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Spiritist Review - Journal of Psychological Studies - 1866 > October > The Times Have Come
The Times Have Come
The times established by God have come, we are told from all sides, in which great things are going to happen for the regeneration of humanity. In which sense should these prophetic words be understood? To the unbelievers they have no importance. To their eyes these are just an expression of a puerile belief, without foundation. To most believers it has something of mystic and supernatural, that seems to be a precursor of a collapse of the natural laws. Both interpretations are equally wrong; the first for implying the denial of Providence and because the facts demonstrate the truth of these words; the second because they do not announce the breach of the laws of nature but its realization.
Let us, therefore, seek a more rational meaning.
Everything is harmony in the works of creation; everything reveals a providence that contradicts neither the smallest nor the greatest things. Therefore, to begin with, we must rule out any caprice, for it is irreconcilable with the Divine wisdom; second, if our times are set for the realization of certain things, it is for that fact that they make sense in the general march. Having said that, we say that our globe, as everything that exists, is submitted to the law of progress. It progresses physically by the transformation of the elements that compose it, and morally by the depuration of its inhabiting incarnate and discarnate Spirits. These two progresses follow one another and march in parallel because the perfection of the dwelling is proportional to the inhabitant. The globe has suffered physical transformation, attested by science, and that have made it gradually inhabitable by more perfected beings; morally, humanity progresses by the development of intelligence, moral sense, and softening of social mores. While the globe improves under the domain of material forces, men contribute to that by the efforts of intelligence. They improve inhospitable regions, advance communications, and make the soil more productive.
This doble progress takes place in two ways: one that is slow, gradual, and imperceptible; the other through more sudden changes, with a faster ascending movement taking place in each one, marking by distinct characters the progressive movement of humanity. Such movements, subordinated in the detail to men’s free-will, are, in a way, fatal as a whole, because they are submitted to the laws, as those that yield germination, growth and maturation of plants, given that progress is the objective of humanity, despite the delay of some individualities. That is why the progressive movement is, sometimes, partial, that is, limited to a race or a nation, and other times general.
The progress of humanity, therefore, takes place due to a law. Since all laws of nature are the eternal works of the Divine wisdom and prescience, everything that is the effect of such laws is the result of the will of God, and not the result of an accidental and whimsical will, but that of an immutable will.
Then, when humanity is mature enough to transpose a step, we can say that the times established by God have come, as we can also say that in a given season they have arrived for the maturation and harvest of fruits.
Considering that the progressive movement of humanity is inevitable, because it is part of nature, it does not follow that God is indifferent to that, and that after having established the laws, he had entered a state of inertia, allowing things to go by themselves. His laws are eternal and immutable, no doubt, but since His own will is eternal and constant, and His thought animates everything without interruption, and since His thought, that penetrates everything, is the intelligent and permanent force that keeps everything in harmony, if that thought stopped acting a single moment, the universe would be like a clock without its regulating rocker arm. Thus, God oversees incessantly His laws, and the Spirits that inhabit space are His ministers in charge of the details, according to the assignment compatible with their degree of development.
The universe is, at the same time, an incommensurable mechanism led by a not less incommensurable number of intelligences, and an immense government in which each intelligent being has its part of the action under the sovereign eye of the Lord, whose unique will keeps the unity of the whole. Under the empire of this vast regulating power, everything moves, everything works in a perfect order. What seems disturbance to us, constitute partial and isolated movements that only seem irregular to us because our sight is circumscribed. If we could embrace the whole, we would see that such irregularities are just apparent and that they are in harmony with the whole.
The forecast of progressive movements of humanity is not at all surprising to the dematerialized beings, that see the target to which everything tend, some of whom get the direct thought of God and judge, by the partial movements, the time in which there could be a general movement, as we foresee the time for a tree to bear fruits, and like the astronomers calculate the time for an astronomical phenomenon based on the time that remains for a given globe to complete its revolution.
But all those that announce such phenomena, the authors of almanacs that predict eclipses and tides, are not certainly the ones capable of doing the necessary calculations. They are simple repeaters. Thus, there are secondary Spirits, whose vision is limited, and that just repeat what the superior Spirits thought appropriate to reveal to them.
Humanity has realized incontestable progresses up until now. For its intelligence, mankind has achieved results that had never been done before in terms of sciences, arts, and material comfort. There remains still a grandiose result to be achieved: have charity, fraternity, and solidarity reigning among all, to ensure their moral well-being. Men could not have it done with their beliefs, their broken institutions, remains of former times, good for a certain period, sufficient for a transient state, but that having given what it was capable of, today they would be stagnation. That is what happens to a boy, whose motivations of childhood are powerless when it comes to a mature age. It is no longer just the development of intelligence that is necessary to men, but the elevation of feelings, and for that it is necessary to destroy everything that could super excite pride and selfishness in them.
That is the period that they will enter and that will mark one of the main phases of humanity. That phase, that is currently in preparation, is the necessary complement of the current phase, as the mature age is the complement of youth. It could, therefore, be predicted in anticipation, and that is why we say that the times marked by God have come. Such time is not about a partial change, a limited renovation of a country, a people, or a race. It is the universal movement that takes place in terms of moral progress. A new order of things tends to be established, and those that oppose to that the most, work for that, nevertheless.
Future generation, disentangled from the scum of the old world, and formed by more depurated elements, will be driven by ideas and feelings completely different from the feelings that drive the present generation, moving away at gigantic steps. The old world will die and live in history, like the medieval times today, with their barbaric social mores and superstitious beliefs.
Besides, everyone knows that the present order of things is lacking. After having, in a way, exhausted material comfort, that is a product of intelligence, if follows that the complement of that well-being can only be the moral development. The more one advances, the more one feels what is lacking, without, however, being able to clearly define it; it is the effect of the intimate work that takes place for the regeneration; one has wishes and aspirations that are like the presentiment of a better state.
