Zouave Jacob The healing faculty being on the agenda, it is not surprising that we have devoted most of this issue to that, and we are certainly far from having exhausted the subject; that is why we will come back to it.
To first appease the thoughts of a large number of persons interested in the question relating to Mr. Jacob, and who wrote us or may write to us about him, we say:
1st – That Mr. Jacob’s sessions are suspended; therefore it would be useless to show up at the place where he was holding them, rue de la Roquette 80, and that he has not, until now, taken them back anywhere. The reason was the excessive congestion that hampered traffic in a busy street, and in a dead end occupied by a large number of industrialists who found themselves hampered in their business, unable to receive customers or ship their goods. At the moment Mr. Jacob holds neither public nor private meetings.
2nd – In view of the crowds, each one having to wait a long time for their turn, to those who have asked us, or would like to ask us in the future if, knowing Mr. Jacob personally, they could obtain a preferential place on our recommendation, we say that we never asked for it and we never will, knowing that it would be useless. If favors had been granted, it would have been to the prejudice of those who wait, and that would certainly raise well-founded complaints. Mr. Jacob made no exception to anyone; the rich had to wait like the poor, because ultimately the poor suffers as much as the rich; he does not have, like this one, comfort for compensation, and moreover, he often requires health to have enough to live on. We congratulate Mr. Jacob for that, and if he had not done so, in begging a favor, we would only have done something that we would have blamed in him.
3rd – To the patients who have asked us, or could ask us, if we advise them to make the trip to Paris, we say: Mr. Jacob does not cure everyone, as he himself declares; he never knows in advance whether or not he will cure a sick person; it is only when he is in their presence that he judges the fluidic action, and sees the result; that is why he never promises anything and answers nothing. Advising someone to make the trip to Paris would be to take a responsibility without any certainty of success. It is, therefore, a risk to take, and if one does not obtain result, one is left with the travel expenses, while one often spends enormous sums on consultations without more success. If one is not cured, one cannot say that one has paid for care in vain.
4th – To those who ask us if, by compensating Mr. Jacob for his travel expenses, since he does not want to accept fees, he would agree to go to such or such a locality, to take care of a patient, we answer: Mr. Jacob does not attend invitations of this kind, for the reasons that are developed above. Unable to answer in advance for the result, he would consider an indelicacy to induce expenditure without certainty; and in the event of failure, it would give rise to criticism.
5th – To those who write to Mr. Jacob, or who send us letters to send them to him, we say: Mr. Jacob has at his house a cupboard full of letters that he does not read, and he does not reply to anyone. In fact, what could he say? Besides, he does not cure by correspondence. Make sentences? It is not his style; to say if such a disease is curable by him? He doesn't know anything about it; It does not follow that he cured one person of such a disease that he cured the same disease in another person, because the fluidic conditions are no longer the same. Indicate a treatment? He is not a doctor, and he would avoid having this weapon used against him.
Writing to him is therefore useless work. The only thing to do, in the event that he resumes his sessions, that people have wrongly qualified as consultations, since he is not consulted, is to present oneself as the first comer, get in line, wait patiently and take the chance. If one is not healed, one cannot complain for having been deceived, since he does not promise anything.
There are sources that have the property of curing certain diseases; people go there; some feel good about it, others are only relieved, and finally others feel nothing at all. We must consider Mr. Jacob as a source of beneficial fluids, to the influence of whom one is going to submit, but who is not a universal panacea, does not cure all diseases, and can be more or less effective, according to the conditions of the patient.
But, after all, were there any healings? One fact answers this question: If no one had been healed, the crowd would not have gone, there as they did.
But cannot the gullible crowd have been deceived by false appearances, going there with faith on a usurped reputation? Can't accomplices have faked illnesses to appear to be healed?
This has, undoubtedly, been seen, and is seen every day, when accomplices have an interest in acting. Here, however, what profit would they have drawn from it? Who would have paid them? It is certainly not Mr. Jacob out of his pay as a musician of the Zouaves; nor it is by giving them a discount on the price of his consultations since he was not receiving anything. It is understandable that whoever wants to acquire a clientele, at any cost, uses such means; but Mr. Jacob had no interest in drawing the crowd to him; he did not call them, they came to him, and one can say in spite of himself. If there hadn't been the facts, no one would have come since he wasn't calling anyone. The newspapers, undoubtedly, contributed to increasing the number of visitors, but they only spoke about it because the crowd already existed, otherwise they would not have said anything. Mr. Jacob did not ask them to speak about him, nor he paid to advertise it. It is, therefore, necessary to rule out any idea of subterfuge that would have no reason to exist in the circumstances in question.
To appreciate the acts of an individual, one must seek the interest that can drive his behavior; however, it turned out that there was none from Mr. Jacob; that there was no interest to Mr. Dufayet, who offered his premises free of charge, and put his workers at the service of the sick, to carry them, and that to the detriment of his own interests; finally, that accomplices had nothing to gain.
Considering that the cures operated by Mr. Jacob in recent times are of the same type as those he obtained last year, at the at Camp Chalons, and that the facts happened in much the same way, only on a larger scale, we refer our readers to the reviews and assessments that we gave in the Spiritist Review, October and November 1866. As to the incidents of this year, we could only repeat what everyone knew through the newspapers. We will, therefore, confine ourselves, for the present, to a few general considerations on the fact itself.
