51 THE SPIRITS’ BOOK XV There are persons who see danger in everything that is new to them, and who have therefore not failed to draw an unfavourable conclusion from the fact that some of those who have taken up the subject of Spiritism have lost their reason. But bow can sensible people urge that fact as an objection? Does not the same thing often happen to weak heads when they give themselves up to any intellectual pursuit? Who shall say how many have gone mad over mathematics, medicine, music, philosophy, etc. But what does that prove? And are those studies to be proscribed on that account? Arms and legs, the instruments of physical activity, are often injured by physical labour; the brain, instrument of thought, is often impaired by intellectual labour, to which, in fact, many a man may be said to fall a martyr. But, though the instrument may be injured, the mind remains intact, and, when freed from matter, finds itself again in full possession of its faculties.
Intense mental application of any kind may induce cerebral disease; science, art, religion even, have all furnished their quota of madmen. The predisposing cause of madness is to be found in some tendency of the brain that renders it more or less accessible to certain impressions; and, where the predisposition to insanity exists, its manifestation takes on the character of the pursuit to which the mind is most addicted, and which then assumes the form of a fixed idea. This fixed idea may be that of spirits, in the case of those who have been deeply absorbed by spiritist matters; as it may be that of God, of angels, the devil, fortune, power, an art, a science, a political or social system. It is probable that]Jat the victim of religious mania would have gone mad on Spiritism, if Spiritism had been his predominant mental occupation; just as he who goes mad over Spiritism would, under other circumstances, have gone mad over something else.
We assert, therefore, that Spiritism does not predispose to insanity; nay, more, we assert that, when correctly understood, it is a preservative against insanity.
Among the most common causes of cerebral disturbance must be reckoned the disappointments, misfortunes, blighted affections, and other troubles of human life, which are also the most frequent causes of suicide. But the enlightened spiritist looks upon the things of this life from so elevated a point of view, they seem to ma ALLAN KARDEC ma ALLAN KARDEC him so petty, so worthless, in comparison with the future he sees before him-life appears so short, so fleeting-that its tribulations are, in his eyes, merely the disagreeable incidents of a journey. What would produce violent emotion in the mind of another affects him hut slightly; besides, he knows that the sorrows of life are trials which aid our advancement, if borne without murmuring, and that he will be rewarded according to the fortitude with which he has borne them. His convictions, therefore, give him a resignation that preserves him from despair, and consequently from a frequent cause of madness and suicide. He knows, moreover, through spirit communications, the fate of those who voluntarily shorten their days; and as such knowledge is well calculated to suggest serious reflection, the number of those who have thus been arrested on the downward path is incalculable. Such is one of the results of Spiritism. The incredulous may laugh at it as much as they please; we only wish them the consolations it affords to those who have sounded its mysterious depths.
Fear must also be reckoned among the causes of madness. Dread of the devil has deranged many a brain; and who shall say how many victims have been made by impressing weak imaginations with pictures of which the horrors are enhanced by the hideous details so ingeniously worked into them? The devil, it is sometimes said, frightens only little children, whom it helps to make docile and well-behaved. Yes; but only as do nursery-terrors and bugaboos in general; and when these have lost their power, they who have been subjected to this sort of training are apt to be worse than before; while, on the other hand, those who have recourse to it overlook the risk of epilepsy involved in such disturbing action upon the delicate child-brain. Religion would be weak indeed if its power could only be sustained by fear. Happily such is not the case, and it has other means of acting on the mind. Spiritism furnishes the religious element with a more efficient support than superstitious terror. It discloses the reality of things, and thus substitutes a salutary appreciation of the consequences of wrong-doing for the vague apprehensions of unreasonable fear.
XVI Two objections still remain to be examined, the only ones really deserving of the name, because they are the only ones founded 53 THE SPIRITS’ BOOK on a rational basis. Both admit the reality of the material and moral phenomena of Spiritism, but deny the intervention of spirits in their production.
According to the first of these objections, all the manifestations attributed to spirits are merely effects of magnetism, and mediums are in a state that might be called waking somnambulism, a phenomenon which may have been observed by any one who has studied animal magnetism. In this state the intellectual faculties acquire an abnormal development; the circle of our intuitive perceptions is extended beyond its ordinary limits; the medium finds in himself, and with the aid of his lucidity, all that he says, and all the notions transmitted by him, even in regard to subjects with which he is least familiar in his usual state.
