Inauguration of a Spiritist Group in Bordeaux.

In spite of a certain ill will, Spiritist groups multiply daily. For us it is a pleasure and a duty to present to our numerous readers the address delivered in Bordeaux, at the inauguration of one of them, by its founder, Mr. Condat, on March 20, 1862. The manner in which the serious question of Spiritism is regarded in it proves, now, how well its essential objective and its true scope are understood. We feel happy to say that such a sentiment is general today, because everywhere curiosity gives way to the desire for instruction and improvement. This is what we were able to observe in the visits we made to several towns of the interior. We saw their interest in instructive communications and their esteem for the mediums who receive them. This is a characteristic fact in the history of the establishment of Spiritism. We are in no way acquainted with the group to which we refer, but we judge its tendencies by the inaugural address. The orator would not have sustained such language in the presence of a frivolous and superficial audience, gathered to amuse itself. It is the serious meetings that give a serious idea of Spiritism. This is why it would never be too much to encourage their multiplication. Ladies and Gentlemen, In asking you to accept my thanks for the kind reception of my invitation, allow me to address a few words to you on the reason for our meeting. In the absence of talent, I hope, at least, that you will find the conviction of a man profoundly devoted to the progress of Humanity.

Often the intrepid traveler, aspiring to reach the summit of a mountain, finds a narrow path obstructed by a rock. Often too, in the course of the ages, Humanity, which tends to draw nearer to God, encounters its obstacle: its rock is materialism. It halts for some time, perhaps centuries; but the invincible force it obeys, acting in proportion to the resistance, triumphs over the obstacle, and Humanity, ever invited to march forward, resumes its journey with a more lively impulse.

Let us not be astonished, then, gentlemen, when one of those great ideas which best reveal the celestial origin of man manifests itself, when one of those prodigious facts occurs which come to disturb the restricted calculations and the limited observations of materialist science; let us not be alarmed and, above all, let us not allow ourselves to be discouraged by the resistances opposed to all that may serve to demonstrate that man is not merely a bit of clay whose elements will be returned to the earth after death.

Rather let us observe, and let us observe with joy, we, the adepts of Spiritism, children of the nineteenth century, which, in its turn, was the most complete manifestation, so to speak the incarnation, of skepticism and of its disheartening consequences; let us observe it: Humanity is on the march!

See the progress that Spiritism makes here, in this beautiful, great, and intelligent city; see how everywhere doubt is extinguished in the light of the new science.

Let us count, gentlemen, and let us confess with sincerity, how many of us, who only yesterday, with a smile of incredulity on our lips, are today with a foot on the road and the heart resolved not to retreat? It is understandable: we are in the current and are carried along by it. What, then, is this doctrine, gentlemen? Where does it lead us?

To raise the courage of man, to sustain him in his moments of weakness, to fortify him against the vicissitudes of life, to revive his faith, to prove to him the immortality of the soul, not only by demonstrations, but by facts: this is the doctrine, this is where it leads!

What other doctrine will produce upon the moral and intellectual nature better results? Could it be the denial of a future life that might be opposed to it as preferable, in the interest of all Humanity and for the moral and intellectual perfection of each man individually?

Taking as a principle the words that sum up materialism: “All ends when the tomb opens” — what can be produced with that maxim, except nothingness? I experience a kind of painful sensation, a shame at having drawn a parallel between these two extremes: the hope of finding, in a better world, our beloved ones whose souls have spread their wings, and the invincible horror that we experience, that the atheist himself experiences, at the thought that everything would be annihilated with the last breath of the mortal part of our being—this would suffice to repel all idea of comparison. Nevertheless, gentlemen, if all the consolations contained in Spiritism were no more than a belief, if they were merely a system of pure speculation, an ingenious fiction, as the apostles of materialism object, devised to subject weak intelligences to certain rules, arbitrarily called virtue, and thus to hold them back from the seductive appetites of matter—a compensation which on a day of pity the author of that fatal order, who gives everything to some and reserves suffering for the majority, would have granted to the latter to stupefy it. Gentlemen, for strong intelligences, for the man who knows how to make legitimate use of reason, would not those ingenious combinations, established as consequences of a baseless principle and as the mere fruit of imagination, be one more torment, added to the torments of a fatality from which they could not escape? Without doubt demonstration is an admirable thing; it proves, above all, human reason, the soul, that abstraction of matter. But until this day its sole point of departure was this maxim of Descartes: “I think, therefore I am.” Today, Spiritism has come to give an immense force to the principle of the immortality of the soul, supported by tangible, irrefutable facts.

What precedes explains how and why we are gathered here. But, gentlemen, allow me still to communicate to you an impression that I have always felt, a desire constantly renewed, each time I find myself in the presence of a society that has as its aim the perfecting of the moral man. I would have liked to have been present at the first meeting, to have taken part in the first communications from soul to soul of the founders, to have presided over the development of the germ of the idea which, like the grain become a giant, later produced abundant fruits.

Well then, gentlemen! today, when I have the honor of gathering you to propose the formation of a new Spiritist group, my idea has full acceptance; and, like me, I ask you to preserve in your heart, in your memory, the date of March 20.

