt that a false idea may gather some followers, but it will never prevail against what is taught everywhere. Spiritism that has just been born and raises question of the highest importance, does bring ebullition to several imaginations. Each one sees things their own way. Hence the surge of systems in its infancy, the majority of which have already disappeared by the force of the general teaching. The same applies to those that are not with the truth because the divergent teaching of a Spirit given to a medium will always be opposed to the teaching of millions of Spirits given to millions of mediums. That is why certain exotic theories only lived a few days and never left the small circle where they were produced. Deprived from the general sanction, they do not find echo nor sympathy in the masses, and if they also shock logic and common sense, they then provoke repulsion that precipitates their downfall.
Spiritism, therefore, has an element of stability and unity that comes from its own nature and origin, something that is not proper to any purely human conceived philosophical doctrine; it is the shield that will shatter any attempt to have it destroyed or divided. Such divisions can only be partial, momentary and circumscribed.
You mentioned sects that, in your opinion, divide the Spiritists, then concluding that the ruin of the doctrine is near. But you forgot all that divided Christianity since its inception, that made it bleed and still divide it, and whose number is not less than three hundred and sixty today. However, despite the profound dissidences about the fundamental dogmas, Christianity stood up, a proof that it is independent of those controversies. Why then you wish that Spiritism, connected to Christianity in its foundation, only divided in secondary issues that are daily clarified, would suffer with the divergence of a few personal opinions, when it has such a powerful universal control as an aggregator?
Hence, even if Spiritism today were divided into twenty sects, something that is not and shall not be, this would not have any consequence because it is the work of delivery. If the divisions were driven by personal ambitions, by persons dominated by the idea of becoming heads of sects, or by the exploration of the idea to serve their self-love, or their personal interests, there is not doubt that they would be the least dangerous. Personal ambitions die with the individuals and if the truth was not with those that wanted to rise up, their ideas will die with them and perhaps even before that. Truth, however, cannot die.
You are right, Mr. Priest, when saying that there will be ruins with Spiritism, but not as you think. The ruins will be of every mistaken idea that surges and boils. If they are all wrong, they will all fall, and that is inevitable; but if there is only one that is true, that will infallibly survive.
Two very marked opinions, that we could really call sects, were formed a few years back, from the teachings of two Spirits masked by venerable names, captivating the trust of a few people. Today nobody talks about that. What caused the downfall? The common sense and logic of the masses on one side, the general teachings of the Spirits in agreement with that very logic.
Will you contest the value of such universal control, by the fact that the Spirits are the souls of people, and therefore equally subject to error? You would then be in contradiction with yourself. Don’t you agree that a general council has more authority than that of a particular council, given that it is more numerous and that its opinion prevails onto the opinion of individual priests, each bishop and even that of the Pope? That the majority creates the laws in people’s assemblies? Isn’t that reasonable to expect that the Spirits that govern the world by the order of God also had their councils, their assemblies? Do you deny the Spirits the sanction of truth but you accept that among people? Do you forget the fact that if there are inferior Spirits among them, these are not the ones called upon by God to deliver the interests of Earth, but the superior Spirits, those that overpassed the obstacles of humanity and whose number is incalculable? And how do they bring the instruction of the majority to us? Is it by the voice of a single Spirit, a single person? No, but as I said, by millions of Spirits and millions of people. Does it happen in a single center, in one city, one country, one cast, in a privileged nation as in the past with the Israelites? No, it happens everywhere, in all countries, at the home of the rich as of the poor. How could you expect that the opinion of a few individuals could prevail against such a formidable ensemble of voices? Believe me, Mr. Priest, such a universal sanction is much worth the same as an ecumenic council.
Spiritism is strong precisely because it is based on that sanction and not on isolated opinions. Does it proclaim itself as immutable in its current teachings, saying that there is nothing more to be taught? No, because up until now it has followed, and will follow in the future, the progressive teaching that is appropriate, and that is a source of strength to Spiritism because it will never distant itself from progress.
Wait a little more, Mr. Priest, and before a quarter of a century you will see Spiritism much less divided than Christianity is today, after eighteen centuries.
You mistakenly concluded by the instability of the doctrine based on the fluctuations that you noticed in the society and in the Spiritist gatherings. Spiritism is not a speculative theory, based on a preconceived idea. It is a matter of fact, and consequently, of personal conviction. Anyone that may admit the fact and its consequences is Spiritism without the need to take part in any society. One can be a perfect Spiritist without it. The future of Spiritism is in its own principle, an imperishable principle, because it is in nature and not in the meetings, many times taking place in unfavorable condition, composed of heterogenous elements, and consequently subordinated to several eventualities.
The societies are useful but not is indispensable, and all of them could cease to exist without affecting the march of Spiritism, considering that the largest number of followers are not in their circles. They represent much more the believers that seek sympathetic centers than the non-believers. The serious and well managed societies are particularly important to neutralize the bad impression left by those where Spiritism is badly represented or disfigured. The Spiritist Society of Paris is not an exception to the rule for it does not claim any monopoly. It does not consist on the greater or smaller number of followers but on the idea that it represents. Such idea is independent of any meeting and whatever happens the propagating element will replace it if needed. Therefore, one can say that the Parisian Society is everywhere where the same principles are professed, from the orient to the occident, and that if it disappeared materially the idea would outlive. Spiritism is an infant that grows and whose initial steps are naturally dithering; but like the premature children, it shows signs of strength early on. That is why certain persons are afraid and would like to have it muffled in the crib. If it had arrived as weak as you suppose it would not have caused such resistance, nor would it have raised so much hostility, and you yourself would not have tried to fight against it. Let the child grow then, and you shall see what will become of the adult. You predicted its near end but several incarnate and discarnate made their predictions otherwise. Hear them out and their predictions that have been taking place unstoppably for the last ten years and repeat all over the world.
“Spiritism has come to fight disbelief that is a disaggregating element of society, replacing the blind faith, that fades away, by the reasoned faith, that vivifies. It carries the regenerating element of humanity and will be the compass of future generations. Like all other great renovating ideas, it must fight against the opposition of interests that it will harm and ideas that it will bring down. All kinds of obstacles will be produced; all kinds of weapons will be used against it, loyal and disloyal, that people will believe to be adequate to have it destroyed. Its first steps will be on heathers and thorns. Its followers will be denigrated, ridiculed, betrayed, scorned and persecuted; they shall find disappointment and deception. Happy are the ones whose faith is not shaken in these terrible days; who have fought and suffered for the triumph of truth, because they will be rewarded for their courage and perseverance. Yet, Spiritism will continue its march through traps and hindrances; it is unshakable, like everything else that is in God’s will, because it is supported by the laws of nature that are eternal like God, whereas everything else that is contrary to those laws shall fail. Through the light that it shines upon obscure and controversial points of the Scriptures, it shall lead mankind to the unit of belief. Giving the laws of nature for the basis of the principles of equality, freedom and fraternity, it will lay the foundation of the kingdom of the true Christian charity, the very kingdom of God on Earth, predicted by Jesus Christ. Many still reject it because they do not know it or do not understand it; when they acknowledge that it does realize the dearest hopes for the future of humanity, they will embrace it like St. Paul with Christianity, and it will find defenders among the adversaries of the last hour. From the multitude strong souls will rise and hold in their hands the cause and the authority of their word will bring silence to the detractors. The struggle shall still last a long time, because the super excited human passions by pride and material interests cannot be suddenly appeased. Those passions shall disappear with people, and before this century terminates the new faith will acquire a prominent place among the civilized peoples, and the era of regeneration will mark the next century.”
[1] Matthew 7:18 (T.N.)
[2] John, 18:36 (T.N.)
[3] Epimenides of Cnossos was a semi-mythical 7th or 6th century BC Greek seer and philosopher-poet (Wikipedia, T.N.)
“Some time ago a vicar died in our neighborhood. He was an open enemy of Spiritism but not one of those lighthearted adversaries, as there are so many, that replace the lack of good reasons by slander. He was an educated man, of superior intelligence. He fought Spiritism with talent and without bitterness and with civility. Unfortunately for him, and despite all of his knowledge and unequivocal merit, he was only able to oppose it with the ordinary arguments and found none that could inexorably convince the masses. His constant idea, at least the one that he allowed to transpire, was that Spiritism had a limited time; that its fast propagation was only a transient enthusiasm and that like any other utopic idea, it would fall. We had the idea of evoking him in our small circle. His communication seemed to us to be instructive in several aspects and that is why we sent it to you. In our opinion it has an incontestable aspect of identity. Below the communication:
Question to the guide of the medium: Can you tell us if we can evoke father D…? A. – Yes. He will come but although convinced of the reality of your teachings, convinced by death, he will still try to demonstrate the uselessness of your efforts to propagate them in a more serious way. He is ready to support his points on the momentary dissensions caused by stray brothers and demonstrate the insanity of your doctrine. Hear him out. His language will give you the lead on how to talk to him.
Evocation: Dear Spirit of Mr. D… we hope that with God’s help and the good Spirits you may kindly come to communicate with us. As you can see we bear no feeling of curiosity in our thoughts. By provoking this communication, we wish to take a useful teaching to us and perhaps to you as well. We then appreciate whatever you can tell us.
– You are right in calling me but wrong by supposing that I could deny attending your call. Believe me that my title of enemy of Spiritism is not another reason to keep silence. I have good reasons to talk. My life is a confession, an affirmation of your teachings. I know that and I acknowledge that. I am convinced of the reality of manifestations that I experience today but that is not enough to recognize its excellence and to accept the as correct the objectives that you propose. Yes, the Spirits communicate and not only the demons, as we teach, for obvious reasons. It is useless to elaborate on that for you know as well as I do the reasons that lead us to act like that. The Spirits of all categories certainly communicate; I am a proof of that and although I do not pretend to be superior both in morality and knowledge, knowing well my own worth to know that I am above of those categories of Spirits subject to all sorts of atonement for their vile imperfections. I am not perfect. As anybody else I may have done wrong, but I am proud to acknowledge that. Yes, I was an opinionated man, but I was also a good man in the broad meaning of the term. Hear me out then. The priest may be wrong in fighting you. I do not know what the future reserves and will not enter the discussion of their truly systematic position; but carefully examining all the consequences of an acceptance they cannot but acknowledge that you would could their social ruin or, at least, such an absolute transformation that every privilege and separation from humanity would be nulled. But nobody joyfully renounces to a coveted royalty, to an uncommon prestige that places them above the ordinary, to the richness that although material is not less necessary to them as compared to common people. With Spiritism there is no more clerical oligarchy; the priest is nobody and someone; he is the good man that teaches truth to his brothers; he is the charitable worker that reaches out to the fallen human being; his priesthood is faith; his hierarchy is the merit and his salary is God! That is great and beautiful, but one must also say that sooner or later that is the downfall not of the man that can only gain from such teachings but of the clerical family. One cannot gladly renounce, and I repeat, to the honor and respect that is already enjoyed. You are right, I give you that, however I cannot reproach our attitude before your teachings. I say ‘our’ because I still hold it despite all that I see and all that you can tell me. Let us hypothetically believe that your doctrine is accepted, heard and spread everywhere among the people and the wealthy; among the artists and the scholars; the latter will help you the most but what shall come from that? Here is what I think: You have already experienced divisions. There are two sects among you: the spiritualists of the American school and the Spiritists of the French school. Let us, however, concentrate on the last one alone. Is it unified? No. On one side the purists or ‘Kardecists’ that only admit the truth after a careful examination and the general agreement; it is the main core but it is not alone; several branches have learned from the teachings of the center and separated to form particular sects; others, not entirely separated from the trunk, issue subversive opinions. Each chief of opposition has their followers; the fields are not yet delineated but are in formation and the scission will soon take place. I tell you that Spiritism, like the philosophical doctrines, could not live long. It was born and raised but has reached its peak and is now descending. It gathers followers everyday but like the Theosophy, and the doctrines of Saint-Simon and Fourier, it will also fall, perhaps to be replaced, but it will follow, I truly believe. Nonetheless, its principle does exist: the Spirit. But, doesn’t it bring along its own dangers? Inferior Spirits can also communicate and that is its downfall. Mankind is, before anything else, dominated by passions and these Spirits are used to excite them. Since there is more imperfection than quality in our humanity, it is therefore evident that the evil Spirit shall be victorious, and the only thing Spiritism will be able to do will be to spread disgrace to all. I therefore conclude that Spiritism is good in its essence but bad in its results, hence it is wise to avoid it.
The medium: Dear Spirit, if Spiritism were a human conception, I would agree with you but if you cannot deny the existence of the Spirits you must also acknowledge the power hand of divinity, in the movement driven by the invisible. Now, unless you deny your own teaching when on Earth, you cannot admit that the action of men might be an obstacle to the will of God, the creator. It must be one of two: Spiritism is a human creation and as such, like every human work, it is subject to failure or it is the works of God, manifestation of God’s will and in such a case there is not a single obstacle capable of delaying its development. If you then believe that there are Spirits and that those Spirits communicate to instruct us, this cannot be beyond the will of God otherwise there would be, besides God, an independent power and God consequently would no longer be Almighty. Spiritism could not be destroyed by some dissensions, brought about by human interesses within.
Answer: You may perhaps be right, my young friend (the medium was a young man) but I keep what I said. I stop any discussion about it. Leaving that aside I am available to any other question that you may have.
The medium: Then, considering that you have allowed, and not proceeding with a subject that may be painful to you right now, we beg you to describe your passage from this life to the one you live now, telling us about a possible confusion and if we can be of any service to you, given your current condition.
Answer: I cannot but acknowledge the excellence of these principles that you teach mankind, about death and the affection given to totally unknown creatures. But… in any case, my dear young man, I will respond to your question. I will not abuse your time and will satisfy your wishes in a few words. I confess that at the time of death I was uptight. Was it matter that made me be sorry for leaving this life? Was it ignorance of the future? I will not hide it, for I was afraid! You asked if I was disorderly. What do you mean by that? If you mean that the violent action of separation took me to a kind of mental lethargy, from which I came out as if from a painful sleep, yes, I was confused. But if you mean a disturbance in intelligence, memory and self-awareness, no. I did not experience that. Nonetheless, the disturbance does happen to certain creatures; may be to me as well, but I do not believe so. I do believe though that such phenomenon must not occur immediately after death. It is true that I was surprised by seeing the existence of the Spirit as you teach but that is not confusion. Here is how I understand that disturbance and how I experienced that. If I were not sure about of my own beliefs; if I had any doubt in my soul about everything I believed until then; If I had experienced a big change in the way I saw things, that would disturb me. In my opinion such disturbance should not occur just after death. If I believe in my reason tells me, at death the creature remains as before passing… It is only later, when isolation and the changes that gradually take place around us is modify their opinion, when the creature experiences a mental commotion, when the primitive assurances shake, and the real confusion begins. You asked if you could be useful to me in any way. My religion tells me that prayer is good; your belief says that too. Therefore, pray for me and be certain of my gratitude. Despite the differences between us it will be a pleasure to come a few times to talk to you.
Father D…”
Our correspondent was right when saying that this communication had a useful instruction. In fact, it is instructive in several ways and our readers will easily understand the serious teachings that come out of that, without the need for our highlights. We see a Spirit here that fought our doctrines when alive and had exhausted the arguments carried by his profound knowledge. Recently deceased, as a Spirit, recognizing the fundamental truths that support us, and yet persisting on his position and for the same motives. It is incontestable that if he had found stronger arguments to combat us, in his spiritual and more lucid state, he would have used them. Far from that, he seems to be afraid of seeing things more clearly, he presents changes in his thoughts that are all connected to earthly ideas that he still carries. He is afraid of the future and therefore, he dares not to face it. We will respond as if he were living and written the message he dictated after his death. We address both the man and the Spirit, responding to those that share his thoughts and that could use the same arguments against us. We then say:
Mr. Priest, although you had been our declared and militant adversary on Earth, none of us thinks the same about you and never thought so when you were alive, first because our faith turns tolerance into law and to us every idea is respectable, when sincere. Freedom of conscience is one of our principles; we wish it to others as we wish it to ourselves. Only God can judge the validity of people’s beliefs and no one has the right to say anathema in the name of God. Freedom of conscience does not exclude discussion and refutation but charity commands not to curse anyone. Second, we do not like you less since your opposition caused no harm to the doctrine. You unwillingly served the cause of Spiritism, as every one that attacks it, helping to promote it and demonstrating, especially due to your personal qualifications, the insufficiency of the weapons used to fight it. Allow me now to discuss a few of your propositions.
One seems to fail logic to me. It is when you say that “Spiritism, fundamentally good, is bad for its results.” I believe you must have forgotten when Jesus said this maxim, that became proverbial by the force of truth: “A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit.”[1] One cannot understand that something essentially good would cause any harm. In another passage you say that the danger of Spiritism is in the manifestation of the bad Spirits, that will exploit human passions to serve evil. Here we have one of the theses that you supported when alive. But side by side with the bad Spirits we have the good ones that stimulate good, whereas according to the doctrine of the Church the power of communication is only given to the demons. If you then consider Spiritism dangerous because it admits the communication of the bad Spirits as well as the good ones, then the doctrine of the Church is much more dangerous because it only admits the bad ones.
As a matter of fact, it was not Spiritism that invented the manifestation of the Spirits, nor it is the cause of their communication. It only attests a fact that has occurred in all times for it is in nature. Spiritism can only cease to exist when the Spirits can no longer manifest. If such manifestation brings about any danger, we must blame nature for that and not Spiritism. Is the science that explains electricity responsible for the damages caused by lightning? Certainly not. It explains the causes and provides the means of deviating them. It is the same with Spiritism. It explains the causes of a bad influence that may unsuspectedly act upon a person, indicating the means of protection against it, whereas by ignoring it the person would still suffer the effect and follow unaware of them.
The influence of the bad Spirits is part of the scourge to which mankind is exposed down here, like the diseases and disasters of all kinds, because we are in a planet of atonement and testing, where we must work for our moral and intellectual advancement. Bod God’s benevolence always places the remedy by the illness; God gave mankind intelligence to find it. That is the result of the progress of sciences. Spiritism comes to indicate the medicine to one of those disasters. It teaches that to avoid and neutralize the influence of the bad Spirits, one must become better, dominate one’s bad inclinations and practice the virtues taught by Jesus Christ: humility and charity. Would you call that bad result?
The manifestation of the Spirits is a positive fact, acknowledged by the Church. Experience today demonstrates that the Spirits are the souls of people and that is the reason why there are so many imperfect ones. If that fact comes to contradict certain dogmas, Spiritism is as much to blame as Geology that demonstrates that Earth was not built in six days. The mistake is in the dogmas that are not in agreement with nature. By these manifestations, as by the discoveries of science, God wishes to lead us to more truthful beliefs. Hence, when we deny progress, we ignore God’s will; it is blasphemy against God to attribute all that to the devil. Trying, in good or bad faith, to keep a belief against the evidence and turn a knowingly false principle into the basis of a doctrine is the same as supporting a house on a rotten foundation. The strut breaks gradually, and the house falls apart.
You say that the opposition of the Church to Spiritism is understandable and that you approve it because it would be the end of clergy, whose separation from the ordinary people would be destroyed. You say: “With Spiritism there is no more clerical oligarchy; the priest is nobody and someone; he is the good man that teaches truth to his brothers; he is the charitable worker that reaches out to the fallen human being; his priesthood is faith; his hierarchy is the merit and his salary is God! That is great and beautiful, but one must also say that sooner or later that is the downfall not of the man that can only gain from such teachings but of the clerical family. One cannot gladly renounce, and I repeat, to the honor and respect that is already enjoyed. But nobody joyfully renounces to a coveted royalty, to an uncommon prestige that places them above the ordinary, to the richness that although material is not less necessary to them as compared to common people” What now! Would the clergy be motivated by such petty feelings? Would it be ignorance of these words by Jesus: “My kingdom is not of this world”,[2] to the point of sacrificing the interest of truth for the satisfaction of pride, ambition and human passions? He then would not believe in that kingdom promised by Jesus since he prefers the earthly one. He therefore would have his supporting point in heavens, just by appearance and to give him prestige, but just to protect his earthly interests. We prefer to believe that it can be the drive of some of their followers but not that of majority. Otherwise his kingdom would be very near its end and his words would be his sentence, because only the celestial kingdom is eternal whereas those on Earth are fragile and unstable. You go to far, Mr. Priest, in your forecasts about the consequences of Spiritism, farther than me and my writings. Not sharing your thoughts on this, I will just say that for the fact that everyone presents it, the inevitable result will be the transformation of society; it will create a new order of things, new habits, new needs; it will modify beliefs, social relationships; it will do, from a moral point of view, what all great discoveries of science and technology do from a material point of view. Such transformation scares you out and that is why, by presenting it, you keep you away from your thoughts; you do not want to believe in that; in one word, you close your eyes so that you cannot see, and shut your ears so that you cannot hear. There are many like that on Earth. However, if such a transformation is in God’s designs, it will take place, do what they will. One would have to accept that in good will or be forced to accept it, like those from the old regimen had to accept the consequences of the Revolution that they also denied and declared impossible, before its realization.
Whoever told them that in less than a quarter of a century every privilege would have been abolished; that a recent born boy would not become a colonel by birth; that an entire regiment could no longer be bought like a herd of oxen, that the soldier could become a general and the last plebeian a minister; that the rights would be the same to everyone, that the peasant would have voice in the important businesses of the country, side by side with the farmer, they would have shaken their heads out of disbelief! However, if you one them had slept for forty years, like Epimenedes,[3] he would have believed to have awaken in another world. It is the fear of the future that makes you say that Spiritism will only have one turn. You try to create an illusion, trying to prove it to yourself, and you ended up believing in good faith because that calms you down. But what is the reason that you present? The least concluding of all, as it is easy to demonstrate.
Ah if you demonstrated unequivocally that Spiritism is a utopia, that is based on a mistaken fact, on a false basis, illusive and hopeless, you would then be right. But, on the contrary, you affirm the existence of the principle and even the excellence of that principle. You acknowledge, and with you the whole Church, the reality of the material fact that is its foundation: the manifestations. Can such a fact be annihilated? No, as one cannot annihilate the movement of Earth.
Considering that it is part of nature, it shall be always produced. Such a fact, misunderstood in the past, but better studied and understood in our days, brings inevitable consequences. If you cannot annihilate it, you are forced to endure its consequences. Follow it step by step in its ramifications and you will inexorably arrive at a transformation in the ideas. Now, a change in the ideas forcibly brings a change in the order of things. (refer to What is Spiritism).
On another hand, Spiritism do not step on people’s intelligence; it does not impose a blind belief; it wishes faith to be supported by understanding. This is the main point, Mr. Priest, of our disagreement. Spiritism gives total freedom of examination of any point, based on the principle that since truth is one, sooner or later it must prevail upon falsehood, and that a principle based on error falls by the force of things. False ideas, when discussed, show their weak spots and fade away before logic. Divergences like these are inevitable in the beginning; they are even necessary because they help the depuration and the establishment of the fundamental idea. It is preferable that they are produced since the beginning for the true doctrine will disentangle sooner. That is why we always tell the followers: Do not worry about contradicting ideas that are issued or published. See how many have been born dead! How many writings are no longer talked about! What is it that we seek? The success of our ideas at any price? No, but the triumph of truth. If, among the contrary ideas, some are more truthful than ours, they shall succeed, and we must follow them; if they are false, they cannot withstand the decisive control of the universal teachings of the Spirits, the only criteria of the surviving idea. The assimilation that you establish between Spiritism and other philosophical doctrines lacks accuracy. It was not people that made Spiritism what it is and what is going to be later; it is the Spirits by their teachings. People only make it move and coordinate the material that is provided. That teaching is not complete yet and what has been given so far can only be considered as the landmarks of the science. It can be compared to the four rules of math and we are still in the equations of first degree. That is why many people still do not understand its importance and reach. But the Spirits regulate the teachings and depend on nobody to make it move slower or faster than they wish; they neither follow those in a hurry nor they fall behind the slow ones.
Spiritism is not the works of a single Spirit or a single man. It is the work of the Spirits in general. If follows that the opinion of a given Spirit about a principle is only considered, by the Spiritists, as an individual opinion, that can be fair or false and only has value when sanctioned by the teaching of the majority, given in several points of the world. It was this universal teaching that made Spiritism what it is and will make it what it is going to be. Before such a powerful criterion, every false idea necessarily falls, as does every particular theory that is the product of systematic ideas, be it from one person or one isolated Spirit. There is no doubt that a false idea may gather some followers, but it will never prevail against what is taught everywhere. Spiritism that has just been born and raises question of the highest importance, does bring ebullition to several imaginations. Each one sees things their own way. Hence the surge of systems in its infancy, the majority of which have already disappeared by the force of the general teaching. The same applies to those that are not with the truth because the divergent teaching of a Spirit given to a medium will always be opposed to the teaching of millions of Spirits given to millions of mediums. That is why certain exotic theories only lived a few days and never left the small circle where they were produced. Deprived from the general sanction, they do not find echo nor sympathy in the masses, and if they also shock logic and common sense, they then provoke repulsion that precipitates their downfall.
Spiritism, therefore, has an element of stability and unity that comes from its own nature and origin, something that is not proper to any purely human conceived philosophical doctrine; it is the shield that will shatter any attempt to have it destroyed or divided. Such divisions can only be partial, momentary and circumscribed.
You mentioned sects that, in your opinion, divide the Spiritists, then concluding that the ruin of the doctrine is near. But you forgot all that divided Christianity since its inception, that made it bleed and still divide it, and whose number is not less than three hundred and sixty today. However, despite the profound dissidences about the fundamental dogmas, Christianity stood up, a proof that it is independent of those controversies. Why then you wish that Spiritism, connected to Christianity in its foundation, only divided in secondary issues that are daily clarified, would suffer with the divergence of a few personal opinions, when it has such a powerful universal control as an aggregator?
Hence, even if Spiritism today were divided into twenty sects, something that is not and shall not be, this would not have any consequence because it is the work of delivery. If the divisions were driven by personal ambitions, by persons dominated by the idea of becoming heads of sects, or by the exploration of the idea to serve their self-love, or their personal interests, there is not doubt that they would be the least dangerous. Personal ambitions die with the individuals and if the truth was not with those that wanted to rise up, their ideas will die with them and perhaps even before that. Truth, however, cannot die.
You are right, Mr. Priest, when saying that there will be ruins with Spiritism, but not as you think. The ruins will be of every mistaken idea that surges and boils. If they are all wrong, they will all fall, and that is inevitable; but if there is only one that is true, that will infallibly survive.
Two very marked opinions, that we could really call sects, were formed a few years back, from the teachings of two Spirits masked by venerable names, captivating the trust of a few people. Today nobody talks about that. What caused the downfall? The common sense and logic of the masses on one side, the general teachings of the Spirits in agreement with that very logic.
Will you contest the value of such universal control, by the fact that the Spirits are the souls of people, and therefore equally subject to error? You would then be in contradiction with yourself. Don’t you agree that a general council has more authority than that of a particular council, given that it is more numerous and that its opinion prevails onto the opinion of individual priests, each bishop and even that of the Pope? That the majority creates the laws in people’s assemblies? Isn’t that reasonable to expect that the Spirits that govern the world by the order of God also had their councils, their assemblies? Do you deny the Spirits the sanction of truth but you accept that among people? Do you forget the fact that if there are inferior Spirits among them, these are not the ones called upon by God to deliver the interests of Earth, but the superior Spirits, those that overpassed the obstacles of humanity and whose number is incalculable? And how do they bring the instruction of the majority to us? Is it by the voice of a single Spirit, a single person? No, but as I said, by millions of Spirits and millions of people. Does it happen in a single center, in one city, one country, one cast, in a privileged nation as in the past with the Israelites? No, it happens everywhere, in all countries, at the home of the rich as of the poor. How could you expect that the opinion of a few individuals could prevail against such a formidable ensemble of voices? Believe me, Mr. Priest, such a universal sanction is much worth the same as an ecumenic council.
Spiritism is strong precisely because it is based on that sanction and not on isolated opinions. Does it proclaim itself as immutable in its current teachings, saying that there is nothing more to be taught? No, because up until now it has followed, and will follow in the future, the progressive teaching that is appropriate, and that is a source of strength to Spiritism because it will never distant itself from progress.
Wait a little more, Mr. Priest, and before a quarter of a century you will see Spiritism much less divided than Christianity is today, after eighteen centuries.
You mistakenly concluded by the instability of the doctrine based on the fluctuations that you noticed in the society and in the Spiritist gatherings. Spiritism is not a speculative theory, based on a preconceived idea. It is a matter of fact, and consequently, of personal conviction. Anyone that may admit the fact and its consequences is Spiritism without the need to take part in any society. One can be a perfect Spiritist without it. The future of Spiritism is in its own principle, an imperishable principle, because it is in nature and not in the meetings, many times taking place in unfavorable condition, composed of heterogenous elements, and consequently subordinated to several eventualities.
The societies are useful but not is indispensable, and all of them could cease to exist without affecting the march of Spiritism, considering that the largest number of followers are not in their circles. They represent much more the believers that seek sympathetic centers than the non-believers. The serious and well managed societies are particularly important to neutralize the bad impression left by those where Spiritism is badly represented or disfigured. The Spiritist Society of Paris is not an exception to the rule for it does not claim any monopoly. It does not consist on the greater or smaller number of followers but on the idea that it represents. Such idea is independent of any meeting and whatever happens the propagating element will replace it if needed. Therefore, one can say that the Parisian Society is everywhere where the same principles are professed, from the orient to the occident, and that if it disappeared materially the idea would outlive. Spiritism is an infant that grows and whose initial steps are naturally dithering; but like the premature children, it shows signs of strength early on. That is why certain persons are afraid and would like to have it muffled in the crib. If it had arrived as weak as you suppose it would not have caused such resistance, nor would it have raised so much hostility, and you yourself would not have tried to fight against it. Let the child grow then, and you shall see what will become of the adult. You predicted its near end but several incarnate and discarnate made their predictions otherwise. Hear them out and their predictions that have been taking place unstoppably for the last ten years and repeat all over the world.
“Spiritism has come to fight disbelief that is a disaggregating element of society, replacing the blind faith, that fades away, by the reasoned faith, that vivifies. It carries the regenerating element of humanity and will be the compass of future generations. Like all other great renovating ideas, it must fight against the opposition of interests that it will harm and ideas that it will bring down. All kinds of obstacles will be produced; all kinds of weapons will be used against it, loyal and disloyal, that people will believe to be adequate to have it destroyed. Its first steps will be on heathers and thorns. Its followers will be denigrated, ridiculed, betrayed, scorned and persecuted; they shall find disappointment and deception. Happy are the ones whose faith is not shaken in these terrible days; who have fought and suffered for the triumph of truth, because they will be rewarded for their courage and perseverance. Yet, Spiritism will continue its march through traps and hindrances; it is unshakable, like everything else that is in God’s will, because it is supported by the laws of nature that are eternal like God, whereas everything else that is contrary to those laws shall fail. Through the light that it shines upon obscure and controversial points of the Scriptures, it shall lead mankind to the unit of belief. Giving the laws of nature for the basis of the principles of equality, freedom and fraternity, it will lay the foundation of the kingdom of the true Christian charity, the very kingdom of God on Earth, predicted by Jesus Christ. Many still reject it because they do not know it or do not understand it; when they acknowledge that it does realize the dearest hopes for the future of humanity, they will embrace it like St. Paul with Christianity, and it will find defenders among the adversaries of the last hour. From the multitude strong souls will rise and hold in their hands the cause and the authority of their word will bring silence to the detractors. The struggle shall still last a long time, because the super excited human passions by pride and material interests cannot be suddenly appeased. Those passions shall disappear with people, and before this century terminates the new faith will acquire a prominent place among the civilized peoples, and the era of regeneration will mark the next century.”
[1] Matthew 7:18 (T.N.)
[2] John, 18:36 (T.N.)
[3] Epimenides of Cnossos was a semi-mythical 7th or 6th century BC Greek seer and philosopher-poet (Wikipedia, T.N.)
The Davenport Brothers
The Davenport brothers, that right now attract so much attention, are two young man, one twenty-four years old and the other twenty-five years old, born in Buffalo, New York, giving public displays as mediums. Their skills are, however, limited to physical effects, being the most remarkable one the event in which they are tightly tied up with ropes and released instantaneously by an invisible force, despite all precautions taken to verify that they cannot do it on their own. This is added to other more common phenomena such as the transportation of objects through space, the spontaneous sound produced by musical instruments, the apparition of illuminated hands, people being touched by invisible hands, etc.
The Didiers, editors of The Spirits’ Book, have just published their biography, with a detailed description of the effects that are produced by them and that, except for the tight ropes, share many similar points with those produced by Mr. Home. The commotion caused by their presence in England and in Paris gives this book a strong contemporaneous seal. The book was not written by them but by their English biographer, Dr. Nichols, that limited himself to the report of the events and the documentation provided by them; the French editors, however, had the great idea of adding to the publication two of our brochures: Summary of the Laws of the Spiritist Phenomena and Spiritism in its Simplest Expression, with a large number of explanatory notes in the body of the text.[1] One can then find appropriate teachings about the case of those gentlemen whose detail we cannot provide now since we must look at the issue from a different perspective.
We say only that their aptitude to produce those phenomena presented itself spontaneously since their childhood. For several years they traveled around the main northern American cities where they acquired their reputation. In September 1864 they came to England where they produced vivid interest. They were both acclaimed and denigrated, ridiculed and even scorned by the press and the public. In Liverpool were subjected to the most outrageous malevolence to the point of seeing their own personal safety endangered. The opinions about them were greatly divided: some considered them no more than skillful con men; others thought they were acting in good faith and could admit a hidden cause to the phenomena; but to summarize they did not conquer much support to the Spiritist idea there. In that essentially religious country, natural commonsense repudiated the idea that spiritual beings would reveal their presence through theatrical exhibitions and demonstration of force. Since the Spiritist Philosophy was not much known there, the public confused Spiritism with such demonstrations and built a more contrary than favorable opinion about the doctrine. It is true that in France Spiritism began by the turning tables but in much different conditions. Mediumship revealed itself all over the place, in all social classes with people of all ages and gender, immediately ruling out the idea of charlatanism; anybody could attest it directly, in the intimacy of their homes, through repetitive observations, the reality of events linked to a powerful interest beyond the material effects that were not much appealing to reason but they saw their moral and philosophical consequences. If, instead, that kind of primitive mediumship were the privilege of a few isolated individuals with the need of promoting it on stages, buying faith, and nobody would have heard of the Spirits long ago. Faith is born out of a moral impression. Anything that is prone to produce a bad impression repels faith, instead of exciting it. There would be much less believers in Spiritism today if the phenomenon had been always presented that way. The non-believer, naturally predisposed to mockery, cannot be led to take seriously something that I surrounded by circumstances that do not impose respect or trust. Shallow criticism forms opinion based on a first unfavorable impression, confounding good and bad in the same reproach. Very few convictions were formed in public demonstrations whereas the immense majority came out of intimate gatherings, where the notorious honorability of the members could inspire trust and defy any suspicion of fraud.
In the last Spring, after exploring England, the Davenport brothers came to Paris. Some time before their arrival, a person came to see us on their behalf, asking us to support them in our Spiritist Review. It is a well-known fact that we are not easily enthusiastic, even with things that are familiar to us, and with even more reason with things that are unknow to us. We were then unable to promise an anticipated support, given our habit of only talking about things that we knew. Public opinion was divided in France as well as in England. In France they were only known from the contradictory reports in the papers. Hence, we could not censor them prematurely since this could be injustice, nor could we approve them, since the could have taken advantage of that. That was the reason for our abstention.
