September
Increase or decrease in Earth’s volume – about the Genesis“I ask you again, sir, for your permission to submit to you a reflection that came to me while reading your last book on Genesis. Page 161 there reads: “At the time when the terrestrial globe was an incandescent mass, it did not contain one atom more nor less than today. However, the Spirits have said that there aren’t two different laws for the formation of main bodies and secondary bodies;” and then, I read somewhere else, that the plants give back to Earth more than they borrow from it. I do not know if this is well established and scientifically demonstrated, but according to this data and others, not to mention the meteorites that are today an undisputed fact, couldn’t it be the case that one day we discover that our globe is still acquiring volume, that would contradict this assertion?"
It is very true that the plants give back to the soil more than they take from it; but the globe is not only composed of the solid part, and the atmosphere is an integral part of it; However, it has been proven that plants feed as much, and even more, on aerial fluids drawn from the atmosphere than on solid elements absorbed by the roots. Considering the quantity of plants that have lived on Earth since its origin, not to mention animals, the atmospheric fluids would long be exhausted if they did not feed on a permanent source; this source is in the decomposition of solid, organic and inorganic matters, that return to the atmosphere as oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, carbon and other gases that had been extracted from it. It is therefore a constant exchange, a perpetual transformation that takes place on the surface of the globe. Here it is just like the water that rises as vapor and falls back as rain, keeping the quantity always the same. The growth of plants and animals, operating with the aid of the constituent elements of the globe, their remains, however considerable they may be, they do not add a single atom to the mass. If the solid part of the globe increased, by this cause, in a permanent mode, it would be at the expense of the atmosphere, that would diminish accordingly, and would end by being unfit for life.
At the origin of Earth, the first geological layers were formed from solids momentarily volatilized, by the effect of high temperature, later condensed and precipitated by cooling. They undoubtedly raised somewhat the surface of the ground, otherwise it would have stopped at the granite layer, but without adding anything to the total mass, since it was only a displacement of matter. When the atmosphere, purged from the foreign elements that it held in suspension, moved into its normal state, things followed the regular course they have had since. Today, the slightest modification in the constitution of the atmosphere would inevitably lead to the destruction of present living beings; but then, probably, new races would be formed in different conditions of vitality.
Considered from this point of view, the mass of the globe, that is the sum of molecules that compose the whole of its solid, liquid, and gaseous parts, is incontestably the same since its origin. If it experienced expansion or condensation, its volume would increase or decrease, without any change in the mass. Therefore, if the mass of Earth increased, by the addition of new molecules, it would be by the effect of a foreign cause since it could not draw the elements necessary for its growth from itself.
Some people believe that the fall of meteorites can be a cause of increase in the volume of Earth; others, regardless of ways and means, are based on the principle that since the animals and plants are born, grow and die, the planetary bodies must be subjected to the same law.
First, the origin of the meteorites is still problematic; it was even thought for a long time that they could be formed in the upper regions of Earth's atmosphere, by the condensation of gasified matters coming from Earth itself; but assuming that they have a source foreign to our globe, that they come from the debris of a few broken planets, or that they form spontaneously by the condensation of interplanetary cosmic matter, in which case they could be considered as abortions of planets, their accidental fall could not give rise to a noticeable, and even less so, regular increase of our globe.
On the other hand, the similarity that one would claim to establish between plants and planets is lacking in accuracy, because that would make the latter organic beings, which is not admissible.
According to another opinion, the globe can grow by the influx of interplanetary cosmic matter drawn in its course through space, incessantly depositing new molecules on its surface. There is nothing irrational about this doctrine, for in this case the increase would take place by addition and superposition, as with all inorganic bodies; but, apart from the fact that one might wonder where this increase would stop, it is still too hypothetical to be admitted as a principle. It is only a system opposed by contrary systems, because, according to others, instead of acquiring, Earth spends, by the effect of its movement, meaning that it loses part of its molecules to space, and so, instead of growing, it diminishes. Between these two theories, positive science has not pronounced yet, and it is probable that it will not be able to do so soon, for lack of material means of observation. We are therefore reduced to formulating reasoning based on the known laws, that can give probabilities, but not certainties yet.
Here is, in response to the proposed question, the articulated opinion of the eminent Spirit who dictated the wise uranographic studies reported in chapter VI of Genesis.
Parisian Society, July 1868, medium Mr. Desliens
The worlds become exhausted as they age and tend to dissolve to serve as formation elements for other universes. Little by little they give back to the universal cosmic fluid of space what they have drawn from it to form. In addition, all bodies wear out from friction; the rapid and incessant movement of the globe through the cosmic fluid has the effect of constantly reducing its mass, albeit by an inappreciable amount at a time.[1]
The existence of worlds can, in my opinion, be divided into three periods. First period: condensation of matter, in which the volume of the globe decreases considerably, and the mass remains the same; it is the period of childhood. - Second period: contraction, solidification of the crust, hatching of germs, development of life until the appearance of the most perfectible kind. At this moment the globe is in all its plenitude: it is the age of virility; it loses, but very little, of its constituent elements. As its inhabitants progress spiritually, it passes into the period of material decline; it loses, not only because of friction, but also by the disintegration of molecules, like a hard stone that, eaten away by time, ends by falling to dust. In its double movement of rotation and translation, it leaves in space fluidic parcels of its substance, until the moment when its dissolution is complete.
But then, since the attractive force is proportional to the mass - I am not saying the volume - the mass decreasing, its conditions of equilibrium in space are modified; dominated by more powerful globes to which it can no longer counterbalance, deviations in its movements are produced and in its position with respect to the sun; it suffers new influences, and from there emerge changes in the conditions of existence of its inhabitants, while waiting for it to disappear from the scene of the world.
Thus, birth, life, and death; childhood, virility, and decrepitude, these are the three phases through which any agglomeration of organic or inorganic matter passes. It is only the Spirit, that is not matter, that is indestructible."
Galileo.”
What happens to the inhabitants of a destroyed world? They do what the inhabitants of a demolished house: they will settle elsewhere, in better conditions; the globes are, for them, only temporary stations; but it is likely that when a globe has reached its period of dissolution, it has long ceased to be inhabited, for then it can no longer provide the elements necessary for the maintenance of life.
Everything is an insoluble problem in nature, if we disregard the spiritual element; on the contrary, everything is explained, clearly, and logically, if that element is considered.
It should be noted that, according to the order of ideas expressed in the above communication, the end of a world would coincide with the greatest amount of progress of its inhabitants, compatible with the nature of that world, instead of being the signal of a reprobation that would condemn the majority to the eternal disgrace.
[1] In its translational movement around the sun, the speed of Earth is 400 leagues per minute. Earth’s circumference is 9,000 leagues at the equator, so that in its movement of rotation on its own axis, each point of the equator travels, consequently, at 9,000 leagues in twenty-four hours, or 6.3 leagues per minute.
Note: 1 nautical league is approximately 3.45 miles (T.N.)
