Flageolet.

The following fact is reported to us by one of our correspondents from Maine-et-Loire, Dr. E. Champneuf. Although in itself the fact does not depart from the circle of known phenomena of physical manifestations, it is instructive in that it proves, once again, the diversity of types found in the invisible world, and that, upon entering it, certain spirits do not immediately divest themselves of their character. This was unknown before Spiritism put us in contact with the inhabitants of that world. Here is the account addressed to us:

“Allow me to bring to your knowledge a rather curious fact, not of a transport, but of a subtraction by a spirit, produced eight days ago in our midst.

There is a spirit, a frequenter of our group at Saumur for several years, who, for some time now, has made himself even more familiar with our group at Vernantes. He said his name was Flageolet; but our medium, by whom he made himself recognized, and who indeed knew him when he lived in this world, told us that he bore the name of Biron, a violinist, very bold, a bohemian, frequenting taverns where he made people dance. He is a frivolous, mystifying spirit, but he is not wicked.

Thus Flageolet installed himself at my brother’s house, where our sessions take place. And the lunches and dinners are enlivened by the tunes he plays, whether asked of him or not, fortunate when the glasses and plates are not knocked over by his truly scandalous pranks.

Eight days ago my brother, who smokes a great deal, had, as usual, his snuffbox beside him on the table, and, as is also customary, Flageolet was attending the family dinner. After a few tunes and marches, the spirit began to play the air: I have good tobacco in my snuffbox. At that moment my brother looked for his, which was no longer beside him; he glanced about him, rummaged through his pockets, nothing. The same air continues with more animation; he rises, explores the little table by the chimney, the furniture, carries his investigations to the neighboring rooms, and the air of the snuffbox, sung with greater vigor, pursues him with redoubled mockery, as he moves away and grows animated in his searches. If he approaches the chimney, the raps become stronger and more rapid. At last the seeker, irritated by this pitiless harmony, thinks of Flageolet and says to him: — Was it you who took my snuffbox? — Yes. — Will you give it back to me? — Yes. — Well then! speak. They took the alphabet and a pencil, and the spirit dictated: “I put it in the fire.” They stirred the very hot ashes and there found, at the bottom of the hearth, the snuffbox, whose contents were calcined.

Every day there is some surprise on his part or some trick in his manner. Three days ago he made known to us the contents of a well-tied basket that had just arrived.

“Last night, it was a new mischief against my brother. During the day, entering the house, he looks for the cap he wears indoors and, not finding it, decides to think no more of the matter. In the evening, Flageolet, no doubt vexed at playing his tunes without being given attention, and without anyone thinking to question him, asked to write. We put ourselves at his disposal and he dictated:

“— I filched your cap. — Will you tell where it is? — Yes. — Where did you put it? — I gave it to Napoleon.

“Persuaded that it was a joke of the spirit, we asked: — Which one? — Yours.

“For some years there has been a statue of Napoleon I, of medium size, in the room where our sessions are held. We headed for the statue, lamp in hand, and found the vanished cap, which covered the little historic hat.”

Observation. – Everything, in Spiritism, is a subject of study for the serious observer; apparently insignificant facts have their cause, and this cause may be linked to the most important principles. Do not the great laws of Nature reveal themselves in the smallest insect, as in the gigantic animal? in the grain of sand that falls, as in the movement of the stars? Does the botanist despise a flower because it is humble and without brilliance? It is the same in the moral order, where everything has its philosophical value, as in the physical order everything has its scientific value.

While certain persons will see in the fact related above only something curious, amusing, a subject of distraction, others will see in it an application of the law that governs the progressive march of intelligent beings, and will gather a teaching from it. The invisible world being the milieu into which Humanity inevitably flows, nothing that can help to make it known could be a matter of indifference. The corporeal world and the spiritual world, ceaselessly pouring one into the other, through deaths and births, explain one another. Here is one of the great laws revealed by Spiritism.

Is not the character of this spirit that of a mischievous child? Yet in life he was a grown man, and even of a certain age. So then, would some spirits return to childhood? No; the truly adult spirit does not go backward, as the river does not flow back to its source. But the age of the body is by no means an index of the age of the spirit. Since it is necessary for all spirits who incarnate to pass through corporeal infancy, it follows that in the bodies of children one necessarily finds advanced spirits. Now, if these spirits die prematurely, they reveal their superiority as soon as they have divested themselves of their envelope. For the same reason, a spirit that is young, spiritually speaking, being unable to reach maturity in the course of one existence, which is less than an hour in relation to the life of the spirit, an adult body may enclose a child-spirit, in character and in moral development. Flageolet belonged incontestably to this latter category of spirits; he will advance more rapidly than others, because he has in him only frivolity, and at bottom is not wicked. The serious milieu in which he manifests, the contact of enlightened men, will ripen his ideas; his education is a task incumbent upon them, whereas he would gain nothing with frivolous persons, who would have amused themselves with his jests, as with those of a clown.