It is not by us, who have witnessed its prodigies and studied all its phases during thirty-five years, that the action of somnambulism could be contested, and we admit that many spirit- manifestations may be thus explained; but we assert that sustained and attentive observation shows us a host of facts in which any intervention of the medium, otherwise than as a passive instrument, is absolutely impossible. To those who attribute the phenomena in question to magnetism, we would say, as to all others, "See, and observe, for you have certainly not seen everything;" and we would also ask them to consider the two following points, suggested by their own view of the subject. In the first place, we would ask them, What is the origin of the hypothesis of spirit-action? Is it an explanation invented by a few individuals to account for those phenomena? Not at all. By whom, then, has it been broached? By the very mediums whose lucidity you extol. But if their lucidity be such as you declare it to be, why should they attribute to spirits what they have derived from themselves? How can they have given information so precise, logical, sublime in regard to the nature of those extra-human intelligences? Either mediums are lucid, or they are not; if they are, and if we trust to their veracity, we cannot, without inconsistency, suppose them to be in error on this point. In the second place, if all the phenomena had their source in the medium himself, they would always be identical in the case of each individual; and we should never find the same medium making use of different styles of expression, or giving utterance to contradictory statements.
The want of unity so often observed in the manifestations obtained by the same medium is a proof of the diversity of the 54 ALLAN KARDEC sources from which they proceed; and as the cause of this diversity is not to be found in the medium himself, it must be sought for elsewhere.
According to the other objection, the medium is really the source of the manifestations, but, instead of deriving them from himself, as is asserted by the partisans of the somnambulic theory, he derives them from the persons among whom he finds himself. The medium is a sort of mirror, reflecting all the thoughts, ideas, and knowledge of those about him; from which it follows that he says nothing which is not known to, at least, some of them. it cannot be denied, for it is one of the fundamental principles of spiritist doctrine, that those who are present exercise an influence upon the manifestations; but this influence is very different from what it is assumed to be by the hypothesis we are considering, and, so far from the medium being the mere echo of the thoughts of those around him, there are thousands of facts that prove directly the contrary. This objection is therefore based on a serious mistake, and one that shows the danger of hasty judgements; those who bring it forward, being unable to deny the reality of phenomena which the science of the day is incompetent to explain, and being unwilling to admit the presence of spirits, explain them in their own way. Their theory would be specious if it explained all the facts of the case; but this it cannot do. In vain is it proved by the evidence of facts that the communications of the medium are often entirely foreign to the thoughts, knowledge, and even the opinions of those who are present, and that they are frequently spontaneous, and contradict all received ideas; the opponents referred to are not discouraged by so slight a difficulty. The radiation of thought, say they, extends far beyond the circle immediately around us; the medium is the reflection of the human race in general; so that, if he does not derive his inspirations from those about him, he derives them from those who are further off, in the town or country he inhabits, from the people of the rest of the globe, and even from those of other spheres.
We do not think that this theory furnishes a more simple and probable explanation than that given by Spiritism; for it assumes the action of a cause very much more marvellous. The idea that universal space is peopled by beings who are in perpetual contact with us, and who communicate to us their ideas, is certainly not more repugnant to reason than the hypothesis of a universal radiation, coming from every point of the universe, and con- 5) THE SPIRITS’ BOOK verging in the brain of a single individual, to the exclusion of all the others.
We repeat (and this is a point of such importance that we cannot insist too strongly upon it), that the somnambulic theory, and that which may be called the theory of reflection, have been devised by the imagination of men; while, on the contrary, the theory of spirit-agency is not a conception of the human mind, for it was dictated by the manifesting intelligences themselves, at a time when no one thought of spirits, and when the opinion of tile generality of men was opposed to such a supposition. We have therefore to inquire, first, from what quarter the mediums can have derived a hypothesis which had no existence in the thought of any one on earth? and, secondly, by what strange coincidence. can it have happened that tens of thousands of mediums, scattered over the entire globe, and utterly unknown to one another, all agree in asserting the same thing? If the first medium who appeared in France was influenced by opinions already received in America, by what strange guidance was he made to go in search of ideas across two thousand leagues of sea, and among a people whose habits and language were foreign to his own, instead of taking them in his own immediate vicinity?
