Healing group of Marmande

— “Marmande, May 12, 1867.

“Dear Mr. Kardec, “Some time ago I entertained you with the results of our Spiritist works, which we continue with perseverance and, I am happy to say, with satisfactory successes. The obsessed and the sick are always the object of our exclusive care. Moralization and fluids are the principal means indicated by our guides.

“Our good Spirits, who devote themselves to the propagation of Spiritism, have also taken on the task of popularizing magnetism. In almost all consultations, for the various cases of illness, they ask for the help of relatives: a father, a mother, a brother or a sister, a neighbor, a friend are called upon to give passes. These brave creatures are surprised to subdue crises, to soothe pains. It seems to me that this means is ingenious and reliable for making converts; that is why confidence is spreading more and more in our country. The groups that occupy themselves with cures would perhaps do well to give the same advice; the happy results obtained would prove in an evident manner the truth of magnetism, and would give the certainty that the faculty of healing or relieving one’s fellow being is not the exclusive privilege of some persons; that, for this, nothing is needed but good will and confidence in God. I am not speaking here of good health, which is an indispensable condition, that is understood. In recognizing that one has such a power within oneself, one acquires the certainty that there is no trickery, nor sorcery, nor pact with the devil. It is, therefore, a means of destroying superstitious ideas.

— “Here are some examples of cures obtained.

“A little girl of 6 or 7 years was bedridden, with a continuous headache, fever, frequent cough with expectoration and a sharp pain in the left side and also in the eyes, which, from time to time, were covered with a milky substance, forming a kind of leucoma. Under the hair, the skin of the skull was covered with white films; thick and turbid urine. Weak and dejected, the child neither ate nor slept. The doctor had ended by suspending his visits. The mother, poor, in the presence of her sick and abandoned daughter, came to seek me out. When consulted, our guides prescribed as the only remedy the laying on of hands, the fluidic passes on the part of the mother, recommending that I go, for some days, to show her how she should conduct herself. I began by draining the vesicles and making them dry up. After three days of passes and of laying on of hands upon the head, the kidneys and the chest, carried out by way of lessons, but done with soul, the child asked to get up; the fever had passed and all the accidents described above disappeared at the end of ten days. “This cure, which the mother described as miraculous, caused me to be called two days later to another little girl of 3 or 4 years, who had a fever. After the passes and laying on of hands, the fever ceased from the first day.

“The cures of certain obsessions give us no less satisfaction and confidence. Maria B…, a young woman of 21, from Samazan, near Marmande, would strip naked like an animal, run through the fields and go lie down beside the dog in a hole in the haystack. The moralization of the obsessor on our part and the fluidic passes done by the husband, according to our instructions, soon freed her. The whole commune of Samazan witnessed the impotence of Medicine to cure her, and the efficacy of the simple means employed to bring her back to the normal state.

“Mrs. D…, 22 years old, from the commune of Sainte-Marthe, not far from Marmande, would fall into extraordinary and violent crises; she would scream, bite, roll about, feel terrible blows in the stomach, faint and, at times, remain unconscious for four or five hours; once she went eight days without recovering lucidity. In vain had Dr. D… given her care. The husband, after having run in search of professionals, priests of the region reputed as healers and exorcists, fortune-tellers — for he confessed to having consulted them — turned to us, asking us to occupy ourselves with his wife, if, as he had been told, the power to cure her lay within us. We promised to write to him, to indicate what he should do. “When consulted, our guides said: Cease all medical treatment: the remedies would be useless; let the husband raise his soul to God, lay his hands upon the wife’s brow and give her fluidic passes with love and confidence; let him observe punctually the recommendations we are going to make to him, however vexed he may be (the recommendations follow, absolutely personal), and let him become well impressed with the idea that these are necessary for the benefit of his poor tormented one, and soon he will have his reward.

“They also told us to call and moralize the obsessing Spirit, under the name of Lucie Cédar. This Spirit revealed the cause that led it to torment Mrs. D… This cause was precisely connected to the recommendations made to the husband. The latter having complied with everything, he had the satisfaction of seeing his wife completely freed within the space of ten days. He said to me: Since the Spirits communicate, I am not surprised that they told you what was known only to me, but I am much more surprised that no remedy was able to cure my wife; if I had turned to you from the beginning, I would have 150 francs in my pocket, which are no longer there, for I spent them on medicines.

“I shake your hand most cordially.”

Dombre.

— These cases of cure have nothing more extraordinary about them than those we have already cited, coming from the same center; but they prove, by the persistence of success, for several years, what can be obtained through perseverance and dedication, which is why the assistance of the good Spirits never fails them. They abandon only those who leave the good path, which is easy to recognize by the decline of success, whereas they sustain, until the last moment, even against the attacks of malevolence, those whose zeal, sincerity, self-denial and humanity are proof against the vicissitudes of life. They raise up the one who humbles himself and humble the one who exalts himself. This applies to all kinds of mediumship. Nothing discouraged Mr. Dombre. He fought energetically against all the obstacles raised against him and triumphed over them; he despised the insults and threats of our common adversaries and forced them into silence by his firmness; he spared neither his time, nor his effort, nor material sacrifices; he never sought to take advantage of what he does in order to put himself in the spotlight or to make of it some kind of springboard; his moral disinterestedness equals his material disinterestedness; if he is happy to triumph, it is because each success is one for the doctrine. These are the serious titles to the gratitude of all Spiritists present and future, titles to which it is necessary to associate the members of the group who second him with so much zeal and self-denial, and whose names we regret not being able to cite. The most characteristic fact pointed out in this letter is that of the intervention of the relatives and friends of the sick in the cures. It is a new idea, the importance of which will escape no one, because its propagation cannot fail to have considerable results. It is the announced popularization of healing mediumship. Spiritists will note how ingenious the Spirits are in the so varied means they employ to make the idea penetrate the masses. How could it be otherwise, since new channels are incessantly opened to it and it is given the means to knock at every door?

This practice, therefore, could never be too much encouraged. Nevertheless, one must not lose sight of the fact that the results will be in proportion to the good direction given to the matter by the leaders of the healing groups, and to the impulse they know how to impart by their energy, their devotion and their own example.