Proofs of the Existence of the Soul

171 Pages·2002·0.87 MB·English

by  Crisley Akin

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DEATH AND ITS MYSTERY
BEFORE DEATH

Proofs of the Existence of the Soul

BY
CAMILLE FLAMMARION

TRANSLATED BY
E. S. BROOKS

NEW YORK
THE CENTURY CO.
1921

Copyright, 1921, by
THE CENTURY CO.
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Copyright, 1920, by
ERNEST FLAMMARION

Electronic Version prepared by the Spiritist Alliance for Books

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Special thanks for the Spiritist Alliance for Books Team who participated in this project:
Milena e Dean Whorton
Crisley Akin
Jussara Korngold
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TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

I THE GREATEST OF PROBLEMS – CAN IT ACTUALLY BE SOLVED? 7

II MATERIALISM – AN ERRONEOUS, INCOMPLETE, AND INSUFFICIENT DOCTRINE 19

III WHAT IS MAN? DOES THE SOUL EXIST? 29

IV SUPRA-NORMAL FACULTIES OF THE SOUL, UNKNOWN OR LITTLE UNDERSTOOD 37

V THE WILL, ACTING WITHOUT THE SPOKEN WORD, WITHOUT A SIGN, AND AT A DISTANCE 56

VI TELEPATHY AND PSYCHIC TRANSMISSIONS AT A DISTANCE 71

VII VISION WITHOUT EYES – THE SPIRIT’S VISION, EXCLUSIVE OF TELEPATHIC TRANSMISSIONS 90

VIII THE SIGHT OF FUTURE EVENTS; THE PRESENT FUTURE; THE ALREADY SEEN 119

IX KNOWLEDGE OF THE FUTURE 131
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I
THE GREATEST OF PROBLEMS.
CAN IT ACTUALLY BE SOLVED?

To be or not to be.
SHAKESPEARE.

ALTHOUGH I am not yet entirely satisfied with it, I have decided to offer today, to the
attention of thinking men, a work begun more than half a century ago. The method of scientific
experiment, which is the only method of value in the search for truth, lays requirements upon us
that we cannot and ought not to avoid. The grave problem considered in this treatise is the most
complex of all problems and concerns the general construction of the universe as well as of the
human being – that microcosm of the great whole. In the days of our youth we begin these
endless researches because we are full of confidence and see a long life stretching out before us.
But the longest life passes, with its lights and shadows, like a dream. If we may form one wish in
the course of this existence, it is to have been in some way of service to the slow but none the
less real progress of humanity, that fantastic race, credulous and skeptical, virtuous and criminal,
indifferent and curious, good and wicked, as well as incoherent and ignorant as a whole – barely
out of the chrysalis wrappings of its animal state.
When the first edition of my book “La Pluralité des Mondes habites” were published (1862-
64), a certain number of readers seemed to expect the natural sequel: “La Pluralité des existences
de l’ame.” If the first problem has been considered solved by my succeeding books
(“Astronomie populaire,” “La Planete Mars,” “Uranie,” “Stella,” “Reves etoiles,” etc.), the
second has remained as open question,1 and the survival of the soul, either in space or on other
worlds or through earthly reincarnations, still confronts us as the most formidable of problems.
A thinking atom, borne on a material atom across the boundless space of the Milky Way,
man may well ask himself if he is as insignificant in soul as he is in body, if the law of progress
can raise him in an indefinite ascent, and if there is a system of order in the moral world that is
harmoniously associated with the order of the physical world.
Is not spirit superior to matter? What is our true nature? What is our future destiny? Are we
merely ephemeral flames shining an instant to be forever extinguished? Shall we never see again
those whom we have loved and who have gone before us into the Great Beyond? Are such
separations eternal? Does everything in us die? If something remains, what becomes of this
imponderable element – invisible, intangible, but conscious – which must constitute our lasting
personality? Will it endure for long? Will it endure forever?
To be or not to be? Such is the great, the eternal question asked by all the philosophers, the
thinkers, the seekers of all times and all creeds. Is death an end or a transformation? Do there
exists proofs, evidences of survival of the human being after the destruction of the living
organism? Until today the subject has remained outside the field of scientific observation. Is it
possible to approach it by the principles of experimentation to which humanity owes all the
progress that has been realized by science? Is the attempt logical? Are we not face to face with