But such a radical change, like the one that is taking place, cannot happen without commotion; there is inevitable struggle between ideas, and in the struggle, there is the possibility of success or failure. However, since the new ideas are those of progress, and progress is in the laws of nature, they can only overcome the backward-looking ideas. Temporary disruptions will forcibly arise from this conflict, until the terrain is cleared from the obstacles that are opposed to the construction of the new social edifice.
It is, therefore, form the struggle of ideas that the announced grave events will take place, and not from cataclysms and purely material catastrophes. The general cataclysms followed the periods of formation of Earth; today it is no longer the guts of Earth that agitates, but those of humanity.
Humanity is a collective being, in which the moral revolutions that take place are the same as those in each individual, with the difference that some take place year over year, and the others century after century. Following their evolution through times, one can see the life of the several races marked by periods that give each one a particular character.
Side by side with partial movements, there is a general movement that gives the whole humanity an impulse; but the progress of each part of the whole is relative to their degree of advancement. Such would be a family formed by several children, in which the youngest is in the crib and the oldest is ten years old, for example. After ten years, the oldest one will be a twenty-year-old man, and the youngest will be only ten, and although grown, he will still be a child, but in due time he will become a man. That is what happens to the several fractions of humanity; the younger advance, but they could not leap to the same level as the older ones. By becoming adult, humanity has new needs, ampler and more elevated aspirations; it understands the emptiness of the ideas that lulled it, the insufficiency of its institutions for its happiness, no longer finding in such state of things the legitimate satisfactions that it demands, and for that reason humanity shakes the diapers and moves forward, pushed by an irresistible force towards the unknown, seeking new and less limited horizons. And at the time when it finds itself suffocated in its material sphere, when intellectual life thrives, when the feeling of spirituality expands, that certain men, pretense philosophers, expect to fill the emptiness with the doctrines of nihilism and materialism! Strange aberration! These very men that pretend to take it forward, strive to keep it in the narrow circle of matter, from which humanity aspires to leave; they block its vision of an infinite life, and say by pointing at the grave: Nec plus ultra.[1]
The progressive march of humanity occurs in two different ways, as we said: one is gradual, slow, imperceptible, if we consider less remote epochs, translated into successive improvements in social mores, laws, uses, and that we only notice with time, like the changes provoked on the surface of the globe by the currents of water; the other one, by a relatively sudden and fast movement, similar to a torrent breaking the dikes, making it cover in a few years what would otherwise be done in centuries. It is then a moral cataclysm that shortly devours the institutions of the past, succeeded by a new order of things that is established bit by bit, as calm returns and becomes definitive.
To someone that lives enough to embrace the two sides of the new phase, it seems that a new world has come out of the ruins of the old one; the character, the social mores, the uses, everything has changed. It is for the fact that new men, or better saying, regenerated men have arrived. The ideas sustained by the extinguishing generation give rise to the one that stands up.
Humanity has arrived to one of these periods of transformation, or moral growth, if you will. It passes from adolescence to a mature age. Past can no longer suffice to its new aspirations and needs; it can no longer be driven by the same means; it no longer allows elusions and gimmicks. Matured reason requires more substantial food. Present is ephemeral; it feels that its destiny is ampler, that the material life is excessively restricted to completely contain it. That is why it looks back at the bast and forward, to the future, to discover the mystery of its own existence, seeking a reassuring safety net.
Anyone that has meditated about Spiritism and its consequences, and do not restrict it to the production of some phenomena, understands that it opens a new path to humanity, unfolding the horizons of infinity. Initiating in the mysteries of the invisible world, it shows one’s true role in the creation, an eternally active role, both in the spiritual and in the corporeal state. Man no longer walks blindly. He knows where he comes from, where he is going to and why he is on Earth. Future shows him how it truly is, free from the prejudices of ignorance and superstition; to him, it is no longer a hope, it is rather a tangible truth, as certain as the succession of days and nights. He knows that his being is not limited to an existence of a few instants, whose duration is submitted to the whims of chance; that the spiritual life is not interrupted by death; that he has already lived and will live again, and that everything that is acquired in perfection by work is not lost; he finds the reason for what he is today in previous existences, and from what he does today he can conclude what, one day, he is going to be.
With the thought that individual activity and cooperation in the general works of civilization are limited to the present life, and that we were nothing and will be nothing, what does it matter to man the future progress of humanity? What does it matter that peoples are better governed in the future, that they are happier, more enlightened, and better to one another? Considering that there is no benefit to be taken from this, isn’t such progress lost to him? What good does it make to him to work for those that will come afterwards, if he is never going to meet them; if they are new beings, that later will also fall in the void? Under the empire of the denial of an individual future, everything forcibly reduces to the meager proportions of the moment and personality.
But, the certainty of the perpetuity of the spiritual being, on the contrary, what amplitude of thoughts does it give to man! What strength and courage aren’t acquired against the vicissitudes of material life? What more rational, more grandiose, more worth of the Creator than such a law, according to which the spiritual life, and the material life, are two ways of life that alternate for the accomplishment of progress! What more just and reassuring than the idea of beings progressing incessantly, first through the generations in the same world, then from world to world, up to perfection, without solution of continuity!
