A repentant criminal.

— During the visit we have just made to the Spiritists of Brussels, the following fact occurred in our presence, in an intimate meeting of seven or eight persons, on September 13.

A lady medium was asked to write, without any special evocation having been made. Assailed by extraordinary agitation, and after having violently scrawled over the paper, she wrote in very thick characters these words:

“I repent! I repent! Latour.”

Surprised by the unexpected communication, in no way provoked, since no one had thought of this unfortunate man, whose death until then was unknown to a part of those present, we addressed to the Spirit words of comfort and commiseration, then putting to him this question:

— What motive led you to manifest yourself here, in preference to another place, when we did not evoke you?

The medium answers aloud:

“I saw that you, compassionate souls, would have pity on me, whereas others evoked me more out of curiosity than out of charity, or drew away from me in horror.”

Then there began an indescribable scene, which lasted no more than half an hour. The medium, joining gestures and the expression of her countenance to the words, made evident the identification of the Spirit with her person; at times, those gestures of cruel despair vividly portrayed his suffering; the tone of her voice was so contrite, the supplications so vehement, that we were profoundly moved. Some were even terrified by the medium's overexcitement, but we knew that the manifestation of a repentant being, who implores pity, could offer no danger whatsoever. If he sought the organs of the medium, it is because he the more desired to make plain his situation, so that we might take greater interest in his fate, and not like the obsessing and possessing Spirits, who aim to take hold of mediums in order to dominate them. Such a manifestation had perhaps been permitted to him not only for his own benefit, but also for the edification of those present. Behold him exclaiming:

“Oh! yes, pity… I have great need of it… You do not know what I suffer… You do not know it, and you could not understand it. It is horrible! The guillotine!… What is the guillotine compared to this suffering of now? Nothing! — it is an instant. This fire that devours me, yes, it is worse, because it is a continual death, without truce or rest… without end!… And my victims, there they are around me, showing me their wounds, pursuing me with their gazes… “There they are, and I see them all… all… without being able to flee from them! And this sea of blood?! And this gold stained with blood? It is all there!… all… and ever before my eyes! And the smell of blood… Do you not smell it? Oh! Blood and ever blood! Behold them imploring, the poor victims, and I striking them ever… ever… mercilessly!… The blood intoxicates me… I believed that after death all would be ended, and so it was that I faced the torture and faced God Himself, denying Him!… Yet, when I believed myself annihilated forever, what a terrible awakening… oh! yes, terrible, surrounded by corpses, by menacing specters, my feet mired in blood!!… I believed myself dead, and I am alive! Alive to see all this again! to see it incessantly!… Horrendous! horrendous! more horrendous than all the tortures of the Earth! Ah! if all men could know what there is beyond life, they would also know how costly are the consequences of evil! Surely there would be no more murders, nor criminals, nor malefactors! I would only wish that all murderers could see what I see and suffer… “Oh! then they would be so no longer, because this suffering is horrible! Well do I know that I deserved it, oh! my God, because I too had no compassion on my victims; I repelled the suppliant hands when they implored me to spare them… Yes, I was cruel, certainly, killing them in cowardice to rob them! And I was impious, and I was a blasphemer too, denying your most sacred name… I wished to deceive myself, because I wanted to persuade myself that you did not exist… My God, I am great and criminal! Now I understand it. But… will you not have pity on me?… You are God, that is, goodness, mercy! You are omnipotent! Pity, Lord, Pity! I beg it of you, do not be inexorable; deliver me from these hateful gazes, from these horrible specters… from this blood… from my victims… gazes that, like daggers, pierce through my heart. “You others, who are here, who hear me, be kind, charitable souls. Yes, I see it, I know that you have pity on me, is it not true? You will pray for me…

“Oh! I beseech you, do not abandon me as I once did to others. You will ask God to take this horrendous spectacle from before my eyes, and He will hear you because you are good… I implore you, pray for me.”

— Those present, moved, addressed to him words of comfort and consolation. God, they told him, is not inflexible; He only requires of the guilty a sincere repentance, joined to the will to repair the evil done. Since your heart is not petrified and since you ask Him forgiveness for your crimes, His mercy will descend upon you.

It is necessary, then, that you persevere in the good resolution to repair the evil that you have done. Certainly, you cannot restore to the victims the lives you tore from them, but, if you implore it with fervor, God will allow you to find them again in a new incarnation, in which you will be able to show them as much devotion as the evil you did them. And when the reparation seems sufficient to Him, you will then enter into His holy grace. Thus, the duration of your punishment is in your own hands, depending on you to shorten it. We pledge ourselves to aid you with our prayers and to invoke for you the assistance of the good Spirits. We are going to pronounce on your behalf the prayer contained in The Imitation of the Gospel, concerning suffering and repentant Spirits. We will not pronounce the one referring to evil Spirits, because since you repent, since you implore, since you renounce evil, you are for us nothing but an unhappy Spirit and not an evil one.