1 Although a distinguished writer, the philosopher Andre Pezzaani, who calls himself my disciple, published in 1865 La
Pluralité des existences de l’6me, conforme a la doctrine de la Pluralité des mondes.
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the mysteries of an invisible world that is different from that which lies before our senses and
which cannot be penetrated by our methods of positive investigation? May we not essay, seek to
find whether or not certain facts, if carefully and correctly observed, are susceptible of being
scientifically analyzed and accepted as real by the severest criticism? We want no more fine
words, no more metaphysics. Facts! Facts!
It is a question of our fate, our destiny, our personal future, our very existence.
It is not cold reason alone that demands an answer; it is not only the mind; it is our longings,
our heart also.
It is childish and may appear conceited to bring one’s own self upon the scene, but it is
sometimes difficult to refrain from doing so; and as I have undertaken these laborious researches
primarily in order to answer the questions of sorrowing hearts it seems to me that the most
logical preface to this book will be furnished by some of those innumerable confidential
communications which have reached me during more than half a century, begging with anguish
for the solution of the mystery.
Those who have never lost by death some one deeply loved have never sounded the depths of
despair, have never bruised themselves against the closed door of the tomb. We seek, and an
impenetrable wall rises inexorably before the terror that confronts us. I have received hundreds
of earnest appeals that I should have liked to answer. Should I make these confidences known? I
have hesitated a long time. But there are so many of them, they reflect so faithfully the intense
desire that exists to reach a solution, that it has now become a matter of general interest and my
duty is clear. These expressions of feeling are the natural introduction to this work, for it is they
that have decided me to write it. Nevertheless, I must apologize for reproducing these pages
without alteration; for if they reveal the very souls of their sensitive authors, they also express
themselves about me in terms of praise that it might well seem immodest on my part to publish.
But this is only a personal detail, and consequently insignificant, especially as an astronomer,
who realizes that he is an atom before the infinite and eternal universe, is inaccessible to and
hermetically sealed against feelings of worldly vanity. Those who know me have considered me
for many long years. My absolute indifference to all honors has abundantly proved this true.
Whether I am considered great or insignificant, whether I am praised or criticized, I remain the
distant spectator.
The following letter was written me by a distracted mother and has been reproduced literally.
It shows how well worth while it would be at least to attempt to relieve suffering humanity. It is
more than the science of doctoring the body, it is the science of healing the soul that must be
created.

