COLLECTION OF SPIRITIST PRAYERS.

Preamble. — The Lord's Prayer.

— Spiritist meetings.

— For mediums.

Preamble.

The Spirits have always said: “Form is worth nothing, thought is everything. Let each one, then, pray according to his convictions and in the manner that most touches him; 2 a good thought is worth more than a great number of words in which the heart has no part.”

The Spirits have never prescribed any absolute formula of prayers; when they give some, it is only to fix ideas and, above all, to draw attention to certain principles of the Spiritist Doctrine.

They also do so with the aim of assisting those who feel embarrassed in expressing their ideas, for there are some who would not believe they had truly prayed unless they formulated their thoughts.

The collection of prayers contained in this chapter represents a selection made from among many that the Spirits dictated in various circumstances; they may, no doubt, have dictated others, and in different terms, suited to certain ideas or to special cases; but the form matters little, if the thought is essentially the same.

The purpose of prayer consists in raising our soul to God; the diversity of formulas should create no difference among those who believe in Him, and still less among the followers of Spiritism, for God accepts them all when they are sincere.

This collection, then, is not to be regarded as an absolute and unique formulary, but merely as one variety within the whole of the instructions the Spirits impart.

It is an application of the principles of evangelical morality developed in this book, a complement to their dictations concerning the duties toward God and toward one's neighbor, a complement in which all the principles of the Doctrine are recalled.

Spiritism recognizes as good the prayers of all forms of worship, when said from the heart and not from the lips alone; it imposes none, nor does it condemn any; God, according to Spiritism, is supremely great to reject the voice that supplicates Him or that sings His praises, because it does so in one manner and not in another.

Whoever casts anathema upon prayers that are not in his own formulary proves that he is ignorant of the greatness of God. To believe that God confines Himself to a formula is to lend Him the pettiness and the passions of Humanity.

An essential condition of prayer, according to Saint Paul (chapter XXVII, no. 16), is that it be intelligible, so that it may speak to our spirit; for this it is not enough that it be said in a language that the one who prays understands; 12 there are prayers in the common tongue that say no more to the thought than if they were uttered in a foreign language, and which, for that very reason, do not reach the heart; the few ideas they contain are, most often, stifled by the superabundance of words and by the mysticism of the language.

The principal quality of prayer is to be clear, simple, and concise, 14 without useless phraseology or a lavishness of epithets, which are mere spangled adornments; 15 each word must have its own reach, awaken an idea, set a fiber of the soul vibrating: 16 in a word, it must make one reflect; only under this condition can prayer attain its object; otherwise, it is nothing but noise.

Yet note with what distracted air and with what volubility they are said in most cases. One sees lips moving; but, by the expression of the countenance, by the very sound of the voice, one verifies that there is there only a mechanical act, purely external, to which the soul remains indifferent.

The prayers contained in this collection are divided into five categories: 1st General prayers; 2nd Prayers for oneself; 3rd Prayers for the living; 4th Prayers for the dead; 5th Special prayers for the sick and the obsessed.

With the purpose of drawing attention, in a special manner, to the object of each prayer and of making its scope more comprehensible, they are all preceded by a preliminary instruction, a kind of statement of motives, under the title of preface.

The Lord's Prayer.

PREFACE. The Spirits recommended that, at the head of this collection, we place the Lord's Prayer, not only as a prayer, but also as a symbol.

Of all prayers, it is the one they place in first rank, whether because it proceeds from Jesus Himself (Saint Matthew, chapter VI, vv. 9 to 13), or because it can suffice for all, according to the thoughts that are joined to it; it is the most perfect model of conciseness, a true masterpiece of sublimity in its simplicity.

Indeed, under the simplest form, it sums up all the duties of man toward God, toward himself, and toward his neighbor; 4 it contains a profession of faith, an act of adoration and of submission, the request for the things necessary to life, and the principle of charity.

Whoever says it, with the intention for someone, asks for that person what he would ask for himself.

Nevertheless, by virtue of its very brevity, the profound meaning contained in the few words of which it is composed escapes most people; hence it comes that they generally say it without their thoughts dwelling on the applications of each of its parts; 7 they say it like a formula whose efficacy is conditioned on the number of times it is repeated; now, almost always that is one of the cabalistic numbers: three, seven, or nine, taken from the ancient superstitious belief in the virtue of numbers and used in the operations of magic.

To fill in what the conciseness of this prayer leaves vague in the mind, to each of its propositions we have added, advised by the Spirits and with their assistance, a commentary that develops its meaning and shows the applications.

