Reaction of spiritualist ideas.

For a century society has been worked upon by materialist ideas, reproduced in every form, finding expression in the majority of literary and artistic works. Incredulity was in fashion, and it was good form to display the negation of everything, even of God. The present life, there is the positive; outside of this, all is chimera or uncertainty; let us therefore live as well as possible, since, afterward, we do not know what will come. Such was the reasoning of those who claimed to be above prejudices and who, for this reason, called themselves strong minds. It must be granted that they were the greater number among those who moved society and were charged with leading it, and whose example must necessarily have had great influence. The clergy itself suffered this influence; the conduct, private or public, of many of its members, in complete disagreement with their teachings and those of Christ, proved that they did not believe in what they preached, for had they firmly believed in the future life and in the chastisements, they would have despised the interests of Heaven less for those of the Earth. Thus, they had sought all the foundations of human institutions in the order of material things, ending by recognizing that these institutions lacked a solid point of support, since those that seemed best established collapsed on a day of tempest; that repressive laws masked vices but did not make men better. What was this point of support? There is the question; but they sought, and some ended by believing that God might well have something to do with the Universe. Then some strong minds began to be afraid and, in order to laugh at the future only with their lips, said: They claim that everything ends with death; but, in the final analysis, what do those who affirm it know of it? After all, it is merely their opinion. Before Christopher Columbus it was likewise believed that there was nothing beyond the ocean. And what if there should be, then, something beyond the tomb? It would be interesting to know it, for, if there is something, all of us must pass through it, since all of us will die. How does one fare there? Well? Ill? The question is important and ought to be considered. But if we survive, it will certainly not be our body. Have we, then, a soul? Then would the soul not be a chimera? What is this soul like? whence does it come? whither does it go? From this a vague disquiet took hold of the greatest swaggerers in the face of death; they set about seeking, discussing; then, recognizing that, whatever they did, they would never be completely well off on the Earth, sometimes even very badly off, they cast their gaze and their hopes toward the future. All extreme things have their reaction, when they are not in the truth; only the truth is immutable. Materialist ideas had reached their apogee; then it was perceived that they did not give what was expected of them; that they left a void in the heart; that they opened an unfathomable abyss, from which one recoiled with terror, as before a precipice; from this an aspiration toward the unknown and, consequently, an inevitable reaction toward spiritualist ideas, as the only possible way out. It is such a reaction that has manifested for some years; but man has reached one of the culminating points of intelligence. Now, at that age in which the faculty of comprehension is full-grown, he can no longer be led as in childhood or in adolescence. The positivism of life has taught him to seek; we say more, it has made necessary to him the why and the how of each thing, for in our mathematical century there is need to give an account of everything, to calculate everything, to measure everything, in order to know where we set our foot. Even in abstraction we want certainty, if not material, at least moral; it is not enough to say whether a thing is good or bad, one wishes to know why it is so, and whether or not there is reason to prescribe it or forbid it; that is why blind faith no longer has currency in our reasoning century. It is not asked only that one have faith; faith is desired, today its thirst is felt, because it is a necessity; but a reasoned faith is wanted. To discuss one's belief is a demand of the age, to which, for good or ill, one must resign oneself. Spiritualist ideas respond well to the general aspirations, being preferred to skepticism and to the idea of nothingness, because it is known, instinctively, that they are right, but they satisfy only imperfectly, because they still leave the soul in uncertainty and are powerless to give, by themselves alone, the solution of a multitude of problems. The simple spiritualist is in the position of a man who perceives his goal, but does not yet know which is the road that leads to it and meets obstacles along the way. That is why, in these latter times, so great a number of writers and philosophers have set about sounding these mysterious secrets, for many systems have been created with a view to resolving innumerable problems that remain without solution. Whether these systems be rational, or absurd, they do not on that account fail to bear witness to the spiritualist tendencies of the age, of which mystery is no longer made, which one does not seek to conceal and of which, on the contrary, one glories, as formerly one gloried in one's incredulity. If none of these systems reached the complete truth, it is incontestable that several approached it or touched upon it, and that the discussion which followed prepared the way, predisposing minds to this kind of study. It was under these circumstances, eminently favorable, that Spiritism arrived; earlier, it would have collided against all-powerful materialism; in a more distant time, it would have been smothered by blind fanaticism. It presents itself at the moment when fanaticism, killed by the incredulity it itself provoked, can no longer impose upon it a serious barrier, and when one is wearied of the void left by materialism; at the moment when the spiritualist reaction, provoked by the very excesses of materialism, takes hold of all minds, when one is in search of the great solutions that concern the future of Humanity. It is, then, at this moment that it comes to resolve these problems, not by hypotheses, but by effective proofs, giving to Spiritism the positive character, the only one suited to our age. In it is found what is sought and what was not found elsewhere: that is why it is accepted so easily. Thousands of organs have opened and continue to open the way for it, sowing little by little the ideas it professes. One must not believe that in this case there are only serious works, read by a small number of scholars! Note how greatly, under a light form, that of the novel or the feuilleton, Spiritist thoughts abound at this moment; through these they penetrate everywhere, even among those who think of it least. They are so many latent germs that will burst forth when the great light comes, for they will be familiar with the new ideas. One of the most important principles of Spiritism is, incontestably, that of the plurality of corporeal existences, that is, of reincarnation, which skeptics confuse, through bad faith or through ignorance, with the dogma of metempsychosis. Without this principle we collide with so many insoluble difficulties in the moral and psychological order, that many modern philosophers were led to it by the force of reasoning, as to a necessary law of Nature; such are Charles Fourier, Jean Reynaud, and many others. This principle, today openly discussed by men of great worth, without their being on that account Spiritists, has a clear tendency to introduce itself into modern philosophy. Once in possession of this key, philosophy will see new horizons open before it and the most arduous difficulties will be smoothed away as if by enchantment. Now, it cannot fail to arrive at this; to it philosophy will be led by the force of things, because the plurality of existences is not a system, but a law of Nature, which stands out from the evidence of facts. Without being so clearly formulated as in Fourier and Reynaud, nor presented as a doctrine, the principle of the plurality of existences is now found in a number of writers and, from there, in every mouth, so that it may be said to be the order of the day and tends to take its place among common beliefs, although, in many, it precedes the knowledge of Spiritism. It is a natural consequence of the spiritualist reaction which is operating at the moment, and to which Spiritism comes to give a powerful impulse. For quotations, we would have difficulty in the choice. We shall limit ourselves to the following passage, from one of the latest novels of Mrs.

