Questions
A. Does Spiritism produce miracles?
B. What do spiritual phenomena consist?
C. Which type of mediums is the most numerous?
Text for reading
745. The inner composition of the perispirit is not identical among all the incarnate or discarnate spirits that populate the earth or the space surrounding it. However, the same does not apply to the corporeal body, which, as has been shown, is formed of identical elements, however highly or little evolved the spirit may be. Also, the effects produced by the body are the same for everyone and their needs are the same, whereas everybody is different with respect to their perispirit.
746.The perispiritual envelope of the same spirit changes with its progress in each incarnation even if it incarnates in the same environment; in the exceptional case where high order spirits incarnate on missions on a less evolved world, they have a less dense perispirit than the indigenous inhabitants of that world.
747. The environment always has to do with the nature of the beings that must live in it: fish are in the water; land beings, in the air; and spirit beings in the spiritual or ethereal fluid, even on earth. The ethereal fluid is to the needs of spirits what the atmosphere is to the needs of incarnates.
748. So, just as fish cannot live in the air and land animals cannot live in an atmosphere too rarified for their lungs, low order spirits cannot bear the radiance and impact of the most ethereal fluids. They would not die while in such fluids, because the spirit does not die, but an instinctive force keeps them away, just as incarnates stay away from a very hot fire or a very bright light.
749.That is why they cannot leave the environment that is suited to their nature. In order to change environments, they must first change their nature. They must rid themselves of the material instincts that keep them in material environments; in other words, they must purify and transform themselves morally. Then, they will gradually identify with a more purified environment, which becomes a need for them, a necessity, like the eyes of someone who has lived in darkness for a long time imperceptibly grow accustomed to the light of day and the brilliance of the sun.
750. Thus, everything in the universe is connected, everything forms a chain; everything is subject to the grand and harmonious law of unity, from the most physically dense to the most spiritually purified. The earth is like a vessel from which a thick smoke escapes: as it rises higher its rarified particles become lost in infinite space.
751. You are right to say, “Faith is dead,” but it is the faith in anything that shocks common sense and reason that is dead; the faith similar to the kind that used to make people say, “The gods are dead!” However, faith in serious matters, the faith in God and immortality, has always lived in the human heart, and even if it has been suffocated under the childish stories that have overburdened it, it reveals itself all the stronger from the moment it is liberated, like a withered plant rises again as soon as it receives the sun!
752. The action of spirits upon the fluids - The spiritual fluids, which comprise one of the states of the universal cosmic fluid, are, properly stated, the atmosphere for spirit beings; it is the element from which they draw the matter upon which they operate; it is the environment where special phenomena occur, perceptible to the spirit’s sight and hearing, but beyond the corporeal senses, which are impressed solely by tangible matter. It is where that light which is particular to the spirit world is formed, and which is different from ordinary light through its causes and its effects. Finally, it is the vehicle for thought, like the air is the vehicle for sound.
753. Spirits act upon the spiritual fluids, but they do not manipulate them like humans manipulate gases; instead, they use the help of thought and will. Thought and will are for spirits what hands are to humans. By means of thought they impress upon the fluids this or that direction; they agglomerate, combine or disperse them; they form them in ensembles having a single appearance, shape and certain coloration; they alter their properties as a chemist alters gases or other substances, combining them according to certain laws. It is the great workshop or laboratory of the spirit life.
754. Sometimes these transformations are the result of intent; frequently, however, they are the product of an unconscious thought. It is enough for a spirit to think about something in order for it to be produced, just as it is enough for the spirit to intone a melody in order for it to resound in the atmosphere. For example, this is how a spirit makes itself visible to an incarnate endowed with psychic sight, appearing in the same form it had while alive at the time in which it was known, even if it has had many incarnations since then.
755. It presents itself in the same clothing and with the same outward signs — infirmities, scars, amputated limbs, etc. — that it had then. A beheaded person will appear without a head. This does not mean that it has retained such an appearance — certainly not — for as a spirit it is not lame, maimed, cross-eyed or headless. But going back in thought to the time in which it had been this way, its perispirit instantly takes on the appearance, just as it will instantly drop it the moment the thought ceases. Hence, if it had been black at one time and then white at another, it will present itself either as black or white depending on which of the two incarnations for it is being evoked, and to which it goes back in thought.
756. Through a similar effect, the spirit’s thought fluidically creates the objects that it had had the habit of using. A miser will finger gold; a soldier will bear arms and wear a uniform; a smoker will use a pipe; a laborer will have his plow and cattle, and an old woman her distaff. Such fluidic objects are as real to the spirit — who is also fluidic — as they are in the material state to the live individual; however, since they are creations of its thought, their existence is as fleeting as the thought itself.
757. Since the fluids are the vehicles for thought, thought acts upon the fluids as sound acts upon the air; fluids bring thought to us just as the air brings sound. One could truthfully state, therefore, that in these fluids there are waves and rays of thought that crisscross one another without mixing, just as in the air there are sound waves and rays.
