Physical portrait of the Spiritists.

One reads in the France of September 14, 1866:

“The robust faith of the persons who, in spite of everything, believe in all the marvels of Spiritism—so often refuted—is, in truth, admirable. One shows them the trick of the turning tables, and they believe; one unveils for them the impostures of the Davenports’ cabinet, and they believe still more; one exhibits to them all the cords, makes them touch the lie with their finger, pierces their eyes with the evidence of charlatanism, and their belief only becomes more obstinate. Inexplicable need of the impossible! Credo quia absurdum [I believe even though it be absurd].

“The Messager franco-américain, of New York, speaks of a convention of the adherents of Spiritism that has just gathered at Providence (Rhode Island). Men and women are distinguished by countenances from the other world; the pallor of the skin, the emaciation of the face, the prophetic reverie of the eyes, lost in a vague oceanic expanse—such are, in general, the exterior signs of the Spiritist. Add that, contrary to general usage, the women cut their hair short, à la mal-content, as one said in former times, whereas the men have an abundant head of hair, Absalonic, energetic, descending to the shoulders. When one carries on commerce with the Spirits, one must distinguish oneself from the common run of mortals, from the vile multitude. “Several discourses, many discourses were pronounced. The orators, with no more concern for the denials of Science than for those of common sense, imperturbably recalled the great series—which everyone knows by heart—of the marvelous facts attributed to Spiritism.

“Without wishing to pass herself off as a prophetess, Miss Susia Johnson declared that she foresaw the nearness of the times when the great majority of men will no longer rebel against the mystical revelations of the new religion. She appeals with all her wishes for the creation of numerous schools, where children of both sexes will imbibe, from the most tender age, the teachings of Spiritism. That was all that was lacking!”

Under the title Always the Spiritists! the Événement of August 26, 1866 published a long article, from which we extract the following passage:

“Have you ever been to a gathering of Spiritists, on an evening of idleness or of curiosity? Generally, it is a friend who leads you there. One climbs quite high—the Spirits like to draw near to heaven—to a small apartment already crammed full. One enters elbowing one’s way in.

“People pile up, bizarre figures, with frenzied gestures. One suffocates in that atmosphere, one is pressed together, they lean over the tables where mediums, with their eyes on the ceiling, pencil in hand, write the lucubrations that pass through there. There is an initial surprise; one seeks among all these people to rest one’s gaze; they interrogate, they guess, they analyze.

“Old women with avid eyes, gaunt and weary young men, the promiscuity of classes and of ages, neighborhood concierges and great ladies of the quarter, Indian calico and pure lace, poetesses of chance and prophetesses of occasion, tailors and laureates of the Institute fraternize in Spiritism. They wait, they make the tables turn, they raise them, they read aloud the scrawls that Homer or Dante dictated to the seated mediums. These mediums are motionless, their hand upon the paper, dreaming. Suddenly their hand stirs, runs, shakes violently, covers the sheets in a back-and-forth, and stops abruptly. Then someone, in the silence, cites the name of the Spirit who has just dictated the message and reads it. Ah! those readings! “Thus, I heard Cervantes complain of the demolition of the Theater of Comic Diversions, and Lamennais recount that Jean Journet was his intimate friend in the beyond. Most of the time Lamennais commits errors of spelling and Cervantes does not know a word of Spanish. At other times the Spirits take on an angelic pseudonym to leave to their public some aphorism in the manner of Pantagruel. They protest. They are answered: We shall complain to your ringleader!

“The medium who traced the sentence becomes somber and angry, at being in relation with Spirits so ill-bred. I asked to what legion these mystifiers of the other world belonged, and they answered me plainly: — They are prankster Spirits!

“I know of more amiable things—for example, the draftsman Spirit who impelled the hand of Victorien Sardou and made him trace the image of the house where Beethoven dwells in the beyond. A profusion of ornamental foliage, interlacings of quavers and semiquavers—it is a work of patience that would have demanded months and that was done in a single night. At least that is what they affirmed to me. Only Monsieur Sardou could convince me.