To Our Great Flammarion
Reinosa, Spain, March 30, 1907.
Monsieur:
I wish I might cling to your knees and kiss your feet while I beseech you to hear me and not reject my prayer. I
cannot, I know not how to express myself. I wish I might arouse your pity, might interest you in my grief, but I
should have to see you, to tell you myself of my own unhappiness, to paint the horror of what is passing in my soul,
and then you could not deny me an immense compassion. What I have had to suffer before I could bring myself to
commit this act of daring and indiscretion that resembles madness! Whence came the idea of addressing myself to
our illustrious Flammarion, of asking him to console an unknown person who has no other claim upon his kindness
than that of a fellow-countrywoman? It is because I am suffering! I have just lost a son, an only son. I am a widow
and my only happiness consisted in this son and one daughter. Monsieur Flammarion, you would have had to know
the beloved child I have just lost, to understand. I should have to tell you the story of the thirty-three years of his
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existence: then you would understand.
When at five years of age he was given up by all the celebrated physicians of Paris and Madrid, because of hip
trouble, my poor husband and I sacrificed a brilliant position at Madrid and buried ourselves in a lonely country
district in Spain in order to save this little boy who was the object of our devotion. For eight years he was ill and he
was left lame! What he cost me in anxiety, care, sorrow, sleepless nights, anguish, and sacrifices it would be
impossible to explain. But how dear and lovable he was! Brought up in a little carriage, petted and caressed, he was
the most adorable child one could imagine. Oh, that childhood! How I wish I could get it back! At twelve years of
age he no longer suffered from his leg, but he could not walk without crutches. What a grief this was to me, who had
brought him into the world strong and well made! Later, at seventeen, he walked with only one crutch and a cane. At
twenty, he was as handsome a lad as could be seen anywhere. If I dared, I would send you his photograph, so that
you might see that my mother’s love exaggerates nothing. Everyone felt his charm; he had that gift of pleasing
which can be neither defined nor explained. Men, women, children, old and young were charmed by I know not
what that radiated from his person. Wherever I went with him, I was congratulated on the beauty and goodness of
my son. People envied him. Ah! That was because he was as beautiful as he was good! His soul was all nobility,
grandeur, generosity. Intelligent and spiritual, even-tempered and sweet in his disposition as he was, life with him
was a heavenly dream, a continual enchantment. You will realize what this meant, Monsieur, when I tell you that at
twenty he developed cystitis, which was certainly a return of the first trouble in his leg, and that this cystitis was the
beginning of a whole chain of suffering of which only hell could give you any idea. I cannot understand how God,
our Creator, can permit the human body to be so martyrized. Above all, when this martyrdom is inflicted on a good
and innocent being like my son. All the great specialists were consulted again, but alas! none of them was able to
cure him. He spent thirteen years alternating between periods of better and worse, preserving, in the midst of the
most atrocious suffering, his sweetness, his goodness and even his gaiety, so as not to sadden others.
For the past four years he has scarcely suffered at all, and last year he was so much better that he believed he
was cured. My poor husband had died in 1902. From that time my son had been the head of our little family: mother,
sister, and himself. How happy we were!
Although we were obliged to work to supply our needs, life appeared very beautiful to us! My daughter had
never wished to marry, so that she might devote herself to her brother, whom she adored. I was so happy in the love
I saw that my children bore each other that I no longer feared death for myself, as I knew I should leave them
together, not to be separated as long as they lived, living each for the other. And how shall I describe to you the
tenderness of my son for his mother, of this mother for her son? Seek in heaven among the angels; seek above,
among those worlds to which your gaze penetrates; seek among all the best and sweetest things that love can
produce, and you will have only a feeble idea of the filial and the maternal love of these two. I dare not think of it. I
dare not remember his eyes, his voice, when he looked at me and said, “Darling Mother!”
Last August it was proposed to him that he should visit a mine (he had acquired a taste for this kind of work and
had been occupied with it for some time). He wished to take me with him. When we had reached a certain spot we
were told that we should have to go on horseback to reach the mine. As I knew he had been forbidden to ride on
horseback, because of his bladder, I refused; but my son assured me he felt certain he could make this trip without
danger. We hesitated; we discussed it; I yielded.
Ah! Why can we never retrace our steps! This excursion so tired my son that he fell ill of gastric fever. He was
in the hands of stupid and ignorant physicians who knew nothing of his condition and who let the months slip by
while they said that nothing was the matter! A tumor attacked the bladder, the walls could not endure the strain: the
bladder burst!
The tortures of hell are nothing to the tortures suffered by my unhappy son! A celebrated surgeon was called in.
he did not arrive until twenty-two hours after the accident. My child had made all his preparations for leaving this
world. They operated, but all hope was gone. The poor boy survived the operation for thirteen days; the surgeon had