According to circumstances and the time available, one may therefore say the Lord's Prayer simple or developed.

PRAYER. — I. Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name!

We believe in Thee, Lord, because everything reveals Thy power and Thy goodness.

The harmony of the Universe bears witness to a wisdom, a prudence, and a foresight that surpass all human faculties; 4 in all the works of Creation, from the tiny blade of grass and the little insect, up to the heavenly bodies that move in space, there is inscribed the name of a being supremely great and wise; 5 everywhere there is presented to us the proof of paternal solicitude; blind, therefore, is he who does not recognize Thee in Thy works, proud he who does not glorify Thee, and ungrateful he who does not render Thee thanks.

II. Thy kingdom come!

Lord, Thou hast given to men laws full of wisdom, which would give them happiness if they fulfilled them.

With these laws, they would make peace and justice reign among themselves and would mutually aid one another, instead of mistreating one another, as they do. The strong would sustain the weak, instead of crushing him. The ills that are engendered by excesses and abuses would be avoided.

All the miseries of this world come from the violation of Thy laws, for no infraction of them fails to occasion fatal consequences.

Thou hast given to the brute instinct, which marks out for it the limit of what is necessary, and it mechanically conforms to it; to man, however, besides this instinct, Thou hast given intelligence and reason;

Thou hast also given him the liberty to fulfill or to infringe those of Thy laws that personally concern him, that is, the liberty to choose between good and evil, so that he may have the merit and the responsibility of his actions.

No one can plead ignorance of Thy laws, for, with paternal foresight, Thou hast willed that they be engraved on the conscience of each one, without distinction of forms of worship or of nations; 13 if they violate them, it is because they despise them. A day will come when, according to Thy promise, all will practice them; 14 incredulity will then have disappeared; all will recognize Thee as sovereign Lord of all things, and the reign of Thy laws will be Thy kingdom on Earth.

Deign, Lord, to hasten its advent, granting to men the necessary light that may lead them to the path of truth.

III. Thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven.

If submission is a duty of the son toward the father, of the inferior toward his superior, how much greater must that of the creature be toward its Creator!

To do Thy will, Lord, is to observe Thy laws and to submit, without complaints, to Thy divine decrees; 19 man will submit to it when he understands that Thou art the source of all wisdom and that without Thee he can do nothing; he will then do Thy will on Earth, as the elect do it in Heaven.

IV. Give us this day our daily bread.

Give us the nourishment indispensable to the sustenance of the strength of the body; but give us also the spiritual nourishment for the development of our Spirit.

The brute finds its pasture; man, however, owes his sustenance to his own activity and to the resources of his intelligence, because Thou hast created him free.

Thou hast said to him: “Thou shalt draw thy food from the earth by the sweat of thy brow;” in this way, Thou hast made of labor, for him, an obligation, so that he might exercise his intelligence in seeking the means to provide for his needs and his well-being, some through manual labor, others through intellectual labor; without labor, he would remain stationary and could not aspire to the happiness of the superior Spirits.

Thou helpest the man of good will who trusts in Thee, in what concerns the necessary; but not him who takes pleasure in idleness and would wish to obtain everything without effort, nor him who seeks the superfluous. (chapter XXV)

How many there are who succumb through their own fault, through their negligence, through their improvidence, or through their ambition and through not having been willing to content themselves with what Thou hadst granted them!

These are the artisans of their own misfortune and lack the right to complain, for they are punished in that wherein they sinned.

But not even these dost Thou abandon, because Thou art infinitely merciful;

Thou stretchest out Thy hands to succor them, provided that, like the prodigal son, they turn sincerely toward Thee. (chapter V, no. 4.)

Before complaining of our lot, let us inquire of ourselves whether it is not our own work; 29 with each misfortune that comes to us, let us take care to learn whether it would not have been within our hands to avoid it; 30 let us also consider that God granted us intelligence to draw us out of the mire, and that the manner of using it depends on us.

Since man on Earth is subject to the law of labor, give us courage and strength to obey this law; 32 give us also prudence, foresight, and moderation, so that we may not lose its fruit.

Give us, then, Lord, our daily bread, that is, the means of acquiring, through labor, the things necessary to life, for no one has the right to claim the superfluous.

If labor is impossible for us, to Thy divine providence we entrust ourselves.

If it be in Thy designs to test us by the harshest trials, despite our efforts, we accept them as just expiation of the faults we may have committed in this existence, or in another previous one, for Thou art just; we know that there are no undeserved penalties and that Thou never punishest without cause.

