Method for driving away evil Spirits.

— The interference of deceiving Spirits in written communications is one of the greatest difficulties of Spiritism. It is known from experience that they have no scruple whatsoever about taking on assumed and even respectable names. Are there means of driving them away? That is the question. To this end, certain people employ what one might call methods, that is, particular formulas of evocation, or kinds of exorcisms, for example, making them swear in the name of God that they are telling the truth, making them write certain things, etc. We know someone who, at each sentence, obliges the Spirit to sign the name; if it is the true one, he writes it without difficulty; if it is not, he suddenly stops, unable to complete it. We have seen this person receive the most ridiculous communications from Spirits who signed a false name with remarkable audacity. Other creatures think that an effective means is to make them confess Jesus in the flesh, or other truths of religion. Well then! We declare that, although some Spirits a little more scrupulous hold back at the idea of perjury or of a profanation, there are those who swear to anything we want, sign all names, laugh at everything, and affront the presence of the most venerated figures, from which it is concluded that, among what may be called methods, there exists no formula, no material expedient that can function as an effective safeguard. It will be said, in that case, that there is nothing to do but to stop writing. This means would be no better. Far from it, in many cases it would be worse. We have already said — and it would never be too much to repeat it — that the action of the Spirits upon us is incessant and, by being hidden, is no less real for that. If it is to be bad, it will be all the more pernicious for the very reason that the enemy is concealed. Through written communications he reveals himself and unmasks himself. Thus, we know with whom we are dealing and we can fight him. But, if there is no means of driving him away, what then is to be done? We did not say that there is no means, but only that the majority of those we employ are ineffective. This is the thesis we propose to develop.

— One must not lose sight of the fact that the Spirits constitute a whole world, a whole population that fills space, circulates beside us, mingles with everything we do. If the veil that hides them from us were to be lifted, we would see them around us, coming and going, following us or avoiding us, according to the degree of sympathy; some indifferent, true idlers of the hidden world, others very busy, whether with themselves or with the men to whom they attach themselves, with a more or less praiseworthy purpose, according to the qualities that distinguish them. In a word, we would see a perfect copy of the human race, with its good and bad qualities, with its virtues and vices. This enveloping, from which we cannot escape, since there are no recesses too hidden to be inaccessible to the Spirits, exerts upon us, and unbeknownst to us, a permanent influence. Some impel us toward good, others toward evil; often our decisions result from their suggestions; happy are those who have judgment enough to discern the good or the bad path along which they seek to drag us. Considering that the Spirits are nothing more than men themselves stripped of their coarse garment, or souls that survive their bodies, it follows that there have been Spirits ever since there have been human beings in the Universe. They are one of the powers of Nature, and they do not wait for there to be writing mediums in order to act; the proof of this is that, in all times, men have committed thoughtless acts. This is why we say that their influence is independent of the faculty of writing; this faculty is a means of knowing such influence, of knowing which are those that surround us and which are those that attach themselves to us. To think that we can withdraw ourselves from this influence by abstaining from writing is to act like children who believe they escape a danger by simply covering their eyes. By revealing those whom we have as companions, whether as friends or enemies, writing thereby provides us with a weapon to fight the latter, for which we should give thanks to God. In the absence of the sight to recognize the Spirits, we have spiritist communications, by which they reveal themselves as they are; this is, for us, a sense that allows us to judge them. To reject it is to take pleasure in remaining blind and exposed to deception without control. . The interference of evil Spirits in written communications does not, then, constitute a danger to Spiritism, because, if there is danger, it will continue to exist and in a permanent character. We could never be sufficiently persuaded of this truth; it is merely a difficulty, over which Spiritism will triumph, if we dedicate ourselves to it in a suitable manner.

— First of all, we can establish as a principle that evil Spirits do not appear except where something attracts them. Therefore, when they intrude into communications, it is because they find sympathies in the milieu where they present themselves or, at least, weak sides that they hope to take advantage of; in any case, because they do not find a moral force sufficient to repel them. Among the causes that attract them, one must place in the first rank the moral imperfections of any nature, because evil always sympathizes with evil; in the second place, the excessive confidence with which their words are received. When a communication reveals a bad origin, it would be illogical to infer from this a necessary parity between the Spirit and the evokers. We frequently see very distinguished persons exposed to the knaveries of deceiving Spirits, as occurs in the world with honest persons deceived by sharpers; but when we take precautions, the latter have nothing to do; the same happens also with the Spirits. When an honest person is deceived by them, this may stem from two causes: the first is an absolute confidence, which leads one to forgo all examination; the second is that the best qualities do not exclude certain weak sides that give shelter to the evil Spirits, eager to seize upon the smallest flaws in the armor. We are not referring to pride and ambition, which are more than hindrances, but to a certain weakness of character and, above all, to the prejudices that those Spirits know how to exploit skillfully, flattering them; with a view to this, they use all manner of masks, in order to inspire more confidence. Frankly coarse communications are the least dangerous, since they can deceive no one. Those that deceive the most are those that have a false appearance of wisdom or of seriousness: in a word, those of hypocritical and pseudo-learned Spirits. Some may deceive themselves in good faith, through ignorance or presumption; the others act only through cunning. Let us see, then, what is the means of ridding ourselves of them.