But there is yet another circumstance to which sufficient attention has not been given. The earliest manifestations, in Europe, as in America, were not made either by writing or by speech, but by raps indicating the letters of the alphabet, and forming words and sentences. It is by this means that the manifesting intelligences declared themselves to be spirits; and therefore, even though we should admit an intervention of the medium's mind in the production of verbal or written communications, we could not do so in regard to raps, whose meaning could not have been known beforehand.
We might adduce any number of facts proving the existence of a personal individuality and an absolutely independent will on the part of the manifesting intelligence; and we therefore invite our opponents to a more attentive observation of the phenomena in question, assuring them that, if they study these without prejudice, and refrain from drawing a conclusion until they have made themselves thoroughly acquainted with the subject, they will find that their theories are unable to account for all of them. We will only propose to such antagonists the two following queries:- 56 ALLAN KARDEC 56 ALLAN KARDEC 1. Why does it so often happen that the manifesting intelligence refuses to answer certain questions in regard to matters that arc perfectly known to the questioner, as, for instance, his name or age, what he has in his hand, what he did yesterday, what he intends to do on the morrow, etc.? If the medium be only a mirror reflecting the thought of those about him, nothing should be easier for him than to answer such questions.
If our adversaries retort by inquiring why it is that spirits, who ought to know everything, are unable to answer questions so simple, and conclude, from this presumed inability, that the phenomena cannot be caused by spirits, we would ask them whether, if an ignorant or foolish person should inquire of some learned body the reason of its being light at noonday, any answer would be returned to his question? and whether it would be reasonable to conclude, from the derision or the silence with which such a question might be received, that its members were merely a set of asses? It is precisely because they are at a higher point than ourselves that spirits decline to answer idle and foolish questions; keeping silence when such are asked, or advising us to employ ourselves with more serious subjects.
2. We have also to ask them why it is that spirits come and depart at their own pleasure, and why, when once they have taken their departure, neither prayers nor entreaties can bring them back? If the medium were acted upon solely by the mental impulsion of those around him, it is evident that the union of their wills, in such a case, ought to stimulate his clairvoyance. If, therefore, he do not yield to the wishes of those assembled, strengthened by his own desire, it is because he obeys an influence which is distinct from himself and from those about him, and which thus asserts its own independence and individuality.
XVII Incredulity in regard to spirit-communication, when not the result of systematic opposition from selfish motives, has almost always its source in an imperfect acquaintance with the facts of the case; which, however, does not prevent a good many persons from attempting to settle the question as though they were perfectly familiar with it. It is possible to be very clever, very learned, and yet to lack clearness of judgement; and a belief in one's own a1 THE SPIRITS’ BOOK infallibility is the surest sign of the existence of this defect. Many persons, too, regard spirit manifestations as being only a matter of curiosity. Let us hope that the reading of this book will show them that the wonderful phenomena in question are something else than a pastime.
Spiritism consists of two parts: one of these, the experimental, deals with the subject of the manifestations in general; the other, the philosophic, deals with the class of manifestations denoting intelligence. Whoever has only observed the former is in the position of one whose knowledge of physics, limited to experiments of an amusing nature, does not extend to the fundamental principles of that science. Spiritist philosophy consists of teachings imparted by spirits, and the knowledge thus conveyed is of a character far too serious to be mastered without serious and persevering attention. If the present book had no other result than to show the serious nature of the subject, and to induce inquirers to approach it in this spirit, it would be sufficiently important; and we should rejoice to have been chosen for the accomplishment of a work in regard to which we take no credit to ourselves, the principles it contains not being of our own creating, and whatever honour it may obtain being entirely due to the spirits by whom it has been dictated. We hope that it will achieve yet another result-viz., that of serving as a guide to those who are desirous of enlightenment, by showing them the grand and sublime end of individual and social progress to which the teachings of Spiritism directly tend, and by pointing out to them the road by which alone that end can be reached.