The Soul of Earth
The soul of earth plays a main role in the theory of the formation of our globe, by the encrustation of four planets; theory of which we have demonstrated the material impossibility, according to geological observations and the data of experimental science (see Genesis, Chapter VII, No. 4 and following). As far as the soul is concerned, we will also rely on the facts.
This question leads to another: is Earth a living being? We know that certain philosophers, more systematic than practical, consider Earth and all planets as living beings, based on the principle that everything lives in nature, from the mineral to man. We believe first that there is a capital difference between the molecular movement of attraction and repulsion, aggregation and disintegration of the mineral, and the vital principle of the plant; there are different effects there that show different causes, or at least a profound modification in the first cause if it is unique. (Genesis, chap. X, Nos. 16 to 19).
But let us admit, for a moment, that the principle of life has its source in the molecular movement. We cannot dispute that it is still more rudimentary in the mineral than in the plant; now, from there to a soul, whose essential attribute is intelligence, the distance is big; no one, we believe, has dreamed of endowing a stone or a piece of iron with the faculty of thinking, of wishing and of understanding. By even making all the possible concessions to this system, that is by taking the point of view of those who confuse the vital principle with the soul itself, the soul of the mineral would only be there in the state of a latent germ, since it does not reveal itself by any manifestation.
A fact not less obvious than the one we have just mentioned, is that the organic development is always in relation with the development of the intelligent principle; the organism completes as the faculties of the soul multiply. The organic scale constantly follows, in all beings, the progression of intelligence, from the polyp to man; it could not be otherwise, since the soul needs an instrument appropriate to the importance of the functions that it must fulfill.
What would be the use of the oyster having the intelligence of a monkey, without the organs necessary for its manifestation? Therefore, if Earth were an animated being, serving as a body to a special soul, this soul would have to be even more rudimentary than that of the polyp, since Earth does not have even the vitality of the plant, while, by the role that is attributed to this soul, especially in the theory of incrustation, they make it a being endowed with reason and the most complete free will, a superior Spirit, in a word, which is neither rational, nor in conformity with the general law, for never a Spirit would have been more imprisoned and more badly served. The idea of the soul of Earth, understood in this sense, as well as the one that makes Earth an animal, must therefore be placed among the systematic and chimerical conceptions.
The smallest animal, in fact, has the freedom of movements; it goes where it wants to and walks when it pleases; while the stars, those supposedly living beings and animated by higher intelligences, would be constrained to perpetually automatic movements, without ever being able to deviate from their path; they would be much less favored than the last aphid. If, according to the theory of incrustation, the souls of the four planets that formed Earth, had the freedom of uniting their envelopes, they had the freedom to go wherever they wanted, to change the mechanical laws of the universe as they pleased; why don’t they no longer have it?
There are ideas that refute themselves, and systems that collapse as soon as their consequences are seriously scrutinized. Spiritism would be rightly ridiculed by its adversaries if it made itself the responsible publisher of utopias that do not stand examination. If ridicule did not kill it, it is because it only kills what is ridiculous.
By the soul of Earth, we can understand, more rationally, the collectivity of Spirits charged with the elaboration and the direction of its constituent elements, that already supposes a certain degree of advancement and intellectual development; or, better still, the Spirit to whom is entrusted the high direction of the moral destinies and the progress of its inhabitants, a mission that can be devolved only to a being eminently superior in knowledge and in wisdom. In this case, it is not, strictly speaking, the soul of Earth, for this Spirit is neither incarnate there, nor subordinated to its material state; he is a chief in charge of his direction, as a general oversees the control of an army. A Spirit, charged with a mission as important as that of the governance of a world, could not have whims, or God would be very careless to entrust the execution of his sovereign decrees to beings capable of making them fail by their sloppiness; however, according to the doctrine of incrustation, the unwillingness of the soul of the moon would have been the cause for Earth to have remained incomplete.
Numerous communications, given in various places, have come to confirm this way of considering the question of the soul of Earth; we will only cite one that sums them all up in a few words.
Spiritist Society of Bordeaux, April 1862
“Earth does not have a soul of its own, because it is not an organized being like those who are endowed with life; it has millions of them who are the Spirits responsible for its balance, its harmony, its vegetation, its heat, its light, the seasons, the incarnation of the animals they watch, as well as that of men. This is not to say that these Spirits are the cause of those phenomena: they preside over them, like the officials of a government preside over each of the cogs of the administration.
Earth progressed as it was formed; it always progresses, without ever stopping, until the moment when it will have reached its maximum of perfection. Everything that is life and matter in it, progresses simultaneously, because, as the progress is accomplished, the Spirits in charge of watching over it and its products, progress on their side, by the work they do, or give way to more advanced Spirits. Currently, Earth is touching a transition from bad to good, from mediocre to beautiful.
God, creator, is the soul of the universe, of all the worlds that gravitate in the infinity, and the Spirits in charge in each world, of the execution of His laws, are the agents of His will, under the management of a superior delegate. This delegate necessarily belongs to the order of the highest spirits, for it would be an insult to the divine wisdom to believe that it would abandon to the whim of an imperfect creature the care of overseeing the fulfillment of the destiny of millions of His own creatures.
Question: Can the Spirits responsible for the direction and the elaboration of the constituent elements of our globe incarnate here?
Answer: Certainly, because, in the state of incarnation, having a more direct action on matter, they can do what would be impossible for them as Spirits, just as certain functions, by their nature, fall more especially to the spiritual state. Each state has specific missions.
Don’t the inhabitants of Earth work for its material improvement? So, consider all the embodied Spirits as part of those who are responsible for making it progress, at the same time as they are progressing themselves. It is the collectivity of all these intelligences, incarnate and discarnate, including the superior delegate, that constitutes, properly speaking, the soul of Earth, of which each one of you is a part. Incarnate and discarnate are the bees who work in the building of the hive, under the direction of the Head Spirit; this one is the head, the others are the arms.
Question: Can this Head Spirit also incarnate?
Answer: Without a doubt, when he receives the mission, that takes place when his presence among men is deemed necessary for progress.
One of your spiritual guides.”
About the protection by the Spirit of saint patrons
“Setting aside all prejudices of sect and mystical ideas, the qualification of saint denotes a certain spiritual superiority, for to deserve this title one must have been distinguished by some meritorious act. According to this, and considering the matter from a Spiritist point of view, the saints, under whose invocation we are placed at birth, don’t they become our natural protectors, and when we celebrate the patronymic feast of someone whose name one bears, isn’t he attracted to it by sympathy, associating to that, at least by thought, if not by presence?”
There are two points to consider in this question, that must be considered separately.
The Spiritists, better than anyone else, know that thought attracts thought, and that the sympathy of the Spirits, whether they are beatified or not, is solicited by our feelings towards them. Now, what is it, in general, that determines the choice of names? Is this a special veneration for the saint who bore that name, admiration for their virtues, confidence in their merits, the thought of giving it as a model to the newborn? Ask most of those who choose one name if they know what they were, what they did, when they lived, what has distinguished them, if they know of any of their actions. Except for a few saints with popular histories, almost all of them are completely unknown, and without the calendar, the public would not even know if they existed. Hence, nothing can solicit one’s thought towards one rather than the other. We admit that, for some people, the title of saint is enough, and that one can take a name in confidence, as long as it is on the list of blessed ones drawn by the Church, without the need for one to know better: it is a question of faith.