On their arrival they went to live in Gennevilliers’ Castle, near Paris, where they stayed for several months, without giving any public appearance. We do not know the reason for that absence. In recent days they gave some private sessions that were reported by the papers in a kind of picturesque way. Their public session was finally announced to September 12th, to take place at the Hertz theater. The outcome of that deplorable session is well-known; it renovated, in a lesser scale, the tumultuous events of Liverpool, in which one of the spectators jumped on the stage and broke a device used by the brothers and showing a board he said: “Here is the trick!”. Such outrageous attitude, unacceptable in a civilized country, led to the turmoil. The session was interrupted, and money returned to the public. However, since many tickets had been donated, the box office had a deficit of seventy francs, indicating that seventy spectators had come for free and left the theater with ten francs more in their pockets, undoubtedly to compensate for their expenses to attend the meeting. The controversy that was established about the Davenport brothers offers several teaching opportunities that we will examine.
The first question asked by the Spiritists themselves was this: Are those gentlemen mediums or not? All the facts reported in their biography enter the circle of mediumistic possibility, considering that analogous and notoriously authentic effects were produced many times under the influence of serious mediums. If the facts themselves are admissible, we must acknowledge that the circumstances in which they are produced lead to suspicion. The first one that shocks upfront is the need for dimly light, something that evidently facilitates fraud. But that alone would not constitute a strong objection. The mediumistic effects have absolutely nothing of supernatural; all of them, without exception, are due to the combination of fluids of the medium and the Spirit; those fluids, although imponderable, are nonetheless subtle matter. There is, therefore, a cause and effect that are in a certain way material; that led us to always say that since the Spiritist phenomena are based on the laws of nature, they have nothing of miraculous. As with many other phenomena, they only seem miraculous because their laws are unknown. The marvelous and the supernatural have disappeared now that those laws are known, giving place to reality. Therefore, there isn’t a single Spiritist that attribute miraculous skills to oneself. That is what critics would known if they took the burden of studying what they criticized.
Going back to the issue of darkness, it is also known that there are chemical combinations that cannot take place in the light; that there are combinations and chemical decompositions that are excited by light. Considering that every Spiritist phenomenon is the result of fluidic combination, as we said, and since those fluids are material, it wouldn’t be strange that in certain cases light would work against them.
A more serious objection is the timing to produce the phenomena, with scheduled day and time and at will. Such submission to the wishes of individuals is contrary to everything that is known about the nature of the Spirits, and the selective repetition of a given phenomenon must be rightfully considered suspicious, even when there is selflessness, and with more reason when related to profitable public exhibitions that make reason reject the idea that Spirits could submit themselves to that. Mediumship is a natural aptitude, inherent to the medium, like the ability to produce sound is inherent to a musical instrument; but as the instrument requires the musician to produce sound, the medium requires Spirits to produce mediumistic effects. The Spirits come when they wish and when they can, resulting that the best equipped medium sometimes obtains nothing. In that case it is like an instrument without the musician. That happens every day; it happened to Mr. Home that frequently would go for months without producing anything, despite his own will, even if in the presence of a sovereign.
If follows, therefore, from the very essence of mediumship, and that can be established as an absolute principle, that a medium is never certain that a given effect will be produced because that does not depend on her. Affirming the opposite would be total ignorance of the most elementary principles of the Spiritist science. In order to promise the production of a given phenomenon with a set time one needs to possess material resources that do not come from the Spirits. Is it the case with the Davenport brothers? We don’t know. Judgment can be passed by those that followed their experiences.
There was talk of proposed challenges and bets for the best magic. The Spirits are not con artists and a serious medium would never fight anyone, let alone a deceiver. The latter has his own means, the former is a passive instrument of a foreign, free and independent will and that cannot be controlled by anybody. If the con man says that he does more than the medium, let him do so. He is right because he acts with certainty; entertains the public and that is his purpose; he boasts about it and that is his role; he promotes it and that is a necessity for his position. The serious medium that knows to have no personal merit in what is done, is modest; cannot be proud of something that is not the product of his own talent or promise something that does not depend on oneself.
The mediums, however, do something else. Through them the good Spirits inspire charity and benevolence to all; they teach mankind to see everyone as brothers, without distinction of cast or sect; to forgive those that cause them harm; to overcome bad inclinations; to withstand the miseries of life with patience; to face death fearlessly for the certainty of a future life. They give consolation to those in suffering, courage to the weak, hope to the ones that did not believe, etc. What they do not teach is the magic of the deceivers nor that of the Davenports.
The inherent conditions of mediumship, therefore, cannot be submitted to regularity and punctuality, conditions that are necessary to scheduled sessions that must satisfy the public at any price. If, however, the Spirits supported such kind of manifestation, something that is not radically impossible, since there are Spirits at all possible level of advancement, those could only be of low classes because it would be totally absurd to think that other class of Spirits would come to have fun by making exhibitions. But even in that hypothetical case the medium would still depend on that Spirits that could leave the medium when their presence was more necessary and lead the presentation or consultation to failure. Since the theater goer must be compensated, if the Spirits do not show up, they must then be forgotten; with some skill it is easy to make the change. That is what commonly happens to mediums that were originally bestowed with real faculties but insufficient for the proposed objective.
Of all Spiritist phenomena, the physical effects are the ones that better facilitates imitation. Although the real manifestations have a distinct character and are only produced under determined conditions, the imitation may approach reality to the point of eluding people, particularly persons that do not know the laws that govern the true phenomena. But for the fact that they can be imitated it would be illogical to conclude that they do not exist as much as it would be illogical to conclude that there aren’t true diamonds for the fact that there are false ones.
We make no personal assumption here. We provide the principles based on reason and experience from where we come to this conclusion: that a scrupulous examination carried out with a thorough knowledge of the Spiritist phenomena is the only one capable of distinguishing deception from real mediumship. We add that the best of all guarantees is the respect and consideration associated to the medium, her morality and notorious honorability, her absolute moral and material altruïsm. Nobody disagrees that in such circumstances the quality of the individual constitutes precedent that impresses favorably because they rule out the suspicion of fraud.
We do not judge the Davenport brothers and far from us to doubt their honorability. But besides their moral quality that we have no reason to suspect, we must confess that they present themselves in conditions that are not much favorable to attest their condition of mediums, and that it is an enormous frivolity from the part of the critics that raise them to the position of apostles and priests of the doctrine. The objective of their voyage to Europe is clearly defined in this passage of their biography:
“I believe, without a doubt, that the Davenport’s brothers left New York on August 27th, bringing along a helper, Mr. Willian Fay, who was attending Mr. Willian Davenport’s illness; the former should not be confused with Mr. H. Melleville Fay, that as it seems was discovered in Canada by some sort of authority trying to produce some sort of similar effects. They were followed by Mr. Palmer, a well-known person in the business world as an agent in the world of theater and classical singing, to whom the commercial side of the enterprise was entrusted, thanks to his experience.”
It is then clear that it was a business enterprise, managed by a businessman, an agent of theatrical events. The facts reported in the biography are, as we heard, are possible in mediumistic terms; the age and the circumstances in which they began rule out the idea of charlatanism; it all tends to demonstrate that those young men were in fact mediums of physical effects, as there are many in their country and where the exploitation of such faculty became habit and does not surprise public opinion. What we cannot attest, since we do not have any proof of that, is the possible augmentation of their natural gifts, as other exploiting mediums did to increase their prestige and compensate for the lack of flexibility of those very gifts.
If we admit, however, the truthfulness of those faculties, we would say that they were eluded with respect to the European reception, since they were presented as a spectacle of curiosity, and in conditions much contrary to the principles of religious and philosophical Spiritism. The enlightened and sincere Spiritists that abound, particularly in France, could not welcome them in such conditions, neither to accept them as apostles, even considering that they are sincere. As for the non-believers, whose number is so large and still dominate the press, the occasion was perfect for them to exercise their vein of mockery, so that they could not let it go. Those gentlemen then opened the door to the widest criticism, giving people the same right of those that purchase any kind of ticket. There is no doubt that if they had presented themselves in a more serious manner the reception would have been different; they would have shut the mouth of the detractors. A medium is strong when able to say this courageously: “How much did you pay to come here and who invited you; God bestowed me a gift that can be withdrawn at God’s will, like the vision or the spoken word. I only use if for good, in the interest of truth and not to satisfy curiosity or my own interests. My only reward is the work of devotion; I do not try even to satisfy self-love for that faculty does not depend on me. I consider it a sacred thing since it puts me in communication with the spiritual world, allowing me to give faith to the non-believers and consolation to those in suffering. To me it is a sacrilege to trade with that because I do not have the right to sell the assistance of the Spirits that come to me for free. Considering that I take no advantage, I therefore have no interest in deceiving you.” A medium that can say so is strong, we repeat. It is a answer without replica and that always imposes respect.
In this present case the critic was malevolent; it was unfair and injurious and embraced all the Spiritists and all mediums in the same reproach, not sparing the most disrespectful labels, regardless of the amount of damage it might cause and that it would reach the most respectable families. We will not repeat the expressions that were used and that only dishonor the ones that produce them. Every sincere belief is respectable and all of you that constantly scream about the freedom of conscience as a natural right, at least respect those of others. You can discuss opinions, for that is your right, but calumny has always been the worst argument and never of a good cause.
Not all the press shares that deviation of civility; there are some, among the critics of the Davenport brothers, whose character does not exclude education and moderation, and that are fair. The one we are going to cite, points out precisely the weak spot that we mentioned above. It was taken from the “Courrier de Paris du Monde Illustré”, on September 16th, 1865, signed by Neuter.
“A first objection seemed enough to me to demonstrate that the good young men that gave a public display at the Hertz theater were skillful in tricks completely strange to the superior worlds. This objection is taken from the very regularity with which they exploited their supposedly miraculous power. Since they gave guarantees that it was the Spirits that came to manifest publicly in their benefit, the Davenports treated them as servants and with the same familiarity that the director of a play treats his chorus girls. They never asked if their super-human accomplices were tired, if the date was convenient to them, if the heat bothered them, and yet the scheduled a precise day and time, expecting that the fluidic beings were available and played their roles at that moment, executing their musical jokes with the precision of a musician to whom their concert-café yields the fee of 1 franc.
They did not ask their super-human accomplices if the day was good for them, if they were tired, if it was not too hot and still scheduled a fixed date and time, and it was expected that the fluidic beings were okay at that moment, that they played their role on time, executed their little musical tricks with the precision of a musician to whom the café-concert would pay a one franc fee!
Seriously, that is a petty idea of the spiritual world, presenting it like that to us, like a village of commanded genies, commissioned elves that go to a given city attending a signal of their master. No rest to the super terrestrial actors! When a sudden illness of the show-off gives him the right of rescheduling the spectacle, the souls of the Davenports lot are slaves that must attend at any time. It is hard to live in fantastic planets to become reduced to such a degree of slavery. And what is the task attributed to those unfortunate souls from beyond the grave? Make their hands – the hands of souls – pass through the cracks of an armoire. Take them down to the exhibition level of jesters! Make them play guitars, those grotesque instruments refused even by the wandering minstrels in search of a few cents!”
Isn’t that in fact like touching a sore spot? If only Mr. Neuter knew that Spiritism says precisely the same thing, although in a less witty way, he would then have said: “But this is not Spiritism!” absolutely in the same way, when he sees a charlatan, he says: “This is not medicine.” Since neither science nor religion support abuse, Spiritism does not support those that use its name either. The bad impression that the author had was not of the persons of the Davenports but from the condition that they place themselves before the public and from the ridiculous idea that they pass of the spiritual world, something that even non-believers are shocked to see displayed on the stage. That was the impression of critics in general, translated by him in a kind of polite way. This will always be the case when the mediums are not ready to respect the belief that they profess. The hardship of the Davenports is a lucky strike to the adversaries of Spiritism that, in turn, hurry to boast victory and ridicule the followers as much as they can, screaming at them that their belief is mortally wounded, as if Spiritism was incarnate in the Davenports brothers. Spiritism is incarnate in nobody. It is in nature and nobody can preclude its march, because those that try, in fact, work to make it progress. Spiritism is not about tying someone with ropes, nor it is about this or that physical experimentation. Spiritism has never sponsored those gentlemen, nor has it presented them as cornerstones of the doctrine that they did not even know, hence it cannot be belied by their adversity. Their failure is not a blow against Spiritism but against those that exploit Spiritism.
It must be one of the two: they either are con men or true mediums. If they are charlatans, we must thank all the others that helped to unmask them; with that regards we owe Mr. Robin special thanks for in the present case he does a great service to Spiritism that would have suffered if people believed in their frauds. Every time the press pointed out abuse, exploitation or maneuvers to compromise the doctrine, the sincere Spirits, far from regretting it they applauded. If they are true mediums, the conditions in which they present themselves does not produce a favorable impression and cannot be useful to the cause. In one case or the other Spiritism has no interest in taking sides in their favor.
Now, what is going to be the result of such uproar? Here it is: the chronicle that was starving in these days of tropical heat gains a subject with that, quickly grabbing it to fulfil their lacking columns of political and theatrical news. Mr. Robin finds there an excellent publicity for his theater of conjurers, something that he exploited skillfully, and we wish him well since there he speaks of the Spiritists and Spiritism every day. With that criticism loses some of its consideration, given the eccentricity and lack of civility of the controversy. Materially speaking perhaps, the least benefited are the Davenports, whose speculation is markedly compromised.
Spiritism is evidently the one that should benefit the most. Its followers understand it so well that they are not absolutely moved by the situation and wait the result with confidence. In the country side where they are affected by the mockery of the adversaries even more than in Paris, they simply respond: Wait and soon you shall see who is going to be dead and buried. With that, Spiritism in principle will gain immense popularity and shall become known, at least by name, by many people that had never heard of it. But among them many do not limit themselves to the name. Their curiosity is excited by the fury of the attacks; they want to know what is behind such a doctrine, that some say is ridiculous; they will search at the source and when they see that they were just making fun and will tell themselves that is it not something bad. Spiritism will then gain for being better understood, judged and appreciated.
It will also gain by putting in evidence the sincere and devout followers with whom it can count on, separating them from the superficial followers. The adversaries will still try to exploit the circumstances to bring divisions or defections, true or simulated, using it as support to destroy Spiritism. After having failed from all other means, this is their ultimate way out; however, it will also fail, only separating the dead branches from the trunk, branches that produced no sap and hence reenergizing the tree.
These results, and several others that we abstain from listing, are inevitable and we would not be surprised by learning that it was the Spirits themselves that provoked all that uproar to reach such object more promptly.
[1] See bibliographic bulletin
The Didiers, editors of The Spirits’ Book, have just published their biography, with a detailed description of the effects that are produced by them and that, except for the tight ropes, share many similar points with those produced by Mr. Home. The commotion caused by their presence in England and in Paris gives this book a strong contemporaneous seal. The book was not written by them but by their English biographer, Dr. Nichols, that limited himself to the report of the events and the documentation provided by them; the French editors, however, had the great idea of adding to the publication two of our brochures: Summary of the Laws of the Spiritist Phenomena and Spiritism in its Simplest Expression, with a large number of explanatory notes in the body of the text.[1] One can then find appropriate teachings about the case of those gentlemen whose detail we cannot provide now since we must look at the issue from a different perspective.
We say only that their aptitude to produce those phenomena presented itself spontaneously since their childhood. For several years they traveled around the main northern American cities where they acquired their reputation. In September 1864 they came to England where they produced vivid interest. They were both acclaimed and denigrated, ridiculed and even scorned by the press and the public. In Liverpool were subjected to the most outrageous malevolence to the point of seeing their own personal safety endangered. The opinions about them were greatly divided: some considered them no more than skillful con men; others thought they were acting in good faith and could admit a hidden cause to the phenomena; but to summarize they did not conquer much support to the Spiritist idea there. In that essentially religious country, natural commonsense repudiated the idea that spiritual beings would reveal their presence through theatrical exhibitions and demonstration of force. Since the Spiritist Philosophy was not much known there, the public confused Spiritism with such demonstrations and built a more contrary than favorable opinion about the doctrine. It is true that in France Spiritism began by the turning tables but in much different conditions. Mediumship revealed itself all over the place, in all social classes with people of all ages and gender, immediately ruling out the idea of charlatanism; anybody could attest it directly, in the intimacy of their homes, through repetitive observations, the reality of events linked to a powerful interest beyond the material effects that were not much appealing to reason but they saw their moral and philosophical consequences. If, instead, that kind of primitive mediumship were the privilege of a few isolated individuals with the need of promoting it on stages, buying faith, and nobody would have heard of the Spirits long ago. Faith is born out of a moral impression. Anything that is prone to produce a bad impression repels faith, instead of exciting it. There would be much less believers in Spiritism today if the phenomenon had been always presented that way. The non-believer, naturally predisposed to mockery, cannot be led to take seriously something that I surrounded by circumstances that do not impose respect or trust. Shallow criticism forms opinion based on a first unfavorable impression, confounding good and bad in the same reproach. Very few convictions were formed in public demonstrations whereas the immense majority came out of intimate gatherings, where the notorious honorability of the members could inspire trust and defy any suspicion of fraud.
In the last Spring, after exploring England, the Davenport brothers came to Paris. Some time before their arrival, a person came to see us on their behalf, asking us to support them in our Spiritist Review. It is a well-known fact that we are not easily enthusiastic, even with things that are familiar to us, and with even more reason with things that are unknow to us. We were then unable to promise an anticipated support, given our habit of only talking about things that we knew. Public opinion was divided in France as well as in England. In France they were only known from the contradictory reports in the papers. Hence, we could not censor them prematurely since this could be injustice, nor could we approve them, since the could have taken advantage of that. That was the reason for our abstention.
On their arrival they went to live in Gennevilliers’ Castle, near Paris, where they stayed for several months, without giving any public appearance. We do not know the reason for that absence. In recent days they gave some private sessions that were reported by the papers in a kind of picturesque way. Their public session was finally announced to September 12th, to take place at the Hertz theater. The outcome of that deplorable session is well-known; it renovated, in a lesser scale, the tumultuous events of Liverpool, in which one of the spectators jumped on the stage and broke a device used by the brothers and showing a board he said: “Here is the trick!”. Such outrageous attitude, unacceptable in a civilized country, led to the turmoil. The session was interrupted, and money returned to the public. However, since many tickets had been donated, the box office had a deficit of seventy francs, indicating that seventy spectators had come for free and left the theater with ten francs more in their pockets, undoubtedly to compensate for their expenses to attend the meeting. The controversy that was established about the Davenport brothers offers several teaching opportunities that we will examine.
The first question asked by the Spiritists themselves was this: Are those gentlemen mediums or not? All the facts reported in their biography enter the circle of mediumistic possibility, considering that analogous and notoriously authentic effects were produced many times under the influence of serious mediums. If the facts themselves are admissible, we must acknowledge that the circumstances in which they are produced lead to suspicion. The first one that shocks upfront is the need for dimly light, something that evidently facilitates fraud. But that alone would not constitute a strong objection. The mediumistic effects have absolutely nothing of supernatural; all of them, without exception, are due to the combination of fluids of the medium and the Spirit; those fluids, although imponderable, are nonetheless subtle matter. There is, therefore, a cause and effect that are in a certain way material; that led us to always say that since the Spiritist phenomena are based on the laws of nature, they have nothing of miraculous. As with many other phenomena, they only seem miraculous because their laws are unknown. The marvelous and the supernatural have disappeared now that those laws are known, giving place to reality. Therefore, there isn’t a single Spiritist that attribute miraculous skills to oneself. That is what critics would known if they took the burden of studying what they criticized.
Going back to the issue of darkness, it is also known that there are chemical combinations that cannot take place in the light; that there are combinations and chemical decompositions that are excited by light. Considering that every Spiritist phenomenon is the result of fluidic combination, as we said, and since those fluids are material, it wouldn’t be strange that in certain cases light would work against them.
A more serious objection is the timing to produce the phenomena, with scheduled day and time and at will. Such submission to the wishes of individuals is contrary to everything that is known about the nature of the Spirits, and the selective repetition of a given phenomenon must be rightfully considered suspicious, even when there is selflessness, and with more reason when related to profitable public exhibitions that make reason reject the idea that Spirits could submit themselves to that. Mediumship is a natural aptitude, inherent to the medium, like the ability to produce sound is inherent to a musical instrument; but as the instrument requires the musician to produce sound, the medium requires Spirits to produce mediumistic effects. The Spirits come when they wish and when they can, resulting that the best equipped medium sometimes obtains nothing. In that case it is like an instrument without the musician. That happens every day; it happened to Mr. Home that frequently would go for months without producing anything, despite his own will, even if in the presence of a sovereign.
If follows, therefore, from the very essence of mediumship, and that can be established as an absolute principle, that a medium is never certain that a given effect will be produced because that does not depend on her. Affirming the opposite would be total ignorance of the most elementary principles of the Spiritist science. In order to promise the production of a given phenomenon with a set time one needs to possess material resources that do not come from the Spirits. Is it the case with the Davenport brothers? We don’t know. Judgment can be passed by those that followed their experiences.
There was talk of proposed challenges and bets for the best magic. The Spirits are not con artists and a serious medium would never fight anyone, let alone a deceiver. The latter has his own means, the former is a passive instrument of a foreign, free and independent will and that cannot be controlled by anybody. If the con man says that he does more than the medium, let him do so. He is right because he acts with certainty; entertains the public and that is his purpose; he boasts about it and that is his role; he promotes it and that is a necessity for his position. The serious medium that knows to have no personal merit in what is done, is modest; cannot be proud of something that is not the product of his own talent or promise something that does not depend on oneself.
The mediums, however, do something else. Through them the good Spirits inspire charity and benevolence to all; they teach mankind to see everyone as brothers, without distinction of cast or sect; to forgive those that cause them harm; to overcome bad inclinations; to withstand the miseries of life with patience; to face death fearlessly for the certainty of a future life. They give consolation to those in suffering, courage to the weak, hope to the ones that did not believe, etc. What they do not teach is the magic of the deceivers nor that of the Davenports.
The inherent conditions of mediumship, therefore, cannot be submitted to regularity and punctuality, conditions that are necessary to scheduled sessions that must satisfy the public at any price. If, however, the Spirits supported such kind of manifestation, something that is not radically impossible, since there are Spirits at all possible level of advancement, those could only be of low classes because it would be totally absurd to think that other class of Spirits would come to have fun by making exhibitions. But even in that hypothetical case the medium would still depend on that Spirits that could leave the medium when their presence was more necessary and lead the presentation or consultation to failure. Since the theater goer must be compensated, if the Spirits do not show up, they must then be forgotten; with some skill it is easy to make the change. That is what commonly happens to mediums that were originally bestowed with real faculties but insufficient for the proposed objective.
Of all Spiritist phenomena, the physical effects are the ones that better facilitates imitation. Although the real manifestations have a distinct character and are only produced under determined conditions, the imitation may approach reality to the point of eluding people, particularly persons that do not know the laws that govern the true phenomena. But for the fact that they can be imitated it would be illogical to conclude that they do not exist as much as it would be illogical to conclude that there aren’t true diamonds for the fact that there are false ones.
We make no personal assumption here. We provide the principles based on reason and experience from where we come to this conclusion: that a scrupulous examination carried out with a thorough knowledge of the Spiritist phenomena is the only one capable of distinguishing deception from real mediumship. We add that the best of all guarantees is the respect and consideration associated to the medium, her morality and notorious honorability, her absolute moral and material altruïsm. Nobody disagrees that in such circumstances the quality of the individual constitutes precedent that impresses favorably because they rule out the suspicion of fraud.
We do not judge the Davenport brothers and far from us to doubt their honorability. But besides their moral quality that we have no reason to suspect, we must confess that they present themselves in conditions that are not much favorable to attest their condition of mediums, and that it is an enormous frivolity from the part of the critics that raise them to the position of apostles and priests of the doctrine. The objective of their voyage to Europe is clearly defined in this passage of their biography:
“I believe, without a doubt, that the Davenport’s brothers left New York on August 27th, bringing along a helper, Mr. Willian Fay, who was attending Mr. Willian Davenport’s illness; the former should not be confused with Mr. H. Melleville Fay, that as it seems was discovered in Canada by some sort of authority trying to produce some sort of similar effects. They were followed by Mr. Palmer, a well-known person in the business world as an agent in the world of theater and classical singing, to whom the commercial side of the enterprise was entrusted, thanks to his experience.”
It is then clear that it was a business enterprise, managed by a businessman, an agent of theatrical events. The facts reported in the biography are, as we heard, are possible in mediumistic terms; the age and the circumstances in which they began rule out the idea of charlatanism; it all tends to demonstrate that those young men were in fact mediums of physical effects, as there are many in their country and where the exploitation of such faculty became habit and does not surprise public opinion. What we cannot attest, since we do not have any proof of that, is the possible augmentation of their natural gifts, as other exploiting mediums did to increase their prestige and compensate for the lack of flexibility of those very gifts.
If we admit, however, the truthfulness of those faculties, we would say that they were eluded with respect to the European reception, since they were presented as a spectacle of curiosity, and in conditions much contrary to the principles of religious and philosophical Spiritism. The enlightened and sincere Spiritists that abound, particularly in France, could not welcome them in such conditions, neither to accept them as apostles, even considering that they are sincere. As for the non-believers, whose number is so large and still dominate the press, the occasion was perfect for them to exercise their vein of mockery, so that they could not let it go. Those gentlemen then opened the door to the widest criticism, giving people the same right of those that purchase any kind of ticket. There is no doubt that if they had presented themselves in a more serious manner the reception would have been different; they would have shut the mouth of the detractors. A medium is strong when able to say this courageously: “How much did you pay to come here and who invited you; God bestowed me a gift that can be withdrawn at God’s will, like the vision or the spoken word. I only use if for good, in the interest of truth and not to satisfy curiosity or my own interests. My only reward is the work of devotion; I do not try even to satisfy self-love for that faculty does not depend on me. I consider it a sacred thing since it puts me in communication with the spiritual world, allowing me to give faith to the non-believers and consolation to those in suffering. To me it is a sacrilege to trade with that because I do not have the right to sell the assistance of the Spirits that come to me for free. Considering that I take no advantage, I therefore have no interest in deceiving you.” A medium that can say so is strong, we repeat. It is a answer without replica and that always imposes respect.
In this present case the critic was malevolent; it was unfair and injurious and embraced all the Spiritists and all mediums in the same reproach, not sparing the most disrespectful labels, regardless of the amount of damage it might cause and that it would reach the most respectable families. We will not repeat the expressions that were used and that only dishonor the ones that produce them. Every sincere belief is respectable and all of you that constantly scream about the freedom of conscience as a natural right, at least respect those of others. You can discuss opinions, for that is your right, but calumny has always been the worst argument and never of a good cause.
Not all the press shares that deviation of civility; there are some, among the critics of the Davenport brothers, whose character does not exclude education and moderation, and that are fair. The one we are going to cite, points out precisely the weak spot that we mentioned above. It was taken from the “Courrier de Paris du Monde Illustré”, on September 16th, 1865, signed by Neuter.
“A first objection seemed enough to me to demonstrate that the good young men that gave a public display at the Hertz theater were skillful in tricks completely strange to the superior worlds. This objection is taken from the very regularity with which they exploited their supposedly miraculous power. Since they gave guarantees that it was the Spirits that came to manifest publicly in their benefit, the Davenports treated them as servants and with the same familiarity that the director of a play treats his chorus girls. They never asked if their super-human accomplices were tired, if the date was convenient to them, if the heat bothered them, and yet the scheduled a precise day and time, expecting that the fluidic beings were available and played their roles at that moment, executing their musical jokes with the precision of a musician to whom their concert-café yields the fee of 1 franc.
They did not ask their super-human accomplices if the day was good for them, if they were tired, if it was not too hot and still scheduled a fixed date and time, and it was expected that the fluidic beings were okay at that moment, that they played their role on time, executed their little musical tricks with the precision of a musician to whom the café-concert would pay a one franc fee!
Seriously, that is a petty idea of the spiritual world, presenting it like that to us, like a village of commanded genies, commissioned elves that go to a given city attending a signal of their master. No rest to the super terrestrial actors! When a sudden illness of the show-off gives him the right of rescheduling the spectacle, the souls of the Davenports lot are slaves that must attend at any time. It is hard to live in fantastic planets to become reduced to such a degree of slavery. And what is the task attributed to those unfortunate souls from beyond the grave? Make their hands – the hands of souls – pass through the cracks of an armoire. Take them down to the exhibition level of jesters! Make them play guitars, those grotesque instruments refused even by the wandering minstrels in search of a few cents!”
Isn’t that in fact like touching a sore spot? If only Mr. Neuter knew that Spiritism says precisely the same thing, although in a less witty way, he would then have said: “But this is not Spiritism!” absolutely in the same way, when he sees a charlatan, he says: “This is not medicine.” Since neither science nor religion support abuse, Spiritism does not support those that use its name either. The bad impression that the author had was not of the persons of the Davenports but from the condition that they place themselves before the public and from the ridiculous idea that they pass of the spiritual world, something that even non-believers are shocked to see displayed on the stage. That was the impression of critics in general, translated by him in a kind of polite way. This will always be the case when the mediums are not ready to respect the belief that they profess. The hardship of the Davenports is a lucky strike to the adversaries of Spiritism that, in turn, hurry to boast victory and ridicule the followers as much as they can, screaming at them that their belief is mortally wounded, as if Spiritism was incarnate in the Davenports brothers. Spiritism is incarnate in nobody. It is in nature and nobody can preclude its march, because those that try, in fact, work to make it progress. Spiritism is not about tying someone with ropes, nor it is about this or that physical experimentation. Spiritism has never sponsored those gentlemen, nor has it presented them as cornerstones of the doctrine that they did not even know, hence it cannot be belied by their adversity. Their failure is not a blow against Spiritism but against those that exploit Spiritism.
It must be one of the two: they either are con men or true mediums. If they are charlatans, we must thank all the others that helped to unmask them; with that regards we owe Mr. Robin special thanks for in the present case he does a great service to Spiritism that would have suffered if people believed in their frauds. Every time the press pointed out abuse, exploitation or maneuvers to compromise the doctrine, the sincere Spirits, far from regretting it they applauded. If they are true mediums, the conditions in which they present themselves does not produce a favorable impression and cannot be useful to the cause. In one case or the other Spiritism has no interest in taking sides in their favor.
Now, what is going to be the result of such uproar? Here it is: the chronicle that was starving in these days of tropical heat gains a subject with that, quickly grabbing it to fulfil their lacking columns of political and theatrical news. Mr. Robin finds there an excellent publicity for his theater of conjurers, something that he exploited skillfully, and we wish him well since there he speaks of the Spiritists and Spiritism every day. With that criticism loses some of its consideration, given the eccentricity and lack of civility of the controversy. Materially speaking perhaps, the least benefited are the Davenports, whose speculation is markedly compromised.
Spiritism is evidently the one that should benefit the most. Its followers understand it so well that they are not absolutely moved by the situation and wait the result with confidence. In the country side where they are affected by the mockery of the adversaries even more than in Paris, they simply respond: Wait and soon you shall see who is going to be dead and buried. With that, Spiritism in principle will gain immense popularity and shall become known, at least by name, by many people that had never heard of it. But among them many do not limit themselves to the name. Their curiosity is excited by the fury of the attacks; they want to know what is behind such a doctrine, that some say is ridiculous; they will search at the source and when they see that they were just making fun and will tell themselves that is it not something bad. Spiritism will then gain for being better understood, judged and appreciated.
It will also gain by putting in evidence the sincere and devout followers with whom it can count on, separating them from the superficial followers. The adversaries will still try to exploit the circumstances to bring divisions or defections, true or simulated, using it as support to destroy Spiritism. After having failed from all other means, this is their ultimate way out; however, it will also fail, only separating the dead branches from the trunk, branches that produced no sap and hence reenergizing the tree.
These results, and several others that we abstain from listing, are inevitable and we would not be surprised by learning that it was the Spirits themselves that provoked all that uproar to reach such object more promptly.
[1] See bibliographic bulletin
Funeral of a Spiritist
The speech below was given by us during the funeral of Mr. Nant, one of our colleagues from the Parisian Society of September 23rd, 1865. We had it published following a request by the family and because given the circumstances reported in the preceding article, it shows where the true doctrine is.
“Ladies and gentlemen of the Spiritist Society of Paris, and all of you our brothers in belief that are present here; Only a month ago we came here to pay our last respects to one of our former colleagues, Mr. Dozon.[1] The departure of another brother brings us back here today. Mr. Nant, member of the Society, has just delivered his mortal remains to earth, now coating the brilliant envelope of the Spirits. Have we come to say the last farewell, using the acclaimed expression? No, because we know that death is not only the entry point of the new life but just a separation of a few moments and that the emptiness that it leaves at home is just apparent. Oh, sweet and sacred belief, that incessantly shows us the loved ones by our side. If it were an illusion it should be blessed because it fills our hearts with consolation! But no, it is not an empty hope; it is a reality, daily attested by the relationships established between the dead and the living one, according to the flesh. Blessed therefore the science that shows us the tomb as the throne of freedom, teaching us to face death without fear. Oh, my brothers! Let us be sorry for those who are still blinded by the veil of disbelief. Those are the ones that suffer terrible apprehension before death. The ones that survive see it as more than a separation; it is the eternal destruction of their loved ones. For the one that sees the last our approaching, it is the abyss of emptiness, opening before their eyes, a terrible thought that legitimates anguish and desperation.
What a difference to the one that not only believe in a future life but understands it and identifies oneself with that! He no longer marches with anxiety towards the unknown, but with the confidence towards the new paths that opens before his eyes. He presents them, calmly counting the seconds that still separate him, like the traveler that approaches the end of the journey and knows that he will find rest and the warmth welcome of friends. That was the case with Mr. Nant; his life was that of a good man by excellence; his death was that of the righteous and true Spiritist. His faith in the teachings of our doctrine was sincere and enlightened; he drank immense consolations in that faith during his life; he found resignation for the sufferings that brought him to this end, and a shiny calmness at his last moments. He offered us a touching example of conscious death; he followed the progress of the separation with lucidity, without commotions, and when he felt that the last link had ruptured, he blessed those around; then he held the hands of his ten-year-old grandson and placed them onto his own eyes, shutting them. He exhaled his last breath a few seconds later and said: Ah, I see! His grandson then taken by a violent emotion fell asleep, induced by the Spirits. In his ecstasy he saw the soul of his grandfather followed by several other Spirits, rising in space, but still connected to the corporeal envelope by the fluidic cordon. Thus, as the doors of the earthly life closed before him, those of the spiritual world opened and whose splendors the foresaw. What a sublime and touching spectacle! Why his witnesses were not those that make so much fun of this science that reveals such consoling mysteries to us? They would have greeted it with respect, instead of ridicule. Let us forgive them if they throw irony and slander; they do not know it and search for it where it is not!
As from our side, let us say grace to the Lord that wanted to remove from our eyes the veil that separates us from a future life, because death is only terrible to those that foresee nothing beyond. By teaching us where we come from, where to go next and why we are on Earth, Spiritism has given us immense benefit, giving us courage, resignation and hope.
Dear Mr. Nant, we follow you in our thoughts in the world of the Spirits, where you are going to harvest the fruit of your terrestrial trials and the virtues that you exemplified. Receive our good-bye up to the moment when we shall be allowed to meet again.
You have undoubtedly seen our brother that preceded you not long ago, Mr. Dozon, that certainly follows you now. We join him in the prayer that we are going to say to God, in your favor.
(here it is said the prayer that is found in the Gospels According to Spiritism, for those that have just left Earth)
Note: At the time of the printing of this current issue of the Spiritist Review we learned that Mr. Nant, through his will, left 2,000 francs to be applied in the propagation of Spiritism.
