Budget of Spiritism

Under this title, a former retired officer, ex-representative of the people in the Constituent Assembly of 1848, published in Algiers a brochure, in which, seeking to prove that the aim of Spiritism is a gigantic speculation, he makes calculations from which there result for us fabulous revenues, which leave far behind the millions with which a certain abbot of Lyon so generously gratified us (See the Review of June 1862). [See also the explanations of Allan Kardec in item 2 of the article:

Report of the cash of Spiritism.] To put our readers in a position to appreciate this interesting inventory, we quote it textually, as well as the conclusions of the author. Such an extract will give an idea of what the remainder of the brochure may contain, from the point of view of the appreciation of Spiritism.

“Without dwelling on the analysis of all the articles that apparently concern the proofs of neophytism and the discipline of the Society, we draw the reader's attention to articles 15 and 16. Everything is there.

“There he will see that, under the pretext of providing for the expenses of the Society, each titular member pays: 1st — an entrance fee of 10 fr.; 2nd — an annual quota of 24 fr.; and each free member pays a quota of 20 fr. per year.

“The quotas are paid in full for the year, that is, in advance: Mr. Allan Kardec takes his precautions against desertions.

“Now, by the enthusiasm that one notes everywhere for Spiritism, we believe we are being modest in counting only 3,000 members for Paris, both free and titular. Such quotas, then, would amount to 63,000 fr. per year, without considering the entrance fees that served to set up the business.

“We shall count only roughly the profits from the sale of The Spirits' Book and The Mediums' Book. They must be considerable, for we know of no work in greater vogue, a vogue founded on the insatiable desire that leads man to penetrate the mystery of the future life.

“But, from what precedes, we have not yet shown the most abundant source of profits. There exists a monthly Spiritist review, published by Mr. Allan Kardec, an indigestible collection that far surpasses the marvelous legends of Antiquity and the Middle Ages, whose annual subscription is 10 fr. for Paris, 12 fr. for the provinces, and 14 fr. for abroad.

“Now, which of the numerous adherents of Spiritism would, for lack of 10 fr. per year (about 90 centimes per month), deprive himself of his share of apparitions, evocations, manifestations of Spirits, and legends? One cannot, then, count, in France and abroad, fewer than 30,000 subscribers to the Review, producing an annual total of 300,000 fr.

“Which, with the quotas of 63,000 fr.

“give a total of 363,000 fr.

“The expenses to be deducted are:

“1st The rent of the Society's session hall, the salaries of the secretaries, of the treasurer, service assistants, and a good number of mediums. We judge ourselves to be above reality in calculating these expenses at 40,000 fr.

“Cost price of the Review: A number of 32 pages does not cost more than 20 centimes; the twelve numbers of the year will cost 2 fr. 40 c., which, repeated 30,000 times, give the figure of 72,000 fr.

“Total of expenses……………

112,000 fr.

Subtracting these expenditures from the 363,000 fr., there remains for Mr. Allan Kardec a net annual profit of 250,000 fr., without counting that from the sale of The Spirits' Book and The Mediums' Book.

“The way the epidemic is marching, within a short time France will be Spiritist, if it is not already so in fact; and since one cannot be a good Spiritist if one is not at least a free member and subscriber to the Review, it is probable that among 20 million inhabitants, of which that half is composed, there will be 5 million members and an equal number of subscribers to the Review. Consequently, the income of the presidents and vice-presidents of the Spiritist societies will be 100 million per year, and that of Mr. Allan Kardec, proprietor of the Review and sovereign pontiff, 38 million. “If Spiritism wins over the other half of France, this income will be doubled; and, if Europe lets itself be infested, it must be counted no longer in millions, but in billions.

“What ingenuousness, Spiritists! What do you think of this speculation based on your simplicity? Could you ever have imagined that from the game of turning tables such treasures could come forth? And now are you edified by the ardor with which the propagators of the doctrine found societies?

“Are they not right who say that human stupidity is an inexhaustible mine to be exploited?

“Examining now the means put into practice by Mr. Allan Kardec, his skill as a speculator will be the only thing that cannot be cast into doubt.

“He knows that, on the wave of the universal success of the turning tables, there is found ready-made, and without costing a centime, the most difficult thing to obtain: publicity.

