August
“The demoniacal epidemic that reigns in the burg of Morzine since 1857 and in the surrounding shanties located in the mountains of High Savoy, has not yet finished its devastation. The French government has shown concern with the case since the Savoy belongs to France. Specialized and intelligent persons were sent in to study the issue and its development together with inspectors of hospices of the mentally ill. Some measures were tried, some women moved to Chambery, Annecy, Thoron, etc. but the results of these attempts were unsatisfactory. Despite the medical treatment that was considered adequate there was only a few cases of cure and when the women returned to their homes they would fall ill once again.
After having initially reached children and young ladies only, the epidemic moved on to affect mature and even elderly women. Not many men suffered the influence however it claimed the life of one. This miserable person squeezed himself in the little space between the stove and the wall from where he said he could not leave, remaining there for a full month without food. He died of hunger and total breakdown, victimized by his own sick imagination.
The French government envoys prepared reports and in one of them Mr. Constant, among other things, declared that the small number of cures in that population were due to the magnetism that I employed in Genève on girls and ladies that were brought to me in 1858 and 1859. Our readers know that such scourge that the good peasants of Morzine and, what is more unpleasant, their spiritual guides, attribute to the devil manifest in those that are taken by violent convulsions followed by screams, pain in the stomach and impressive acrobatic moves, not to mention the blasphemies and other scandalous processes in which the patients find themselves guilty of something when entering o Church. We were able to cure several of those patients that had no further issues while away from the pernicious and contagious influence and the impressionable minds of their region.
In Morzine, however, the terrible disease did not stop devastating the unfortunate population. On the contrary, the number of victims continued to rise. Prayers and exorcisms were done in vain; patients were uselessly taken to hospitals of several neighboring towns. The scourge that more easily attacks the more sensitive imagination of young ladies became bloodthirsty and the only attested cures were those operated by us, and that we have reported in our journal.
Finally and given the absence of any new means of cure, a great blow was attempted. Monsignor Bishop of Annecy announced recently that he was going to visit Morzine both to baptize the inhabitants that had not yet received that sacrament and to teach the means of defeating that terrible disease. The good people of the village had high hopes for that visit. It took place Saturday, April 30th and Sunday, May 1st and here the details of the events that followed:
About 4am on Saturday the ecclesiastic approached the village. He was horse-back riding, followed by a large number of priests. The patients were gathered at the Church and some driven there by force. A witnessed said that – since the time when the Bishop stepped foot in Morzine the patients, feeling his approximation, were taken by the most violent convulsions and in particular those that were kept in the Church would scream and screech beyond humans. Every girl that had endured the diseases at some point in the past returned to show the symptoms again and many of them were free from that for over five years without any attack and now taken again by the same convulsions of those horrible crises.
The Bishop himself turned a pale face by hearing the shouts that welcomed him. Regardless he continued to move towards the Church despite the vociferation of some patients that had escaped from the hands of their guardians, throwing themselves and cursing him. He dismounted by the Church’s door and entered with dignity. He had just stepped in for the riot to redouble. It was then a truly hellish seen. The possessed girls, about seventy of them with one man, cursed and jumped all over the place. That last many hours and when the priest wanted to carry out the Confirmation the furor redoubled again, if that is at all possible. Seven or eight men had to join forces with the police and drag them towards the altar.
The Bishop should leave at 4pm but at 7pm he was still in Church where three patients were not able to be dragged to him. They were then able to bring two, breathless, foaming by the mouth and cursing at the feet of the priest. The last one resisted all efforts. The Bishop, defeated by fatigue and emotion, renounced to the imposition of hands on her. He left the Church trembling, disturbed, with his legs covered by excoriations received from the patients while agitating under his blessings. He left the village extending words of good wishes to the inhabitants but without hiding his profound impression of astonishment before an evil that he could had never imagined to be of such significance. He finished by confessing that ‘he had not felt strong enough to quench the flame that he had come to heal, promising to return as soon as possible, armed with greater powers’. Today we are not making any assessment. We are limiting ourselves to report these deplorable facts. In our next issue perhaps we will say how painful all of that is to us.”
Ch. Lafontaine
This is the succinct report that the Courrier des Alpes gave about the events and that several papers reproduced without comments:
“There is a lot of talk about an incident in Annecy, so much painful as unforeseen, that required the travel of Monsignor Maguin, our dignified prelate. Everybody knows the disease that has affected the commune of Morzine for a long time, particularly the women, namely the possessed. Many inhabitants of the commune, in fact, are persuaded that a curse has been cast upon that region. People also remember the fact that in 1862 a certain number of people were affected by that strange disease that produces the effects of furious madness, without the actual signs of the disease, spread in several hospitals and multiples locations in France, returning perfectly cured. This year the disease affected other people and took terrifying proportions. It was under such circumstances that Monsignor Maguin, only touched by charity, made his pastoral visit to Morzine and it was at the time he was administering the Confirmation that a certain number of unfortunate patients attending the ceremony were suddenly taken by the fit. The Church was then shaken by a terrible scandal. The details of that scene are too afflictive to be reported. I will only say that the superior administration was moved by that sad episode and that a platoon of thirty men from the infantry was dispatched to the region. I learned from a good source that such a platoon will double and commanded by a high echelon officer, assigned with detailed instructions. Unnecessary to say that other measures will be taken such as for example the dispatch of specialized doctors tasked with the study of the disease. The army is assigned with the mission of protecting people.”
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Science is lost there and that is a confession of impotence. Then, what will the doctors do there? Haven’t they sent some highly qualified before? They say specialized doctors will be sent. But how can one establish their specialization if the nature of the disease is unknown and in which science is lost? We can understand the specialty of ophthalmology for the diseases of the eyes and toxicology for the cases of poisoning but here what is the category? The alienists? It is alright if demonstrated that the patients have a mental disorder but the alienists themselves acknowledged their failure. There is no agreement with respect to the cause or the actual treatment. Now, if science gets lost there, and that is an actual fact, the alienists are no more specialists than the surgeons. It is true that an army will join them but such a means has already been employed unsuccessfully. We doubt it very much that it will be successful this time around.
If science fails it means that it is not in the right direction. What is strange about that? Everything reveals a moral cause and they send in people that only believe in matter. They search matter and find nothing there, astoundingly demonstrating that they do not search what is needed. If it is more specialized doctors that they want then have them found among the spiritualist doctors rather than materialists. The former will at least be able to understand that there could be something there beyond the physical organization.