But then, for these very people, what are the determining motives? There are two that almost always predominate. The first is often the desire to please some relative or friend whose self-esteem they want to flatter by giving his name to the newborn, especially if they expect something from it, because if it were a poor devil, without credit and consistency, they would not do him this honor. With that, they aim much more at the protection of man than that of the saint.
The second motive is even more mundane. What one almost always looks for in a name is a graceful form, a pleasant sounding; in a certain world especially, people want well-worn names, that have a status of distinction. Some are mercilessly rejected, because they flatter neither the ear nor the vanity, notwithstanding the fact that they were the names of most worthy of veneration saints. Besides, the name is often a question of fashion like the shape of a hairstyle.
It must be admitted that these holy characters should, in general, be little affected by the reasons for the preference given to them; in reality, they have no special reason to be more interested in those that bear their names than in others, towards whom they are like those far distant relatives whom people only remember when expecting an inheritance.
The Spiritists, who understand the principle of the loving relationships between the physical world and the spiritual world, would act differently in such a circumstance. At the birth of a child, the parents would choose, among the Spirits beatified or not, ancient or modern, friends, relatives or strangers to the family, one of those who, to their knowledge, have given indisputable proofs of their superiority, by their exemplary life, the meritorious acts they have accomplished, the practice of the virtues recommended by Christ: charity, humility, self-denial, selflessness devotion to the cause of humanity, in a word by all that they know to be a cause of advancement in the world of the spirits; they would solemnly and fervently invoke him, begging him to join the guardian angel of the child to protect him in the life he is going to travel, to guide him with his advice and good inspirations; and as a token of a covenant, they would give the child the name of that Spirit. The Spirit would see this choice as proof of sympathy, and he would gladly accept a mission that would be a testimony of esteem and trust.
Then, as the child grows up, he would be taught the story of his protector; they would repeat his good deeds to him; he would know why he had that name, and that name would constantly remind him of a fine model to follow. It would then result that in birthday celebrations the invisible protector would not fail to join forces, because he would have his place in the hearts of those present.
The Ancestors’ Armchair
The person who quoted this fact to us, as coming from a good source, added: “The Spiritists reject purely formal things, and rightly so; but if there is one that they can adopt, without denying their principles, it is without a doubt this one."
Certainly, this is a thought that will never arise in the brain of a materialist; it attests not only the spiritualist idea, but it is eminently Spiritist, and it does not surprise us in any way on the part of a man who, without openly raising the flag of Spiritism, has repeatedly affirmed his belief in the fundamental truths that follow it.
There is something touching and patriarchal in this usage that imposes respect. Who, in fact, would dare to ridicule it? It is not one of those sterile formulas that say nothing to the soul: it is the expression of a feeling that emanates from the heart, the tangible sign of the bond that unites the present to the absent ones. This apparently empty seat, but occupied by thought, is a whole profession of faith, and more, a whole teaching for adults as well as for children. For the children, it is an eloquent lesson, although silent, and that cannot fail to leave valuable impressions. Those that are brought up with these ideas will never be incredulous, because later, reason will come to confirm the beliefs with which they were lulled. The idea of the presence of their grandparents or revered persons around them, will be a more powerful brake than the fear of the devil for them.
Circle of Spiritist Morality, in Toulouse
In the past, there was in Paris a long flourishing society of Christian morality; why shouldn’t there be societies of Spiritist morality? It would be the best way to impose silence on the mockers, and to silence the prejudices nourished against Spiritism by those who do not know it. The quality of member of a society that deals with theoretical and practical morality, is a title to the esteem and to the confidence, even to the unbelievers, because it is equivalent to that of member of a society of honest people, and every sincere Spiritist should take pride in being part of them. Will the bad jokers dare to say that they are societies of fools, mad or stupid people?
The word circle, adopted by the Toulouse society, indicates that it is not limited to ordinary sessions, but that it is also a meeting place, where members can come and discuss the special object of their studies.
Memories of a husband
By Mr. Fernand Duplessis
It isn’t only there that we must seek them, but also in the expression of intimate feelings, because it is there that we often find them in a state of purity. If one could fathom all the archives of thought, one would be surprised to see how ingrained they are in the human heart, from vague intuition to clearly formulated principles. Now, who then gave birth to them there before the appearance of Spiritism? Will some say that it is a coterie influence? They are born there spontaneously, because they are in nature; but they have been often stifled or distorted by ignorance and fanaticism. Today Spiritism, passed to the state of philosophy, comes to uproot these parasitic plants, and constitute a body of doctrine of what was only a vague aspiration.
One of our correspondents from Joinville-sur-Marne, Mr. Petit-Jean, to whom we already owe many documents on this subject, sends us one of the most interesting, that we gladly add to those we have already published.
“Joinville, July 16th, 1868
Here you have more Spiritist thoughts! These are even more important since they are not, like many others, the product of imagination, or an idea exploited by novelists; it is the account of a belief shared by the family of a conventional, and expressed in the most serious circumstance of life, in which one does not dream of playing with words.
I took them from a literary work entitled: “Memories of a husband,” that is nothing other than a detailed account of the life of Mr. Fernand Duplessis. These memoirs were edited in 1849, by Eugène Sue, to whom Mr. Fernand Duplessis handed them with the mission of delivering them to publicity, as atonement for him and teaching for others, according to his own expressions. I leave to you the analysis of the passages that are more related to our belief."
“Mrs. Raymond, as well as her son, political prisoners, receive a visit from their friend, Mr. Fernand Duplessis. The visit gave rise to a conversation, after which Mrs. Raymond spoke in the following terms with her son (page 121):
"Come, my child," resumed Mrs. Raymond in a tone of affectionate reproach, "was it yesterday that we took our first steps in this career where we must thank God for a day without anguish? Do we pursue, do we reach the goal to which we strive without pain, without perils, and often without martyrdom? Haven’t we told ourselves, a hundred times, that our life is not ours, but of the holy cause of freedom for which your father died at the noose? Since you already got to the age of reason, haven't we got used to the thought that one day I might have to close your eyelids as you could close mine? Is there anything to be sad about in advance? Do you ever see me gloomy, weeping, because I still live with the dear and sacred memory of your father, whose bloody forehead I kissed, and whom I buried with my own hands? Don’t we have faith, like our Gallic parents, in the indefinite rebirth of our bodies and souls, that will in turn populate the immensity of the worlds? What is death for us? The beginning of another life, nothing else. We are on this side of the curtain, we move on the other, where immense perspectives await our gaze. As for myself, I do not know if it is because I am the daughter of Eve,” added Madame Raymond with a half-smile, “but the phenomenon of death has only excited in me an excessive curiosity.”
