304
728. Is destruction a law of nature?
"It is necessary that all things should be destroyed that they may be re-born and regenerated; for what you call destruction is only a transformation, the aim of which is the renewing and amelioration of living beings."
- The instinct of destruction would seem, then, to have been given to living beings for providential purposes?
"God's creatures are the instruments which He uses for working out His ends. Living beings destroy each other for food; thus maintaining equilibrium in reproduction, which might otherwise become excessive, and also utilising the materials of their external envelopes. But it is only this envelope that is ever destroyed, and this envelope is only the accessory, and, not the essential part, of a thinking being; the essential part is the intelligent principle which is indestructible, and which is elaborated in the course of the various metamorphoses that it undergoes."
729. If destruction be necessary for the regeneration of beings, why does nature surround them with the means of self-preservation?
"In order that their destruction may not take place before the proper time. Destruction that occurs too soon retards the development of the intelligent principle. It is for this reason that God has given to each being the desire to live and to reproduce itself."
730. Since death is to lead us to a better life, and since it delivers us from the ills of our present existence, and is therefore
305
to be rather desired than dreaded, why has man the instinctive horror of death which causes him to shrink from it?
"We have said that man should seek to prolong his life in order to accomplish his task. To this end God has given him the instinct of self-preservation, and this instinct sustains him under all his trials; but for it, he would too often abandon himself to discouragement. The inner voice, which tells him to repel death, tells him also that he may yet do something more for his advancement. Every danger that threatens him is a warning that bids him make a profitable use of the respite granted to him by God; but he, ungrateful, gives thanks more often to his 'star' than to his Creator."
731. Why has nature placed agents of destruction side by side with the means of preservation?
"We have already told you that it is in order to maintain equilibrium, and to serve as a counterpoise. The malady and the remedy are placed side by side."
732. Is the need of destruction the same in all worlds?
"It is proportioned to the more or less material state of each world; it ceases altogether in worlds of higher physical and moral purity. In worlds more advanced than yours, the conditions of existence are altogether different."
733. Will the necessity of destruction always exist for the human race of this earth?
"The need of destruction diminishes in man in proportion as his spirit obtains ascendancy over matter. Consequently, you see that intellectual and moral development is always accompanied by a horror of destruction."
734. Has man, in his present state, an unlimited right of destruction in regard to animals?
"That right is limited to providing for his food and his safety; no abuse can be a matter of right."
735. What is to be thought of destruction that goes beyond the limits of needs and of safety; of hunting, for instance, when it has no useful aim, and is resorted to from no other motive than the pleasure of killing?
"It is a predominance of bestiality over the spiritual nature. All destruction that goes beyond the limits of your needs is a violation of the law of God. The animals only destroy according to the
306
measure of their necessities; but man, who has free-will, destroys unnecessarily. He will be called to account for thus abusing the freedom accorded to him; for, in so doing, he yields to evil! instincts from which he ought to free himself."
736. Are those peoples especially meritorious who, in regard to the taking of animal life, carry their scrupulousness to excess?
"Their sentiment in regard to this matter, though laudable in itself, being carried to excess, becomes an abuse in its turn; and its merit, moreover, is neutralised by abuses of many other sorts. That sentiment, on their part, is the result of superstitious fear, rather than of true gentleness."
737. What is the aim of God in visiting mankind with destructive calamities?
"To make men advance more quickly. Have we not told you that destruction is necessary to the moral regeneration of spirits, who accomplish a new step of their purification in each new existence? In order to appreciate any process correctly, you must see its results. You judge merely from your personal point of view, and you therefore regard those inflictions as calamities, because of the temporary injury they cause you; but such upsettings are often needed in order to make you reach more quickly a better order of things, and to effect, in a few years, what you would otherwise have taken centuries to accomplish." (744)
738. Could not God employ other methods than destructive calamities for effecting the amelioration of mankind?
"Yes; and He employs them every day, for He has given to each of you the means of progressing through the knowledge of good and evil. It is because man profits so little by those other means, that it becomes necessary to chastise his pride, and to make him feel his weakness."