Religion was not more successful. It applied its ammunition against the devils but it was powerless to bring them to reason. It must be the case that either the devil is stronger or it is not the devil. The frequent failures in similar cases indicates one of the two things: it is wrong or it is defeated by the enemy.
The clearest aspect in all that is the fact that none of the employed means yielded good result and they will not have better result while adamant in not finding the origin of the true cause. A careful study of the symptoms demonstrate with the strongest evidence that its cause is in the action of the invisible world upon the visible one, an action that is the source of more diseases than one can imagine, against which science fails because it fights the effect and not the cause. In a word, that is what Spiritism calls obsession, taken to the highest degree, that is, subjugation and possession. The crises are consecutive effects. The cause is the obsessing Spirit. It is therefore upon that creature that one must act like in the convulsions produced by worms one acts upon the worms.
Some will say that the system is absurd. It is absurd to those that admit nothing beyond the tangible world but much positive to those that attest the existence of the spiritual world and the presence of invisible beings around us. As a matter of fact, the system is based on experience and observation and not in a pre-conceived theory. The action of an invisible malevolent being was attested in a number of isolated cases, keeping a complete analogy with the events of Morzine, from what is then logical to conclude that the cause is the same since the effects are similar. The difference is only in the quantity. All of the symptoms, without exception, observed in patients of that region were also observed in the particular cases that we mentioned. Considering that patients affected by the same problem were freed, without exorcisms, medications or even police, what was done elsewhere can be done in Morzine. If that is the cases, people will ask, why then the means employed by the Church are ineffective?
Here is why:
The Church believes in demons that is in a category of creatures of a perverse nature and eternally devoted to evil and for that reason not perfectible. With such an idea the Church does not try to better them. Spiritism on the contrary acknowledged that the invisible world is formed by the souls or Spirits of people that lived on Earth and that, after death, inhabit the space. There are good and bad among them, like among mankind. From those that were happy to do evil when alive there are some that persist doing bad things after death. However, since they belong to humanity, they are subordinated to the law of progress and can improve. Hence they are not demons, in the sense attributed by the Church, but imperfect Spirits.
Their actions affect people both on the physical as well as moral side. From that a number of diseases that have no root in the organism, apparent madness that are refractory to any medication. It is a new field of pathology that may be called ‘spiritual pathology’. Experience teaches to distinguish the cases in this category from those that belong to organic pathology. We do not intend to describe the treatment of such diseases because it has already been done somewhere else. We will only recap that it consists of a triple action: the fluidic action that frees the perispirits of the patient from the pressure of the malevolent Spirit; the ascendant exerted upon the latter by the authority with a moral superiority and in the moralizing influence of the advices that are given. The first one is a simple accessory of the two others. Alone it is insufficient because if it can momentarily keep the Spirit away there is nothing that preclude that Spirit from coming back. One must employ efforts to lead that Spirit to a voluntary renunciation of the intents, then moralizing the Spirit.
It is a true educational process that takes place that requires sensibility, patience, devotion and above all a sincere faith. Experience demonstrates the power of such a means by the results obtained but it also demonstrates that in certain cases it is necessary the simultaneous support of several people united by a common intention.
Now, what is it that the Church does in such cases? Certain that it is dealing with incorrigible demons the Church gives no attention to their improvement. It believes to be able to keep them away by fear and by the use of signs, formulas and instruments of exorcism that make them laugh and reinforce their malice as verified in all cases in which there was an attempt to exorcise places where there was noise and disturbance. It is a fact demonstrated by experience that the signs and exterior acts have no power upon them while the most hardened and perverse among them have been seen to yield to a moral pressure, returning to good feelings. Then the double satisfaction of freeing the obsessed person and bring a lost soul back to God.
People may also ask why the Spiritists that are convinced of the cause of the problem and the means of fighting it did not go to Morzine to operate miracles there. To begin with the Spiritists make no miracles. The curative action that may be exerted in such cases has nothing of wonderful or supernatural since it rests on a natural law, that is the relationships between the visible and invisible worlds, a law that by providing the reason for certain misunderstood phenomena for lack of knowledge narrows the limits of the supernatural, instead of widening them. Second, one must ask if their help would be acceptable; if they would not have found a systematic opposition; if far from being supported they would not have been hindered by the very persons that failed; if they would not have been insulted and mistreated by a population super excited by fanaticism, then accused of witchery together with the patients themselves and of acting in the name of the devil, as seen in other places.
In the individual and isolated cases those that dedicate themselves to alleviate the afflicted are generally helped by family and neighborhood, frequently by the patients themselves, upon whom they must act morally and through good and encouraging words that must excite the prayer. Similar cures do not happen instantaneously. Those workers need calm and profound reverence. In the current circumstances would such conditions be possible in Morzine? That is very doubtful. God will provide when the time is right to stop evil. As a matter of fact the events in Morzine and their continuation have a reason to be in the same way of the manifestations of the same kind in Poitiers. They will multiply, isolated or collectively, to convince people about the impotence of the means employed up until now to stop them, forcing disbelief to finally acknowledge the existence of an extra human power.
For every case of obsession, possession and any other unpleasant manifestations, we call the attention to what is in The Mediums’ Book, in the chapter about obsession; to the articles of the Spiritist Review relatives to Morzine, reported above; to our February, March and June 1864 articles regarding the obsessed of Marmande; and finally to the items 325 to 335 of the Imitation of the Gospels. There you will find the necessary instructions to be followed under similar circumstances.
Several subscribers testified their sorrow for not having found a special prayer in our Imitation of the Gospels According to Spiritism*, a prayer for a habitual use in the morning and at night.
We must point out that the prayers in that book do not constitute a recipe that to be complete must contain a much larger number of prayers. They are part of the communications given by the Spirits; we gathered them in a chapter dedicated to the analysis of the prayer, as we added to each of the other chapters the communications that could be used as their references. By removing those that could be used in the morning and at night we did so on purpose to remove from our work a liturgical character, that being the reason why we limited ourselves to those that had a closer relationship with Spiritism. The others each person may find among those of their private cult. Despite that, and in order to attend a desire that was expressed to us, we provide below the ones that we believe to best attend the objective. We precede them, however, with some observations so that their reach can be better understood.
