THE DESERTERS.

If it is true that all great ideas count fervent and devoted apostles, it is no less true that even the best among them have their deserters. Spiritism could not escape the effects of human weakness. It too had its own, and in this regard a few observations will not be useless.

In the early days, many were mistaken about the nature and aims of Spiritism and did not perceive its scope. Above all else, it excited curiosity; many were those who saw in the spiritist manifestations nothing more than a mere object of amusement; they amused themselves with the Spirits, while these wished to amuse them. They constituted a pastime, often a complement to family gatherings.

This manner in which the matter at first presented itself was a skillful tactic of the Spirits. Under the form of amusement, the idea penetrated everywhere and sowed seeds, without frightening timorous consciences. They played with the child, but the child had to grow.

When to the facetious Spirits there succeeded the serious, moralizing Spirits; when Spiritism became science, philosophy, superficial people ceased to find it amusing; for those who concern themselves above all with material life, it was an importunate and embarrassing censor, on account of which not a few set it aside. There is no cause to deplore the existence of these deserters, for frivolous creatures are but poor helpers, whatever the matter may be. Nevertheless, that first phase cannot be considered time lost. Thanks to that disguise, the idea became popularized a hundred times more than it would have if, from the very first moment, it had assumed a severe form, and from those frivolous and casual milieus there emerged serious thinkers. Made fashionable by the attraction of curiosity, constituting a lure, the phenomena tempted the cupidity of those who go in search of whatever arises as a novelty, in the hope of finding therein an open door. The manifestations seemed something marvelously exploitable, and there was no lack of those who thought of making of them an auxiliary to their business; for others, they were a variant of the art of divination, a process, perhaps more reliable than cartomancy, palmistry, coffee grounds, etc., etc., for knowing the future and discovering hidden things, since, according to the then current opinion, the Spirits knew everything.

When at last these people saw that the speculation slipped through their fingers and turned into mystification, that the Spirits did not come to help them grow rich, nor to indicate to them numbers that would win in the lotteries, or to reveal good fortune to them, or to lead them to discover treasures, or to receive inheritances, nor even to furnish them with a fruitful invention from which they might draw a patent, in short to supply their ignorance and dispense them from intellectual and material labor, the Spirits served for nothing and their manifestations were but illusions. As much as these people lavished praises upon Spiritism, during the whole time in which they hoped to derive some profit from it, so much did they denigrate it once disappointment arrived. More than one of the critics who vituperate it would have raised it to the skies, had it made them discover a rich uncle in America, or win on the Stock Exchange. Of the categories of deserters, this is the most numerous; but it is understood that those who compose it cannot be qualified as Spiritists. This phase too presented its usefulness. By showing what was not to be expected from the assistance of the Spirits, it made known the serious objective of Spiritism and purified the doctrine. The Spirits know that the lessons of experience are the most profitable; if, at the very outset, they had said: Do not ask for this or that, because you will obtain nothing, no one would have given them credence. This is the reason why they let things take the course they took: it was so that from observation the truth might stand out. The disappointments discouraged the exploiters and contributed to diminishing their number. They were parasites of which the disappointments rid Spiritism, and not sincere adherents. Some individuals, more perspicacious than others, glimpsed the man in the child that had just been born and feared it, as Herod feared the child Jesus. Not daring to attack Spiritism head-on, these individuals incited agents charged with embracing it in order to suffocate it; agents who mask themselves so as to intrude everywhere, so as to skillfully stir up disaffection in the centers and to spread within them, with stealthy hand, the venom of calumny, kindling, at the same time, the torch of discord, inspiring compromising acts, attempting to lead the doctrine astray, in order to render it ridiculous or odious and then to simulate defections.

Others still are more cunning: preaching union, they sow separation; deftly they raise irritating and wounding questions; they awaken the jealousy of preponderance among the different groups; they would delight in seeing them stone one another and raise banner against banner, on account of some divergences of opinion on certain questions of form or of substance, most often intentionally provoked. All doctrines have had their Judases; Spiritism could not fail to have its own, and they have not yet been wanting to it.

These are contraband Spiritists, but who have also been of some usefulness: they taught the true Spiritist to be prudent, circumspect, and not to trust in appearances.

As a principle, one should distrust enthusiasms that are too feverish: they are almost always a flash in the pan, or sham, occasional ardors, which supply with the abundance of words the lack of acts. True conviction is calm, reflective, motivated; it reveals itself, like true courage, through facts, that is, through firmness, through perseverance, and, above all, through abnegation. Moral and material disinterestedness is the legitimate touchstone of sincerity.