Every action, therefore, has an objective, for working for everyone one is working for oneself, and vice-versa, so that neither individual progress, nor general progress are ever sterile, because they benefit both future individualities and generations, that are nothing else but the past individualities that have achieved a higher degree of advancement. The spiritual life is the normal and eternal life of the Spirit, and the incarnation is only a temporary form of its existence. Except for the exterior outfit, there is, therefore, identification between the incarnate and discarnate; they are the same individualities in two different forms, one time belonging to the visible world, another to the invisible one, being in one or in another, concurring in both to the same objective with the means that are appropriate to their condition. The consequence of this law is the perpetuity of the relationships among the beings. Death does not separate them and does not end the relationships of sympathy, as it does not end their reciprocal duties. From that, the solidarity of all for one and one for all; from that, also, the fraternity. Men will not live happily on Earth unless both these feelings have been housed in their hearts and social mores, because then their institutions will be subjected to them. This will be one of the main results of the transformation that takes place.
But how to reconcile the duties of solidarity and fraternity with the belief that men become strange to one another forever with death? By the law of perpetuity of relationships of all beings, Spiritism seats this principle on the very laws of nature. It makes it not only a duty, abut a necessity. By the law of plurality of existences, man is connected to what has been done and what is going to be done by the men of past and future; he can no longer say that he has nothing in common with the ones that die, for one and the others are incessantly in this and in the other world, to climb together the ladder of progress and to provide mutual support. Fraternity is no longer restricted to a few individuals, gathered by chance during the ephemeral duration of a life; it is eternal, like the life of the Spirit, universal, like humanity, that constitutes a great family whose members are all in solidarity with one another, irrespective of the period in which they lived.
Such are the ideas that emerge from Spiritism, and that it will arouse among all men when it is universally spread, understood, taught, and practiced. Fraternity, with Spiritism, synonym of the charity preached by Christ, is no longer an empty word. It has its reason of existence. From the feeling of fraternity arises that of reciprocity and social duties from man to man, people to people, race to race. The most beneficial institutions for the well-being of all will inevitably come from these two well understood feelings.
Fraternity must be the cornerstone of the new social order. But there will not be real, solid and effective fraternity if it is not supported by an unshakable foundation, and such foundation is faith, not the faith in this or that particular dogma, that change with time and by which peoples throw stones at one another, and for anathemizing they entertain antagonism, but faith in the fundamental principles that everybody can accept: God, the soul, the future, the indefinite individual progress, the perpetuity of the relationships among the beings. When men are convinced that God is the same to all, that this sovereignly just and good God cannot wish anything unfair, and that evil comes from men and not from Him, they will then see one another as children of the same Father and hold hands. That is the faith given by Spiritism and that will be, from now on, the pivot around which humankind will move, irrespective of their ways of worshiping and their particular beliefs, that Spiritism respects but does not have to deal with. It is only from this faith that the moral progress may come because it is the only one that provides a logical sanction to the legitimate rights and duties. Without it, the right is what is given by force; the duty is a human code imposed by constraint. What is man without that faith? A little bit of matter that dissolves, an ephemeral being that just passes. Without that faith the genius himself is only a spark that shines momentarily, to disappear forever, and certainly this is not much of a praise before his own eyes.
With such a thought, where are really rights and duties? What is the objective of progress? It is only this faith that makes man feel his dignity by the perpetuity and progression of his own being, not a meager future, restricted to his own personality, but grandiose and splendid; his thought raises him above Earth; he feels growing, believing that he has his role to play; that this universe is his domain that he will be able to travel through one day, and that death will not transform him in a nullity or on a useless being to him and to the others.
The intellectual progress carried out until now, in the largest proportions, is a great step and marks the first phase of humanity whose regeneration cannot be achieved by that progress alone; while man is dominated by pride and selfishness, he will utilize his intelligence and knowledge to the benefit of his passions and personal interests, being this the reason why he applies them to the improvement of means of disserving and destroying others. It is only moral progress that can ensure men’s happiness on Earth by breaking the bad passions; it is only that progress that can establish concord, peace, and fraternity among men. That is what is going to destroy the barriers between peoples; that will drop prejudices of cast and shut the antagonisms of sect, teaching men to see one another as brothers, called to help one another and not have some exploiting others. It is still moral progress, here seconded by the progress of intelligence, that will confound men in the same belief, established on the eternal truths, not subjected to discussions, and for that very reason accepted by all. The unity of belief will be the most powerful bond, the most solid foundation of the universal fraternity, broken by religious disputes that have divided peoples and families in all times, that make people see enemies in their fellow citizens, that need to be fought, kept away and exterminated, instead of brothers that need to be loved.
Such a state of things requires a radical change in the feeling of masses, a general progress that could only take place by moving away from the circle of narrow and shallow ideas that stimulate egotism. Noble men have strived to drive humanity through this path, in several periods, but the still too young humanity remained deaf, and their teachings were like the good seed that fell on the rock. Humanity now is more mature to look up higher than it has done, to assimilate ampler ideas and understand what had not been understood.
The generation that disappears will carry along its prejudices and mistakes; the generations that appears, strengthened in a more depurated source, driven by healthier ideas, will impose the ascending movement to the world, regarding the moral progress that must mark a new phase of humanity. Such a phase is already revealed by unequivocal signs, by attempts of useful reforms, by the great and generous ideas that come to light and begin to find echo. That is how we see the foundation of many protecting, civilizing and emancipating institutions, by the impulse of men evidently predestined to the works of regeneration, and the penal laws daily acquire a more humane feeling. The prejudices of race soften out and the peoples begin to see each other as members of a great family. By the uniformity and facility of the means of transportation, they suppress the barriers that divided them in all parts of the world, gathering in universal committees for peaceful tournaments of intelligence. But such reforms lack a basis for its development, complement and consolidation, a more general moral predisposition to fructify and be accepted by the masses. This is not less a characteristic sign of the times, the prelude of what is going to take place in a larger scale, as the time is right.