Now, gentlemen, it is time to pass to practice: perhaps I have lingered too long. Without transition, to repair the loss of the time, generously granted for a few effusions, I shall approach the objective of our meeting, asking that you guard yourselves against an objection that will naturally present itself to your mind, as it presented itself to mine, regarding the indispensable necessity of mediums when one wishes to form a Spiritist group. Here, gentlemen, is an apparent difficulty, and not a difficulty. To begin with, be assured that our meetings will not become sterile through the simple absence of mediums. This is an idea that I present to you, asking for your opinion. We shall proceed thus: The first part of each session would be devoted to the reading of The Spirits' Book and of The Mediums' Book. The second would be consecrated to the formation of mediums among us and, believe me, gentlemen, if we follow the counsels and the teachings given in those works of our venerated chief, Mr. Allan Kardec, the mediumistic faculty will not be slow to develop in most of us, an occasion on which our labors will receive their sweetest, broadest reward, for God, the great Creator of all things, the infallible judge, will not be mistaken as to the good use we wish to make of the precious mediumistic faculty. He will not fail, then, to give us the most beautiful reward we could aspire to, and to permit that one of us, at least, obtain such a faculty in the same degree as several serious mediums whom, this evening, we have the happiness to count in our midst. Our beloved brothers Gourgues and Sabò, whom I have the honor of presenting to you, by attending our inaugural session, have wished to give it a higher degree of solemnity. May they give us the hope—we beseech them—and may they, with as much frequency as possible, come to visit us. Their presence will fortify our faith and enliven the ardor of some of us who, at the failure of the first mediumistic attempts, might fall into discouragement.

Above all, gentlemen, let us not go astray. Let us render account of our undertaking and of its objective. He would seriously deceive himself who were tempted to take part in the new group we are going to form, moved only by the hope of finding futile distractions outside the true morality proclaimed by the good Spirits.

“The essential aim of Spiritism”—said our venerated chief—“is the betterment of creatures. In it one should seek only that which can aid moral and intellectual progress. Lastly, one must not lose sight of the fact that belief in Spiritism is profitable only to him of whom it can be said: He is better today than yesterday.”

Thus, let us not forget that our poor planet is a purgatorial station, where, in the present existence, we expiate the faults committed in the preceding ones. This proves one thing, gentlemen: that none of us can call himself perfect, because, as long as we have faults to expiate, we shall reincarnate. Our presence on Earth attests, then, to our imperfection.

Spiritism has planted the markers of the road that leads to the feet of God. Let us march without ever losing sight of them. The line traced by the good Spirits, geometers of the Divinity, is surrounded by precipices; heath and thorns are its borders. Let us not fear their wounds. What are such wounds, compared to the eternal happiness that will welcome the traveler who has reached the end of his journey?

That end, that objective, gentlemen, has long been the object of my meditations. Embracing my past with a glance, and turning to recognize the thornbush that had wounded me, the obstacle that had made me stumble on the path, I did not fail to do what every man does, at least once in his life: the reckoning, so to speak, of joys and sorrows, of the good moments of courage and the hours of discouragement. And, with my head calm, my soul free, that is, concentrated upon itself, detached from matter, I said to myself: Human existence is but a dream, but a horrible dream, which begins when the soul or incarnate Spirit of the child is enlightened by the first glimmers of intelligence, to end in the swoon of death. Death! This word of terror for so many people is in truth only the awakening from that horrible sleep, the benefactor who rescues us, who delivers us from the unbearable nightmare that accompanies us, step by step, from birth. I speak in general terms, but not in an absolute manner. The life of the man of goodness no longer has these same characteristics; that which he has done that is good, great, and useful illuminates with pure light the dream of his existence. For him, the passage from life to death is made without painful transition; he leaves nothing behind him that could compromise the future of his new spiritual existence, the reward of his benefactions.

But, on the contrary, for those who, voluntary blind ones, have constantly kept their eyes closed the better to deny the existence of God, who have refused the contemplation of the sublime spectacle of his divine works, proofs and manifestations of his goodness, his justice, his power, I shall say that they will have a terrible awakening, full of bitter laments, above all for having disregarded the beneficial counsels of their Spiritist brothers; the moral suffering they will have to endure will last until the day when a sincere repentance awakens the divine pity, which will grant them the grace of a new incarnation. Many persons still see in Spiritist communications the work of the demon; nevertheless, their number diminishes each day. That happy diminution is evidently due to curiosity, causing people to visit Spiritist groups or to read The Spirits' Book, and because among the number of the curious there are creatures who become convinced, especially among those who read that book. For, gentlemen, do not believe that you can attract many adepts to our sublime doctrine by first having them attend our sessions. No; I have the intimate conviction that a person completely a stranger to the doctrine will not be convinced by what he sees in our meetings; he will rather be ready to laugh at the phenomena than to take them seriously. As for me, gentlemen, I shall have done much more for the new doctrine when, instead of taking someone to attend one of our sessions, I have him read The Spirits' Book. Having made sure that the reading has been done and has yielded the fruits it ought to produce, oh! then I take that person with satisfaction to a Spiritist group, because only at that moment am I certain that he will give an account to himself of all that he sees and hears; and he who would probably have laughed before the reading of that book will present effects diametrically opposite. I do not mean to say that he will weep.

And to conclude, gentlemen, nothing is better than a quotation n from The Spirits' Book; it will convince, more than my feeble arguments permit, those who still doubt the true basis upon which the Spiritist beliefs rest:

“Those who say that Spiritist beliefs threaten to invade the world proclaim, ipso facto, the force of Spiritism, because an idea without foundation and destitute of logic could never become universal. Thus, if Spiritism establishes itself everywhere, if, principally among the cultivated classes, it recruits adepts, as everyone will easily recognize, it is because it has a foundation of truth. Vain, against this tendency, will be all the efforts of its detractors, and the proof is that the very ridicule with which they seek to cover it, far from deadening its impetus, seems to have given it new vigor, a result that fully justifies what the Spirits have repeatedly said: ‘Do not be disturbed by the opposition; all that they do against you will turn to your advantage, and your greatest adversaries, without wishing it, will serve your cause. Against the will of God the ill will of men cannot prevail.’” Condat.

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Translator's note: See item V. – Conclusion of The Spirits' Book. (Part Four.)