This latter has a sui generis stamp; it manifests itself through nuances often easier to understand than to define; it is felt by the effect of that transmission of thought, whose law Spiritism has regulated, without falsehood ever managing to simulate it completely, since it is not possible for it to change the nature of the fluidic currents that it projects from itself. Sincerity considers it an error to give heed to base and servile flattery, which seduces only proud souls, flattery by means of which precisely falsehood betrays itself before elevated souls.

Never can ice imitate heat.

If we pass to the category of Spiritists properly so called, even there we shall come upon certain human weaknesses, over which the doctrine does not triumph immediately. The most difficult to overcome are egoism and pride, the two original passions of man. Among convinced adherents, there are no desertions, in the legitimate acceptation of the term, since whoever should desert, by reason of interest or any other, would never have been sincerely a Spiritist; there may, however, be faintings. It may happen that courage and perseverance falter before a disappointment, before a frustrated ambition, before a preeminence not attained, before a wound to self-love, before a difficult trial. There is the recoiling before the sacrifice of well-being, before the fear of compromising material interests, before the dread of “what will they say?”; there is the being cast down by a mystification, having as consequence, not estrangement, but cooling; there is the wanting to live for oneself and not for others, the benefiting from the belief, but under the condition that it cost nothing. Doubtless, those who proceed thus may be believers but, without contestation, egoistic believers, in whom faith has not kindled the sacred fire of devotion and abnegation; it costs their souls to detach themselves from matter. Nominally they make up the numbers, but they cannot be counted upon.

All the others are Spiritists who truly deserve that qualification. They accept of themselves all the consequences of the doctrine and are recognizable by the efforts they employ to improve themselves. Without despising, beyond the limits of the reasonable, material interests, these are, for them, the accessory and not the principal; they regard earthly life only as a more or less arduous crossing; they are certain that upon the useful or useless employment they give it depends the future; they hold paltry the enjoyments it affords, in face of the splendid objective they glimpse in the beyond; they are not intimidated by the obstacles they encounter on the way; they see in the vicissitudes and disappointments trials that cause them no discouragement, because they know that rest will be the reward of labor. Hence it comes that among them no desertions, nor bankruptcies, are verified. For that very reason, the good Spirits manifestly protect those who struggle with courage and perseverance, those whose devotion is sincere and without preconceived ideas; they help them to overcome the obstacles and soften the trials they cannot spare them, whereas, no less manifestly, they abandon those who turn away from them and sacrifice the cause of truth to their personal ambitions.

Should we also include among the deserters of Spiritism those who withdraw because our manner of seeing does not satisfy them; those who, finding our method too slow or too rapid, claim to reach more quickly and under better conditions the goal at which we aim? Certainly not, if they have for guide sincerity and the desire to propagate the truth. — Yes, if their efforts tend solely to putting themselves in evidence and to drawing public attention upon themselves, for the satisfaction of self-love and of personal interests!…

You have a way of seeing different from ours, you do not sympathize with the principles that we admit! Nothing proves that you are closer to the truth than we are. One may differ in opinion in matters of science; investigate on your side, as we investigate on ours; the future will show which of us is in error or in the right. We do not claim to be the only ones to gather the conditions outside of which serious and useful studies are not possible; what we have done others can, without doubt, do. Whether intelligent men join us, or congregate far from us, matters little!… If the centers of study multiply, so much the better; it will be a sign of incontestable progress, which we shall applaud with all our strength. As for the rivalries, the attempts they may make to supplant us, we have an infallible means of not fearing them. We work to understand, to enrich our intelligence and our heart; we struggle with others, but we struggle with charity and abnegation. The love of one's neighbor inscribed on our standard is our device; the search for truth, come whence it may, our sole objective. With such sentiments, we confront the mockery of our adversaries and the attempts of our competitors. If we are mistaken, we shall not have the foolish self-love that leads us to persist obstinately in false ideas; there are, however, principles about which we can all be sure of never being mistaken: the love of good, abnegation, the proscription of every sentiment of envy and of jealousy. These principles are ours; we see in them the bonds that will bind all men of good, whatever the divergence of their opinions. Only egoism and bad faith raise insurmountable barriers among them. But what will be the consequence of such a state of things? Undoubtedly, the conduct of the false brethren may for the moment bring about some partial disturbances, on account of which all efforts must be employed to lead them to failure, as far as possible; these disturbances, however, will necessarily last but a short time and will not be able to be prejudicial to the future: first, because they are mere maneuvers of opposition, fated to fall by the very force of things; then, say what they may, or do what they may, no one would be capable of depriving the doctrine of its distinctive character, of its rational and logical philosophy, of its consoling and regenerating morality. Today, the foundations of Spiritism are laid in an unshakable manner; the books written without ambiguity and placed within the reach of all intelligences will always be the clear and exact expression of the teaching of the Spirits and will transmit it intact to those who succeed us. It is important not to lose sight of the fact that we are at a moment of transition and that no transition operates without conflict. No one, then, should be astonished that certain passions are stirred, by the effect of frustrated ambitions, of wounded interests, of thwarted pretensions. Little by little, however, all this is extinguished, the fever abates, men pass and the new ideas remain. Spiritists, if you wish to be invincible, be benevolent and charitable; good is a cuirass against which the maneuvers of malevolence will always be broken!…