A not less characteristic sign of the period in that we enter is the evident reaction that takes place in the spiritualist ideas. An instinctive repulsion manifests against the materialistic ideas, whose representatives become less abundant and less absolute. The spirit of incredulity that had taken the masses, ignorant or enlightened, making them reject both the form and substance of any belief, was like a sleep, after which one feels the need to breathe a more vivifying air. Involuntarily, one seeks something, a supporting point, a hope, where it was empty before.
In this great regenerating movement, Spiritism plays a considerable role, not the ridiculous spiritism invented by a mocking critic, but the philosophical Spiritism, that is understood by those that take the burden of finding the almond inside the shell. By the proof that it brings about the fundamental truths, Spiritism fulfills the emptiness that incredulity engineers in the ideas and beliefs; by the certainty that it provides in a future according to the justice of God, that can be admitted by the strictest reason, it alleviates the bitterness of life and prevents the dismal effects of despair. By revealing the new laws of nature, it gives the key of misunderstood phenomena, and unsolved problems, up until now, killing, at the same time, incredulity, and superstition. For Spiritism there is neither the supernatural nor the marvelous; everything happens in the world due to immutable laws.
Far from replacing an exclusivism by another, it stands as the absolute champion of freedom of conscience; it combats fanaticism in all forms and cut it in its root, proclaiming salvation to all good men, and the possibility to the more imperfect ones to arrive at perfection, by their own efforts, atonement and reparation, a perfection that is the only one that leads to supreme happiness. Instead of discouraging the weak, it encourages them, showing the end that can be achieved.
It does not say: There is no salvation outside Spiritism, but says with Christ: There is no salvation outside charity, a principle of union and tolerance, that will unite men in a common feeling of fraternity, instead of dividing them into enemies sects. By this other principle: There is no unshakable faith but the one that can look at reason face to face in all ages of humanity – it destroys the empire of a blind faith, that annihilates reason, and the passive obedience that numbs; it emancipates man’s intelligence and lifts his morale.
By being consistent, it does not impose itself; it says what it is, what it wants, what it gives, and waits for people to come freely, voluntarily; it wants to be accepted by reason and not by force. It respects all sincere beliefs, and only combats incredulity, egotism, pride and hypocrisy, that are the ulcers of society and the most serious obstacles to moral progress; but it does not cast anathema to anyone, not even to its enemies, for it is convinced that the path of good is open to the most imperfect ones that sooner or later will enter it.
If we suppose the majority of men pervaded by such feelings, we can easily imagine the changes that they will bring to social relations: charity, fraternity, benevolence to all, and tolerance with all beliefs, such will be its motto. This is evidently the objective to which humanity tends, the object of its aspirations, its desires, without realizing the means to achieve them; it tries, gropes along, but it is stopped by the active forces of inertia of prejudices, and by beliefs that are stationary and refractory to progress. These are the resistances that need to be overcome and that is the task of the new generation. Those that will follow the natural course of things will acknowledge that everything seems to be predestined to clear the way. Humanity will count on its favor with the double power of the number and the ideas, besides experience.
Thus, the new generation will march towards the realization of all humanitarian ideas, compatible with its own degree of advancement. Spiritism, by seeking the same objective and carrying out its plans, will meet humanity in the same terrain, where instead of competitors they will be collaborators, helping one another. Men of progress will find a powerful lever in the Spiritist ideas, and Spiritism will find in the new men Spirits absolutely prepared to welcome it. In such a state of things, what can those that wish to create obstacles do?
It is not Spiritism that creates the social renovation, it is the maturity of humanity that makes such a renovation a necessity. By its moralizing power, by its progressive tendencies, by the amplitude of its vision, by the generality of questions that it embraces, Spiritism, more than any other doctrine, apt to second the regenerating movement. That is why it is its contemporary. It came when it could be useful, for time has come for Spiritism as well. Earlier on it would have found unsurpassable obstacles; it would have inevitably succumbed, for the fact that men were satisfied with what they had and had not yet felt the need for what Spiritism brings. Today, born with the fermenting movement of the ideas, it finds the terrain ready to receive it. Tired of doubt and uncertainty, terrified by the abyss that opens before their eyes, the minds receive it like the lifeline of salvation, and a supreme consolation.
By saying that humanity is mature for the regeneration, this does not mean that all individuals are on the same level, but many intuitively carry the germ of the new ideas that circumstances will make sprout; they will then appear more advanced that it seemed, enthusiastically following the impulse of the majority. There are, however, those that are fundamentally refractory, even among the most intelligent, that will certainly not join, at least in this existence, some out of good faith and conviction, others out of interest.
Those whose material interests are linked to the present state of things, and that are not sufficiently advanced to free themselves from that, to whom the general well-being touches less than that of their own, those cannot see the tiniest reforming movement without apprehension. Truth to them is a secondary issue, or better saying, the whole truth is in what does not cause them any disturbance; to their eyes, every progressive idea is subversive and that is why they attack them ruthlessly and carry out a bloodthirsty war.
Too intelligent not to see in Spiritism an auxiliar to those ideas and their feared elements of transformation, and since they do not feel to be up to that, they strive to destroy it; if they thought it was worthless and meaningless, they wouldn’t care. We have already said somewhere else: “The bigger an idea, the more adversaries it encounters, and its importance may be measured by the violence of the attacks that it suffers.”
The number of latecomers is, undoubtedly, still large, but what can they do against the growing wave other than throwing stones at it? This wave is the generation that is rising, while they are disappearing everyday with the generation that extinguishes at a fast pace. Until then they will defend the ground, foot by foot. There is, therefore, an inevitable struggle, but an unequal struggle, because it is the decrepit past, that is falling apart, against the youthful future; that of stagnation against progress; that of the individual against the will of God, for their time has come.