In the Imitation, number 274, we pointed out the need for the intelligible prayers. Someone that prays without knowing what is said gets into the habit of giving more importance to the words than to the thoughts; for that person it is the words that are efficient even without the participation of the heart. Therefore many consider to be free after reciting some words that subtract them from the need of improving themselves. It is like making a strange image of the Divinity, believing that God is satisfied with a few words more than with actions that attest a moral betterment. In fact, here is what St. Paul says about it:
“If I don’t understand the meaning of the words I am like a barbarian to the one to whom I speak and the one that speak to me will be a barbarian. If I pray in a language that I don’t understand my heart prays but my mind goes without a fruit. If you praise with the Spirit only how come one of those men that can only understand their own language will say Amen at the end of you prayer, considering that he cannot understand what you say? That does not mean that your prayer is not good but the others are not edified (St. Paul, 1st Epistle to the Corinthians, Chap. XIV, verses 11,14,16 and 17).”
It is impossible to condemn in a more formal and logical way the use of unintelligible prayers. One may be surprised by the fact that the authority of St. Paul is not so much taken into account in this matter whereas it is so much invoked in so many other points. The same could be said about the majority of the holy writers, considered as the lights of the Church, and whose precepts are all far from being implemented in practice.
An essential condition of the prayer, according to St. Paul, is that of being intelligible so that it may speak to our soul. For that it is not enough for the prayer to be said in the language understood by the one that prays for there are prayers in vulgar language that speak as much to the mind as it would do if spoken in a foreign language and for that very reason do not reach the heart because the rare ideas that they carry are frequently muffled by the super abundance of words and the mysticism of the language.
The main feature of the prayer is to be clear, simple and concise, without useless phraseology and the luxury of epithets that are nothing but sequin on a garment. Each word must have its reach, awake a thought, move on fiber, in a word must be food for thought. It is only with this condition that the prayer may reach its objective, otherwise it is only noise. Notice also the air of distraction and gibberish with which they are said most of the time! One can see the lips moving but by the expression of the face and tone of voice one can identify a purely mechanical act from which the soul remains indifferent.
The most perfect example of concision, in the case of prayer, is without doubt the Our Father Prayer, a true masterpiece of sublimity in its simplicity. In the most reduced form it summarizes all mankind’s duties to God, to oneself and one’s neighbors. Due to its very brevity, however, the profound meaning carried in the few words it contains escapes most people; the comments already made about it are not always live in one’s memory or are even unknown to the majority and for that matter it is generally said without the thoughts directed to the actual application of its parts. It is said like out of a recipe whose effectiveness is proportional to the number of times it is said. It is generally one of the cabalistic numbers three, seven or nine taken from the old belief in the virtue of numbers that are also applied in magical operations. Think or do not think in what you are saying but repeat the prayer so many times and that is enough. Now that Spiritism strictly repeals any efficacy attributed to words, signs and formulas, the Church accuses it of resuscitating old superstitious beliefs.
All former and pagan religions had their sacred and mysterious language, only intelligible to the initiated but whose true meaning was hidden to the general public that used to respect it in proportion to the lack of understanding. This could be accepted at the time of intellectual infancy of the masses but nowadays that those masses are spiritually emancipated the mystical languages make no sense any longer and constitute an anachronism; people want to see religious things as clearly as they see things in their civilian life; there is no more request to believe and pray but a need to understand why we do believe and what must be requested when praying.
Latin, of frequent use in the first days of Christianity, became the sacred language to the Church and it is due to a little prestige left to that language that the majority of those that don’t know it say the Our Father Prayer in that language other than in their own language.
One could say that the more value is given to something the least it is understood. Certainly it was not Jesus’ intent when dictating it and that was not St. Paul’s thought when he said: “For if I pray in a foreign language, my spirit prays, but my mind is unfruitful.”** Even if in the absence of intelligence the heart always prays it would only be half-bad, however, unfortunately quite often the heart does not pray more than the Spirit. It the heart really prayed we would not see so many among those that pray a lot to find so little benefit, or not to be more benevolent or charitable or less defaming of their fellow human beings.
Made that point we say that the pest prayer to be said in the morning or at night is without doubt the Our Father Prayer, said with intelligence, from one’s heart and not only with the lips. In order to bridge the blank left in its concision we will add with, by advice and with the assistance of the good Spirits, a development to each proposition.
According to the circumstances and time available one can say the simple Our Father Prayer or with the added comments. One can also add some of the prayers contained in the “Imitation of the Gospels” from those that do not a special objective, like for example the prayer of the guardian angels and to the protecting Spirits #293; the one to keep the bad Spirits away #297, to our loved ones #358, to the suffering souls that request prayers #360, etc. It must be understood that this does not affect the special prayers of one’s cult and that there is no request from Spiritism for that to be renounced.
For those that request from us a line of conduct to be followed with respect to the daily prayers we advise each one to make their own collection appropriate to their own circumstances, to others and to those that have left Earth and develop or restrict them according to the occasion. Once a week, say on Sunday for example, one can dedicate a longer time to this and say all of them, be it in private or in a group, adding to that the reading of some passages of the Imitation of the Gospels and some other good instructions dictated by the Spirits. This is more specially addressed to persons that are repelled by the Church because of Spiritism and that do not feel a lesser need to connect to God through their thoughts.
With the exception of that case, there is nothing that preclude those that feel the need to assist on the days dedicated to their own cults to say, at the same time, some of the prayers related to their Spiritist beliefs. This can only contribute to elevate one’s soul to God by the union of thoughts and words. Spiritism is an intimate faith. It is in one’s hearts and not in exterior acts. It does not prescribe any action that may scandalize those that share this belief but it does recommend, on the contrary, one’s abstention in the Spirit of charity and tolerance.
In consideration and as a way of application of the preceding ideas we provide below the “Our Father Prayer” developed. If some people believe that here is not the adequate place for a document of such a nature we would remind them that our Spiritist Review is not a collection of facts only and that its scope involves everything that may help the moral betterment. There was a time that the only thing of interest to our readers was the cases of manifestations. Today, however, that the serious and moralizing objective of Spiritism is understood and appreciated, the majority of the followers seek here things that are more attractive to their hearts than to their minds.
Therefore those are the ones that we address at this time. We know that our work pleases many if not all through this very publication. That alone would have been sufficient to make us decide if we did not have other considerations about which we must keep our silence and that helped us decide to make it now rather than in another time.
