The Essential Works of Helena Blavatsky

«The work now submitted to public judgment is the fruit of a somewhat intimate acquaintance with Eastern adepts and study of their science.» — primera frase del prefacio de *Isis Unveiled*.

«We believe in no Magic which transcends the scope and capacity of the human mind, nor in "miracle," whether divine or diabolical, if such imply a transgression of the laws of nature instituted from all eternity.» — el prefacio acota qué entiende por magia.

«It was while most anxious to solve these perplexing problems that we came into contact with certain men, endowed with such mysterious powers and such profound knowledge that we may truly designate them as the sages of the Orient.» — la fuente declarada de *Isis Unveiled*, en primera persona del plural.

«The Theosophical Society, to which these volumes are dedicated by the author as a mark of affectionate regard, was organized at New York» — la dedicatoria y el lugar de fundación; la fecha, *in 1875*, quedó del otro lado del corte de plana.

«Tradition declares that on the dead body of Hermes, at Hebron, was found by an Isarim, an initiate, the tablet known as the Smaragdine.» — la leyenda de hallazgo de la Tabla de Esmeralda, presentada como tradición.

«Separate the earth from the fire, the subtile from the gross. . . . What I had to say about the operation of the sun is completed» — cita del Smaragdine Tablet dentro del texto de *Isis Unveiled*.

«the astral or sidereal light as explained by the alchemists and Eliphas Levi, in his Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie» — Añade que bajo el nombre de AKASA esa misma fuerza era conocida por los adeptos de todos los países.

«The Abbe Tritheim, the famous author of Steganographie, who lived in the seventeenth century, could converse with his friends by the mere power of his will.» — grafía y siglo tal cual: ver Notas de carga.

«We refer the reader to the Kabbala Denudata of Henry Khunrath» — la adjudicación de la obra, tal como la imprime *Isis Unveiled*.

«the famous John Reuchlin, author of the Mirific Word and friend of Pico di Mirandola, the teacher and instructor of Erasmus, Luther, and Melancthon, was a kabalist and occultist» — la obra de Reuchlin que nombra es *el Mirific Word*, no *De arte cabalistica*.

«Trithemius, Abbott of the Spanheim Benedictines, was the teacher, friend, and confidant of Cornelius Agrippa» — la relación va en ese sentido y se repite igual en la *Secret Doctrine*.

«Anima Mundi, and the Astral Light of the theurgists and kabalists» — identifica el alma del mundo de los neoplatónicos con la luz astral.

«As originally announced, it was intended that The Secret Doctrine should be an amended and enlarged version of Isis Unveiled.» — En la misma página declara que el plan cambió.

«These truths are in no sense put forward as a revelation; nor does the author claim the position of a revealer of mystic lore» — la obra declina el estatuto de revelación.

«For this work is a partial statement of what she herself has been taught by more advanced students, supplemented, in a few details only, by the results of her own study and observation.» — la fórmula exacta de la procedencia.

«It is more than probable that the book will be regarded by a large section of the public as a romance of the wildest kind; for who has ever even heard of the Book of Dzyan?» — la propia obra anticipa la objeción.

«The Book of Dzyan (or Dzan) is utterly unknown to our Philologists, or at any rate was never heard of by them under its present name.» — la fuente declarada se declara también inverificable por la filología.

«The members of several esoteric schools—the seat of which is beyond the Himâlayas, and whose ramifications may be found in China, Japan, India, Tibet, and even in Syria, and also South America—claim to have in their possession the sum total of sacred and philosophical works in MSS. and print» — el reclamo va en boca de las escuelas, no en la suya.

«This first instalment of the esoteric doctrines is based upon Stanzas, which are the records of a people unknown to ethnology.» — Añade que están escritas en una lengua ausente de la nomenclatura de la filología.

«So very old that our modern antiquarians might ponder over its pages an indefinite time» — se cita a sí misma: es el «old book» con que abría *Isis Unveiled*, del que dice que se compiló el Siprah Dzeniouta.

«for there was a time when its language (the Senzar) was known to the Initiates of every nation» — el senzar, dictado por Seres Divinos a los Hijos de la Luz en Asia Central.

«The Secret Doctrine then, establishes three fundamental propositions» — La primera es «An Omnipresent, Eternal, Boundless and Immutable Principle, on which all speculation is impossible».

«This Be-ness is symbolized in the Secret Doctrine under two aspects.» — Espacio abstracto absoluto y Movimiento abstracto absoluto, este último llamado el Gran Aliento.

«The Eternity of the Universe in toto as a boundless plane» — segunda proposición: la universalidad absoluta de la ley de periodicidad.

«The fundamental identity of all Souls with the Universal Over-Soul, the latter being itself an aspect of the Unknown Root» — tercera proposición, con la peregrinación obligatoria de cada alma por el ciclo de encarnación.

«Extracts are given from the Chinese, Tibetan and Sanskrit translations of the original Senzar Commentaries and Glosses on the Book of Dzyan—now rendered for the first time into a European language.» — declara la primicia de la traducción.

«The reader who is not a Theosophist, is once more invited to regard all that follows as a fairy tale, if he likes» — la obra ofrece ella misma esa salida al lector.

«The Eternal Parent, wrapped in her Ever-Invisible Robes, had slumbered once again for Seven Eternities.» — primer shloka de la Estancia I, impresa como texto del Book of Dzyan.

«Darkness alone was Father-Mother, Svabhâvat; and Svabhâvat was in Darkness.» — Estancia II, shloka 5.

«Thus were the germs of the White and the Black Magic sown in those days.» — atribuido al Comentario, y situado en la cuarta raza atlante.

«Hermes was a generic nom de plume used by a series of generations of Mystics of every shade» — la obra declara pseudoepígrafe al corpus hermético que ella misma cita.

«I, who wrote Isis Unveiled, maintain that the Atlanteans are mentioned as our predecessors» — responde a la objeción de que los atlantes no figuran en su libro anterior.

«In the Smaragdine Tablet of Hermes, the uplifted right hand is inscribed with the word “Solve,” the left with the word “Coagula.”» — Lo llama signo alquímico, cosmogónico, antropológico y mágico a la vez, con siete claves.

«Hence in the Smaragdine Tablet, disfigured by Christian hands» — adjudica a manos cristianas la alteración del texto que cita a continuación.

«Isarim, an Initiate, is said to have found at Hebron, on the dead body of Hermes, the well known Smaragdine Tablet» — la misma leyenda de *Isis Unveiled*, repetida once años después.

«In the Sepher Jetzirah it is stated that: “God engraved in the Holy Four the Throne of his Glory, the Auphanim [the Wheels or World-Spheres], the Seraphim, and the Sacred Animals, as Ministering Angels» — cita del Sepher Jetzirah dentro del comentario a las Estancias.

«the work attributed by the Hebrew Kabalists to their Patriarch Abraham (!)» — consigna la atribución del Sepher Jetzirah y le pone el signo de admiración.

«It is incorrect to think that there exists any special “powder of projection” or “philosopher's stone,” or “elixir of life.”» — Añade que el elixir «lurks in every flower, in every stone and mineral throughout the globe».

«It is not a complete or exhaustive text-book of Theosophy, but only a key to unlock the door that leads to the deeper study.» — el prefacio declara el alcance del libro.

«The name Theosophy dates from the third century of our era, and began with Ammonius Saccas and his disciples,1 who started the Eclectic Theosophical system.» — la genealogía declarada del término; el impreso pega la llamada de nota al sustantivo, *disciples,1*, y la cita lo conserva.