Note. - The reflections above are the development of the instructions given by the Spirits on the same subject, in a large number of communications, either to us or to other persons. The one we publish below is the summary of several interviews we had through two of our frequent mediums, in an ecstatic somnambulistic state, and who, upon awakening, do not retain any memory. We methodically coordinated the ideas to give them a better sequence, removing all unnecessary details and accessories. The thoughts have been accurately reproduced, and the words are also as literally as it was possible to capture by hearing them.
[1] Nothing beyond (T.N.)
Let us, therefore, seek a more rational meaning.
Everything is harmony in the works of creation; everything reveals a providence that contradicts neither the smallest nor the greatest things. Therefore, to begin with, we must rule out any caprice, for it is irreconcilable with the Divine wisdom; second, if our times are set for the realization of certain things, it is for that fact that they make sense in the general march. Having said that, we say that our globe, as everything that exists, is submitted to the law of progress. It progresses physically by the transformation of the elements that compose it, and morally by the depuration of its inhabiting incarnate and discarnate Spirits. These two progresses follow one another and march in parallel because the perfection of the dwelling is proportional to the inhabitant. The globe has suffered physical transformation, attested by science, and that have made it gradually inhabitable by more perfected beings; morally, humanity progresses by the development of intelligence, moral sense, and softening of social mores. While the globe improves under the domain of material forces, men contribute to that by the efforts of intelligence. They improve inhospitable regions, advance communications, and make the soil more productive.
This doble progress takes place in two ways: one that is slow, gradual, and imperceptible; the other through more sudden changes, with a faster ascending movement taking place in each one, marking by distinct characters the progressive movement of humanity. Such movements, subordinated in the detail to men’s free-will, are, in a way, fatal as a whole, because they are submitted to the laws, as those that yield germination, growth and maturation of plants, given that progress is the objective of humanity, despite the delay of some individualities. That is why the progressive movement is, sometimes, partial, that is, limited to a race or a nation, and other times general.
The progress of humanity, therefore, takes place due to a law. Since all laws of nature are the eternal works of the Divine wisdom and prescience, everything that is the effect of such laws is the result of the will of God, and not the result of an accidental and whimsical will, but that of an immutable will.
Then, when humanity is mature enough to transpose a step, we can say that the times established by God have come, as we can also say that in a given season they have arrived for the maturation and harvest of fruits.
Considering that the progressive movement of humanity is inevitable, because it is part of nature, it does not follow that God is indifferent to that, and that after having established the laws, he had entered a state of inertia, allowing things to go by themselves. His laws are eternal and immutable, no doubt, but since His own will is eternal and constant, and His thought animates everything without interruption, and since His thought, that penetrates everything, is the intelligent and permanent force that keeps everything in harmony, if that thought stopped acting a single moment, the universe would be like a clock without its regulating rocker arm. Thus, God oversees incessantly His laws, and the Spirits that inhabit space are His ministers in charge of the details, according to the assignment compatible with their degree of development.
The universe is, at the same time, an incommensurable mechanism led by a not less incommensurable number of intelligences, and an immense government in which each intelligent being has its part of the action under the sovereign eye of the Lord, whose unique will keeps the unity of the whole. Under the empire of this vast regulating power, everything moves, everything works in a perfect order. What seems disturbance to us, constitute partial and isolated movements that only seem irregular to us because our sight is circumscribed. If we could embrace the whole, we would see that such irregularities are just apparent and that they are in harmony with the whole.
The forecast of progressive movements of humanity is not at all surprising to the dematerialized beings, that see the target to which everything tend, some of whom get the direct thought of God and judge, by the partial movements, the time in which there could be a general movement, as we foresee the time for a tree to bear fruits, and like the astronomers calculate the time for an astronomical phenomenon based on the time that remains for a given globe to complete its revolution.
But all those that announce such phenomena, the authors of almanacs that predict eclipses and tides, are not certainly the ones capable of doing the necessary calculations. They are simple repeaters. Thus, there are secondary Spirits, whose vision is limited, and that just repeat what the superior Spirits thought appropriate to reveal to them.
Humanity has realized incontestable progresses up until now. For its intelligence, mankind has achieved results that had never been done before in terms of sciences, arts, and material comfort. There remains still a grandiose result to be achieved: have charity, fraternity, and solidarity reigning among all, to ensure their moral well-being. Men could not have it done with their beliefs, their broken institutions, remains of former times, good for a certain period, sufficient for a transient state, but that having given what it was capable of, today they would be stagnation. That is what happens to a boy, whose motivations of childhood are powerless when it comes to a mature age. It is no longer just the development of intelligence that is necessary to men, but the elevation of feelings, and for that it is necessary to destroy everything that could super excite pride and selfishness in them.
That is the period that they will enter and that will mark one of the main phases of humanity. That phase, that is currently in preparation, is the necessary complement of the current phase, as the mature age is the complement of youth. It could, therefore, be predicted in anticipation, and that is why we say that the times marked by God have come. Such time is not about a partial change, a limited renovation of a country, a people, or a race. It is the universal movement that takes place in terms of moral progress. A new order of things tends to be established, and those that oppose to that the most, work for that, nevertheless.
Future generation, disentangled from the scum of the old world, and formed by more depurated elements, will be driven by ideas and feelings completely different from the feelings that drive the present generation, moving away at gigantic steps. The old world will die and live in history, like the medieval times today, with their barbaric social mores and superstitious beliefs.
Besides, everyone knows that the present order of things is lacking. After having, in a way, exhausted material comfort, that is a product of intelligence, if follows that the complement of that well-being can only be the moral development. The more one advances, the more one feels what is lacking, without, however, being able to clearly define it; it is the effect of the intimate work that takes place for the regeneration; one has wishes and aspirations that are like the presentiment of a better state.