[1] Mr. Dozon, author of Revelations from beyond the grave, 4 vol., deceased in Passy, Paris, August 1st, 1865
“Ladies and gentlemen of the Spiritist Society of Paris, and all of you our brothers in belief that are present here; Only a month ago we came here to pay our last respects to one of our former colleagues, Mr. Dozon.[1] The departure of another brother brings us back here today. Mr. Nant, member of the Society, has just delivered his mortal remains to earth, now coating the brilliant envelope of the Spirits. Have we come to say the last farewell, using the acclaimed expression? No, because we know that death is not only the entry point of the new life but just a separation of a few moments and that the emptiness that it leaves at home is just apparent. Oh, sweet and sacred belief, that incessantly shows us the loved ones by our side. If it were an illusion it should be blessed because it fills our hearts with consolation! But no, it is not an empty hope; it is a reality, daily attested by the relationships established between the dead and the living one, according to the flesh. Blessed therefore the science that shows us the tomb as the throne of freedom, teaching us to face death without fear. Oh, my brothers! Let us be sorry for those who are still blinded by the veil of disbelief. Those are the ones that suffer terrible apprehension before death. The ones that survive see it as more than a separation; it is the eternal destruction of their loved ones. For the one that sees the last our approaching, it is the abyss of emptiness, opening before their eyes, a terrible thought that legitimates anguish and desperation.
What a difference to the one that not only believe in a future life but understands it and identifies oneself with that! He no longer marches with anxiety towards the unknown, but with the confidence towards the new paths that opens before his eyes. He presents them, calmly counting the seconds that still separate him, like the traveler that approaches the end of the journey and knows that he will find rest and the warmth welcome of friends. That was the case with Mr. Nant; his life was that of a good man by excellence; his death was that of the righteous and true Spiritist. His faith in the teachings of our doctrine was sincere and enlightened; he drank immense consolations in that faith during his life; he found resignation for the sufferings that brought him to this end, and a shiny calmness at his last moments. He offered us a touching example of conscious death; he followed the progress of the separation with lucidity, without commotions, and when he felt that the last link had ruptured, he blessed those around; then he held the hands of his ten-year-old grandson and placed them onto his own eyes, shutting them. He exhaled his last breath a few seconds later and said: Ah, I see! His grandson then taken by a violent emotion fell asleep, induced by the Spirits. In his ecstasy he saw the soul of his grandfather followed by several other Spirits, rising in space, but still connected to the corporeal envelope by the fluidic cordon. Thus, as the doors of the earthly life closed before him, those of the spiritual world opened and whose splendors the foresaw. What a sublime and touching spectacle! Why his witnesses were not those that make so much fun of this science that reveals such consoling mysteries to us? They would have greeted it with respect, instead of ridicule. Let us forgive them if they throw irony and slander; they do not know it and search for it where it is not!
As from our side, let us say grace to the Lord that wanted to remove from our eyes the veil that separates us from a future life, because death is only terrible to those that foresee nothing beyond. By teaching us where we come from, where to go next and why we are on Earth, Spiritism has given us immense benefit, giving us courage, resignation and hope.
Dear Mr. Nant, we follow you in our thoughts in the world of the Spirits, where you are going to harvest the fruit of your terrestrial trials and the virtues that you exemplified. Receive our good-bye up to the moment when we shall be allowed to meet again.
You have undoubtedly seen our brother that preceded you not long ago, Mr. Dozon, that certainly follows you now. We join him in the prayer that we are going to say to God, in your favor.
(here it is said the prayer that is found in the Gospels According to Spiritism, for those that have just left Earth)
Note: At the time of the printing of this current issue of the Spiritist Review we learned that Mr. Nant, through his will, left 2,000 francs to be applied in the propagation of Spiritism.
[1] Mr. Dozon, author of Revelations from beyond the grave, 4 vol., deceased in Passy, Paris, August 1st, 1865
Varieties
Your sons and your daughters will prophesy
Mr. Delanne, known by many readers already, has an eight-year-old son. The boy hears about Spiritism all the time in his family and sometimes attend sessions directed by his father and his mother; he was then initiated in the doctrine since an early age and impresses by his knowledge of the principles of the doctrine. No surprise there since it is an echo of the ideas that cradled him. But that is not the object of the current article. This is just an introduction of the theme that we will report and that fits in the current events.
Mr. Delanne’s meetings are serious and managed in a perfect order, as must be the case to all others that wish to collect fruits. Although the written communications come in first place there, they also utilize as an accessory and complement instruction, physical manifestations and tiptology, but always with a serious teaching objective and never out of curiosity.
Directed with method and reverence and always supported by some theoretical explanations, those gathering are in the desired condition to lead to conviction by the impressions that they cause. These are the conditions in which physical manifestations are really useful; they speak to the soul and impose silence to mockery. We feel in the presence of a phenomenon of profound meaning and that keeps playfulness at a distance. If that kind of frequently abused manifestation was always presented in such a manner, instead of an entertainment and pretext to ask silly questions, the critics would not have called it charlatanism. Unfortunately, this is what people frequently allow to happen.
Mr. Delanne’s son attended those manifestations many times and influenced by the good example, considered them a serious thing. One day he was in the house of an acquainted person, playing with his five-year-old cousin and two boys, one seven and the other four years old. A lady that lived on the ground floor invited them in and offered them chocolate candies. The children did not refuse that, as one can imagine.
The lady then asked Mr. Delanne’s son:
-What is your name, my dear?
-My name is Gabriel, man.
-What does your father do?
-My father is a Spiritist, mam.
-I don’t know that profession.
-But mam, it is not a profession; my father is not payed for that, he does it without self interest and to do good to people.
-My young man, I don’t know what you mean.
-How come? Haven’t you heard of turning tables?
-Well my friend, it would be nice to have your father here to make them turn.
-It is not necessary mam, I can do it and make them turn.
-Can you then do it and show me how to proceed?
-With pleasure mam.
Having said that he sat near a little table and had his three little friends joining him; he seriously had them all placing their hands on the table. Gabriel then made an evocation with a very serious ton and with reverence. He had hardly finished when the table lifted in the air and knocked with energy. You may enquire, man, who is coming to answer through the table. The neighbor asked and the table spelled the following words: Your father. The woman’s face became paled by the emotion. She continued. Then, father, should I send the letter that I have just written? Yes, rightly so, said the table.
-To prove that it is you, my good father, can you tell me how long have you been dead? The table immediately knocked eight marked times. The number eight years was correct.
-Can you tell me your name and the city where you died? The table spelled the two names.
-The lady wept and she could no longer continue, terrified by the revelation and dominated by emotion.
This fact notably defies any suspicion of preparation of an instrument, preconceived idea and charlatanism. The two spelled out names can not be considered the works of chance either. We doubt very much that this lady would have had such an impression in the sessions of the Davenports, or in any other of the same kind. Besides this is not the first time that mediumship reveals in children, in the intimacy of their families. Isn’t that the accomplishment of those prophetic words: Your sons and daughters will prophesy (Acts, II:17)
Mr. Delanne’s meetings are serious and managed in a perfect order, as must be the case to all others that wish to collect fruits. Although the written communications come in first place there, they also utilize as an accessory and complement instruction, physical manifestations and tiptology, but always with a serious teaching objective and never out of curiosity.
Directed with method and reverence and always supported by some theoretical explanations, those gathering are in the desired condition to lead to conviction by the impressions that they cause. These are the conditions in which physical manifestations are really useful; they speak to the soul and impose silence to mockery. We feel in the presence of a phenomenon of profound meaning and that keeps playfulness at a distance. If that kind of frequently abused manifestation was always presented in such a manner, instead of an entertainment and pretext to ask silly questions, the critics would not have called it charlatanism. Unfortunately, this is what people frequently allow to happen.
Mr. Delanne’s son attended those manifestations many times and influenced by the good example, considered them a serious thing. One day he was in the house of an acquainted person, playing with his five-year-old cousin and two boys, one seven and the other four years old. A lady that lived on the ground floor invited them in and offered them chocolate candies. The children did not refuse that, as one can imagine.
The lady then asked Mr. Delanne’s son:
-What is your name, my dear?
-My name is Gabriel, man.
-What does your father do?
-My father is a Spiritist, mam.
-I don’t know that profession.
-But mam, it is not a profession; my father is not payed for that, he does it without self interest and to do good to people.
-My young man, I don’t know what you mean.
-How come? Haven’t you heard of turning tables?
-Well my friend, it would be nice to have your father here to make them turn.
-It is not necessary mam, I can do it and make them turn.
-Can you then do it and show me how to proceed?
-With pleasure mam.
Having said that he sat near a little table and had his three little friends joining him; he seriously had them all placing their hands on the table. Gabriel then made an evocation with a very serious ton and with reverence. He had hardly finished when the table lifted in the air and knocked with energy. You may enquire, man, who is coming to answer through the table. The neighbor asked and the table spelled the following words: Your father. The woman’s face became paled by the emotion. She continued. Then, father, should I send the letter that I have just written? Yes, rightly so, said the table.
-To prove that it is you, my good father, can you tell me how long have you been dead? The table immediately knocked eight marked times. The number eight years was correct.
-Can you tell me your name and the city where you died? The table spelled the two names.
-The lady wept and she could no longer continue, terrified by the revelation and dominated by emotion.
This fact notably defies any suspicion of preparation of an instrument, preconceived idea and charlatanism. The two spelled out names can not be considered the works of chance either. We doubt very much that this lady would have had such an impression in the sessions of the Davenports, or in any other of the same kind. Besides this is not the first time that mediumship reveals in children, in the intimacy of their families. Isn’t that the accomplishment of those prophetic words: Your sons and daughters will prophesy (Acts, II:17)
November
To the Spiritist Society of Paris, the Spiritists of France and AbroadA recent event gave our adversaries an opportunity to renew their attacks against our doctrine with a level of aggression that had never been used before, casting sarcasm and slander upon its followers. Some people may have had their opinion deviated for a short while, but the writing as well as verbal protests were so broad that it is now going back. You all understand that Spiritism is based on unshakable foundations to yield to any attack and that this outbreak will only help to have it better understood and more popularized.
It is proper to all great truths to be baptized by persecution. The animosities raised against Spiritism are the proof of its importance because, if judged useless, people would not pay any attention. In the recent conflict all the Spiritists kept their calm and moderation, the signs of true strength; all received the shock with courage; nobody doubted the result, and rest assured that such attitude, at the same time strong and dignifying, responding to the attacks and acrimony of our detractors, allows us to ponder and think a lot about the opinion. The impartial public makes no mistake. Even not considering the fact and the cause in favor of one or another, a secret sympathy attracts them to the one that remains dignified in the discussion. The comparison is always advantageous. Therefore, the latest events conquered many supporters to Spiritism.
At this opportunity the Spiritist Society of Paris is happy to offer every brother of France and abroad its congratulations and the sincerest thanks. In the new struggles that may occur, it counts on all of you as you can count on the Society.
With our warmest and kind devotion,
In the name of the members of the Society,
The President, Allan Kardec
(Unanimously approved in the session on October 27th, 1865)
It is proper to all great truths to be baptized by persecution. The animosities raised against Spiritism are the proof of its importance because, if judged useless, people would not pay any attention. In the recent conflict all the Spiritists kept their calm and moderation, the signs of true strength; all received the shock with courage; nobody doubted the result, and rest assured that such attitude, at the same time strong and dignifying, responding to the attacks and acrimony of our detractors, allows us to ponder and think a lot about the opinion. The impartial public makes no mistake. Even not considering the fact and the cause in favor of one or another, a secret sympathy attracts them to the one that remains dignified in the discussion. The comparison is always advantageous. Therefore, the latest events conquered many supporters to Spiritism.
At this opportunity the Spiritist Society of Paris is happy to offer every brother of France and abroad its congratulations and the sincerest thanks. In the new struggles that may occur, it counts on all of you as you can count on the Society.
With our warmest and kind devotion,
In the name of the members of the Society,
The President, Allan Kardec
(Unanimously approved in the session on October 27th, 1865)
Speech Given at the reopening of the sessions at the Parisian Society, on October 6th, 1865
Ladies and gentlemen,
At the time of resuming our works, it is a great satisfaction to all of us, and to me in particular, to meet again. We will undoubtedly meet our spiritual guides also. Let us hope that with their support this will be a great year in results. Allow me, at this opportunity, to address you with a few words.
Since our separation, there was a huge uproar about Spiritism. In fact, I only heard about it when I came back from my retreat in the mountains, where only a few rumors came to my ears. I will not enter the details, superfluous now, and regarding my personal appreciation you know it from what I wrote in the Spiritist Review. I will only add one word. Everything comes to confirm my opinion about the consequences of what happened. I am happy to see that such appreciation is shared by the great majority, if not unanimously by the Spiritists, and I have daily proofs of that in my correspondence. An evident aspect sticks out from the controversy established during the passage of the Davenports brothers: it is the absolute ignorance of the critics about Spiritism. The confusion that they establish between serious Spiritism and charlatanism may, undoubtedly, induce some people to err, but is notable that the very eccentricity of their language led many people to question what is fair about Spiritism, and were greatly surprised of find things much different from magic. Spiritism will therefore win, as I said, by becoming better known and appreciated. Such consequence, that is far from being the result of chance, will certainly speed up the development of the doctrine. We can say that it is a stranglehold whose result will soon be felt. Besides, Spiritism will soon enter a new phase that will certainly draw the attention of those indifferent, and what has just happened will level the field. This will be the realization of the prophetic words of father D…, whose communication was cited in the Spiritist Review: “The educated people will be your most powerful allies”. The are already, and unwillingly, but will be voluntarily later. There are circumstances in preparation that will precipitate that result, and it is with confidence that I say that lately the interests of Spiritism advanced more than one would suppose. Since our separation I learned many things, ladies and gentlemen. Please do not believe that this interruption of our common works made me enjoy the “dolce far niente”[1]. It is true that I did not visit Spiritist Centers, but it does not mean that I saw less and observed less, and for that very reason I worked a lot. The events move rapidly, and as the work I still need to finish is considerable, I must hurry and be ready when the time is right. Given the greatness and seriousness of the events that make us present everything, secondary incidents are insignificant; personal things pass but the fundamental ones stay.
Hence, we must give only relative weight to certain things, and as far as I am concerned, I must push away from my concerns what is secondary and that could delay or veer me off from the main objective. That objective is more and more delineated, and what I learned lately was particularly the means of reaching it more safely and to overcome obstacles.
May God spare me from the presumption of considering myself the only one capable, or better equipped than any one else, or the only one assigned with the mission designed by the Providence. No. Such a thought is far from me. In this great movement of renovation, I have my part in the action. I therefore only talk about what is up to me; what I can then affirm, and without a bigmouth, is that I will not lack courage and perseverance in the role that is assigned to me. I have never yielded, but today that I see the path illuminated by a wonderful clarity, I feel my strength grow. I have never doubted, but thanks to the new lights that God wanted to give me, I am sure, and I say it to all my brothers and with more certainty than ever: Courage, perseverance, because a magnificent success will crown our efforts.
Despite the advanced state of Spiritism, it would be naïve to believe that from now on it will march without obstacles. On the contrary, we must expect new struggles and new difficulties. Thus, we will still have to difficult situations because our adversaries will not lay down their weapons and will fight for every inch of the terrain. But it is in critical moments that the strong hearts and true devotions are known. It is when profound convictions are distinguished from superficial or simulated beliefs. There is no merit in showing courage in times of peace. At this very moment our invisible chiefs count their soldiers and their difficulty is the find those that can support them. To us it is also a means of identifying who is really with us and who is against us.
The tactic of our adversaries at this time – it is never too much to repeat – is to try to divide the followers, throwing the seed of disagreement, exciting true or simulated weaknesses; and, it is necessary to say, they have the support of certain Spirits disturbed by the appearance of a faith that must interconnect peoples in a common feeling of fraternity. Thus, these words from one of our spiritual guides are perfectly true: “Spiritism revolutionizes the visible and the invisible worlds.” Our adversaries have, for some time, aimed at the societies and Spiritist gatherings, where they sow in profusion the seed of disagreement and jealousy. Short-sighted people, blinded by passion, believe to have conquered a great victory when succeeded in cause some local disturbance, as if Spiritism were entrenched somewhere or incarnate in some individuals! It is everywhere, on Earth and in Space! The movement is not driven by men but by the Spirits, the representatives of God. It is irresistible for it is Providential. Hence, it is not a human revolution that may be stopped by material force. Who would then believe to be able to block it by throwing a little pebble under the wagon? A pigmy in the hand of God, to be dragged by the maelstrom.
May all sincere Spiritists unite in a sacred communion of thoughts, to face the storm; may all that are convinced of the greatness of the object, put aside petty secondary issues, silence the susceptibilities of the self-love to only see the importance of the results to which the Providence drives humanity.
From that elevated point of view, what becomes of the Davenports’ issue? Nonetheless, despite being secondary, this is a wake-up call. It imposes special duties to all Spiritists, and in particular to us. As well-known, those that confound Spiritism with charlatanism lack knowledge about what Spiritism is. They can undoubtedly learn about it from the books, if they wish to do so. It is not enough to say that it is a beautiful doctrine; it is necessary to have it applied by those that profess it. It is then up to the supporters of the cause to demonstrate it by their behavior, be it in private or in the meetings, avoiding with the maximum care anything that can feed malevolence and produce an unfavorable impression in the skeptical. Anyone that is embedded in the principles of the doctrine can dare defy criticism and will never face the censorship of authority or the severity of the law.
In evidence more than any other, the Parisian Society must give the example. We are all glad to see that it has never failed its duties and for seeing acknowledged its eminently serious character, for the gravity and reverence of its gatherings. It is one more reason to scrupulously avoid the appearances that could compromise the reputation that it had conquered. It is up to each one of us to watch for that, in the own interest of the cause. The function of member or medium must be a title of trust and consideration. I then count on the cooperation of all of our colleagues, each one at the limit of their possibilities. We must not forget that personal issues must fade away before the general interest. The times before us are grave, I repeat, and each one of us will have their mission, little or great. We must be prepared to accomplish that and we shall be accounted for. Please forgive my language somewhat harsh at the beginning of our activities but I am forced by the circumstances.
Ladies and gentlemen, one of our colleagues is physically absent to the roll call. During our recess, Mr. Nant, father of our excellent Spiritist, Mrs. Breul, returned to the spiritual world, from where, God willing, will kindly come to us. We paid him the just tribute in his funerals; we believe appropriate to renovate it today and will be happy if he can momentarily kindly address us with a few words, and in the future join the good Spirits that help us with their advices. Let us beg, ladies and gentlemen, that they may continue to provide us with their assistance.
[1] Pleasant idleness (T.N.)
Since our separation, there was a huge uproar about Spiritism. In fact, I only heard about it when I came back from my retreat in the mountains, where only a few rumors came to my ears. I will not enter the details, superfluous now, and regarding my personal appreciation you know it from what I wrote in the Spiritist Review. I will only add one word. Everything comes to confirm my opinion about the consequences of what happened. I am happy to see that such appreciation is shared by the great majority, if not unanimously by the Spiritists, and I have daily proofs of that in my correspondence. An evident aspect sticks out from the controversy established during the passage of the Davenports brothers: it is the absolute ignorance of the critics about Spiritism. The confusion that they establish between serious Spiritism and charlatanism may, undoubtedly, induce some people to err, but is notable that the very eccentricity of their language led many people to question what is fair about Spiritism, and were greatly surprised of find things much different from magic. Spiritism will therefore win, as I said, by becoming better known and appreciated. Such consequence, that is far from being the result of chance, will certainly speed up the development of the doctrine. We can say that it is a stranglehold whose result will soon be felt. Besides, Spiritism will soon enter a new phase that will certainly draw the attention of those indifferent, and what has just happened will level the field. This will be the realization of the prophetic words of father D…, whose communication was cited in the Spiritist Review: “The educated people will be your most powerful allies”. The are already, and unwillingly, but will be voluntarily later. There are circumstances in preparation that will precipitate that result, and it is with confidence that I say that lately the interests of Spiritism advanced more than one would suppose. Since our separation I learned many things, ladies and gentlemen. Please do not believe that this interruption of our common works made me enjoy the “dolce far niente”[1]. It is true that I did not visit Spiritist Centers, but it does not mean that I saw less and observed less, and for that very reason I worked a lot. The events move rapidly, and as the work I still need to finish is considerable, I must hurry and be ready when the time is right. Given the greatness and seriousness of the events that make us present everything, secondary incidents are insignificant; personal things pass but the fundamental ones stay.
Hence, we must give only relative weight to certain things, and as far as I am concerned, I must push away from my concerns what is secondary and that could delay or veer me off from the main objective. That objective is more and more delineated, and what I learned lately was particularly the means of reaching it more safely and to overcome obstacles.
May God spare me from the presumption of considering myself the only one capable, or better equipped than any one else, or the only one assigned with the mission designed by the Providence. No. Such a thought is far from me. In this great movement of renovation, I have my part in the action. I therefore only talk about what is up to me; what I can then affirm, and without a bigmouth, is that I will not lack courage and perseverance in the role that is assigned to me. I have never yielded, but today that I see the path illuminated by a wonderful clarity, I feel my strength grow. I have never doubted, but thanks to the new lights that God wanted to give me, I am sure, and I say it to all my brothers and with more certainty than ever: Courage, perseverance, because a magnificent success will crown our efforts.
Despite the advanced state of Spiritism, it would be naïve to believe that from now on it will march without obstacles. On the contrary, we must expect new struggles and new difficulties. Thus, we will still have to difficult situations because our adversaries will not lay down their weapons and will fight for every inch of the terrain. But it is in critical moments that the strong hearts and true devotions are known. It is when profound convictions are distinguished from superficial or simulated beliefs. There is no merit in showing courage in times of peace. At this very moment our invisible chiefs count their soldiers and their difficulty is the find those that can support them. To us it is also a means of identifying who is really with us and who is against us.
The tactic of our adversaries at this time – it is never too much to repeat – is to try to divide the followers, throwing the seed of disagreement, exciting true or simulated weaknesses; and, it is necessary to say, they have the support of certain Spirits disturbed by the appearance of a faith that must interconnect peoples in a common feeling of fraternity. Thus, these words from one of our spiritual guides are perfectly true: “Spiritism revolutionizes the visible and the invisible worlds.” Our adversaries have, for some time, aimed at the societies and Spiritist gatherings, where they sow in profusion the seed of disagreement and jealousy. Short-sighted people, blinded by passion, believe to have conquered a great victory when succeeded in cause some local disturbance, as if Spiritism were entrenched somewhere or incarnate in some individuals! It is everywhere, on Earth and in Space! The movement is not driven by men but by the Spirits, the representatives of God. It is irresistible for it is Providential. Hence, it is not a human revolution that may be stopped by material force. Who would then believe to be able to block it by throwing a little pebble under the wagon? A pigmy in the hand of God, to be dragged by the maelstrom.
May all sincere Spiritists unite in a sacred communion of thoughts, to face the storm; may all that are convinced of the greatness of the object, put aside petty secondary issues, silence the susceptibilities of the self-love to only see the importance of the results to which the Providence drives humanity.
From that elevated point of view, what becomes of the Davenports’ issue? Nonetheless, despite being secondary, this is a wake-up call. It imposes special duties to all Spiritists, and in particular to us. As well-known, those that confound Spiritism with charlatanism lack knowledge about what Spiritism is. They can undoubtedly learn about it from the books, if they wish to do so. It is not enough to say that it is a beautiful doctrine; it is necessary to have it applied by those that profess it. It is then up to the supporters of the cause to demonstrate it by their behavior, be it in private or in the meetings, avoiding with the maximum care anything that can feed malevolence and produce an unfavorable impression in the skeptical. Anyone that is embedded in the principles of the doctrine can dare defy criticism and will never face the censorship of authority or the severity of the law.
In evidence more than any other, the Parisian Society must give the example. We are all glad to see that it has never failed its duties and for seeing acknowledged its eminently serious character, for the gravity and reverence of its gatherings. It is one more reason to scrupulously avoid the appearances that could compromise the reputation that it had conquered. It is up to each one of us to watch for that, in the own interest of the cause. The function of member or medium must be a title of trust and consideration. I then count on the cooperation of all of our colleagues, each one at the limit of their possibilities. We must not forget that personal issues must fade away before the general interest. The times before us are grave, I repeat, and each one of us will have their mission, little or great. We must be prepared to accomplish that and we shall be accounted for. Please forgive my language somewhat harsh at the beginning of our activities but I am forced by the circumstances.
Ladies and gentlemen, one of our colleagues is physically absent to the roll call. During our recess, Mr. Nant, father of our excellent Spiritist, Mrs. Breul, returned to the spiritual world, from where, God willing, will kindly come to us. We paid him the just tribute in his funerals; we believe appropriate to renovate it today and will be happy if he can momentarily kindly address us with a few words, and in the future join the good Spirits that help us with their advices. Let us beg, ladies and gentlemen, that they may continue to provide us with their assistance.
[1] Pleasant idleness (T.N.)
Criticism of the Davenport Brothers
2nd Article
The agitation caused by the Davenport brothers begins to calm down. After the blow swung by the press against them and Spiritism there are only a few shooters left that here and turn fire the last shots, waiting for another subject that may excite public curiosity. Who are the winners? Is Spiritism dead? They will soon find out. Let us suppose that criticism had killed the Davenports, something that is not of our concern. What would be the outcome? What we said in the preceding article. In their ignorance about Spiritism they shot at those gentlemen, exactly like the hunter shots at a cat thinking that it is a hare: the cat is dead but the hare is still running.
It is what happens to Spiritism, that was not nor could be reached by the attacks it receives on its flanks. The critic was then wrong and that could have been avoided had they known Spiritism. There was enough warning. Some writers even confessed the influence of the refutations that came from all sides, and that from the part of the most honorable persons. Shouldn’t that be an eye opener to them? They were, however, walking on a path from which they did not want to back up; they needed to be right at any price. Many of such refutations were sent to us. All of them were distinguished by a moderation that contrasts with the language of our adversaries, and most of them are fair in their appreciation. It is certain that nobody wanted to impose an opinion to those gentlemen, but it is a duty of impartiality to admit corrections, in order to give public opinion the necessary conditions to analyze the pros and cons. Now, since it is more convenient to be right when one is talking to oneself, many of those corrections did not see the light of publicity. Who knows if even their majority were read? We must then be grateful to the newspapers that were less exclusivists. Among them we find the “Journal des Pyrénées-Orientales”, that in its last issue of October 8th, published the following letter:
“Perpignan, October 5th, 1865
Dear Mr. Editor,
I do not wish to get into the controversy; I just request your fairness in allowing me, just once, to respond to the open attacks found in the Parisian Letter, published in the last issue of your Journal, against the Spiritists and Spiritism. The true Spiritists, like the true Catholics, do not give public spectacles. They are embedded in the respect of their faith, they aspire for the general progress of everybody, and they do not seek to proselytize on stages. With respect to the Davenport brothers, there would be a lot to say in order to repudiate the errors of the author of those sarcastic attacks. I will just say that since God gave mankind free-will, the act of precluding someone’s belief, or censoring someone’s thoughts is like placing oneself above God, and consequently, a huge sin of pride. When we say that this new science has made immense progress, and that many cities count on large number of followers; that it has its headquarters and presidents, and that its meetings count on the attendance of scholars, renowned people for their positions in the civil and military societies, in law and magistracy, when we say that isn’t the same as saying that Spiritism is based on the truth? If Spiritism is a mistake why are people worried about it? Mistakes have only a short existence, like a will-o-the-wisp that lasts a few hours and disappears. If, on the contrary, it is a truth, however much you try you cannot destroy it. Truth is like light: only the blind ones deny its beauty. Some also say that Spiritism has provoked cases of mental disorder. I say this: Spiritism has not caused madness as well as Christianity and the other cults are not responsible for the cases of mental illnesses that many times are found among the followers of those several religions. Badly informed minds are subjected to enthusiasm and misunderstandings. Let us then leave, once for all, this last argument at the arsenal of the outdated weapons.
I finish this answer by saying that Spiritism came to destroy nothing but the belief in the eternal punishments. It strengths our faith in God; makes it evident that the soul is immortal and that the Spirit depurates and progresses through the reincarnations; it demonstrates that the different social positions have a reason; it teaches us to withstand our trials, whatever they may be; finally, it demonstrates to us that there is only one path leading us to God: the love for good and charity!
With my most sincere thanks and respectful greetings, I have the honor of being your server,
Breux.”
All the refutations that we have before us and that were addressed to the newspapers, protest the confusion that was made between Spiritism and the sessions by the Davenports. If the critics insist in making them the same, it is because the want to do so.
Note: In an article that we must postpone to the next issue given the lack of space, we will examine the most important propositions that stick out from the controversy generated around the Davenport brothers.
It is what happens to Spiritism, that was not nor could be reached by the attacks it receives on its flanks. The critic was then wrong and that could have been avoided had they known Spiritism. There was enough warning. Some writers even confessed the influence of the refutations that came from all sides, and that from the part of the most honorable persons. Shouldn’t that be an eye opener to them? They were, however, walking on a path from which they did not want to back up; they needed to be right at any price. Many of such refutations were sent to us. All of them were distinguished by a moderation that contrasts with the language of our adversaries, and most of them are fair in their appreciation. It is certain that nobody wanted to impose an opinion to those gentlemen, but it is a duty of impartiality to admit corrections, in order to give public opinion the necessary conditions to analyze the pros and cons. Now, since it is more convenient to be right when one is talking to oneself, many of those corrections did not see the light of publicity. Who knows if even their majority were read? We must then be grateful to the newspapers that were less exclusivists. Among them we find the “Journal des Pyrénées-Orientales”, that in its last issue of October 8th, published the following letter:
“Perpignan, October 5th, 1865
Dear Mr. Editor,
I do not wish to get into the controversy; I just request your fairness in allowing me, just once, to respond to the open attacks found in the Parisian Letter, published in the last issue of your Journal, against the Spiritists and Spiritism. The true Spiritists, like the true Catholics, do not give public spectacles. They are embedded in the respect of their faith, they aspire for the general progress of everybody, and they do not seek to proselytize on stages. With respect to the Davenport brothers, there would be a lot to say in order to repudiate the errors of the author of those sarcastic attacks. I will just say that since God gave mankind free-will, the act of precluding someone’s belief, or censoring someone’s thoughts is like placing oneself above God, and consequently, a huge sin of pride. When we say that this new science has made immense progress, and that many cities count on large number of followers; that it has its headquarters and presidents, and that its meetings count on the attendance of scholars, renowned people for their positions in the civil and military societies, in law and magistracy, when we say that isn’t the same as saying that Spiritism is based on the truth? If Spiritism is a mistake why are people worried about it? Mistakes have only a short existence, like a will-o-the-wisp that lasts a few hours and disappears. If, on the contrary, it is a truth, however much you try you cannot destroy it. Truth is like light: only the blind ones deny its beauty. Some also say that Spiritism has provoked cases of mental disorder. I say this: Spiritism has not caused madness as well as Christianity and the other cults are not responsible for the cases of mental illnesses that many times are found among the followers of those several religions. Badly informed minds are subjected to enthusiasm and misunderstandings. Let us then leave, once for all, this last argument at the arsenal of the outdated weapons.
I finish this answer by saying that Spiritism came to destroy nothing but the belief in the eternal punishments. It strengths our faith in God; makes it evident that the soul is immortal and that the Spirit depurates and progresses through the reincarnations; it demonstrates that the different social positions have a reason; it teaches us to withstand our trials, whatever they may be; finally, it demonstrates to us that there is only one path leading us to God: the love for good and charity!
With my most sincere thanks and respectful greetings, I have the honor of being your server,
Breux.”
All the refutations that we have before us and that were addressed to the newspapers, protest the confusion that was made between Spiritism and the sessions by the Davenports. If the critics insist in making them the same, it is because the want to do so.
Note: In an article that we must postpone to the next issue given the lack of space, we will examine the most important propositions that stick out from the controversy generated around the Davenport brothers.
Spiritist Poetry
(A phenomenon – Fable)
Through one of those tranquil Spring nights,
So many spots in the skies, bright and shiny,
Some good bourgeoises in the city
Talked slow and calmly
About the space walkways.
Each one took turn, looking from
the ground up to the celestial dome,
And, no doubt, you will think that the theme
Of the talk was the eternity and infinity
Of the power that submits all those bodies to harmony!
No, their conversation took a different turn,
They talked about the highs and lows of the market,
One subject only, prices and harvests,
Fed their souls, when one of them stopped and said,
As if shaken by a sudden thought:
“What is that? Is it possible? A shooting-star!
It moves up… then down!”
Then, rubbing the eyes: “What Am
I saying, a star? My word, it is a prodigy,
Unless I am dreaming, it grows,
One, two, three, even four stars
Moving and dancing quietly;
A strange mystery that gives the night
Pleasure to embrace them all!”
The mind of the bourgeoise hopelessly
Follow the phases of the phenomenon,
Trying to explain it, concentrated, quietly.
It must all be fortuitous!
They move on; their heads touched by the strings
Of some kites sustained in flight,
Ornated by a vacillating light,
Floating on a renovating draught;
The boys, authors of such a wonderful act,
Smiled, only two steps away.
What did they say,
After the double surprise,
After such a great delight?
That all the fire in the distance
Is just an artifice, a silly piece
To stun innocence.
Therefore, if the beautiful lights of the vista
Paint the night in mysterious colors;
If the fire of a sudden meteor
Shines behind the darkness of the firmament;
If the lively sparks of a shooting-star
Plow the fields in space,
Those good bourgeoise go everywhere,
Hands in the air, astonished faces,
Looking for the hidden filaments!
Truth always has its counterpart:
It is up to us to keep them apart,
To separate the true from the mistake.
Skepticism desperately shouts: Deceit!
Before the facts, subjected to the eternal fate.
To rightfully judge cause and effect,
The skeptical has two things misplaced:
A little bit of modesty and good faith!
C.Dombre, from Marmande
Spiritism in Brazil
Extracted from “Bahia Daily”
The Bahia Daily on September 26th and 27th, 1865 publishes two articles that are the translation to Portuguese of those published six years ago by Dr. Déchambre, in the Gazette Médicale in Paris. The second edition of The Spirits’ Book had just been published and that was the subject of a kind of semi burlesque report done by Dr. Déchambre. By the way, he demonstrates with history and citations that the phenomena of the turning and vibrating tables are mentioned by Theocritus, with the name “Kosskinomanteia” which means foretelling with the use of a crucible, used for divination those days; he then concluded, with the common logic of our adversaries, that if the phenomenon was not ours it could not hold any truth. We must acknowledge that this is a singular argument from a man of positive sciences. We regret the fact that Mr. Déchambre’s erudition was unable to take him further back because he would have find it in the old Egypt and in the Indies. We will one day return to this article that we had lost sight of and that was missing in our collection. While we wait, we ask Mr. Déchambre if we are expected to reject modern medicine and physics for the fact that their rudiments are mixed up with the superstitious practices of antiquity and middle ages. If the modern chemistry of our days was not originated in the alchemy and modern astronomy in judicious astrology. Why then the Spiritist phenomena, that are not but natural phenomena, could not be also found in the primitive practices and beliefs? Considering that this article, just reproduced and without comments, proves nothing from the part of the Brazilian newspaper, showing a systematic hostility against the doctrine. It is even likely that since they did not know the doctrine, they found in that article an accurate appreciation. This is demonstrated by their interest in publishing in the following issue, on September 28th, the refutation sent by the Spiritists of Bahia, reproduced below:
“Dear Mr. Editor,
Since you act in good faith with respect to the Spiritist doctrine, we beg you to kindly publish in your Daily paper a passage from The Spirits’ Book, by Mr. Allan Kardec, that has already reached its thirteenth edition, so that your readers may appreciate the article that you reproduced from the Gazette Médicale of Paris, in its fair value. The article was published, against this very doctrine, more than six years ago by Dr. Déchambre and it is acknowledged that the referred doctor is not faithful in the citations that he made of The Spirits’ Book, just trying to depreciate that doctrine.
Yours sincerely and thankfully,
Luis Olympio Telles de Menezes, Jose Alvarez do Amaral, Joaquim Carneiro de Campos”
A lengthy excerpt from the Introduction to The Spirits’ Book is provided as an answer and refutation. The literal citation of the Spiritist books is, in fact, the best refutation to the deformations carried out by certain critics of the doctrine. The doctrine justifies itself, and that is the reason it suffers those attacks. One does not wish to convince the adversaries that the doctrine is good because, most of the time, this is a waste of time since, truth be told, they have all the freedom to believe it is bad; all one must do is to demonstrate that the doctrine says the opposite of what people make believe it does. It is up to the impartial public judge if it is good or bad. As despite everything they may do, the doctrine daily recruits new partisans, a demonstration that it does not displeases everybody and that the arguments that are opposed are powerless to discredit it. From this article we can see that it does not have nationality and that it goes around the world.
