“CIRCLE OF ABRED”
XV – Three necessary things in the circle of abred: the least possible degree of the whole life, and
from that its beginning; the matter of all things, and from there the progressive growth which only
takes place in the state of need; the formation of all things of death, and from there the debility of
the existences.
XVI – Three things that all living beings necessarily participate, through God’s justice: God’s help
in abred, because without that nobody could know anything; the privilege of participating into
God’s love; and the agreement with God who is fair and merciful regarding the realization of His
power.
XVII – Three causes of the need in the circle of abred: the development of the material substance of
every animated being; the development of the knowledge of all things; and the development of the
moral force to overcome every Cythraul (evil spirit) opposition and to free the Droug (the evil).
Without such a transition, per each state of life, there could not be the realization of any being.
XVIII – Three primitive calamities of abred: the need, the absence of memory and death.
XIX – Three necessary conditions to get to the plenitude of Science: transmigrate in abred,
transmigrate in gwynfyd and remember the past things, up until annoufn.
XX – Three indispensable things in the circle of abred: transgression of the law, as it cannot be
different; redemption through death before Droug and Cythraul; the development of life and the
good through the separation from Droug, in the redemption of death and that by the love of God,
who embraces everything.
XXI – Three efficient ways of God in abred to dominate Droug and Cythraul and to overcome one’s
position relatively to the circle of gwynfyd: the need, the loss of memory and death.
XXII – Three things are primitively contemporary: man, freedom and light.
XXIII – Three things are needed for the victory of man over evil: strength against pain, change and
freedom of choice. Having the power of choice, man cannot have the prior certainty about the place
where he is going to be.
XXIV – Three alternatives offered to man:
abred and
gwynfyd; need and freedom; good and evil.
Having the whole in equilibrium, man can connect to one or another, at will.
XXV – By three things man fall in the need of
abred: by the absence of efforts towards knowledge;
by his detachment from good and by his attachment to evil. As a consequence of these things, he
falls into
abred until his analogous and restarts the course of his transmigration.
XXVI – By three things man necessarily returns to
abred, although in other senses he is connected
to what is good: by pride he falls down to
annoufn; by deceitfulness, down to the equivalent point
of demerit; by cruelty, down to the corresponding degree of animality. From there he transmigrates
again to humanity, as before.
XXVII – The three main things to obtain in the state of humanity: science, love and the moral
strength, in the highest possible state of development, before death. This cannot be achieved prior to
the state of humanity and can only be achieved through the privilege of freedom and choice. These
three things are called the three victories.
XXVIII – There are three victories over
Droug and
Cythraul: science, love and moral strength and
as the knowledge, the wish and the power, realize whatever needed in their connection with things.
These three victories start in the condition of humanity and develop eternally.
XXIX – Three privileges of the condition of man: the balance between good and evil and from that
the ability to compare; the freedom of choice and from that the judgment and preference; the
development of the moral strength as a consequence of the judgment and from that the preference.
These three things are necessary to the realization of anything.”
♦♦♦
In summary, the beginning of the beings in the heart of the Universe happens at the lowest point of
the scale of life. Without stretching the consequences of the declaration contained in the twenty-
seventh triad, one can assume that in the Druids doctrine this initial point was in the mysterious and
confusing abyss of animality. It does result, as a consequence, in the logic need of progress, as God
has not destined the beings to remain is such a low and obscure condition since the origin of the
soul’s history. However, in the inferior zones of the Universe, such a progress does not develop
according to a continuous line. That long life, being born in such a low level and having so much to
improve, breaks into segments, which are connected to each other at the basis of its succession, but
whose mysterious solidarity escapes the individual consciousness, thanks to the lack of memory, at
least for some time. Those periodic interruptions, in the secular course of life, form what we call
death; hence death and birth, from a superficial consideration, make such distinct events, in reality
being nothing more than the two faces of the same phenomenon: one related to the period that ends,
and the other to the one that begins.
That is why death itself is not a real calamity but a benefit from God. Breaking the narrowest links
that we had established with our present life, it transports us to new conditions, thus giving place to
a freer elevation, to new progresses.
Thus, as with death, the loss of memory which follows it should not be taken as anything other than
a benefit. It is a consequence of the first point because if the soul clearly kept the memories from
one period to the other, in the course of this long life, the interruption would be merely accidental
and there would not be death, as such, neither birth, as these events would then loose the absolute
character which distinguish and give them strength.
Even from the point of view of that theology it is not difficult to directly notice, with respect to the
previous periods, how the loss of memory could be considered a benefit relatively to man in his
present condition, if in those previous periods, as with the current position of man in a world of
suffering and trials, they were unfortunately stained by crime and mistakes, today’s primary cause
of misery and expiation. It is evidently a great advantage to the soul to be free from the vision of so
many faults and, at the same time, of the most distressing remorse which would then originate. As it
does not oblige a formal repentance other than those relatively to the guilt of the present life, God
really concedes an enormous grace, thus showing compassion for their weaknesses.