«Hence the motto adopted by the Theosophical Society: “There is no religion higher than truth.”» — el lema, que la *Secret Doctrine* imprime también en sánscrito.

«All the old worships indicate the existence of a single Theosophy anterior to them. The key that is to open one must open all; otherwise it cannot be the right key.» — citado por la obra como de *Eclect. Philo.*.

«Its creed is Loyalty to Truth, and its ritual ‘To honour every truth by use.’» — la obra niega a la teosofía credo y ritual en el sentido corriente.

«To form the nucleus of a Universal Brotherhood of Humanity without distinction of race, colour, or creed.» — el primero de los tres objetos declarados de la Sociedad.

«I have heard many Theosophists speak of a “power behind the Society” and of certain “Mahatmas,” mentioned also in Mr. Sinnett’s works, that are said to have founded the Society, to watch over and protect it.» — la objeción va puesta en boca del interlocutor ficticio del diálogo; la respuesta es «You may laugh, but it is so.»

«In the first place they are living men, born as we are born, and doomed to die like every other mortal.» — niega que los Maestros sean espíritus o seres sobrenaturales.

«They are men of great learning, whom we term Initiates, and still greater holiness of life.» — Añade que se aíslan solo de Occidente.

«The powers which they exercise are simply the development of potencies lying latent in every man and woman» — declina el marco de lo sobrenatural también para ellos.

«There are passages entirely dictated by them and verbatim, but in most cases they only inspire the ideas and leave the literary form to the writers.» — la fórmula exacta con que la obra gradúa el dictado.

«The Masters do not guide the Society, not even the Founders; and no one has ever asserted that they did: they only watch over and protect it.» — acota el alcance de la tutela declarada.

«she says expressly in the PREFACE that she gives out the doctrines that she has learnt from the Masters, but claims no inspiration whatever for what she has lately written» — la obra se remite a su propio prefacio de la *Secret Doctrine*.

«all Theosophical books must be accepted on their merits, and not according to any claim to authority which they may put forward» — regla de recepción que la obra se aplica a sí misma.

«In 1879, the headquarters of the T.S. were transferred from New York to Bombay, India, and then permanently to Madras.» — cronología de la Sociedad dada por la propia obra.

«I may now draw your attention to a paragraph from Isis Unveiled, written in 1875.» — data así la escritura de su primera obra.

«THE following pages are derived from "The Book of the Golden Precepts," one of the works put into the hands of mystic students in the East.» — apertura del prefacio: la obra se declara derivada, no original.

«The work from which I here translate forms part of the same series as that from which the "Stanzas" of the Book of Dzyan were taken, on which the Secret Doctrine is based.» — enlaza las dos fuentes declaradas en una sola serie.

«The original Precepts are engraved on thin oblongs [squares] ; copies very often on discs.» — descripción material del soporte declarado, conservado en altares de templos de escuelas mahayana.

«The Book of the Golden Precepts—some of which are pre-Buddhistic while others belong to a later date—contains about ninety distinct little treatises. Of these I learnt thirty-nine by heart, years ago.» — cifra la parte memorizada y por tanto el alcance de la traducción.

«The Mind is the great Slayer of the Real. Let the Disciple slay the Slayer.» — Fragmento I.

«Compassion is no attribute. It is the LAW of LAWS — eternal Harmony, Alaya's SELF» — Fragmento III, el precepto que cierra los Siete Portales.

«Occultism is not magic, though magic is one of its tools.» — epígrafe del volumen, con su procedencia impresa al pie.

«Neither is occultism the pursuit of happiness, as men understand the word; for the first step is sacrifice, the second, renunciation.» — misma página, mismo epígrafe.

«Occultism is the science of life, the art of living.—Lucifer, Vol. I, p. 7.» — el propio texto declara que procede de la revista *Lucifer*.

«This last word is certainly misleading, translated as it stands from the compound word Guptâ-Vidyâ, "Secret Knowledge."» — Distingue cuatro Vidyâs de las que solo la última, Âtmâ-Vidyâ, es ocultismo verdadero.

«true Occultism or Theosophy is the "Great Renunciation of self," unconditionally and absolutely, in thought as in action» — la condición que la obra pone al aspirante.

«But it shows neither mercy for enthroned error, nor reverence for usurped authority.» — el prefacio de *Isis Unveiled* declara el tono con que la obra trata a la autoridad establecida.

«They showed us that by combining science with religion, the existence of God and immortality of man's spirit may be demonstrated like a problem of Euclid.» — lo que Blavatsky dice haber recibido de los sabios de Oriente, en su voz, no en la suya.

«We were taught that this omnipotence comes from the kinship of man's spirit with the Universal Soul — God!» — sigue la enseñanza adjudicada a esos maestros orientales en el prefacio de *Isis Unveiled*.

«Blind faith would no longer be necessary; he would have supplanted it with KNOWLEDGE.» — la consecuencia que el prefacio de *Isis Unveiled* saca de esa enseñanza.

«When the Pope can go to the extreme of fulminating anathemas against all who maintain the liberty of the Press and of speech, or who insist that in the conflict of laws, civil and ecclesiastical, the civil law should prevail, or that any method of instruction solely secular, may be approved; and Mr. Tyndall, as the mouth-piece of nineteenth century science, says, ". . . the impregnable position of science may be stated in a few words: we claim, and we shall wrest from theology, the entire domain of cosmological theory" — the end is not difficult to foresee.» — el prefacio de *Isis Unveiled* pone en la misma frase al papa y a Tyndall, y cita a este último como boca de la ciencia decimonónica.

«Broad Churchmen and Freethinkers will find that we do not accept what they do, but demand the recognition of the whole truth.» — el prefacio de *Isis Unveiled* declina alinearse también con los liberales religiosos.

«The contest now going on between the party of public conscience and the party of reaction, has already developed a healthier tone of thought.» — el prefacio de *Isis Unveiled* sitúa su obra dentro de esa contienda.

«And yet, when we consider the bitter opposition that we are called upon to face, who is better entitled than we upon entering the arena to write upon our shield the hail of the Roman gladiator to Cæsar: MORITURUS TE SALUTÂT!» — cierra el prefacio de *Isis Unveiled*, fechado en Nueva York en septiembre de 1877.

«The ethics of Paganism perhaps met the wants of the uncultivated people of antiquity, but not until the advent of the luminous "Star of Bethlehem," was the true road to moral perfection and the way to salvation made plain.» — abre *Before the Veil* de *Isis Unveiled* enunciando la pretensión ajena que a renglón seguido nombra *the assumption* y contesta preguntando cuáles son los hechos.

«At Rome, the self-styled seat of Christianity, the putative successor to the chair of Peter is undermining social order with his invisible but omnipresent net-work of bigoted agents, and incites them to revolutionize Europe for his temporal as well as spiritual supremacy.» — *Isis Unveiled* abre su cuadro de la época por la autoridad papal, a la que atribuye una red de agentes.

«Between these two conflicting Titans — Science and Theology — is a bewildered public, fast losing all belief in man's personal immortality, in a deity of any kind, and rapidly descending to the level of a mere animal existence.» — el diagnóstico de época de *Isis Unveiled*: la disputa entre ciencia y teología deja al público sin creencia.