* Later renamed The Gospel According to Spiritism (TN)
** Corinthians I, 14:14 (T.N.)
Our Father Prayer Developed
I. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name
We believe in you, our Lord, because everything reveals your power and your will. The harmony of the universe is the testimony of your wisdom, a prudence and providence that go beyond all human aptitudes; the name of a sovereignly great and wise being is inscribed in all works of creation, from the shoot of the weed and the minor insect to the orbs that move in space; we see the proof of a paternal solicitude everywhere and that is why the one that does not recognize you in your work is blind, the one that does not glorify you is proud and ungrateful is the one that does not praise you.
II.Your kingdom come
Lord, you gave mankind laws full of wisdom and that would bring happiness if they were observed. With those laws there would be the kingdom of peace and justice among them; they would help one another instead of harming as they do; the strong would support the weak instead of smashing them; they would avoid the wrongs that give rise to abuses and excesses of all kinds. All miseries down here come from the violation of your laws because there isn’t a single infringement that would not meet its fatal consequences.
You gave the animals the instinct that give them the limit of the necessary and they mechanically conform to that but to mankind, in addition to that instinct, you gave intelligence and reason; you also gave them the freedom of observing or infringing the laws that apply to them personally, that is, the freedom of choice between good and bad so that they may have the merit and responsibility of their own actions. Nobody can pretend ignorance of your laws because your paternal providence wanted them to be recorded in the conscience of each one, without distinction of cult or nationality. Those that violate them neglect you.
One day will come when everyone will practice them, as you promised. Disbelief will then have disappeared and everyone will acknowledge you as the Sovereign Lord of all things and the kingdom of your laws will be the kingdom on Earth. Please, Lord, speed up your arrival given mankind the necessary light beam to lead them in the path of truth.
III. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven
If submission is a duty of the son to the father, from the inferior to his superior, how much more must not be the submission of the creature to the Creator! Do as you wish, Lord, is to observe your laws and abide by them without moaning against your divine designs; mankind will submit to them when understand that you are the source of every wisdom and that without you nothing is possible; your will shall then be done on Earth as with the elected ones in heaven.
IV.Give us this day our daily bread
Give us the food to keep up with the strength of our body; give us also the spiritual food for the development of the Spirit.
The animal finds its pasture but mankind owns that to their own work and to the resources of intelligence because you created them free. You said: “By the sweat of your face
you shall eat bread”.[1] By doing so you turned work into an obligation to lead them to provide the means of survival and well-being by exercising their intelligence, some by the physical others by the intellectual work. Without work they shall remain stationary and will not aspire the happiness of the superior Spirits. You help the person of good will that trusts you for what is needed but not the one that is complacent with idleness and that wanted to obtain everything effortlessly, and nor the one that seeks the superfluous.
How many fail due to their own negligence, improvidence or ambition and for not having been satisfied with what you have given them! These are the architects of their own misery and have no right to complain for they are punished by their own sins. But even those are not abandoned by you because you are infinitely merciful. You reach out to them with your helping hand allowing them to come back to you sincerely, like the prodigal son.
Before we complain about our fate let us question if that is not our own work. In every misfortune that comes to us let us ask if we were not able to avoid it; but let us also say that God gave us the intelligence to take us from the swamp and that it is up to us to make that work for us.
Considering that the law of work is the condition for mankind on Earth give us the courage to accomplish that; give us also the wisdom, providence and moderation so that we may not lose its fruit. Give us, Lord, the daily bread, that is, the means of acquiring the life needed things through work for nobody has the right to claim the superfluous. If work is impossible to us we trust our lives to your divine Providence.
If it is in your design to try us in the hardest trials, despite our efforts, we accept it as a fair atonement of faults that we may have incurred in this life or in the preceding ones because you are just; we know that there aren’t undeserved penalties and that you never punish without a reason.
Keep us, oh God, from feeding any envy towards those that have what we don’t, not even towards those that have the superfluous, even if we lack the necessary. Forgive them if they forgive the law of charity and love towards their neighbors that you taught them.
Keep also from our Spirits any thoughts of denying your justice when we see the prosperity of evil and the misfortune that sometimes upsets good people. We now know, thanks to the new lights that you wanted to give us that your justice is always accomplished and fails nobody; that the material prosperity of a bad person is transient as their physical existence and that it will entail terrible returns whereas the happiness reserved to the one that suffers with resignation will be eternal.
V. Forgive us our debts, as we have also forgiven our debtors
Each one of our breaches of your laws, Lord, is an offense to you and a new debt that sooner or later we will have to repair. We ask your infinite mercy for its remission with the promise that we will make efforts not to contract new ones.
You turn charity into an express law but charity is not only assistance to our neighbor in need; it consists also in forgiving and forgetting the offenses. How can we claim your indulgence if we fail her with those that brought us sorrow?
Give us, oh my God, the strength to muffle in our soul every resentment, hate and grudge; don’t allow that a sudden death may surprise us with a desire of vengeance in our heart. If it is in your plans to take us from here today allow us to present ourselves to you free from any animosity, like Jesus Christ, whose last words were in favor of his executioners.
The persecutions imposed on us by the bad ones are part of our earthly trials; we must accept them without complaint like every other trial and do not slander those that through their evilness open to us the path of eternal happiness for you told us through the mouth of Jesus: “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.”[2] We must then bless the hand that humiliates us because the injuries of the body strengthen our soul and we shall be exalted as a consequence of our humility.
Blessed your name, Lord, for you have taught us that our fate is not inexorably determined after death; that in other existences we shall find the means for the repair and atonement of our past faults and accomplish in a new life what we could not have achieved in this one for our own betterment. That is finally the explanation to every apparent anomaly of life; it is the light cast upon our past and future, the amazing sign of your sovereign justice and your infinite benevolence.
VI. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil
Give us, Lord, the strength to resist the suggestions of the bad Spirits that may try to veer us off from the good path, inspiring in us good thoughts.
But we, ourselves, are imperfect Spirits incarnate on Earth to atone and become better. The primary cause of the evil is in us and the bad Spirits just take advantage of our bad and vicious inclinations through which they tempt us.
Each imperfection is an open door to their influence while they become impotent and renounce to any attempt against perfect creatures. Everything that we can do to keep them away shall be useless if we don’t oppose them with an unshakable determination on the good path and an absolute renunciation to evil. Hence it is against ourselves that we must direct all of our efforts and the bad Spirits will then naturally stay away because it is evil that attracts them while good repeals them.
Lord, sustain us in our weakness; give us the inspiration, through the voice of the guardian angels and the good Spirits, so that we can fix our imperfections so that we can shut to the impure Spirits any access to our soul.
