Two idiot brothers.

— In a family of workers in Paris there are two children afflicted with idiocy. Up to the age of 5 or 6 they enjoyed all their intellectual faculties, relatively well developed. Unless it is caused by an accidental cause, idiocy in children almost always results from an arrest in the development of the organs, manifesting itself, consequently, from birth. Moreover, what is to be noted here is the fact of two children stricken by the same infirmity under identical conditions.

This twofold phenomenon being able to be the object of an interesting study, from the psychological point of view, Mr. Desliens, one of the members of the Society of Paris, was introduced into the family by a friend, in order to be able to give an account to the Society. Here is the result of his observations:

He said: “When the father learned the purpose of my visit, he passed into a small room, from which he returned bringing in his arms a being who, by his features, more resembled an animal than a focus of intelligence. He likewise brought a second one in the same state of brutishness, but with more human physical appearances. No intelligible sound escaped from the mouths of these unfortunate creatures; sharp little cries, hoarse grunts are their only noisy manifestations. Almost always a bestial laugh animates their physiognomy. The elder is named Alfred, and the second, Paulin. Alfred, currently seventeen years old, was born with all his intelligence, which manifested itself even with a certain precocity. At three years of age he spoke properly and understood the least signs. He then had a slight illness, after which he lost the use of speech and his mental faculties. The medical treatments only led to the exhaustion of his vital forces, today expressed by an absolute rachitis.

“This being, who does not even retain the appearance of a man, has, nevertheless, feeling; he loves his parents and his brother, and knows how to manifest sympathy or repulsion for those who surround him. He understands everything that is said to him; he looks with brilliant and intelligent eyes; he ceaselessly tries, but without result, to answer when they speak to him of things that interest him. He has an invincible fear of death and cannot see a funeral car without trying to hide. One day, his aunt having told him, as a joke, that she would poison him if he continued to be bad, he understood so well that for more than a year he refused to receive any food from her hand, although he has an extraordinary appetite. “From the corporeal point of view, Paulin, 15 years old, has a more human appearance. He bears on his brutish face the mark of an absolute idiocy. Nevertheless he loves, his exterior manifestations being limited to this. He too was born with all his reason, which he kept intact until the age of six. He was very fond of his brother. At that age he fell ill and went through the same phases as the elder. Recently he was stricken by an illness of long course, after which he seems to understand better what is said to him. The parish priest and the priests of the parish made the family know that there was possession by the demon and that it was necessary to exorcize the boys. The parents hesitated. However, wearied by the insistence of those gentlemen, and fearing to lose the help they received on account of the children, they consented. But then those gentlemen maintained that, indeed, there would have been possession at an earlier time, but that today it was no longer a question of this and that there was nothing more to be done. It must be said, to the credit of the parents, that their tenderness for these unfortunate creatures was never belied and that they have constantly been the object of the most affectionate care.”

— The ecclesiastical gentlemen wisely renounced the exorcism, which would only have led to a failure. The children present none of the characters of obsession, in the sense of Spiritism, and everything proves that the cause of the ailment is purely pathological. In both, idiocy was produced as a consequence of an illness that, undoubtedly, occasioned the atrophy of the organs for the manifestation of thought. But it is easy to see, behind this veil, that there exists an active thought, which finds an invincible obstacle to its free emission. The intelligence of these children, during the first years, proves in them advanced Spirits, who later found themselves contained within bonds too tight for them to be able to manifest themselves. In an envelope under normal conditions they would have been intelligent men; and when death has freed them from their fetters, they will recover the free use of their faculties. “This constraint imposed upon the Spirit must have a moral cause, providential, and this cause must be just, since God is the source of all justice. Now, as these boys did nothing in this existence that could merit any punishment whatsoever, it must be admitted that they pay the debt of a former existence, unless one denies the justice of God. They offer us a proof of the necessity of reincarnation, that key which resolves so many problems and which, daily, projects light upon so many questions still obscure. (See: The Gospel According to Spiritism, chapter V, no. 6: Anterior causes of earthly afflictions.) n

— On the subject, the following communication was given in the Society of Paris, on July 7, 1865. (Medium: Mr. Desliens).

“The loss of intelligence in the two idiots to whom we refer is, certainly, explainable from the scientific point of view. Each of them had a brief illness; one may, therefore, conclude with reason that the cerebral organs were affected. But why did this accident occur after the evident manifestation of all their faculties, contrary to what, in general, happens in idiocy? I repeat: every disturbance of the intelligence or of the organic functions can be explained physiologically, whatever the first cause may be, considering that the Creator established laws for the relations between the intelligence and the organs of transmission, laws that cannot be derogated. The disturbance of these relations is a very consequence of these laws, and can wound the guilty one for his former faults: therein lies the expiation. “Why were these two beings wounded together? Because they participated in the same life; as they were bound together during the trial, they must be reunited in the life of expiation.

“Why did their intelligence at first manifest itself, contrary to what generally happens in similar cases? From the point of view of the providential intention, it is one of the thousand nuances of expiation, which has its reason for being for the individual, but whose motive it would often be difficult to fathom, for the very reason that it is individual. One must see therein, also, one of those facts that daily come to confirm, through attentive observation, the bases of the Spiritist Doctrine, and to sanction, through evidence, the principles of reincarnation. “Do not forget, either, that the parents have their part in what takes place here. Their tenderness toward these beings, who offer them no compensation, is a great trial. They are to be congratulated for not having failed, because that compensation which they do not find in the world, they will find later. Say to yourselves that the care and the affection that they lavish upon these two poor beings might well be a reparation in relation to them, a reparation that the family's state of need renders still more meritorious.”

Mokí.

[1] Translator's note: In the original, by mistake, no. 66 appears, instead of 6. (In The Gospel According to Spiritism only the subtitle appears: “Anterior causes of afflictions”.)