George Sand: [Mademoiselle de La Quintinie - Google Books], a notable philosophical work, placed on the index by the Roman curia, as well as the [Revue Des Deux Mondes - Google Books], which published it in the issues of March 1 and 15, April, and May 1863. It concerns a priest very guilty, brought to repentance, to reparation, and to terrestrial expiation by the severe counsels of a layman who, among other things, says to him:

“You say that you have passed the age of the passions!… No, for you are entering that of vengeances and persecutions. Beware! But, whatever your lot may be among us, you will one day see clearly beyond the grave; and as I no longer believe in endless chastisements, any more than in fruitless trials, I announce to you that we shall meet somewhere, where we shall understand each other better and shall love one another, instead of fighting one another. But, like you also, I do not believe in the impunity of evil and in the efficacy of error. I believe that you will expiate in another existence the voluntary hardening of your heart, by means of great lacerations of feeling. Nevertheless, it rests only with you to enter upon the straight path of progressive happiness, for I am certain that everything can be redeemed beginning in this life. The human soul is endowed with magnificent forces of repentance and of rehabilitation. This is not contrary to your dogmas, and your word of contrition says much.” In a forthcoming article we shall examine Mr. Renan's work on the life of Jesus and shall show that, in spite of appearances and without the author knowing it, it is still a product of the spiritualist reaction. However much materialism proclaims nothingness, in vain it shakes the circle of logic and of universal conscience that encloses it; its last cries are stifled by the voice that cries to it from the four corners of the world: “We have an immortal soul!” But to whom will the reaction profit? That is what a future not very distant will tell us.

While waiting for us to speak of Mr. Renan's work, we insistently recommend to our readers a small brochure, in which the question seems to us considered from a very rational point of view, and which contains observations very judicious on this delicate question. Its title is: Réflexions d'un orthodoxe de l'Église grecque sur la Vie de Jésus, par M. Renan. (Chez MM. Didier et Ce. Price, 50 cent.) [See the book of the Abbé Anglade on the work of M. Renan. - Google Books.].