Evil is not the result of your work, Lord, because the source of every good cannot engineer evil. We created it by trespassing your laws and by the bad use that we made of the freedom that you gave us. When mankind observe your laws evil will disappear from Earth as it has already disappeared from more advanced worlds.
Evil is not a deterministic need to anyone and it is only irresistible to those that embrace it with satisfaction. If we have the will to do it we can also do good. For that, oh my God, we ask your assistance and that of the good Spirits so that we can resist temptation.
VII. Amen
May our wishes come true, Lord! But we kneel before your infinite wisdom. Above all things that are we are not given to understand may your sacred will be done and not ours because we know that the only thing you want is our good and you know what is useful to us better than we do.
We address this prayer to you, oh my God, by ourselves, for every suffering soul, incarnate and discarnate, for all of our friends and enemies, for all of those that request our assistance. For all of them we ask for you mercy and blessings.
Note: Here we can mention something that we are thankful to God for and something that we would like to us for ourselves or someone else.
* Genesis 3:19 (TN)
** Mathews 5:6 (TN)
We got the text below from Bordeaux:
“Reading in the Civilisateur the letters of Christopher Columbus about the condition of Mexico at the time of discovery, by Lamartine, the following passage has particularly drawn our attention:
“Nature, says Columbus, is so rich there that private property did not create a feeling of avarice or greed. Those men seem to live the golden age, happy and tranquil amidst open and limitless gardens that are not surrounded by moat, divided by fences or protected by walls. They are loyal to one another, without laws, books or judges. A person that rejoices harming another is considered evil. Their whole legislation seems to be in the horror that good feels towards evil. Their religions seems to be only a feeling of inferiority, recognition and love towards the invisible Being that had given them live and happiness. There isn’t a better nation or country in the whole universe. They love their neighbors as they do to themselves; they always employ a smooth and gracious language bearing a kind smile on their lips. It is true that the walk around naked but dressed on innocence and candor.”
According to this image those peoples were infinitely superior not only to their invaders but still today if compared to those of the most civilized countries. The Spaniards did not learn anything from their virtues, contaminating them with their vices; in response to their good hospitality brought them slavery and death. Those miserable peoples were exterminated in their majority and the few that still remain were perverted by contact with their conquerors.”
“Before such result here is the question: Where is the progress, the moral benefit collected by humanity with so much bloodshed? Wouldn’t have been better that the old Europe had just ignored the New World, so happy before that discovery?”
Here is how my spiritual guide answered that question:
We would respond with pleasure if your Spirit were capable of handling such a serious matter at this point in time, a matter that requires some spiritual-philosophical development. Ask Kardec. This order of ideas was already debated but they will report to that in a more lucid way than you would because you always have a tense Spirit and curious ears. That is a consequence of your current condition that you must accept.”
-o-
A first instruction sticks out from that. It is not good enough to be a medium, even a developed one, to easily receive communications about the first subject that shows up. That medium is doing his homework but at this point in time his own Spirit is struggling with other things and could not have the necessary calm. That is how a thousand other things may oppose to the exercise of mediumship. That faculty may subsist but it still depend on the support of the Spirits that may give it or deny according to their own judgment of convenience and that frequently in the interest of the medium.
As for the main question this is the response obtained at the Parisian Society:
(July 8th, 1864 – medium Mr. d’Ambel)
“Under the appearance of a certain natural goodness and with customs that are sweeter than righteous the Incas lived carelessly, without progress or elevation. Those primitive races lacked the struggle and if bloody battles did not decimate them; if an individual ambition did not exert influence there drive those populations to conquests, they were not less contaminated by a dangerous virus that would lead their race to extinction. It was necessary to stir up the vital sources of those corrupt Incas from which the Aztecs represented the fatal decadence that would affect all of those peoples. If we add to these entirely physiological causes the moral causes we will notice that the level of sciences and arts had remained there in a prolonged infancy. Hence, there was the need to put those pacific countries at the level of occidental races. Today the race is considered extinct because it melt with the Spanish conquerors. A new and lively nation flourished from that mixture of races that from a vigorous impulse will soon equate with the peoples of the old continent. What is left of so much blood shed, ask those in Bordeaux. To begin with the blood shed was not as considerable as one could believe. Facing the firearms and a few soldiers of Pizarro the whole region surrender as if before semi-gods coming out of the water. It is almost an episode of the old mythology and that indigenous race is, in more than one feature, similar to those that defended the Order of the Golden Fleece.”
We add a few reflections to these judicious explanation.
From an anthropological point of view the extinction of races is a positive fact. From the point of view of philosophy it is still a problem. From the point of view of religion the fact is irreconcilable with God’s justice if admitted only one corporeal existence to mankind to decide its future for eternity. In fact the extinguished races are always inferior to those that succeed them. Can they have an identical position in a future life when compared to the more perfected ones?
Simple common sense repeals that idea otherwise our endeavor to improve would be useless and we couldn’t care less if we remained savages. The non-pre-existence of the soul would forcibly imply the creation of new more perfect souls, for each race, leaving the hands of the Creator, a hypothesis that is irreconcilable with every principle of justice. If, on the contrary, we admit the same starting point to all souls and a succession of progressive existences, everything is explained.
In the extinction of races people generally don’t take into account that it is only the material body that is destroyed and the spiritual one is forgotten, only changing the vestment because the former was no longer compatible with one’s moral and intellectual development. Suppose the whole black race is destroyed. The only thing that will be destroyed is the black garment but the Spirit, that always lives, will first take an intermediary body between the white and the black and later a white body. That is how a being placed in last degree of humanity will reach in a given time the sum of perfections compatible with the condition of our globe.
Therefore one must not forget that the extinction of races only reaches the body not affecting the Spirit in any way. Far from suffering with that the Spirit gains a more perfected body, provided with a brain network that respond to a greater number of faculties.
The Spirit of a savage incarnate in the body of a European wise man would not be wiser and would not know what to do with his instrument whose inactive networks would break; the Spirit of a wise man, incarnate in the body of a savage would be like a pianist before a piano that lacked many strings. This thesis was developed in an article of the Spiritist Review, April 1862, about the perfectibility of the black race.
There is no doubt that the Caucasian white race is the one that occupies the first place on Earth. But has that race reached the apogee of perfection? Are all faculties of the soul represented in that race? Who would dare say? Let us then suppose that advancing continually the Spirits of that race ended up meeting in a dead end. The race would disappear to give rise to another one, of a more rich organization. That is what the law of progress wishes. Can we already see in the white race very distinct nuances, like moral and intellectual development? We may rest assured that the most advanced will absorb the others.