Preserve us, O my God, from envying those who possess what we have not, nor even those who have the superfluous at their disposal, while we lack the necessary. Forgive them, if they forget the law of charity and of love of neighbor, which Thou hast taught them. (chapter XVI, no. 8.)

Keep away, likewise, from our spirit the idea of denying Thy justice, when we observe the prosperity of the wicked and the misfortune that, at times, falls upon the man of good.

We already know, thanks to the new light it has pleased Thee to grant us, that Thy justice is always fulfilled and excepts no one; that the material prosperity of the wicked is ephemeral, like his corporeal existence, and that he will experience terrible reverses, while eternal will be the joy of him who suffers resignedly. (Chap. V, no. 7, 9, 12, 18.)

V. Forgive us our debts, as we forgive those who owe us. Forgive us our offenses, as we forgive those who have offended us.

Each of our infractions of Thy laws, Lord, is an offense we commit against Thee and a debt we contract, which sooner or later we shall have to settle. We beg Thee to forgive us them through Thy infinite mercy, under the promise we make to Thee to employ our utmost efforts not to contract others.

Thou hast imposed charity upon us by express law; but charity does not consist only in assisting our fellow beings in their needs; it consists also in the forgetting and the pardon of offenses.

With what right would we claim Thy indulgence, if we did not use it toward those who have given us cause for complaint?

Grant us, O my God, strength to efface from our soul all resentment, all hatred, and all rancor; grant that death may not surprise us harboring in the heart desires of vengeance.

If it please Thee to take us this very day from this world, grant that we may present ourselves, before Thee, pure of all animosity, after the example of the Christ, whose last thoughts were on behalf of His executioners. (chapter X.)

The persecutions that the wicked inflict upon us constitute part of our earthly trials; we must, then, receive them without complaining, like all the other trials, 46 and not curse those who, by their wickedness, clear for us the path of eternal happiness, since Thou hast told us, through Jesus: “Blessed are those who suffer for justice!”

Let us bless, therefore, the hand that wounds and humbles us, since the mortifications of the body strengthen our soul and since we shall be exalted by effect of our humility. (chapter XII, no. 4.)

Blessed be Thy name, Lord, for having taught us that our lot is not irrevocably fixed after death; that we shall find, in other existences, the means of redeeming and of repairing our past faults, of fulfilling in a new life what we cannot do in this one, for our progress. (chapter IV, and chapter V, no. 5.)

Thus are explained, in the end, all the apparent anomalies of life. It is the light that is projected upon our past and our future, evident sign of Thy sovereign justice and of Thy infinite goodness.

VI. Leave us not given over to temptation, but deliver us from evil. [1]

Give us, Lord, the strength to resist the suggestions of the evil Spirits, who try to turn us aside from the path of good, inspiring in us evil thoughts.

But we are imperfect Spirits, incarnated on Earth to expiate our faults and to improve ourselves. In ourselves lies the primary cause of evil, and the evil Spirits do no more than take advantage of our vicious inclinations, in which they keep us occupied in order to tempt us.

Each imperfection is a door open to their influence, whereas they are powerless and renounce every attempt against perfect beings.

All that we may do to keep them away is useless, if we do not oppose to them a decided and unshakable will to remain in good and an absolute renunciation of evil.

It is against ourselves, then, that we need to direct our efforts;

and, if we do so, the evil Spirits will naturally withdraw, for it is evil that attracts them, while good repels them. (See further on here:

Prayers for the obsessed.)

Lord, sustain us in our weakness; inspire in us, through our guardian angels and through the good Spirits, the will to correct ourselves of all our imperfections in order to bar the evil Spirits from access to our soul. (See here further on, no. 11.)

Evil is not Thy work, Lord, for the wellspring of all good can engender nothing evil; it is we ourselves who create evil, by infringing Thy laws and by making bad use of the liberty Thou hast granted us.

When we men fulfill them, evil will disappear from the Earth, as it has already disappeared from worlds more advanced than ours.

Evil does not constitute for anyone a fatal necessity and only seems irresistible to those who take pleasure in it.

Since we have the will to do it, we can also have the will to practice good, wherefore, O my God, we ask Thy assistance and that of the good Spirits, in order to resist temptation.

VII. So be it.

May it please Thee, Lord, that our desires be effected. But we bow before Thy infinite wisdom.

May Thy holy will, and not ours, be done in all the things that escape our comprehension, for Thou willest only our good and knowest better than we what is fitting for us.

We address to Thee this prayer, O God, for ourselves and also for all the suffering souls, incarnated and disincarnated, for our friends and enemies, for all who solicit our assistance and, in particular, for N…

For all we implore Thy mercy and Thy blessing.