«Among the many phenomenal outgrowths of our century, the strange creed of the so-called Spiritualists has arisen amid the tottering ruins of self-styled revealed religions and materialistic philosophies; and yet it alone offers a possible last refuge of compromise between the two.» — *Isis Unveiled* concede al espiritismo el lugar de último refugio de compromiso, y lo llama credo extraño en la misma frase.

«It is the Platonic philosophy, the most elaborate compend of the abstruse systems of old India, that can alone afford us this middle ground.» — *Isis Unveiled* deriva el platonismo de los sistemas de la India antigua y lo propone como el terreno medio entre ciencia y religión.

«Thus is warranted the inference that to Plato and the ancient Hindu sages was alike revealed the same wisdom.» — *Isis Unveiled* saca por inferencia propia que a Platón y a los sabios hindúes les llegó una misma sabiduría.

«Basing all his doctrines upon the presence of the Supreme Mind, Plato taught that the nous, spirit, or rational soul of man, being "generated by the Divine Father," possessed a nature kindred, or even homogeneous, with the Divinity, and was capable of beholding the eternal realities.» — *Isis Unveiled* expone así la doctrina que adjudica a Platón sobre el nous.

«The basis of this assimilation is always asserted to be the preëxistence of the spirit or nous.» — *Isis Unveiled* señala la preexistencia del espíritu como base de esa asimilación a lo divino.

«It is the province of the discipline of philosophy to disinthrall it from the bondage of sense, and raise it into the empyrean of pure thought, to the vision of eternal truth, goodness, and beauty.» — *Isis Unveiled* asigna a la filosofía la tarea de liberar al espíritu de los sentidos.

«The life of the interior spirit is the death of the external nature; and the night of the physical world denotes the day of the spiritual.» — *Isis Unveiled* da esta razón de que las escenas más altas de los Misterios se celebraran de noche.

«we perceive only the shadows of objects, and think them the actual realities. Is not this the idea of Maya, or the illusion of the senses in physical life, which is so marked a feature in Buddhistical philosophy?» — *Isis Unveiled* lee la alegoría de la caverna de *La República* como la misma idea de maya que atribuye a la filosofía budista.

«Plato denominates the epopteia, or personal view, the perfect contemplation of things which are apprehended intuitively, absolute truths and ideas.» — *Isis Unveiled* nombra epopteia el grado más alto de esa iniciación filosófica, siguiendo a Teón de Esmirna, a quien cita en la misma página.

«The fifth gradation is the most perfect felicity arising from hence, and, according to Plato, an assimilation to divinity as far as is possible to human beings.» — cierre de la cita de Teón de Esmirna que *Isis Unveiled* trae para escalonar la filosofía en cinco grados.

«But Aristotle was no trustworthy witness. He misrepresented Plato, and he almost caricatured the doctrines of Pythagoras.» — *Isis Unveiled* descarta a Aristóteles como testigo de Platón y de Pitágoras.

«Numbers were regarded as the best representations of the laws of harmony which pervade the cosmos.» — *Isis Unveiled* resume así la razón pitagórica del número.

«The mystic Decad 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 = 10 is a way of expressing this idea.» — *Isis Unveiled* lee la Década pitagórica como expresión de la unidad que se despliega.

«The whole of this combination of the progression of numbers in the idea of creation is Hindu. The Being existing through himself, Swayambhu or Swayambhuva, as he is called by some, is one. He emanates from himself the creative faculty, Brahma or Purusha (the divine male), and the one becomes Two;» — *Isis Unveiled* adjudica a la India el esquema entero de la progresión numérica de la creación.

«It is out of this invisible and incomprehensible trinity, the Brahmanic Trimurty, that evolves the second triad which represents the three faculties — the creative, the conservative, and the transforming.» — sigue la derivación: de la trimurti brahmánica sale la segunda tríada de facultades, que *Isis Unveiled* tipifica en Brahma, Vishnu y Siva.

«He who has studied Pythagoras and his speculations on the Monad, which, after having emanated the Duad retires into silence and darkness, and thus creates the Triad» — *Isis Unveiled* remite la filosofía de la India y la de Pitágoras a un mismo esquema de mónada, díada y tríada.

«Speusippus and Xenocrates after him, held, like their great master, that the anima mundi, or world-soul, was not the Deity, but a manifestation.» — *Isis Unveiled* consigna que para esos platónicos el alma del mundo es manifestación y no la Deidad misma.

«A man's idea of God, is that image of blinding light that he sees reflected in the concave mirror of his own soul, and yet this is not, in very truth, God, but only His reflection.» — *Isis Unveiled* pone la idea de Dios como reflejo en el espejo del alma propia.

«In the ecstatic Yogin, in the illuminated Seer, the spirit will shine like the noonday sun; in the debased victim of earthly attraction, the radiance has disappeared, for the mirror is obscured with the stains of matter.» — *Isis Unveiled* gradúa ese reflejo por la limpieza del espejo, y no por doctrina.

«He (the Supreme) drew from his own essence the immortal breath which perisheth not in the being,» — *Isis Unveiled* cita así el Manava-Dharma-Sastra sobre el aliento inmortal que el Supremo extrae de su propia esencia.

«These three qualities are Intelligence, Conscience, and Will; answering to the Thought, Perception, and Envisagement of Xenocrates.» — *Isis Unveiled* empareja las tres cualidades del texto hindú con los tres grados de conocimiento de Jenócrates.

«The relation of numbers to Ideas was developed by him further than by Speusippus, and he surpassed Plato in his definition of the doctrine of Indivisible Magnitudes.» — *Isis Unveiled* pone a Jenócrates por encima de Platón en la doctrina de las magnitudes indivisibles.

«But he states expressly that the individual or personal soul is the leading guardian dæmon of every man, and that no dæmon has more power over us than our own.» — *Isis Unveiled* resume así lo que atribuye a Jenócrates sobre el demon guardián: es el alma personal misma.

«Thus the Daimonion of Socrates is the god or Divine Entity which inspired him all his life.» — *Isis Unveiled* lee el daimonion socrático como entidad divina, no como voz externa.

«But some Hermetic philosophers have taught that the soul has a separate continued existence only so long as in its passage through the spheres any material or earthly particles remain incorporated in it; and that when absolutely purified, the latter are annihilated, and the quintessence of the soul alone becomes blended with its divine spirit (the Rational), and the two are thenceforth one.» — *Isis Unveiled* adjudica a filósofos herméticos esta doctrina de la persistencia del alma solo mientras conserve partículas materiales.

«But we believe that it was rather because, like Pythagoras, he had had the Hindu sages for his masters and models.» — *Isis Unveiled* corrige la explicación de Zeller sobre la abstinencia de carne de Jenócrates y la remite a maestros hindúes.

«It is these doctrines, which, studied analogically, and on the principle of correspondence, led the ancient, and may now lead the modern Philaletheian step by step toward the solution of the greatest mysteries.» — *Isis Unveiled* declara el método: analogía y correspondencia, y llama filaleteo al que lo sigue.

«On the brink of the dark chasm separating the spiritual from the physical world stands modern science, with eyes closed and head averted, pronouncing the gulf impassable and bottomless, though she holds in her hand a torch which she need only lower into the depths to show her her mistake.» — la imagen con que *Isis Unveiled* acusa a la ciencia de su tiempo de no querer mirar.

«In his Fragments of Science Tyndall makes the following sad confession: "If you ask me whether science has solved, or is likely in our day to solve the problem of this universe, I must shake my head in doubt.» — *Isis Unveiled* cita a Tyndall contra sí mismo, de sus *Fragments of Science*.