Page 208. - “The thought of death excited, especially in Jean, a very lively curiosity. Spiritualist in essence, he shared with his mother, his uncle and Charpentier, the strong belief of our Gallic parents. According to the remarkable Druidic dogma, man being immortal, soul and body, Spirit, and matter, he thus went, soul and body, incessantly reborn and live from world to world rising, with each new migration, towards an infinite perfection like that of the Creator.”
This valiant belief alone explained, in my view, the superb detachment with which Jean and his mother faced these terrible problems that cause so much trouble and terror in weak souls, accustomed to seeing the void in death or the end of physical life, while death is only the hour of a complete rebirth, that another life awaits with its mysterious news.
But unfortunately, it was not given to me to share that belief; I painfully saw approaching the fateful day when Jean would be tried by the Court of Peers. When that day came, Mrs. Raymond begged me to accompany her to that terrible session; in vain I wanted to divert her from such design, given my fear of a death sentence against Jean; I dared not express my apprehensions to her, but she guessed my thoughts. “My dear Mr. Duplessis,” she told me, “My son's father died on the scaffold for liberty; I piously buried him with my hands… if my son must also die for the same cause, I will be able to accomplish my duty with a firm hand… Do you believe that Jean can be condemned to death? He can only be condemned to immortality. (literally) Give me your arm, Mr. Duplessis… Calm your emotion, and let's go to the House of Peers.”
Jean was condemned to death and was to be executed two days later. I went to see him in his prison, and I hoped to at least have the strength to resist that last and gloomy interview. When I came in, he was doing his morning toilet, under the supervision of an officer, with an as meticulous care as if he had been at home. He came to me reaching out with his hands; then, looking me in the face, he said with anxiety: “- My God! my good Fernand, how pale you are! ... What is the matter?”
- What is the matter! I cried, bursting into tears, and throwing myself at his neck!
“- Poor Fernand!” He replied, moved by my emotion, “calm down ... have courage!”
- And it is you, you who are encouraging me at this supreme moment, I said. But are you then, like your mother, endowed with superhuman strength?
“- Superhuman! … No; you do us too much honor,” he resumed, smiling; “but my mother and I know what death is… and it does not frighten us… Our soul changes body, like our bodies change clothes; we are going to relive elsewhere and wait for or join those we have loved… Thanks to this belief, my friend, and to the curiosity to see new, mysterious worlds; finally, thanks to the awareness of the imminent advent of our ideas and the certainty of leaving behind the memory of an honest man, you must admit, leaving this world offers nothing frightening at all, on the contrary."
Jean Raymond was not executed; his sentence was commuted to life in prison, and he was transferred to the citadel of Doullens."
Bibliography
The fantastic regiment, by Victor Dazur[1]
We borrow the following passages from the review that Le Siècle gave of this work in its June 22nd, 1868, issue:
“It is a kind of philosophical novel, where most of the questions that currently fascinate the minds are treated in an original and dramatic form; spiritualism and materialism, the immortality of the soul and the nothingness, free will and fatalism, responsibility and irresponsibility, eternal punishments and atonement, then war, universal peace, permanent armies, etc.
All these questions are not discussed with much method and depth, but they are all discussed with a certain erudition, with evident good faith, with almost always cheerfulness, often with wit, and sometimes with eloquence.
In short, the book is from a liberal man, friend of progress, perfectibility and spiritualism, friend of peace, although obviously in the military.
Here is, therefore, how the author speaks of himself:
The author, who in this book gave himself the name of François Pamphile, had the great honor of being a corporal in the French army, when he had a strange dream that forms the outline of the work that you will read, if you have nothing better to do. Later, our soldier wrote down his dream, and then amused himself by embellishing it when he had time. "
The Fantastic Regiment, by Victor Dazur, is therefore a dream like Paris in America, by Mr. Laboulaye, but it is a dream that transports you to a completely imaginary world.
Corporal François Pamphile returns to his barracks, after taking part in the festivities at a public celebration in Paris with a few comrades. Saturated with the noise, music, open air shows, illuminations, fireworks, with a full stomach and a clear conscience, having had no quarrel with anyone, having struck no civilian with his saber, he fell in a deep sleep. After some time that he cannot precise, it seems to him that his bed is removed, as if it were suspended in a basket from a balloon.
He opens his eyes and sees himself in space; a moving panorama extends below him; he sees Paris disappear, then the countryside, then Earth. It seems to him like making one of the space journeys of our collaborator Flammarion, of which he declares to be an assiduous reader, and from whom he enthusiastically praises the beautiful spiritualist book entitled Plurality of the Inhabited Worlds.
Suddenly he misses air; he suffocates; but he then enters another atmosphere; his breathing resumes; he sees another globe that his astronomical studies allow him to recognize as the planet Mars. He feels drawn to this planet whose globe is growing rapidly in his eyes. He trembles, thinking that he could be crushed thee, by falling according to the laws of gravity; he fears a terrible shock; but no! There he is stretched out on a thick lawn, by the feet of marvelous trees filled with not less marvelous birds.
He thinks he is in a new world, having gone from the rank of corporal to the rank of first man. He calls an Eve. It is the song of King Dagobert that answers him.
The astonishment of the good corporal redoubled when he saw that the singer was a tall fellow, wearing the uniform of a sergeant-major of the French line infantry.
- Who are you? Asked the sergeant, looking as surprised as he does.
- Major, answers François Pamphile, I am a corporal; I come from planet Earth that I involuntarily left last night; and I would like you to be so kind as to tell me the name of the planet where I fell.
- This planet is Soraï-Kanor, of course!
- Soraï-Kanor? … I assumed it was planet Mars. It seems that I was wrong.
- You are not mistaken. It is only that our planet, that the earthlings call Mars, is called Soraï-Kanor by our astronomers.
The corporal is surprised that the sergeant knows the name given by the inhabitants of Earth to his planet. But the sergeant tells him that he only left Earth after his earthly death, and that he was king of France there.
To this unexpected response, the corporal takes his hat off, that is, takes off the cotton cap he has on his head.
The king, sergeant-major, told him not to do him so much honor, since he was no more than a simple sub-officer. His name on Earth was Francis I; on Mars, he belongs to the Fantastic Regiment, a regiment made up of most of the rulers who have ruled the globe. The colonel is Alexander the Great; Lieutenant-Colonel Julius Caesar (who did not reign, strictly speaking), and Major Pericles (who reigned even less). The regiment has three battalions, and each battalion eight companies. The commander of the first battalion is Senusret and the adjutant-major Attila; the commander of the second battalion, Charlemagne, and the adjutant-major Charles V; the commander of the third battalion, Anibal; and Adjutant Mithridates.
Each company is made up of the sovereigns of the same nation. The French company is the first of the second battalion and has for captain Louis XIV, proving, by the way, that favor dominates on Mars as on Earth; for Francis I, who is only a sergeant-major, was assuredly a greater captain than Louis XIV, and he also had seniority on his side.