“Now, in such circumstances, to promise to unveil, by means of the turning tables, the mysteries of the hereafter and of the future life, was to address oneself to an immense clientele, avid for these mysteries and, consequently, disposed to listen to his revelations. Then, thinking that the existing religions could take from him a good number of adherents, he proclaims their decadence. One reads in his brochure Spiritism in Its Simplest Expression (p. 15): “From the religious point of view, Spiritism has for its basis the fundamental truths of all religions: God, the soul, immortality, future penalties and rewards; but it is independent of any particular religion.” “This doctrine, made to order to seduce the ever-growing number of men who no longer wish to bear any social hierarchy, could not fail to produce its effects.

(Remark — In your opinion, then, there are many for whom the yoke of religion is insupportable!)

“What surprises us extremely is that, in authorizing the preaching of Spiritism, the government has not seen that this audacious attempt contains the germ of the abolition of its own authority; because, after all, when the epidemic shall have grown still more, is it not possible that, by injunction of the Spirits, there be decreed the abolition of an authority that may threaten the existence of Spiritism? “One could, without danger, permit the Spiritist societies. But would it not be a sensible measure to prohibit their publications?

“The sect would have confined itself to the precincts of the sessions and would probably never have surpassed the impact of the performances of Conus or of Robert Houdin.

“But the law is atheistic, said modern philosophy; and it is by virtue of this paradox that a man has been able to proclaim the downfall of the authority of the Church.

“This example, be it said in passing, would demonstrate to less clear-sighted eyes the wisdom of the legislators of antiquity, who did not believe that material order could coexist with moral disorder, binding so intimately, in their codes, the civil laws and the religious laws.

“If it were in the power of Humanity to destroy the spiritual creations of God, the first effect of Spiritism would be to tear Hope from the heart of man.

“What would man hope for on Earth, if he acquired the conviction (we do not say the proof) that after death he will have at his disposal, and indefinitely, several corporeal existences?

“Is this dogma, which is nothing other than the metempsychosis taken from Pythagoras, not capable of weakening in man the sentiment of duty and of making him say here: For later the serious matters? Does not charity, so strongly recommended by Christ and by the Church, and of which Spiritism itself affects to make the cornerstone of its edifice, receive a mortal blow?

“Another effect of Spiritism is to transform faith, which is an act of free will and of volition, into a blind credulity.

“Thus, to make the speculation of Spiritism or of the turning tables triumph, Mr. Allan Kardec preaches a doctrine whose tendency is the destruction of faith, of hope, and of charity.

“In spite of this, let the Christian world be reassured, for Spiritism will not prevail against the Church.

“One will recognize all the value of a religious principle (as the Lord Bishop of Algiers says, in his letter of February 13, 1863, to the vicars of his diocese), because it suffices of itself alone to overcome all hesitations, all oppositions, and all resistances.”

“But are there true Spiritists? — We shall not deny it, so long as a man feels that hope is not extinguished in his heart.

“What, then, is there in Spiritism? Nothing more than speculators and simpletons. And on the day when the temporal authority shall understand its solidarity with the moral authority and shall merely confine itself to prohibiting the Spiritist publications, this immoral speculation will fall to rise no more.”