Let us wind up these introductory remarks with one concluding observation. Astronomers, in sounding the depths of the sky, discovered seemingly vacant spaces not in accordance with the general laws that govern the distribution of the heavenly bodies and they therefore conjectured that those spaces were occupied by globes that had escaped their observation. On the other hand, they observed certain effects the cause of which was unknown to them; and they said to themselves, "In such a region of space there must be a world, for otherwise there would be a void that ought not to exist; and the effects we have observed imply the presence in that seeming void of such a world as their cause." Reasoning, then, from those effects to their cause they calculated the elements of the globe whose presence they had inferred, and facts subsequently justified their inference. Let us apply the 58 ALLAN KARDEC 58 ALLAN KARDEC same mode of reasoning to another order of ideas. If we observe the series of beings, we find that they form a continuous chain from brute matter to man. But between man and God, who is the alpha and omega of all things, what an immense hiatus! Is it reasonable to suppose that the links of the chain stop short with man, that he can vault, without transition, over the distance which separates him from the Infinite? Reason shows us that between man and God there must be other links, just as it showed the astronomers that between the worlds then known to them there must be other worlds as yet unknown to them. What system of philosophy has filled this hiatus? Spiritism shows that it is filled with the beings of all the ranks of the invisible world, and that these beings are no other than the spirits of men who have reached the successive degrees that lead up to perfection; and all things are thus seen to be linked together from one end of the chain to the other. Let those who deny the existence of spirits tell us what are the occupants of the immensity of space which spirits declare to be occupied by them; and let those who scoff at the idea of spirit-teachings give us a nobler idea than is given by those teachings of the handiwork of God, a more convincing demonstration of His goodness and His power.
ALLAN KARDEC 59 PROLEGOMENA PHENOMENA which are inexplicable by any known laws are occurring all over the world, and revealing the action of a free and intelligent will as their cause.
Reason tells us that an intelligent effect must have an intelligent force for its cause; and facts have proved that this force is able to enter into communication with men by the employment of material signs.
This force, interrogated as to its nature, has declared itself to belong to the world of spiritual beings who have thrown off the corporeal envelope of men. It is thus that the existence of spirits has been revealed to us.
Communication between the spirit world and the corporeal world is in the nature of things, and has in it nothing supernatural. Traces of its existence are to be found among all nations and in every age; they are now becoming general and evident to all. Spirits assure us that the time appointed by Providence for a universal manifestation of their existence has now come; and that their mission, as the ministers of God and the instruments of His will, is to inaugurate, through the instructions they are charged to convey to us, a new era of regeneration for the human race.
This book is a compilation of their teachings. It has been written by the order and under the dictation of spirits of high degree, for the purpose of establishing the bases of a rational philosophy, free from the influence of prejudices and of preconceived opinions. It contains nothing that is not the expression 60 ALLAN KARDEC of their thought; nothing that has not been submitted to their approbation. The method(‘(1 adopted in the arrangement of its contents, the comments upon these, and the form given to certain portions of the work, are all that has been contributed by him to whom the duty of publishing it has been entrusted.
Many of the spirits who have taken part in the accomplishment of this task declare themselves to have been persons whom we know to have lived at different epochs upon the earth, preaching and practising virtue and wisdom Of the names of others history has preserved no trace; but their elevation is attested by the purity of their doctrine and their union with those who bear venerated names.
We transcribe the words in which, by writing, through the intermediary of various mediums, the mission of preparing this book was confided to the writer: -"Be zealous and persevering in the work you have undertaken in conjunction with us, for this work is ours. In the book you are to write, we shall lay the foundations of the new edifice which is destined to unite all men in a common sentiment of love and charity; but, before making it public, we shall go thorough it with you, so as to ensure its accuracy.
"We shall be with you whenever you ask for our presence, and shall aid you in all your labours; for the preparation of this book is only a part of the mission which has been confided to you, and of which you have already been informed by one of us.
"Of the teachings given to you, some are to be kept to yourself for the present; we shall tell you when the time for publishing them has come. Meanwhile make them the subject of your meditations, that you may be ready to treat of them at the proper moment.