The first thing is not to attract them and to avoid everything that may give them access.

— As we have seen, the moral dispositions are a preponderant cause. However, leaving aside that cause, the manner employed is not without influence. There are people who have as a principle never to make evocations and to await the first spontaneous communication that comes from the medium's pencil. Now, if we recall what we have already said about the varied and numerous population of the Spirits that surround us, we will understand without difficulty that this would be to place ourselves at the mercy of the first one who comes along, good or bad. And as in that multitude there are more evil Spirits than good ones, there is more opportunity for the evil ones, exactly as if we opened the door to all the passersby in the street, whereas, by evocation, we make the choice; furthermore, surrounding ourselves with good Spirits, we impose silence on the evil ones who, in spite of this, may well try to insinuate themselves at times. The good ones even go so far as to permit it, in order to exercise our sagacity in recognizing them, but they will have no influence. Spontaneous communications have a great usefulness when we are aware of the quality of those who surround us. We should, then, congratulate ourselves on the initiative left to the Spirits. The drawback is found only in the absolute system, which consists in abstaining from the direct appeal and from questions. Among the causes that powerfully influence the quality of the Spirits who frequent spiritist houses, one must not omit the nature of the things that are dealt with there. Those that set themselves a serious and useful aim attract, by that very fact, serious Spirits; those that aim only to satisfy vain curiosity or their personal interests expose themselves at the least to mystifications, when not to worse things. In short, we can extract from spiritist communications the most sublime and the most useful teachings, provided we know how to direct them. The whole question comes down to not letting ourselves be carried away by the cunning of mocking or malevolent Spirits. Now, for this the essential thing is to know with whom we are dealing. First, let us listen on this subject to the counsels that were given by the Spirit of Saint Louis to the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies through Mr. R…, one of its good mediums. It is a spontaneous communication received by him one day at his home, with the mission of transmitting it to the said Society:

— “However great may be the legitimate confidence that the Spirits who preside over your works inspire, there is a recommendation that will never be too much repeated and that you must always keep present in your mind, when you give yourselves over to your studies: weigh and mature; submit to the control of the most severe reason the totality of the communications that you receive; do not hesitate, as soon as a response seems to you doubtful or obscure, to demand the clarifications necessary to settle it.

“You know that revelation has existed since the most remote times, always appropriate to the degree of advancement of those who received it. Today it is not a matter of speaking to you by images and parables; you must receive our teachings in a manner that is clear, precise, and without ambiguity. However, it would be very convenient to have only to question in order to be enlightened; besides, that would be to escape the progressive laws that preside over universal evolution. Do not be astonished, then, if, in order to leave you the merit of choice and of labor, and also to punish the infractions you may commit against our counsels, it is sometimes permitted to certain Spirits, more ignorant than ill-intentioned, to answer in certain cases your questions. Instead of this being a motive for discouragement, it must be a powerful stimulus, that you may ardently search for the truth. Be, then, well convinced that, following this path, you cannot fail to arrive at happy results. Be united in heart and in intention; let all work; seek, seek always and you will find. Louis.

— However little tact, reasoning, or habit of observation we may have, the language of good and serious Spirits bears a seal that makes it impossible for us to be mistaken. As for the evil Spirits, however much they cover their baseness with the veil of hypocrisy, they can never play their role indefinitely; they end up letting the mask fall. Otherwise, if their language were unpolluted, they would be good Spirits. The language of the Spirits is, then, the true criterion by which we can judge them. Language being the expression of thought, it always carries a reflection of the good or bad qualities of the individual. Is it not also by language that we judge the men we do not know? If we receive twenty letters from twenty persons whom we have never seen, will we not be impressed in different ways by reading them? Will it not be by the qualities of style, by the choice of expressions, by the nature of the thoughts, and even by certain details of form, that we will recognize, in the one who writes to us, the rustic man and the well-bred one, the learned and the ignorant, the proud and the modest? It is absolutely the same thing with the Spirits. Let us suppose that they are men who write to us: we must judge them in the same manner. Let us judge them severely, for the good Spirits will in no way feel offended by this scrupulous investigation, because it is they themselves who recommend it to us as a means of control. Knowing that we can be deceived, our first sentiment must be one of distrust. Only the evil Spirits, who seek to lead us into error, can fear examination, because, far from provoking it, they want to be believed on their word.