«Magic may have one signification to one class of readers and another to another class.» — *Isis Unveiled* abre su glosario advirtiendo que el término no es unívoco.

«We shall give it the meaning which it has in the minds of its Oriental students and practitioners.» — y declara de qué lado se pone para definirlo.

«ÆTHROBACY, is the Greek name for walking or being lifted in the air; levitation, so called, among modern spiritualists.» — entrada del glosario de *Isis Unveiled*, que iguala el término griego con la levitación de los espiritistas.

«A symbolical explanation of æthrobacy is given in an old Syriac manuscript which was translated in the fifteenth century by one Malchus, an alchemist.» — *Isis Unveiled* declara así la procedencia del pasaje sobre Simón el Mago que cita a continuación; la grafía Malchus va sin cotejo.

«The earth is a magnetic body; in fact, as some scientists have found, it is one vast magnet, as Paracelsus affirmed some 300 years ago.» — *Isis Unveiled* adjudica a Paracelso, tres siglos antes, la tesis de la Tierra como imán.

«If well-regulated, it can produce "miracles"; among others a change of this electrical polarity from negative to positive; the man's relations with the earth-magnet would then become repellent, and "gravity" for him would have ceased to exist.» — la explicación que *Isis Unveiled* da de la levitación: invertir la polaridad eléctrica propia frente al imán terrestre.

«The study of nervous diseases has established that even in ordinary somnambulism, as well as in mesmerized somnambulists, the weight of the body seems to be diminished.» — *Isis Unveiled* apoya esa explicación en la clínica del sonambulismo de su época.

«We are so accustomed to consider gravitation as being a something absolute and unalterable, that the idea of a complete or partial rising in opposition to it seems inadmissible; nevertheless, there are phenomena in which, by means of material forces, gravitation is overcome.» — *Isis Unveiled* recoge esta concesión de la medicina alemana que cita, sobre la gravitación vencida por fuerzas materiales.

«Surely such men as Roger Bacon, Agrippa, Henry Kunrath, and the Arabian Geber (the first to introduce into Europe some of the secrets of chemistry), can hardly be treated as impostors — least of all as fools.» — *Isis Unveiled* defiende a los alquimistas de la acusación de impostura; la grafía Henry Kunrath es la que imprime la fuente.

«Scientists who are reforming the science of physics upon the basis of the atomic theory of Demokritus, as restated by John Dalton, conveniently forget that Demokritus, of Abdera, was an alchemist, and that the mind that was capable of penetrating so far into the secret operations of nature in one direction must have had good reasons to study and become a Hermetic philosopher.» — *Isis Unveiled* reclama a Demócrito de Abdera para la alquimia, contra quienes lo leen solo como atomista.

«Olaus Borrichias says, that the cradle of alchemy is to be sought in the most distant times.» — autoridad que *Isis Unveiled* invoca para la antigüedad de la alquimia.

«As the Rosicrucians regarded the real, as the direct opposite of the apparent, and taught that what seems light to matter, is darkness to spirit, they searched for the latter in the astral ocean of invisible fire which encompasses the world; and claim to have traced the equally invisible divine spirit, which overshadows every man and is erroneously called soul, to the very throne of the Invisible and Unknown God.» — *Isis Unveiled* atribuye a los rosacruces la busca del espíritu divino en el océano astral de fuego invisible.

«That this astral light permeates the whole cosmos, lurking in its latent state even in the minutest particle of rock, they demonstrate by the phenomenon of the spark from flint and from every other stone, whose spirit when forcibly disturbed springs to sight spark-like, and immediately disappears in the realms of the unknowable.» — sigue la demostración que *Isis Unveiled* pone en boca de los rosacruces: la chispa del pedernal.

«Paracelsus named it the sidereal light, taking the term from the Latin.» — *Isis Unveiled* declara de dónde toma el nombre de luz sideral.

«The body is wood and the life is fire, which comes like the light from the stars and from heaven.» — Paracelso citado por *Isis Unveiled* en esa misma página, junto a la fórmula de que la magia es la filosofía de la alquimia.

«Everything pertaining to the spiritual world must come to us through the stars, and if we are in friendship with them, we may attain the greatest magical effects.» — sigue la cita de Paracelso; la amistad con los astros es la condición que pone.

«Everything is double in nature; magnetism is positive and negative, active and passive, male and female.» — *Isis Unveiled* enuncia la polaridad como ley general de la naturaleza.

«When the mesmerizer will have learned the grand secret of polarizing the action and endowing his fluid with a bisexual force he will have become the greatest magician living.» — *Isis Unveiled* cifra la maestría mágica en polarizar el fluido y dotarlo de fuerza bisexual.

«Thus the astral light is androgyne, for equilibrium is the resultant of two opposing forces eternally reacting upon each other.» — de ahí que *Isis Unveiled* llame andrógina a la luz astral.

«The astral light alone, as the chief agent in magic, can discover to us all secrets of nature.» — *Isis Unveiled* hace de la luz astral el agente principal de la magia.

«The astral light is identical with the Hindu akâsa, a word which we will now explain.» — la ecuación que *Isis Unveiled* traza entre la luz astral de Occidente y el akâsa.

«AKÂSA. — Literally the word means in Sanscrit sky, but in its mystic sense it signifies the invisible sky; or, as the Brahmans term it in the Soma-sacrifice (the Gyotishtoma Agnishtoma), the god Akâsa, or god Sky.» — entrada de glosario de *Isis Unveiled*; la grafía Sanscrit y Akâsa va tal cual.

«In its latent state it tallies exactly with our idea of the universal ether; in its active state it became the Akâsa, the all-directing and omnipotent god.» — *Isis Unveiled* distingue el estado latente del activo del akâsa: éter universal y dios que todo lo dirige.

«the author of one of the most modern works on the occult philosophy, Art-Magic, gives for the first time to the world a most intelligible and interesting explanation of the Akâsa in connection with the phenomena attributed to its influence by the fakirs and lamas.» — *Isis Unveiled* adjudica a *Art-Magic* la primera explicación inteligible del akâsa; esa obra no tiene ficha en el corpus.

«In modern science, psychology relates only or principally to conditions of the nervous system, and almost absolutely ignores the psychical essence and nature.» — *Isis Unveiled* reprocha a la psicología de su tiempo haber reducido su objeto al sistema nervioso.

«The famous Hillel, the precursor of Jesus in philosophy and in ethics, was a Chaldean.» — *Isis Unveiled* hace caldeo a Hillel dentro de su entrada de glosario sobre los caldeos.

«Franck in his Kabbala points to the close resemblance of the "secret doctrine" found in the Avesta and the religious metaphysics of the Chaldees.» — autoridad que *Isis Unveiled* invoca para emparentar el Avesta con la metafísica caldea.

«Freemasons derive from this word their phrase of "Supreme Architect."» — la entrada de glosario sobre el demiurgo remite de ahí la fórmula masónica.

«The most dreadful operations, such as flaying the limbs alive; cutting off the toes, feet, and legs; tearing out the eyes; and causing one's self to be buried alive up to the chin in the earth, and passing whole months in this posture, seem child's play to them.» — *Isis Unveiled* describe así las mortificaciones de los fakires indios, a los que en la misma entrada contrapone con los derviches.

«He remains calm and serious and as composed as if taking a refreshing bath.» — sigue el cuadro del fakir suspendido del Tshiddy-Parvady; la grafía del término va sin cotejo.