“Dear Mr. Editor,
Since you act in good faith with respect to the Spiritist doctrine, we beg you to kindly publish in your Daily paper a passage from The Spirits’ Book, by Mr. Allan Kardec, that has already reached its thirteenth edition, so that your readers may appreciate the article that you reproduced from the Gazette Médicale of Paris, in its fair value. The article was published, against this very doctrine, more than six years ago by Dr. Déchambre and it is acknowledged that the referred doctor is not faithful in the citations that he made of The Spirits’ Book, just trying to depreciate that doctrine.
Yours sincerely and thankfully,
Luis Olympio Telles de Menezes, Jose Alvarez do Amaral, Joaquim Carneiro de Campos”
A lengthy excerpt from the Introduction to The Spirits’ Book is provided as an answer and refutation. The literal citation of the Spiritist books is, in fact, the best refutation to the deformations carried out by certain critics of the doctrine. The doctrine justifies itself, and that is the reason it suffers those attacks. One does not wish to convince the adversaries that the doctrine is good because, most of the time, this is a waste of time since, truth be told, they have all the freedom to believe it is bad; all one must do is to demonstrate that the doctrine says the opposite of what people make believe it does. It is up to the impartial public judge if it is good or bad. As despite everything they may do, the doctrine daily recruits new partisans, a demonstration that it does not displeases everybody and that the arguments that are opposed are powerless to discredit it. From this article we can see that it does not have nationality and that it goes around the world.
Spiritism and Cholera
We know the accusations that victimized the first Christians in Rome. There was no crime that they could not perpetrate, there was no public disgrace that was not of their responsibility, voluntarily or involuntarily, according to their enemies, for their influence was detrimental. In a few centuries it will be hard to believe that strong minds of the nineteenth century tried to resuscitate such ideas about the Spiritists, blaming them for every disturbance of society, comparing their doctrine to a plague and stimulating persecution. This is printed history; these words fell from more than one evangelical chair, but what is even more surprising is that we find them in the newspapers that believe to be the champions of total freedom, and in particular the freedom of conscience. We already have a very curious collection of such kind of thing, that later I intend to convert in a book for the greater glory of the authors and the edification of posterity. We then thank those that can help us to enrich that collection, sending us everything that they know that has been done or will be done with that respect. Comparing those documents of the history of Spiritism with the history of the first centuries of the Church, we are surprised to find identical expressions and thoughts there. The only thing missing is the beasts of the circle, something that, nonetheless, is a progress.
Considering then that Spiritism is an eminently contagious plague, for it invades all classes of society with an incredible speed, it has a certain analogy with cholera. Some critics, therefore, provocatively called it Spirito-morbus in this last battle; it would come as no surprise if they had accused Spiritism of having imported the plague because we can detect two opposing sides join forces to combat it. From what we heard, in one year the had a coin produced with the face of St. Benedict that one must just wear to avoid the contagious contact of a Spiritist. We were not told if such procedure cures the ones that were already affected. There is certainly an analogy between Spiritism and cholera. It is the fear that both cause on certain persons. Let us, however, consider the situation from a more serious point of view. Here what was sent to us from Constantinople: “… The newspapers informed you about the terrible plague that reached our city and its suburbs, and whose devastation begins to attenuate. Some supposedly well-informed people say that the number of those affected is about 70 thousand, others say near 100 thousand. In any case we were terribly tested, and you can imagine the adversities and general grieving of our population. It is in these sad moments of hardship that the Spiritist belief and faith encourage people. We have all given the most truthful testimony of that.
Who knows we shouldn’t thank this calmness of the soul, this persuasion of immortality, the certainty of future existences in which the creatures are compensated on the basis of their merit and degree of advancement; who knows, I ask, if it is not due to such beliefs, foundation of this beautiful doctrine, that all of us, Spiritists of Constantinople, in large number, as you know, must be spared by the plague that fell and still falls around us? I say this mainly because it has been attested, here and elsewhere, that fear is the most predisposing element of cholera, like ignorance unfortunately becomes a source of contagion…
“Repos Filho, Attorney.”
It would be certainly an absurd to believe that the Spiritist faith is a certificate of guarantee against the cholera. But since it has been demonstrated that fear weakens the body and the mind, making people more susceptible of being affected by contagious illnesses, it is obvious that any factor that may strengthen them is a means of protection. This is so much understood these days that people avoid, be in reports or material confirmations, anything that may affect imagination through a dismal aspect.
There is no doubt that the Spiritist may die from cholera as anybody else, because their bodies are not more immortal than the others, and because when it is time, one must depart, be it through this cause or another. Cholera is one of those causes whose only particularity is to take a large number of people at the same time, and that produces more commotion. It is a mass departure, instead of in isolation, that is the difference. But the positiveness of the Spiritists about the future, and in particular, the knowledge they have about that future, that responds to all of their aspirations and satisfy reason, make them not to absolutely feel sorry for leaving Earth, considered a momentary exile. While the skeptical only sees the void at the time of death, or questions what is going to be next, the Spiritist knows that with death she is only undressing from a material envelope, subjected to the vicissitudes of life, but she will continue to be the same person, as an ethereal body, inaccessible to pain; will enjoy new and better perceptions; will meet again the loved ones that wait at the portal of the true and imperishable life.
As for the material possessions, she knows that they are no longer needed and that the pleasures that they proportionated will be replaced by others, purer and more desirable, that do not leave behind pain or sorrow. She then leaves them behind joyfully and effortlessly, feeling sorry for those that remain on Earth and will need them further down the road. It is like someone that becomes rich and leaves the old rags behind for the unfortunate ones. She then says to the friends left behind: Don’t be sorry; do not cry my death; instead, congratulate me for being freed from the material concerns and for entering in the radiant world where I shall wait for you.
Anyone who read and gave some thought to our book Heavens and Hell According to Spiritism, particularly the chapter about the anxieties of death, will understand the moral strength that the Spiritists acquire with their belief, before the plague that devastates populations. Will it follow that the Spiritists will neglect the necessary precautions before similar cases and lower their heads when facing danger? Absolutely not. They must act following every practice recommended by prudence and a rational hygiene, because they are not fatalists, and because, although they do not fear death, they must not seek it. Therefore, neglecting the sanitary measures necessary to avoid it would be a suicide, whose consequences they know well enough to expose themselves to that. They consider a duty to take care of their health, because health is needed for the accomplishment of their social duties. If they seek to prolongate their corporeal life that is not for their attachment to Earth but to have more time to progress, improve and depurate, leaving the “old man” behind and acquiring a larger summation of merits for their spiritual life.
But, if despite every effort, they must succumb, they take their cross without complaining, knowing that any progress bears its fruits, that nothing that is acquired in intelligence and morality is lost, and that if they did not diminish themselves to the eyes of God, they will always be better in the other world than in this one, even if they did not reach the first place. They simply say: We go a little bit earlier to where we would go a little bit later. Won’t such thoughts put us in better mental conditions than those recommended by science? To the non-believer or to the skeptical, death is all terror because they lose everything and expect nothing. What can a materialist doctor say to sooth the fear of death in his patients? Nothing but what one of them said to a cholera patient: “Well, there is always hope while we are not dead; after that, we definitely only die once and it all goes fast; when dead, everything is over; no more suffering.” Everything is over when one is dead, that is the ultimate consolation that is given.
The Spiritist doctor, on the contrary, tells the one about to die before him: “My friend, I will apply all the resources of science to bring your health back and to keep you around as much as possible. We will succeed and that is what I hope for. Man’s life, however, is in the hands of God, that calls us when our trial here is over. If the time of your liberation is come, rejoice, like the prisoner that is about to leave prison. Death disentangles us from the body that makes us suffer and takes us to the true life, a life exempt from disturbances and miseries. If you must leave, don’t believe that you are lost for your relatives and friends that stay behind. No, you will not be less among them; you will see them and hear them better than you can do now. You will advise, guide and inspire them for good. If God wishes to call you, be thankful for the conquered freedom; if God prolongates your passage here, be thankful for the time given to finish the work. When in doubt, submit yourself to God’s will, without complaints.”
Aren’t such words adequate to bring serenity to the soul, and wouldn’t such serenity support the efficacy of the medication, whilst the perspective of the void would throw the moribund into anxiety and desperation? Spiritism has still another more material influence, in addition to the spiritual one. It is a well-known fact the excesses of all kinds are among the causes that most predispose to the attacks of the current epidemy. The doctors, therefore, recommend sobriety in everything, a healthy prescription that many people have a hard time to follow. Admitting that they do, it is undoubtedly an important point, but will a momentary abstinence instantaneously repair the physical disorders caused by intense abuse, that weakens the body and for that very reason make it more accessible to illnesses? Besides cholera, don’t we know how overindulgence is deleterious in hot climates and where yellow fever is endemic? Well, then! Following their beliefs and the way they see the objective of the present life and the result of a future life, the Spiritist completely modifies their behavior. Instead of living to eat they eat to live; no more excesses; does not live like a cenobite; everything is useful, but nothing is abused. This must certainly be a strong consideration to add up to the one given by our corresponding member from Constantinople. This is, therefore, one of the results of the doctrine, upon which skepticism casts contempt and sarcasm, calls is madness and that brings disturbance to society. Keep your skepticism, if you will, but respect a belief that makes people better and happier.
If the belief in that nothing ends with death is madness; that we enter a better life after death, exempt from concerns; that we return to the circle of the loved ones; or even the belief that after death, we are not thrown into the eternal flames, without hope to leave it, something that would not be better than the nothingness, and that we are not lost in the idle and beatific contemplation of infinity, may God wish that every person is mad like that for there would be much less crime and suicides. Many communications were given about the cholera; several were done at the Parisian Society or in our private circle. We only give two, combined in a single one, to avoid repletion and because they summarize the dominating thought.
Spiritist Society of Paris, mediums: Mr Desliens and Mr. Morin
“Considering that the cholera is the subject of the day and that everyone has a medicine to indicate in order to keep the disease away, I shall allow myself, if you will, to give my advice as well, although it seems unlikely to me that you should fear its fearful effect. Nonetheless, to prevent a lack of means when the time comes, I offer you the little I know. Despite what they say, it is not immediately contagious, and those that are in a region where the disease is spread, must not be afraid of helping those that are affected. There isn’t a universal medication against this disease, be it preventative or curative, taking into account the fact that the illness changes in several ways, here depending on the temperament of the individuals, there depending on their education and habits, or on the climatic conditions, and that leads to good results of a give medication with certain persons and not with others. One can say that each outbreak requires investigation, according to the location, requiring a different medication. That is why ice and theriac were helpful in depleting the illness in a large number of cases, in certain regions, during the outbreaks of 1832 and 1849, the same could lead to unsuccessful treatments in other times and other countries. There are, therefore, several good medications and none is specific. That diversity of results has confused and will still confuse science, making it difficult for us as well to indicate a remedy that is good to all, because the very nature of the disease does not allow it. There are, nonetheless, general rules that resulted from observation whose guidelines should be closely followed. The best preservative is in the careful hygiene, wisely recommended in every instruction given about it, consisting in cleanness and in sweeping away any possible cause of infection and insalubrity, and in the avoidance of any excess. Besides, one must keep from changing feeding habits, except for the avoidance of debilitating things. It is also recommended to avoid colds, sudden transitions of temperature or any strong substance that may lead to physical disturbance. You know that fear is many times worse than the illness in similar cases. Unfortunately, one cannot impose cold-blood, but you, the Spiritists, do not need advice about this since you face death fearlessly and with a faith-given calmness. In case of a spell one must not neglect the first symptoms. Heat, food, abundant transpiration, friction and rice water with a few drops of laudanum are inexpensive medications with positive action, when added to mental strength and tranquility. Considering that the lack of doctors may sometimes lead to difficulty in finding laudanum, is such cases one may use any other soothing substance, like lettuce juice, but in small doses. In fact, one may just boil a few leaves of lettuce in rice water. In these events, trust in God and in oneself is the first healthy approach. Now that your physical health is sheltered, let me mention your spiritual temperament that seems to be attacked by a different kind o epidemy. Have no fear here for this disease can only affect those that do not live a truly spiritual life and that are already dead. All of those that devoted to the doctrine, without a hidden agenda, will find, on the contrary, the necessary strength to fructify the teachings that we consider a duty to pass on to you. Persecution, whatever it is, is useful. It exposes the strong minds and encourages the feeble hearts that, through the struggle, will succeed and mature with our advices, then becoming serious and wise people. Have courage then! Move on fearlessly, following the path that was designed to you and you may always count on my support, to the limit of my own forces.”
Dr. Demeure
Considering then that Spiritism is an eminently contagious plague, for it invades all classes of society with an incredible speed, it has a certain analogy with cholera. Some critics, therefore, provocatively called it Spirito-morbus in this last battle; it would come as no surprise if they had accused Spiritism of having imported the plague because we can detect two opposing sides join forces to combat it. From what we heard, in one year the had a coin produced with the face of St. Benedict that one must just wear to avoid the contagious contact of a Spiritist. We were not told if such procedure cures the ones that were already affected. There is certainly an analogy between Spiritism and cholera. It is the fear that both cause on certain persons. Let us, however, consider the situation from a more serious point of view. Here what was sent to us from Constantinople: “… The newspapers informed you about the terrible plague that reached our city and its suburbs, and whose devastation begins to attenuate. Some supposedly well-informed people say that the number of those affected is about 70 thousand, others say near 100 thousand. In any case we were terribly tested, and you can imagine the adversities and general grieving of our population. It is in these sad moments of hardship that the Spiritist belief and faith encourage people. We have all given the most truthful testimony of that.
Who knows we shouldn’t thank this calmness of the soul, this persuasion of immortality, the certainty of future existences in which the creatures are compensated on the basis of their merit and degree of advancement; who knows, I ask, if it is not due to such beliefs, foundation of this beautiful doctrine, that all of us, Spiritists of Constantinople, in large number, as you know, must be spared by the plague that fell and still falls around us? I say this mainly because it has been attested, here and elsewhere, that fear is the most predisposing element of cholera, like ignorance unfortunately becomes a source of contagion…
“Repos Filho, Attorney.”
It would be certainly an absurd to believe that the Spiritist faith is a certificate of guarantee against the cholera. But since it has been demonstrated that fear weakens the body and the mind, making people more susceptible of being affected by contagious illnesses, it is obvious that any factor that may strengthen them is a means of protection. This is so much understood these days that people avoid, be in reports or material confirmations, anything that may affect imagination through a dismal aspect.
There is no doubt that the Spiritist may die from cholera as anybody else, because their bodies are not more immortal than the others, and because when it is time, one must depart, be it through this cause or another. Cholera is one of those causes whose only particularity is to take a large number of people at the same time, and that produces more commotion. It is a mass departure, instead of in isolation, that is the difference. But the positiveness of the Spiritists about the future, and in particular, the knowledge they have about that future, that responds to all of their aspirations and satisfy reason, make them not to absolutely feel sorry for leaving Earth, considered a momentary exile. While the skeptical only sees the void at the time of death, or questions what is going to be next, the Spiritist knows that with death she is only undressing from a material envelope, subjected to the vicissitudes of life, but she will continue to be the same person, as an ethereal body, inaccessible to pain; will enjoy new and better perceptions; will meet again the loved ones that wait at the portal of the true and imperishable life.
As for the material possessions, she knows that they are no longer needed and that the pleasures that they proportionated will be replaced by others, purer and more desirable, that do not leave behind pain or sorrow. She then leaves them behind joyfully and effortlessly, feeling sorry for those that remain on Earth and will need them further down the road. It is like someone that becomes rich and leaves the old rags behind for the unfortunate ones. She then says to the friends left behind: Don’t be sorry; do not cry my death; instead, congratulate me for being freed from the material concerns and for entering in the radiant world where I shall wait for you.
Anyone who read and gave some thought to our book Heavens and Hell According to Spiritism, particularly the chapter about the anxieties of death, will understand the moral strength that the Spiritists acquire with their belief, before the plague that devastates populations. Will it follow that the Spiritists will neglect the necessary precautions before similar cases and lower their heads when facing danger? Absolutely not. They must act following every practice recommended by prudence and a rational hygiene, because they are not fatalists, and because, although they do not fear death, they must not seek it. Therefore, neglecting the sanitary measures necessary to avoid it would be a suicide, whose consequences they know well enough to expose themselves to that. They consider a duty to take care of their health, because health is needed for the accomplishment of their social duties. If they seek to prolongate their corporeal life that is not for their attachment to Earth but to have more time to progress, improve and depurate, leaving the “old man” behind and acquiring a larger summation of merits for their spiritual life.
But, if despite every effort, they must succumb, they take their cross without complaining, knowing that any progress bears its fruits, that nothing that is acquired in intelligence and morality is lost, and that if they did not diminish themselves to the eyes of God, they will always be better in the other world than in this one, even if they did not reach the first place. They simply say: We go a little bit earlier to where we would go a little bit later. Won’t such thoughts put us in better mental conditions than those recommended by science? To the non-believer or to the skeptical, death is all terror because they lose everything and expect nothing. What can a materialist doctor say to sooth the fear of death in his patients? Nothing but what one of them said to a cholera patient: “Well, there is always hope while we are not dead; after that, we definitely only die once and it all goes fast; when dead, everything is over; no more suffering.” Everything is over when one is dead, that is the ultimate consolation that is given.
The Spiritist doctor, on the contrary, tells the one about to die before him: “My friend, I will apply all the resources of science to bring your health back and to keep you around as much as possible. We will succeed and that is what I hope for. Man’s life, however, is in the hands of God, that calls us when our trial here is over. If the time of your liberation is come, rejoice, like the prisoner that is about to leave prison. Death disentangles us from the body that makes us suffer and takes us to the true life, a life exempt from disturbances and miseries. If you must leave, don’t believe that you are lost for your relatives and friends that stay behind. No, you will not be less among them; you will see them and hear them better than you can do now. You will advise, guide and inspire them for good. If God wishes to call you, be thankful for the conquered freedom; if God prolongates your passage here, be thankful for the time given to finish the work. When in doubt, submit yourself to God’s will, without complaints.”
Aren’t such words adequate to bring serenity to the soul, and wouldn’t such serenity support the efficacy of the medication, whilst the perspective of the void would throw the moribund into anxiety and desperation? Spiritism has still another more material influence, in addition to the spiritual one. It is a well-known fact the excesses of all kinds are among the causes that most predispose to the attacks of the current epidemy. The doctors, therefore, recommend sobriety in everything, a healthy prescription that many people have a hard time to follow. Admitting that they do, it is undoubtedly an important point, but will a momentary abstinence instantaneously repair the physical disorders caused by intense abuse, that weakens the body and for that very reason make it more accessible to illnesses? Besides cholera, don’t we know how overindulgence is deleterious in hot climates and where yellow fever is endemic? Well, then! Following their beliefs and the way they see the objective of the present life and the result of a future life, the Spiritist completely modifies their behavior. Instead of living to eat they eat to live; no more excesses; does not live like a cenobite; everything is useful, but nothing is abused. This must certainly be a strong consideration to add up to the one given by our corresponding member from Constantinople. This is, therefore, one of the results of the doctrine, upon which skepticism casts contempt and sarcasm, calls is madness and that brings disturbance to society. Keep your skepticism, if you will, but respect a belief that makes people better and happier.
If the belief in that nothing ends with death is madness; that we enter a better life after death, exempt from concerns; that we return to the circle of the loved ones; or even the belief that after death, we are not thrown into the eternal flames, without hope to leave it, something that would not be better than the nothingness, and that we are not lost in the idle and beatific contemplation of infinity, may God wish that every person is mad like that for there would be much less crime and suicides. Many communications were given about the cholera; several were done at the Parisian Society or in our private circle. We only give two, combined in a single one, to avoid repletion and because they summarize the dominating thought.
Spiritist Society of Paris, mediums: Mr Desliens and Mr. Morin
“Considering that the cholera is the subject of the day and that everyone has a medicine to indicate in order to keep the disease away, I shall allow myself, if you will, to give my advice as well, although it seems unlikely to me that you should fear its fearful effect. Nonetheless, to prevent a lack of means when the time comes, I offer you the little I know. Despite what they say, it is not immediately contagious, and those that are in a region where the disease is spread, must not be afraid of helping those that are affected. There isn’t a universal medication against this disease, be it preventative or curative, taking into account the fact that the illness changes in several ways, here depending on the temperament of the individuals, there depending on their education and habits, or on the climatic conditions, and that leads to good results of a give medication with certain persons and not with others. One can say that each outbreak requires investigation, according to the location, requiring a different medication. That is why ice and theriac were helpful in depleting the illness in a large number of cases, in certain regions, during the outbreaks of 1832 and 1849, the same could lead to unsuccessful treatments in other times and other countries. There are, therefore, several good medications and none is specific. That diversity of results has confused and will still confuse science, making it difficult for us as well to indicate a remedy that is good to all, because the very nature of the disease does not allow it. There are, nonetheless, general rules that resulted from observation whose guidelines should be closely followed. The best preservative is in the careful hygiene, wisely recommended in every instruction given about it, consisting in cleanness and in sweeping away any possible cause of infection and insalubrity, and in the avoidance of any excess. Besides, one must keep from changing feeding habits, except for the avoidance of debilitating things. It is also recommended to avoid colds, sudden transitions of temperature or any strong substance that may lead to physical disturbance. You know that fear is many times worse than the illness in similar cases. Unfortunately, one cannot impose cold-blood, but you, the Spiritists, do not need advice about this since you face death fearlessly and with a faith-given calmness. In case of a spell one must not neglect the first symptoms. Heat, food, abundant transpiration, friction and rice water with a few drops of laudanum are inexpensive medications with positive action, when added to mental strength and tranquility. Considering that the lack of doctors may sometimes lead to difficulty in finding laudanum, is such cases one may use any other soothing substance, like lettuce juice, but in small doses. In fact, one may just boil a few leaves of lettuce in rice water. In these events, trust in God and in oneself is the first healthy approach. Now that your physical health is sheltered, let me mention your spiritual temperament that seems to be attacked by a different kind o epidemy. Have no fear here for this disease can only affect those that do not live a truly spiritual life and that are already dead. All of those that devoted to the doctrine, without a hidden agenda, will find, on the contrary, the necessary strength to fructify the teachings that we consider a duty to pass on to you. Persecution, whatever it is, is useful. It exposes the strong minds and encourages the feeble hearts that, through the struggle, will succeed and mature with our advices, then becoming serious and wise people. Have courage then! Move on fearlessly, following the path that was designed to you and you may always count on my support, to the limit of my own forces.”
Dr. Demeure
A New Nebuchadnezzar
We received the following letter from Kharkov, Russia:
“By writing to you, Mr. President, I dare expect that Spiritism may shed some light upon this, up until now, inexplicable fact, and that I believe to be of great interest. I got it from an eye witness, a close relative of the person in question. Here is what I was told:
All members of the R… family were noticeable by their original character and inclinations. I will only mention the two brothers, Alexandre and Voldemar. Both held very impressive eye expressions, impossible to describe. We used to play around together in our childhood, and even jokingly I could not bear their staring eyes. I mentioned that to my father who then said that he also had felt the same discomfort and advised me to avoid it. As it seems, Voldemar was not the family’s favorite. When the time was right both brothers joined the University of Kazan. Voldemar soon stunned his teachers and colleagues for his strange attitudes; he frequently bullied his own brother that he had chosen for his mockeries. His joy was short living. He died, at the age of sixteen, in his brother’s arms. His brother is the one we are going to talk about. Although with less intensity, Alexandre also had that fascinating magnetism in his eyes, something that was shocking in his brothers. He did not show the same brilliance either, but he was determined and was quick to learn. His brother’s death caused a huge impression in him, turning him into a different person. Six weeks after the fact he kept his eyes closed, did not change or wash under any circumstance, so much so that his clothes decomposed and ragged on his own body. He was then to the countryside by his mother. He was entrusted to an uncle that promised to help him forgot his whole misery. The uncle then warned him that he would not spare any means to make him change such attitude in his house. Alexandre soon became reasonable; he did not offer any resistance to his uncle’s commands but secretly sent for his mother to come and rescue him from that executioner. His mother attended his wishes. Once away from his uncle, his bizarre behavior started again and intensified. Among other things, he demanded to have the Church’s bell ringing at meal time. They thought he had some sort of mental illness so that he was taken in to a hospital in Kazan. Something strange happened. He changed again, completely. He seemed perfectly normal in his acts and words. The doctors thought it was a family feud and no longer observed him closely. On one occasion, at night, when everybody was asleep, he dressed like a doctor and found his way out of the hospital, passing by the doorman in disguise, walking 30 versts[1] to reach his farm.
He then went to a kind of hen shed, undressed completely and claimed that the only thing he needed in his life was that one squared toise.[2]
His mother uselessly begged him to change his mind; in vain people tried to persuade him to allow them to build a shelter for his tent. He remained adamant; he only wanted an old servant by his side, a person that had always been with him and that had always shown a dog like fidelity. Since nothing was achieved his father ordered all the peasants to move to a place 7 versts away; he then left as well, calling the place a “lost village”. They thought they should lease out the property and organized a committee for that but Alexander that was always forewarned dressed up, even without underwear, and came out to meet everybody. He responded to every question with common sense and accuracy, so much so that the committee that thought they were dealing with a mad person, left in disappointment. All that happened in 1842 and up until now Alexander remains in the same state. He remains standing, no clothes, in a shanty place without doors and windows, exposed to the environment and in a region where the winter temperature goes down to 30°C below zero. He eats a little of grape jelly that is brought to him once a day in a clay bowl; he catches in the air the food that is thrown to him with a spoon, like an animal, communicating with growling, no longer using human language. For keeping his head down for such a long time, he can no longer raise it; his feet widened a lot so that he can no longer walk. He, sometimes, allows himself to be tucked in with a sheepskin. There is nothing extraordinary about his appearance with the exception of his eyes. He is neither fat nor slim. His face shows he is suffering. Once he was asked why such a behavior, to which he answered: “- don’t mention that; I lack the will.” Nothing more. What did he mean by lack of will? Was that a pledge? He sometimes pronounces the name of the dead brother; on other occasions he asks: “- When will this end?”. He does not follow any precept from his religion. A piece of his hair had been sent to a somnambulist in London. The answer was that he had the illness of Nebuchadnezzar. Yet, he is not mad. Something extraordinary is that besides such animal life there is intelligent life in him. He continues to be interested in everything that happens around the world. He receives many newspapers but since his shelter is dimly lit, he allowed people next to his place and have someone else reading them for him. They do that from the same place where his mother used to read for him but since she is now dead, she was replaced by a hired reader. The task force in charge of studying the case obtained the details below that only confused the case. D…, Alexander’s college mate, said that when they were together, he learned that he was in love with the wife of a pharmacist that was really beautiful and virtuous. Alexander rode his horse daily, just to ride by her window and have the pleasure of eventually seeing her from afar. That summarized their affair. Everyday, nonetheless, a sealed letter was delivered to him and if there were anybody else in the room, he promptly concealed it in a drawer. D... was persuaded that they contained love messages and was not interested in knowing the contents. Later, when the investigation began, only two of those letters were found since he had burnt all others, supposedly those that he received while in college. The first letter was somewhat in the following terms: “– Yesterday a strange thing happened. I was coming back from the Russian Switzerland (name of a touristic spot around Kazan), walking through the fields of Ars when I heard a scream for help. I screamed back and dashed into the place from where I heard the cry; when I got there, I saw a fenced cemetery. The figure of a young man appeared on the fence, vividly thanking my intervention, saying that he had been attacked by thieves that ran away when they heard me. (Note: there was a fabric manufacturing plant in Ars that was shuttered due to the lack of orders and some workers turned into thieves as an alternative to the lack of job.)
We walked together towards downtown holding a very interesting and lively conversation. I still cannot tell you what it was all about, but I will when we meet again. We then got to my unknown acquaintance’s house and we spent the afternoon there. He indicated to me a place where he used to go every day at a certain time and said that I could see him there if I wanted. What is really strange is that when I returned to my own house, I could not remember the street and the house that I had just visited, although I know perfectly well the town where I live for four years now. I then decided to meet that person again at the place that was indicated. I will go to his house again and this time I will certainly remember.”
There was no signature. Here the second letter, a continuation of the previous one, but this time shorter:
“I some the unknown person at the indicated place; he invited me to his house; we spent the afternoon together but on returning home I totally forget the street and the house again.”
No signature. Having the handwriting examined carefully it seemed that it was from one of his comrades that laughed at that when he saw the letters, saying that he had never written such things.
The investigation ends here. It seems that there is a huge mystery in all this and that such mystery is only known by three persons. First, his mother, then the old servant lady that was always by his side and finally his sister. The two first ones are dead; the third one lives in the same village as Alexander with her husband. She visits him every day and remains there for three or four hours. What would they talk about? Will the brother forget the growling and return to human language? Nobody knows that. It is remarkable that such a singular phenomenon be little known. It has never been published by any newspaper and yet it happens very near Kazan where there is a university, there are scientists and doctors. It is true that it was investigated in the beginning, but it seems to me that it was soon discouraged. Still, it seems a vast field of research for science, not to mention the psychological aspect. It is a contemporary fact that can be attested by anyone.
Could Spiritism, that explains everything, give an explanation to this phenomenon? I dare not ask you for a written answer since I know you time is precious. I just ask you to give your opinion in the Spiritist Review, in case you consider it worthwhile.
Yours truly, etc.”
There is one thing that sticks out from this report. It is the fact that this young man is not mad, in the scientific meaning of the term; he enjoys fool reason, when he wishes. What could be the cause of such eccentricity at that age? We believe that it will still be a long time before science uncovers that with its essentially material resources. However, there is something that is not a simple mania: the assimilation of sounds and gestures of animals. It is true that we have seen individuals abandoned in the woods since early age that live like beasts, adopting their howling and gestures by imitation. But that is not the case.
This young man did serious studies, lives in his own land in a village; he is daily in contact with human beings. Therefore, in this case it is not a question of habit and isolation. The somnambulist of London said it was an illness like that of Nebuchadnezzar. But what is that disease? Isn’t the story of that King a legend? Is it possible that a man turn into a beast? If we, however, compare the biblical report to the current fact of Alexander R… we will find more than a common point between them. Something that happens today may have happened in the past and the King of Babylon may have been hit by something similar. If then that King, dominated by a similar influence, left his palace, like Alexander R… left his castle; if he lived and screamed like him, like animals, they could have then said, in the language of those days, that he was transformed into a beast. It is true that it kills the miracle. But how many more miracles now fall before the laws of nature that are discovered every day? Religion gains from this if something that was miraculous is now considered natural. When the adversaries of Spiritism say that it resuscitates the supernatural and the superstitious, they demonstrate ignorance regarding the first words because, on the contrary, Spiritism comes to demonstrate that certain facts considered mysterious are not but natural effects.
After reading the subject above in the Parisian Society, as an object of study, it was requested that a medium evoked the Spirits to provide an explanation. The three communications below were obtained. One from the dead brother, Voldemar; the second from the protecting Spirit of the two brothers, and the third from a spiritual guide of another medium.
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, October 13th, 1865
Medium: Mr. Desliens
I
Here I am! What do you want? How come you get involved into private family business? Know this: nobody has ever offended me and remained unpunished; watch my wrath when you try to scavenge a secret that is none of your business! Do you want the keys that explain the reasons why my brother was led to do such things? You must know that it is all on me that punished him for his lack of faith and for his guilt towards me. We were united by a terrible link of death! He should have honored his word and he did not; he was a coward! May he suffer for the injury that would not find shelter in me! As my accomplice in the action, he should have followed in the ordeal. Why did he hesitate? He suffers today as a punishment for his hesitation. Since I could not force him to follow me, at least immediately, I employed the magnetic force that I have at a high degree, forcing him to abandon his own will and yield to mine. Is he suffering? Even better! Each one of his moans gives me a kick of pleasure. Are you happy with my civility? Are you happy with my explanations? No. Do you want to moralize me? But who are you to give me sermons? Are you a priest? No. Then, how come do you want me to listen to you? I want to hear nothing and I am going back to the place that I should not have left. He understands his issues now. His will may react upon matter! Damn you if you allow him to escape from my domination!
Voldemar R…
II
Do not try, at least for now, to impel this poor senseless mind to listen to you. He could not do it and your words would only excite his brutal rage. I come in his place to give you some explanations that will shed some light onto the somber drama that was authored by these two players in another existence. At this time they atone, suffering the consequences of the criminal action whose details I cannot elaborate today. You must only know that from those two, Alexander reported to Voldemar under another name and in another time, in a social condition that you can presume from a few words that are in the report that you read. Think about the passage in which Alexander demanded that the bell rang at the beginning of his meals and you are on the right path. As I said, subordinated to Voldemar and instigated by him, he did a number of things whose responsibility are shared by both today and that are the source of their sufferings. Alexander was, and still is, a feeble and vacillating character that was easily dominated when there was an opportunity. Regarding anybody else he was arrogant, despotic and brutal. In short, he was under the domination of his brother. What both did will be revealed to you later, in this study. Let us move to the results.
They vowed to never betray one another or to move away from each other, and in addition Voldemar reserved the right, to cast the full weight of his strong will power onto his accomplice. You saw that he had transformed him into the main target of his jokes, in the fragments of existences that they shared. Highly intelligent individuals, they had previously formed a scary allegiance against society, by the association of their bad tendencies. Voldemar was retrieved back, by design of the Providence that thus prepared the way for the renovation of both creatures. Alexander pledged to follow his brother in the grave but his affection to one person mentioned in the report and the fatigue for carrying a load that he was painstakingly carrying made him fight back. His brother could not kill him physically but did so mentally, surrounding him by a beam of influences that determined the cruel obsession whose consequences you know. The somnambulist that classified his illness as the disease of Nebuchadnezzar was not far from the truth as it might be thought because Nebuchadnezzar was an obsessed mind that was convinced that he was a beast. It is therefore an obsession that does not exclude, as you know, the intelligence and does not definitely annihilates it. It is one of the most remarkable cases whose study may be beneficial to all. Tonight, this matter would take us a long way given all the necessary explanations. I will stop at this point, asking you to gather your spiritual forces to evoke Voldemar. Since he fears him, with reason, in his absence the brother recovers his energy and may be able to free himself. That is why he rejects to leave him and exerts a continual magnetic action.
The guide of both.
Paulowitch
III
(Medium: Mrs. Delanne)
My beloved brothers, certain facts reported in the Scriptures are overlooked by many as fables to children. They were disdained because they were not understood, and people refused to give them credit. Despite that, once undressed from its allegoric meaning, the bottom line is true, and only Spiritism could decode them. Events of several kind are going to take place not only with the Spiritists but with everybody and all over the world, compelling scientists to study and be convinced, despite what some people say, that Spiritism teaches new things because it is through Spiritism that one will have the explanation of what has remained misunderstood up until now. Weren’t you told that obsession would take new forms? This is an example. The punishment of Nebuchadnezzar is not, therefore, a fable. He was not, as you rightfully said, transformed into a beast; but he was, as in the case that you discuss now, for some time deprived of his intellectual skills, and that in conditions that approached him to the beasts and transformed the powerful tyrant in an object of pity to all. God hit his pride.
All these issues are related to fluids and magnetism. There is obsession and subjugation in this young man. He is very lucid as a Spirit and his brother exerts an irresistible magnetic influence; he easily attracts him out of his body when there is no friend or sympathetic person near to refrain him. He then suffers when detached; to him it is also a punishment and that is when he howls ferociously.
Don’t be so quick in condemning what is written in the sacred books, as does the majority that only sees the letter and not the Spirit. You are better enlightened every day and new truths shall be unveiled before your eyes for you are far from having exhausted every application of what you know about Spiritism.
