We already know the essentials; is there any reason to dedicate yourself?

Paulo Degering R Jr
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Many of us, and I place myself among them, at certain times ask themselves about Spiritism: “I seem to have understood the essentials. What's the point of continuing to study? No one else seems to want to know about it.”

My suggestion is that, whenever we find ourselves with a lack of answers, we evoke the good Spirits, through the internal disposition of our own thoughts. The answer, one way or another, will not be long in coming.

I don't consider myself a medium, per se, but I have, as every incarnated spirit has, the intuitive capacity. So today, without waiting, I thought of: Spiritist Magazine, August 1865. I leave you this wonderful reflection by Kardec himself:

Contents hide
1 What does Spiritism teach?
2 Reading Recommendations (Books)

What does Spiritism teach?

“There are people who ask what new conquests we owe to Spiritism. From the fact that he did not endow the world with a new productive industry, like steam, they conclude that he produced nothing. Most of those who ask such a question, not having taken the trouble to study it, only know fantasy Spiritism, created for the needs of criticism, and which has nothing in common with serious Spiritism. It is therefore no wonder that they ask what its useful and practical side can be. They would have had to look for it at its source, and not in the caricatures made of it by those who are only interested in denigrating it.

In another order of ideas, some find, on the contrary, the march of Spiritism too slow for their taste. It is astonished that he has not yet probed all the mysteries of Nature, nor addressed all the questions that seem to fall within his purview; they would like to see him teach new things every day, or be enriched by some discovery. As he has not yet resolved the question of the origin of beings, the beginning and end of all things, the divine essence and some others of the same magnitude, they conclude that he did not leave the a-be-ce; that has not yet entered the true philosophical path and that drags on in commonplaces, because it incessantly preaches humility and charity. They say: “Until today he has taught us nothing new, because reincarnation, the negation of eternal punishments, the immortality of the soul, the gradation through periods of intellectual vitality, the perispirit, are not spiritist discoveries per se; so it is necessary to move towards truer and more solid discoveries.”

In this regard, we believe that we should present some observations, which will not be new either, but there are things that must be repeated in different ways.

It is true that Spiritism did not invent any of this, because there are no true truths other than those that are eternal and that, for this very reason, must have germinated in all times. But it is not something to have taken them, if not out of nothing, at least out of oblivion; of a germ having made a living plant; of an individual idea, lost in the night of time, or muffled by prejudices, having made a general belief; to have proved what was hypothesized; to have demonstrated the existence of a law in what seemed exceptional and fortuitous; of a vague theory having made a practical thing; of an unproductive idea having drawn useful applications? Nothing is truer than the proverb, “There is nothing new under the sun,” and even that truth is not new. Thus, there is no discovery of which traces and the principle are not to be found somewhere. On account of this, Copernicus would not have the merit of his system, because the movement of the Earth had been suspected before the Christian era. It was such a simple thing, yet you had to find it. The story of the Columbus egg will always be an eternal truth.

Furthermore, it is indisputable that Spiritism still has much to teach us. It is what we have never stopped repeating, because we never pretended that he had said the last word. However, given that there is still work to be done, does it follow that he has not yet come out of the a-be-ce? His a-be-ce was the turning tables, and since then, it seems to us, he has taken a few steps; It really seems to us that such steps were great in a few years, if we compare it to other sciences that took centuries to reach the point where they are. None reached the peak in a first impulse; they advance, not by the will of men, but as circumstances put them in the way of new discoveries. Now, no one has the power to command these circumstances, and the proof is that every time an idea is premature, it aborts, to reappear later, in opportune time.

But in the absence of new discoveries, will men of science have nothing to do? Will Chemistry no longer be Chemistry if it does not discover new bodies every day? Will astronomers be condemned to sit idly by for not finding new planets? And so in all other branches of science and industry. Before looking for new things, don't you have to apply what you know? It is precisely to give men time to assimilate, apply and popularize what they know that Providence puts the march forward on hold. There is History to show us that the Sciences do not follow a continuous upward march, at least ostensibly. The great movements that revolutionize an idea only operate at more or less distant intervals. There is, therefore, no stagnation, but elaboration, application and fruition of what is known, which is always progress.