The Algiers newspaper, Akhbar, of March 28, 1863, in an article as indulgent as the brochure, reproducing a part of the arguments, concludes that it is duly proven, by authentic calculations, that Spiritism currently gives us a positive income of 250,000 fr. per year. The author of the brochure sees things even more largely, for his forecasts raise it within a few years to 38 million, that is, to a figure superior to the civil list of the richest sovereigns of Europe. We shall certainly not give ourselves the trouble of combating calculations that refute themselves by their very exaggeration, but that prove one thing: the dread that the rapid propagation of Spiritism causes to its adversaries, to the point of leading them to say the greatest inconsistencies. In fact, let us admit for an instant the reality of the author's figures: would it not be the most energetic protest against the present-day ideas, which would crumble throughout the whole world before the idea put forth by a single man, unknown until six years ago? Is it not to recognize the irresistible force of that idea? You say that it tends to supplant religion, and, to prove it, you present it as soon adopted by twenty million, then by forty million inhabitants, in France alone; then you exclaim: “No, religion cannot perish.” But if your forecasts are realized, what will remain for religion? Let us also make a little statistic of the figures, according to the author: in France, 36 million inhabitants; Spiritists, 40 million; there remains for the Catholics less than 4 million, because, in your opinion, one cannot be Catholic and Spiritist. If the Church is so easily overthrown by one individual with the aid of an extravagant idea, is it not to recognize that it rests on a very fragile base? To say that it can be compromised by an absurdity is to make little of the power of its arguments and to confess the secret of its own weakness. Where, then, is its unbreakable base? We wish for the Church a defender stronger and, above all, more logical than the author of the brochure. Nothing is more dangerous than an imprudent friend. One does not think of everything. The author did not reflect that, in wishing to denigrate us, he exalts our importance, although the means he employs goes exactly against his aim. Money being the god of our epoch, he who possesses it in the greatest quantity does not lack courtiers, attracted by the hope of the spoils. The billions with which he gratifies us, far from driving people away from us, would put even princes at our feet. What would the author say if, considering that we have no children, we made him our legatee of a few tens of millions? Would he find the source bad? This would be enough to make him say that Spiritism is good for something. In his opinion, one of the sources of our immense revenues is the Society of Paris, which he supposes to have at least 3,000 members. First of all, we could ask him by what right he comes to meddle in private affairs; but we pass over it. Since he prides himself on so much exactness, and this is necessary when one wishes to prove with figures, if he had only given himself the trouble of reading the report of the Society, published in the Review of June 1862, he could have formed a more exact idea of its resources, and of what he calls the budget of Spiritism. Gathering the information elsewhere, and not in his imagination, he would have known that the Society, officially classified among the scientific societies, is neither a confraternity nor a congregation, but a simple gathering of persons who occupy themselves with the study of a new science, which it deepens; that, far from aiming at numbers, more harmful than useful to its works, it restricts them rather than increases them, by the difficulty of admissions; that, instead of 3,000 members, it never had a hundred; that it does not remunerate any of its functionaries, neither presidents, vice-presidents, nor secretaries; that it employs no paid medium and has always risen up against the exploitation of the mediumistic faculty; that it has never received a centime from the few visitors it admits and has never opened its doors to the public; that, apart from the contributing members, no Spiritist is tributary to it; that the honorary members pay no quota; that between it and the other Spiritist societies there exists no affiliation or material solidarity; that the product of the quotas never passes through the hands of the president; that every expense, however small, cannot be made without the deliberation of the committee; in short, that its budget of 1862 was closed thanks to a reserve of 429 fr. 40 c. Does this feeble result invalidate the growing importance of Spiritism? No; on the contrary, it proves that the Society of Paris is not a speculation for anyone. And when the author seeks to excite animosity against us, telling the adherents that they are ruining themselves to our profit, they will simply answer that it is a calumny, because nothing is asked of them and they pay nothing. One could say the same of everyone, and could one not return to others the argument of the author, with figures more authentic than his? As for the thirty thousand subscribers to the Review, we wish for them. “Calumniate, calumniate — said an author — and something will always remain.” Yes, certainly; there will always remain something that, sooner or later, falls back upon the calumniator. Insults, calumnies, manifest inventions, even intrusion into private life, with a view to casting disrepute upon an individual and upon a numerous class of persons, this brochure, which has far surpassed all the diatribes published until today, has all the conditions required to be brought to justice. We have not done so, despite the solicitations addressed to us in this regard, because it is a piece of good fortune for Spiritism, and we would not like, at the cost of still greater insults, that it had not been published. Our adversaries could do nothing better for their own discredit, showing to what sad expedients they have been reduced in order to attack us, and to what point the success of the new ideas terrifies them. And, we could say, makes them lose their heads. The effect of this brochure was to provoke an enormous burst of laughter in all those who know us, and these are numerous. As for those who do not know us, it must inspire in them a lively desire to know this improvised Nabob, who gathers millions more easily than one gathers coins, and for whom it suffices to throw out an idea to make the population of a whole empire adhere to it.

Now, since, according to the author, he attracts only fools, it results that this empire is composed of fools, from the top to the bottom of the scale. The History of Humanity offers no example of such a phenomenon. Had the author been paid for such a result, he could not have done better. Thus, we have nothing to complain of.

[see also the “Écho de Sétif” to Mr. Leblanc de Prébois.]

[1] [Louis Leblanc de Prébois — Budget du spiritisme, ou Exploitation de la crédulité humaine. In-8º.

Challamel. 75 c.]

[2] They write to us from Algeria, and we give it with reserve, that the author of the brochure was part of a Spiritist group; that his zeal for its cause had raised him to the presidency; but that, later, for not having wished to renounce certain projects disapproved of by the other members, he had been deposed.