The cantinières[2] of the fantastic regiment are Semiramis, Cleopatra, Elisabeth, and Catherine II. Just as all the officers and soldiers of the regiment are former sovereigns or men who have exercised sovereignty, all the canteens and canteen servers are former sovereigns. The only musicians are former composers: Beethoven, Mozart, Gluck, Puccini, Haydn, Bellini. The regiment has only adopted the French uniform since the reign of Napoleon I, whose campaigns have excited Alexander the Great. Since then, the regiment has followed all the variations of our military costume, which is saying a lot. It is also since the reign of Napoleon I that the French language has been adopted as the regulatory language of the regiment. However, it was not under the Empire that the French language shone the most. Moreover, the winner of Austerlitz is not among the soldiers of the fantastic regiment. He is not on Mars; perhaps he is in a superior world, perhaps in an inferior world: Francis I ignores it.
Other sovereigns have never figured in the fantastic regiment; others left it after several centuries of service; a few still, after several thousand centuries. The regiment never changes garrison, and never makes war. It is a kind of penitentiary regiment where the sovereigns, male and female, are placed only to atone for the crimes they have committed during their reigns.
That is good, but the musicians Beethoven, Mozart, and the others, what crimes did they commit to be retained in this expiatory regiment? This is what the author neglects to tell us.
The usual torture of soldiers and cantinières of the regiment is the torture of Tantalus. The warriors who enjoyed blood and carnage on Earth, have kept their bellicose instincts, constantly awaken by the sound of the bugle, overexcited by the exercises and combat simulations, without it ever being possible for them to be satisfied, for the divine power that allows war on Earth, forbids it on Mars.
The luxurious suffer a similar torment. Everyone, men, and women, retain the beauty they enjoyed at the best time of their life, but they are subject to a physiological cause that condemns them to absolute chastity.
Another punishment, that saddens them even more, is the torture of memories. An extraordinarily lucid memory reminds them of the acts of their earthly life. A continual occupation alone manages to distract them; but the discipline is rigorous; all the time they are condemned to the police precinct, to prison or to the room of memories. In the police room and in prison, they are still allowed some distractions, but in the memory room they are not allowed any. There they find themselves locked up amid all the instruments of punishment and torture employed in their reigns; all the sufferings and all the murders ordered by the kings are fresco painted on the walls.
When Louis XI is locked up in the room of memories, he is put in an iron cage in use during his ruling and placed in front of the scaffold of Nemours, whose blood drips on the heads of his children. Philippe le Bel is lying on a stake from where he sees the torture of the Templars. Ferdinand the Catholic is tied to an easel, his head turned towards an auto-da-fé.
Our corporal hears Nero complaining in these following terms to his comrade Caligula:
- Three quarters of the time, I am punished with a detention or with the police room. If I complain against a punishment, it gets worse. When I'm not in the police room, I'm with the punishment squad, and when I'm not with the punishment squad, I'm cleaning the barracks. Finally, I am overwhelmed with annoyances of all kinds, not to mention my other sufferings. This has been going on for many centuries. When will it end? "
But your fantastic regiment is hell, said the good Pamphile to Francis I.
- No, he replies, because the penalties are not eternal. The Great Unknown, who is supreme justice, does not pronounce eternal condemnation, since finite faults, however great they may be, cannot merit infinite penalties. Our planet and certain others are not hells, but purgatories where men, in one or more successive existences, pay the moral debts that they have contracted in a previous existence.
By chatting that way sometimes with the sergeant-major Francis I, sometimes with the simple infantryman Charles V, sometimes with his colleague Corporal Charles VII, Corporal Pamphile receives instructions and revelations that interests humanity at the highest degree. Finally, in an audience granted to him by Colonel Alexander the Great, in the circle of officers, the former conqueror presented him with a project for a universal international congress, assigning it to him to propose to Earth, to establish peace concord and brotherhood forever in our globe.
- Colonel, exclaimed enthusiastically Pamphile, your project is so logical, it seems to me so indispensable and the idea so natural, that it seems to me that as soon as it is known on Earth, everyone over there will say: How is it that one did not think earlier of establishing a universal congress?
“Despite the good corporal's hope, we doubt that the various governments of our planet will hasten to welcome Alexander's project; but the peace congress, that will be held in Berne next September, cannot fail to take it into consideration. We recommend it especially to the rapporteur responsible for studying what could be the constitution of the United States of Europe.
E.D. of Biéville.”
If Mr. Victor Dazur (this name is undoubtedly a pseudonym) was inspired by the Plurality of the inhabited worlds by Mr. Flammarion, of which he declares to be an assiduous reader, he has also gleaned widely in the Spiritist books. Except for the framework he used, his philosophical theory of future penalties, of the plurality of existences, of the state of Spirits free from the body, of moral responsibility, etc., is obviously drawn from the doctrine of Spiritism, of which he reproduces not only the idea, but often even the form.
The following passages leave no doubt on this point:
“You are dreaming, my friend, I thought; you are dreaming! All these rulers from Earth who are starting a new existence on planet Mars, this genius with a diaphanous body and azure wings, all that smells like Spiritism… And yet, when you are awake, you do not believe in this invention. Then, addressing myself to Francis I, I said to him:
- Major, a strange idea occurs to me; this idea makes me suppose that all that I see and all that I hear since I arrived here is only the effect of a dream. Tell me, please, your opinion. Do you think, like me, that I am dreaming?
- Of course not! You are not dreaming, said Francis I, with an indignant air, as if I had made a very stupid question. No, you're not dreaming! If you were dreaming, a crowd of chimeras without tail or head would parade before your mind. The events that you would witness would have no reasonable relation to each other.
But that's not all, Major. What still makes me believe that I am dreaming is that I have felt myself, and I did not find a body ... I still feel myself now, and I cannot find it. However, I feel alive, and I see myself with arms and legs. It goes without saying that these arms and legs being impalpable, these are just fantastic appearances. I could well explain these appearances, but for that it would be necessary for me, me who does not believe in Spiritism, to admit certain Spiritist theory, that true or false, in any case, is rather ingenious.
This theory claims that the Spirit of a body is surrounded by a perispirit, that is, a semi-material envelope, that can take the form of this body and become visible in some cases. Once the perispirit is admitted, the same theory claims that an individual can sometimes be seen in two places at the same time, even very distant from each other, the sleeping body in one place, and the appearance of the body, that is, the perispirit, acting somewhere else. If this assertion were true, I would find myself putting into practice the theory I just spoke of. You could see my body sleeping in Paris right now while you see my perispirit as if it were my body. But I would not believe such an extraordinary thing unless it was proven. It would still be adopting Spiritism to admit this meeting of rulers assembled here as real, so they claim, to atone the misdeeds they have committed while on Earth.
- If you want, said Francis I, do not believe what you have in front of you. Suppose for a moment that instead of being on this planet, you are in the ideal domain of reason, and tell me if you believe that men who do evil, regardless of their position in society, can be exempt from purgatory after their earthly death.