«These elementals are the principal agents of disembodied but never visible spirits at seances, and the producers of all the phenomena except the subjective.» — *Isis Unveiled* adjudica los fenómenos de las sesiones espiritistas a los elementales y no a los muertos.

«Eliphas Levi and some other kabalists make little distinction between elementary spirits who have been men, and those beings which people the elements, and are the blind forces of nature.» — *Isis Unveiled* señala aquí una imprecisión de Lévi y de otros kabalistas: no separan los elementarios que fueron hombres de las fuerzas ciegas.

«Once divorced from their bodies, these souls (also called "astral bodies") of purely materialistic persons, are irresistibly attracted to the earth, where they live a temporary and finite life amid elements congenial to their gross natures. From having never, during their natural lives, cultivated their spirituality, but subordinated it to the material and gross, they are now unfitted for the lofty career of the pure, disembodied being, for whom the atmosphere of earth is stifling and mephitic, and whose attractions are all away from it.» — *Isis Unveiled* explica la atracción terrestre de esas almas por su falta de cultivo espiritual en vida.

«After a more or less prolonged period of time these material souls will begin to disintegrate, and finally, like a column of mist, be dissolved, atom by atom, in the surrounding elements.» — y les asigna disolución, no eternidad.

«Eusebius, and after him De Quincey, declared them to be the same as the early Christians, which is more than probable.» — *Isis Unveiled* recoge y respalda la identificación de esenios y primeros cristianos, con el límite de que la llama probable.

«Modern, or so-called exact science, holds but to a one-sided physical evolution, prudently avoiding and ignoring the higher or spiritual evolution, which would force our contemporaries to confess the superiority of the ancient philosophers and psychologists over themselves.» — *Isis Unveiled* imputa a la ciencia exacta evitar la evolución espiritual por lo que le costaría reconocer.

«The ancient sages, ascending to the UNKNOWABLE, made their starting-point from the first manifestation of the unseen, the unavoidable, and from a strict logical reasoning, the absolutely necessary creative Being, the Demiurgos of the universe.» — *Isis Unveiled* describe el punto de partida que adjudica a los sabios antiguos.

«Evolution began with them from pure spirit, which descending lower and lower down, assumed at last a visible and comprehensible form, and became matter.» — la evolución descendente que *Isis Unveiled* opone a la de los evolucionistas de su siglo.

«the Emanationist believes that nothing can be evolved — or, as the word means, unwombed or born — except it has first been involved, thus indicating that life is from a spiritual potency above the whole.» — *Isis Unveiled* distingue al emanacionista del evolucionista por la involución previa.

«Agni is god of fire, of the Spiritual Ether, the very substance of the divine essence of the Invisible God present in every atom of His creation and called by the Rosicrucians the "Celestial Fire."» — *Isis Unveiled* identifica el Agni védico con el fuego celeste de los rosacruces.

«They will find in it, moreover, a perfect identity of thought and even doctrine with the Hermetic philosophy, and also that of Pythagoras and Plato.» — *Isis Unveiled* pone la cosmogonía del Rig-Veda, la filosofía hermética, Pitágoras y Platón bajo una misma doctrina.

«No fakir will be seen without this powerful adjunct of his calling.» — entrada de glosario de *Isis Unveiled* sobre el bastón del fakir brahmánico.

«It is, as they all claim, the divining rod, the cause of every occult phenomenon produced by them.» — y consigna el reclamo como de ellos, no como propio.

«The kabalists identify him with Adam Kadmon, the first manifestation of the Divine Power, and with Enoch. There were two Hermes: the elder was the Trismegistus, and the second an emanation, or "permutation" of himself; the friend and instructor of Isis and Osiris.» — *Isis Unveiled* consigna la identificación kabalística de Hermes con Adam Kadmon y con Enoc, y distingue dos Hermes.

«HIEROPHANT. — Discloser of sacred learning. The Old Man, the Chief of the Adepts at the initiations, who explained the arcane knowledge to the neophytes, bore this title. In Hebrew and Chaldaic the term was Peter, or opener, discloser; hence, the Pope, as the successor of the hierophant of the ancient Mysteries, sits in the Pagan chair of "St. Peter."» — la entrada de glosario deriva el papado del hierofante de los Misterios por la vía del término hebreo.

«The vindictiveness of the Catholic Church toward the alchemists, and to arcane and astronomical science, is explained by the fact that such knowledge was the ancient prerogative of the hierophant, or representative of Peter, who kept the mysteries of life and death.» — *Isis Unveiled* explica por esa vía la hostilidad de la Iglesia a los alquimistas.

«Men like Bruno, Galileo, and Kepler, therefore, and even Cagliostro, trespassed on the preserves of the Church, and were accordingly murdered.» — la lista de perseguidos que *Isis Unveiled* pone a continuación, con Cagliostro incluido.

«Even the Jews had their Peter — Tanaïm or Rabbin, like Hillel, Akiba, and other famous kabalists, who alone could impart the awful knowledge contained in the Merkaba.» — *Isis Unveiled* extiende la figura del hierofante a los tanaím judíos y a la Merkaba.

«INITIATES. — In times of antiquity, those who had been initiated into the arcane knowledge taught by the hierophants of the Mysteries; and in our modern days those who have been initiated by the adepts of mystic lore into the mysterious knowledge, which, notwithstanding the lapse of ages, has yet a few real votaries on earth.» — la entrada de glosario declara que la iniciación sigue viva en pocos, y no que se haya extinguido.

«KABALIST, from, KABALA; an unwritten or oral tradition. The kabalist is a student of "secret science," one who interprets the hidden meaning of the Scriptures with the help of the symbolical Kabala, and explains the real one by these means.» — definición de glosario; deriva la palabra de una tradición oral no escrita.

«Pythagoras and Plato held it in high esteem, and Socrates advised his disciples to study Manticism.» — *Isis Unveiled* respalda el manticismo por la autoridad de Pitágoras, Platón y Sócrates.

«The Church Fathers, who condemned so severely the mantic frenzy in Pagan priests and Pythiæ, were not above applying it to their own uses.» — *Isis Unveiled* imputa a los Padres de la Iglesia usar lo mismo que condenaban.

«But Christians forget, apparently, that Moses was also a magician, and Daniel, "Master of the magicians, astrologers, Chaldeans, and soothsayers" (Daniel, v. II).» — argumento de *Isis Unveiled* contra la condena cristiana de la magia, con la referencia bíblica que ella imprime.

«The word magician then, scientifically speaking, is derived from Magh, Mah, Hindu or Sanscrit Maha — great; a man well versed in the secret or esoteric knowledge; properly a Sacerdote.» — *Isis Unveiled* deriva mago del sánscrito maha; la etimología va sin cotejo.

«The three magi, also denominated kings, that are said to have made gifts of gold, incense, and myrrh to the infant Jesus, were fire-worshippers like the rest, and astrologers; for they saw his star.» — *Isis Unveiled* hace astrólogos y adoradores del fuego a los magos del evangelio.

«The two sacrificial cups of the Soma-mystery used during the religious rites, and generally known as grahas, are respectively called Sukra and Manti.» — entrada de glosario sobre el misterio del soma y sus dos vasos.

«The contents of the other cup, the manti, which "stirs the Brahma," put thereby the soul in communication not only with the minor gods — the well-informed but not omniscient spirits — but actually with the highest divine essence itself.» — *Isis Unveiled* atribuye al segundo vaso la comunicación directa con la esencia divina.