758. There is more: as thought creates fluidic images, it is reflected in the perispiritual envelope as in a mirror; there, it takes on a body and photographs itself somehow. Suppose that a certain man, for example, gets the idea to kill another. As impassive as his physical body may be, his fluidic body goes into action by means of the thought, which reproduces all the nuances; it fluidically executes the motion, the act that he has the desire to accomplish. The thought creates the image of the victim, and the entire scenario is painted like a picture just as it exists in his mind. This is how the most secret movements of the soul reverberate in the fluidic envelope; how one soul can read another soul like a book and see what is imperceptible to the body’s eyes. However, it cannot see what is not yet in the thought; what it does see is the habitual preoccupation of the individual — his or her desires, plans and good or evil intentions.
759. Qualities of the fluids - The action of spirits upon the spiritual fluids has consequences of crucial and direct importance for incarnates. Since these fluids are the vehicles for thought, which can modify their properties, it is obvious that they must be impregnated with the good or evil qualities of the thoughts that set them in motion, and they change according to the purity or impurity of sentiments. Evil thoughts corrupt the spiritual fluids just as harmful miasmas corrupt breathable air. The fluids that surround evil spirits, or which are projected by them, are therefore noxious, whereas those that receive the influence of good spirits are as pure as the spirits’ degree of moral perfection allows.
760. It would be impossible to draw up an enumeration or classification of good and bad fluids, or to specify their respective characteristics because of the fact that their diversity is as great as is the diversity of thoughts. The fluids do not possess qualities sui generis, but rather acquire them within the environment where they are developed. They are modified by the emanations of that environment like exhalations, and water modified the air by the salts of the surfaces it crosses.
761. According to the circumstances, their qualities are, like those of air and water, temporary or permanent, which make them especially suited to producing these or those particular effects.
762. The fluids do not have special labels. Like odors, they are designated according to their properties, effects and original type. From a moral point of view, they bear the mark of the sentiments of hate, envy, jealousy, pride, selfishness, violence, hypocrisy, goodness, benevolence, love, charity, tenderness, etc.
763. From the physical point of view, they are exciting, calming, penetrating, acerbic, irritating, soothing, soporific, narcotic, toxic, reparatory, expelling, etc. They become a force for transmission, propulsion, etc. A table of the fluids would thus contain all the passions, virtues and vices of humankind, and all the properties of matter corresponding to the effects they produce.
764. Since humans are incarnate spirits, they have a portion of the attributes of the spirit life, because they live that life as well as the corporeal life, primarily during sleep but often in the waking state as well. Upon incarnating, the spirit retains its perispirit with the qualities proper to it, and the perispirit, as we know, is not circumscribed by the body but radiates all around and envelops it as in a fluidic atmosphere. Through its intimate union with the body, the perispirit performs an extremely important role in the organism. Through its expansion, it puts the incarnate spirit in a more direct relationship with discarnate spirits and also with other incarnate ones.
765. The thought of the incarnate spirit acts upon the spiritual fluids in the same way as does the thought of discarnates spirits; it is transmitted from spirit to spirit through the same means, and depending on whether it is good or evil, it cleanses or contaminates the surrounding fluids.
766. If the ambient fluids are modified by the projection of the thoughts of the spirit, its perispiritual envelope, which is a constituent part of its being, and which directly and permanently receives the impression of its thoughts, must bear the mark of its good or evil qualities even more. Fluids contaminated by emanations from evil spirits can be purified by expelling such spirits, but their perispirit will always be what it is as long as the spirit itself does not change.
Answer Key
A. Does Spiritism produce miracles?
No. Spiritism shows us that said miraculous facts are the facts of the Natural Laws and therefore the supernatural does not exist. Far from extending the realm of the supernatural, Spiritism restricts it to its farthest limits and takes away its last refuge. If it encourages belief in the possibility of certain phenomena, it hinders the belief in many others, for it demonstrates, within the sphere of spirituality, just as science does within the sphere of materiality, what is possible and what is not. However, since it does not pretend to hold the final word on all things, not even those that are within its jurisdiction, it does not present itself as the absolute regulator of what is possible, and takes into account knowledge that is reserved for the future. (Genesis, Ch. XIII, items 4 and 8)
B. What do spiritual phenomena consist?
Spirit phenomena consist in the different modes of manifestation of the soul, or spirit, whether during incarnation or in the errant state. It is through its manifestations that the soul reveals its existence, its survival after death, and its individuality. It is judged by its effects; and since the cause is natural, the effect is also natural. It is these effects that comprise the special object of Spiritist research and study so as to arrive at as complete an understanding as possible concerning the nature and attributes of the soul, as well as the laws that govern the spiritual principle. Spirit phenomena are most often spontaneous and are produced without any preconceived idea on the part of the persons who least think about them. Under certain circumstances they can be precipitated by agents known as mediums. In the former case, mediums are unconscious of what is produced through their intermediation; in the latter, they act with full knowledge of the fact; hence the distinction between conscious and unconscious mediums. (Genesis, Ch. XIII, items 9 and 13)
C. Which type of mediums is the most numerous?
The unconscious mediums are the most numerous and are frequently found among the most obstinate disbelievers, who thus practice Spiritism without realizing it or wanting to. (Genesis, Ch. XIII, item 12)