But such a radical change, like the one that is taking place, cannot happen without commotion; there is inevitable struggle between ideas, and in the struggle, there is the possibility of success or failure. However, since the new ideas are those of progress, and progress is in the laws of nature, they can only overcome the backward-looking ideas. Temporary disruptions will forcibly arise from this conflict, until the terrain is cleared from the obstacles that are opposed to the construction of the new social edifice.
It is, therefore, form the struggle of ideas that the announced grave events will take place, and not from cataclysms and purely material catastrophes. The general cataclysms followed the periods of formation of Earth; today it is no longer the guts of Earth that agitates, but those of humanity.
Humanity is a collective being, in which the moral revolutions that take place are the same as those in each individual, with the difference that some take place year over year, and the others century after century. Following their evolution through times, one can see the life of the several races marked by periods that give each one a particular character.
Side by side with partial movements, there is a general movement that gives the whole humanity an impulse; but the progress of each part of the whole is relative to their degree of advancement. Such would be a family formed by several children, in which the youngest is in the crib and the oldest is ten years old, for example. After ten years, the oldest one will be a twenty-year-old man, and the youngest will be only ten, and although grown, he will still be a child, but in due time he will become a man. That is what happens to the several fractions of humanity; the younger advance, but they could not leap to the same level as the older ones. By becoming adult, humanity has new needs, ampler and more elevated aspirations; it understands the emptiness of the ideas that lulled it, the insufficiency of its institutions for its happiness, no longer finding in such state of things the legitimate satisfactions that it demands, and for that reason humanity shakes the diapers and moves forward, pushed by an irresistible force towards the unknown, seeking new and less limited horizons. And at the time when it finds itself suffocated in its material sphere, when intellectual life thrives, when the feeling of spirituality expands, that certain men, pretense philosophers, expect to fill the emptiness with the doctrines of nihilism and materialism! Strange aberration! These very men that pretend to take it forward, strive to keep it in the narrow circle of matter, from which humanity aspires to leave; they block its vision of an infinite life, and say by pointing at the grave: Nec plus ultra.[1]
The progressive march of humanity occurs in two different ways, as we said: one is gradual, slow, imperceptible, if we consider less remote epochs, translated into successive improvements in social mores, laws, uses, and that we only notice with time, like the changes provoked on the surface of the globe by the currents of water; the other one, by a relatively sudden and fast movement, similar to a torrent breaking the dikes, making it cover in a few years what would otherwise be done in centuries. It is then a moral cataclysm that shortly devours the institutions of the past, succeeded by a new order of things that is established bit by bit, as calm returns and becomes definitive.
To someone that lives enough to embrace the two sides of the new phase, it seems that a new world has come out of the ruins of the old one; the character, the social mores, the uses, everything has changed. It is for the fact that new men, or better saying, regenerated men have arrived. The ideas sustained by the extinguishing generation give rise to the one that stands up.
Humanity has arrived to one of these periods of transformation, or moral growth, if you will. It passes from adolescence to a mature age. Past can no longer suffice to its new aspirations and needs; it can no longer be driven by the same means; it no longer allows elusions and gimmicks. Matured reason requires more substantial food. Present is ephemeral; it feels that its destiny is ampler, that the material life is excessively restricted to completely contain it. That is why it looks back at the bast and forward, to the future, to discover the mystery of its own existence, seeking a reassuring safety net.
Anyone that has meditated about Spiritism and its consequences, and do not restrict it to the production of some phenomena, understands that it opens a new path to humanity, unfolding the horizons of infinity. Initiating in the mysteries of the invisible world, it shows one’s true role in the creation, an eternally active role, both in the spiritual and in the corporeal state. Man no longer walks blindly. He knows where he comes from, where he is going to and why he is on Earth. Future shows him how it truly is, free from the prejudices of ignorance and superstition; to him, it is no longer a hope, it is rather a tangible truth, as certain as the succession of days and nights. He knows that his being is not limited to an existence of a few instants, whose duration is submitted to the whims of chance; that the spiritual life is not interrupted by death; that he has already lived and will live again, and that everything that is acquired in perfection by work is not lost; he finds the reason for what he is today in previous existences, and from what he does today he can conclude what, one day, he is going to be.
With the thought that individual activity and cooperation in the general works of civilization are limited to the present life, and that we were nothing and will be nothing, what does it matter to man the future progress of humanity? What does it matter that peoples are better governed in the future, that they are happier, more enlightened, and better to one another? Considering that there is no benefit to be taken from this, isn’t such progress lost to him? What good does it make to him to work for those that will come afterwards, if he is never going to meet them; if they are new beings, that later will also fall in the void? Under the empire of the denial of an individual future, everything forcibly reduces to the meager proportions of the moment and personality.
But, the certainty of the perpetuity of the spiritual being, on the contrary, what amplitude of thoughts does it give to man! What strength and courage aren’t acquired against the vicissitudes of material life? What more rational, more grandiose, more worth of the Creator than such a law, according to which the spiritual life, and the material life, are two ways of life that alternate for the accomplishment of progress! What more just and reassuring than the idea of beings progressing incessantly, first through the generations in the same world, then from world to world, up to perfection, without solution of continuity!
Every action, therefore, has an objective, for working for everyone one is working for oneself, and vice-versa, so that neither individual progress, nor general progress are ever sterile, because they benefit both future individualities and generations, that are nothing else but the past individualities that have achieved a higher degree of advancement. The spiritual life is the normal and eternal life of the Spirit, and the incarnation is only a temporary form of its existence. Except for the exterior outfit, there is, therefore, identification between the incarnate and discarnate; they are the same individualities in two different forms, one time belonging to the visible world, another to the invisible one, being in one or in another, concurring in both to the same objective with the means that are appropriate to their condition. The consequence of this law is the perpetuity of the relationships among the beings. Death does not separate them and does not end the relationships of sympathy, as it does not end their reciprocal duties. From that, the solidarity of all for one and one for all; from that, also, the fraternity. Men will not live happily on Earth unless both these feelings have been housed in their hearts and social mores, because then their institutions will be subjected to them. This will be one of the main results of the transformation that takes place.
