100- PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS. – The classification of spirits is based on their degree of development, the qualities they have acquired, and the imperfections from which they have not yet freed themselves. This classification is by no means absolute; no single category displays a well-defined characteristic except as a group. The transition is hardly noticeable from one degree to the next. The gradations blend together at their borders, much like what occurs in the kingdoms of nature, in the colors of the rainbow or even in the different phases of human life. Thus, we may form a larger or smaller number of classes, depending on how we consider the subject. Such is the case with all systems of scientific classification. Such systems may entail various degrees of completeness, reasonableness or convenience for the intellect. Whichever way they are viewed, however, in reality they change nothing regarding science itself. In this regard, the Spirits30 questioned about this could have given various answers as to the number of categories without harming the overall idea. There are persons who have rather latched on to this seeming contradiction without considering the fact that spirits do not give any importance to what is purely conventional. For them, the thought is everything. To us they leave the form, the choice of terms, the classifications – in a word, the systems.
30 The Spirits: see footnote in the Introduction, sect. V – Tr.
Furthermore, we would add yet one more consideration that we must always bear in mind: among spirits, as among human beings, there are some who are very ignorant, and we must always be on our guard against the tendency to believe that they know everything simply because they are spirits. Every attempt at classification demands a methodical analysis and an in-depth knowledge of the subject. In addition, just as there are ignorant individuals in this world, there are those in the spirit world with limited knowledge, who are incapable of learning and formulating any kind of system. They only know or comprehend any classification imperfectly. To them, all spirits who are more highly evolved than themselves are of the first order because they cannot discern their differences of knowledge, ability and morality – as would be the case with an uneducated person among us in relation to learned individuals. Even those who may be capable of formulating a system can vary in the details according to their own points of view, especially when a division has nothing absolute about it. Linnaeus, Jussieu and Tournefort each had their own method, but botany did not change because of it. They invented neither plants nor their characteristics but merely observed analogies, forming groups and classes accordingly. We have done the same: we invented neither spirits nor their characteristics; rather, we watched and observed. We judged by their words and acts, and afterward we classified them according to their similarities, basing our classification on the data they themselves had furnished us.
The Spirits generally acknowledge three main categories or large divisions. In the last category and at the bottom of the scale are the imperfect spirits, characterized by the predominance of matter over spirit and an inclination toward evil. Those of the second are characterized by the predominance of the spirit nature over matter and their desire to practice the good: they are the good spirits. And finally, the first category includes the pure spirits, who have reached the highest degree of purification.
This division seems perfectly rational and displays welldefined characteristics, leaving us only to discern, through a sufficient number of subcategories, the main nuances of each group as a whole. That is what we did with the help of the Spirits, whose benevolent instructions have never failed us.
With the aid of the following classifications it will be easy to determine the order and degree of the highly evolved or less evolved spirits with whom we may associate, and consequently, the degree of trust and esteem they deserve. In some ways, this is the key to Spiritist science because it alone can explain to us the anomalies that sometimes appear in communications by enlightening us regarding spirits’ intellectual and moral inequalities. However, we should note that spirits do not perpetually and exclusively belong to this or that class. Their progress is gradual, and since it often occurs in one area more than in another at any given time, they can display characteristics of several categories, a fact which is easy to discern through their language and acts.
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