- But the good man succumbs under the action of these scourges, as does the wicked; is this just?
"During his earthly sojourn, man measures everything by the standard of his bodily life; but, after death, he judges differently, and feels that the life of the body, as we have often told you, is a very small matter. A century in your world is but the length of a flash in eternity, and therefore the sufferings of what you call
307
days, months, or years, are of no importance; let this he a lesson for your future use. Spirits are the real world, pre-existent to, and surviving, everything else; they are the children of God, and the object of all His solicitude; and bodies are only the disguises under which they make their appearances in the corporeal world. In the great calamities that decimate the human race, the sufferers are like an army that, in the course of a campaign, sees its clothing tattered, worn out, or lost. The general is more anxious about his soldiers than about their coats."
- But the victims of those scourges are none the less victims?
"If you considered an earthly life as it is in itself, and how small a thing it is in comparison with the life of infinity, you would attach to it much less importance. Those victims will find, in another existence, an ample compensation for their sufferings, if they have borne them without murmuring."
Whether our death be the result of a public calamity or of an ordinary cause, we are none the less compelled to go when the hour of our departure has struck; the only difference is that, in the former case, a greater number go away at the same time.
If we could raise our thoughts sufficiently high to contemplate the human race as a whole, and to take in the whole of its destiny at a glance, the scourges that now seem so terrible would appear to us only as passing storms in the destiny of the globe.
739. Are destructive calamities useful physically notwithstanding the temporary evils occasioned by them?
"Yes, they sometimes change the state of a country, but the good that results from them is often one that will be felt by future generations."
740. May not such calamities also constitute for man a moral trial, compelling him to struggle with the hardest necessities of his lot?
"They are always trials, and, as such, they furnish him with the opportunity of exercising his intelligence, of proving his patience and his resignation to the will of God, and of displaying his sentiments of abnegation, disinterestedness, and love for his neighbour, if he be not under the dominion of selfishness."
741. Is it in man's power to avert the scourges that now afflict him?
"Yes, a part of them; but not as is generally supposed. Many of those scourges are the consequence of his want of foresight; and, in proportion as he acquires knowledge and experience, he becomes able to avert them, that is to say, he can prevent their
308
occurrence when he has ascertained their cause. But, among the ills that afflict humanity, there are some, of a general nature, which are imposed by the decrees of Providence, and the effect of which is felt, more or less sensibly, by each individual. "To these, man can oppose nothing bill his resignation to the divine will, though he can, and often does, aggravate their painfulness by his negligence."
In the class of destructive calamities resulting from natural causes, and independently of the action of man, are to be placed pestilence, famine, inundations, and atmospheric influences fatal to the productions of the earth. But has not man already found, in the applications of science, in agricultural improvements, in the rotation of crops, in the study of hygienic conditions, the means of neutralising, or at least of attenuating, many of these disasters? Are not many countries, at the present day, preserved from terrible plagues by which they were formerly ravaged? What, then, may not man accomplish for the advancement of his material well-being, when he shall have learned to make use of all the resources of his intelligence, and when he shall have added, to the care of his personal preservation, the large charity that interests itself in the well-being of the whole human race? (107)
742. What is the cause that impels man to war?
"The predominance of the animal nature over the spiritual nature, and the desire of satisfying his passions. In the barbaric state, the various peoples know no other right than that of the strongest; and their normal condition is, therefore, that of war. As men progress, war becomes less frequent, through their avoidance of the causes which lead to it; and when it becomes inevitable they wage it more humanely."
743. Will wars ever cease on the earth?
"Yes; when men comprehend justice, and practise the law of God; all men will then be brothers."
744. What has been the aim of Providence in making war necessary?
"Freedom and progress."
- If war is destined to bring us freedom, how does it happen that its aim and upshot are so often the subjugation of the people attacked?
"Such subjugation is only momentary, and is permitted in order to weary the nations of servitude, and thus to urge them forward more rapidly."
