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

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ALLAN KARDEC
-Might it be worse? - that is to say, might a man commit, in a subsequent existence, faults
which he had not committed in the preceding one?
"That depends on his advancement. If he were unable to resist temptation, he might be drawn
into new faults as a consequence of the situation chosen by him; but such faults must be
considered as indicating a state which is stationary rather than retrograde, for a spirit may
advance or remain stationary, but he never goes back."
399. The vicissitudes of corporeal life being at once an expiation of the faults of the past and
lessons for the future, can we, from the nature of those vicissitudes, infer the character of our
preceding existence?
"You can do so very frequently, since the nature of the punishment incurred always
corresponds to that of the fault committed. Nevertheless, it would not do to consider this as
being an absolute rule. The instinctive tendencies furnish a more certain indication; for the
trials undergone by a spirit are as much for the future as for the past."
When a spirit has reached the end of the term assigned by Providence to his errant life, he chooses for
himself the trials which he determines to undergo in order to hasten his progress - that is to say, the kind
of existence which he believes will be most likely to furnish him with the means of advancing and the trials
of this new existence always correspond to the faults which he has to expiate. If he triumphs in this new
struggle, he rises in grade; if he succumbs, he has to try again.
A spirit always possesses free-will. It is in virtue of this free-will that he chooses, when in the spirit-state,
the trials he elects to undergo In the corporeal life, and that he deliberates, when in the incarnate state
whether he will do, or not do, and chooses between good and evil. To deny a man's free-will will would be
to reduce him to a machine.
When a spirit has re-entered corporeal life, he experiences a temporary forgetfulness of his former
existences, as though these were hidden from him by a veil. Sometimes, however, he preserves a vague
consciousness of them, and they may, under certain circumstances, be revealed to him but this only occurs
as a result of the decision of higher spirits, who make that revelation spontaneously for some useful end,
and never for the gratification of idle curiosity.
A spirit's future existences cannot, in any case, be revealed to him during the corporeal life, because they
will depend on the manner in which he accomplishes his present existence, and on his own ulterior choice.
Temporary forgetfulness of the faults he has committed is no obstacle to a spirit's improvement for if he
have not a precise remembrance of them, the knowledge he had of them In the state of erraticity, and the
desire he then conceived to repair them, guide him intuitively, and inspire him with the Intention of
resisting the evil tendency. This Intention is the voice of his conscience, and is seconded by the spirits who
assist him, if he gives heed to the suggestions with which they inspire him.
Although a man does not know exactly what may have been his acts in his former existences, he always
knows the kind of faults of Which he has been guilty, and what has been his ruling characteristic. He has
only to study himself, and he will know what he has been, not by what he is, but by his tendencies.