«In its general sense, though, a mantra is either simply a prayer to the gods and powers of heaven, as taught by the Brahmanical books, and especially Manu, or else a magical charm.» — la entrada de glosario deja el mantra entre la oración y el ensalmo, sin decidir.

«In its esoteric sense, the "word" of the mantra, or mystic speech, is called by the Brahmans Vâch.» — y nombra Vâch a la palabra mística; la grafía va sin cotejo.

«The kabalistic axiom, "A stone becomes a plant, a plant an animal, an animal a man, a man a spirit, and a spirit a god,"» — el axioma kabalístico con que *Isis Unveiled* introduce la metempsicosis.

«But the Asklepiades were initiates of the Æsculapian serpent-worship, as the Bacchantes were of the Dionysia; and both rites were eventually incorporated with the Eleusinia.» — *Isis Unveiled* refunde en Eleusis los cultos de Asclepio y de Dioniso.

«The Hippocratic oath was but a mystic obligation. Hippocrates was a priest of Asklepios, some of whose writings chanced to become public.» — *Isis Unveiled* lee el juramento hipocrático como obligación de iniciado y hace sacerdote de Asclepio a Hipócrates.

«NABIA. — Seership, soothsaying. This oldest and most respected of mystic phenomena, is the name given to prophecy in the Bible, and is correctly included among the spiritual powers, such as divination, clairvoyant visions, trance-conditions, and oracles.» — entrada de glosario de *Isis Unveiled* sobre la profecía bíblica.

«But while enchanters, diviners, and even astrologers are strictly condemned in the Mosaic books, prophecy, seership, and nabia appear as the special gifts of heaven.» — *Isis Unveiled* señala la asimetría de la ley mosaica: condena la adivinación y consagra la profecía.

«In early ages they were all termed Epoptai, the Greek word for seers, clairvoyants; after which they were designated as Nebim, "the plural of Nebo, the Babylonian god of wisdom.» — sigue la serie de nombres que *Isis Unveiled* da a los videntes, con la etimología babilonia que ella imprime.

«OCCULTIST. — One who studies the various branches of occult science. The term is used by the French kabalists (See Eliphas Levi's works). Occultism embraces the whole range of psychological, physiological, cosmical, physical, and spiritual phenomena.» — la entrada de glosario adjudica el término a los kabalistas franceses y remite a las obras de Éliphas Lévi.

«Thus every one of the numberless deities of the Hindu, Greek, and Egyptian Pantheons, are simply Powers of the "Unseen Universe."» — *Isis Unveiled* reduce los panteones a potencias del universo invisible, no a personas divinas.

«PITRIS. — It is generally believed that the Hindu term Pitris means the spirits of our direct ancestors; of disembodied people.» — la entrada de glosario expone primero la creencia corriente sobre los pitris.

«but those of the human kind or Adamic race; the spirits of human races which, on the great scale of descending evolution, preceded our races of men, and were physically, as well as spiritually, far superior to our modern pigmies.» — y la rechaza: la voz de *Isis Unveiled* los hace razas anteriores a la adámica y superiores a la presente; la Secret Doctrine repite la frase casi igual en la p. 2855.

«The ancients placed the astral soul of man, fuch , or his self-consciousness, in the pit of the stomach.» — *Isis Unveiled* sitúa ahí el alma astral; la grafía fuch es como la capa de texto rinde el griego ψυχή.

«They call it the lamp of the Deshtur, or high priest; the light of the Dikshita (the initiate), and otherwise designate it by many other names.» — los nombres que *Isis Unveiled* da a esa luz del ombligo.

«SOMA.— This Hindu sacred beverage answers to the Greek ambrosia or nectar, drunk by the gods of Olympus.» — entrada de glosario que empareja el soma con la ambrosía griega.

«The soma-drink known to Europeans is not the genuine beverage, but its substitute; for the initiated priests alone can taste of the real soma; and even kings and rajas, when sacrificing, receive the substitute.» — *Isis Unveiled* declara sustituto lo que los europeos conocen por soma.

«We were positively informed that the majority of the sacrificial priests of the Dekkan have lost the secret of the true soma.» — y adjudica la noticia a un informante, no a lectura.

«According to the exoteric explanation the soma is a plant, but, at the same time it is an angel.» — *Isis Unveiled* sostiene la doble naturaleza del soma sin resolverla.

«The soma makes a new man of the initiate; he is reborn and transformed, and his spiritual nature overcomes the physical; it gives the divine power of inspiration, and develops the clairvoyant faculty to the utmost.» — los efectos que *Isis Unveiled* atribuye a la bebida sacrificial.

«SPIRIT. — The lack of any mutual agreement between writers in the use of this word has resulted in dire confusion. It is commonly made synonymous with soul; and the lexicographers countenance the usage. This is the natural result of our ignorance of the other word, and repudiation of the classification adopted by the ancients. Elsewhere we attempt to make clear the distinction between the terms "spirit" and "soul." There are no more important passages in this work. Meanwhile, we will only add that "spirit" is the nou'" of Plato, the immortal, immaterial, and purely divine principle in man — the crown of the human Triad; whereas,» — la entrada de glosario reserva *spirit* para el nous platónico y remite al lector al resto de la obra.

«SOUL is the fuch , or the nephesh of the Bible; the vital principle, or the breath of life, which every animal, down to the infusoria, shares with man.» — y reserva *soul* para el principio vital que el hombre comparte con todo animal.

«THEOSOPHISTS.— In the mediæval ages it was the name by which were known the disciples of Paracelsus of the sixteenth century, the so-called fire-philosophers or Philosophi per ignem.» — *Isis Unveiled* data el término en los discípulos de Paracelso del siglo XVI.

«As well as the Platonists they regarded the soul fuch and the divine spirit, nous (νους)as a particle of the great Archos — a fire taken from the eternal ocean of light.» — y les atribuye ver el alma y el espíritu como partícula del gran Archos.

«THEURGIST.— From θεος, god, and εγρον , work. The first school of practical theurgy in the Christian period was founded by Iamblichus among the Alexandrian Platonists; but the priests attached to the temples of Egypt, Assyria, and Babylonia, and who took an active part in the evocations of the gods during the Sacred Mysteries, were known by this name from the earliest archaic period. The purpose of it was to make spirits visible to the eyes of mortals.» — entrada de glosario de *Isis Unveiled*; data la primera escuela cristiana de teurgia práctica en Jámblico y remonta el arte a los sacerdotes de Egipto, Asiria y Babilonia.

«The school of Iamblichus was distinct from that of Plotinus and Porphyry, who were strongly against ceremonial magic and practical theurgy as dangerous, though these two eminent men firmly believed in both.» — *Isis Unveiled* separa a Plotino y Porfirio de Jámblico sin negarles la creencia.

«In the rare cases when the presence of a tangible and visible spirit was required, the theurgist had to furnish the weird apparition with a portion of his own flesh and blood — he had to perform the theopœa, or the "creation of gods," by a mysterious process well known to the modern fakirs and initiated Brahmans of India.» — *Isis Unveiled* describe la teopeya y la empareja con lo que atribuye a fakires y brahmanes iniciados.

«The Brahman Grihasta (the evocator) must be in a state of complete purity before he ventures to call forth the Pitris.» — el ritual va citado del Libro de Evocaciones de las pagodas, no dicho por *Isis Unveiled* en su nombre.

