The Spiritist Review - Journal of Psychological Studies - 1863

Allan Kardec

Back to the menu
The fact below was transmitted to us by Mr. A. Superchi from Parma, an honorary member of the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies:

In our session on April 23rd last, I had the medium to pose his hand onto the paper, without the evocation of any Spirit. As soon as the hand started to move he felt a strange force that obliged him to keep the index finger up and straight, in an abnormal position. The finger was singularly cold. Since I could not find the reason for that I asked the Spirit about it. Answer: ‘You forgot! Don’t you remember the one who used to write like that when alive? I hardened this finger to give you proof of our authenticity and power.’ It was the Spirit of one of the medium’s brother, deceased more than twenty years ago in Florence. He had hurt his finger with a broken bottle when pouring its content no much so that his finger became ankylosed. I attach a drawing illustrating the medium’s hand.

Another medium, envious due to a mystification, deservedly in fact, struggled to demonstrate that the phenomena were produced by our own Spirits, somehow concentrated. Talking with him one day he distractedly took a pencil to jokingly draw some lines but his hand became immobile, despite every effort he made to use it. Yielding, he then began to write: ‘You will never be able to write anything if I don’t want you to .’ Astonished, but at the same time hurt by his own ego , he took the pencil again saying that he did not want to write and that he challenged the supposed Spirit to force him. Despite his resolution his hand moved quickly writing: ‘You cannot stop writing if I don’t want you do’

In both cases above, as it can be seen, the action of the Spirit upon the organs is entirely independent of one’s will. It can be readily seen that it can occur spontaneously, abstraction made of any knowledge of Spiritism. That is what in fact is demonstrated by many observations. Here it occurs in a finger, elsewhere it will be on another organ and could be translated by other effects. Temporary in such a case, the action could last certain time and have a pathological appearance that is inexistent in reality and against which ordinary treatments would be ineffective.

From the point of view of the Spiritist manifestations this phenomenon provides a remarkable proof of identity. The Spirit, in the condition of Spirit, unquestionably does not have the ankylosed finger; but to the eyes of a clairvoyant, he would have presented himself as having it in order to be recognized; to the one that could not see him, he communicates his disease. Still once more there is here a proof that the Spirit identifies with the medium and utilizing the body as if his own.

If such an action is produced by a bad Spirit, with a certain duration, that takes the most characteristic and eccentric forms, we will find the explanation to the majority of the cases of physical subjugation, taken by madness.

The fact below, of a similar kind, was reported by a member of the Parisian Society that witnessed it in a provincial town. He says:

I saw a very normal medium. It was a young lady that asked her familiar Spirit for example to paralyze her tongue and soon she cannot speak but only struggle to communicate and make herself understood like a mute person. On her request she has both hands glued to one another, making it impossible to separate them. The Spirit grounds her on a chair until she asks to have her freedom back. I asked the Spirit to make her sleep instantaneously and he did. The medium fell asleep immediately at the first time without the help of anyone. It was in that state that I thought I had recognized the nature of that Spirit that seemed like an obsess or to me because when the young lady suffered or at least became agitated during the sleep the Spirit forced her to push me away when I tried to apply some magnetic passes on her. I advised the lady not to repeat those experiments very often.”

As for ourselves, we advise that she should abstain from that completely for he could trick her. It is obvious that a good Spirit is not given to such things. Playing games with that is the same as voluntarily be under dismal dependence, morally and physically, and only God can tell where it would end. It could result in any terrible subjugation to her from which it would be very difficult if not impossible for her to get rid of. It is already enough that such accidents take place spontaneously, without enjoyment and only to satisfy an empty curiosity.

Such experiments have no use for the moral betterment and may lead to the most serious inconveniences. People would then blame Spiritism when in fact the only thing to blame is improvidence or the pride of those who believe to be able to control the bad Spirits according to their own will. We never go unpunished when challenging them.

We don’t say that the Spirit referred above is fundamentally bad. But it is certain that he cannot be advanced not even fundamentally good and that it is always dangerous to submit oneself to such domination whose minimal inconvenience would be the removal of one’s free-will. By given access to Spirits of such a nature one becomes engulfed in their fluids, necessarily refractory to the influence of good Spirits that stay away if we do not strive to attract them by seeking in Spiritism the means of improving ourselves.

Once immersed in such a mean fluid the perispirit is like an outfit that is impregnated by an acrid odor that the most delicious perfume cannot make disappear.







Related articles

Show related items