In a previous article we talked about the incessant progresses of Spiritism. Are those progresses durable or ephemeral? Is it a meteor that shines with a temporary light, like many other things? That is what we are going to examine in a few words.
If Spiritism were a simple theory, a philosophical school founded on a personal opinion, nothing would guarantee its stability because it could please today and not please tomorrow; in a given time it could no longer be in harmony with the customs and the intellectual development, and then it would fall like all other things that are outdated and that did not follow progress; finally, it could be replaced by something better. That is what happens to every human conception, every legislation and every purely speculative doctrine.
Spiritism presents itself in completely different conditions, as we have pointed out so many times. It is founded on a fact, the communication between the visible and invisible worlds. A fact cannot be nulled by time, like an opinion. Undoubtedly it is not yet accepted by everybody but why bother with the denial of some when Spiritism is daily attested by millions of individuals whose number grows incessantly, and who are not sillier or blinder than the others? A time will then come when there will no longer be deniers as there aren’t any more deniers of the movement of Earth these days. How much opposition hasn’t this last point raised! For a long time the nonbelievers did not lack apparent reasons to dispute that. “
How to believe, they used to say, in the existence of the antipodes[1] upside down? And if Earth turns around as they pretend, how can we believe that every other 24h interval we ourselves are in that uncomfortable position as well and without noticing it? In that situation we would not be able to maintain contact with Earth unless we could walk upside down like flies on a ceiling. Besides, what would happen to the oceans? When the vase is inclined, doesn’t the water spills over? The thing is simply impossible, therefore absurd and Galileo is a mad man!” Nonetheless, if that absurd thing is a fact it defeated every contrary reason and every anathema. What was it that was missing for its admission? The knowledge of the natural law that is its foundation. If Galileo was satisfied by saying that Earth turns, even today he would not be believed but the denials fell before the knowledge of the principle.
The same will happen to Spiritism. Considering that it rests on a material fact that results from an explained and demonstrated law that eliminates any characteristic of wonderful and supernatural, it is imperishable. Those that deny the possibility of the manifestations are in the same situation as those that denied the movement of Earth. The majority denies the primary cause that being the soul, its survival and its individuality. Therefore it is not surprising that they deny the effect. They judge by the simple announcement of the fact and declare it absurd like in the past the belief of the antipodes was declared absurd. But what can their opinion do against a phenomenon that has been attested by observation and demonstrated by a natural law? Since the movement of the planet is a purely scientific fact its demonstration was not at the reach of the masses; it was necessary to accept the authority of the arguments of the scientists. But in its favor Spiritism has the fact that it can be attested by everybody and that is what explains its fast propagation. Every new discovery of some importance has more or less serious consequences. The movement of Earth and the Gravitational Law that governs that movement had incalculable consequences. Science opened up a vast horizon of exploration and one could not count all discoveries, inventions and applications that followed as a consequence of that. The progress of science led to the progress of technology and the progress of technology changed the way we live, our habits, in short the living conditions of humanity. The knowledge of the relationships between the visible and the invisible worlds has even more direct and immediately practical consequences because it is available to all individualities and it is of the interest of everybody.
Since every person must one day die, nobody can remain indifferent to what will succeed after their death. By the certainty that Spiritism gives about the future, each person changes the way they see it and that has influence upon their morality. By inhibiting egotism, Spiritism will modify profoundly the social relationships between individuals and peoples.
Many reformers of generous thoughts formulated more or less attractive doctrines, but in their majority they only had the success of a temporary and circumscribed sect. It was like that and it will always be like that with purely systematic theories, because it is not given to man on Earth the conception of something perfect and complete. Spiritism, on the contrary, founded not on a preconceived idea but on positive facts, is shielded from those fluctuations and can only grow as the facts become widely known, better known and understood. Well, no single human power can hinder the propagation of facts that everybody may attest. Once the facts are attested, nobody will be able to preclude the consequences that result from them. These consequences are here a complete revolution of ideas and in the way people see things from this world as from the other. This will take place before this century is over. But, some will say, besides the facts you have a theory, a doctrine; who can assure that the theory will not suffer variations; that in a few years it will be the same as today?
Undoubtedly it may suffer modifications in its details, before new observations, but once the principle is established it cannot vary and even less be eliminated. That is the essential. Since Copernicus and Galileo the movement of Earth and the stars have been better calculated but the fact of the movement remained as being the principle.
We have said that Spiritism is above all a science of observation. That is what constitutes its force against the attacks that it suffers and gives its followers an unbreakable faith. All lines of thoughts that are opposed fall before the facts and the more those lines of reasoning are driven by interest the less those thoughts have value to their eyes. It is useless with some say this is not like that or it is something else, the followers respond: We cannot deny evidence. If it were only about an individual there could be reason to believe that the individual was deluded, but when millions of individuals see the same thing, in every country, one logically concludes that the deniers are the mistaken ones.
If the Spiritist facts only resulted in the satisfaction of curiosity, they would certainly only lead to a momentary concern, like everything else that is useless. However the consequences that stem out of Spiritism touch the heart; make the persons happy; satisfy their aspirations; fulfill the emptiness left by doubt; cast a light upon the fearful issue of the future; even more, a powerful instrument for the moralization of society is found. That leads to a great interest. Now, one does not easily resign to a source of happiness. Certainly, it is not with the perspective of obliviousness or with the flames of hell that the Spiritists will be yanked from their belief.
Spiritism will not move away from the truth and will have nothing to fear from the contrary opinions, as long as its scientific theory and its moral Doctrine are a deduction of scrupulously and consciously observed facts, without prejudice or preconceived systems. It was before a more complete observation that every premature and adventurous theories that appeared at the origin of the modern days Spiritist phenomena fell, and came to melt with the powerful unity that there is today, and against which only a few rare and diminishing number of individuals voice their opinion. The blanks that the current theory may have will be filled out in the same way. Regarding the consequences, Spiritism is far from having announced its final word, but it remains inflexible in its foundation because that foundation is based on facts.
Therefore, may the Spiritist have no fear because the future is theirs; let the adversaries struggle under the influence of the truth that obfuscates them for any denial is powerless against the evidence that will inevitably prevail by the force of things. It is a matter of time, and in this century time moves at strides of giants by the impulse of progress.
[1] Natives of New Zealand (TN)