745. What is to be thought of him who stirs up war for his own profit?
"Such an one is deeply guilty, and will have to undergo many corporal existences in order to expiate all the murders caused by
309
him; for he will have to answer for every man who has been killed for the satisfaction of his ambition."
746. Is murder a crime in the sight of God?
"Yes, a great crime; for he who takes the life of his fellow-man cuts short an expiation or a mission; hence the heinousness of his offence."
747. Are all murders equally heinous?
"We have said that God is just; He judges the intention rather than the deed."
748. Does God excuse murder in cases of self-defence?
"Only absolute necessity can excuse it; but if a man can only preserve his life by taking that of his aggressor, he ought to do."
749. Is a man answerable for the murders he commits in war?
"Not when he is compelled to fight; but he is answerable for the cruelties he commits, and he will be rewarded for his humanity."
750. Is parricide or infanticide the greater crime in the sight of God?
"They are equally great; for all crime is crime.”
751. How is it that the custom of infanticide prevails among peoples of considerable intellectual advancement, and is even recognised as allowable by their laws?
"Intellectual development is not always accompanied by moral rectitude. A spirit may advance in intelligence, and yet remain wicked; for he may have lived a long time without having improved morally, and gained knowledge, without acquiring moral purification."
752. Is the sentiment of cruelty connected with the instinct of destruction?
"It is the instinct of destruction in its worst form, for, though destruction is sometimes necessary, cruelty never is; it is always the result of an evil nature."
753. How comes it that cruelty is the dominant characteristic of the primitive races?
310
"Among the primitive races, as you call them, matter has the ascendancy over spirit. They abandon themselves to the instincts of the brute; and as they care for nothing but the life of the body, they think only of their personal preservation, and this generally renders them cruel. And besides, peoples, whose development is still imperfect, are under the influence of spirits equally imperfect, with whom they are in sympathy, until the coming among them of some other people, more advanced than themselves, destroys or weakens that influence."
754. Is cruelty a result of the absence of the moral sense?
"Say that the moral sense is not developed, but do not say that it is absent; for its principle exists in every man, and is this sense which, in course of time, renders beings kind and humane. It exists, therefore, in the savage; but in him it is latent, as the principle of the perfume is in the bud, before it opens into the flowers."
All faculties exist in man in a rudimentary or latent state; they are developed according as circumstances are more or less favourable to them. The excessive development of some of them arrests or neutralizes that of others. The undue excitement of the material instincts stifles, so to say, the moral sense; as the development of the moral sense gradually weakens the merely animal-faculties.
755. How is it that, in the midst of the most advanced civilisation, we sometimes find persons as cruel as the savages?
"Just as, on a tree laden with healthy fruit, you may find some that are withered. They may be said to be savages who have nothing of civilisation about them but the coat; they are wolves who have strayed into the midst of the sheep. Spirits of low degree, and very backward, may incarnate themselves among men of greater advancement, in the hope of advancing themselves; but, if the trial be too arduous, their primitive nature gets the upper hand."
756. Will the society of the good be one day purged of evildoers?
"The human race is progressing. Those who are under the dominion of the instinct of evil, and who are out of place among good people, will gradually disappear, as the faulty grain is separated from the good when the wheat is threshed; but they will be born again under another corporeal envelope, and, as they acquire more experience, they will arrive at a clearer understanding of good and evil. You have an example of this in the plants and animals which man has discovered the art of improving, and in
311
which he develops new qualities. It is only after several generations that the improvement becomes complete. This is a picture of the different existences of each human being."
757. Can duelling be considered as coming under the head of lawful self-defence?
"No; it is murder, and an absurdity worthy of barbarians. When civilisation is more advanced and more moral, men will see that duelling is as ridiculous as the combats which were formerly regarded as the ‘judgement of God.'"
758. Can duelling be considered as murder on the part of him who, knowing his own weakness, is pretty sure of being killed?
"In such a case it is suicide."
- And when the chances are equal, is it murder or suicide?
"It is both."