About two years ago, the Spirits announced to us that healing mediumship would take great development and would be a powerful means of propagation for Spiritism. Up until then there had been only healers operating, so to speak, in privacy and quietly. We told the Spirits that, for the spread to be more rapid, it would be necessary for them to emerge sufficiently powerful for the healings to have resonance with the public. It will take place, we were told, and there will be more than one.
This forecast began to realize last year, at the Camp Châlons, and God knows if there were lack of repercussion this year, with the cures of the rue de la Roquette, not only in France, but also abroad.
The general emotion that these facts caused is justified by the gravity of the questions they raise. Make no mistake, this is not one of those events of simple curiosity, that fascinates the crowd for a moment, eager for novelties and distractions. One does not distract oneself from the spectacle of human miseries; the sight of those thousands of patients chasing after health, that they could not find in the resources of science, is nothing to rejoice, and gives rise to serious reflections.
Yes, there is something here other than a vulgar phenomenon. We are, no doubt, astonished at the cures obtained in such exceptional conditions, that they seem to be miraculous; but what impresses even more than the material fact, is that it foresees the revelation of a new principle, whose consequences are incalculable, of one of those long hidden laws in the sanctuary of nature, that when they appear, they change the course of ideas and profoundly modify beliefs.
A secret intuition says that if the facts in question are real, it is more than a change in habits, more than a displacement of industry: it is a new element introduced into society, a new order of ideas that is established.
Although the events of Camp Châlons prepared for what has just happened, owing to Mr. Jacob's inactivity for one year, they had been almost forgotten; the emotion had calmed down, when the same facts suddenly burst out in the heart of the capital, and suddenly take on unheard-of proportions. People woke up, so to speak, as the day after a revolution, only approaching each other by asking: do you know what is happening in the rue de la Roquette? Do you have any news? The newspapers were passed around as if it had been a great event. In forty-eight hours, the whole of France was informed about it.
There is something remarkable and more important about this instantaneity than one might think.
The first impression was that of amazement: nobody laughed. The mocking press itself simply reported the facts and hearsay, without comment; every day it gave a bulletin, without pronouncing either for or against, and it was observed that most of the articles were not made in a tone of mockery; they expressed doubt, uncertainty about the reality of such strange facts, but leaning more towards affirmation than towards denial. This is because the subject, by itself, was serious; it was about suffering, and there is something sacred about suffering that commands respect; in such a case the joke would be misplaced and universally condemned. We have never seen the mocking spirit exercised in front of a hospital, even of madmen, or before a convoy of wounded. Men of heart and sense could not fail to understand that, in a matter that touches an issue of humanity, mockery would have been inappropriate, for it would have been an insult to pain. It is also with a painful feeling and a sort of disgust that today we see the spectacle of these unfortunate handicapped, grotesquely reproduced on stages, and translated into burlesque songs. By admitting, on their part, a puerile credulity, and an ill-founded hope, that is not a reason for disrespecting suffering.
In the presence of such a repercussion, the absolute denial was difficult. Doubt is only allowed to those who do not know or that have not seen; among the unbelievers of good faith and ignorance, many have understood that it would be imprudent to register prematurely against facts that could, one day or another, receive a blessing and belie them. Without, therefore, denying or affirming anything, the press has generally confined itself to registering the state of affairs, leaving it to experience to confirm or deny them, and above all, to explain them; it was the wisest decision.
The first moment of surprise was over; the obstinate opponents of any new thing that frustrates their ideas, for a moment stunned by the violence of the irruption, took courage, when they particularly saw that the Zouave was patient, and of a peaceful mood; they started the attack, and launched a full charge against him with the usual weapons of those who have no good reasons to oppose: mockery and slander to the limit; but their bitter controversy reveals anger and obvious embarrassment, and their arguments that, for the most part, are based on falsehood and notoriously inaccurate allegations, are not convincing, for they refute themselves.
In any event, this is not a personal matter here; whether Mr. Jacob succumbs or not in the struggle, it is a question of principle that is at stake, posed with immense repercussion, and that will follow its course. It brings to memory the innumerable facts of the same kind mentioned in history, and that multiply in our days. If it is a truth, it is not embodied in a man, and nothing can asphyxiate it; the very violence of the attacks proves that they are afraid that this is the truth.
In this circumstance, those that show the least surprise and are moved the least, are the Spiritists, for the reason that these kinds of facts have nothing of which they do not fully realize; knowing the cause, they are not surprised at the effect.
As for those that know neither the cause of the phenomenon nor the law that governs it, they naturally wonder if it is an illusion or a reality; if Mr. Jacob is a charlatan; if he really heals all diseases; if he is endowed with supernatural power, and from whom he derives it; if we have returned to the time of miracles. Seeing the crowd that besieges and follows him, as the one that followed Jesus in Galilee, in the past, some even wonder if he would not be the reincarnated Christ, while others claim that his faculty is a gift of the devil. All these questions have long been resolved for the Spiritists, who have the solution in the principles of the doctrine. However, as there are several important lessons that can be learned, we will examine them in a future article, in which we will also highlight the inconsistency of some criticisms.