Note. Here may be formulated the thanksgivings that one wishes to address to God and what one wishes to ask for oneself or for another.

(See, further on, numbers 26 and 27.)

Spiritist meetings.

Wherever two or three persons are gathered together in my name, I will be with them. (Saint Matthew, chapter XVIII, v. 20.)

PREFACE. For two, three, or more persons to be gathered together in the name of Jesus does not mean that it is enough for them to be materially together; it is necessary that they be so spiritually, in communion of intentions and of ideas, for good; Jesus, then, or the pure Spirits who represent Him, will be present in the assembly.

Spiritism makes us understand how the Spirits can be among us. They are there with their fluidic or spiritual body and under the appearance that would lead us to recognize them, if they were to become visible. The more elevated they are in the spiritual hierarchy, the greater is their power of irradiation; thus it is that they possess the gift of ubiquity and that they can be simultaneously in many places, it being sufficient for this that they send to each of those places a ray of their minds.

In saying the words transcribed above, Jesus wished to reveal the effect of union and of fraternity; what attracts Him is not the greater or lesser number of persons who gather, for, instead of two or three, He could have said ten or twenty, but the sentiment of charity that mutually animates them; now, for this, it is enough that there be two of them.

Nevertheless, if those two persons pray each on their own side, although both directing themselves to Jesus, there is no communion of thoughts between them, especially if they are not there under the influence of a sentiment of mutual benevolence;

if they look upon each other with prejudice, with hatred, envy, or jealousy, the fluidic currents of their thoughts, far from being joined by a common impulse of sympathy, repel one another; in that case, they will not be gathered together in the name of Jesus; Jesus is but the pretext of the gathering, and not the true motive. (chapter XXVII, no. 9.)

This does not mean that He shows Himself deaf to what a single person may say to Him; and if He did not say: “I will heed everyone who calls upon me,”

it is that, above all, He requires love of neighbor; and of that love more proofs can be given when those who entreat, with the exclusion of all personal sentiment, are many, and not one alone; 6 it follows that, if, in a numerous assembly, only two or three persons unite from the heart, by the sentiment of true charity, while the others isolate themselves and concentrate on egoistic or worldly thoughts, He will be with the first and not with the others.

It is not, then, the simultaneity of words, of chants, or of outward acts that constitutes the gathering in the name of Jesus, but the communion of thoughts, in concordance with the spirit of charity that He personifies.

(chapter X, no. 7 and 8; chapter XXVII, no. 2 to 4.)

Such is the character with which serious Spiritist meetings must be invested, those in which the concurrence of the good Spirits is sincerely desired.

PRAYER. (For the beginning of the meeting.) — To the Lord God almighty we supplicate that He send, to assist us, good Spirits; that He keep away those who might lead us into error and grant us the light necessary to distinguish truth from imposture.

Keep away, likewise, Lord, the malevolent Spirits, incarnated and disincarnated, who try to cast discord among us and to turn us aside from charity and from love of neighbor. If some of them seek to introduce themselves here, grant that they find no access in the heart of any one of us.

Good Spirits who deign to come to instruct us, make us docile to your counsels, preserve us from all idea of egoism, pride, envy, and jealousy; inspire in us indulgence and benevolence toward our fellow beings, present and absent, friends or enemies; bring it about, in short, that, by the sentiments with which we find ourselves animated, we may recognize your salutary influence.

Give to the mediums you choose as transmitters of your teachings, consciousness of the mandate conferred upon them and of the gravity of the act they are about to perform, so that they may do it with the requisite fervor and recollection.

If, in our meeting, there be persons who have come impelled by sentiments other than those of good, open their eyes to the light and forgive them, as we forgive them, if they bring malevolent intentions.

We ask, especially, of the Spirit N…, our spiritual guide, that he assist us and watch over us.

(For the end of the meeting.) — We thank the good Spirits who have deigned to communicate with us and we beg them to help us put into practice the instructions they have given us and to bring it about that, on leaving here, each of us may feel strengthened for the practice of good and of love of neighbor.

We also desire that their instructions may profit the suffering, ignorant, or vicious Spirits who may have taken part in our meeting and for whom we implore the mercy of God.

For mediums.

In the last days, saith the Lord, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh; your sons and daughters shall prophesy; your young men shall have visions and your old men, dreams. In those days, I will pour out of my Spirit upon my menservants and maidservants, and they shall prophesy. (Acts, chapter II, vv. 17 and 18.)