"Put at the beginning of the book the vine-branch we have drawn! for that purpose, because it is the emblem of the work of the Creator. In it are united all the material elements that most fitly symbolise body and spirit: the stem represents the body; the juice, the spirit; the fruit, the union of body and spirit. Man's labour calls forth the latent qualities of the juice; the labour of the body develops, through the knowledge thus acquired, the latent powers of the soul.
1 Vide p. 59, the facsimile of the branch drawn by spirits.
61 THE SPIRITS’ BOOK "Do not allow yourself to be discouraged by hostile criticism. You will have rancorous contradictors, especially among those whose interest it is to keep up existing abuses. You will have such even among spirits; for those who are not completely dematerialised often endeavour, out of malice or ignorance, to scatter abroad the seeds of doubt. Believe ill God, and go boldly forward. We shall be with you to sustain you on your way; and he time is at hand when the truth will shine forth on all sides.
"The vanity of some men, who imagine that they know everything, and are bent on explaining everything in their own way; will give rise to opposing opinions; but all who have in view the grand principle of Jesus will be united in the same love of goodness, and in a bond of brotherhood that will embrace the entire world. Putting aside' all vain disputes about words, they will devote their energies to matters of practical importance, in regard to which, whatever their doctrinal belief, the convictions of all who receive the communications of the higher spirits will be the same.
"Perseverance will render your labour fruitful. The pleasure you will feel in witnessing the spread of our doctrine and its right appreciation will be for you a rich reward, though perhaps rather in the future than in the present. Be not troubled by the thorns and stones that the incredulous and the evil-minded will place in your path; hold fast your confidence, for your confidence will ensure our help, and, through it, you will reach the goal.
"Remember that good spirits only give their aid to those who serve God with humility and disinterestedness; they disown all who use heavenly things as a stepping-stone to earthly advancement, and withdraw from the proud and the ambitious. Pride and ambition are a barrier between man and God; for they blind man to the splendours of celestial existence, and God cannot employ the blind to make known the light."
"JOHN THE EVANGELIST, ST AUGUSTINE, ST VICENT DE PAUL, ST LOUIS, THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH, SOCRATES, PLATO, FENELON, FRANKLIN, SWEDENBORG," etc., etc.
63 THE SPIRITS’ BOOK.
BOOK FIRST - CAUSES CHAPTER I GOD 1.GOD AND INFINITY - 2. PROOFS OF THE EXISTENCE OF GOD - 3. ATTRIBUTES OF THE DIVINITY - 4. PANTHEISM.
God and Infinity 1. What is God? "God is the Supreme Intelligence-First Cause of all things."! 2. What is to be understood by infinity? "That which has neither beginning nor end; the unknown: all that is unknown is infinite." 3. Can it be said that God is infinity?
"An incomplete definition. Poverty of human speech incompetent to define what transcends human intelligence."
God is infinite in His perfections, but "infinity" is an abstraction. To say that God is infinity is to substitute the attribute of a thing for the thing itself, and to define something unknown by reference to some other thing equally unknown.
1 The passage placed between inverted commas after each question is the reply made by the communicating spirits, whose very words are given textually throughout the whole of this book. The remarks and developments occasionally added by the author are printed in smaller type wherever they might otherwise be confounded with the replies of the spirits themselves. Where the author's remarks occupy an entire chapter or chapters, the ordinary type is used, as, In that case, no such confusion could occur.
64 ALLAN KARDEC Proofs of the Existence of God 4. What proof have we of the existence of God?
"The axiom which you apply in all your scientific researches, 'There is no effect without a cause.' Search out the cause of whatever is not the work of man, and reason will furnish the answer to your question."
To assure ourselves of the existence of God. we have only to look abroad on the works of creation. The universe exists, therefore It has a cause. To doubt the existence of God is to doubt that every effect has a cause, and to assume that something can have been made by nothing.
5. What is to be inferred from the intuition of the existence of God which may be said to be the common property of the human mind?
"That God exists; for whence could the human mind derive this intuition if it had no real basis? The inference to he drawn from the fact of this intuition is a corollary of the axiom. ‘There Is no effect without a cause."
6. May not our seemingly intuitive sense of the existence of God be the result of education and of acquired ideas?
"If such were the case, how should this intuitive sense be possessed by your savages?" If the intuition of the existence of a Supreme Being were only the result of education It would not be universal, and would only exist, like all other acquired knowledge, in the minds of those who had received the special education to which it would be due.
