A defence of modern spiritualismWallace, Alfred Russel
Religion
A defence of modern spiritualism
Wallace, Alfred Russel
Spiritualism
The assertion so often made, that Spiritualism is the survival or
revival of old superstitions, is so utterly unfounded as to be hardly
worth notice. A science of human nature which is founded on observed
facts; which appeals only to facts and experiment; which takes no
beliefs on trust; which inculcates investigation and self-reliance as
the first duties of intelligent beings; which teaches that happiness in
a future life can be secured by cultivating and developing to the utmost
the higher faculties of our intellectual and moral nature, _and by no
other method_—is and must be the natural enemy of all superstition.
Spiritualism is an experimental science, and affords the only sure
foundation for a true philosophy and a pure religion. It abolishes the
terms “supernatural” and “miracle” by an extension of the sphere of law
and the realm of nature; and in doing so it takes up and explains
whatever is true in the superstitions and so-called miracles of all
ages. It, and it alone, is able to harmonize conflicting creeds; and it
must ultimately lead to concord among mankind in the matter of religion,
which has for so many ages been the source of unceasing discord and
incalculable evil; and it will be able to do this because it appeals to
evidence instead of faith, and substitutes facts for opinions; and is
thus able to demonstrate the source of much of the teaching that men
have so often held to be divine.
It will thus be seen that those who can form no higher conception of the
uses of Spiritualism, “even if true,” than to detect crime or to name in
advance the winner of the Derby, not only prove their own ignorance of
the whole subject, but exhibit in a marked degree that partial mental
paralysis, the result of a century of materialistic thought, which
renders so many men unable seriously to conceive the possibility of a
natural continuation of human life after the death of the body. It will
be seen also that Spiritualism is no mere “physiological” curiosity, no
mere indication of some hitherto unknown “law of nature”; but that it is
a science of vast extent, having the widest, the most important, and the
most practical issues, and as such should enlist the sympathies alike of
moralists, philosophers and politicians, and of all who have at heart
the improvement of society and the permanent elevation of human nature.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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