St. Benedict
If follows from this eminently rational explanation that this young man is enduring an obsession, or better said, a terrible subjugation, like that of King Nebuchadnezzar. Does it destroy God’s justice that had punished the monarch of pride? Absolutely not for we know that obsessions are at the same time trial and atonement. Thus, God could punish him by placing him under the influence of a maleficent Spirit that impelled him to behave like an animal without transforming him in a beast. The first of those punishments is natural and is explained by the law of relationships between the visible and the invisible word; the other one is anti-natural, fantastic and does not explain itself. One presents itself as a reality in our days, in the different forms of obsession; the other is only found in fairy tales. Finally, one is accepted by reason, the other does not.
From the point of view of Spiritism, this fact offers an important theme for study. Obsession is presented in a new way regarding the form and the determining cause, but it has nothing remarkable after what we see every day. St. Benedict is totally right when he says that we are far have exhausted all the applications of Spiritism and of having understood everything it can explain to us. As it is, it offers us a rich mine to explore, helped by the laws that we are taught. Before we say that it is stationary, let us take advantage of what it can teach us.
[1] Obsolete Russian unit of length; 1 verst = approximately 1km or 0.66 miles
[2] Obsolete unit of measure, approximately 1.8x1.8 m2 or 6x6 ft2
“By writing to you, Mr. President, I dare expect that Spiritism may shed some light upon this, up until now, inexplicable fact, and that I believe to be of great interest. I got it from an eye witness, a close relative of the person in question. Here is what I was told:
All members of the R… family were noticeable by their original character and inclinations. I will only mention the two brothers, Alexandre and Voldemar. Both held very impressive eye expressions, impossible to describe. We used to play around together in our childhood, and even jokingly I could not bear their staring eyes. I mentioned that to my father who then said that he also had felt the same discomfort and advised me to avoid it. As it seems, Voldemar was not the family’s favorite. When the time was right both brothers joined the University of Kazan. Voldemar soon stunned his teachers and colleagues for his strange attitudes; he frequently bullied his own brother that he had chosen for his mockeries. His joy was short living. He died, at the age of sixteen, in his brother’s arms. His brother is the one we are going to talk about. Although with less intensity, Alexandre also had that fascinating magnetism in his eyes, something that was shocking in his brothers. He did not show the same brilliance either, but he was determined and was quick to learn. His brother’s death caused a huge impression in him, turning him into a different person. Six weeks after the fact he kept his eyes closed, did not change or wash under any circumstance, so much so that his clothes decomposed and ragged on his own body. He was then to the countryside by his mother. He was entrusted to an uncle that promised to help him forgot his whole misery. The uncle then warned him that he would not spare any means to make him change such attitude in his house. Alexandre soon became reasonable; he did not offer any resistance to his uncle’s commands but secretly sent for his mother to come and rescue him from that executioner. His mother attended his wishes. Once away from his uncle, his bizarre behavior started again and intensified. Among other things, he demanded to have the Church’s bell ringing at meal time. They thought he had some sort of mental illness so that he was taken in to a hospital in Kazan. Something strange happened. He changed again, completely. He seemed perfectly normal in his acts and words. The doctors thought it was a family feud and no longer observed him closely. On one occasion, at night, when everybody was asleep, he dressed like a doctor and found his way out of the hospital, passing by the doorman in disguise, walking 30 versts[1] to reach his farm.
He then went to a kind of hen shed, undressed completely and claimed that the only thing he needed in his life was that one squared toise.[2]
His mother uselessly begged him to change his mind; in vain people tried to persuade him to allow them to build a shelter for his tent. He remained adamant; he only wanted an old servant by his side, a person that had always been with him and that had always shown a dog like fidelity. Since nothing was achieved his father ordered all the peasants to move to a place 7 versts away; he then left as well, calling the place a “lost village”. They thought they should lease out the property and organized a committee for that but Alexander that was always forewarned dressed up, even without underwear, and came out to meet everybody. He responded to every question with common sense and accuracy, so much so that the committee that thought they were dealing with a mad person, left in disappointment. All that happened in 1842 and up until now Alexander remains in the same state. He remains standing, no clothes, in a shanty place without doors and windows, exposed to the environment and in a region where the winter temperature goes down to 30°C below zero. He eats a little of grape jelly that is brought to him once a day in a clay bowl; he catches in the air the food that is thrown to him with a spoon, like an animal, communicating with growling, no longer using human language. For keeping his head down for such a long time, he can no longer raise it; his feet widened a lot so that he can no longer walk. He, sometimes, allows himself to be tucked in with a sheepskin. There is nothing extraordinary about his appearance with the exception of his eyes. He is neither fat nor slim. His face shows he is suffering. Once he was asked why such a behavior, to which he answered: “- don’t mention that; I lack the will.” Nothing more. What did he mean by lack of will? Was that a pledge? He sometimes pronounces the name of the dead brother; on other occasions he asks: “- When will this end?”. He does not follow any precept from his religion. A piece of his hair had been sent to a somnambulist in London. The answer was that he had the illness of Nebuchadnezzar. Yet, he is not mad. Something extraordinary is that besides such animal life there is intelligent life in him. He continues to be interested in everything that happens around the world. He receives many newspapers but since his shelter is dimly lit, he allowed people next to his place and have someone else reading them for him. They do that from the same place where his mother used to read for him but since she is now dead, she was replaced by a hired reader. The task force in charge of studying the case obtained the details below that only confused the case. D…, Alexander’s college mate, said that when they were together, he learned that he was in love with the wife of a pharmacist that was really beautiful and virtuous. Alexander rode his horse daily, just to ride by her window and have the pleasure of eventually seeing her from afar. That summarized their affair. Everyday, nonetheless, a sealed letter was delivered to him and if there were anybody else in the room, he promptly concealed it in a drawer. D... was persuaded that they contained love messages and was not interested in knowing the contents. Later, when the investigation began, only two of those letters were found since he had burnt all others, supposedly those that he received while in college. The first letter was somewhat in the following terms: “– Yesterday a strange thing happened. I was coming back from the Russian Switzerland (name of a touristic spot around Kazan), walking through the fields of Ars when I heard a scream for help. I screamed back and dashed into the place from where I heard the cry; when I got there, I saw a fenced cemetery. The figure of a young man appeared on the fence, vividly thanking my intervention, saying that he had been attacked by thieves that ran away when they heard me. (Note: there was a fabric manufacturing plant in Ars that was shuttered due to the lack of orders and some workers turned into thieves as an alternative to the lack of job.)
We walked together towards downtown holding a very interesting and lively conversation. I still cannot tell you what it was all about, but I will when we meet again. We then got to my unknown acquaintance’s house and we spent the afternoon there. He indicated to me a place where he used to go every day at a certain time and said that I could see him there if I wanted. What is really strange is that when I returned to my own house, I could not remember the street and the house that I had just visited, although I know perfectly well the town where I live for four years now. I then decided to meet that person again at the place that was indicated. I will go to his house again and this time I will certainly remember.”
There was no signature. Here the second letter, a continuation of the previous one, but this time shorter:
“I some the unknown person at the indicated place; he invited me to his house; we spent the afternoon together but on returning home I totally forget the street and the house again.”
No signature. Having the handwriting examined carefully it seemed that it was from one of his comrades that laughed at that when he saw the letters, saying that he had never written such things.
The investigation ends here. It seems that there is a huge mystery in all this and that such mystery is only known by three persons. First, his mother, then the old servant lady that was always by his side and finally his sister. The two first ones are dead; the third one lives in the same village as Alexander with her husband. She visits him every day and remains there for three or four hours. What would they talk about? Will the brother forget the growling and return to human language? Nobody knows that. It is remarkable that such a singular phenomenon be little known. It has never been published by any newspaper and yet it happens very near Kazan where there is a university, there are scientists and doctors. It is true that it was investigated in the beginning, but it seems to me that it was soon discouraged. Still, it seems a vast field of research for science, not to mention the psychological aspect. It is a contemporary fact that can be attested by anyone.
Could Spiritism, that explains everything, give an explanation to this phenomenon? I dare not ask you for a written answer since I know you time is precious. I just ask you to give your opinion in the Spiritist Review, in case you consider it worthwhile.
Yours truly, etc.”
There is one thing that sticks out from this report. It is the fact that this young man is not mad, in the scientific meaning of the term; he enjoys fool reason, when he wishes. What could be the cause of such eccentricity at that age? We believe that it will still be a long time before science uncovers that with its essentially material resources. However, there is something that is not a simple mania: the assimilation of sounds and gestures of animals. It is true that we have seen individuals abandoned in the woods since early age that live like beasts, adopting their howling and gestures by imitation. But that is not the case.
This young man did serious studies, lives in his own land in a village; he is daily in contact with human beings. Therefore, in this case it is not a question of habit and isolation. The somnambulist of London said it was an illness like that of Nebuchadnezzar. But what is that disease? Isn’t the story of that King a legend? Is it possible that a man turn into a beast? If we, however, compare the biblical report to the current fact of Alexander R… we will find more than a common point between them. Something that happens today may have happened in the past and the King of Babylon may have been hit by something similar. If then that King, dominated by a similar influence, left his palace, like Alexander R… left his castle; if he lived and screamed like him, like animals, they could have then said, in the language of those days, that he was transformed into a beast. It is true that it kills the miracle. But how many more miracles now fall before the laws of nature that are discovered every day? Religion gains from this if something that was miraculous is now considered natural. When the adversaries of Spiritism say that it resuscitates the supernatural and the superstitious, they demonstrate ignorance regarding the first words because, on the contrary, Spiritism comes to demonstrate that certain facts considered mysterious are not but natural effects.
After reading the subject above in the Parisian Society, as an object of study, it was requested that a medium evoked the Spirits to provide an explanation. The three communications below were obtained. One from the dead brother, Voldemar; the second from the protecting Spirit of the two brothers, and the third from a spiritual guide of another medium.
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, October 13th, 1865
Medium: Mr. Desliens
I
Here I am! What do you want? How come you get involved into private family business? Know this: nobody has ever offended me and remained unpunished; watch my wrath when you try to scavenge a secret that is none of your business! Do you want the keys that explain the reasons why my brother was led to do such things? You must know that it is all on me that punished him for his lack of faith and for his guilt towards me. We were united by a terrible link of death! He should have honored his word and he did not; he was a coward! May he suffer for the injury that would not find shelter in me! As my accomplice in the action, he should have followed in the ordeal. Why did he hesitate? He suffers today as a punishment for his hesitation. Since I could not force him to follow me, at least immediately, I employed the magnetic force that I have at a high degree, forcing him to abandon his own will and yield to mine. Is he suffering? Even better! Each one of his moans gives me a kick of pleasure. Are you happy with my civility? Are you happy with my explanations? No. Do you want to moralize me? But who are you to give me sermons? Are you a priest? No. Then, how come do you want me to listen to you? I want to hear nothing and I am going back to the place that I should not have left. He understands his issues now. His will may react upon matter! Damn you if you allow him to escape from my domination!
Voldemar R…
II
Do not try, at least for now, to impel this poor senseless mind to listen to you. He could not do it and your words would only excite his brutal rage. I come in his place to give you some explanations that will shed some light onto the somber drama that was authored by these two players in another existence. At this time they atone, suffering the consequences of the criminal action whose details I cannot elaborate today. You must only know that from those two, Alexander reported to Voldemar under another name and in another time, in a social condition that you can presume from a few words that are in the report that you read. Think about the passage in which Alexander demanded that the bell rang at the beginning of his meals and you are on the right path. As I said, subordinated to Voldemar and instigated by him, he did a number of things whose responsibility are shared by both today and that are the source of their sufferings. Alexander was, and still is, a feeble and vacillating character that was easily dominated when there was an opportunity. Regarding anybody else he was arrogant, despotic and brutal. In short, he was under the domination of his brother. What both did will be revealed to you later, in this study. Let us move to the results.
They vowed to never betray one another or to move away from each other, and in addition Voldemar reserved the right, to cast the full weight of his strong will power onto his accomplice. You saw that he had transformed him into the main target of his jokes, in the fragments of existences that they shared. Highly intelligent individuals, they had previously formed a scary allegiance against society, by the association of their bad tendencies. Voldemar was retrieved back, by design of the Providence that thus prepared the way for the renovation of both creatures. Alexander pledged to follow his brother in the grave but his affection to one person mentioned in the report and the fatigue for carrying a load that he was painstakingly carrying made him fight back. His brother could not kill him physically but did so mentally, surrounding him by a beam of influences that determined the cruel obsession whose consequences you know. The somnambulist that classified his illness as the disease of Nebuchadnezzar was not far from the truth as it might be thought because Nebuchadnezzar was an obsessed mind that was convinced that he was a beast. It is therefore an obsession that does not exclude, as you know, the intelligence and does not definitely annihilates it. It is one of the most remarkable cases whose study may be beneficial to all. Tonight, this matter would take us a long way given all the necessary explanations. I will stop at this point, asking you to gather your spiritual forces to evoke Voldemar. Since he fears him, with reason, in his absence the brother recovers his energy and may be able to free himself. That is why he rejects to leave him and exerts a continual magnetic action.
The guide of both.
Paulowitch
III
(Medium: Mrs. Delanne)
My beloved brothers, certain facts reported in the Scriptures are overlooked by many as fables to children. They were disdained because they were not understood, and people refused to give them credit. Despite that, once undressed from its allegoric meaning, the bottom line is true, and only Spiritism could decode them. Events of several kind are going to take place not only with the Spiritists but with everybody and all over the world, compelling scientists to study and be convinced, despite what some people say, that Spiritism teaches new things because it is through Spiritism that one will have the explanation of what has remained misunderstood up until now. Weren’t you told that obsession would take new forms? This is an example. The punishment of Nebuchadnezzar is not, therefore, a fable. He was not, as you rightfully said, transformed into a beast; but he was, as in the case that you discuss now, for some time deprived of his intellectual skills, and that in conditions that approached him to the beasts and transformed the powerful tyrant in an object of pity to all. God hit his pride.
All these issues are related to fluids and magnetism. There is obsession and subjugation in this young man. He is very lucid as a Spirit and his brother exerts an irresistible magnetic influence; he easily attracts him out of his body when there is no friend or sympathetic person near to refrain him. He then suffers when detached; to him it is also a punishment and that is when he howls ferociously.
Don’t be so quick in condemning what is written in the sacred books, as does the majority that only sees the letter and not the Spirit. You are better enlightened every day and new truths shall be unveiled before your eyes for you are far from having exhausted every application of what you know about Spiritism.
St. Benedict
If follows from this eminently rational explanation that this young man is enduring an obsession, or better said, a terrible subjugation, like that of King Nebuchadnezzar. Does it destroy God’s justice that had punished the monarch of pride? Absolutely not for we know that obsessions are at the same time trial and atonement. Thus, God could punish him by placing him under the influence of a maleficent Spirit that impelled him to behave like an animal without transforming him in a beast. The first of those punishments is natural and is explained by the law of relationships between the visible and the invisible word; the other one is anti-natural, fantastic and does not explain itself. One presents itself as a reality in our days, in the different forms of obsession; the other is only found in fairy tales. Finally, one is accepted by reason, the other does not.
From the point of view of Spiritism, this fact offers an important theme for study. Obsession is presented in a new way regarding the form and the determining cause, but it has nothing remarkable after what we see every day. St. Benedict is totally right when he says that we are far have exhausted all the applications of Spiritism and of having understood everything it can explain to us. As it is, it offers us a rich mine to explore, helped by the laws that we are taught. Before we say that it is stationary, let us take advantage of what it can teach us.
[1] Obsolete Russian unit of length; 1 verst = approximately 1km or 0.66 miles
[2] Obsolete unit of measure, approximately 1.8x1.8 m2 or 6x6 ft2
Patriarch Joseph and the Clairvoyant of Zimmerwald
We got the following text from one of our Paris subscribers:
“When I read the October issue of the Spiritist Review it reported me to a passage of the Bible that contains a similar fact as that of the clairvoyant of the forest of Zimmerwald. It goes like this:
Genesis 44:4-5 They had gone only a short distance from the city. Now Joseph said to his steward, “Up, follow after the men, and when you overtake them, say to them, ‘Why have you repaid evil for good? Is it not from this that my lord drinks, and by this that he practices divination? You have done evil in doing this.’”
Genesis 44:14-15 When Judah and his brothers came to Joseph’s house, he was still there. They fell before him to the ground. Joseph said to them, “What deed is this that you have done? Do you not know that a man like me can indeed practice divination?”
The kind of mediumship that you described existed amongst the Egyptians and Jewish.”
C… Attorney
This is in fact very true. Joseph was gifted with the art of divination, that is, to be able to see hidden things, and he used a drinking goblet, like the clairvoyant of Zimmerwald used his glass. If mediumship is a demoniac faculty, here we have one of the most respectable characters of the sacred antiquity believing to act through the devil. If he was with God and our mediums with the devil then the devil does the same as God, and consequently equals God’s power. They are then surprised to serious people sustaining such a thesis that destroys their own doctrine.
Spiritism, therefore, did not discover nor invented the mediums, but discovered and explains the laws of mediumship. It is then the true key to the comprehension of the New as well as the Old Testament where there are plenty of similar facts. The lack of such a key led to so many contradictory comments about the Scriptures, explaining nothing. Disbelief increased incessantly regarding these facts and invaded the Church itself. From now on they shall be admitted as natural phenomena for they happen repeatedly in our days through now known laws. We are then right to say that Spiritism is a positive science that destroys the last vestige of the supernatural.
Suppose that the books from antiquity that explain the pagan theogony and the mythology had been lost. Could we understand today the meaning of the innumerable inscriptions that are discovered every day and that are more or less related to those beliefs? Could we understand the objectives and motives of the structures of monuments whose ruins we contemplate today? Would we understand the statues and inscriptions? Certainly not. Without the knowledge of mythology, it would all be dead letter to us, like the cuneiform scripture and the Egyptian hieroglyphs. Mythology is then the key for the reconstruction of history through a fragment of stone, like Cuvier reconstructed pre-diluvian animals from a bone. Just because we no longer believe in the fables of pagan divinities, will it follow that we must neglect mythology. Anyone that supported this would be considered barbarian.
Well, then! Spiritism, as a belief in the existence and manifestation of the souls, as a means for their communication; magnetism, as a means of cure; somnambulism, as the double sight, all these were mingled with all theogonies of the pas, even the Judaic theogony, and later on the Christian; this leads to a number of monuments and inscriptions that still persist. Spiritism that at the same time embraces magnetism and somnambulism, is a light shed onto Archeology and the study of antiquity. We are even convinced that it is a fecund source for the understanding of the hieroglyphs because those beliefs were much spread out in Egypt and its study was part of the mysteries hidden to the commoners. Here some facts that support this statement:
One of our friends, a wise Archeologist that lives in Africa, and who is also an enlightened Spiritist, a few years ago found in the outskirts of Setif, a tomb inscription whose meaning was unintelligible with the knowledge of Spiritism. We remember seeing in the Louvre, a long time ago, an Egyptian painting that portrayed a sleeping person and another one standing up with arms and hands stretching towards the first one, looking at that person as if positively applying a magnetic pass. One could say that it was a drawing based on the little vignette that in former times Mr. Baron Dupotet use to place on the headings of his Journal of Magnetism. The reason for that painting was unmistakable to any magnetizer. Any person that had no knowledge of magnetism would find that image meaningless. This fact alone would demonstrate, as if there weren’t many more, that in former times the Egyptians were skillful in magnetization and that they applied that more or less as we do. Hence, it was part of their culture and therefore stamped in a public monument. Without modern magnetism that gave us the key to certain allegories, we would not know it.
Another Egyptian painting, also in the Louvre, portrayed a standing mummy, surrounded by small layers of linen; a body of the same shape and size, but without the linen, was detached in the middle, as if coming out of the mummy, and another individual placed in front seemed to reach out to that body. We did not know Spiritism then and asked ourselves the meaning of all that.
Today it is clear that the allegoric painting represents the soul separating from the body, but keeping its human appearance; the detachment is facilitated by the action of another incarnate or discarnate person, as we are taught by Spiritism.
Believe not in Spiritism, if that is your wish. Consider it to be a fantasy. Nobody will impose it. Study it, as you do to mythology, just for learning and laughing at people’s beliefs, and you will then see how many horizons will open up before you, regardless of how serious you are.
“When I read the October issue of the Spiritist Review it reported me to a passage of the Bible that contains a similar fact as that of the clairvoyant of the forest of Zimmerwald. It goes like this:
Genesis 44:4-5 They had gone only a short distance from the city. Now Joseph said to his steward, “Up, follow after the men, and when you overtake them, say to them, ‘Why have you repaid evil for good? Is it not from this that my lord drinks, and by this that he practices divination? You have done evil in doing this.’”
Genesis 44:14-15 When Judah and his brothers came to Joseph’s house, he was still there. They fell before him to the ground. Joseph said to them, “What deed is this that you have done? Do you not know that a man like me can indeed practice divination?”
The kind of mediumship that you described existed amongst the Egyptians and Jewish.”
C… Attorney
This is in fact very true. Joseph was gifted with the art of divination, that is, to be able to see hidden things, and he used a drinking goblet, like the clairvoyant of Zimmerwald used his glass. If mediumship is a demoniac faculty, here we have one of the most respectable characters of the sacred antiquity believing to act through the devil. If he was with God and our mediums with the devil then the devil does the same as God, and consequently equals God’s power. They are then surprised to serious people sustaining such a thesis that destroys their own doctrine.
Spiritism, therefore, did not discover nor invented the mediums, but discovered and explains the laws of mediumship. It is then the true key to the comprehension of the New as well as the Old Testament where there are plenty of similar facts. The lack of such a key led to so many contradictory comments about the Scriptures, explaining nothing. Disbelief increased incessantly regarding these facts and invaded the Church itself. From now on they shall be admitted as natural phenomena for they happen repeatedly in our days through now known laws. We are then right to say that Spiritism is a positive science that destroys the last vestige of the supernatural.
Suppose that the books from antiquity that explain the pagan theogony and the mythology had been lost. Could we understand today the meaning of the innumerable inscriptions that are discovered every day and that are more or less related to those beliefs? Could we understand the objectives and motives of the structures of monuments whose ruins we contemplate today? Would we understand the statues and inscriptions? Certainly not. Without the knowledge of mythology, it would all be dead letter to us, like the cuneiform scripture and the Egyptian hieroglyphs. Mythology is then the key for the reconstruction of history through a fragment of stone, like Cuvier reconstructed pre-diluvian animals from a bone. Just because we no longer believe in the fables of pagan divinities, will it follow that we must neglect mythology. Anyone that supported this would be considered barbarian.
Well, then! Spiritism, as a belief in the existence and manifestation of the souls, as a means for their communication; magnetism, as a means of cure; somnambulism, as the double sight, all these were mingled with all theogonies of the pas, even the Judaic theogony, and later on the Christian; this leads to a number of monuments and inscriptions that still persist. Spiritism that at the same time embraces magnetism and somnambulism, is a light shed onto Archeology and the study of antiquity. We are even convinced that it is a fecund source for the understanding of the hieroglyphs because those beliefs were much spread out in Egypt and its study was part of the mysteries hidden to the commoners. Here some facts that support this statement:
One of our friends, a wise Archeologist that lives in Africa, and who is also an enlightened Spiritist, a few years ago found in the outskirts of Setif, a tomb inscription whose meaning was unintelligible with the knowledge of Spiritism. We remember seeing in the Louvre, a long time ago, an Egyptian painting that portrayed a sleeping person and another one standing up with arms and hands stretching towards the first one, looking at that person as if positively applying a magnetic pass. One could say that it was a drawing based on the little vignette that in former times Mr. Baron Dupotet use to place on the headings of his Journal of Magnetism. The reason for that painting was unmistakable to any magnetizer. Any person that had no knowledge of magnetism would find that image meaningless. This fact alone would demonstrate, as if there weren’t many more, that in former times the Egyptians were skillful in magnetization and that they applied that more or less as we do. Hence, it was part of their culture and therefore stamped in a public monument. Without modern magnetism that gave us the key to certain allegories, we would not know it.
Another Egyptian painting, also in the Louvre, portrayed a standing mummy, surrounded by small layers of linen; a body of the same shape and size, but without the linen, was detached in the middle, as if coming out of the mummy, and another individual placed in front seemed to reach out to that body. We did not know Spiritism then and asked ourselves the meaning of all that.
Today it is clear that the allegoric painting represents the soul separating from the body, but keeping its human appearance; the detachment is facilitated by the action of another incarnate or discarnate person, as we are taught by Spiritism.
Believe not in Spiritism, if that is your wish. Consider it to be a fantasy. Nobody will impose it. Study it, as you do to mythology, just for learning and laughing at people’s beliefs, and you will then see how many horizons will open up before you, regardless of how serious you are.
Spiritist Dissertations - Eternal rest
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, October 13th, 1865
Medium: Mr. Leymarie
When I left my bodily envelope, people delivered several speeches at my grave, all impregnated by the same idea. Sonnez, my friend, go and enjoy the eternal rest. Soul, a priest said, rest in the divine contemplation. Friend, a third one would say, sleep in peace after a well lived life. It was the eternal rest, coming out of so many touching farewells. The eternal rest! What was it that people understood by such expression and by the same words repeated so many times every time some one disappeared from Earth, towards the unknown?
Ah! Friends, you believe we rest. What a strange mistake! It is your way of understanding resting. Look around you; do you see rest? At this very moment the trees will leave behind their enchanting dresses; everything vibrates in this season; nature seems to be preparing for death, and yet, if we search we will find life in preparation under such apparent death. Everything depurates in this terrestrial laboratory: the sap and the flower, the insect and the fruit, everything that will embellish and fertilize.
That mountain, that seems to be on an eternal immobility, does not rest. The infinite number of molecules that form the mountain carry out a tremendous task. Some of them tend to separate, others to aggregate, and that slow transformation that may be surprising, at first, causes admiration to the researcher that finds multiple instincts and mysteries to explore. And if this Earth agitates in its own crucible it is to prepare the air and the atmosphere that sustain the whole nature. It follows the path of millions of planets that you see in space, whose daily movements and continual work obey the sovereign will. Their evolution follows a mathematical formulation and it contains other elements that make you act; let us do it! Believe it! Those elements work for your own depuration, your own perfection. Yes, perfection because that is the eternal word. Perfection is the objective and to achieve it atoms, molecules, sap, minerals, trees, animals, people, planets and Spirits endeavor in this general movement, impressive by its diversity and for the fact that it is harmony. All tendencies lead to the same objective and that objective is God, the center of every attraction.
My mission was not accomplished after my departure from Earth; I seek and work every day; my expanded mind embraces better the managing power; I feel better by doing good and like myself, legions of innumerable Spirits prepare the future.
Do not believe in an eternal rest! Those that use such words do not understand its emptiness. All of you that hear me out, can you stop your thoughts, can you force them to rest? No. Even the vagabond seeks and always seeks, pleasing the kind and useful charlatans that deny Spiritism and its power. Spiritism does exist and we will prove that, even better when the time comes. We shall teach them, the apostles of disbelief, that a person is not a serendipitous aggregation of atoms, later destroyed by chance. We shall teach them that there is a soul that radiates by its free-will, owner of its own destiny, elaborating in the terrestrial Gehenna[1]the power of action upon other lives and other trials.
Sonnez
[1] Gehenna is a small valley in Jerusalem. In the Hebrew Bible, Gehenna was initially where some of the kings of Judah sacrificed their children by fire. Thereafter, it was deemed to be cursed. In rabbinic literature, Gehenna is a destination of the wicked. (Wikipedia, TN)
Medium: Mr. Leymarie
When I left my bodily envelope, people delivered several speeches at my grave, all impregnated by the same idea. Sonnez, my friend, go and enjoy the eternal rest. Soul, a priest said, rest in the divine contemplation. Friend, a third one would say, sleep in peace after a well lived life. It was the eternal rest, coming out of so many touching farewells. The eternal rest! What was it that people understood by such expression and by the same words repeated so many times every time some one disappeared from Earth, towards the unknown?
Ah! Friends, you believe we rest. What a strange mistake! It is your way of understanding resting. Look around you; do you see rest? At this very moment the trees will leave behind their enchanting dresses; everything vibrates in this season; nature seems to be preparing for death, and yet, if we search we will find life in preparation under such apparent death. Everything depurates in this terrestrial laboratory: the sap and the flower, the insect and the fruit, everything that will embellish and fertilize.
That mountain, that seems to be on an eternal immobility, does not rest. The infinite number of molecules that form the mountain carry out a tremendous task. Some of them tend to separate, others to aggregate, and that slow transformation that may be surprising, at first, causes admiration to the researcher that finds multiple instincts and mysteries to explore. And if this Earth agitates in its own crucible it is to prepare the air and the atmosphere that sustain the whole nature. It follows the path of millions of planets that you see in space, whose daily movements and continual work obey the sovereign will. Their evolution follows a mathematical formulation and it contains other elements that make you act; let us do it! Believe it! Those elements work for your own depuration, your own perfection. Yes, perfection because that is the eternal word. Perfection is the objective and to achieve it atoms, molecules, sap, minerals, trees, animals, people, planets and Spirits endeavor in this general movement, impressive by its diversity and for the fact that it is harmony. All tendencies lead to the same objective and that objective is God, the center of every attraction.
My mission was not accomplished after my departure from Earth; I seek and work every day; my expanded mind embraces better the managing power; I feel better by doing good and like myself, legions of innumerable Spirits prepare the future.
Do not believe in an eternal rest! Those that use such words do not understand its emptiness. All of you that hear me out, can you stop your thoughts, can you force them to rest? No. Even the vagabond seeks and always seeks, pleasing the kind and useful charlatans that deny Spiritism and its power. Spiritism does exist and we will prove that, even better when the time comes. We shall teach them, the apostles of disbelief, that a person is not a serendipitous aggregation of atoms, later destroyed by chance. We shall teach them that there is a soul that radiates by its free-will, owner of its own destiny, elaborating in the terrestrial Gehenna[1]the power of action upon other lives and other trials.
Sonnez
[1] Gehenna is a small valley in Jerusalem. In the Hebrew Bible, Gehenna was initially where some of the kings of Judah sacrificed their children by fire. Thereafter, it was deemed to be cursed. In rabbinic literature, Gehenna is a destination of the wicked. (Wikipedia, TN)
Bibliographic News
In preparation, to be publish in a few days
The Gospel According to Spiritism,
3rd Edition revised, corrected and modified
by Allan Kardec
This edition resulted in a complete reshuffling of the work. Besides some additions, the main changes consist in a clearer, more accommodating and methodic classification of the subject matters, making it easier to read and search.
The Gospel According to Spiritism,
3rd Edition revised, corrected and modified
by Allan Kardec
This edition resulted in a complete reshuffling of the work. Besides some additions, the main changes consist in a clearer, more accommodating and methodic classification of the subject matters, making it easier to read and search.
The Davenport Brothers
A philosophical study
by Ernest Altony
Brochure in-8. Price 1 franc. By mail 1.2 francs. In Marseille, Mengelle Bookstore, Rue Longue-des-Capucins. 32 bis.
Proceeds to the families of the cholera victims. To receive this brochure send 1.2 francs in stamps to Mr. Mengelle, bookstore owner in Marseille.
A philosophical study
by Ernest Altony
Brochure in-8. Price 1 franc. By mail 1.2 francs. In Marseille, Mengelle Bookstore, Rue Longue-des-Capucins. 32 bis.
Proceeds to the families of the cholera victims. To receive this brochure send 1.2 francs in stamps to Mr. Mengelle, bookstore owner in Marseille.
Warning
Mr. Ledoyen, bookstore owner in Paris (Palais-Royal) retired from his activities and left no successor. Any request for subscription or other things addressed to him would remain void.
December
Open-up!Cárita’s appeal
We got this letter from Lyon:
“… Spiritism, this great link that unites all children of God, has opened up such a vast horizon before us that we can look at all these hearts that the circumstances placed from the east to the west, seeing them vibrating before a single appeal from Cárita. I still remember the profound emotion that I felt last year, when the Spiritist Review reported the impression produced by one communication of this excellent Spirit in all corners of Europe. There is no doubt that any thing can be said about Spiritism; it is a proof that it grows because in general people will not attack small things but those that have big impact. Besides, what are these attacks if not just like a child’s rage that throws stones at the ocean to stop its roar? The enemies of Spiritism are oblivious to the fact that when they attack the doctrine it is free propaganda because it excites every reader to get to know this terrible enemy that follows this chant: - there is no salvation but through charity.”
This letter was followed by the communication below, dictated by the Spirit Cárita, the eloquent and gracious beggar so much known by the good hearts:
Lyon, November 8th, 1865
“It is could, and very windy; open up! I walked a long way through the paths of misery and come back with a semi-dead heart, my shoulders yielding to the weight of so much pain. Open quickly, my beloved one, you that know well that when charity knocks at your door, there is a lot of suffering on the way. Open your heart up to welcome my confidences; open your pocket to dry out the tears of my protégées and listen up with that emotion that is brought to your lips, from you soul, by pain. Oh you the ones that know what is reserved by God, you that frequently cry the tears of love that Jesus called the dew of the celestial life, open up!... Thank you. I am inside.
I left this morning. I was called from all sides, but suffering has such a vibrant voice that one single appeal is enough. My first visitation was with two poor oldies: husband and wife. They lived all these long days of scarce bread, when the sun is hidden, and work lacks to the strong arms. They buried their misery in the crucible of dignity, and nobody could guess they would see the days go by without the daily bread. Then came age, the weakening of the limbs, and the veiled eyes. The employer said: I no longer have work for you. Death did not come, however, and hunger and cold are the frequent visitors of the poor shelter. How can one respond to that misery? Proclaiming it? Oh, no. There are ulcers that cannot be cured by removing the bandages that cover them. What does sooth the heart is a word of consolation said by a friendly voice that guessed it right by the soul, something that was hidden to the eyes. Open-up to that misery.
I then saw a mother sharing her only piece of bread with three little children, and since the piece was small, she kept nothing for herself. I saw no fire in the stove, the bed had no linen; the trembling limbs covered in rags; I saw the husband coming home without finding a job; I finally saw the youngest kid dying without help, because mother and father are Spiritists and suffered humiliation from beneficent institutions.
I saw the full and horrible face of misery; I saw shrinking hearts and dignity vanishing before the rodent germ of need of subsistence. I saw people from God denying their immortal origin because they did not understand their atonement. I finally saw materialism expanding with misery and I uselessly screamed: Open-up! I am charity. I come to you with the warmth of my heart. Cry no more; I come to reassure you. But I was not heard by the hearts of the miserable because their guts were starving!
I then came to you, my good friends, you that listen to me; you who know that Cárita is the beggar to the poor and the one who said: Open-up! I just told you what I saw in my long journey and I beg you to spare one thought to my poor ones, one word, a kind memory, so that at night, at the time of prayer, they will not sleep without thanking God because you sent their your smile from far away. You know that the poor are the touchstone that God sends to Earth to try your hearts. Do not repel them so that one day, when you transpose the portal that leads to the space, God may recognize you by the purity of your hearts and give you shelter in the dwelling of the chosen ones!”
Cárita
We are happy to serve as interpreters to the good Cárita and we hope that she may not have asked this in vain: Open-up! If she is knocking so insistently it is for the fact that the winter, in turn, is also knocking.
Drive in Support of the Poor in Lyon and the Victims of Cholera
Running in the office of the Spiritist Review
This year an addition source of suffering added to the rigors of the winter that walks in strides. There is no doubt that the solicitude of the authorities has never been so intelligent and providential to those affected by this last invasion of a scourge; speed and wise distribution of medical and other resources; nothing was missing in that respect. Justice be done by all in acknowledging that. Thanks to the measures that were taken, the devastation was quickly circumscribed. Nonetheless, it still leaves behind cruel marks on poor families and the most regrettable ones are not those that succumbed. Here is where private charity is really needed. The amount received as well as its distribution are submitted to the control of the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies.