«Whoever is acquainted with the nature of divinely luminous appearances ( fasmata ) knows also on what account it is requisite to abstain from all birds (animal food), and especially for him who hastens to be liberated from terrestrial concerns and to be established with the celestial gods," says Porphyry.» — Porfirio citado por *Isis Unveiled* sobre la abstinencia de carne de aves.

«Though he refused to practice theurgy himself, Porphyry, in his Life of Plotinus, mentions a priest of Egypt, who, "at the request of a certain friend of Plotinus (which friend was perhaps Porphyry himself, remarks T. Taylor), exhibited to Plotinus, in the temple of Isis at Rome, the familiar daimon, or, in modern language, the guardian angel of that philosopher.» — *Isis Unveiled* consigna que Porfirio rehusaba la teurgia y aun así refiere la aparición del daimon de Plotino en el templo de Isis en Roma.

«But never have any of the highly moral and pious philosophers, whose fame has descended to us spotless of any evil deed, practiced any other kind of magic than the theurgic, or benevolent, as Bulwer-Lytton terms it.» — *Isis Unveiled* toma de Bulwer-Lytton el nombre de magia benevolente para lo que admite.

«YAJNA. — "The Yajna," say the Brahmans, exists from eternity, for it proceeded forth from the Supreme One, the Brahma-Prajapâti, in whom it lay dormant from "no beginning." It is the key to the TRAIVIDYA, the thrice sacred science contained in the Rig verses, which teaches the Yagus or sacrificial mysteries.» — entrada de glosario que pone la doctrina en boca de los brahmanes; la grafía Brahma-Prajapâti va sin cotejo.

«Yagus or sacrificial mysteries. "The Yajna" exists as an invisible thing at all times; it is like the latent power of electricity in an electrifying machine, requiring only the operation of a suitable apparatus in order to be elicited.» — el símil eléctrico con que *Isis Unveiled* explica el estado latente del yajna; la misma parrafada se reimprime casi igual en la p. 3873, ya dentro del aparato de *Studies in Occultism*.

«This Yajna is again one of the forms of the Akâsa, and the mystic word calling it into existence and pronounced mentally by the initiated Priest is the Lost Word receiving impulse through WILL-POWER.» — *Isis Unveiled* enlaza el yajna con el akâsa y con la Palabra Perdida de la tradición occidental.

«It is rather a brief summary of the religions, philosophies, and universal traditions of human kind, and the exegesis of the same, in the spirit of those secret doctrines, of which none — thanks to prejudice and bigotry — have reached Christendom in so unmutilated a form, as to secure it a fair judgment.» — *Isis Unveiled* declara así el alcance de su propio libro.

«And these few have never, as a rule, written for the public, but only for those of their own and succeeding times who possessed the key to their jargon.» — *Isis Unveiled* explica por ahí la oscuridad de las fuentes que maneja.

«We wish to show how inevitable were their innumerable failures, and how they must continue until these pretended authorities of the West go to the Brahmans and Lamaists of the far Orient, and respectfully ask them to impart the alphabet of true science.» — la conclusión polémica de la introducción de *Isis Unveiled* sobre la ciencia occidental.

«It is the bastard progeny of the French Revolution and its reaction against ages of religious bigotry and repression.» — *Isis Unveiled* deriva el materialismo de su siglo de la Revolución francesa y de la represión religiosa previa.

«Our voice is raised for spiritual freedom, and our plea made for enfranchisement from all tyranny, whether of SCIENCE or THEOLOGY.» — la declaración con que *Isis Unveiled* cierra su introducción, contra las dos autoridades a la vez.

«These are the Maruts of the "Vedas" (See Max Müller's "Rig-Veda Sanhita"). The well-known and respected lecturer, author, and clairvoyant, Mrs. Emma Hardinge Britten, has published accounts of her frequent experiences with these elemental spirits.» — nota al pie de *Isis Unveiled*; adjudica a Emma Hardinge Britten el testimonio y a Max Müller la referencia védica.

«There exists somewhere in this wide world an old Book--so very old that our modern antiquarians might ponder over its pages an indefinite time, and still not quite agree» — el capítulo I de *Isis Unveiled* abre por la fuente declarada, un libro antiguo del que no da paradero; la *Secret Doctrine* se cita a sí misma por este pasaje en la p. 1316.

«Siphra Dzeniouta--was compiled from it, and that at a time when the former was already considered in the light of a literary relic.» — *Isis Unveiled* deriva de ese libro el Siphra Dzeniouta, que ya sería reliquia cuando aquél se compiló; la *Secret Doctrine* reimprime la parrafada entera en la p. 1316 y ahí la grafía es Siprah.

«One of its illustrations represents the Divine Essence emanating from ADAM like a luminous arc proceeding to form a circle; and then, having attained the highest point of its circumference, the ineffable Glory bends back again, and returns to earth, bringing a higher type of humanity in its vortex. As it approaches nearer and nearer to our planet, the Emanation becomes more and more shadowy, until upon touching the ground it is as black as night.» — *Isis Unveiled* describe la lámina del arco luminoso que emana de Adán y se ennegrece al tocar tierra; es la caída en la materia, y la *Secret Doctrine* la reimprime en la p. 1316.

«A conviction, founded upon seventy thousand years of experience,4 as they allege, has been entertained by hermetic philosophers of all periods that matter has in time become, through sin, more gross and dense than it was at man's first formation; that, at the beginning, the human body was of a half-ethereal nature; and that, before the fall, mankind communed freely with the now unseen universes.» — *Isis Unveiled* pone en boca de los filósofos herméticos de todos los tiempos la tesis del cuerpo semietéreo anterior a la caída.

«The oldest esoteric traditions also teach that, before the mystic Adam, many races of human beings lived and died out, each giving place in its turn to another.» — razas anteriores al Adán místico, adjudicadas a las tradiciones esotéricas más antiguas.

«When the arc attained a certain point which brought it parallel with the fixed line of our terrestrial plane, the man was furnished by nature with "coats of skin," and the Lord God "clothed them."» — *Isis Unveiled* hace coincidir el punto del arco con las túnicas de piel del Génesis.

«According to Philo Judaeus, the air is filled with an invisible host of spirits, some of whom are free from evil and immortal, and others are pernicious and mortal.» — Filón citado por *Isis Unveiled* sobre la hueste invisible del aire.

«And the unequivocal statement of the anonymous Gnostic who wrote The Gospel according to John, that "as many as received Him," i.e., who followed practically the esoteric doctrine of Jesus, would "become the sons of God," points to the same belief.» — *Isis Unveiled* atribuye a un gnóstico anónimo el cuarto evangelio; la adjudicación queda consignada, no arbitrada.

«Plato describes admirably in Phaedrus the state in which man once was, and what he will become again: before, and after the "loss of his wings"; when "he lived among the gods, a god himself in the airy world.» — el *Fedro* citado por *Isis Unveiled* para el estado anterior a la pérdida de las alas.

«The Kalmucks and some tribes of Siberia also describe in their legends earlier creations than our present race.» — *Isis Unveiled* suma las leyendas kalmukas y siberianas a la serie de creaciones anteriores.

«The Astor Library of New York has recently been enriched by a facsimile of an Egyptian Medical Treatise, written in the sixteenth century B.C. (or, more precisely, 1552 B.C.), which, according to the commonly received chronology, is the time when Moses was just twenty-one years of age.» — *Isis Unveiled* data así el papiro médico egipcio, sincronizándolo con la edad de Moisés según la cronología recibida.