Let us, then, fear nothing: the future belongs to us. Let us leave our adversaries to struggle, pressed by the truth that dazzles them; any opposition is impotent against the evidence, which inevitably triumphs by the very force of things. The universal popularization of Spiritism is a question of time, and in this century time marches at a giant's pace, under the impulsion of progress.

Allan Kardec.

NOTE. — As a complement to this article, we publish an instruction which, on the same subject, Allan Kardec gave, as soon as he returned to the world of the Spirits. It seemed to us interesting, for our readers, to join to the eloquent and virile pages that have just been read the present opinion of the organizer par excellence of our philosophy.

[Communication from Allan Kardec.]

(Paris, November 1869.)

“When I found myself corporeally among you, I said many times that I would one day produce a History of Spiritism, which would not be devoid of interest. Such is, even now, my opinion, and the elements I had gathered for that purpose may one day serve for the realization of that idea. The fact is that I, indeed, found myself better placed than any other to appreciate the curious spectacle that the discovery and popularization of a great truth had provoked. I sensed in former times, today I know, what marvelous order and what inconceivable harmony preside over the concentration of all the documents destined to give birth to the new work. The benevolence, the good will, the absolute devotion of some; the bad faith, the hypocrisy, the malicious maneuvers of others, all concur to guarantee the stability of the edifice that is rising. In the hands of the superior potentates, who preside over all progress, the unconscious or simulated resistances, the attacks aiming to sow discredit and ridicule, become elements of elaboration. “What have they not done! What have they not put into action to suffocate the child in the cradle!

“At first charlatanism and superstition wished, now the one, now the other, to take possession of our principles, in order to exploit them to their own profit; all the thunderbolts of the press were hurled against us, they jeered at the most respectable things, they attributed to the Spirits of evil the teachings of the Spirits most worthy of universal admiration and veneration; meanwhile, all those combined efforts succeeded in nothing more than proclaiming the impotence of our adversaries.

“It is within that incessant struggle against established prejudices, against accredited errors, that one learns to know men. I knew, in consecrating myself to the work of my predilection, that I exposed myself to the hatred, the envy, and the jealousy of others. The path was strewn with difficulties that were continually renewed. Able to do nothing against the doctrine, they threw themselves upon the man; but, on that side, I felt myself strong, because I had renounced my personality. What did the efforts of calumny matter to me? My conscience and the grandeur of the objective made me willingly forget the thistles and thorns of the road. The testimonies of sympathy and of esteem, which I received from those who knew how to appreciate me, constituted the most estimable reward, which I had never coveted. But, ah!, how many times would I have succumbed under the weight of my task, had not the affection and the gratitude of many made me forget the ingratitude and the injustice of some, for, if the attacks directed against me always found me insensible, I felt myself painfully grieved, I must say it, every time I discovered false friends among those upon whom I most counted. “If it is just to censure those who have tried to exploit Spiritism or to denature it in their writings, without having previously studied it, how much more culpable are those who, after having assimilated all the principles, not content to part from its bosom, turned against it all their efforts! It is, above all, for the deserters of that category that we must implore divine mercy, for they voluntarily extinguished the torch that illuminated them and with which they could have enlightened others. They, for that reason, soon lose the protection of the good Spirits, and, according to the sad experience we have had, very soon arrive, from fall to fall, at the most critical situations! “Since I returned to the world of the Spirits, I have seen again some of those unfortunates. They now repent, they lament the inaction in which they remained and the ill will of which they gave proof, without succeeding, however, in recovering the time lost! They will soon return to Earth, with the firm purpose of contributing actively to progress, and they will find themselves still in struggle with their old tendencies, until they definitively triumph.

“One would be inclined to believe that the Spiritists of today, enlightened by these examples, would avoid falling into the same errors. Such, however, is not the case. For a long time yet there will be false brethren and ill-advised friends, but, like their elder brethren, they will not succeed in making Spiritism depart from its course. Although they cause some momentary and purely local disturbances, the doctrine will not on that account be endangered. On the contrary, the strayed Spiritists will very soon recognize the error into which they fell and will come to collaborate with greater ardor in the work for an instant abandoned, and, acting in accord with the superior Spirits who direct the humanitarian transformations, they will march at a rapid pace toward the happy times promised to regenerated Humanity.”