- Major, I don't know what to answer. - But I do know what you think. You think purgatory exists anywhere, but only for the people at the highest levels of the social ladder. And what leads you to think so is that the faults of people in high places in the world are much more apparent than those of ordinary individuals. But you will immediately modify this idea by thinking that, for the Supreme Being, there are no hidden faults. Indeed, the Great Unknown constantly sees simple individuals on Earth who do relatively as much harm in their small sphere of action as certain tyrants marked by history have done in their States. The private individuals of whom I speak, instead of exercising their tyranny in a kingdom, they exercise it in their family and in their environment, making women, children, and subordinates suffer without mercy. These tyrants have only one concern, that is to enjoy life by escaping the law of the country they inhabit. Now, I ask you, do you believe that these evil people, who sometimes go by virtuous in the eyes of anyone who does not know their life, do you believe, I say, that these evil beings are immediately transported into a place of enjoyment?
- No, I don't think so.
- Don’t you agree that they contracted a certain moral debt by doing evil?
- Yes, Major, I admit it.
- Well then, you should not be surprised that certain planets are real purgatories where men, in one or more existences, pay the debts that they contracted in a previous existence.
But, Major, don't the sufferings that every man experience during his life sufficiently pay for the harm he can do, from the age of reason until death?
- That could only apply to a very small number of individuals; for often the evil that a man does reflects on a certain number of his fellows, that multiplies the sum of the personal evil by as much, and almost always makes the debt so great that this man cannot pay it during its short existence. Now, when we have not been able to pay our debts in one life, we must necessarily pay them in another; for in the matter of criminal debts, the Great Unknown has arranged things in such a way that bankruptcy is not possible. That being admitted, you will also admit that it is impossible that monsters like Nero, Caligula, Heliogabalus, Borgia and so many others, whose crimes cannot be enumerated, could have paid such debts by the few pains that they have suffered in their life. Now, it is one of two things: these men, at their death, have fallen into nothingness, or else they have started a new existence; if we admit that they fell into nothingness, we quite naturally admit that they must have gone into an enormous bankruptcy. You will agree that the idea of such bankruptcy disgusts one’s mind, while if we admit that they have each started a new existence, the mind is satisfied in thinking that these new lives can only be existences of atonement or, to put it better, of purification.[3]
- Major, isn't that easier to admit the eternal disgrace for the monsters you speak of?
- I agree that it is simpler, but not more logical. Logic, that must be the soul of justice, refuses to admit eternal disgrace, because finite faults cannot deserve infinite penalties.”
There follows one of the most striking and logical dissertations that we have read against hell and the eternal punishments, on the justice of the proportionality of penalties, and about the doctrine of work, but its extent does not allow us to reproduce.
- Major, said Corporal Pamphile, I will point out to you that the negation of eternal hell, as well as the proportionality of penalties, is the very foundation of the doctrine of the Spirits; however, as I have already told you, I do not believe in Spiritism.
- Then… believe in eternal hell if that makes you happy.”
Among the rulers that Corporal Pamphile finds in Mars, there are some who lived during the time of the flood, the kings of Assyria, at the time of the Babel Tower, the Pharaohs at the time of the passage of the Red Sea by the Hebrews, etc., and each one gives explanations about those events that, for the most part, have the merit, if not of material proof, at least that of logic.
In short, the framework chosen by the author to express his ideas is good, even his very denial of Spiritism that ultimately leads to an indirect affirmation. We will say, like Le Siècle, that in an apparently light form, all the questions are treated with a certain erudition there, with evident good faith, almost always with joy, often with wit, and sometimes with eloquence. We will add that, not knowing the author, if this issue falls in his hand, we want him to find here the expression of our sincere congratulations, because he has written an interesting and very useful book.
[1] A large volume, 1n-12, price 3.5 francs; by mail 4 francs. This book was published in Lyon and does not carry the name of any editor; it only says that it can be found in every bookstore in Paris. We got it at the Librarie Internationale, Boulevard Montmartre, 15.
[2] A French name for women attached to military regiments as sutlers or canteen keepers (Wikipedia, T.N.)
[3] If the effect of the injustice or evil that a man does against another man stops at the individual, the need for reparation will be individual; but if, on the contrary, this evil affects a hundred individuals, its debt will be a hundredfold, for it will be one hundred reparations to accomplish. The more victims he has made, directly or indirectly, the more individuals there will be who will hold him accountable for his conduct. Thus, the responsibility and the number of reparations increases with the extent of the authority with which one is invested, so that one is responsible before individuals whom one has never known, but who have nonetheless suffered the consequences of our actions.
Conference on the soul, by Alexandre Chaseray[1]
Modern works in which the principle of the plurality of existences is incidentally affirmed are innumerable; but the one we are speaking of seems to us one of those where it is treated in the most complete manner; the author also endeavors to demonstrate that the idea grows and is imposed more and more every day on enlightened minds. In the fragments that we report below, the notes are by the author.
“The transmigration of souls,” says Chaseray, “is both an ancient and a newer philosophical idea. Metempsychosis forms the basis of the religion of the Indians, a religion well before Judaism, and Pythagoras may have taken this belief from the Brahmans, if it is true that he had been in India; but it is more likely that he brought it back from Egypt, where he stayed for a long time. Civilization reigned on the banks of the Nile, several thousand years before the birth of Moses, and according to Herodotus, the Egyptian priests were the first to announce that the soul is immortal and that it passes successively into all species of animals, before entering a human body.
The Greeks, on their part, never completely abandoned the idea of metempsychosis. Those of them who did not fully accept the doctrine of Pythagoras, vaguely believed with Plato that the immortal soul had existed somewhere, before manifesting itself in a human form, or believed in the river Lethe and the rebirth of man in humanity. Among the first Christians, many neophytes intended to retain what seemed good to them from their ancient dogmas; the Manicheans, for example, had retained the two principles of good and evil and the migration of souls; it is thus that the heresiarchs multiplied, and the Fathers and the Councils had so much to do to bring back the spirits to a uniform faith. Victorious, the Apostolic Church banished metempsychosis from its empire, then replaced by the dogma of the irrevocable judgment and the division of humans between the elected and the disgraced. Purgatory was introduced later, as a corrective for an overly inflexible decision.
Just as I did not consider the spiritualism of St. Thomas much of a progress, of which we see no trace in the holy books, I also do not judge either happy or in conformity with the ancient doctrine of original sin, that establishes such a close solidarity between all generations of men, the dogmatic assertion that the existence of each of us is rootless in the past and ends in an eternal heaven or hell. This is, in my opinion, a philosophical heresy against which the modern mind reacts with force.
“We are coming back to the transmigration of souls from all sides. But one generally conceives a broader metempsychosis these days than that which one attributed the belief to the ancients. Having the spirit of induction crossed the limits of Earth and recognized in the suns and the planets habitable worlds, it no longer limited the destinies of man to the terrestrial globe. Instead of seeing the soul ceaselessly traversing the circle of plants, animals, and the human species, or constantly being reborn in humanity, we could imagine it taking off towards the infinite worlds.[2]
I have difficulty in the choice of quotations to show that faith has a series of existences, some preceding, others posterior to present life, and that it grows more and more every day, imposing on the enlightened spirits.