given him only twenty-four hours more. But my son, who understood his mother’s and sister’s grief, resisted,
fighting bravely in spite of everything. What days, Monsieur! They gave us the measure of his greatness of soul.
Thinking only of us, of the consequences of his death to two women who would remain alone and without
support in a foreign country, who would always mourn an adored son and brother, he tried in all ways to soften the
horror of this situation. What he said to us in those supreme moments were the words not of a young man of thirty-
three but of a saint, an angel, a superhuman being! Oh, that face tortured by suffering! Those eyes that seemed to see
something of another world! And his mouth, twisted by pain, still trying to smile, his hand pressed mine as he said:
“Good-bye, darling Mother, good-bye! I have loved you so dearly! Do not forget me! Oh! Almighty God,” he said,
“you did not lay so much on your son, on your own son, who was God, and I, who am only a poor man, you give ten
times more to bear. Oh! death! in pity, death! If you love me, ask God to send me to death!”
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For thirteen days and longer!
Oh, Flammarion! have pity on me! In the name of your mother, be merciful! I am mad with grief. It is thirty-
two days since he died and I have not slept ten hours since. At night I sit up until four in the morning, and when
fatigue has conquered me I throw myself, entirely clothed, on my bed and shut my eyes, but a fixed idea continues
during this painful sleep; I do not lose my memories for a single instant, and when I open my eyes I am obsessed by
them all day long; what I suffer is so frightful, so atrocious that I ask myself if hell is not preferable to what I
endure. Is it possible that it can be God who has created beings destined to experience such horrors!
You, an astronomer and a thinker, who weigh the suns and the worlds, you whose glance penetrates those
mysterious regions among which our spirits loses itself, tell me, I beg you on my knees, tell me if our souls survive
somewhere. If I can preserve the hope of seeing my son again, if he sees me. If there exists any way of
communicating with him.
You who know so many things about the heavens, about spirits, about the marvels of the universe, I ask you in
pity to tell me something that can leave my wounded, tortured heart a ray of hope, however feeble! You cannot
understand the excess of my grief. I wish that I might die of it. I hope to die, but – my daughter is here, who
beseeches me to live, not to leave her alone in the world; and then I see myself forced to live and forced to suffer!
What horror! When I think that in an instant I could put an end to my misery! If it were possible to weigh grief, to
measure it as you measure the worlds, the weight would be heavy, the extent so great that you would be frightened
to think that one human soul could reach such a degree of torture: there must be something infernal in my destiny!
Neither red-hot irons nor pincers could cause such suffering! My son, my beloved child! I want him, I wish to see
him! I desire no heaven without him. Oh! my adored Emanuel! flesh of my flesh! joy of my life! my happiness as a
mother lost forever! Is there a God? is it he who permits these horrors on earth? Monsieur Flammarion, in pity, in
the name of those you love and who love you, do not be insensible to the greatest human grief that has ever torn an
heart! you who know! We simple mortals can neither know nor understand. Tell me if souls survive somewhere, if
they remember, if they still love those who remain on earth; if they see us, if we can call them near us.
Ah! If I could see you and fall at your knees! Forgive this mad act. I no longer know whether I dream or wake! I
feel only one thing, a grief so sharp that it seems like a red-hot iron, continually plunged into a gaping wound.
Forgive me, Monsieur Flammarion! Your suns and stars, so beautiful and so marvelous, do not feel or suffer.
And I feel a grief greater than all the worlds that move in space! So small, so unimportant a thing, and yet to feel so
intolerable a grief! What can it be? What is this mystery? A being so feeble and limited – and to suffer so!
Forgive me once more, Master, in the name of your mother! Forgive me and pity your unhappy countrywoman,
N. BOFFARD,
At Reinosa, Province of Santander, Spain.

So runs this letter, full of anguish, which I reproduce literally, in order to show all the horror
of such a situation. I repeat that I must apologize for the dithyrambic that concern me. Their only
significance is in so clearly revealing this immense grief joined to the ardent hope of seeing these
clouds dispersed.
One would have to possess a heart of stone to be untouched by these heart-rendering appeals
of mother love, to remain deaf to the anguish of such despair, and not to feel an ardent desire to
consecrate one’s life to bringing some relief.
Priests receive appeals of this sort every day, because they are considered ministers of God,
endowed with the power of penetrating the riddle of the supernatural and solving it. They answer
such grief with the consolations of religion. The priest speaks in the name of Faith and
Revelation; but faith cannot be imposed, it is not even as generally held as we imagine. I know
priests, bishops, and cardinal who are without it, even while they teach it as a social necessity.
There are a hundred different religions on earth, all of them perhaps useful, but unacceptable
from the point of view of philosophy. Face to face with such events as I have just related, are
their ministers able to convince us that a just and good God rules over humanity? The man of
science is seated neither on the bench of the confessional nor in the bishop’s chair, and he can
tell only what he knows. He is honest, frank, independent, rational before everything. His duty is
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