The disappearance of races take place in two ways: one by the natural extinction as a consequence of environmental conditions and of their degeneration when remain isolated; second by the conquests and dispersion determined by cross marriages. It is known that the black and white races gave rise to another one much superior to the former and that it is like a step further for the Spirits of that race. Furthermore the fusion of blood brings the alliance of Spirits from which the most advanced help the progress of the others. With that respect who can foresee the effects of the last war of China; the alterations that will take place in that country for so long stationary; the new physiological and psychological elements taken there? In a few centuries perhaps it may not be more recognized than today’s Mexico when compared to the times of Columbus.
As for the indigenous peoples of Mexico we say, with Erastus, that their customs were more sweet than virtuous and add that its pretense golden age was undoubtedly much poeticized. The history of conquests teaches us that they fought one another, something that does not indicate great respect towards their neighbors. Their golden age was that of infancy. Today they live the apex of youth. Later will reach maturity. If they still don’t have the virtue of the wise men they have acquired the intelligence that will lead to that when matured by experience. Nonetheless, centuries are needed for the education of peoples; it only takes place by the transformation of their constituent elements. Would France be what it is today without the conquest of the Romans? Would the barbarians get civilized without the invasion of Gallia? The Gallic wisdom and the Roman civilization together with the strength of the peoples from the North formed the current French people.
It is undoubtedly painful to think that progress may sometimes need destruction. But it is necessary to destroy the old shanties to replace them by new, more beautiful and comfortable houses. Besides, it is necessary to take into account the belated state of the globe whose humanity is still in the phase of material and intellectual progress. When it enters the phase of moral and spiritual progress the moral needs will surpass the material necessities; mankind will govern itself according to the justice and will no longer have to claim their place by force. War and destruction will no longer have a meaning. Until then the struggle is a consequence of their moral inferiority.
Living more the materiality than the spirituality mankind does not see things but from the present and material point of view, and for that matter, limited. Up until now humanity has ignored that the central role belongs to the Spirit. Mankind has seen the effects but did not figure out the causes and that is the reason for veering off in sciences, institutions and religions. By teaching them the participation of the spiritual element in everything in this world Spiritism broadens the horizon and changes the direction of the ideas. It opens up the era of moral progress.
“Dear Mr. Allan Kardec,
Would you kindly insert the following lines in the next issue of your Spiritist Review?
I was very surprised when I opened the last issue of your Review (July 1864) and find there one letter signed by Barricand, in which that theologian mentioned my name with respect to a report that I published about one of his anti-Spiritist courses (La Vérité, April 10th, 1864).
The very judicious observations with which you followed that unqualifiable and much delayed protest would certainly dismiss my personal response if I were not afraid that my silence would go like a defeat or a mistake to the eyes of some. I herein declare that my conscience could not have associated to the serious criticism he made to me for supposedly having fantasized and deviated the course in question. I attest before God if I have not reproduced exactly the same phrases and the same words pronounced by my contradictor, continuing certain of having given them the true meaning.
Besides, if the high intelligence of Father Barricand considers my own too little or too heavy to have been able to extract the true meaning of his speech through the sinuous but flowery paths that he walked; if Father Barricand takes from that premise the induction that in such a case I am not allowed to affirm or attest; my word, it is very possible! In such a case and to be faithful to my principles of tolerance, and would almost criticize myself for having defended La Vérité and the other Spiritist journals against delusional accusations, born in my delirious brain; in being proud for having understood that instead of breaking the bells ringing above our heads it seems that they were satisfied in taking our pulses.
Therefore and as I expect the rage of Mr. Dean of the Faculty of Theology will be appeased; that is how, to the eyes of the world, his person and his teachings will be rehabilitated.
Yours sincerely, etc.”
E. Edoux, director of La Vérité
In the commune of Villate, near Nozai (Lower Loire) there was a poor woman called Juliana Maria, old, sick and living out of people’s charity. One day she fell on a swamp from where she was rescued by an inhabitant of the region, Mr. Aubert, who was used to help her. Once transported to her house she died soon after as a consequence of the accident. It was the general belief that she wanted to commit suicide. On the same day of her death Mr. Albert, Spiritist and medium, felt like a person surrounding him, without any explanation for that though. When he learned about Juliana Maria’s death he thought that perhaps her Spirit had come to visit him.
Following the advice of Mr. Cheminant, one of his friends and member of the Spiritist Society of Paris where he had reported the events, he evoked that woman with the objective of being useful to her. Before that, however, he requested the advice of his spiritual guides from whom he received the following answer:
You can and that will give you pleasure besides being useful to her the service that you intend to do. She is happy and entirely devoted to those that had pity on her. You are one of her good friends. She is always around you and frequently entertains with you unnoticeably. Sooner or later the work done shall be compensated either by the recipient or by those that were interested in the case, both before and after death. If the Spirit did not have time to recognize itself other sympathetic Spirits do that in its name, testifying the whole acknowledgement. That explains what you felt on the day of her death. Now she is the one helping you in the good you want to do. Remember Jesus’ words: …whoever humbles themselves will be exalted. You will have the measure of the services that she can do to you if, however, you only ask for her help to be useful to your neighbor.
Evocation:
-Good Juliana Maria, you are happy and that is all I wanted to know. That will not preclude me from thinking of you many times and never forget you in my prayers. A – Have trust in God; inspire a sincere faith on your patients and you will almost always succeed. Never think about the rewards that may come from that. It will go beyond your expectations. God always know how to compensate the merit of those that dedicate themselves to alleviate their fellow human beings and practice their actions with complete selflessness. Without that it is all delusion and fantasy. Before anything else one needs faith; on the contrary there is nothing. Remember this maxim and you shall be surprised by the results that will be obtained. The two mad persons that you healed are a proof of that. Given their circumstances the medicine alone would have failed. When you ask God to allow the good Spirits to cast upon you their good fluids, if that request does not make you feel an involuntary shiver it means that your prayer was not truthful enough to be heard; it will only be in the conditions I tell you. That is what you have experienced when you say from the bottom of your heart: Almighty God, Merciful God, God of infinite benevolence, hear my prayer and allow the good Spirits to assist me in the cure… have mercy on this person, my God, and give her health; without you I cannot do anything. Your will be done.