Let's start with Jean Reynaud. This philosopher insists on the natural connection presented by the two ideas of pre-existence and future life.
If we examine, he says, all men who have passed through Earth, since the era of enlightened religions began there, we will see that the vast majority have lived in the somewhat established consciousness of an existence prolonged by invisible ways, within as well as beyond the limits of this life. There is, in fact, a kind of symmetry so logical that it must have seduced the imaginations at first sight; the past balances the future there, and the present is only the pivot between what is no more and what is not yet. Platonism awakened this light previously stirred by Pythagoras and used it to enlighten the most beautiful souls that honored ancient times.[3]
This assessment by Jean Reynaud is fully confirmed by the following note from Lagrange, the elegant translator of Lucretius’ poem:
Of all philosophers that lived before Christianity, none supported the immortality of the soul without first establishing its preexistence; one of these dogmas was regarded as the natural consequence of the other. It was believed that the soul must always exist, because it had always existed; and people were convinced, on the contrary, that by granting that it had been engendered with the body, one was no longer entitled to deny that it should die with the body. - Our soul, says Plato, existed somewhere before being in this form of men; that is why I do not doubt that it is immortal.
Old Druidism, continues the author of Terre et Ciel, speaks to my heart. This same soil that we inhabit today carried a people of heroes before us, all of whom were accustomed to seeing themselves as having experienced the universe for a long time before their current incarnation, thus basing the hope of their immortality on the conviction of their pre-existence.
One of our best historians also gives great praise to the main teaching of the Druids; Henri Martin is of the opinion that our fathers, the Gaul, represented "the firmest, the clearest notion of immortality that ever existed" in the ancient world.[4]
Eugene Sue, on his part, said of the Druidic faith:
According to this sublime belief, the immortal man, spirit, and matter, coming from below, going above, transited through this Earth, remained there temporarily, as he had remained and was to remain in these other spheres that shine innumerable, amid the abysses of space.[5]
Already in the seventeenth century, Cyrano de Bergerac said, like the Gallic priests:
We die more than once; and, as we are only parts of this universe, we change shape to come back to life elsewhere; this is not bad, since it is a way to perfect one's being and to arrive at an infinite amount of knowledge.
Several of our contemporaries, not appearing to be inspired by the Druids though, also announce that the destiny of the soul is to travel from world to world. We read, for example, in the Profession of Faith of the nineteenth century, by Eugène Pelletan:
By the irresistible logic of the idea, I believe I can affirm that mortal life will have the infinite space as a place of pilgrimage… Man will therefore always go from sun to sun, always rising, as in Jacob's ladder, the hierarchy of existence; always passing, according to his merit and according to his progress, from man to angel, from angel to archangel.
And in Religious Renovation, by Mr. Patrice Larroque, former rector at the Academy:
One can conjecture that most of the other globes that move in space carry, like Earth, organized and animated beings, and that these globes will be the successive theaters of our future lives.
Lamennais expresses the idea of rebirth in an equally precise although more restricted way:
Possible progress, he says, for the individual in his present organic form, once accomplished, he returns this worn-out organism to the elementary mass, and he clothes another more perfect one.[6]
Let us also point out the following excerpt from the speech given by Mr. Guéroult, of the National Opinion, at the tomb of Father Enfantin:
No one was more religious than Enfantin; no one has lived, as much as he did, in the presence of eternal life, of which this life that escapes us at every moment is only one of the innumerable stages.
One of our most famous novelists suggests that he believes in the passage of inferior beings into superior species, namely, animals into humanity. George Sand says:
“Who will explain these affinities between man and certain secondary beings in creation. They are just as real as the antipathies and the insurmountable terrors that certain harmless animals inspire in us… It is perhaps that all kinds, each one specially assigned to each breed of animals, are found in man. The physiognomists have noted physical resemblances; who can deny the moral similarities? Aren’t foxes, wolves, lions, eagles, beetles, flies among us? Human rudeness is often low and fierce like the appetite of a swine…"
George Sand is more explicit, regarding the migration of souls, in the following lines of the same book:[7]
If we must not aspire to the beatitude of the pure spirits of the land of chimeras, if we must always, beyond this life, foresee work, duty, trials, and a limited organization in our faculties, before infinity, at least we are allowed by reason, commanded by the heart, to count on a series of progressive existences because of our good desires ... We can look at this Earth as a place of passage and count on a sweeter awakening in the cradle that awaits us elsewhere. From worlds to worlds, we can, by freeing ourselves from the animality that fights our spiritualism down here, make us fit to put on a purer body, more appropriate to the needs of the soul, less fought against and less hampered by illnesses of human life, as we experience here.
Let us also quote a novelist, Balzac. The novelists of this order, as well as the first-class poets, tackle the highest questions, and know how to sow profound messages in their writings, in a pleasant and light form. Thus, in Les Misérables, Victor Hugo drops from his pen this vague question: "Where do we come from? Is it true that we didn't do anything until we were born?” It is only by thinking, and without taking the stand of supporting a philosophical thesis, that the author of the Human Comedy speaks of successive existences. So, I can only grasp this thought by browsing several of his novels.
Here, for example, are a few lines from the Lily of the valley:
Man is made up of matter and spirit; animality comes to end in him, and the angel begins in him. Hence the struggle that we all experience between a future destiny that we have a presentiment of and the memories of our external instincts, from which we are not entirely detached: a bodily love and a divine love.
And I find in Seraphita, this mystical novel in which Balzac exposes, with such powerful interest and charm, the religious doctrine of the Swede Swedenborg:
The acquired qualities that develop slowly in us are invisible bonds that bind each of our existences to another.
Finally, in Les Comédiens, without knowing it, Madame Fontaine, the sibyl, asks Gazonal:
- What flower do you like best?
- The Rose.
- What is your favorite color?
- Blue.
- Which animal do you prefer?
- Horse. Why these questions? he asks in turn.
- Man is attached to all forms by his previous states, she said sententiously; that is where his instincts come from, and his instincts dominate his destiny. "
Michelet shows his sympathy for the same ideas, when he calls the dog a candidate for humanity, and when he says, speaking of birds:
What are they? Sketched souls, souls still specialized in such functions of existence, candidates for the more general and more vastly harmonic life into which the human soul has arrived.[8]
Pierre Leroux does not believe that man has passed through the inferior species of animals and plants. According to him, individuals are perpetuated within the species and man is reborn indefinitely in humanity. Solidarity between all members of the human family is then evident; the good that a man does to his fellows turns to his own advantage, since does not separate from them at death, soon coming back to mingle with them. By supporting the perpetuity of a being within the species, Pierre Leroux departs from the authors I have just cited and does not meet many supporters;[9] but he is nonetheless an ardent defender of the general idea and of the extreme importance that links present-day life to a series of existences.