“Poor human brain! how painful these things are to recount! Thus, we have not taken a single step toward Reason and Truth! Or, at the least, the battalion of the lazy swells day by day, as one advances! It is formidable, it is almost an army. Do you know how many possessed women there are at present in France?

“More than two thousand. The possessed women have their president, Madame B… who, since the age of two years, lives in direct contact with the Virgin. Two thousand! The Auvergne has kept its miracles, the Cevennes always have their Camisards. n The books of Spiritism, the treatises of mysticism have seven, eight, ten editions. The marvelous is indeed the disease of an age that, having nothing before the mind to satisfy it, takes refuge in chimeras, like a debilitated stomach deprived of meat, which would feed itself on ginger.

“And the number of the mad increases! Delirium is like a wave that rises. What light, then, is one to seek, since electricity is insufficient to destroy these shadows?”

Jules Claretie. n It would truly be an error to be irritated with such adversaries, for they believe in good faith, and very ingenuously, that they have the monopoly of good sense. What is as amusing as the singular portraits they make of the Spiritists is to see them moan dolefully over these poor human brains, which take no step toward reason and truth, because they want, cost what it may, to have a soul and to believe in the other world, in spite of the eloquence of the unbelievers to prove that this does not exist, for the happiness of Humanity; theirs are the regrets at the sight of these Spiritist books, which sell out without the aid of advertisements, of puffery, and of the paid praises of the press; of this battalion of the lazy in reason which—a thing of despair!—swells daily and becomes so formidable that it is almost an army; which, having nothing before the mind to satisfy them, are foolish enough to refuse the perspective of nothingness, offered to them to fill the void. It is truly cause for despair to see this poor Humanity, illogical enough not to find nothingness better in exchange for something, for preferring to live again rather than to die once and for all. These jests, these grotesque images, more amusing than dangerous, and which it would be puerile to take seriously, have their instructive side, which is why we cite a few examples. In former times they sought to combat Spiritism with arguments—doubtless bad ones, since they convinced no one; but, in the end, well or ill, they tried to discuss the thing; men of real worth, orators and writers, explored the arsenal of objections to combat it. What was the result? Their books were forgotten and Spiritism stands. Here is a fact. Today there are still a few mockers, of the caliber of those we have just cited, little concerned with the value of the arguments, for whom to laugh at everything is a necessity, but the matter is no longer discussed. The adverse polemic seems to have exhausted its munitions; the adversaries content themselves with lamenting the progress of what they call a calamity, as one complains of the progress of a flood that cannot be stopped. But the offensive arms to combat the doctrine have taken no step forward, and if they have not yet found the cocked rifle to bring it down, it is not for lack of having sought it. It would be useless labor to refute things that refute themselves. To the recriminations with which the journal France prefaces the burlesque portrait it takes from the American journal, there is but one thing to answer. If the faith of the Spiritists resists the revelation of the tricks and the cords of charlatanism, it is because this is not Spiritism; if, the more they divulge the fraudulent maneuvers, the more faith redoubles, it is because you are fencing in order to combat precisely what it disapproves and itself combats; if they are not shaken by your demonstrations, it is because you are outside the question; if, when you strike, Spiritism does not cry out, it is because you strike at the periphery, and then the mockers are not on your side. By unmasking the abuses that are made of a thing, one fortifies the thing itself, just as one strengthens true religion by stigmatizing its abuses. Only those who live off the abuses can lament, in Spiritism as in religion. Stranger contradiction still! Those who preach social equality see, under the sway of Spiritist beliefs, the prejudices of castes erased, the extreme ranks drawing nearer to one another, the great and the small giving each other their hands fraternally—and they laugh! In truth, reading these things, one asks on which side the aberration lies.

[1] Tr. note: Our emphasis. Calvinists of the Cevennes who rebelled during the persecutions that followed the revocation of the Edict of Nantes.

[2] [see Jules Claretie.]