In all cases, even in those in which the chances are equal, the duellist is guilty; in the first place, because he makes a cool and deliberate attack on the life of his fellow-man, and in the second place, because he exposes his own life uselessly, and without benefit to any one.
759. What is the real nature of what is called the point of honour in the matter of duels?
"Pride and vanity; two sores of humanity."
- But are there not cases in which a man's honour is really at stake, and in which a refusal to fight would be an act of cowardice?
"That depends on customs and usages; each country and each century has a different way of regarding such matters. But when men are better, and more advanced morally, they will comprehend that the true point of honour is above the reach of earthly passions, and that it is neither by killing, nor by getting themselves killed, that they can obtain reparation for a wrong."
There is more real greatness and honour in confessing our wrongdoing if we are in the wrong, or in forgiving if we are in the right; and, in all cases, in despising insults which cannot touch those who are superior to them.
760. Will capital punishment disappear some day from human legislation?
"Capital punishment will, most assuredly, disappear in course of time; and its suppression will mark a progress on the part of the human race. When men become more enlightened, the penalty of death will be completely abolished throughout the earth; men will
312
no longer require to be judged by men. I speak of a time which is still a long way ahead of you."
The social progress already made leaves much still to be desired, but it would be unjust towards modern society not to recognise a certain amount of progress in the restrictions which, among the most advanced nations, have been successively applied to capital punishment, and to the crimes for which it is inflicted. If we compare the safeguards with which the law, among those nations, surrounds the accused, and the humanity with which he is treated even when found guilty, with the methods of criminal procedure that obtained at a period not very remote from the present, we cannot fail to perceive that the human race is really moving forwards on a path of progress.
761. The law of Preservation gives man the right to preserve his own life; does he not make use of that same right when he cuts off a dangerous member from the social body?
"There are other means of preserving yourselves from a dangerous individual than killing him; and besides, you ought to open the door of repentance for the criminal, and not to close it against him."
762. If the penalty of death may be banished from civilised society, was it not a necessity in times of less advancement?
"Necessity is not the right word. Man always thinks that a thing is necessary when he cannot manage to find anything better. In proportion as he becomes enlightened, he understands more clearly what is just or unjust, and repudiates the excesses committed, in times of ignorance, in the name of justice."
763. Is the restriction of the number of the cases in which capital punishment is inflicted an indication of progress in civilisation?
"Can you doubt its being so? Does not your mind revolt on reading the recital of the human butcheries that were formerly perpetrated in the name of justice, and often in honour of the divinity; of the tortures inflicted on the condemned, and even on the accused, in order to wring from him, through the excess of his sufferings, the confession of a crime which, very often, he had not committed? Well, if you had lived in those times, you would have thought all this very natural; and, had you been a judge, you would probably have done the same yourself. It is thus that what seemed to be right at one period seems barbarous at another. The divine laws alone are eternal; human laws change as progress advances; and they will change again and again, until they have been brought into harmony with the laws of God."
313
764. Jesus said, "He that take the sword shall perish by the sword." Are not these words the consecration of the principle of retaliation? and is not the penalty of death, inflicted on a murderer, an application of this principle?
“Take care! You have mistaken the meaning of these words, as of many others. The only righteous retaliation is the justice of God; because it is applied by Him. You are all, at every moment, undergoing this retaliation, for you are punished in that wherein you have sinned, in this life or in another one. He who has caused his fellow-men to suffer will be placed in a situation in which he himself will suffer what he caused them to endure. This is the true meaning of the words of Jesus; for has He not also said to you, 'Forgive your enemies,' and has He not taught you to pray that God may forgive you your trespasses as you forgive those who have trespassed against you, that is to say, exactly in proportion as you have forgiven? Try to take in the full meaning of those words."
765. What is to be thought of the infliction of the penalty of death in the name of God?
"It is a usurpation of God's place in the administration of justice. Those who act thus show how far they are from comprehending God, and how much they still have to expiate. Capital punishment is a crime when applied in the name of God, and those who inflict it will have to answer for it as for so many murders."