From this principle there results very naturally and with sufficient logic the most effective means of driving away the evil Spirits and of guarding ourselves against their falsehoods. The man who is not heeded ceases to speak; the one who sees his stratagems constantly discovered will go to cause vexation elsewhere; the sharper, aware that we keep ourselves in a state of alert, makes no useless attempts. In the same way, the deceiving Spirits leave the game when they perceive that they can do nothing, or when they encounter vigilant persons who scorn everything that seems suspect to them.

— To conclude, it remains to review the principal characteristics that reveal the origin of spiritist communications.

The superior Spirits, as we have already said on several occasions, have a language always dignified, noble, elevated, without any mixture of triviality. They say everything with simplicity and modesty, never boast and make no ostentation of their knowledge nor of their position among the others. That of the inferior or vulgar Spirits always has some reflection of the human passions; every expression that denotes baseness, self-sufficiency, arrogance, bragging, or acrimony is a characteristic sign of inferiority and of deceit, in case the Spirit presents itself with a respectable and venerated name.

The good Spirits say only what they know; they keep silent or confess their ignorance about that which they do not know. The evil ones speak of everything with assurance, without troubling themselves about the truth. Every notorious scientific heresy, every principle that shocks reason and good sense denounces fraud, as soon as the Spirit presents itself as an enlightened being.

The language of elevated Spirits is always identical, if not as to form, at least as to substance. The thoughts are the same, whatever the time and the place. They may be more or less developed, according to circumstances, needs, and the facilities for communicating, but they are not contradictory. If two communications, bearing the same signature, are found to be in opposition, one of them will evidently be apocryphal, and the true one will be that in which nothing belies the known character of the personage. When a communication presents the character of sublimity and of elevation, without any defect, it is because it emanates from a superior Spirit, whatever its name may be; if it contains a mixture of good and bad, it proceeds from a vulgar Spirit, in case it presents itself as it is; it will be from an impostor Spirit if it adorns itself with a name that it cannot justify.

The good Spirits never give orders; they do not impose: they counsel and, if they are not heeded, they withdraw. The evil ones are imperious: they command and want to be obeyed. Every Spirit that imposes betrays its origin.

The good Spirits do not flatter. They approve when good is done, but always with reservations; the evil ones are prodigal in exaggerated praises, they stimulate pride and vanity, even while preaching humility, and they seek to exalt the personal importance of those whom they wish to catch.

The superior Spirits are above formal puerilities in all things; for them thought is everything, form is worth nothing. Only the vulgar Spirits can attach importance to certain details incompatible with truly elevated ideas. Every meticulous prescription is a sure sign of inferiority and of deceit on the part of a Spirit that takes an imposing name.

One must distrust the strange and ridiculous names taken by certain Spirits who wish to impose themselves upon credulity; it would be the supreme absurdity to take such names seriously.

One must likewise distrust those who very easily present themselves with extremely venerated names, and not accept their words except with the greatest reserve. It is above all in these cases that a severe control becomes necessary, for often it is a mask that they use to make us believe in supposed intimate relations with the Spirits of elevated hierarchy. By this means they flatter vanity, frequently taking advantage of it to induce lamentable or ridiculous attitudes.

The good Spirits are very scrupulous about the measures they may counsel; in all cases these always have a serious and eminently useful objective. One must, then, look upon as suspect all those that do not have this character, reflecting maturely before adopting them.

The good Spirits prescribe only good. Every maxim, every counsel that is not strictly in conformity with the pure evangelical charity cannot be the work of good Spirits; the same happens with every malevolent insinuation, tending to excite or to feed sentiments of hatred, of jealousy, and of egoism.

The good Spirits never counsel things that are not perfectly rational. Every recommendation that departs from the straight line of good sense or from the immutable laws of Nature denounces a limited Spirit still under the influence of terrestrial prejudices; consequently, little worthy of confidence.

The evil Spirits, or simply imperfect ones, still betray themselves by material signs about which we could not be mistaken. Their action upon the medium is at times violent, provoking in his writing abrupt and irregular movements, a feverish and convulsive agitation, that contrasts with the calm and the gentleness of the good Spirits.

Another sign of their presence is obsession. The good Spirits never obsess. The evil ones impose themselves at all moments, which is why every medium should distrust the irresistible need to write that seizes hold of him at the least opportune occasions. It is never a good Spirit, and he must never yield.