You did well by not neglecting the simple ones. The voice of the one that endured and suffered with resignation the miseries of this world is always heard and, as you see, a service done always receives its reward. Now a word about myself and that will confirm what was said above.
Spiritism explains to you my language as a Spirit. No need to enter into details about that. I also believe to be useless to give you details about my previous life. My situation on Earth when you met me must allow you to understand and appreciate my other existences which were not always irreproachable. Living a life of misery, sick and not being able to work I had to beg my entire life. I accumulated nothing and only had about one hundred francs that I kept for when my legs could no longer carry me. God judged my atonement and trial sufficient and put an end to that, freeing me without the suffering of earthly life, because I did not commit suicide as people initially thought. I fell thunderstruck by the border of the swamp at the time I addressed my last prayer to God. The slope in the terrain was the cause of having my body found in the water. I did not suffer; I am happy for having being able to accomplish my mission, without obstacles and with resignation. I became useful to the limits of my forces and means and avoided doing any harm to my neighbor. Today I receive the compensation for which I thank God, our divine Master that alleviates our bitterness in the very punishment imposed, allowing us to forget our previous existences in the present one and put on our way charitable souls to help and support the load of our previous errors. You also persevere and like myself, you will be compensated. I thank you for your good prayers on my behalf. I will never forget that. One day we will meet again and many things will be explained to you. At this point in time it would be superfluous. Know this that I am much devoted to you, I am many times by your side and whenever you need me to alleviate those in suffering.
The poor little woman Juliana Maria.
“Thank you for the benevolence of admitting me in your session, dear President. You realized that my previous existences were in a more elevated social condition and if I returned to suffer the test of poverty it was to punish me from a hopeless pride that made me repeal whoever was poor and miserable. I then suffered the just penalty by the law of talion that turned me into the most horrible beggar of that region, and to demonstrate to me the benevolence of God, I was not rejected by anybody. That was my whole fear. I then withstood my trial without complaint, presenting a better life from where I would not have to return to this world of exile and calamity. What a joy the day in which our soul, still young, can enter the spiritual world to meet the loved ones again, because I also loved and I am happy for having met again those that preceded me. Thanks to this good Aubert. He opened to me the door of acknowledgement. Without his mediumship I could not have thanked him and demonstrated to him that the soul does not forget the happy influences upon the heart and recommend to him the propagation of this divine belief. He is called to redirect veered off souls. He rest assured of my help. Yes, I can help him a hundred times more than he helped me, instructing him on his good path. Praise the Lord for allowing the Spirits to give you instructions to give the poor encouragement in their punishments and stop the rich in their pride. Be aware of the shame that there is in repealing a miserable person. May I serve you as an example so as to avoid, like me, to have to atone such faults in these painful social positions in which you may be placed, turning you into the spoilage of society.”
Juliana Maria
OBSERVATION: This fact is full of teachings for anyone that gives some thought to the words of this Spirit in both messages. All great principles of Spiritism are gathered there. Since the first one the Spirit shows its superiority by the language; like a benevolent godmother she comes to protect the one that did not repeal her in her miserable rags. It is an application of this maxim from the Gospel: “the great will be humiliated and the simple exalted; blessed are the meek; blessed are the unfortunate because these will be consoled; do not neglect the little ones for one is little in this world may be greater than you think.” May those that deny reincarnation as contrary to God’s justice explain the position of that woman, destined to unhappiness since her birth by the diseases, if not through a previous life! After transmitting this communication to Mr. Aubert he, in turn, got the one that follows and that is confirmatory.
Juliana Maria
Bibliographic News
If we offer a just praise to those journals for their demonstrated firmness and for their refutations full of logic, we must above all praise them for maintaining moderation, that is the essential character of Spiritism, being at the same time proof of true force; for not having followed our antagonists in the terrain of personalism and offenses, incontestable sign of weakness, for one can only reach such extremes when lacking good reasons. The one that has solid argumentation makes them prevail; they are not replaced or weakened by a language that is not worth of a good cause.
In Paris, a newcomer presents itself under the unpretentious title Avenir, Monitor of Spiritism. The majority of our readers already know it as well as its editor, Mr. d’Ambel, and were able to judge it by its initial arms. The best propaganda is to demonstrate what can be done; then it is followed by the grand jury of the opinion that announces the verdict. By the way, we do not believe that the latter will not be favorable considering the sympathetic welcome it received at its appearance.
We also add our personal sympathies, conquered previously for all those publications destined to bravely serve the cause of Spiritism, because we could not consciously support or encourage those that by their form or content, voluntarily or by imprudence, were more harmful than useful, deviating public opinion with respect to the true character of the doctrine, or by offering a flank to founded attacks and criticism from our adversaries. In such a case the intention cannot be granted the credit of the fact.
“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.
John 16:12-14
Our thoughts above with respect to the Avenir do not apply only to periodical publications but also to any other books or brochures whose number multiplies incessantly and whose authors are equally champions that joined the battle and bring their stone to the edifice. Our fraternal welcome greeting to all those defenders, men and women, that shaking the burden of old prejudices, raise the flag without second intentions, without any other interest but the general well-being, launching the liberating and emancipating scream of humanity: There is no salvation but through charity! As soon as that scream was heard for the first time everyone understood that it containing a whole moral revolution, presented and desired for a long time and that found sympathetic echo on all five corners of the planet. It was welcomed like the dawn of a happy world and in a few months it became the connecting words of every sincere Spiritist. Fact is that after such a lengthy and cruel fight against egotism that lemma finally allowed us to foresee the kingdom of fraternity.
The brochure that we announce here was written by a lady, member of the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, excellent medium, manager of a private group that is remarkably coordinated and someone that cannot be criticized but for an excess of modesty, if there could be excess in good. She only signed with her initials because she thought that an unknown name is not a recommendation and that she is not concerned with be seeing as a writer. That will not subtract from her the courage of expressing her opinion that she hides from nobody.
Mrs. J.B. is sincerely Catholic, but a very enlightened Catholic, and that says all. Her brochure is written from that point of view and for that very reason it addresses mainly the ecclesiastics. It is impossible to refute with more talent, elegance in the form and moderation and logic the arguments that an exclusive and blind faith opposes to the new ideas. We recommend this interesting piece of work to our readers. They can fearlessly propagate it among those persons of a very somber susceptibility with respect to the orthodoxy of the Church, giving it as a response to the attacks addressed to Spiritism, from a religious point of view.