“… Spiritism, this great link that unites all children of God, has opened up such a vast horizon before us that we can look at all these hearts that the circumstances placed from the east to the west, seeing them vibrating before a single appeal from Cárita. I still remember the profound emotion that I felt last year, when the Spiritist Review reported the impression produced by one communication of this excellent Spirit in all corners of Europe. There is no doubt that any thing can be said about Spiritism; it is a proof that it grows because in general people will not attack small things but those that have big impact. Besides, what are these attacks if not just like a child’s rage that throws stones at the ocean to stop its roar? The enemies of Spiritism are oblivious to the fact that when they attack the doctrine it is free propaganda because it excites every reader to get to know this terrible enemy that follows this chant: - there is no salvation but through charity.”
This letter was followed by the communication below, dictated by the Spirit Cárita, the eloquent and gracious beggar so much known by the good hearts:
Lyon, November 8th, 1865
“It is could, and very windy; open up! I walked a long way through the paths of misery and come back with a semi-dead heart, my shoulders yielding to the weight of so much pain. Open quickly, my beloved one, you that know well that when charity knocks at your door, there is a lot of suffering on the way. Open your heart up to welcome my confidences; open your pocket to dry out the tears of my protégées and listen up with that emotion that is brought to your lips, from you soul, by pain. Oh you the ones that know what is reserved by God, you that frequently cry the tears of love that Jesus called the dew of the celestial life, open up!... Thank you. I am inside.
I left this morning. I was called from all sides, but suffering has such a vibrant voice that one single appeal is enough. My first visitation was with two poor oldies: husband and wife. They lived all these long days of scarce bread, when the sun is hidden, and work lacks to the strong arms. They buried their misery in the crucible of dignity, and nobody could guess they would see the days go by without the daily bread. Then came age, the weakening of the limbs, and the veiled eyes. The employer said: I no longer have work for you. Death did not come, however, and hunger and cold are the frequent visitors of the poor shelter. How can one respond to that misery? Proclaiming it? Oh, no. There are ulcers that cannot be cured by removing the bandages that cover them. What does sooth the heart is a word of consolation said by a friendly voice that guessed it right by the soul, something that was hidden to the eyes. Open-up to that misery.
I then saw a mother sharing her only piece of bread with three little children, and since the piece was small, she kept nothing for herself. I saw no fire in the stove, the bed had no linen; the trembling limbs covered in rags; I saw the husband coming home without finding a job; I finally saw the youngest kid dying without help, because mother and father are Spiritists and suffered humiliation from beneficent institutions.
I saw the full and horrible face of misery; I saw shrinking hearts and dignity vanishing before the rodent germ of need of subsistence. I saw people from God denying their immortal origin because they did not understand their atonement. I finally saw materialism expanding with misery and I uselessly screamed: Open-up! I am charity. I come to you with the warmth of my heart. Cry no more; I come to reassure you. But I was not heard by the hearts of the miserable because their guts were starving!
I then came to you, my good friends, you that listen to me; you who know that Cárita is the beggar to the poor and the one who said: Open-up! I just told you what I saw in my long journey and I beg you to spare one thought to my poor ones, one word, a kind memory, so that at night, at the time of prayer, they will not sleep without thanking God because you sent their your smile from far away. You know that the poor are the touchstone that God sends to Earth to try your hearts. Do not repel them so that one day, when you transpose the portal that leads to the space, God may recognize you by the purity of your hearts and give you shelter in the dwelling of the chosen ones!”
Cárita
We are happy to serve as interpreters to the good Cárita and we hope that she may not have asked this in vain: Open-up! If she is knocking so insistently it is for the fact that the winter, in turn, is also knocking.
Drive in Support of the Poor in Lyon and the Victims of Cholera
Running in the office of the Spiritist Review
This year an addition source of suffering added to the rigors of the winter that walks in strides. There is no doubt that the solicitude of the authorities has never been so intelligent and providential to those affected by this last invasion of a scourge; speed and wise distribution of medical and other resources; nothing was missing in that respect. Justice be done by all in acknowledging that. Thanks to the measures that were taken, the devastation was quickly circumscribed. Nonetheless, it still leaves behind cruel marks on poor families and the most regrettable ones are not those that succumbed. Here is where private charity is really needed. The amount received as well as its distribution are submitted to the control of the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies.
Spiritist Novels
Spiritist, by Theophile Gautier
Double Sight, by Elie Berthet
When we say novel, we say works of imagination. The very essence of a novel is to represent a fictitious subject, with respect to the events and characters. But even in that kind of literature there are rules from which common sense does not allow to run away from, and that together with the quality of the style, constitute its merit. If the facts are not true in themselves, they must, at least, be verisimilar and in perfect agreement with the environment where the action takes place.
In historical novels, for example, one must respect the local ambience and there are anachronisms that are not acceptable. The reader must be able to mentally travel in time and to places that must be correctly represented. That is the great talent of Walter Scott. When we read him, we find ourselves right in the Middle Ages. Had he attributed the events and gestures of Francis I to Louis XI, or even had he made the latter and the characters of his court to speak in the times of Renascence, and he could not be forgiven for his mistakes, even if utilizing the most beautiful style.
The same happens to historical novels. Its merit lies in the truthful images because it would be extremely ridiculous to give a Spanish vassal the habits and character of the British.
Novel, to begin with, seems to be the easiest genre. We believe it to be more difficult than history, even though it is less serious. The historian has the picture outlined by the facts from which one must not deviate an inch; the Novelist must create everything; nonetheless, some think that a bit of imagination and style suffice to create a good novel. A serious mistake: one needs a lot of erudition. To write Notre-Dame de Paris, Victor Hugo should know his old and archeological Paris as much as he knew his contemporary Paris. One can write a novel about Spiritism as it can be done about anything else. We even say that when Spiritism is known and understood in its essence, it shall provide arts and literature with an inexhaustible source of poetry. But that would not be the case for those who would only see it in the turning tables, in the ropes of the Davenport brothers or in the art of the charlatans. As in the historical or customs novels, the embroiderer does need to know profoundly the screen that will receive the needlework, does avoiding non-sense that would provide so much ignorance. The same applies to a musician that produces variations of a theme that must be acknowledge through the added fantasy. Anyone who has not studied Spiritism thoroughly, in its spirit, in its tendencies, in its maxims as well as in its material forms, is as unsuitable for making a spiritualist novel of any value as Lesage's to make Gil Blas, if he had not known the history and customs of Spain.
Is it therefore necessary to be a believer and fervent Spiritist for this? Not at all; it is enough to be truthful, and one cannot be truthful without knowing. To make an Arabic novel, it is certainly not necessary to be Muslim, but it is essential to know enough the Muslim religion, its character, its dogmas and its practices, as well as the mores so that one would not make the Africans act and speak like French knights; but there are those who believe that it is enough to give the stamp of the race, to lavish wrongly and plentifully use the name Allah! the names of Fatima and Zulema, because that's about all they know about Islamism. In a word, if one does not need to be a Muslim, one must to get impregnated by the Muslim spirit, as if to make a Spiritist work, even a fantastic one, one must soak up in the spirit of Spiritism; lastly, by reading a Spiritist novel, the Spiritists must be able to recognize themselves, as the Arabs must recognize themselves in an Arabic novel, and be able to say: you got it; but neither will recognize themselves if they are misrepresented, and the author will have done a poor job, as if a painter had painted French ladies in Chinese costumes.
These reflections come to mind in connection with the serial novel that Mr. Théophile Gautier is currently publishing in the Grand Monitor, with the title of Spiritist. We do not have the honor of knowing the author personally; we do not know his convictions or his knowledge regarding Spiritism; his work, which is at the beginning, does not yet allow us to see its conclusion. We will only say that if he only considered his subject from a single point of view, that is of manifestations, while neglecting the philosophical and moral side of the doctrine, he would not cover the general and complex idea embraced by his title, although this name of Spiritist is that of one of his characters. If the facts which he imagines for the need of action, did not fall within the limits drawn by experience; if he presented them as happening in unacceptable conditions, his work would lack truth, and would make one suppose that the Spiritists believe in the marvels of the tales of Arabian Nights. If he lent the Spiritists practices and beliefs which they disown, it would not be impartial, and from this point of view, it would not be a serious piece of literary work.
The Spiritist doctrine is not secret like that of masonry; it has no mysteries for anyone, and spreads out in the broad day light of publicity; it is neither mystical, abstract, nor ambiguous; but clear and within everyone's reach; having nothing allegorical, it can give rise neither to ambiguities nor to false interpretations; it bluntly says what it does admit and what it does not; the phenomena recognized by the doctrine are neither supernatural nor marvelous, but founded on the laws of nature; so that it does neither makes miracles nor wonders. Anyone who does not know it or who misunderstands its tendencies does not want to bother to know it. This clarity and popularization of the Spiritist principles, which have followers in all countries and in all ranks of society, are the most peremptory refutation of the diatribes of their adversaries, for there isn’t a single one of their false allegations that do not find a categorical answer.
Spiritism can therefore only benefit from being known, and that is what those who believe they are ruining it by attacks devoid of any serious argument are unsuspectingly working on. The deviation from convenience in language produce an effect quite opposite to that one would expect; the public analyzes them, and it is not in favor of those who do such a thing; the more violent the aggression, the more it leads people to inquire about the truth, even in the ranks of hostile literature. The calm of the Spiritists before this outcry; the composure and the dignity which they kept in their answers, make with the acrimony of their antagonists a contrast which strikes even the indifferent ones, throwing uncertainty in the opposite ranks, which count today on more than one desertion.
The Spiritist novel can be seen as a transient transaction between negation and affirmation. It takes real courage to face and defy the ridicule that attaches to new ideas, but that courage comes with conviction. Later, we are convinced, serious champions of the doctrine will emerge from the ranks of our adversaries in the press. When the tendencies of the work by M. Théophile Gautier are better defined, we will give our appreciation from the point of view of the Spiritist truth.
The above reflections naturally apply to works of the same genre on magnetism and somnambulism. The phenomenon of double sight recently provided Mr. Élie Berthet with the subject of a very interesting novel published by the Siècle, adding the merit of accuracy to the talents of the author. The author has undoubtedly had to make a serious study of this faculty; to describe it as it does, one must have seen and observed well. However, we could criticize him for a bit of exaggeration in the extension he gives it in some cases. Another mistake, in our view, is to present it as a disease; Now a natural faculty, whatever it is, can coincide with a pathological state, but is not a disease by itself, and the proof is that a large number of people gifted to the highest degree by the double sight, are doing perfectly well.
Here the hero is a young and cataleptic girl: that is her real disease. The faculty that she enjoys caused misfortunes by the misunderstandings that followed, and that is why she deplores the dismal gift that she received; but this gift was only made dismal by ignorance, inexperience and imprudence of those who used it clumsily; from that point of view, there is not one of our faculties which cannot become a lethal gift by the bad use or the false applications that one can make of it.
Having made the reservation above we say that the phenomenon is perfectly described. He describes precisely the vision of a detached soul that knows no distance, that penetrates matter like a beam of light crosses transparent bodies, being a visible and positive demonstration of the existence and independence of the spiritual principle; he also accurately describes the picture of the strange transfiguration that takes place during ecstasy, and the impressive lucidity that confounds for its accuracy in certain cases, and that sometimes causes embarrassing illusions.
To the characters in the drama, it is the true representation of the feelings of believers, non-believers, the skeptical and the scared ones. There is a doctor that oscillates between belief and skepticism, but as a man of wisdom, he does not believe that science has already said the last word. He observes, study and confirms the facts. His behavior, during the crises of the young lady, attest his shrewdness. There is also the discouragement of the exploits, duly repelled in that work.
The author’s job would have been incomplete if he had neglected the moral side of the issue. His objective is not to excite curiosity with extraordinary facts but to deduce their practical and useful consequences. There is one episode, among others, that demonstrates that he understood perfectly well this part in his program. The young clairvoyant lady finds important documents in the underground, documents that can end a serious lawsuit against the family. She describes places and circumstances in detail. The excavations that followed her instructions proved that she saw it very well. They find the papers and the lawsuit is nulled. Notice, in passing, that she made that discovery spontaneously, led by her care for the family and not out of a request. The main piece was a letter in old style that she read textual and completely, and as easily as if she had it before her eyes. It is here, in particular, that we believe her faculty was stretched too far. Later she sees another underground where huge treasures are buried and whose origin she explains. To get there one must cross a cave full of human remains, of numerous victims of the times of feudalism. Up until now nothing that is not likely; what is absolutely unlikely is the fact that the souls of those victims remained locked for centuries and can rise up menacing before those that dare to disturb their somber rest, looking for a treasure. That is the fantastic part. If it were the executioners there would not be anything surprising. We know, from a large number of examples, that it is frequently the temporary punishment of the guilty, condemned to remain in the same place and in the presence of their crimes, until touched by regret they raise their thoughts to God begging for mercy. But in his case it is the innocent victims that would be punished and that is not rational.
The owner of the old castle, the stingy old man, attracted by the discovery of the documents, wants to continue the excavations. These are difficult and dangerous to the workers, but he stops at nothing. The clairvoyant implores him to stop; she predicts that if he persists it will bring disgrace.
-Besides, she says, you will not do it.
-Then, such treasures do not exist, asks the stingy man.
-They do exist as I described them, I guarantee; but once more, you will not get there.
-And who is going to stop me?
-The souls in the cave that must be crossed.
The miser old man, hardened skeptical, admitted the extra corporeal sight of the young lady, although without understanding it very well, because he had just had a proof of that in his loss, since the documents found frustrated his pretensions in the process, but he believed more in the money than in the invisible forces. He then continues:
-How could them oppose? Those treasures belong to me because they are in my property.
-No. They will be found one day by the one that must enjoy them; but they are not destined to you. That is why you will not get there. I insist, if you continue, disgrace will come.
This is the essentially moral, instructive and true side of the report. These words seem to be taken from The Mediums’ Book, in the article about the help of the Spirits in the discovery of treasures: “If the Providence assigns hidden treasures to someone, that person will find them naturally; on the contrary, no.” (Chapter XXVI, No. 295). In fact, there is no example that Spirits, or somnambulists, have facilitated similar discoveries, as with the recovery of inheritances, an all that, by entertaining such a hope, made similar attempts, suffered a lot and spent a lot of money. Said and hard frustration await those that base their hopes of enrichment on similar means. The Spirits are not assigned with the mission of favoring greed and giving us wealth without work, something that would be neither fair nor morally correct.
There is no doubt that the lucid somnambulist sees but she only sees what is allowed to be seen, and the Spirits may, according to the circumstances, and from superior order, obliterate her lucidity, or raise obstacles to the realization of things that are not in the designs of the Providence. In the present example it was allowed to find the papers that would cease the family dispute; it was not that of finding treasures that would only serve to feed greed. That is why the old stingy man perished, victim of his own stubbornness.
The dramatic adventures imagined by Mr. Élie Berthet are not so fantastic as one could believe. They remind us of the more real ones endured by Mr. Borreau, from Niort, in searches of the same kind, and whose touching report is found in his own brochure entitled How and Why I became Spiritist (see our report in the Spiritist Review, December 1864). Another not less important lesson sticks out of the book by Mr. Élie Berthet. The young lady saw positive things, and in another serious case she was mistaken, attributing a crime to an innocent person. How did the author saw the consequence of that? Negation of the faculty? No. No, because despite all that he proves it; but this conclusion, justified by experience, demonstrates that the most attested lucidity is not infallible, and that one must not trust it in absolute terms, without control.
Vision, through the soul, of things that the body cannot see, demonstrates the existence of the soul. That is already a very important achievement. But it is not given for the satisfaction of human passions. Why, then, the emancipated soul does not see always clearly? The reason is that since mankind is still imperfect, the human soul cannot enjoy prerogatives of perfection. Although isolated, it shares the influences of matter until its depuration. That is the same with the discarnate souls or Spirits, and even with more reason those that are still linked to the corporeal life. That is what Spiritism teaches to those that do bother to study it.
In historical novels, for example, one must respect the local ambience and there are anachronisms that are not acceptable. The reader must be able to mentally travel in time and to places that must be correctly represented. That is the great talent of Walter Scott. When we read him, we find ourselves right in the Middle Ages. Had he attributed the events and gestures of Francis I to Louis XI, or even had he made the latter and the characters of his court to speak in the times of Renascence, and he could not be forgiven for his mistakes, even if utilizing the most beautiful style.
The same happens to historical novels. Its merit lies in the truthful images because it would be extremely ridiculous to give a Spanish vassal the habits and character of the British.
Novel, to begin with, seems to be the easiest genre. We believe it to be more difficult than history, even though it is less serious. The historian has the picture outlined by the facts from which one must not deviate an inch; the Novelist must create everything; nonetheless, some think that a bit of imagination and style suffice to create a good novel. A serious mistake: one needs a lot of erudition. To write Notre-Dame de Paris, Victor Hugo should know his old and archeological Paris as much as he knew his contemporary Paris. One can write a novel about Spiritism as it can be done about anything else. We even say that when Spiritism is known and understood in its essence, it shall provide arts and literature with an inexhaustible source of poetry. But that would not be the case for those who would only see it in the turning tables, in the ropes of the Davenport brothers or in the art of the charlatans. As in the historical or customs novels, the embroiderer does need to know profoundly the screen that will receive the needlework, does avoiding non-sense that would provide so much ignorance. The same applies to a musician that produces variations of a theme that must be acknowledge through the added fantasy. Anyone who has not studied Spiritism thoroughly, in its spirit, in its tendencies, in its maxims as well as in its material forms, is as unsuitable for making a spiritualist novel of any value as Lesage's to make Gil Blas, if he had not known the history and customs of Spain.
Is it therefore necessary to be a believer and fervent Spiritist for this? Not at all; it is enough to be truthful, and one cannot be truthful without knowing. To make an Arabic novel, it is certainly not necessary to be Muslim, but it is essential to know enough the Muslim religion, its character, its dogmas and its practices, as well as the mores so that one would not make the Africans act and speak like French knights; but there are those who believe that it is enough to give the stamp of the race, to lavish wrongly and plentifully use the name Allah! the names of Fatima and Zulema, because that's about all they know about Islamism. In a word, if one does not need to be a Muslim, one must to get impregnated by the Muslim spirit, as if to make a Spiritist work, even a fantastic one, one must soak up in the spirit of Spiritism; lastly, by reading a Spiritist novel, the Spiritists must be able to recognize themselves, as the Arabs must recognize themselves in an Arabic novel, and be able to say: you got it; but neither will recognize themselves if they are misrepresented, and the author will have done a poor job, as if a painter had painted French ladies in Chinese costumes.
These reflections come to mind in connection with the serial novel that Mr. Théophile Gautier is currently publishing in the Grand Monitor, with the title of Spiritist. We do not have the honor of knowing the author personally; we do not know his convictions or his knowledge regarding Spiritism; his work, which is at the beginning, does not yet allow us to see its conclusion. We will only say that if he only considered his subject from a single point of view, that is of manifestations, while neglecting the philosophical and moral side of the doctrine, he would not cover the general and complex idea embraced by his title, although this name of Spiritist is that of one of his characters. If the facts which he imagines for the need of action, did not fall within the limits drawn by experience; if he presented them as happening in unacceptable conditions, his work would lack truth, and would make one suppose that the Spiritists believe in the marvels of the tales of Arabian Nights. If he lent the Spiritists practices and beliefs which they disown, it would not be impartial, and from this point of view, it would not be a serious piece of literary work.
The Spiritist doctrine is not secret like that of masonry; it has no mysteries for anyone, and spreads out in the broad day light of publicity; it is neither mystical, abstract, nor ambiguous; but clear and within everyone's reach; having nothing allegorical, it can give rise neither to ambiguities nor to false interpretations; it bluntly says what it does admit and what it does not; the phenomena recognized by the doctrine are neither supernatural nor marvelous, but founded on the laws of nature; so that it does neither makes miracles nor wonders. Anyone who does not know it or who misunderstands its tendencies does not want to bother to know it. This clarity and popularization of the Spiritist principles, which have followers in all countries and in all ranks of society, are the most peremptory refutation of the diatribes of their adversaries, for there isn’t a single one of their false allegations that do not find a categorical answer.
Spiritism can therefore only benefit from being known, and that is what those who believe they are ruining it by attacks devoid of any serious argument are unsuspectingly working on. The deviation from convenience in language produce an effect quite opposite to that one would expect; the public analyzes them, and it is not in favor of those who do such a thing; the more violent the aggression, the more it leads people to inquire about the truth, even in the ranks of hostile literature. The calm of the Spiritists before this outcry; the composure and the dignity which they kept in their answers, make with the acrimony of their antagonists a contrast which strikes even the indifferent ones, throwing uncertainty in the opposite ranks, which count today on more than one desertion.
The Spiritist novel can be seen as a transient transaction between negation and affirmation. It takes real courage to face and defy the ridicule that attaches to new ideas, but that courage comes with conviction. Later, we are convinced, serious champions of the doctrine will emerge from the ranks of our adversaries in the press. When the tendencies of the work by M. Théophile Gautier are better defined, we will give our appreciation from the point of view of the Spiritist truth.
The above reflections naturally apply to works of the same genre on magnetism and somnambulism. The phenomenon of double sight recently provided Mr. Élie Berthet with the subject of a very interesting novel published by the Siècle, adding the merit of accuracy to the talents of the author. The author has undoubtedly had to make a serious study of this faculty; to describe it as it does, one must have seen and observed well. However, we could criticize him for a bit of exaggeration in the extension he gives it in some cases. Another mistake, in our view, is to present it as a disease; Now a natural faculty, whatever it is, can coincide with a pathological state, but is not a disease by itself, and the proof is that a large number of people gifted to the highest degree by the double sight, are doing perfectly well.
Here the hero is a young and cataleptic girl: that is her real disease. The faculty that she enjoys caused misfortunes by the misunderstandings that followed, and that is why she deplores the dismal gift that she received; but this gift was only made dismal by ignorance, inexperience and imprudence of those who used it clumsily; from that point of view, there is not one of our faculties which cannot become a lethal gift by the bad use or the false applications that one can make of it.
Having made the reservation above we say that the phenomenon is perfectly described. He describes precisely the vision of a detached soul that knows no distance, that penetrates matter like a beam of light crosses transparent bodies, being a visible and positive demonstration of the existence and independence of the spiritual principle; he also accurately describes the picture of the strange transfiguration that takes place during ecstasy, and the impressive lucidity that confounds for its accuracy in certain cases, and that sometimes causes embarrassing illusions.
To the characters in the drama, it is the true representation of the feelings of believers, non-believers, the skeptical and the scared ones. There is a doctor that oscillates between belief and skepticism, but as a man of wisdom, he does not believe that science has already said the last word. He observes, study and confirms the facts. His behavior, during the crises of the young lady, attest his shrewdness. There is also the discouragement of the exploits, duly repelled in that work.
The author’s job would have been incomplete if he had neglected the moral side of the issue. His objective is not to excite curiosity with extraordinary facts but to deduce their practical and useful consequences. There is one episode, among others, that demonstrates that he understood perfectly well this part in his program. The young clairvoyant lady finds important documents in the underground, documents that can end a serious lawsuit against the family. She describes places and circumstances in detail. The excavations that followed her instructions proved that she saw it very well. They find the papers and the lawsuit is nulled. Notice, in passing, that she made that discovery spontaneously, led by her care for the family and not out of a request. The main piece was a letter in old style that she read textual and completely, and as easily as if she had it before her eyes. It is here, in particular, that we believe her faculty was stretched too far. Later she sees another underground where huge treasures are buried and whose origin she explains. To get there one must cross a cave full of human remains, of numerous victims of the times of feudalism. Up until now nothing that is not likely; what is absolutely unlikely is the fact that the souls of those victims remained locked for centuries and can rise up menacing before those that dare to disturb their somber rest, looking for a treasure. That is the fantastic part. If it were the executioners there would not be anything surprising. We know, from a large number of examples, that it is frequently the temporary punishment of the guilty, condemned to remain in the same place and in the presence of their crimes, until touched by regret they raise their thoughts to God begging for mercy. But in his case it is the innocent victims that would be punished and that is not rational.
The owner of the old castle, the stingy old man, attracted by the discovery of the documents, wants to continue the excavations. These are difficult and dangerous to the workers, but he stops at nothing. The clairvoyant implores him to stop; she predicts that if he persists it will bring disgrace.
-Besides, she says, you will not do it.
-Then, such treasures do not exist, asks the stingy man.
-They do exist as I described them, I guarantee; but once more, you will not get there.
-And who is going to stop me?
-The souls in the cave that must be crossed.
The miser old man, hardened skeptical, admitted the extra corporeal sight of the young lady, although without understanding it very well, because he had just had a proof of that in his loss, since the documents found frustrated his pretensions in the process, but he believed more in the money than in the invisible forces. He then continues:
-How could them oppose? Those treasures belong to me because they are in my property.
-No. They will be found one day by the one that must enjoy them; but they are not destined to you. That is why you will not get there. I insist, if you continue, disgrace will come.
This is the essentially moral, instructive and true side of the report. These words seem to be taken from The Mediums’ Book, in the article about the help of the Spirits in the discovery of treasures: “If the Providence assigns hidden treasures to someone, that person will find them naturally; on the contrary, no.” (Chapter XXVI, No. 295). In fact, there is no example that Spirits, or somnambulists, have facilitated similar discoveries, as with the recovery of inheritances, an all that, by entertaining such a hope, made similar attempts, suffered a lot and spent a lot of money. Said and hard frustration await those that base their hopes of enrichment on similar means. The Spirits are not assigned with the mission of favoring greed and giving us wealth without work, something that would be neither fair nor morally correct.
There is no doubt that the lucid somnambulist sees but she only sees what is allowed to be seen, and the Spirits may, according to the circumstances, and from superior order, obliterate her lucidity, or raise obstacles to the realization of things that are not in the designs of the Providence. In the present example it was allowed to find the papers that would cease the family dispute; it was not that of finding treasures that would only serve to feed greed. That is why the old stingy man perished, victim of his own stubbornness.
The dramatic adventures imagined by Mr. Élie Berthet are not so fantastic as one could believe. They remind us of the more real ones endured by Mr. Borreau, from Niort, in searches of the same kind, and whose touching report is found in his own brochure entitled How and Why I became Spiritist (see our report in the Spiritist Review, December 1864). Another not less important lesson sticks out of the book by Mr. Élie Berthet. The young lady saw positive things, and in another serious case she was mistaken, attributing a crime to an innocent person. How did the author saw the consequence of that? Negation of the faculty? No. No, because despite all that he proves it; but this conclusion, justified by experience, demonstrates that the most attested lucidity is not infallible, and that one must not trust it in absolute terms, without control.
Vision, through the soul, of things that the body cannot see, demonstrates the existence of the soul. That is already a very important achievement. But it is not given for the satisfaction of human passions. Why, then, the emancipated soul does not see always clearly? The reason is that since mankind is still imperfect, the human soul cannot enjoy prerogatives of perfection. Although isolated, it shares the influences of matter until its depuration. That is the same with the discarnate souls or Spirits, and even with more reason those that are still linked to the corporeal life. That is what Spiritism teaches to those that do bother to study it.
Protesting Style of a Spiritist Against Attacks of Certain Journals
One of our correspondents wrote us the following:
“Here is what I sent two years ago to Mr. Nefftzer, director of the Journal Le Temps:
I was a subscriber to your Journal for being sympathetic to its tendencies and opinions. I have regrettably cancelled my subscription. Allow me to explain my reasons. In your June issue you endeavor to ridicule Spiritism and the Spiritists, telling a kind of authentic story, not mentioning names or places, something easy to do. You tried to determine that Spiritism leads to madness, a compulsory theme to the materialists nowadays, that feel greatly bothered by Spiritism. Weak minds, no doubt, having already tendencies for mental diseases, lost their minds on dealing with Spiritism, as they would without it, and as it happens when they get involved with Chemistry, Physics or Astronomy, and even the writers that do not believe in Spirits. I do not deny either that there are impostors that exploit Spiritism, but which science is free from charlatanism? Don’t we find charlatans in the literature, technology, agriculture, in the military, politicians and the latter in particular? But to conclude against Spiritism from that is not much logical or sensible. Before casting an accusation of that sort, one should at least get to know the object that is under scrutiny, but that is frequently the least concern of those that write about it. They cut and decide from top to bottom since that is easier than the study and understanding.
If you have already experienced great disgraces and true pain, believe me Sir, study Spiritism; only through that you will find consolation and the truths that will allow you to withstand suffering, losses and despair, and that alone is more valued than suicide. What can you offer us better than this beautiful and reassuring Christian philosophy? A cult to material things, to the golden calf? [1]
This may perhaps be convenient to the temperament of the happy people of these days, but something different is needed for those that no longer wish fanaticism, superstition, and the ridiculous and gross practices of the Middle Ages, the atheism, pantheism and the systematic incredulity of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Allow me, Sir, to advise you to be more judicious in your diatribes against Spiritism for today, in France alone, they address about three hundred or four hundred thousand people.
Blanc de Lalésie, owner near Joncy (Saône-et-Loire).
A few days ago, we learned from the papers about the recent death of Mr. Nefftzer’s only son. I do not know if such a disgrace made him remember my letter. I have just sent Mr. Sr. Émile Aucante, manager of the Univers Illustré journal, the following letter:
I have been a subscriber to the Univers Illustré for eighteen months now and since then there was only a few editions in which your chronicler, by the pseudo name Gérôme, did not bother in occupying himself in making jokes of all sorts about Spiritism and the Spiritists. Up until now, that somewhat tedious entertainment, given its frequency, was very innocent: Spiritism does not do bad because of that. But Mr. Gérôme, undoubtedly noticing that people do not bother with his jokes, changed his tone and in the October 7th edition he treats the mass of Spiritists as idiots. From jokes he moves into offence, not afraid of insulting thousands of people, as much educated, enlightened and intelligent as himself, just because they believe to have an immortal soul and that this soul, on another life, will be punished or rewarded, according to one’s merits or lack of merits. Mr. Gérôme has no more prejudices. Yikes! He, no doubt, believes that he eats, drinks and reproduces not more or less like his dog or horse. Kudos to him!
If Mr. Gérôme were kind enough to receive a word of advice, I would invite him to speak only about things that he knows and to shut up with respect to those that he does not, or least to study them, something that would be easy for him, given his elevated and incontestable intelligence. He would learn about things that he ignores totally, like for example the fact that Spiritism is not but the developed Christianity and that the manifestation of the Spirits, that has always happened, adds nothing to the doctrine that would exist with or without them.
But why am talking about Spirits to a man that only believes in his own, and that perhaps ignores if he himself as one? Finally, may Mr. Gérôme be surrounded by the flag of materialism, pantheism or paganism – the latter would be better because there, at least, they believed in the existence of the soul and in a future life – never mind! But may he know to respect his readers’ beliefs, by respecting himself. It is obvious that I cannot continue to give my money away to be insulted, and if such calumnies must continue I would feel sorry to have to cease my subscription…”
Mr. … is modest when assessing the number of Spiritists in France as three or four hundred thousands. He could have doubled it without exaggeration and would still be well below the numbers produced by an author that pretended to destroy us and placed the mark in 20 million. As a matter of fact, an accurate census of the Spiritists is impossible given the fact that they are not grouped, do not form a corporation or society whose members are registered and may be counted. Spiritism is a belief. Anyone that believes in the existence and survival of the souls, and in the possibility of communication between mankind and the spiritual world, is Spiritist, and many are intuitively without having ever heard of Spiritism or mediums. One is a Spiritist out of conviction, as others are non-believers, and for that reason one does not absolutely need to be part of a society, and a proof of that is that not even a thousandth part of them attend meetings. There is no ledger to be consulted to have them counted. One would have to enquiry each individual and ask them about their beliefs. Through normal conversations, every day, people are found with sympathetic ideas and for that matter only they are Spiritists, without the need for a certificate or any sort of notarization. This number grows daily. The fact is attested by our adversaries that are terrified to acknowledge that such a belief invades every echelon of society, from top to bottom of the scale. It is, therefore, an opinion that must be taken into account, and that has the particularity of not being restricted to a class, a cast or sect, nor to a nation or political party. It has representatives everywhere, in the literature, arts, sciences, medicine and courts, in the army, in the commerce, etc. The number of subscribers in France, no doubt, is higher than that of signatories of all Parisian journals. It is obvious that the former constitutes a significant part of the latter. It is therefore to these supporters that your paid journalists say grievances. Now, as Mr. Lalésie correctly says, it is not nice to give money away and be ridiculed and belittled at. For that he cancelled the subscription to journals in which he felt mistreated in his belief, and nobody can reproach his attitude.
Does it mean that the journals must adopt the Spiritists ideas to please them? Not at all. They themselves discuss opinions that they do not share all the time but they do not offend those that do. Those writers are not Jewish, however they do not cast anathema and disdain upon them. Why? Because, as they say, one must respect the freedom of conscience. Why, then, such freedom is not granted to the Spiritists? Aren’t them citizens like everybody else? Do they claim exemption or privilege? They ask for one thing only: the right to be able to think as they wish. Would those that wrote in their flag “freedom, equality and fraternity” want to create a class of pariah in France?
[1] Exodus, 32 (TN)
“Here is what I sent two years ago to Mr. Nefftzer, director of the Journal Le Temps:
I was a subscriber to your Journal for being sympathetic to its tendencies and opinions. I have regrettably cancelled my subscription. Allow me to explain my reasons. In your June issue you endeavor to ridicule Spiritism and the Spiritists, telling a kind of authentic story, not mentioning names or places, something easy to do. You tried to determine that Spiritism leads to madness, a compulsory theme to the materialists nowadays, that feel greatly bothered by Spiritism. Weak minds, no doubt, having already tendencies for mental diseases, lost their minds on dealing with Spiritism, as they would without it, and as it happens when they get involved with Chemistry, Physics or Astronomy, and even the writers that do not believe in Spirits. I do not deny either that there are impostors that exploit Spiritism, but which science is free from charlatanism? Don’t we find charlatans in the literature, technology, agriculture, in the military, politicians and the latter in particular? But to conclude against Spiritism from that is not much logical or sensible. Before casting an accusation of that sort, one should at least get to know the object that is under scrutiny, but that is frequently the least concern of those that write about it. They cut and decide from top to bottom since that is easier than the study and understanding.
If you have already experienced great disgraces and true pain, believe me Sir, study Spiritism; only through that you will find consolation and the truths that will allow you to withstand suffering, losses and despair, and that alone is more valued than suicide. What can you offer us better than this beautiful and reassuring Christian philosophy? A cult to material things, to the golden calf? [1]
This may perhaps be convenient to the temperament of the happy people of these days, but something different is needed for those that no longer wish fanaticism, superstition, and the ridiculous and gross practices of the Middle Ages, the atheism, pantheism and the systematic incredulity of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Allow me, Sir, to advise you to be more judicious in your diatribes against Spiritism for today, in France alone, they address about three hundred or four hundred thousand people.
Blanc de Lalésie, owner near Joncy (Saône-et-Loire).
A few days ago, we learned from the papers about the recent death of Mr. Nefftzer’s only son. I do not know if such a disgrace made him remember my letter. I have just sent Mr. Sr. Émile Aucante, manager of the Univers Illustré journal, the following letter:
I have been a subscriber to the Univers Illustré for eighteen months now and since then there was only a few editions in which your chronicler, by the pseudo name Gérôme, did not bother in occupying himself in making jokes of all sorts about Spiritism and the Spiritists. Up until now, that somewhat tedious entertainment, given its frequency, was very innocent: Spiritism does not do bad because of that. But Mr. Gérôme, undoubtedly noticing that people do not bother with his jokes, changed his tone and in the October 7th edition he treats the mass of Spiritists as idiots. From jokes he moves into offence, not afraid of insulting thousands of people, as much educated, enlightened and intelligent as himself, just because they believe to have an immortal soul and that this soul, on another life, will be punished or rewarded, according to one’s merits or lack of merits. Mr. Gérôme has no more prejudices. Yikes! He, no doubt, believes that he eats, drinks and reproduces not more or less like his dog or horse. Kudos to him!