7. Is the first cause of the formation of things to be found in the essential properties of matter?
"If such were the case, what would be the cause of those properties? There must always be a first cause."
To attribute the first formation of things to the essential properties of matter, would be to take the effect for the cause, for those properties are themselves an effect, which must have a cause.
&. What is to be thought of the opinion that attributes the first formation of things to a fortuitous combination of matter, in other words, to chance?
"Another absurdity! Who that is possessed of common sense can regard chance as an intelligent agent? And, besides, what is chance? Nothing."
The harmony which regulates the mechanism of the universe can only result from combinations adopted in view of predetermined ends, 65 THE SPIRITS’' BOOK and thus, by its very nature, reveals the existence of an Intelligent Power. To attribute the first formation of things to chance is nonsense for chance cannot produce the results of intelligence. If chance could be intelligent, it would cease to be chance.
9. What proof have we that the first cause of all things is a Supreme Intelligence, superior to all other intelligences?
"You have a proverb which says, "The workman is known by his work.’ Look around you, and, from the quality of the work, infer that of the workman."
We judge of the power of an intelligence by its works as no human being could create that which is Whatever may be the prodigies accomplished by human intelligence, that intelligence itself must have a cause and the greater the results achieved by it, the greater must be the cause of which it is the effect. It is this Supreme Intelligence that is the first cause of all things, whatever the name by which mankind may designate it.
Attributes of the Divinity 10. Can man comprehend the essential nature of God? "No; he lacks the sense required for comprehending it." 11. Will man ever become able to comprehend the mystery of the Divinity?
"When his mind shall no longer be obscured by matter, and when, by his perfection, he shall have brought himself nearer to God, be will see and comprehend Him."
The inferiority of the human faculties renders it impossible for man to comprehend the essential nature of God. In the infancy of the race, man often confounds the Creator with the creature, and attributes to the former the imperfections of the latter. But, in proportion 55 his moral sense becomes developed, man's thought penetrates more deeply into the nature of things, and he is able to form to himself a juster and more rational idea of the Divine Being, although his idea of that Being must always be imperfect and incomplete.
12. If we cannot comprehend the essential nature of God, can we have an idea of some of His perfections?
"Yes, of some of them. Man comprehends them better in proportion as he raises himself above matter; he obtains glimpses of them through the exercise of his intelligence."
13. When we say that God is eternal, infinite, unchangeable, immaterial, unique, all- powerful, sovereignty just and good, have we not a complete idea of His attributes?
"Yes, judging from your point of view, because you think that you sum up everything in those terms; but you must understand that there are things which transcend the intelligence of the most 66 ALLAN KARDEC intelligent man, and for which your language, limited to your ideas and sensations, has no expressions. Your reason tells you that God must possess those perfections in the supreme degree; for, if one of them were lacking, or were not possessed by Him in an infinite degree, He would riot be superior to all, and consequently would not be God. In order to be above all things, God must undergo no vicissitudes, He must have none of the imperfections of which the imagination can conceive.”
God is eternal. If He had had a beginning, He must either have sprung from nothing, or have been created by some being anterior to Himself. It Is thus mat, step by step, we arrive at the idea of infinity and eternity.
God is unchangeable. If He were subject to change, the laws which rule the universe would have no stability.
God is immaterial, that is to say, that His nature differs from every-thing that we call matter, or otherwise. He would not be unchangeable, for He would be subject to the transformations of matter.
God is unique. If there were several Gods, there would be neither unity of plan nor unity of power in the ordaining of the universe.
God is all-powerful because He is unique. If He did not possess sovereign power, there would be something more powerful, or no less powerful, than Himself. He would not have created all things and those which He had not created would be the work of another God.
God is sovereignty just and good. The providential wisdom of the divine laws Is revealed as clearly In the smallest things as In the greatest and this wisdom renders it impossible to doubt either His justice or His goodness.
Pantheism 14. Is God a being distinct from the universe, or is He, according to the opinion of some, the result of all the forces and intelligences of the universe?
"If the latter were the case, God would not be God, for He would be effect and not cause; He cannot be both cause and effect."