But how to reconcile the duties of solidarity and fraternity with the belief that men become strange to one another forever with death? By the law of perpetuity of relationships of all beings, Spiritism seats this principle on the very laws of nature. It makes it not only a duty, abut a necessity. By the law of plurality of existences, man is connected to what has been done and what is going to be done by the men of past and future; he can no longer say that he has nothing in common with the ones that die, for one and the others are incessantly in this and in the other world, to climb together the ladder of progress and to provide mutual support. Fraternity is no longer restricted to a few individuals, gathered by chance during the ephemeral duration of a life; it is eternal, like the life of the Spirit, universal, like humanity, that constitutes a great family whose members are all in solidarity with one another, irrespective of the period in which they lived.
Such are the ideas that emerge from Spiritism, and that it will arouse among all men when it is universally spread, understood, taught, and practiced. Fraternity, with Spiritism, synonym of the charity preached by Christ, is no longer an empty word. It has its reason of existence. From the feeling of fraternity arises that of reciprocity and social duties from man to man, people to people, race to race. The most beneficial institutions for the well-being of all will inevitably come from these two well understood feelings.
Fraternity must be the cornerstone of the new social order. But there will not be real, solid and effective fraternity if it is not supported by an unshakable foundation, and such foundation is faith, not the faith in this or that particular dogma, that change with time and by which peoples throw stones at one another, and for anathemizing they entertain antagonism, but faith in the fundamental principles that everybody can accept: God, the soul, the future, the indefinite individual progress, the perpetuity of the relationships among the beings. When men are convinced that God is the same to all, that this sovereignly just and good God cannot wish anything unfair, and that evil comes from men and not from Him, they will then see one another as children of the same Father and hold hands. That is the faith given by Spiritism and that will be, from now on, the pivot around which humankind will move, irrespective of their ways of worshiping and their particular beliefs, that Spiritism respects but does not have to deal with. It is only from this faith that the moral progress may come because it is the only one that provides a logical sanction to the legitimate rights and duties. Without it, the right is what is given by force; the duty is a human code imposed by constraint. What is man without that faith? A little bit of matter that dissolves, an ephemeral being that just passes. Without that faith the genius himself is only a spark that shines momentarily, to disappear forever, and certainly this is not much of a praise before his own eyes.
With such a thought, where are really rights and duties? What is the objective of progress? It is only this faith that makes man feel his dignity by the perpetuity and progression of his own being, not a meager future, restricted to his own personality, but grandiose and splendid; his thought raises him above Earth; he feels growing, believing that he has his role to play; that this universe is his domain that he will be able to travel through one day, and that death will not transform him in a nullity or on a useless being to him and to the others.
The intellectual progress carried out until now, in the largest proportions, is a great step and marks the first phase of humanity whose regeneration cannot be achieved by that progress alone; while man is dominated by pride and selfishness, he will utilize his intelligence and knowledge to the benefit of his passions and personal interests, being this the reason why he applies them to the improvement of means of disserving and destroying others. It is only moral progress that can ensure men’s happiness on Earth by breaking the bad passions; it is only that progress that can establish concord, peace, and fraternity among men. That is what is going to destroy the barriers between peoples; that will drop prejudices of cast and shut the antagonisms of sect, teaching men to see one another as brothers, called to help one another and not have some exploiting others. It is still moral progress, here seconded by the progress of intelligence, that will confound men in the same belief, established on the eternal truths, not subjected to discussions, and for that very reason accepted by all. The unity of belief will be the most powerful bond, the most solid foundation of the universal fraternity, broken by religious disputes that have divided peoples and families in all times, that make people see enemies in their fellow citizens, that need to be fought, kept away and exterminated, instead of brothers that need to be loved.
Such a state of things requires a radical change in the feeling of masses, a general progress that could only take place by moving away from the circle of narrow and shallow ideas that stimulate egotism. Noble men have strived to drive humanity through this path, in several periods, but the still too young humanity remained deaf, and their teachings were like the good seed that fell on the rock. Humanity now is more mature to look up higher than it has done, to assimilate ampler ideas and understand what had not been understood.
The generation that disappears will carry along its prejudices and mistakes; the generations that appears, strengthened in a more depurated source, driven by healthier ideas, will impose the ascending movement to the world, regarding the moral progress that must mark a new phase of humanity. Such a phase is already revealed by unequivocal signs, by attempts of useful reforms, by the great and generous ideas that come to light and begin to find echo. That is how we see the foundation of many protecting, civilizing and emancipating institutions, by the impulse of men evidently predestined to the works of regeneration, and the penal laws daily acquire a more humane feeling. The prejudices of race soften out and the peoples begin to see each other as members of a great family. By the uniformity and facility of the means of transportation, they suppress the barriers that divided them in all parts of the world, gathering in universal committees for peaceful tournaments of intelligence. But such reforms lack a basis for its development, complement and consolidation, a more general moral predisposition to fructify and be accepted by the masses. This is not less a characteristic sign of the times, the prelude of what is going to take place in a larger scale, as the time is right.
A not less characteristic sign of the period in that we enter is the evident reaction that takes place in the spiritualist ideas. An instinctive repulsion manifests against the materialistic ideas, whose representatives become less abundant and less absolute. The spirit of incredulity that had taken the masses, ignorant or enlightened, making them reject both the form and substance of any belief, was like a sleep, after which one feels the need to breathe a more vivifying air. Involuntarily, one seeks something, a supporting point, a hope, where it was empty before.