If Mr. Gérôme were kind enough to receive a word of advice, I would invite him to speak only about things that he knows and to shut up with respect to those that he does not, or least to study them, something that would be easy for him, given his elevated and incontestable intelligence. He would learn about things that he ignores totally, like for example the fact that Spiritism is not but the developed Christianity and that the manifestation of the Spirits, that has always happened, adds nothing to the doctrine that would exist with or without them.
But why am talking about Spirits to a man that only believes in his own, and that perhaps ignores if he himself as one? Finally, may Mr. Gérôme be surrounded by the flag of materialism, pantheism or paganism – the latter would be better because there, at least, they believed in the existence of the soul and in a future life – never mind! But may he know to respect his readers’ beliefs, by respecting himself. It is obvious that I cannot continue to give my money away to be insulted, and if such calumnies must continue I would feel sorry to have to cease my subscription…”
Mr. … is modest when assessing the number of Spiritists in France as three or four hundred thousands. He could have doubled it without exaggeration and would still be well below the numbers produced by an author that pretended to destroy us and placed the mark in 20 million. As a matter of fact, an accurate census of the Spiritists is impossible given the fact that they are not grouped, do not form a corporation or society whose members are registered and may be counted. Spiritism is a belief. Anyone that believes in the existence and survival of the souls, and in the possibility of communication between mankind and the spiritual world, is Spiritist, and many are intuitively without having ever heard of Spiritism or mediums. One is a Spiritist out of conviction, as others are non-believers, and for that reason one does not absolutely need to be part of a society, and a proof of that is that not even a thousandth part of them attend meetings. There is no ledger to be consulted to have them counted. One would have to enquiry each individual and ask them about their beliefs. Through normal conversations, every day, people are found with sympathetic ideas and for that matter only they are Spiritists, without the need for a certificate or any sort of notarization. This number grows daily. The fact is attested by our adversaries that are terrified to acknowledge that such a belief invades every echelon of society, from top to bottom of the scale. It is, therefore, an opinion that must be taken into account, and that has the particularity of not being restricted to a class, a cast or sect, nor to a nation or political party. It has representatives everywhere, in the literature, arts, sciences, medicine and courts, in the army, in the commerce, etc. The number of subscribers in France, no doubt, is higher than that of signatories of all Parisian journals. It is obvious that the former constitutes a significant part of the latter. It is therefore to these supporters that your paid journalists say grievances. Now, as Mr. Lalésie correctly says, it is not nice to give money away and be ridiculed and belittled at. For that he cancelled the subscription to journals in which he felt mistreated in his belief, and nobody can reproach his attitude.
Does it mean that the journals must adopt the Spiritists ideas to please them? Not at all. They themselves discuss opinions that they do not share all the time but they do not offend those that do. Those writers are not Jewish, however they do not cast anathema and disdain upon them. Why? Because, as they say, one must respect the freedom of conscience. Why, then, such freedom is not granted to the Spiritists? Aren’t them citizens like everybody else? Do they claim exemption or privilege? They ask for one thing only: the right to be able to think as they wish. Would those that wrote in their flag “freedom, equality and fraternity” want to create a class of pariah in France?
[1] Exodus, 32 (TN)
How Spiritism Arrives Without Being Sought
Young peasant lady, inconscient medium
It is a fact, attested by experience, that the Spirits act upon persons that are totally oblivious to the Spiritist ideas, unsuspectingly. We have already mentioned several examples in this Spiritist Review. We do not know a single genre of mediumship not revealed spontaneously, even that of writing. How can the following event be explained by those that attribute all those manifestations to imagination or charlatanism?
The little village of E…, in the Department of Aube, up until recently had been much favored, in these days of moral epidemic, for being preserved from the disgrace of Spiritism. The very name of this diabolic work had never even reached the ears of its peaceful inhabitants, undoubtedly because the local priest had not yet preached against it. But the one that counts, and misses the guest, counts twice; he should not have counted on the absence of the Spirits that require no license to operate. Here what happens about four months ago.
In the village there is an almost illiterate seventeen-year-old woman, daughter of a poor and honest crop grower with whom she works everyday in the fields. One day, on returning to their hut, she felt totally disturbed; she then felt like writing, something she never did since the days of school. Write what? She knew nothing; she only wanted to write. Another bizarre idea was to look around to find a pencil and a piece of paper, although she knew that there was none in the cabin. While trying to make sense of those ideas she saw an extinguished ember by the fireplace; she felt irresistibly attracted to get that, and then she was guided by an invisible to force to the whitened wall. Her leg was suddenly and mechanically raised and she wrote this, in very legible characters: “Find paper and pens for you will use them to correspond with the Spirits.” Strange thing the fact that although she had never heard about manifestations of Spirits, she was not surprised with what had just happened. She told her father who then discussed with one of his friends, a simple farmworker like him, but a man of great discernment. That friend came to carefully examine the situation; then, like an experienced Spiritist, although as ignorant about the matter as the girl’s father, he questioned the manifesting Spirit and that signed the name of a Russian general. The latter invited them to talk to the Spiritist in Troyes to obtain more information about it, and so they did. Since then the girl is a writing medium and in addition to that she obtains remarkable physical effects. A Spiritist group was formed in the village, and willing or not, that is how Spiritism has been sought after.
The letter from our correspondent that reports the fact, ends by saying this: “Couldn’t we say that the more the jokers endeavor to trick themselves, the more the Providence, as if to confuse them, daily pours manifestations that challenge their denial every interpretation of the skeptical?”
The Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies received the following about the subject matter:
Parisian Society, November 27th, 1865 – medium Mr. Morin
God’s power is infinite and employs every means to promote a doctrine that is in everything. A double phenomenon took place here as I will try to explain. The young woman was suddenly surrounded by a powerful fluid that led her to temporarily abandon her day to day activities. Before the manifestation of the phenomenon there was a preparation of the patient; she was magnetized and guided, by the will of the Spirit, to find an instrument that was knowingly absent in the house. When she bent over in the fireplace to get the piece of charcoal to replace the pencil, she was only executing a movement driven by the Spirit. It was neither her instinct nor her intelligence acting, but that of the Spirit that utilized the young lady like an adequate instrument to his own fluid. Up until that moment, she was not, say, a medium; it was only after the first written warning that she really became one, and no longer forced by the Spirit that forced her to act. Her mediumship, thereafter, became semi-mechanic, she knew and understood what she was writing but she could not explain it in words. Besides, the physical effects happened in such a powerful way that any idea of prestidigitation must be ruled out.
Before the first effects, there was nothing that indicated her aptitude for that kind of phenomenon. Had those effect been the first ones to reveal her mediumship, they could have been misinterpreted by superstition. The man that, like a seasoned Spiritist, asked questions to the Spirit, he was himself guided by a force of similar nature as the one that impelled the medium to write. That force, whose origin he could not understand, doubled his capacity of evocation, adding his desire to learn to the memories of gatherings for the manifestation of the soul of the dead. It is only a serious study of the principles of the doctrine that teach these newcomers the real, positive and natural side of things, keeping out any interpretation of marvelous and supernatural. These are the two main roles of the event, that unwillingly played their role. They were the more powerful instruments in the event, the more ignorant and exempt of preconceived ideas.
As you can see, my friends, everything concur to cast light and the most illiterate can give lessons to the most knowledgeable ones.
Guide to the medium.
It is a fact, attested by experience, that the Spirits act upon persons that are totally oblivious to the Spiritist ideas, unsuspectingly. We have already mentioned several examples in this Spiritist Review. We do not know a single genre of mediumship not revealed spontaneously, even that of writing. How can the following event be explained by those that attribute all those manifestations to imagination or charlatanism?
The little village of E…, in the Department of Aube, up until recently had been much favored, in these days of moral epidemic, for being preserved from the disgrace of Spiritism. The very name of this diabolic work had never even reached the ears of its peaceful inhabitants, undoubtedly because the local priest had not yet preached against it. But the one that counts, and misses the guest, counts twice; he should not have counted on the absence of the Spirits that require no license to operate. Here what happens about four months ago.
In the village there is an almost illiterate seventeen-year-old woman, daughter of a poor and honest crop grower with whom she works everyday in the fields. One day, on returning to their hut, she felt totally disturbed; she then felt like writing, something she never did since the days of school. Write what? She knew nothing; she only wanted to write. Another bizarre idea was to look around to find a pencil and a piece of paper, although she knew that there was none in the cabin. While trying to make sense of those ideas she saw an extinguished ember by the fireplace; she felt irresistibly attracted to get that, and then she was guided by an invisible to force to the whitened wall. Her leg was suddenly and mechanically raised and she wrote this, in very legible characters: “Find paper and pens for you will use them to correspond with the Spirits.” Strange thing the fact that although she had never heard about manifestations of Spirits, she was not surprised with what had just happened. She told her father who then discussed with one of his friends, a simple farmworker like him, but a man of great discernment. That friend came to carefully examine the situation; then, like an experienced Spiritist, although as ignorant about the matter as the girl’s father, he questioned the manifesting Spirit and that signed the name of a Russian general. The latter invited them to talk to the Spiritist in Troyes to obtain more information about it, and so they did. Since then the girl is a writing medium and in addition to that she obtains remarkable physical effects. A Spiritist group was formed in the village, and willing or not, that is how Spiritism has been sought after.
The letter from our correspondent that reports the fact, ends by saying this: “Couldn’t we say that the more the jokers endeavor to trick themselves, the more the Providence, as if to confuse them, daily pours manifestations that challenge their denial every interpretation of the skeptical?”
The Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies received the following about the subject matter:
Parisian Society, November 27th, 1865 – medium Mr. Morin
God’s power is infinite and employs every means to promote a doctrine that is in everything. A double phenomenon took place here as I will try to explain. The young woman was suddenly surrounded by a powerful fluid that led her to temporarily abandon her day to day activities. Before the manifestation of the phenomenon there was a preparation of the patient; she was magnetized and guided, by the will of the Spirit, to find an instrument that was knowingly absent in the house. When she bent over in the fireplace to get the piece of charcoal to replace the pencil, she was only executing a movement driven by the Spirit. It was neither her instinct nor her intelligence acting, but that of the Spirit that utilized the young lady like an adequate instrument to his own fluid. Up until that moment, she was not, say, a medium; it was only after the first written warning that she really became one, and no longer forced by the Spirit that forced her to act. Her mediumship, thereafter, became semi-mechanic, she knew and understood what she was writing but she could not explain it in words. Besides, the physical effects happened in such a powerful way that any idea of prestidigitation must be ruled out.
Before the first effects, there was nothing that indicated her aptitude for that kind of phenomenon. Had those effect been the first ones to reveal her mediumship, they could have been misinterpreted by superstition. The man that, like a seasoned Spiritist, asked questions to the Spirit, he was himself guided by a force of similar nature as the one that impelled the medium to write. That force, whose origin he could not understand, doubled his capacity of evocation, adding his desire to learn to the memories of gatherings for the manifestation of the soul of the dead. It is only a serious study of the principles of the doctrine that teach these newcomers the real, positive and natural side of things, keeping out any interpretation of marvelous and supernatural. These are the two main roles of the event, that unwillingly played their role. They were the more powerful instruments in the event, the more ignorant and exempt of preconceived ideas.
As you can see, my friends, everything concur to cast light and the most illiterate can give lessons to the most knowledgeable ones.
Guide to the medium.
A Philosopher Farmworker
Young peasant lady, inconscient medium
Spiritism has definitely invaded the countryside. The Spirits want to prove their existence taking instruments everywhere, even beyond the circle of followers, destroying any hypothesis of convenience. We have just learned about the arrival of the doctrine in a small village in Aube, amongst humble farmworkers, through spontaneous manifestation. Here we have another event, even more remarkable, from another point of view. Our colleague, Mr. Delanne, wrote the following to us:
“… During the few hours I spent in the village where my son is educated, a villager gave me two brochures that he had published with this title: “Natural and Philosophical Ideas About Existence in General, From the Absolute Principle Until the End of the Ends, From the Primary Cause to Infinity”, by Chevelle (father), from Joinville (Haute-Marne); the first brochure deals with God, the angels, the soul of man, animals or instinctive; the second about the physical forces, the elements, the organization and movement.[1]
From the pompous title and the serious matters that it embraces you might think that it comes from a man that devoured books his entire life. Make no mistake, this metaphysics philosopher is a humble artisan, a true philosopher on sandals, going around the village to sell vegetables and other produce. Here a few excerpts from his preface:
-I began this work because I believed it to be of some utility to the public. One has duties to one’s fellow human beings; one’s condition is not that of isolation, and society has its own right to demand from everyone the sharing of knowledge; egotism is an intolerable vice.
The work is entirely mine; I was not helped or seconded by anyone; I copied nothing from nobody; it is the result of an entire life of meditation… I had many difficulties to be faced for the execution of my intent, but I did not dissimulate them. To me, misery was the worst of all; it precluded me from acting, not allowing me any free time; I always withstood it without lamentation; I had learned the secret of living happily without wealth and that secret has always been my greatest resource.
… I let my ideas out because I wrote them as they came to me, naturally and spontaneously, through reflection and meditation.
… In Philosophy one cannot demonstrate all the existences through mathematical formulation; we do not measure the Spirits with a measuring tape and they cannot be observed in a microscope.
… One should not expect a high quality or a very brilliant style in my book. I did not do formal courses; I only attend the school in my village. When we learned our prayers in Latin and could recite well the catechism we were considered educated enough.
… In those days we were considered a wise person when able to do the four operations in Math; I was sought after to help to measure the fields. At the age of ten I was the best student in the school and my old father was proud when people sent for me, asking for help in where to plant a milestone or write a message or a receipt.
I then got the right to apologize to the readers for the triviality of my language. I did not learn the rules of rhetoric, I do believe that the title most adequate to my work is: Natural Ideas.
We went to school from the All Saints day to Easter and would be on vacation from Easter to All Saints. But since my father, despite his poverty, was not afraid of spending a few cents to buy me books, I learned much more from them during the break and did not forget them during class season.
Here are few excerpts from the chapter about God:
-God is the only one that can say: I am the one that is. He is one in everything; everything does exist from him, in him and for him, and nothing can exist without him and beyond him. He is one and yet produced the multiple and the divisible, one and the other to infinity… If I could define God well, I would be God but there could not be two.
God is an infinite whole, indivisible, eternal, immutable; there is no limit in the small as in the large… One minute and a hundred thousand years or a hundred thousand centuries are the same to God; eternity cannot be fragmented; to God there is no past or future, it is an eternal present; the past still is and the future is already; God see all times at once; there is no yesterday or tomorrow, and he said, when talking about his son: I generated you today.
Eternity cannot be measured, as the infinity in space; these are two abysses that we can only get to through abstraction and we would get lost there if willing to penetrate it; they are like virgin forests with no trail. And when we get there we are forced to halt.
God cannot stop creating. He would be just an inactive God if he did not, and his glory would be only to himself. Impossible monotony. God creates eternally and the beginning of creation, taken from infinity, must continue to infinity.
… It was necessary to have free intelligences created, for what would be like the life of the thinking beings if they were not given the freedom of thought? Where would God’s glory be if his creatures were not allowed to issue their opinion about him? It would be the same as remaining alone; their rendered worship would be like a chimera, a comedy directed by him and towards him. He would have been the only actor and the only spectator.
To the glory of God, therefore, it was an absolute necessity that the intelligences were created absolutely free, that were given the right to judge their author, to lead themselves, in good as in evil, as they wished. Evil must be allowed so that good exist; one cannot be known if the other cannot be seen. But, at the same time that God gives free-will to the intelligences, they are also given their private self, that intellectual feeling of freedom of thinking, that act of a free spirit that we call conscience, that individual tribunal warning each person about the value of their action. Nobody does evil unknowingly: one can only sin out of free will.
We also have reasons to believe that the Spirits of angels, have some participation in the universal governance, for it has been received as a dogma of faith that we are guarded by angels and that each one of us has their guardian angel.
The intelligences, or Spirits detached from matter, therefore may sometimes have influence upon people’s minds. How many people have had revelations that happened: bear witness Joan of Arc and so many others from whom the history books that I read talk about, and that we can find out! I do not need my memory alone to cite the passages and do not need to go elsewhere but inside myself. When my older sister died of cholera in Midrevay (Vosges), I heard not heard anywhere about cholera in those days. I had no idea she was sick; I saw her healthier than ever and had no reason to worry about her. I saw her in my dreams in my house in Joinville:
“Dear Joseph, I came to tell you that I slept; I know that I always loved you very much and wanted to bring you the news myself, bring you the news about my return to the other world.” The following day the mailman brought me a letter announcing my sister’s death.
When I received the letter with a black stripe, I told my wife: Remember the dream I told you yesterday and that could be true? I was not wrong.
I several times had, not sleeping but well awake and working, visions that I did not bother about when they happened, even long time afterwards. It happened three or four times in the course of my life; I only kept a slight memory, but I am sure they happened. I am not the only one that have mental revelations; others will prove that I am right and that may have already been proved.
The soul of the animals cannot be but individual, and consequently, cannot be decomposable, and consequently the soul of the animal does not die. People thought of that before I did and that gave rise to the doctrine of metempsychosis. If metempsychosis does exist, it could not be but individual of the same species: the vital soul of mammal cannot pass to a tree.
Given the state of human intelligence it is impossible that it passes to the body of an animal. The soul could not act there. The physical constitution of the animal cannot shelter human intelligence, although they say that devils got together and possessed animals. I cannot believe that they can do anything meaningful in such organization; they could not speak; they could not annihilate the instinct that would always act, willing or not; it is one of the laws established by the Creator; they would be unworthy of them if they could breach them, if they could change them. The cluster of nerves, as we said above, the telegraphic stations of those species, cannot be driven by intelligence.
In these last days there is a lot of talk about Spiritism; some people tell me that this chapter has a lot to do with that, but if that is the case is out of pure chance, for I have never read or heard a single phrase about it.
Now, his reflections about the creation:
All the geologists and naturalists are in agreement that God’s days were not like ours, regulated by the Sun. In fact, God’s days in the creation could not be regulated by the Sun because, according to the Sacred Scriptures, the Sun had not been created yet, or was not visible; hence the word that in the Scriptures, in the language that they were written, means time when it says days. The error, therefore, could have been made by the translators that could have said six times instead of six days; besides, why would we want to make God’s days as short as ours if God is eternal?
It is not that I pretend that God could not have created the planet in six days of twenty four hours each, when each of those could last as much as hundreds of thousands of our years. If I wanted to mean that I would be in contradiction with myself, because in the first volume I said that one minute, a hundred thousand years or a hundred thousand centuries are the same thing to God.
Even if God had utilized only one day, as indicated in the book of Genesis, between each of those days there could be millions of years or centuries.
When we examine the layers of Earth and how they were formed, we call those different revolutions of epochs. The physical proof is there, for those layers were not built in 24h.
People want to take the text of the Sacred Scriptures to much literally; they are true but one must know how to understand them. It is not about acting like those Israelis that allowed themselves to be hanged because it was a Saturday; if they wanted to kill me on a Sunday, I would not wait the following Monday to defend myself. It is only to us that the week has seven days. To God it is only one day, and that day has no beginning and no end. For our benefit, God wishes that we take one day off per week, but God never rests or sleep, and God’s action is ceaseless.
Our days are not but the disappearance of one and the surge of another that illuminates us. When the Sun sets for us it rises for other people. Any time at day or night it rises, and shines in its zenith or lies down. And when the rain, the cold and snow send us close to the fireplace, there are other peoples that pick flowers and fruits. Besides, there isn’t only one world, one Sun; all the starts that we see are suns that illuminate planets like ours, and perhaps more perfect than ours. God is the creator of all those worlds and many more that we do not see; the six days of creation, therefore, are six periods that lasted more or less time, and that were called days to facilitate understanding.
We read the two brochures from father Chevelle with interest, and we could certainly contradict him in several points, but the citations that we just made above reveal ideas of elevated philosophical reach, and that do not go without a certain character of originality. His works form a small encyclopedia, because the deals with a little bit of everything, even common things. Later he announces a Manual of the Herbalist, or the Treatment of Diseases by the Use of Indigenous Medicinal Plants.
Where all those ideas of his come from? He read, undoubtedly, but his position did not allow him to read much, and besides, he needed special skills to benefit from that reading and deal with so much abstract subjects. We have seen natural poets coming out of working classes, but it is rarer to see meta-physicists, without previous studies, and even less from farmworkers. Father Chevelle, in his style, presents a phenomenon like those calculating shepherds that defeated science. Isn’t this a serious subject of study? These are facts. Now, since every effect has a cause, have the wise men searched for that cause? No, because one would have had to search in the depth of the soul. But how about the spiritualist philosophers? They lack the only key that could give them the solution.
Here is how skepticism responds to that: bizarre thing of nature; result of neurological organization. Spiritist says: highly developed intelligence in previous lives, and that not having lost anything from that, it is reflected in the present life, serving as basis to new acquisitions. But why those intelligences that must have shined in their social echelons, now return in more inferior classes? Another problem, not less insolvable without the key given by Spiritism. It says that these are voluntary trials or atonements, chosen by those very minds, that given their moral advancement, wanted to reborn in in simple environment, be it out of humility or to acquire practical knowledge that may be useful to them in other existences.”
These events were reported in the Parisian Society and gave rise to the following communication:
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, November 10th, 1865 – medium Mrs. Breul
My dear friends, in the text read by your President, with several cases reported by your brother Delanne, you saw a remarkable philosophical work, brought to light by a simple peasant of the Vosges. Isn’t this the place to attest how many prodigies take place at this very moment, to shock disbelief and the scholars of the world; to confuse those persons that believe to have the monopoly of science, admitting nothing beyond the strict limits of their conceptions, limited by matter?
Yes, in these days of preparation for the humanitarian revolution that the Spirits of the Lord must carry out, you can more and more acknowledge these words of Jesus, not much understood by men: “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children”.[2]
When I refer to the wise I do not speak of those modest men, relentless pioneers of science that make humanity advance, unveiling the wonders that reveal the power and goodness of the Creator, that infatuated by their knowledge, believe that there could not be anything not yet discovered, supported or published by them. Those will be punished in their pride, and God already allows them to be baffled by the superiority of intellectual works produced by the pencil of persons far from wearing the graduation’s ring.
As with the time of Jesus Christ that wanted to honor and raise the worker, by choosing amongst artisans, the angels of the Lord now recruit their supporters among those simple and honest hearts and people of good will with the simplest professions.
You must then understand, friends, that pride is the greatest enemy of your advancement, and that humility and charity are the only virtues that please God and attract to you these good fluids that help you progress and get closer to God.
Louis of France.
[1] Two large brochures in-12; price 1 franc each directly with the author in Joinville (Haute-Marne); in Bar-le-Duc, with Numa Rolin. The author informs that the work shall be completed with additional five brochures that will all together form a volume.
[2] Mathews 11:25 (TN)
Spiritism has definitely invaded the countryside. The Spirits want to prove their existence taking instruments everywhere, even beyond the circle of followers, destroying any hypothesis of convenience. We have just learned about the arrival of the doctrine in a small village in Aube, amongst humble farmworkers, through spontaneous manifestation. Here we have another event, even more remarkable, from another point of view. Our colleague, Mr. Delanne, wrote the following to us:
“… During the few hours I spent in the village where my son is educated, a villager gave me two brochures that he had published with this title: “Natural and Philosophical Ideas About Existence in General, From the Absolute Principle Until the End of the Ends, From the Primary Cause to Infinity”, by Chevelle (father), from Joinville (Haute-Marne); the first brochure deals with God, the angels, the soul of man, animals or instinctive; the second about the physical forces, the elements, the organization and movement.[1]
From the pompous title and the serious matters that it embraces you might think that it comes from a man that devoured books his entire life. Make no mistake, this metaphysics philosopher is a humble artisan, a true philosopher on sandals, going around the village to sell vegetables and other produce. Here a few excerpts from his preface:
-I began this work because I believed it to be of some utility to the public. One has duties to one’s fellow human beings; one’s condition is not that of isolation, and society has its own right to demand from everyone the sharing of knowledge; egotism is an intolerable vice.
The work is entirely mine; I was not helped or seconded by anyone; I copied nothing from nobody; it is the result of an entire life of meditation… I had many difficulties to be faced for the execution of my intent, but I did not dissimulate them. To me, misery was the worst of all; it precluded me from acting, not allowing me any free time; I always withstood it without lamentation; I had learned the secret of living happily without wealth and that secret has always been my greatest resource.
… I let my ideas out because I wrote them as they came to me, naturally and spontaneously, through reflection and meditation.
… In Philosophy one cannot demonstrate all the existences through mathematical formulation; we do not measure the Spirits with a measuring tape and they cannot be observed in a microscope.
… One should not expect a high quality or a very brilliant style in my book. I did not do formal courses; I only attend the school in my village. When we learned our prayers in Latin and could recite well the catechism we were considered educated enough.
… In those days we were considered a wise person when able to do the four operations in Math; I was sought after to help to measure the fields. At the age of ten I was the best student in the school and my old father was proud when people sent for me, asking for help in where to plant a milestone or write a message or a receipt.
I then got the right to apologize to the readers for the triviality of my language. I did not learn the rules of rhetoric, I do believe that the title most adequate to my work is: Natural Ideas.
We went to school from the All Saints day to Easter and would be on vacation from Easter to All Saints. But since my father, despite his poverty, was not afraid of spending a few cents to buy me books, I learned much more from them during the break and did not forget them during class season.
Here are few excerpts from the chapter about God:
-God is the only one that can say: I am the one that is. He is one in everything; everything does exist from him, in him and for him, and nothing can exist without him and beyond him. He is one and yet produced the multiple and the divisible, one and the other to infinity… If I could define God well, I would be God but there could not be two.
God is an infinite whole, indivisible, eternal, immutable; there is no limit in the small as in the large… One minute and a hundred thousand years or a hundred thousand centuries are the same to God; eternity cannot be fragmented; to God there is no past or future, it is an eternal present; the past still is and the future is already; God see all times at once; there is no yesterday or tomorrow, and he said, when talking about his son: I generated you today.
Eternity cannot be measured, as the infinity in space; these are two abysses that we can only get to through abstraction and we would get lost there if willing to penetrate it; they are like virgin forests with no trail. And when we get there we are forced to halt.
God cannot stop creating. He would be just an inactive God if he did not, and his glory would be only to himself. Impossible monotony. God creates eternally and the beginning of creation, taken from infinity, must continue to infinity.
… It was necessary to have free intelligences created, for what would be like the life of the thinking beings if they were not given the freedom of thought? Where would God’s glory be if his creatures were not allowed to issue their opinion about him? It would be the same as remaining alone; their rendered worship would be like a chimera, a comedy directed by him and towards him. He would have been the only actor and the only spectator.
To the glory of God, therefore, it was an absolute necessity that the intelligences were created absolutely free, that were given the right to judge their author, to lead themselves, in good as in evil, as they wished. Evil must be allowed so that good exist; one cannot be known if the other cannot be seen. But, at the same time that God gives free-will to the intelligences, they are also given their private self, that intellectual feeling of freedom of thinking, that act of a free spirit that we call conscience, that individual tribunal warning each person about the value of their action. Nobody does evil unknowingly: one can only sin out of free will.
We also have reasons to believe that the Spirits of angels, have some participation in the universal governance, for it has been received as a dogma of faith that we are guarded by angels and that each one of us has their guardian angel.
The intelligences, or Spirits detached from matter, therefore may sometimes have influence upon people’s minds. How many people have had revelations that happened: bear witness Joan of Arc and so many others from whom the history books that I read talk about, and that we can find out! I do not need my memory alone to cite the passages and do not need to go elsewhere but inside myself. When my older sister died of cholera in Midrevay (Vosges), I heard not heard anywhere about cholera in those days. I had no idea she was sick; I saw her healthier than ever and had no reason to worry about her. I saw her in my dreams in my house in Joinville:
“Dear Joseph, I came to tell you that I slept; I know that I always loved you very much and wanted to bring you the news myself, bring you the news about my return to the other world.” The following day the mailman brought me a letter announcing my sister’s death.
When I received the letter with a black stripe, I told my wife: Remember the dream I told you yesterday and that could be true? I was not wrong.
I several times had, not sleeping but well awake and working, visions that I did not bother about when they happened, even long time afterwards. It happened three or four times in the course of my life; I only kept a slight memory, but I am sure they happened. I am not the only one that have mental revelations; others will prove that I am right and that may have already been proved.
The soul of the animals cannot be but individual, and consequently, cannot be decomposable, and consequently the soul of the animal does not die. People thought of that before I did and that gave rise to the doctrine of metempsychosis. If metempsychosis does exist, it could not be but individual of the same species: the vital soul of mammal cannot pass to a tree.
Given the state of human intelligence it is impossible that it passes to the body of an animal. The soul could not act there. The physical constitution of the animal cannot shelter human intelligence, although they say that devils got together and possessed animals. I cannot believe that they can do anything meaningful in such organization; they could not speak; they could not annihilate the instinct that would always act, willing or not; it is one of the laws established by the Creator; they would be unworthy of them if they could breach them, if they could change them. The cluster of nerves, as we said above, the telegraphic stations of those species, cannot be driven by intelligence.
In these last days there is a lot of talk about Spiritism; some people tell me that this chapter has a lot to do with that, but if that is the case is out of pure chance, for I have never read or heard a single phrase about it.
Now, his reflections about the creation:
All the geologists and naturalists are in agreement that God’s days were not like ours, regulated by the Sun. In fact, God’s days in the creation could not be regulated by the Sun because, according to the Sacred Scriptures, the Sun had not been created yet, or was not visible; hence the word that in the Scriptures, in the language that they were written, means time when it says days. The error, therefore, could have been made by the translators that could have said six times instead of six days; besides, why would we want to make God’s days as short as ours if God is eternal?
It is not that I pretend that God could not have created the planet in six days of twenty four hours each, when each of those could last as much as hundreds of thousands of our years. If I wanted to mean that I would be in contradiction with myself, because in the first volume I said that one minute, a hundred thousand years or a hundred thousand centuries are the same thing to God.
Even if God had utilized only one day, as indicated in the book of Genesis, between each of those days there could be millions of years or centuries.
When we examine the layers of Earth and how they were formed, we call those different revolutions of epochs. The physical proof is there, for those layers were not built in 24h.
People want to take the text of the Sacred Scriptures to much literally; they are true but one must know how to understand them. It is not about acting like those Israelis that allowed themselves to be hanged because it was a Saturday; if they wanted to kill me on a Sunday, I would not wait the following Monday to defend myself. It is only to us that the week has seven days. To God it is only one day, and that day has no beginning and no end. For our benefit, God wishes that we take one day off per week, but God never rests or sleep, and God’s action is ceaseless.
Our days are not but the disappearance of one and the surge of another that illuminates us. When the Sun sets for us it rises for other people. Any time at day or night it rises, and shines in its zenith or lies down. And when the rain, the cold and snow send us close to the fireplace, there are other peoples that pick flowers and fruits. Besides, there isn’t only one world, one Sun; all the starts that we see are suns that illuminate planets like ours, and perhaps more perfect than ours. God is the creator of all those worlds and many more that we do not see; the six days of creation, therefore, are six periods that lasted more or less time, and that were called days to facilitate understanding.
We read the two brochures from father Chevelle with interest, and we could certainly contradict him in several points, but the citations that we just made above reveal ideas of elevated philosophical reach, and that do not go without a certain character of originality. His works form a small encyclopedia, because the deals with a little bit of everything, even common things. Later he announces a Manual of the Herbalist, or the Treatment of Diseases by the Use of Indigenous Medicinal Plants.
Where all those ideas of his come from? He read, undoubtedly, but his position did not allow him to read much, and besides, he needed special skills to benefit from that reading and deal with so much abstract subjects. We have seen natural poets coming out of working classes, but it is rarer to see meta-physicists, without previous studies, and even less from farmworkers. Father Chevelle, in his style, presents a phenomenon like those calculating shepherds that defeated science. Isn’t this a serious subject of study? These are facts. Now, since every effect has a cause, have the wise men searched for that cause? No, because one would have had to search in the depth of the soul. But how about the spiritualist philosophers? They lack the only key that could give them the solution.
Here is how skepticism responds to that: bizarre thing of nature; result of neurological organization. Spiritist says: highly developed intelligence in previous lives, and that not having lost anything from that, it is reflected in the present life, serving as basis to new acquisitions. But why those intelligences that must have shined in their social echelons, now return in more inferior classes? Another problem, not less insolvable without the key given by Spiritism. It says that these are voluntary trials or atonements, chosen by those very minds, that given their moral advancement, wanted to reborn in in simple environment, be it out of humility or to acquire practical knowledge that may be useful to them in other existences.”
These events were reported in the Parisian Society and gave rise to the following communication:
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, November 10th, 1865 – medium Mrs. Breul
My dear friends, in the text read by your President, with several cases reported by your brother Delanne, you saw a remarkable philosophical work, brought to light by a simple peasant of the Vosges. Isn’t this the place to attest how many prodigies take place at this very moment, to shock disbelief and the scholars of the world; to confuse those persons that believe to have the monopoly of science, admitting nothing beyond the strict limits of their conceptions, limited by matter?
Yes, in these days of preparation for the humanitarian revolution that the Spirits of the Lord must carry out, you can more and more acknowledge these words of Jesus, not much understood by men: “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children”.[2]
When I refer to the wise I do not speak of those modest men, relentless pioneers of science that make humanity advance, unveiling the wonders that reveal the power and goodness of the Creator, that infatuated by their knowledge, believe that there could not be anything not yet discovered, supported or published by them. Those will be punished in their pride, and God already allows them to be baffled by the superiority of intellectual works produced by the pencil of persons far from wearing the graduation’s ring.
As with the time of Jesus Christ that wanted to honor and raise the worker, by choosing amongst artisans, the angels of the Lord now recruit their supporters among those simple and honest hearts and people of good will with the simplest professions.
You must then understand, friends, that pride is the greatest enemy of your advancement, and that humility and charity are the only virtues that please God and attract to you these good fluids that help you progress and get closer to God.
Louis of France.
[1] Two large brochures in-12; price 1 franc each directly with the author in Joinville (Haute-Marne); in Bar-le-Duc, with Numa Rolin. The author informs that the work shall be completed with additional five brochures that will all together form a volume.
[2] Mathews 11:25 (TN)
Two Skeptical Spirits to their Friends
men to their friends on Earth
When the most skeptical and obstinate transpose the portal of the corporeal life, they are forced to acknowledge that they still live; that they are Spirits since they are no longer corporeal; that the Spirits can communicate with humans since they can do it themselves. But their appreciation of the spiritual world varies in proportion to their moral advancement, their knowledge or ignorance, the elevation or misery of their soul. The two Spirits that are mentioned here belonged to the class of men of science and high intelligence. Both were fundamentally skeptical, but eminently skeptical and their skepticism was countered by distinguished moral qualities.
Thus, once in the world of the Spirits they promptly face things from their true standpoint and acknowledge their mistake. In fact, there isn’t anything extraordinary in this and that is not seen every day; if we publish their first impressions it is due to their eminently instructive content. They both died recently. The first one, Mr. M.L… was a surgeon at Hospital B… and brother in-law to Mr. A. Véron, a member of the Spiritist Society of Paris. The second, Mr. Gui…, was a prominent economist, close friend of Mr. Colliez, another member of the Society. Mr. Véron tried, without success, to bring his brother in-law to the spiritualist ideas; after his death he became more accessible to those instructions and below one of the first communications received from him.
Paris, October 5th, 1865 – medium Mr. Desliens
“My dear brother in-law, considering that we enjoy privacy and that I am not taking the place of someone that could be more useful than me, I attend your appeal with pleasure. From starters, do not expect to see me unfolding all my spiritual faculties. I could, no doubt, try to do it and perhaps even more successfully when alive, but my proud presumption is far from me and if I thought a lot of myself on Earth, here I am very small. How many people I disdained and today I am happy to find their protection and teachings! Ignorant people down here are frequently the wise ones up there, and as for our science that pretends to know everything and does not accept anything beyond its own borders, it is illusive and limited! Ah human pride! How long will you still be around on Earth, by the force of habit, where the spirit of routine precludes progress from its unstoppable march? “I don’t know this; it is outside of the limits of my knowledge; hence it does not exist.” That is the way we think down here. If we admitted it, or at least studied that given event, resulting from unknown laws, we would have to renounce to mistaken systems, supported by great names that constitute our glory, and even worse than that, we would have to acknowledge that we were wrong. No, not us, other deniers, we met a universal Galileo that comes to tell us: “I am a Spirit, I am alive, I was a man, and you yourselves were men like me, until through a series of incarnations you are depurate to climb the infinite ladder of the worlds… And we deny!