Mr. Home is a man of the world, kind and full of civility, only revealed to the highest aristocracy. Jean Hillaire is a simple peasant from Charente-Inferior, no much educated and that lives from his work. His greatest travels, as it seems, were from Sonnac, his village, to Saint-Jean-d’Angely and Bordeaux. But God, in the partition of the gifts, does not take into account social positions; God wants the light to shine in all levels of the social fabric and for that He gives as much to the great as to the small.
Criticism and hateful calumny did not spare Mr. Home. Without consideration to the authorities that honored him with their appreciation and received him and still do in their intimacy, as a guest and friend, the mocking disbelief that respects nothing started to denigrate his image, presenting him as a vile charlatan, a skillful rascal, in a word, a refined scoundrel. They did not stop even before the idea that such attacks would reach the honorability of the most respectable persons, for that very reason accused of comradery with a supposedly creator of delusions. We said already about him that it was only necessary to see him to believe that he would be the most awkward charlatan because he shows neither the shocking attitudes nor the loquaciousness of the charlatans, characteristics that are not compatible with his typical shyness. As a matter of fact who would believe that he had at any time put a price to his manifestations? The reason that a short while ago led him to Rome, from where he was expelled, was to learn about sculpture and turn that into his profession, being that the most formal belying of his adversaries. But never mind! They said that he is a charlatan and do not wish to take it back.
Those that know Hillaire were equally convinced that he would be an even more awkward charlatan. It is never too much to remind people that the drive of charlatanism is always personal interest; where there is nothing to gain charlatanism makes no sense; where there is something to lose, charlatanism is a stupidity. Now, what was the material benefit that Hillaire took from his faculties? A lot of fatigue, waste of time, upsets, persecutions and slander. What he gained and that for him has no price is a vivid faith that he did not have in God, in God’s mercy, in the immortality of the soul and in the protection of the good Spirits. That is not precisely the fruit sought by charlatanism. But he also knows that such a protection cannot be obtained but through one’s betterment. That is what he strives to do and that is not what attracts charlatans either. It is also what helps him to withstand vicissitudes and trials with patience.
In similar cases a guarantee of honesty is therefore in an absolute selflessness. Before accusing someone of charlatanism it is necessary to ask first what is the benefit that the person takes from deceiving? Charlatans are not silly enough to gain nothing and less still to lose instead of gaining.
The mediums, therefore, have a peremptory answer to give to the adversaries asking them: How much did you pay me to do what I do? A not less significant guarantee and capable of causing a remarkable impression is the reformation of oneself. It is only a profound belief that can lead a person to win over oneself, disentangling from what is bad and resisting the pernicious attractions. Then it is not only the faculty that we admire but the person that we respect, something that imposes on the mockery.
The manifestations obtained by Hillaire are something sacred to him. He considers them as a favor of God. The feelings inspired in him by those manifestations are summarized in the following words extracted from the book by Mr. Bez:
“The rumor about these phenomena spread everywhere with the speed of light. All that up until then had not witnessed Spiritist manifestation could not wait until the time they could see them. More than ever Hillaire was covered by requests and invitations from all corners. Money offers were made by several persons to convince him to give sessions in their homes but Hillaire always maintained his profound belief that his faculties were only given to him with the objective of doing charity to the soul of the disbelievers and to remove them from the materialism that destroys them mercilessly, throwing them into egotism and vanity.
Since the time God gave him the grace of using him as a server to clarify his countrymen and manifestations of such an elevated degree are produced through him, the simple medium of Sonnac considered his mediumship as a priesthood, persuading himself that the day he accepted the least contribution he would have his faculties removed or given away to the bad and mocking Spirits like a toy to be utilized to harm or mystify anyone that would still be unwise enough to come to him.
His economic situation, however, is very fragile. Without fortune he needs to win the daily bread with his sweat and many times the great fatigue that he experiences during some very important manifestations affects the forces that he needs to handle the shovel and the pickaxe, two instruments that he must always have in his hands.
At time when subdued, that like Jo had the object of testing his faith and resignation, Hillaire found asylum and assistance among grateful friends that owed him their consolation through Spiritism. Is it what one can call a sale of manifestations from the Spirits? Certainly not because that is a consolation that God sent him and that he could and should accept without qualms; his conscience may rest because he did not trade with the gifts that were given to him; he did not sell consolation to the afflicted souls or the faith that he gave to the non-believers. As for those that came to help him they carried out a duty of fraternity for which they shall be compensated.
Hillaire’s faculties are multiple. He is a clairvoyant medium of first order, hearing, speaking, ecstatic and still writes. He obtained direct writing and remarkable transportations. For several times he was lifted up and transposed the space without touching ground, something that is not more supernatural than seeing a table lifting up. All of the communications and manifestations through him attest the assistance of very good Spirits and they always take place in broad daylight. He frequently enters somnambulistic sleep and it is almost always in that state that the most extraordinary phenomena take place.
Mr. Bez is written com simplicity and without exaltation. The author not only says what he saw but also cites several visual witnesses, most of those showed personal interest on the manifestations. These would not let go without a protest any inaccuracy, particularly if attributing to them a role that was in opposition to what actually happened. The author, highly considered and liked in Bordeaux, would not have submitted himself to the exposure of being belied. A conscious man is recognized by his language who would have scruples to consciously alter the truth. As a matter of fact there isn’t a single phenomenon that does not find its explanation in The Medium’s Book.
Such a work differs from that of Mr. Home because instead of a simple report of events that were frequently repeated, without deductions or conclusions, almost all contains moral appreciations and philosophical considerations that make a book that is at the same time interesting and educational and in which the Spiritist is recognized, not only convinced but clarified.
As for Hillaire we congratulate him for his devotion, wishing that he may never lose sight of what is the most important merit of a medium which is not the transcendence of his faculties that may be removed at any time but the good use that he makes of that. The continuation of the assistance of the good Spirits depends on that because there is a great difference between well capacitated medium and a well assisted medium. The former only excites curiosity; the latter, touched in the heart, reacts morally upon others as a result of his moral qualities. In the interest of the cause as well as in his own interest we wish that the praises from friends, sometimes more enthusiasts than judicious, may not take away any of his simplicity and modesty and do not make him fall into the trap of pride that has already led to the loss of so many mediums.
Lack of space forces us to postpone the report of this important work to our next issue. To know about the situation of the works mentioned above see the list of the Diverse Books about Spiritism.
Allan Kardec