Could the human Spirit ceaselessly absorb new ideas? Doesn't the Earth itself need a period of rest before reproducing? What would you say about a teacher who taught his students new rules every day, without giving them time to practice the ones they learned, to identify with them and to apply them? So would God be less farsighted and less able than a teacher?

In all things, new ideas must fit in with acquired ideas. If these are not sufficiently elaborated and consolidated in the brain; if the spirit has not assimilated them, those that we want to implant there will not take root. We will be sowing into the void.

The same goes for Spiritism. Have the adepts so taken advantage of what he taught until today, that they have nothing else to do? They are so charitable, devoid of pride, disinterested, benevolent to their fellow men; they moderated their passions so much, they abjured hatred, envy and jealousy; finally, are they so perfect that from now on it will be superfluous to preach to them charity, humility, abnegation, in a word, morality? This claim alone would prove how much they still need these elementary lessons, which some consider tedious and puerile. It is, however, only with the help of these instructions, if you take advantage of them, that you will be able to elevate yourself enough to become worthy of receiving a superior teaching.

Spiritism has as its objective the regeneration of Humanity: this is a verified fact. Now, since this regeneration cannot operate except through moral progress, it follows that its essential, providential objective is the improvement of each one. The mysteries he can reveal to us are the accessory. Because he has opened to us the sanctuary of all knowledge, we would not be further advanced to our future state if we were not better. To admit us to the feast of supreme happiness, God does not ask what we know or what we have, but what we are worth and the good we have done. It is, therefore, in his individual improvement that every sincere spiritist must work, first of all. Only those who have mastered their bad inclinations have really benefited from Spiritism and will receive their reward. That's why the good spirits, by God's order, multiply their instructions and repeat them to satiety; only foolish pride can say: I don't need anything else. Only God knows when they will be useless and it is up to him alone to direct the teaching of his messengers and adapt it to our progress.

Let's see, however, if outside the purely moral teaching the results of Spiritism are as sterile as some claim.

1st – Initially, as everyone knows, he gives complete proof of the existence and immortality of the soul. It is true that it is not a discovery, but it is because of the lack of evidence on this point that there are so many incredulous or indifferent people about the future; it is by proving what was nothing more than a theory that he triumphs over materialism and avoids its disastrous consequences on Society. Having transformed doubt about the future into certainty, it is a whole revolution in ideas, the consequences of which are incalculable. If the results of the demonstrations were limited to this, these results would be immense.

2nd – Due to the firm belief it develops, it exerts a powerful action on man's morale; it leads him to good, consoles him in afflictions, gives him strength and courage in the trials of life and diverts him from the thought of suicide.

3rd – It rectifies all the false ideas that have been made about the future of the soul, about Heaven, Hell, penalties and rewards; radically destroys, by the irresistible logic of facts, the dogmas of eternal punishment and demons; in a word, it reveals to us the future life and shows it to us rational and according to the justice of God. It is still a thing of great value.

4th – It makes known what happens at the moment of death. This phenomenon, until today unfathomable, no longer has mysteries; the smallest particulars of this much-feared passage are now known. Now, as everyone dies, such knowledge interests everyone.

5th – By the law of the plurality of existences, it opens a new field to Philosophy; man knows where he comes from, where he is going, for what purpose he is on Earth. It explains the cause of all human miseries, of all social inequalities; it gives the very laws of Nature as the basis for the principles of universal solidarity, fraternity, equality and freedom, which were based only on theory. Finally, it sheds light on the most arduous questions of Metaphysics, Psychology and Morals.

6th – Through the theory of perispiritual fluids, it makes known the mechanism of sensations and perceptions of the soul; explains the phenomena of double sight, vision at a distance, somnambulism, ecstasy, dreams, visions, apparitions, etc.; opens a new field to Physiology and Pathology.

7th – Proving the existing relations between the corporeal and spiritual worlds, it shows in the latter one of the active forces of Nature, an intelligent power, and reveals the reason for a portion of effects attributed to supernatural causes that fed the majority of superstitious ideas.