That prayer made, the Spirit continues, after a few moments of calm:

“Thank you, my God!… Oh! thank you! You have had pity on me… Behold, the specters draw away… Do not abandon me, send me your good Spirits to sustain me… Thank you…”

After this scene the medium remains shattered, dejected, her limbs slack for some time. At first, she has only a vague idea of what has happened, but little by little she recalls some of the words she pronounced without willing it, recognizing that it was not she who had spoken.

The next day, in a new meeting, the Spirit manifested himself again, resuming the scene of the previous day, but for only a few minutes, and that with the same expressive gesticulation, though less violent. Then, seized with feverish agitation, he wrote:

“Grateful for your prayers. I already experience a sensible improvement. Such was the fervor with which I prayed, that God granted me a momentary relief; nevertheless, I shall still have to see my victims… There they are! There they are! Do you see this blood?…” (The prayer of the previous day was repeated. The Spirit continues, addressing the medium.)

“Forgive my having taken hold of you. Thank you for the relief you give to my sufferings. Forgive the harm I caused you, but I have need to communicate, and only you can…

“Thank you! thank you! I already feel some relief, though I have not reached the end of the trials. My victims will return shortly. Such is the punishment I have merited, but my God, be indulgent.

“Pray, all of you, for me, have pity.”

Latour.

Remark. – Although we have no material proof of the identity of the Spirit who manifested himself, neither have we reason to doubt it. In any case, he is evidently a very guilty Spirit, but repentant, terribly unhappy and tortured by remorse. Under this aspect, the communication is very instructive, because one cannot disregard the depth and the lofty significance of some of the words it contains; moreover, it offers one of the aspects of the world of punished Spirits, above which, however, one glimpses the mercy of God. The mythological allegory of the Eumenides is thus not so ridiculous as is thought, and the demons, official executioners of the invisible world, who replace them in modern belief, are less rational, with their horns and their tridents, than those victims, themselves serving for the punishment of the guilty. Admitting the identity of this Spirit, one may perhaps be astonished at so immediate a change in his moral state. It is that, as we have remarked on another occasion, there is often more to work with in a brutally evil Spirit than in one dominated by pride, or who hides his vices beneath the cloak of hypocrisy. This prompt return to better sentiments indicates a nature more savage than perverse, which only lacked good direction. Comparing his language with that of another criminal, cited in the Review of July 1864, under the title: Punishment by light, it is easy to see which of the two is more morally advanced, despite the difference in education and social position; one obeyed a natural instinct of ferocity, a kind of overexcitement, while the other brought to the perpetration of his crimes the calm and cold blood of slow and persevering calculation and, after death, still faced punishment with pride. He suffers, but will not submit, whereas the other is subdued immediately. Thus, one may foresee which of the two will suffer the longer. [Review of November 1864.]

A REPENTANT CRIMINAL (Continuation.)

(Passy, October 4, 1864. – Medium: Mr. Rul.)

Note. – The medium had intended to evoke Latour from the moment of the execution. Having asked his spiritual guide whether he could do so, the latter answered that he should wait until the moment was indicated to him. Only on October 3 was the authorization given, after he had read the article in the Review that referred to the case.

Q. – Did you hear my prayers?

Answer. – Yes; I heard them and I thank you for them, despite my disturbance.

I was evoked almost immediately after my death, but I could not manifest myself at once, so that many frivolous Spirits took my name and my place. I took advantage of the stay in Brussels of the President of the Society of Paris and communicated, with the assent of superior Spirits.

I will manifest myself again at the Society, in order to make revelations that will be a beginning of reparation for my faults, and that may also serve as a teaching to all the criminals who will read me and meditate on the exposition of my sufferings. It is only upon the spirit of weak men or of children that the narrative of infernal pains can produce terroristic effects. Now, a great malefactor is not a pusillanimous spirit, and the fear of the police is for him more real than the description of the torments of hell. This is why all who read me will be moved by my words and by my sufferings, which are not fictions. There is not a single priest who can say that he saw what I have seen, because I have witnessed the tortures of the damned. But, when I come to say: – “Behold what happened after my death, the death of the body; behold my enormous disappointment at recognizing myself alive, contrary to what I supposed and had taken for the end of the tortures, when it was the beginning of other tortures, indeed indescribable!” then more than one will halt at the edge of the precipice into which he was about to plunge, and each of the wretches led by me from the criminal path away will contribute to the redemption of my faults. It is thus that from evil itself good comes forth, and that the will of God manifests itself everywhere, on the Earth as in space. It was permitted me to free myself from the gaze of my victims transformed into executioners, in order to communicate with you; on leaving you, however, I shall see them again, and this idea alone causes me such suffering that I could not describe it. I am happy when I am evoked, because thus I leave my hell for a few moments.