But, as Galileo said after his backtracks: “And yet, it moves”! Spiritism says: “And yet, the Spirits are here; they manifest, and no denial can destroy a fact.” The brutal fact is true; nothing can be done against it. Time, that great teacher, will do justice by sweeping some and educating others. Be among the educated ones. I was struck down in the prime of my pride and suffered the consequences of my denials. Avoid my fall and may those that imitate my line of thoughts learn from my mistakes, thus avoiding the abyss of darkness from where I was retrieved by your kindness. You can feel my disturbed language. Later I will be able to speak in a more logical way. Be indulgent to my spiritual youth.
M. L.
Before the communication above was read at the Parisian Society, the Spirit communicated spontaneously, dictating the following:
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, October 20th, 1865 – medium Mr. Desliens
Dear Mr. Allan Kardec, allow this Spirit that, through the studies of your work, was led to consider life, the being and God from its true point of view, allow me a sincere recognition. I ignored your name and your work while on Earth. Had I heard about you I might well have exercised my teasing vein, as I used to do regarding everything that tried to demonstrate the existence of something independent of the body. I was blind then. Forgive me. Today, thanks to you, thanks to the teachings of the Spirits that were spread and promoted by your hand, I am a changed mind, I am aware of myself and I see my destiny. How much don’t I owe you and Spiritism! Anyone that might have known me and today reads the expression of my thoughts will say: “This one cannot be the one we knew, that radical materialistic person that admitted nothing beyond the dense phenomena of nature.” Nonetheless, it is me, undoubtedly.
My dear brother in-law, to whom I have a lot to thank for, you say that I found good feelings in a short time. I thank you for your kindness to me, but it certainly ignores the large number of hours of suffering, resulting from the unconsciousness of one’s very existence! I used to believe in the nothingness and was punished by a fictious void. Feel oneself and not being able to communicate; believing to be spread amongst the sparse rests of matter that formed the body, such was my position for over two months!... two centuries!... Ah, suffering hours are too long and if you did not take the burden of pulling me out of that atmosphere of nihilism, if you had not forced me to come to these gatherings of peace and love, a place that I did not see or understand anything, but where sympathetic fluids acted upon me and gradually woke me up from my heavy spiritual lethargy, where would I be now? My God!... God!... what a sweet name to have pronounced by someone obstinate in denying such a great and good Father! Ah, friends, help me out with moderation, because that is the only thing that I am afraid of today, of becoming fanatic by these beliefs that I would have totally rejected in past, had it come to my attention.
I will say nothing today about your works; I am still too new, too ignorant to dare venture into your shrewd dissertations. I feel it, but I don’t know it. I will only tell you this because this I know: Yes, the fluids do have a huge influence as a heling agent, if not corporeal from which I know nothing, but at least spiritual, because I experienced its action. I already told you and I repeat with joy and recognition: I went to the Spiritist meetings, pushed by an invisible force, undoubtedly by my spiritual guide. I could not see a thing, could not understand anything, however, a fluidic force that I could not understand, cured me spiritually.
I am thankful and in debt to all those that acquired eternal rights to my recognition, pulling me out of the chaos in which I had fallen into, and I beg you, my friends, for your kindness in allowing me to come and quietly attend your wise assemblies, and later on offering my weak scientific lights to your services.
M.L.
Question – Could you tell us, with the help of your guide, how come you so promptly acknowledged your earthly mistakes, while a good number of Spirits that are not spared of spiritual assistance, remain so much longer without understanding the advices given to them?
Thus, once in the world of the Spirits they promptly face things from their true standpoint and acknowledge their mistake. In fact, there isn’t anything extraordinary in this and that is not seen every day; if we publish their first impressions it is due to their eminently instructive content. They both died recently. The first one, Mr. M.L… was a surgeon at Hospital B… and brother in-law to Mr. A. Véron, a member of the Spiritist Society of Paris. The second, Mr. Gui…, was a prominent economist, close friend of Mr. Colliez, another member of the Society. Mr. Véron tried, without success, to bring his brother in-law to the spiritualist ideas; after his death he became more accessible to those instructions and below one of the first communications received from him.
Paris, October 5th, 1865 – medium Mr. Desliens
“My dear brother in-law, considering that we enjoy privacy and that I am not taking the place of someone that could be more useful than me, I attend your appeal with pleasure. From starters, do not expect to see me unfolding all my spiritual faculties. I could, no doubt, try to do it and perhaps even more successfully when alive, but my proud presumption is far from me and if I thought a lot of myself on Earth, here I am very small. How many people I disdained and today I am happy to find their protection and teachings! Ignorant people down here are frequently the wise ones up there, and as for our science that pretends to know everything and does not accept anything beyond its own borders, it is illusive and limited! Ah human pride! How long will you still be around on Earth, by the force of habit, where the spirit of routine precludes progress from its unstoppable march? “I don’t know this; it is outside of the limits of my knowledge; hence it does not exist.” That is the way we think down here. If we admitted it, or at least studied that given event, resulting from unknown laws, we would have to renounce to mistaken systems, supported by great names that constitute our glory, and even worse than that, we would have to acknowledge that we were wrong. No, not us, other deniers, we met a universal Galileo that comes to tell us: “I am a Spirit, I am alive, I was a man, and you yourselves were men like me, until through a series of incarnations you are depurate to climb the infinite ladder of the worlds… And we deny!
But, as Galileo said after his backtracks: “And yet, it moves”! Spiritism says: “And yet, the Spirits are here; they manifest, and no denial can destroy a fact.” The brutal fact is true; nothing can be done against it. Time, that great teacher, will do justice by sweeping some and educating others. Be among the educated ones. I was struck down in the prime of my pride and suffered the consequences of my denials. Avoid my fall and may those that imitate my line of thoughts learn from my mistakes, thus avoiding the abyss of darkness from where I was retrieved by your kindness. You can feel my disturbed language. Later I will be able to speak in a more logical way. Be indulgent to my spiritual youth.
M. L.
Before the communication above was read at the Parisian Society, the Spirit communicated spontaneously, dictating the following:
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, October 20th, 1865 – medium Mr. Desliens
Dear Mr. Allan Kardec, allow this Spirit that, through the studies of your work, was led to consider life, the being and God from its true point of view, allow me a sincere recognition. I ignored your name and your work while on Earth. Had I heard about you I might well have exercised my teasing vein, as I used to do regarding everything that tried to demonstrate the existence of something independent of the body. I was blind then. Forgive me. Today, thanks to you, thanks to the teachings of the Spirits that were spread and promoted by your hand, I am a changed mind, I am aware of myself and I see my destiny. How much don’t I owe you and Spiritism! Anyone that might have known me and today reads the expression of my thoughts will say: “This one cannot be the one we knew, that radical materialistic person that admitted nothing beyond the dense phenomena of nature.” Nonetheless, it is me, undoubtedly.
My dear brother in-law, to whom I have a lot to thank for, you say that I found good feelings in a short time. I thank you for your kindness to me, but it certainly ignores the large number of hours of suffering, resulting from the unconsciousness of one’s very existence! I used to believe in the nothingness and was punished by a fictious void. Feel oneself and not being able to communicate; believing to be spread amongst the sparse rests of matter that formed the body, such was my position for over two months!... two centuries!... Ah, suffering hours are too long and if you did not take the burden of pulling me out of that atmosphere of nihilism, if you had not forced me to come to these gatherings of peace and love, a place that I did not see or understand anything, but where sympathetic fluids acted upon me and gradually woke me up from my heavy spiritual lethargy, where would I be now? My God!... God!... what a sweet name to have pronounced by someone obstinate in denying such a great and good Father! Ah, friends, help me out with moderation, because that is the only thing that I am afraid of today, of becoming fanatic by these beliefs that I would have totally rejected in past, had it come to my attention.
I will say nothing today about your works; I am still too new, too ignorant to dare venture into your shrewd dissertations. I feel it, but I don’t know it. I will only tell you this because this I know: Yes, the fluids do have a huge influence as a heling agent, if not corporeal from which I know nothing, but at least spiritual, because I experienced its action. I already told you and I repeat with joy and recognition: I went to the Spiritist meetings, pushed by an invisible force, undoubtedly by my spiritual guide. I could not see a thing, could not understand anything, however, a fluidic force that I could not understand, cured me spiritually.
I am thankful and in debt to all those that acquired eternal rights to my recognition, pulling me out of the chaos in which I had fallen into, and I beg you, my friends, for your kindness in allowing me to come and quietly attend your wise assemblies, and later on offering my weak scientific lights to your services.
M.L.
Question – Could you tell us, with the help of your guide, how come you so promptly acknowledged your earthly mistakes, while a good number of Spirits that are not spared of spiritual assistance, remain so much longer without understanding the advices given to them?
- Dear Sir, thank you so much for the question that you have kindly addressed to me, and that I believe to be able to respond myself, with the assistance of my guide. You can, no doubt, see an anomaly in my transformation, since, as you say, there are creatures that despite the good feelings that act in their favor, take a long time before they open their eyes. Not wishing to abuse your benevolence I can say this in a few words: The Spirit that resists to the action exerted upon him is new with respect to moral lessons. It can well be an educated individual but totally ignorant with respect to charity and fraternity, in one word, empty of spirituality. Such individual needs to understand the life of the soul that even in the state of Spirit, it was rudimentary to him. To me it was completely different. I can tell you that I am old with respect to our life, although newcomer to eternity. I had notions of moral; I did believe in spirituality that remained latent in me, because one of my capital sins, pride, needed that punishment. I had knowledge of the spiritual life in a previous existence, but I was condemned to be dominated by pried and forget God and the eternal principle that resides in me… Ah, believe me! There is only one kind of cretinism, and the idiot that cannot manifest his intelligence through the soul is, perhaps, less regrettable than the one that enjoys full intelligence, from a scientific point of view, but lost his soul temporarily. It is a truncated but very painful idiotism.
The other Spirit, Mr. Gui…, manifested spontaneously at the Society on the special session about the celebration of the dead. Mr. Colliez, that had known him in person, as we said, had listed him among the Spirits recommended to receive our prayers. Although his opinions were completely different from those that he held when alive, Mr. Colliez recognized hm by the form of his language and before his signature was read out loud he had said that it sounded like Mr. Gui…
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, November 1st, 1865 – medium Mr. Leymarie
Gentlemen… allow me to use this common expression but not much fraternal. I am a newcomer, an unexpected recruit, and my name, undoubtedly, has never reach the ears of keen Spiritists. Yet, it is never too late, and when each family cries for an absent loved one, I come to you to express my much sincere regret. Surrounded by the followers of Voltaire, living and thinking like them, bringing my two cents and my work, according to the necessity for the propagation of liberal and progressive ideas, I believed to be acting correctly, because everybody talks but not all act. I, therefore, acted and I beg you not to forget the people of action. In their sphere they shook off that torpor of so many centuries, that in turn had veiled the future. By tearing off the veil, we had also pushed away the night, which is a lot when the intolerant enemy is looming at the door, ready to paint in black every beam of light. How many times have we sought in ourselves the solution to this question: “Ah, if the dead could speak!” A profound reflection, absorbing, that was killing us at the age of disillusion, when every person apparently marked by chance becomes a beacon of light in the crowd. There is family! Young and candid heads demanding our kisses of hope, and we cannot give anything, we sealed that hope below a very cold stone that we call disbelief. But today I believe, and I come to tell you full of hope and faith: “I hope for the future, I believe in God, and the Spirits of Béranger, de Royer-Collard, de Casimir Perrier… will not belie me.” Those of you that wish progress, that want light, I say: The dead speak, they speak every day, however, you the blind – that we were! – you present the truth without saying it openly. Like Galileo, you tell yourself every night: “Yet, it moves!” but you lower your eyes before the ridicule, before the judgment of things!
All of you that were faithful to me, that weekly spent your afternoons with me, know what I have become. Wise men that investigate the secrets of nature, have you asked the dead leaf, the sprout of the herb, the insect, the matter, what becomes of them in the great concert of the earthly dead? Have you asked them about their functions in death? Were you able to take note about this great law of nature that seems to destroy itself every year, to revive splendid and sovereign, casting the challenge of immortality into your transient and mortal thoughts? Smart doctors that everyday bend your heads onto the mysterious diseases that destroy human bodies in multiple ways, why so much sweat for the future, so much love for the family, so much effort to ensure the honor of a name, the fortune and the morality of your children, so much respect for the virtues of your companions? Men of progress, that work constantly to transform the ideas and make them more beautiful, why so much care, vigilance and deception, if that eternal law of progress absorb all of your skills and have them multiplied by ten, so as to pay tribute to the general movement of harmony and love, before which you bow? Ah, friends, irrespective of who you are on Earth, mechanic, legislators, politicians, artists, or all of you that go by the jargon “economic politics”, believe me, your work defies death; your work rejects it like in a denial, and when through your intelligence and discoveries you leave a trace, a memory, a spotless honor, you defied death, like everything that surrounds you! You offered a sacrifice to the creative power, and like nature, matter and everything else that lives and wants to live, you defeated death. Like me, in former times, like so many others, you fortify yourself in this annihilation of the body, that is life, and get to the Eternal, to defeat eternity! But you will not defeat it because it is your friend. The Spirit is the eternity, the eternal, and I repeat: Everything that dies speaks of life and light. Death speaks to the living one; the dead return to speak. They are the only ones with the key to everything and it is through them that I promise you other explanations.
Gui…
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, November 17th, 1865 – medium Mr. Leymarie
They fled the epidemy and in that singular panic how many moral bankruptcies, how many shameful defections! This is because death becomes the most violent atonement to all of those that violated the laws of the strictest equity. Death is the unknown to the wavering faith. The multiple religions could not establish themselves, with their paradise and hell, onto those whose abnegation was towards the earthly material things; to them, there was no reference point, no solid foundation. Propagation of the divine teaching; that is not certainty. Therefore, with rare exceptions, what a horror, what a lack of charity, what a selfishness in the general “every man for himself” of the satisfied! Believe in God, study God’s will in intelligent statements, be certain that the laws of life are subordinated to the superior and divine laws that measure everything with justice, giving everyone, in several existences, their share of suffering, joy, work, misery and fortune; but that is what I believe is thought by the great researches and interrogations of humanity. Their certainty, isn’t that the true force in everything? If the exhausted body gives freedom to the soul, so that it can live according to its own fluidic aptitudes, its very essence, if, I say, if that truth becomes tangible, evident like a sun beam; if the laws that mathematically chain the several phases of the terrestrial and extra terrestrial life, or in erraticity, becoming clearly demonstrated to us as an algebraic problem, then isn’t there in your hands the highly desirable secret; the answer to all of your objections: the rational explanation for the weakness of your in-depth studies of economic politics, a horrifying weakness to the theory, for practice destroys in one day the work of an entire life?
That is the reason, friends, that I come to beg you to read The Spirits’ Book. Do not stop at the letter but seek the spirit. Smart researchers, you will find new elements to modify your way of thinking and of those that study you. Convicts of the plurality of the existences, you will see life in a better way; defining it better you will be stronger. Scholars, poor and blessed pleiad, you shall give humanity a as much serious a seed as truthful. And when the wise ones were seeing believing and teaching the strong and reassuring maxims, they will love one another and will no longer flee the supposedly invisible evil; the will of all, powerful homogeneity, will destroy all of those poisoned fermentations, the only source of epidemy. The study of the fluids, from another point of view, with transform science; new lights will illuminate the fertile road of our young students, who will no longer hold the flag of intolerance and ignorance; no more the mockery of Europe, because their beloved dead would give them the faith and the religion of the Spirit that moralizes first to elevate next, in the serene regions of knowledge and charity.
Gui…
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, November 1st, 1865 – medium Mr. Leymarie
Gentlemen… allow me to use this common expression but not much fraternal. I am a newcomer, an unexpected recruit, and my name, undoubtedly, has never reach the ears of keen Spiritists. Yet, it is never too late, and when each family cries for an absent loved one, I come to you to express my much sincere regret. Surrounded by the followers of Voltaire, living and thinking like them, bringing my two cents and my work, according to the necessity for the propagation of liberal and progressive ideas, I believed to be acting correctly, because everybody talks but not all act. I, therefore, acted and I beg you not to forget the people of action. In their sphere they shook off that torpor of so many centuries, that in turn had veiled the future. By tearing off the veil, we had also pushed away the night, which is a lot when the intolerant enemy is looming at the door, ready to paint in black every beam of light. How many times have we sought in ourselves the solution to this question: “Ah, if the dead could speak!” A profound reflection, absorbing, that was killing us at the age of disillusion, when every person apparently marked by chance becomes a beacon of light in the crowd. There is family! Young and candid heads demanding our kisses of hope, and we cannot give anything, we sealed that hope below a very cold stone that we call disbelief. But today I believe, and I come to tell you full of hope and faith: “I hope for the future, I believe in God, and the Spirits of Béranger, de Royer-Collard, de Casimir Perrier… will not belie me.” Those of you that wish progress, that want light, I say: The dead speak, they speak every day, however, you the blind – that we were! – you present the truth without saying it openly. Like Galileo, you tell yourself every night: “Yet, it moves!” but you lower your eyes before the ridicule, before the judgment of things!
All of you that were faithful to me, that weekly spent your afternoons with me, know what I have become. Wise men that investigate the secrets of nature, have you asked the dead leaf, the sprout of the herb, the insect, the matter, what becomes of them in the great concert of the earthly dead? Have you asked them about their functions in death? Were you able to take note about this great law of nature that seems to destroy itself every year, to revive splendid and sovereign, casting the challenge of immortality into your transient and mortal thoughts? Smart doctors that everyday bend your heads onto the mysterious diseases that destroy human bodies in multiple ways, why so much sweat for the future, so much love for the family, so much effort to ensure the honor of a name, the fortune and the morality of your children, so much respect for the virtues of your companions? Men of progress, that work constantly to transform the ideas and make them more beautiful, why so much care, vigilance and deception, if that eternal law of progress absorb all of your skills and have them multiplied by ten, so as to pay tribute to the general movement of harmony and love, before which you bow? Ah, friends, irrespective of who you are on Earth, mechanic, legislators, politicians, artists, or all of you that go by the jargon “economic politics”, believe me, your work defies death; your work rejects it like in a denial, and when through your intelligence and discoveries you leave a trace, a memory, a spotless honor, you defied death, like everything that surrounds you! You offered a sacrifice to the creative power, and like nature, matter and everything else that lives and wants to live, you defeated death. Like me, in former times, like so many others, you fortify yourself in this annihilation of the body, that is life, and get to the Eternal, to defeat eternity! But you will not defeat it because it is your friend. The Spirit is the eternity, the eternal, and I repeat: Everything that dies speaks of life and light. Death speaks to the living one; the dead return to speak. They are the only ones with the key to everything and it is through them that I promise you other explanations.
Gui…
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, November 17th, 1865 – medium Mr. Leymarie
They fled the epidemy and in that singular panic how many moral bankruptcies, how many shameful defections! This is because death becomes the most violent atonement to all of those that violated the laws of the strictest equity. Death is the unknown to the wavering faith. The multiple religions could not establish themselves, with their paradise and hell, onto those whose abnegation was towards the earthly material things; to them, there was no reference point, no solid foundation. Propagation of the divine teaching; that is not certainty. Therefore, with rare exceptions, what a horror, what a lack of charity, what a selfishness in the general “every man for himself” of the satisfied! Believe in God, study God’s will in intelligent statements, be certain that the laws of life are subordinated to the superior and divine laws that measure everything with justice, giving everyone, in several existences, their share of suffering, joy, work, misery and fortune; but that is what I believe is thought by the great researches and interrogations of humanity. Their certainty, isn’t that the true force in everything? If the exhausted body gives freedom to the soul, so that it can live according to its own fluidic aptitudes, its very essence, if, I say, if that truth becomes tangible, evident like a sun beam; if the laws that mathematically chain the several phases of the terrestrial and extra terrestrial life, or in erraticity, becoming clearly demonstrated to us as an algebraic problem, then isn’t there in your hands the highly desirable secret; the answer to all of your objections: the rational explanation for the weakness of your in-depth studies of economic politics, a horrifying weakness to the theory, for practice destroys in one day the work of an entire life?
That is the reason, friends, that I come to beg you to read The Spirits’ Book. Do not stop at the letter but seek the spirit. Smart researchers, you will find new elements to modify your way of thinking and of those that study you. Convicts of the plurality of the existences, you will see life in a better way; defining it better you will be stronger. Scholars, poor and blessed pleiad, you shall give humanity a as much serious a seed as truthful. And when the wise ones were seeing believing and teaching the strong and reassuring maxims, they will love one another and will no longer flee the supposedly invisible evil; the will of all, powerful homogeneity, will destroy all of those poisoned fermentations, the only source of epidemy. The study of the fluids, from another point of view, with transform science; new lights will illuminate the fertile road of our young students, who will no longer hold the flag of intolerance and ignorance; no more the mockery of Europe, because their beloved dead would give them the faith and the religion of the Spirit that moralizes first to elevate next, in the serene regions of knowledge and charity.
Gui…
Spiritist Dissertations
Social Condition of Women
Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, October 20th, 1865
Medium: Sr. Leymarie
When I lived among you, my friends, I used to give serious thoughts to the condition of the women. I always spared some time, from my painstaking studies, to those beloved beings. Every night, before sleeping, I used to pray for those poor, unfortunate and much unknown sisters, begging God for them to see better days, hoping to find ideas to help the miserable ones to progress. I sometimes saw them, in my dreams, dearly, loved, living a legal and morally sound life in society, with a family, surrounded by care and respect; I saw them transfigured and that image was so touching that I used to wake up crying. But, ah, I then saw the dismal and appalling truth of reality, sometimes loosing hope that there would be better days.
Those days have come, my friends. There are only a few among you that do not intuitively perceive woman’s rights; many, in fact, deny them, although internally they do recognize them; but it is not less true that amidst profound misery and disillusion, there is hope and there is joy.
A few days back I overheard a group of distinct ladies, given their beauty, social position and fortune, and said to myself: These are all perfume; loved and spoiled ones. There must be a lot of love! Certainly, good mothers, enchanting wives, respectful daughters! They have a lot of knowledge, love and donate a lot.
What a strange mistake! All those fresh faces were lying, disguised by stereotyped smiles; they talked frivolity, about fabrics, fashion and races. With a charming grace they talked behind the one that was absent, but did not talk about their children, their husbands, or about literary issues, or about our geniuses, or about their country or freedom! Beautiful head, no brain… Charming birds, straighten posture and attitude: it is the etiquette; the intent is to please everyone, touch everything and know nothing. The babbler goes with the wind leaving nothing behind; you are not daughters, wives or mothers. You forget your land, your past, the sufferings and greatness. Your child entrusted to a mercenary. Your inner happiness is a fiction. Shiny butterflies with beautiful wings… but then…
I also overhead a group of young working-class ladies. What did they know? Nothing…like the others… nothing of life, duty or reality! They were envious, that was all. Were they taught to understand one another, to like one another, to respect? Were they taught to understand God, the greatness of God and God’s will? No, a thousand times no… The Church teaches them luxury and luxury knock at the door of their shanty, saying: Let me in! I am the bow, the lace, the silk, the good dishes, and the fine wines. Open and you shall be beautiful, you shall have every bedazzlement, every fantasy! That is why so many of them become the shame of the family!
Kind brains that make fun of Spiritism, can you tell me what is the panacea that you invented to purify and vivify the family? I know you are indulgent when it comes to moral issues; lots of talks, outcries for the falling peoples, for the lack of education of the masses; but to morally lift the woman, what is it that you have done? Nothing… Master of Literature, how many times have you poked the sacred laws of respect to women, that you praise so much? You ignore God and neglect women, the family and the future of a nation.
It is through them that the social problems of the future shall be fixed. Spiritism will do what you cannot do, as you know, given women the robust faith that moves mountains, showing that worth and their power, God’s promise for their kindness, intelligence and powerful will. By understanding the magnificent laws developed in The Spirits’ Book, none of them will consider trading their bodies or their souls; daughter of God, the woman will see in her children the visit of the creating Spirit; she will learn herself to be able to teach; she will love the homeland and her history, initiating her children in the great progressive ideas. They shall be mothers and doctors, counselors and managers; in short, women according to Spiritism, and that is the future, the progress and the greatness of the country in its broadest expression.
Baluze
Continuation – October 27th, 1865
In my last communication, my friends, I had shown women from two aspects and added that education in some and ignorance in others had produced negative results. Yet, there are serious exceptions that seem to defy the rule. There are young ladies that can study and take advantage of the teachings of their educators. These have no vanity or light-heartedness; they are not permanently distracted by an ornament or a lace! Fed by strong and serious lessons, they enjoy subjects that magnify the Spirit, and soothes their soul, with that calmness of the strong and generous minds.
They foresee a family in marriage; entice a child not to pass on to the care of others but to sacrifice their own life. The new-born is the center of everything; the first thought, the first gesture of love, the fervent prayers and the sleepless nights, the short days in preparation for the full comfort of the newly incarnate. The child is the object of study, it is love in all forms. The husband is all kindness, forgetting the tough endeavors of the earthly life to hold the first steps of the child and give format to the first syllables.
Therefore, respect to these exemplary exceptions that defy temptation and escape pleasures for the devotion of divinely intelligent mothers. Humble and poor workers; ulcered hearts that love their only hope, a child, there is still a lot to say about their abnegation, they profound feeling of duty, their endurance before the troubles of everyday life. Nothing can disturb them from reassuring the little one; he is the work and the strength, the sublime egotism that sacrifices the mother day and night.
But if religion, or better saying, the multiple cults together with education, cannot destroy in the rich as well as in the poor, that general tendency to live mischievously, ignoring the objective of life, it is because of their inability to impress correctly the infancy.
They frequently hear about the interest of the enemies. The parents, fighting the difficulties of life, show the weak hearts a cruel cynicism. Children that just learned the initial words can already show rage, perceiving that their personal interest is in the center of the circle where everybody moves around. Such initial impressions affect them seriously… Religion and education are useless words thereafter, if their only interest is to multiply comfort and fortune at any price!
When we scream at full power the Spiritist idea, an idea that excites every generous passion, leading to a certainty of mathematical precision, we are laughed at! Pretense liberals that climb on the thrones of their falsehood to call us ridicule and ignorant! We cannot write, we have no style! We are the role model of ineptitude, we are mad… good enough to be sent to hospices. And the apostles of the freedom of speech, would gladly instigate the authority, based on the Penal Code, to persecute these enlightened ones that lessen common sense!
Fortunately the opinion of the masses does not belong to a family or to a writer; nobody is more entitled to common sense than anybody else, and in these days that obscure authors try to destroy theologists, philosophers and the geniuses of all kinds, the common sense in its highest expression, each person wants to decide by herself.
They seek people and things that are badly mouthed, and after examining everything, after hearing everything, they keep aside the insolent pamphlets and the malevolent insinuations, finally paying tribute to the truth that touches every heart.
That is why Spiritism grows before your blows. We are accepted and praised by the families. A hard-working father, with a Spiritist son, will not see him leaving home to become a drifter like in the past. This shall not be the one to sell his conscience or deny the sacred laws that protect women and children. He knows that God does exist; he is aware of the laws of the fluids and the Spirit, and the existence of the soul with all their remarkable consequences. A serious, virtuous, fraternal and charitable man, and not a well-educated clown, a traitor of life and God, friends and parents and finally of oneself. Mothers shall be truly mothers, embedded in the Spiritist ideal, they shall be the safeguard of their beloved daughters. They shall teach their children the awareness of their true value, the magnificent role that each one must play.
Everyone rightfully owns their destiny, hence everyone, to accomplish their mission, must learn to be able to dignify the child entrusted by God. Knowledge shall no longer be the corollary of unbounded desires and shameful wishes, but, on the contrary, the complement of dignity and respect to oneself. What could temptation and unruly passions do against such women? God and righteousness shall be their aegis, added by superior additions that come from above. Now, what is a woman if not a family; and what is a family if not a nation? You see the women, and then you see the people. We want to create what you have destroyed by the extremes. The women were diminished by superstition in the Middle Ages. You did the same, illustrious thinkers, by skepticism! Neither one nor the other is good. We free and moralize women to have them educated next. You want to instruct them without moralization. That is why you lose the current generation and the mothers will soon be no exception.
Baluze
Medium: Sr. Leymarie
When I lived among you, my friends, I used to give serious thoughts to the condition of the women. I always spared some time, from my painstaking studies, to those beloved beings. Every night, before sleeping, I used to pray for those poor, unfortunate and much unknown sisters, begging God for them to see better days, hoping to find ideas to help the miserable ones to progress. I sometimes saw them, in my dreams, dearly, loved, living a legal and morally sound life in society, with a family, surrounded by care and respect; I saw them transfigured and that image was so touching that I used to wake up crying. But, ah, I then saw the dismal and appalling truth of reality, sometimes loosing hope that there would be better days.
Those days have come, my friends. There are only a few among you that do not intuitively perceive woman’s rights; many, in fact, deny them, although internally they do recognize them; but it is not less true that amidst profound misery and disillusion, there is hope and there is joy.
A few days back I overheard a group of distinct ladies, given their beauty, social position and fortune, and said to myself: These are all perfume; loved and spoiled ones. There must be a lot of love! Certainly, good mothers, enchanting wives, respectful daughters! They have a lot of knowledge, love and donate a lot.
What a strange mistake! All those fresh faces were lying, disguised by stereotyped smiles; they talked frivolity, about fabrics, fashion and races. With a charming grace they talked behind the one that was absent, but did not talk about their children, their husbands, or about literary issues, or about our geniuses, or about their country or freedom! Beautiful head, no brain… Charming birds, straighten posture and attitude: it is the etiquette; the intent is to please everyone, touch everything and know nothing. The babbler goes with the wind leaving nothing behind; you are not daughters, wives or mothers. You forget your land, your past, the sufferings and greatness. Your child entrusted to a mercenary. Your inner happiness is a fiction. Shiny butterflies with beautiful wings… but then…
I also overhead a group of young working-class ladies. What did they know? Nothing…like the others… nothing of life, duty or reality! They were envious, that was all. Were they taught to understand one another, to like one another, to respect? Were they taught to understand God, the greatness of God and God’s will? No, a thousand times no… The Church teaches them luxury and luxury knock at the door of their shanty, saying: Let me in! I am the bow, the lace, the silk, the good dishes, and the fine wines. Open and you shall be beautiful, you shall have every bedazzlement, every fantasy! That is why so many of them become the shame of the family!
Kind brains that make fun of Spiritism, can you tell me what is the panacea that you invented to purify and vivify the family? I know you are indulgent when it comes to moral issues; lots of talks, outcries for the falling peoples, for the lack of education of the masses; but to morally lift the woman, what is it that you have done? Nothing… Master of Literature, how many times have you poked the sacred laws of respect to women, that you praise so much? You ignore God and neglect women, the family and the future of a nation.
It is through them that the social problems of the future shall be fixed. Spiritism will do what you cannot do, as you know, given women the robust faith that moves mountains, showing that worth and their power, God’s promise for their kindness, intelligence and powerful will. By understanding the magnificent laws developed in The Spirits’ Book, none of them will consider trading their bodies or their souls; daughter of God, the woman will see in her children the visit of the creating Spirit; she will learn herself to be able to teach; she will love the homeland and her history, initiating her children in the great progressive ideas. They shall be mothers and doctors, counselors and managers; in short, women according to Spiritism, and that is the future, the progress and the greatness of the country in its broadest expression.
Baluze
Continuation – October 27th, 1865
In my last communication, my friends, I had shown women from two aspects and added that education in some and ignorance in others had produced negative results. Yet, there are serious exceptions that seem to defy the rule. There are young ladies that can study and take advantage of the teachings of their educators. These have no vanity or light-heartedness; they are not permanently distracted by an ornament or a lace! Fed by strong and serious lessons, they enjoy subjects that magnify the Spirit, and soothes their soul, with that calmness of the strong and generous minds.
They foresee a family in marriage; entice a child not to pass on to the care of others but to sacrifice their own life. The new-born is the center of everything; the first thought, the first gesture of love, the fervent prayers and the sleepless nights, the short days in preparation for the full comfort of the newly incarnate. The child is the object of study, it is love in all forms. The husband is all kindness, forgetting the tough endeavors of the earthly life to hold the first steps of the child and give format to the first syllables.
Therefore, respect to these exemplary exceptions that defy temptation and escape pleasures for the devotion of divinely intelligent mothers. Humble and poor workers; ulcered hearts that love their only hope, a child, there is still a lot to say about their abnegation, they profound feeling of duty, their endurance before the troubles of everyday life. Nothing can disturb them from reassuring the little one; he is the work and the strength, the sublime egotism that sacrifices the mother day and night.
But if religion, or better saying, the multiple cults together with education, cannot destroy in the rich as well as in the poor, that general tendency to live mischievously, ignoring the objective of life, it is because of their inability to impress correctly the infancy.
They frequently hear about the interest of the enemies. The parents, fighting the difficulties of life, show the weak hearts a cruel cynicism. Children that just learned the initial words can already show rage, perceiving that their personal interest is in the center of the circle where everybody moves around. Such initial impressions affect them seriously… Religion and education are useless words thereafter, if their only interest is to multiply comfort and fortune at any price!
When we scream at full power the Spiritist idea, an idea that excites every generous passion, leading to a certainty of mathematical precision, we are laughed at! Pretense liberals that climb on the thrones of their falsehood to call us ridicule and ignorant! We cannot write, we have no style! We are the role model of ineptitude, we are mad… good enough to be sent to hospices. And the apostles of the freedom of speech, would gladly instigate the authority, based on the Penal Code, to persecute these enlightened ones that lessen common sense!
Fortunately the opinion of the masses does not belong to a family or to a writer; nobody is more entitled to common sense than anybody else, and in these days that obscure authors try to destroy theologists, philosophers and the geniuses of all kinds, the common sense in its highest expression, each person wants to decide by herself.
They seek people and things that are badly mouthed, and after examining everything, after hearing everything, they keep aside the insolent pamphlets and the malevolent insinuations, finally paying tribute to the truth that touches every heart.
That is why Spiritism grows before your blows. We are accepted and praised by the families. A hard-working father, with a Spiritist son, will not see him leaving home to become a drifter like in the past. This shall not be the one to sell his conscience or deny the sacred laws that protect women and children. He knows that God does exist; he is aware of the laws of the fluids and the Spirit, and the existence of the soul with all their remarkable consequences. A serious, virtuous, fraternal and charitable man, and not a well-educated clown, a traitor of life and God, friends and parents and finally of oneself. Mothers shall be truly mothers, embedded in the Spiritist ideal, they shall be the safeguard of their beloved daughters. They shall teach their children the awareness of their true value, the magnificent role that each one must play.
Everyone rightfully owns their destiny, hence everyone, to accomplish their mission, must learn to be able to dignify the child entrusted by God. Knowledge shall no longer be the corollary of unbounded desires and shameful wishes, but, on the contrary, the complement of dignity and respect to oneself. What could temptation and unruly passions do against such women? God and righteousness shall be their aegis, added by superior additions that come from above. Now, what is a woman if not a family; and what is a family if not a nation? You see the women, and then you see the people. We want to create what you have destroyed by the extremes. The women were diminished by superstition in the Middle Ages. You did the same, illustrious thinkers, by skepticism! Neither one nor the other is good. We free and moralize women to have them educated next. You want to instruct them without moralization. That is why you lose the current generation and the mothers will soon be no exception.
Baluze