“Spiritism,” said Carhaix, “is only a new name for the ancient necromancy condemned and cursed by the Church.”

Gevingey looked at his rings, then emptied his glass.

“In any case,” he returned, “you will admit that these theories can be upheld, especially that of the elementals, which, setting Satanism aside, seems the most veridic, and certainly is the most clear.  Space is peopled by microbes.  Is it more surprising that space should also be crammed with spirits and larvae?  Water and vinegar are alive with animalcules.  The microscope shows them to us.  Now why should not the air, inaccessible to the sight and to the instruments of man, swarm, like the other elements, with beings more or less corporeal, embryos more or less mature?”

“That is probably why cats suddenly look upward and gaze curiously into space at something that is passing and that we can’t see,” said the bell-ringer’s wife.

“No, thanks,” said Gevingey to Des Hermies, who was offering him another helping of egg-and-dandelion salad.

“My friends,” said the bell-ringer, “you forget only one doctrine, that of the Church, which attributes all these inexplicable phenomena to Satan.  Catholicism has known them for a long time.  It did not need to wait for the first manifestations of the spirits—­which were produced, I believe, in 1847, in the United States, through the Fox family—­before decreeing that spirit rapping came from the Devil.  You will find in Saint Augustine the proof, for he had to send a priest to put an end to noises and overturning of objects and furniture, in the diocese of Hippo, analogous to those which Spiritism points out.  At the time of Theodoric also, Saint Caesaraeus ridded a house of lemurs haunting it.  You see, there are only the City of God and the City of the Devil.  Now, since God is above these cheap manipulations, the occultists and spiritists satanize more or less, whether they wish to or not.”

“Nevertheless, Spiritism has accomplished one important thing.  It has violated the threshold of the unknown, broken the doors of the sanctuary.  It has brought about in the extranatural a revolution similar to that which was effected in the terrestrial order in France in 1789.  It has democratized evocation and opened a whole new vista.  Only, it has lacked initiates to lead it, and, proceeding at random without science, it has agitated good and bad spirits together.  In Spiritism you will find a jumble of everything.  It is the hash of mystery, if I may be permitted the expression.”

“The saddest thing about it,” said Des Hermies, laughing, “is that at a seance one never sees a thing!  I know that experiments have been successful, but those which I have witnessed—­well, the experimenters seemed to take a long shot and miss.”

“That is not surprising,” said the astrologer, spreading some firm candied orange jelly on a piece of bread, “the first law to observe in magism and Spiritism is to send away the unbelievers, because very often their fluid is antagonistic to that of the clairvoyant or the medium.”