8th – Revealing the fact of obsessions, it makes known the cause, hitherto unknown, of numerous affections about which Science had been wrong to the detriment of the sick, and gives the means to cure them.

9th – Making us aware of the true conditions of prayer and its mode of action; revealing to us the reciprocal influence of incarnated and disembodied spirits, it teaches us the power of man over imperfect spirits to moralize them and rescue them from the sufferings inherent to their inferiority.

10th – Making known spiritual magnetization, which was unknown, opens a new path to magnetism and brings a new and powerful element of healing.

The merit of an invention is not in the discovery of a principle, almost always previously known, but in the application of that principle. Reincarnation, without a doubt, is not a new idea, as much as the perispirit, described by São Paulo under the name of spiritual body, nor even communication with spirits. Spiritism, which does not boast of having discovered Nature, carefully looks for all the traces it can find, of the antecedence of its ideas, and when it finds them, it hastens to proclaim them, as proof in support of what it proposes. Those, therefore, who invoke this anteriority in order to denigrate what he does, go against his objective, and act incorrectly, as this could raise the suspicion of a preconceived idea.

The discovery of reincarnation and the perispirit therefore does not belong to Spiritism. It's known. But, until his appearance, what benefit had Science, Morality, Religion taken from these two principles, ignored by the masses, and kept in a state of dead letter? He not only brought them to light, proved them and made them recognized as laws of Nature, but he developed them and made them bear fruit; from them he has already produced numerous and fruitful results, without which it would not be possible to understand an infinity of things; daily leads us to understand new things, and we are far from exhausting this mine. Taking into account that these two principles were known, why were they unproductive for so long? Why, for so many centuries, have all philosophies run up against so many unsolvable problems? It's just that they were rough diamonds, which had to be polished: that's what Spiritism did. He opened a new path for Philosophy, or rather, he created a new Philosophy that daily conquers its place in the world. So, are these results so null that we should speed up the journey in search of truer and more solid discoveries?

In summary, a certain number of fundamental truths, sketched out by some elite brains, and preserved, for the most part, as if in a latent state, once they have been studied, elaborated and proved, from being sterile they were, become a mine fruitful, from which countless secondary principles and applications emerged, and opened up a vast field for exploration, new horizons for Science, Philosophy, Morals, Religion and the social economy.

Such are, until today, the main conquests due to Spiritism, and we have only indicated the culminating points. Assuming that they had to limit themselves to this, we could already be satisfied and say that a new science, which gives such results in less than ten years, is not accused of nullity, because it touches on all the vital questions of Humanity and brings to human knowledge a contingent that cannot be disdained. Until these points alone have received all the applications that are susceptible to them, and that men have taken advantage of them, a long time will still pass, and the spiritists who want to put them into practice for themselves and for the good of all, will not they will be idle.

These points are so many foci from which innumerable secondary truths will radiate, which it is a matter of developing and applying, which is done daily, because facts are revealed daily that lift a new edge of the veil. Successively, and in a few years, Spiritism provided all the fundamental foundations for the new building. It is now up to its supporters to put this material into practice before asking for new material. God will know how to supply them when they have completed their task.

They say that spiritists only know the basics of Spiritism. Whatever. To start, then, let us learn to spell this alphabet, which is not a matter of a day, because even reduced to these proportions alone, it will be a long time before we have exhausted all the combinations and collected all the fruits. Are there no more facts left to explain? By the way, don't spiritists have to teach this alphabet to those who ignore it? Have they sown the seed wherever they could? Are there no more unbelievers left to convert, obsessed to heal, consolation to give, tears to wipe away? Do we have reasons to say that there is nothing more to be done when we have not yet finished the task, when there are still so many wounds to close? There are noble occupations that are worth knowing better and a little earlier than others.

Let us therefore know how to spell our alphabet before wanting to read fluently in the great book of Nature. God will know how to open it to us as we go along, but it does not depend on any mortal to force his will, anticipating the time for each thing. If the tree of Science is too high for us to reach it, let's wait to fly over it until our wings are grown and solidly attached, so we don't have the luck of Icarus.

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