

xvn THE DESIRE FOR IMMORTALITY 323 



The only exception to this peculiar way of transmuting 

 the purport of the religious doctrine of immortality seems to 

 be exhibited by Spiritism, which for this very reason is 

 inexpressibly shocking to what one may call the religious 

 sense of decency. For Spiritism is a religion whose sole 

 essential dogma seems to be the assertion of the possibility 

 of (in a manner) unifying this world with the next by 

 communicating with the departed, and whose sole essential 

 rite is the practice of such communication. This is what 

 renders the psychology of Spiritism so interesting and 

 worthy of analysis. In the first place it should be noted 

 that it is not a scientific movement (in spite of a few 

 notable exceptions), but a religion, nay, in all probability, 

 the most ancient of all religions. And yet as a religion 

 Spiritism has been and is a failure, and it may be suggested 

 that the reason is just that it does treat the future life as a 

 hard (and somewhat crude) fact. This is the source both 

 of its strength and of its weakness. Of its strength, because 

 no other doctrine can minister with such directness to the 

 bereaved human heart, no other consolation can vie with 

 its proffer of visible and tangible tokens that love outlasts 

 death and that the separation death inflicts is not utter 

 and insuperable. And so long as this craving for a sign 

 possesses our souls, Spiritism will continue to win adherents, 

 who embrace it, not in a calm temper of scientific research, 

 but in an emotional convulsion, and, it may be, with a 

 pathetic eagerness to deceive themselves. 



But such agonies cannot be permanent. The wave of 

 feeling subsides, and with it passes the attractiveness of 

 Spiritism. Its weakness is that it appeals to emotions 

 which cannot permanently occupy the mind, and it is a 

 weakness far more fatal than the objections currently 

 urged against it, its vulgarity, its frauds, etc. Vulgarity, 

 fraud, nay, sheer absurdity, have never been insuperable 

 obstacles to the success of a religious movement which 

 was in other respects congenial to human nature, and there 

 was no reason a priori why Spiritism should have proved 

 less successful than, e.g. Christian Science. 



A typical illustration of the psychology of Spiritism is 