Among the inferior Spirits that intrude into communications, there are those who, so to speak, insinuate themselves furtively, as if to play a prank, but who withdraw as easily as they came, and this at the first summons; others, on the contrary, are tenacious, they cling to the individual and yield only reluctantly and with persistence. They take hold of him, subjugate him, and fascinate him to the point of making him take the coarsest absurdities for admirable things. Happy is he when cool-headed creatures succeed in opening his eyes, which is not always easy, since such Spirits are masters at inspiring distrust of and aversion to whoever may be able to unmask them. From this it follows that we must hold as suspect of inferiority or of bad intention every Spirit that prescribes isolation and withdrawal from the persons who can give good counsels. Self-love comes to their aid, because it is painful for us to confess that we have been the victim of a mystification and to recognize a rogue in the one under whose patronage we felt honored to place ourselves. This action of the Spirit is independent of the faculty of writing. In the absence of writing, the malevolent Spirit has a hundred different ways of acting and deceiving. For him writing is a means of persuasion, but it is not a cause; for the medium, it is a means of enlightening himself.

— Passing all written communications through the control of the preceding considerations, we will easily recognize their origin and will be able to thwart the malice of the deceiving Spirits, who address themselves only to those who let themselves be deceived voluntarily. If they perceive that we bend before their words, they will take advantage of this, exactly as simple mortals would do. It is for us, then, to prove to them that they are wasting their time. Let us add that, for this, prayer is a powerful aid; through it we attract the assistance of God and of the good Spirits, increasing our own strength. The precept is well known: “Help yourself, and heaven will help you.” Certainly God wishes to assist us, provided that, on our side, we do what is necessary.

To this precept we add an example. A gentleman whom I did not know came to see me one day, saying that he was a medium and received communications from a very elevated Spirit, who had charged him to come to me, to make a revelation to me concerning a plot which, according to him, was being woven against me, on the part of secret enemies whom he named. “Do you wish,” he added, “that I write in your presence?” — “With pleasure,” I answered, “but first I must tell you that these enemies are less to be feared than you suppose. I know that I have them; who does not have them? And the most obstinate in general are those whom we have most benefited. I am conscious of never having voluntarily done harm to anyone whatsoever. The same cannot be said by those who did me harm and, between us, God will be judge. Let us see, however, the counsel that your Spirit wishes to give me.” Then this gentleman wrote the following: “I have ordered C… (the name of that gentleman), who is the beacon of light of the good Spirits, from whom he received the mission to spread it among his brothers, to go to the house of Mr. Allan Kardec, who must believe blindly in what I tell him, because I belong to the number of the elect appointed by God to watch over the salvation of men, and because I come to announce the truth to him…”

That is enough — I said to him — do not take the trouble to continue. This exordium is sufficient to show with what kind of Spirit you are dealing. I will add only one word: for a Spirit that claims to be cunning, it is quite clumsy.

This gentleman seemed quite scandalized at the little regard I had for his Spirit, whom he had taken for some archangel or, at least, for some saint of the first class, come expressly for him. I said to him: This Spirit betrays itself in each of the words it has just written and, let us admit, hides its game very badly. First it gives orders; it wants, therefore, to keep you under its dependence, which is characteristic of obsessing Spirits; it calls you the beacon of light of the good Spirits, language tolerably bombastic and incomprehensible, very far from the simplicity that characterizes that of the good Spirits; by it, it flatters your pride and exalts your importance, which is enough to render it suspect. It places itself without the least ceremony in the rank of the elect appointed by God: a boastfulness unworthy of a truly superior Spirit. Finally it tells me that I must believe blindly; this crowns the work. It is indeed the style of those lying Spirits, who want us to believe in them on their word, for they know that in a serious examination they have everything to lose. With a little more perspicacity it would know that I do not let myself be convinced by fine words, nor would it have been so inept as to prescribe to me a blind confidence. From this I conclude that you are the plaything of a mystifying Spirit who abuses your good faith. I seriously exhort you to pay much attention to this, because, if you are not on your guard, you may be the victim of a lamentable blow on its part. I do not know whether that gentleman profited from the warning, for I saw him no more, nor his Spirit. I would never finish if I were to narrate all the communications of this kind submitted to me, at times very seriously, as emanating from the greatest saints, from the Virgin Mary and from Christ himself, and it would be truly curious to see the basenesses debited to the account of those venerated names. One must be blind to let oneself be deceived as to their origin, when, often, a single equivocal word, a single contradictory thought is sufficient to make the deceit discovered by whoever takes the trouble to reflect. As notable examples in its support, we urge our readers to refer to the articles published in the Spiritist Review relating to the months of July [Impostor Spirits: The false Father Ambrose,] and October of 1858. [The obsessed and the subjugated.]