Revenge

Revenge is sweet to the heart, said the poet. Oh! poor blind ones, who give free rein to the most horrendous of passions, you believe you are doing harm to your neighbor when you strike him, and you do not notice that the blows turn back against you. It is not only a crime, but an absurd lack of skill. It is, like its brothers rancor, hatred, and jealousy, children of pride, the means used by the Spirits of darkness to draw to themselves those whom they fear may escape them; it is the most infallible instrument of perdition placed in the hands of men by the enemies who relentlessly pursue their moral decay. Resist, children of Earth, that culpable enticement, and be assured that, if someone has deserved your wrath, it is not in the paroxysm of rancor that you will find calmness of conscience. Place in the hands of the Almighty the care of pronouncing upon your rights and upon the justice of your cause. There is in revenge something impious and degrading to the Spirit. No, revenge is not compatible with perfection. As long as a soul preserves such a sentiment, it will remain in the most miserable regions of the world of Spirits. But, like the others, yours will not be the eternal plaything of that unhappy passion; and I can guarantee that the abolition of the false notion of the eternal hell, or rather of eternal damnation, which has served as a pretext or excuse for acts of revenge, will be the dawn of a new era of tolerance and meekness, which will not be long in extending even to the regions deprived of moral life. Could man condemn revenge when God was presented to him as jealous and avenging himself through endless tortures? Cease, then, O men, to insult the Divinity by lending it your most ignoble passions. Then you will be, O inhabitants of Earth, a people blessed by God. You who listen to me, act so that, your soul freed from the culpable and shameful motive of the acts most contrary to charity, you may deserve to be admitted into the sacred enclosure whose gates only charity can open. Pierre Ange, Protecting Spirit.