Finally, according to this mode of considering the mystery of life, the needs of all nature that we are
submitted to and that since birth, by a fatal destiny, so to speak, determine the form of our existence
in the present period, constitute a last benefit, as sensible as the other two. The most convenient
character of our physical expiations is definitely given by those needs and our trials and,
consequently, our moral development. It is still those same needs, as much with our physical
organization as with the exterior circumstances, in whose environment we are placed, that forcibly
drag us to death then dragging us, by the same reason, to our supreme liberation. In summary, as the
triads imply in their energetic concision, one finds in them the three primitive calamities as the three
efficient means of God in abred.
Which conduct allows the soul to really elevate in this life, deserving to achieve a superior state of
existence after death?
The answer given by Christianism to this fundamental question is known by all: it is the condition
of destroying pride and selfishness in oneself; developing in ones’ intimate substance the forces of
humility and charity, the only efficient and meritorious to God’s eyes. Blessed are the humble!
Druidism’s answer is way different and clearly contrasts with the latest one. As from their
teachings, the soul elevates on the scale of existences with the condition of, by working on itself,
fortifying its own personality. This result is naturally obtained by the development of the strength of
character, added to the development of knowledge. This is what the twenty-fifth triad says, stating
that the souls fall on the need of transmigrations, that is, in the confusing and mortal lives, not only
for feeding the evil passions but also by neglecting the realization of the fair actions; by the lack of
strength to stick to what is prescribed by the consciousness; in one word, by the weakness of
character. Besides this lack of moral virtue, the soul is still halted in its progress towards heaven by
the lack of perfection of the spirit. Intellectual illumination, which is necessary to the plenitude of
happiness, does not happen in the happy soul by a simple and absolutely gracious irradiation from
heaven. It only happens in the celestial life if the soul endeavors, since this life, to achieve it. Thus,
the triad does not only mention the lack of knowledge but also the lack of efforts to acquire
knowledge, which in the end, as with the preceding virtue, is a precept of activity and movement.
In fact, in the following triads, charity is recommended as much as Science and moral strength. But
in this, still regarding the Divine power, it is sensitive to the influence of Christianism. It is to
Christianism that the preaching and enthroning of the law of charity in God and man, in this world,
belong and not to the strong and tough religion of our ancestors.
If such a law shines over the triads it is the effect of an alliance with the Gospel, or even better, of a
happy improvement of the theology of the Druids by the action of the theology of the Apostles and
not by a primitive tradition. Just subtract that Divine ray and there we have the Gallic moral, in its
rude greatness, moral which was capable of producing powerful personalities, in the fields of
heroism and Science, but which could not unite them, neither among them nor with the crowds of
the simple ones. *
The Spiritist Doctrine does not consist only in the belief of the manifestations of the spirits but
rather in everything they teach us about the nature and destiny of the souls. If we then refer to the
precepts contained in the Spirits’ Book, where we will find their complete teachings, we will be
surprised by the identity of some fundamental principles with the Druidic doctrine, among which,
one of the most notable, incontestably, is the reincarnation. In the three circles, in the three
successive states of the animated beings, we find all phases of our spirits’ scale. What is in fact the
circle of abred or the migration, other than the orders of spirits which depurate through successive
existences? In the gwynfyd circle man no longer transmigrates; he enjoys supreme happiness. Isn’t
that the first order of the scale, of the pure spirits who having passed through all trials no longer
need the reincarnation and enjoy eternal life? Notice still that, according to the Spiritist Doctrine,
man preserves the free will; which he gradually elevates by his will, by his progressive perfecting
and by the trials he endured, from the annoufn or abyss to the perfect happiness in gwynfyd, with the
difference, however, that the Druidism admits the possible return to the inferior layers, whereas
according to Spiritism, the spirit may remain stationary but cannot degenerate. In order to complete
the analogy it would be sufficient to add to our scale, below the third order, the annoufn circle,
which characterizes the abyss or the unknown origin of the souls, and above the first order the
ceugant circle, or God’s dwelling, inaccessible to the creatures. The table below will clarify the
comparison.
Spirits' Scale[1]
| Druidic Scale
|
|
|
| Ceugant. God' dwelling
|
1 st Order
| 1 st Class
| Pure spirits. Will no longer incarnate
| Gwynfyd. Home of the blessed ones. Eternal life.
|
| 2 nd Class
| Superior spirits*
|
|
2 nd
Order
3 rd
Order
| 3 rd
Class
4 th class
5th class
| Spirits of wisdom*
Spirits of Science*
Benevolent spirits*
|
Abred. Circle of the migrations or multiple corporeal existences, which the souls pass from annoufn to gwynfyd.
|
6 th class
7th classe
8 th class
9 th class
| Neutral spirits*
Pseudo-wise spirits*
Frivolous spirits*
Impure spirits*
|
|
|
| Annoufn. Abyss, starting point of the souls
|
* Depurating and elevating through the trials of reincarnation
|
_________________________
* Extracted from Magasin Pitoresque, 1857