In this great regenerating movement, Spiritism plays a considerable role, not the ridiculous spiritism invented by a mocking critic, but the philosophical Spiritism, that is understood by those that take the burden of finding the almond inside the shell. By the proof that it brings about the fundamental truths, Spiritism fulfills the emptiness that incredulity engineers in the ideas and beliefs; by the certainty that it provides in a future according to the justice of God, that can be admitted by the strictest reason, it alleviates the bitterness of life and prevents the dismal effects of despair. By revealing the new laws of nature, it gives the key of misunderstood phenomena, and unsolved problems, up until now, killing, at the same time, incredulity, and superstition. For Spiritism there is neither the supernatural nor the marvelous; everything happens in the world due to immutable laws.
Far from replacing an exclusivism by another, it stands as the absolute champion of freedom of conscience; it combats fanaticism in all forms and cut it in its root, proclaiming salvation to all good men, and the possibility to the more imperfect ones to arrive at perfection, by their own efforts, atonement and reparation, a perfection that is the only one that leads to supreme happiness. Instead of discouraging the weak, it encourages them, showing the end that can be achieved.
It does not say: There is no salvation outside Spiritism, but says with Christ: There is no salvation outside charity, a principle of union and tolerance, that will unite men in a common feeling of fraternity, instead of dividing them into enemies sects. By this other principle: There is no unshakable faith but the one that can look at reason face to face in all ages of humanity – it destroys the empire of a blind faith, that annihilates reason, and the passive obedience that numbs; it emancipates man’s intelligence and lifts his morale.
By being consistent, it does not impose itself; it says what it is, what it wants, what it gives, and waits for people to come freely, voluntarily; it wants to be accepted by reason and not by force. It respects all sincere beliefs, and only combats incredulity, egotism, pride and hypocrisy, that are the ulcers of society and the most serious obstacles to moral progress; but it does not cast anathema to anyone, not even to its enemies, for it is convinced that the path of good is open to the most imperfect ones that sooner or later will enter it.
If we suppose the majority of men pervaded by such feelings, we can easily imagine the changes that they will bring to social relations: charity, fraternity, benevolence to all, and tolerance with all beliefs, such will be its motto. This is evidently the objective to which humanity tends, the object of its aspirations, its desires, without realizing the means to achieve them; it tries, gropes along, but it is stopped by the active forces of inertia of prejudices, and by beliefs that are stationary and refractory to progress. These are the resistances that need to be overcome and that is the task of the new generation. Those that will follow the natural course of things will acknowledge that everything seems to be predestined to clear the way. Humanity will count on its favor with the double power of the number and the ideas, besides experience.
Thus, the new generation will march towards the realization of all humanitarian ideas, compatible with its own degree of advancement. Spiritism, by seeking the same objective and carrying out its plans, will meet humanity in the same terrain, where instead of competitors they will be collaborators, helping one another. Men of progress will find a powerful lever in the Spiritist ideas, and Spiritism will find in the new men Spirits absolutely prepared to welcome it. In such a state of things, what can those that wish to create obstacles do?
It is not Spiritism that creates the social renovation, it is the maturity of humanity that makes such a renovation a necessity. By its moralizing power, by its progressive tendencies, by the amplitude of its vision, by the generality of questions that it embraces, Spiritism, more than any other doctrine, apt to second the regenerating movement. That is why it is its contemporary. It came when it could be useful, for time has come for Spiritism as well. Earlier on it would have found unsurpassable obstacles; it would have inevitably succumbed, for the fact that men were satisfied with what they had and had not yet felt the need for what Spiritism brings. Today, born with the fermenting movement of the ideas, it finds the terrain ready to receive it. Tired of doubt and uncertainty, terrified by the abyss that opens before their eyes, the minds receive it like the lifeline of salvation, and a supreme consolation.
By saying that humanity is mature for the regeneration, this does not mean that all individuals are on the same level, but many intuitively carry the germ of the new ideas that circumstances will make sprout; they will then appear more advanced that it seemed, enthusiastically following the impulse of the majority. There are, however, those that are fundamentally refractory, even among the most intelligent, that will certainly not join, at least in this existence, some out of good faith and conviction, others out of interest.
Those whose material interests are linked to the present state of things, and that are not sufficiently advanced to free themselves from that, to whom the general well-being touches less than that of their own, those cannot see the tiniest reforming movement without apprehension. Truth to them is a secondary issue, or better saying, the whole truth is in what does not cause them any disturbance; to their eyes, every progressive idea is subversive and that is why they attack them ruthlessly and carry out a bloodthirsty war.
Too intelligent not to see in Spiritism an auxiliar to those ideas and their feared elements of transformation, and since they do not feel to be up to that, they strive to destroy it; if they thought it was worthless and meaningless, they wouldn’t care. We have already said somewhere else: “The bigger an idea, the more adversaries it encounters, and its importance may be measured by the violence of the attacks that it suffers.”
The number of latecomers is, undoubtedly, still large, but what can they do against the growing wave other than throwing stones at it? This wave is the generation that is rising, while they are disappearing everyday with the generation that extinguishes at a fast pace. Until then they will defend the ground, foot by foot. There is, therefore, an inevitable struggle, but an unequal struggle, because it is the decrepit past, that is falling apart, against the youthful future; that of stagnation against progress; that of the individual against the will of God, for their time has come.
Note. - The reflections above are the development of the instructions given by the Spirits on the same subject, in a large number of communications, either to us or to other persons. The one we publish below is the summary of several interviews we had through two of our frequent mediums, in an ecstatic somnambulistic state, and who, upon awakening, do not retain any memory. We methodically coordinated the ideas to give them a better sequence, removing all unnecessary details and accessories. The thoughts have been accurately reproduced, and the words are also as literally as it was possible to capture by hearing them.
[1] Nothing beyond (T.N.)