In this issue we continue the study of the book Posthumous Works, published after Allan Kardec disembodied and containing texts written by him. The present work is based on the translation made by Dr. Guillon Ribeiro, published by the Brazilian Spiritist Federation.
Questions for discussion
87. Like the planets, do we have a fluidic atmosphere that surrounds us?
88. Is the pleasant or unpleasant feeling we sometimes have in a certain
environment originated by that atmosphere?
89. Do we leave traces of our passage wherever we go?
90. Which factors influence the fluidic power applied by one man over another?
91. Is there a link between photography and memory?
92. What is the phenomenon of the photography of the thought?
Answers to the proposed questions
87. Like the planets, do we have a fluidic atmosphere that surrounds us?
Yes. The cosmic fluid, though received from a universal source, is individual and it acquires specific properties, which distinguishes it. Although we were convinced of this, on the contrary, this specific individualization persists for many years after life itself has ended. Each of us has, therefore, a proper fluid that surrounds and follows us in all our movements, as the atmosphere follows each planet. The extent of the irradiation of the individual atmosphere varies; in a state of absolute rest of the Spirit, this radiation can be limited to a few steps; but under the rule of the will, it can cover infinite distances. The will seems to expand the fluid as the heat expands gas.
Different private atmospheres meet, intersect, and mingle without ever mixing, like the sound waves that remain distinct despite the multitude of sounds that stir the air simultaneously. Each individual is the center of a fluidic wave, and its expansion is proportional to the strength and will, as each vibrant point is the center of a sound wave, and its expansion is due to its vibrating strength. Will is what causes the driving of the fluid, in the same manner that shock is the vibrating cause of the air and the driving of the sound waves.(Posthumous Works, Perispiritual Fluid and Fluidical Atmosphere)
88. Is the pleasant or unpleasant feeling we sometimes have in a certain environment originated by that atmosphere?
Yes. From the particular qualities of each fluid results a kind of harmony or discordance, a tendency to join or to avoid, an attraction or repulsion, in a word, the sympathies or antipathies that we often sense with no real reason.
If we are in the individual’s sphere of activity, its presence is sometimes felt by a pleasant or unpleasant impression that comes from this fluid.
If we are with people and we do not share their feelings, and the fluids do not harmonize with ours, a distressing reaction oppresses us and we are like a dissonant sound in a concert.
However, if several individuals are gathered with common goals and intentions, the feelings of each one of them are magnified in proportion with those of the mass. Who does not know the strength of the frenzy that dominates and drives the mass when there are the same thoughts and desires? (Posthumous Works, Perispiritual Fluid and Fluidical Atmosphere)
89. Do we leave traces of our passage wherever we go?
Yes, we do. Each person, wherever it goes, carries its fluidic atmosphere as the snail carries its shell; but this fluid leaves traces of its passage; it leaves like a luminous trail, inaccessible to our senses in the waking state. However, it serves for the sleepwalkers, the clairvoyants, and the disembodied Spirits, to rebuild the facts and analyze what caused them. (Posthumous Works, Perispiritual Fluid and Fluidical Atmosphere)
90. Which factors influence the fluidic power applied by one man over another?
It may depend on: 1st - the sum of fluid that each one has; 2nd - the intrinsic nature of the fluid of each one, abstraction made of its quantity; 3rd - the degree of energy of the driving force, and perhaps even of these three causes combined.
In the first case, the one that has more fluid gives it to the one who has the least, more than it would receive from him; in this case, there would be an analogy with the exchange of heat observed between two bodies that are at a same temperature.
Whatever the cause of this difference is, we can see its effect by imagining three people representing their force by three numbers: 10, 5 and 1. 10 will act on 5 and 1, but more strongly on 1 than on 5. On the other hand, 5 will act on 1, but it will be powerless over 10; finally: 1 will not act either on one or on the other. This would be the reason why some people are sensitive to the action of one magnetizer and insensitive to the action of another. (Posthumous Works, Perispiritual Fluid and Fluidical Atmosphere.)
91. Is there a link between photography and memory?
Yes. When the incarnate Spirit remembers something, his memory in some way brings him the picture of the fact that he looked for. Most of the times, the embodied that are around him see nothing; the album is in a place inaccessible to their vision; but the Spirits see it and seek for it with us. In certain circumstances, they may even purposely help our search or disturb it.
What happens from the embodied to the Spirit occurs in the same way from the Spirit to the seer. When we evoke the memory of certain facts in the existence of a Spirit, the picture of these facts is presented to him, and the seer, whose spiritual situation is analogous to the Free Spirit, sees it too, and sometimes, in certain circumstances, it sees what the Spirit does not see by itself, in the same manner a disembodied can scroll through the memory of an embodied, without him being aware of this, and make him remember facts which he had forgotten long ago.
As for the abstract thoughts, they take a body to impress the brain and act naturally on it, and form them; in this case also, as in the first, the similarity between the facts that exist on Earth and in space seems perfect. (Posthumous Works, Photography and Telegraphy of the Thought.)
92. What is the phenomenon of the photography of the thought?
This matter was the subject of some studies in the Spiritist Magazine. Briefly, since the fluids are the vehicle of thought, and this acts on the fluids like the sound acts on the air; they carry the thought in the same manner that the air brings the sound. One can therefore say, in all truth, that there are waves in fluids and rays of thoughts that cross, without mixing, as there are in the air waves and sound rays. And more: the thought, creating fluidic images, is reflected in the perispiritual wrap like on a glass plate, or as those images of earthly objects that are reflected in the air vapor; it then forms its body and in some way photographs itself.
Let us suppose a man, for example, has the idea of killing another; as much as he is bodily unmoved, his fluidic body is put into action by thought, and it experiences every nuance; he fluidly executes the gesture, the act that he wished to perform; his thought creates the victim's image, and the whole scene is painted as in a picture, just as it is in his Spirit. This is how the most secret movements of the soul impact on its fluidic casing and a soul can read in another soul, like a book, and see what is not noticeable to the eye of the body. (Posthumous Works, Photography and Telegraphy of the Thought.)
