The two VoltairesParisian Society of Spiritist Studies, Group Faucherand, medium Mr. E. Vézy
It is me alright but not that mocking spirit of other times. The little king from the eighteenth century who dominated through his mind and genius so many sovereigns no longer bears that sarcastic smile on his lips, a smile that used to scare friends and foes alike! My cynicism has gone before the revelation of the great things that I thought I knew but that I really found in the grave!
Poor minds, too narrow to contain so many wonders! Humans, be quiet and humiliate yourselves before such a supreme power! Observe and admire! That is what you can do. How come you want to penetrate the secrets of God and his work? Despite all of your efforts, doesn’t your reason shatters before the atom and the little grain of sand that cannot be defined?
I spent my life looking for and trying to understand God and His principle. My reason failed me and I came to the point not of denying God but His glory, His might and greatness. I explained Him as if developing with time. A heavenly intuition told me that I should reject such a mistake but I did not listen and became the apostle of a false doctrine… Do you know why? Because in the confusion and turmoil of my thoughts, in that constant struggle I could only see one thing: my name, engraved at the entrance of the temple of all nations! I only saw the glory promised by the universal youth that surrounded me seemingly enjoying the delightful essence of the doctrine that I taught them.
Pushed, however, by I do not know which kind of remorse in my conscience I wanted to stop but it was too late. Like every utopia, we are dragged by every system that we embrace. It first follows the currents but later it drags and breaks us down, and the downfall is sometimes quick and brutal.
Believe me, all of you here who are seeking the truth, you will find it when you uproot from your hearts the love for the shinning metal, the silly self-love and pride that make your eyes shine.
Have no fear to fight and defy the error on the new avenue where you walk now, whenever it presents itself to you. Isn’t that monstrous to preconize a doctrine against which one would dare not defend by the simple fact that people know that we made disciples and that they have gone beyond our beliefs?
As you see my friends, this Voltaire is no longer the same as that one of the eighteenth century. I am more Christian for I am here to make you forget my glory and remember what I was in my youth and what I loved in my childhood.
Oh! I loved so much to get lost in the world of my thoughts! My lively and eager imagination visited the vales of the Middle East looking for the one you call the Redeemer… I enjoyed visiting
the places where he had been. And that Christ seemed great and sublime to me amidst the crowds! I believed to hear his powerful voice, teaching the peoples of Galilee, at the shores of Tiberias and Judea!
Later on, in my sleepless nights, how many times did I stand up to open an old Bible and read its sacred pages once again! I then bended by forehead to the cross, this eternal symbol of redemption that unit Earth and Heavens, the creature to the Father! How many times did I admire God’s power, breaking into many parts in a way, and whose spark incarnates to become so small and just to deliver its soul at the Calvary in atonement! August victim whose divinity I denied and yet who made me say:
Your God that you betrayed,
Your God to whom you say blasphemes;
To you, to the universe, He died in those places!
I suffer but I atone the resistance that I used to oppose to God. My mission was to instruct and clarify. I did that in the beginning but my focus disappeared from my hands when the time came for the illumination.
Fortunate children of the nineteenth century, you are given the opportunity to see the light beam of truth.
Make sure you see that light in the right way for it will show heavenly shades to you and its clarity will be divine.
Voltaire
My friends, I allowed one of your great philosophers to speak for me, the one who was the principal architect of the error. I wanted him to tell you where to find light. What do you think? They will all come to tell you: “There is no wisdom without love and charity”. Tell me which doctrine can teach better than Spiritism? It would never be too much to remind you that love and charity are the two supreme virtues that bond together the creature to the Creator, as Voltaire says. Oh! What a mystery and what a sublime bond! Minuscule germ from Earth that can become so powerful that in their glory they can reach the throne of the Eternal!
St. Augustine