Pray always to the Lord for me, ask Him to free me from the gaze of my victims.

Yes, let us pray together. Prayer does so much good… I am more relieved; I do not feel so heavy the burden that overwhelms me. I see a remnant of hope shining in my eyes and, contrite, I exclaim: Blessed be the hand of the Lord and may His will be done!

J. Latour.

— The spiritual guide of the medium dictates the following:

“Do not take the first cries of the Spirit who repents as an infallible sign of his resolutions. He may be in good faith in his promises, because the first impression he feels on seeing himself in the world of Spirits is so overwhelming that, at the first testimony of charity he receives from an incarnate Spirit, he gives himself over to the outpourings of gratitude and repentance. But, at times, the reaction is equal to the action and, in many others, this guilty Spirit, who dictated such good words to a medium, may return to his perverse nature, to his criminal tendencies. Like a child who rehearses his first steps, he needs help so as not to fall.”

— The next day the Spirit Latour was evoked again.

The medium – Instead of asking God to remove you from the gaze of your victims, I invite you to ask Him to give you the strength necessary to endure this expiatory torture.

Latour – I would prefer to free myself from such gazes. If you knew how much I suffer… The most insensitive man would be moved seeing imprinted on my countenance, as though by fire, the sufferings of my soul. I will do, however, what you advise me, for I understand that this is a means of expiating my faults a little more rapidly. It is like a painful operation that comes to cure a gravely ailing body. Ah! Could the guilty of the Earth but see me, and they would be terrified at the consequences of their crimes, those crimes which, unknown to men, are nonetheless seen by the Spirits. How fatal is ignorance for so many people! What responsibility is assumed by those who refuse instruction to the poor classes of society! They believe that with police and soldiers crimes are prevented… What a great error! If they doubled or quadrupled the number of agents of authority, the same crimes would be committed, because it is necessary that the evil incarnate Spirits commit crimes.

I commend myself to your charity.

Remark. – Without doubt it is by a remnant of earthly prejudices that Latour says: “It is necessary that the evil incarnate Spirits commit crimes.” This would be fatality in the actions of men, a doctrine that would excuse all. Besides, it is very natural that on leaving such an existence, the Spirit does not yet understand moral liberty, without which man would be on the level of the animals. It is astonishing that he does not say things still worse.

— The following communication, from the same Spirit, was obtained spontaneously in Brussels, by Mrs. C…, the same medium who had served as instrument for the scene related in the October issue.

“Fear nothing more from me; I am more tranquil, though I still suffer. Seeing my repentance, God had compassion on me. Now I suffer because of that repentance, which shows me the enormity of my crimes. Well advised in life, I would never have committed all this evil, but, without restraint, I obeyed my instincts blindly. If all men thought more of God, or, rather, if they believed in Him, such faults would not be committed.

“Faulty, however, is the justice of men; a fault often passing leads man to prison, which does not cease to be a focus of perversion. From there he comes out completely corrupted by bad examples and counsels. But granting that his nature is good and strong enough not to be corrupted, even so, once out of there, he will find all the doors closed, all hands withdrawn, all hearts indifferent! What then remains to him? Contempt, misery, abandonment, and despair, if it be that good resolutions to correct himself attend him. Then misery drives him to extremes, and so it is that he too takes to despising his fellow man, so it is that he hates him and loses the notion of good and evil, because he finds himself repelled, despite his good intentions. To obtain what is necessary, he steals, sometimes kills, and then… then they execute him! My God, on being again the prey of my hallucinations, I feel that your hand stretches over me; I feel that your goodness envelops and protects me. “Thank you, my God! in the next existence I will employ all my intelligence in the succor of the wretches who have succumbed, in order to preserve them from the fall. Thanks to you who do not disdain to communicate with me; fear nothing, for well do you see it, I am not evil. When you think of me, do not picture my portrait by what you saw of me, but that of an anguished soul which thanks you for your indulgence.

“Farewell; evoke me again and pray to God for me.”

Latour.

Remark. – The Spirit alludes to the fear that his presence inspired in the medium. [see 2nd paragraph above, after the signature.]

— “I suffer, he says further, because of this repentance, which shows me the enormity of my faults.” There is in this a profound thought. Indeed, the Spirit does not understand the gravity of his errors except when he repents; repentance brings regret, remorse, a painful sentiment, which is the transition from evil to good, from moral sickness to moral health.