PREFACE. The Lord willed that the light should be made for all men and that everywhere the voice of the Spirits should penetrate, so that each one might obtain the proof of immortality; 2 it is with this object that the Spirits manifest themselves today at all points of the Earth and that mediumship reveals itself in persons of all ages and of all conditions, in men as in women, in children as in the old; it is one of the signs that the predicted times have arrived.

To know the things of the visible world and to discover the secrets of material Nature, God granted man corporeal sight, the senses, and special instruments; with the telescope, he plunges his gaze into the depths of space, and, with the microscope, he discovered the world of the infinitely small. To penetrate into the invisible world, He gave him mediumship.

Mediums are the interpreters charged with transmitting to men the teachings of the Spirits; or, better, they are the material organs of which the Spirits make use in order to express themselves to men in an intelligible manner. Holy is the mission they perform, since it has for its purpose to open the horizons of eternal life.

The Spirits come to instruct man about his destinies, in order to lead him back to the path of good, and not to spare him the material labor that it falls to him to perform in this world, having for its goal his advancement, nor to favor his ambition and his cupidity.

Here is what mediums must thoroughly take to heart, so as not to make bad use of their faculties.

He who, as a medium, understands the gravity of the mandate with which he is invested, religiously performs it. His conscience would reproach him, as a sacrilegious act, with using for amusement and distraction, for himself or for others, faculties that are granted to him for exceedingly serious ends and that put him in communication with the beings of beyond the tomb.

As interpreters of the teaching of the Spirits, mediums have an important role to play in the moral transformation that is being effected; the services they can render are in proportion to the good direction they give to their faculties, for those who set off on a bad path are more harmful than useful to the cause of Spiritism; by the bad impression they produce, they retard more than one conversion.

They will, for that very reason, have to render an account of the use they have made of a gift that was granted to them for the good of their fellow beings.

The medium who wishes always to enjoy the assistance of the good Spirits must work to improve himself; he who desires that his faculty develop and grow great must grow great morally and abstain from all that may contribute to turning it aside from its providential end.

If, at times, the good Spirits make use of imperfect mediums, it is to give good counsel, by which they seek to make them take up again the road of good. If, however, they meet with hardened hearts and if their admonitions are not heeded, they withdraw, leaving the field free to the wicked. (chapter XXIV, no. 11 and 12.)

Experience proves that, on the part of those who do not profit by the counsels they receive from the good Spirits, the communications, after having shown a certain brilliance for some time, degenerate little by little and end by falling into error, into verbiage, or into the ridiculous, an incontestable sign of the withdrawal of the good Spirits.

To obtain the assistance of the latter, to keep away the frivolous and lying Spirits, such must be the goal toward which the constant efforts of all serious mediums converge; without this, mediumship becomes a sterile faculty, capable even of turning to the detriment of him who possesses it, for it can degenerate into a dangerous obsession.

The medium who understands his duty, far from taking pride in a faculty that does not belong to him, since it can be taken from him, attributes to God the good things he obtains.

If his communications receive praise, he will not grow vain over it, because he knows them to be independent of his personal merit; he thanks God for having consented that through his intermediation good Spirits might manifest themselves.

If they give rise to criticism, he is not offended, because they are not the work of his own Spirit; on the contrary, he recognizes within himself that he was not a good instrument and that he does not possess all the qualities necessary to prevent the interference of the evil Spirits; he takes care, then, to acquire these qualities and supplicates, by means of prayer, for the strength he lacks.

PRAYER. — Almighty God, permit that the good Spirits assist me in the communication I solicit.

Preserve me from the presumption of believing myself safeguarded from the evil Spirits; 3 from the pride that may lead me into error concerning the value of what I obtain; 4 from all sentiment opposed to charity toward other mediums.

If I fall into error, inspire someone with the idea of warning me of it, and me with the humility that may make me accept criticism gratefully and take as addressed to myself, and not to others, the counsels that the good Spirits may wish to dictate to me.

If I be tempted to commit abuse, in whatever it may be, or to grow vain over the faculty it has pleased Thee to grant me, I ask that Thou take it from me, rather than consent that it be turned aside from its providential object, which is the good of all and my own moral advancement. [1] Some translations say: Lead us not into temptation (et ne nos inducas in tentationem). (Mt) This expression would give it to be understood that temptation emanates from God, that He voluntarily impels men toward evil, a blasphemous idea that would make God equal to Satan and that, therefore, could not be in the mind of Jesus. It is, moreover, in accordance with the common doctrine concerning the role of demons. (See: Heaven and Hell, 1st part, chapter IX: The demons.)