Allan Kardec-THE Spirit's Book_ The Principles of Spiritist Doctrine (1989)

160
ALLAN KARDEC
that the perispirit, if it could exist without a spirit, would no more be able to feel any
sensation than is the body when it is dead; and it also follows that the spirit, if it had no
perispirit, would be inaccessible to any painful sensation, as is the case with spirits who are
completely purified. We know that, in proportion as the spirit progresses, the essence of its
perispirit becomes more and more etherealised; whence it follows that the influence of matter
diminishes in proportion to the advancement of the spirit, that is to say, in proportion as his
perispirit becomes less and less gross.
But, it may be urged, it is through the perispirit that agreeable sensations are transmitted to
the spirit, as well as disagreeable ones; therefore, if the purified spirit be inaccessible to the
latter, he must also be to the former. Yes, undoubtedly so, as far as regards those which
proceed solely from the influence of the matter which is known to us. The sound of our
instruments, the perfume of our flowers, produce no impression upon spirits of the highest
orders; and yet they experience sensations of the most vivid character, of a charm
indescribable for us, and of which it is impossible for us to form any idea, because we are, in
regard to that order of sensations, in the same position as that in which men, born blind, are in
regard to light. We know that they exist; but our knowledge is inadequate to explain their
nature or the mode in which they are produced. We know that spirits possess perception,
sensation, hearing, sight, and that these faculties are attributes of their whole being, and not,
as in men, of a part of their being.
But we seek in vain to understand by what intermediary these faculties act; of this we know
nothing. Spirits themselves can give us no explanation of the matter, because our language
can no more be made to express ideas which are beyond the range of our comprehension than
the language of savages can be made to furnish terms for expressing our arts, our sciences, or
our philosophic doctrines.
In saying that spirits are inaccessible to the impressions of earthly matter, we must be
understood as speaking of spirits of very high order, to whose etherealised envelope there is
nothing analogous in our lower sphere. It is different with spirits whose perispirit is of denser
quality, for they perceive our sounds and our odours, though no longer through special parts
of their personality, as they did during life. The molecular vibrations may be said to be felt by
them throughout their whole being, reaching thus their common sensorium, which is the spirit
himself, although