It is to escape this that perverse Spirits become inflexible to the voice of conscience, like the sick who repel the remedy that should cure them. They seek to delude and stupefy themselves, persisting in evil. Latour has reached a period in which the hardening at last gives way; remorse has entered his heart; repentance followed; he understands the extent of the evil he did; he sees his abjection and suffers from it. This is why he says:

“I suffer because of this repentance.” In his preceding existence, he must have been worse than in this one, since, if he had repented as he has done now, his life would have been better. The resolutions taken now will influence his future earthly existence; the one he has just left, however criminal it may have been, has marked for him a stage of progress. It is more than probable that, before beginning it, he was, in erraticity, one of those evil Spirits, rebellious, obstinate in evil, such as so many are seen to be.

Many people have asked what profit could be drawn from past existences, since one does not remember what one was, nor what one did.

This question is completely resolved, taking into account that, if the evil we did were effaced, and if no trace of it remained in our hearts, its remembrance would be useless, since with it we no longer have to concern ourselves. As for that of which we have not completely corrected ourselves, we know it by our present tendencies; it is upon these that we must concentrate all our attention. It suffices to know what we are, without it being necessary to know what we were. During life, when one considers the difficulty of the rehabilitation of even the most repentant of the guilty, the reprobation of which he is the object, one must thank God for having cast a veil over the past. If Latour had been condemned in due time, and even if he had been acquitted, his antecedents would lead society to reject him. Despite his repentance, who would have admitted him into intimacy? The sentiments he today manifests as a Spirit make us hope that, in the next earthly existence, he will be a man of good, esteemed and considered. But suppose it were known who Latour was: reprobation would still pursue him. The veil cast over the past opens to him the door of rehabilitation; he will be able to seat himself without fear and without dishonor among the most distinguished persons. How many would not like, whatever the price, to efface from the memory of men certain years of their existence! Let there then be found a doctrine that better accords with the justice and the goodness of God! Besides, this doctrine is not a theory, but a result of observation. It was not the Spiritists who imagined it; they saw and observed the various situations in which Spirits present themselves; they sought their explanation, from which the doctrine emerged. If they accepted it, it is because it results from the facts and seemed to them more rational than all those conceived until today concerning the future of the soul.

— Latour was evoked many times, which was very natural. But, as happens in similar cases, there were many apocryphal communications, and the frivolous Spirits did not let this occasion pass. The very situation of Latour was opposed to his being able to manifest himself almost simultaneously at so many points at once. Such ubiquity is the privilege only of superior Spirits.

Are the communications we report more authentic? We think so and we desire it, above all for the good of this Spirit. In default of those material proofs, which establish identity in an absolute manner, as are often obtained, we have at least moral proofs, which result as much from the circumstances in which the manifestations occur as from their concordance. Of the communications we know, originating from diverse sources, at least three quarters agree as to the substance; among the others, some do not withstand examination, so evident is the error of situation, in flagrant contradiction with what experience teaches us concerning the state of Spirits in the spiritual world. Be that as it may, one cannot refuse to those we cite a high moral teaching. The Spirit may have been, must indeed have been aided in his reflections and, above all, in the choice of expressions, by more advanced Spirits. But, in similar cases, the latter assist only in the form, and not in the substance, and never put the inferior Spirit in contradiction with himself. In Latour they could poeticize the form of the repentance, but they would not have led him to express repentance against his will, because the Spirit has his free will; in him they saw the germ of good sentiments, which is why they helped him express them, contributing, in this way, to develop them, while at the same time drawing commiseration toward him. Is there anything more moving, more moral, capable of impressing more vividly, than the picture of this great repentant criminal, manifesting despair and remorse? who, amid the tortures, pursued by the incessant gaze of his victims, raises his thought to God to implore mercy? Is there not in this a salutary example for the guilty? All is sensible in his words; all is natural in his situation, while that attributed to him by certain communications is ridiculous. One understands the nature of his anguishes; they are rational, terrible, though simple and without phantasmagorical staging. Why would he not have repented? Why would there not be in him a sensitive and vibrant chord? It is precisely there that the moral side of his communications lies; it is the intelligence he has of the situation; it is the regrets, the resolutions, the projects of reparation that are eminently instructive. What would be extraordinary in the fact of his having repented sincerely before dying? that he had said before what he said afterward? In the eyes of the majority of his fellow men, a return to good before his death would have passed for a weakness. His voice from beyond the tomb is the revelation of the future that awaits them. He is absolutely right when he says that his example is more apt to lead the guilty back than the prospect of the flames of hell and, even, the scaffold. Why, then, would he not give it in the prisons? This would lead more than one to reflect, as we have several examples. How, however, to believe the words of a dead man, when one believes that, after death, all is ended? Yet a day will come when this truth will be recognized: that the dead can come and instruct the living. [1]

Translator's note: See Heaven and Hell, 2nd part, chapter VI. (Jacques Latour.)