Having said that the child coming into the world is not, as Locke's school claimed, a clean slate; and that it is an insult to the Divinity to suppose that it draws new creatures from nothing, that it embellishes at random with its gifts or strikes at random with its anger, Pierre Leroux concludes with these words:
Thus, out of necessity, we must admit either the indeterminate system of metempsychosis, or the determined system of rebirth in humanity that I support.[10]
I am far from absolutely rejecting the system of rebirth in humanity; but humanity had a beginning, posterior even to that of most of the animal and vegetable species that cover our globe; humanity will have an end; and since the soul does not perish, the permanent being, the self, must sink its roots elsewhere than in humanity, and find its future development elsewhere than in humanity, a transitory form."
The numerous quotations made by the author, that are far from being complete, prove how general the idea of the plurality of existences is, and that before long it will have passed into the state of acquired truth. On other points, he deviates completely from the Spiritist Doctrine; we are far from sharing his opinion on all the questions he deals with in his book, especially regarding the divinity to which he attributes a secondary role, and the intimate nature of the soul whose spirituality he contests. His system is a kind of pantheism that rubs shoulders with Spiritism and seems to be a middle term for some people who want neither atheism, nor nothingness, or dogmatic spiritualism. However incomplete it may be, it is nonetheless a remarkable advance in the materialist ideas from which it is much more distant than ours. Except for a few very controversial points, the work contains very deep and very correct views with which Spiritism can only be associated.
[1] Small volume, in-12, price 1.5 francs, by mail 1.75 francs; Germer-Baillière, Rue de l’Ecole-de-Médecine, 17.
[2] It was so natural to take advantage of the glorious issue opened to the soul by the astronomical discoveries, that I cannot believe that the metempsychosis of Pythagoras was really what the common people thought of it; for Pythagoras knew the true system of the world; the double movement of rotation and translation of Earth; the relative stillness of the sun; the importance of fixed stars, each of which is a sun and the center of a group of most likely inhabited planets; the march and return of comets: none of this was ignored by Pythagoras. This philosopher, instructed by the learned Egyptian priests who only revealed their secrets to a small number of initiates, believed it his duty, following their example, to keep this part of his science secret. One of his less scrupulous disciples disclosed it; but as evidence was lacking and truths were lost amidst errors and mystical reveries, the revelation went unnoticed. It is not enough to put forward a correct idea, it is necessary to know how to make it accepted; also, Copernicus and Galileo, the popularizers of the true cosmological system, are regarded as its inventors, although the first notion is lost in the mists of time.
[3] Earth and Sky.
[4] History of France, 4th Edition.
[5] Feuilleton of the Press, October 19th, 1854.
The old authors have not all ignored the beautiful side of the religion of the Druids, witness these verses from Lucain: Vobis auctoribus, umbræ. Non tacitas Erebi sedes, Ditisque profundi. Pallida regna petunt: regit idem spiritus artus. Orb alio: longæ (canitis si cognita) vitæ. Mors media is.
“According to you, Druids, shadows do not descend into the silent abodes of Erebus, into the pale realms of the god of the abyss. The same Spirit animates a new body in another sphere. Death (if your hymns contain the truth) is the middle of a long life.”
[6] Of the first society and its laws, Book III.
[7] The story of my life.
[8] The bird.
[9] Goethe seemed to share this view when he exclaimed in one of his letters to the charming Madame de Stein: "Why has fate bound us so closely? Ah! in times gone by, you were my sister or my wife! You have known the least of my traits, you have watched the vibration of the purest of my fibers, you have been able to read me with a glance, me that a human eye hardly penetrates!” (German Review, December 1865). Victor Meunier is not far from also believing in the rebirth of man on Earth: "The fate of those who will come after us," he said, "does not find me indifferent, far from it!" Even more so since it has not been demonstrated to me that we will not succeed ourselves.” (Science and the Savants in 1865, 2nd semester).
[10] Humanity.
Instructions of the Spirits
We extracted the following communication from the Spiritist journal Le Salut, published in New Orleans, from the issue of June 1st, 1868:
“- Children, I wrote to you: “When your good union calls me, I will come to you;” And your good union called me, and here I am.
You are now like my former apostles. Do like the good ones and don't do like the bad ones; let no one deny, no one betray! you are going to sit down at the same table that brought together the friends of my faith and of my heart; let no one be Peter or Judas!
Oh! my good children, look around you and see! My cross, the glorious instrument of my vile torture, dominates the edifices of tyranny… and I, I had only come to preach freedom and happiness. With my cross, they drowned bodies in blood, and consciences in lies! With my cross, they said to men: “Obey your masters; bow down before the oppressors! "And I said:" You are all the children of the same father, without distinction other than that of your merits, resulting from your freedom.”
I had said to the great ones: “Lower yourself! "And to the little ones:" Stand up! And the big ones were raised, and the small ones lowered.”
What has been done of me, my memory, my remembrance, my apostolate? A saber! - Yes, and there are still some who have made themselves the agents of this infamy! … Oh! if one could suffer in the heavenly stay, I would suffer! … and you, you must suffer… and you must be ready for anything, for the redemption that I have started, even if only to display the same sign of union, in the same mountain! … It will be seen and understood, and they will leave everything to defend it, to bless it and to love it.
Children, to heaven with faith, and all of humanity will follow you fearlessly and with love! You will quickly know, in practice, what the world is like, if you have not been taught by theory.
Everything that has been said to you about the practice of true Christianity is only a shadow of the truth! The triumph that awaits you is as much above human triumphs and those of your thoughts, as the stars of heaven are above the errors of Earth!
Oh! When will they see like Thomas! When they have touched! … You will see! You will see! Passions will create obstacles to you, then they will help you, because it will be the good passions after the bad passions.
Think of me, when you break my bread and drink my wine, telling yourself that you will fly the flag of the worlds, for eternity… Oh! Yes, the worlds, for it will rally the past, the present and the future to God.
Jesus”
The journal publishes this communication without giving any information on the circumstances in which it was obtained; it seems, however, that it must have been in a commemorative feast of the Last Supper, or some fraternal agape between followers. Be that as it may, it carries, in the form and the substance of the thoughts, in the simplicity joined to the nobility of the style, a stamp of identity that cannot be ignored. It attests, on the part of the assistants, dispositions likely to merit them such a favor, and we can only congratulate them. We can see that the instructions given in America, on charity and fraternity, do not in any way yield to those given in Europe; it is the bond that will unite the inhabitants of the two worlds.
In the press
To appear at the end of September
Spiritism in the Bible, an essay on psychological ideas among the ancient Hebrews; by Henri Stecki, from St. Petersburg. Brochure from 150 to 200 pages; in the format of What is Spiritism.
International League of Peace
We do appreciate the invitation extended to us, since all the Spiritists are, a matter of principle, friends of peace, and they sympathize with all the institutions or projects aimed at eliminating the scourge of war. Their doctrine, that leads to universal brotherhood, by eliminating the antagonisms of races, peoples, and cults, is a powerful element for general peace.