«It was purchased in Egypt, in 1872-3, by the archaeologist Ebers, of "a well-to-do Arab from Luxor."» — la procedencia del papiro Ebers tal como la refiere *Isis Unveiled*.

«Within the last few years geology, which previously had only conceded that man could be traced as far back as the tertiary period, has found unanswerable proofs that human existence antedates the last glaciation of Europe--over 250,000 years!» — *Isis Unveiled* invoca la geología de su tiempo a favor de la antigüedad extrema de la especie.

«Because the fossil implements of man are found to become more rough and uncouth as geology penetrates deeper into the bowels of the earth, it seems a proof to science that the closer we come to the origin of man, the more savage and brute-like he must be.» — *Isis Unveiled* enuncia así el razonamiento de la ciencia que enseguida rechaza.

«They divided the interminable periods of human existence on this planet into cycles, during each of which mankind gradually reached the culminating point of highest civilization and gradually relapsed into abject barbarism.» — *Isis Unveiled* adjudica a los antiguos la doctrina cíclica de civilización y barbarie que ella sostiene.

«Dr. Schliemann, the enthusiastic Hellenist, has recently found, in his excavations in the Troad, abundant evidences of the same gradual change from barbarism to civilization, and from civilization to barbarism again.» — *Isis Unveiled* invoca la excavación de la Tróade a favor de su doctrina del ciclo.

«Such a hypothesis must be considered as reasonable as any other until some countervailing evidence shall be discovered to destroy it.» — y acota el estatuto de lo que afirma: hipótesis mientras no la destruya una evidencia contraria.

«Professor Draper partially corroborates this view by saying that the periods into which geology has "found it convenient to divide the progress of man in civilization are not abrupt epochs which hold good simultaneously for the whole human race";» — Draper citado por *Isis Unveiled* contra la simultaneidad de las épocas geológicas.

«Professor Draper laments that such speculative mystics as Ammonius Saccas and Plotinus should have taken the place "of the severe geometers of the old museum.» — *Isis Unveiled* recoge el lamento de Draper por Ammonio Saccas y Plotino; lo cita como adversario, no como aliado.

«The cosmological theory of numerals which Pythagoras learned from the Egyptian hierophants, is alone able to reconcile the two units, matter and spirit, and cause each to demonstrate the other mathematically.» — *Isis Unveiled* remonta la teoría numérica de Pitágoras a los hierofantes egipcios; la *Secret Doctrine* reimprime la frase en la p. 2998 y ahí le añade la India.

«Mochus, the Sidonian, the physiologist and teacher of the science of anatomy, flourished long before the Sage of Samos; and the latter received the sacred instructions from his disciples and descendants.» — *Isis Unveiled* antepone a Mochus el sidonio a Pitágoras en la enseñanza de la anatomía.

«The impenetrable veil of arcane secrecy was thrown over the sciences taught in the sanctuary.» — *Isis Unveiled* explica por el secreto de santuario la oscuridad que se les reprocha a los antiguos.

«Even Plato and Philo Judaeus have been accused by many a commentator of absurd inconsistencies, whereas the design which underlies the maze of metaphysical contradictions so perplexing to the reader of the Timaeus, is but too evident.» — y atribuye a esa clave el sentido del laberinto del *Timeo*.

«The doctrine of Metempsychosis has been abundantly ridiculed by men of science and rejected by theologians, yet if it had been properly understood in its application to the indestructibility of matter and the immortality of spirit, it would have been perceived that it is a sublime conception.» — *Isis Unveiled* reivindica la metempsicosis por la indestructibilidad de la materia y la inmortalidad del espíritu.

«The harmony and mathematical equiformity of the double evolution--spiritual and physical--are elucidated only in the universal numerals of Pythagoras, who built his system entirely upon the so-called "metrical speech" of the Hindu Vedas.» — *Isis Unveiled* hace derivar el sistema entero de Pitágoras del habla métrica de los Vedas.

«Plato, the ardent disciple of Pythagoras, realized it so fully as to maintain that the Dodecahedron was the geometrical figure employed by the Demiurgus in constructing the universe.» — el dodecaedro como figura del Demiurgo, atribuido a Platón por *Isis Unveiled*.

«If the Pythagorean metempsychosis should be thoroughly explained and compared with the modern theory of evolution, it would be found to supply every "missing link" in the chain of the latter.» — *Isis Unveiled* ofrece la metempsicosis pitagórica como el eslabón que la teoría evolutiva echa de menos.

«Notwithstanding proofs to the contrary, they not only deny that the nations of the archaic periods, but even the ancient philosophers had any positive knowledge of the Heliocentric system.» — *Isis Unveiled* imputa a los sabios de su siglo negar el heliocentrismo antiguo.

«In the Vedas, for instance, we find positive proof that so long ago as 2000 B.C., the Hindu sages and scholars must have been acquainted with the rotundity of our globe and the Heliocentric system.» — y aduce los Vedas por testimonio de ese conocimiento hacia el 2000 a. C.

«Hence, Pythagoras and Plato knew well this astronomical truth; for Pythagoras obtained his knowledge in India, or from men who had been there, and Plato faithfully echoed his teachings.» — *Isis Unveiled* hace pasar por la India el saber astronómico de Pitágoras y de Platón.

«In the "Serpent-Mantra," the Brahmana declares as follows: that this Mantra is that one which was seen by the Queen of the Serpents,» — *Isis Unveiled* cita el Aitareya Brahmana sobre el mantra de la serpiente; el nombre que sigue lo imprime la fuente partido por el salto de renglón, Sarpa-rajni, y por eso queda fuera de la cita.

«by the god Vayu, the lord of the air, forcibly suggests the idea that the authors of the sacred Vedic books knew the earth to be round or spherical; moreover, that it had been a gelatinous mass at first, which gradually cooled off under the influence of the air and time.» — *Isis Unveiled* infiere de la imagen védica de la tierra gelatinosa endurecida por Vayu que sus autores la sabían esférica; el verbo es *suggests*, no demostración.

«The sun never sets nor rises. When people think the sun is setting, it is not so; they are mistaken.» — el Aitareya Brahmana citado por *Isis Unveiled* en apoyo del heliocentrismo hindú.

«He says this passage contains "the denial of the existence of sunrise and sunset," and that the author supposes the sun "to remain always in its high position.» — *Isis Unveiled* apoya esa lectura en el traductor Haug, a quien nombra en la misma página.

«The Sattras lasted one year, and were "nothing but an imitation of the sun's yearly course.» — el calendario ritual como imitación del año solar, en la lectura de *Isis Unveiled*.

«It was Sosigenes, the Chaldean astronomer, who restored order into the confusion, by putting back the 25th of March ninety days, thus making it correspond with the vernal equinox; and it was Sosigenes, again, who fixed the lengths of the months as they now remain.» — *Isis Unveiled* adjudica al caldeo Sosígenes la reforma del calendario romano.

«The extreme accuracy of their astronomical calculations was so great, that no error has been discovered in their reckoning by subsequent verifications; while the Europeans, who landed in Mexico in 1519, were, by the Julian calendar, nearly eleven days in advance of the exact time.» — *Isis Unveiled* opone la exactitud del cómputo azteca al retraso del calendario juliano de los conquistadores.

«It is to the priceless and accurate translations of the Vedic Books, and to the personal researches of Dr. Haug, that we are indebted for the corroboration of the claims of the hermetic philosophers.» — *Isis Unveiled* declara su deuda con las traducciones védicas de Haug.

«Origen and Clemens Alexandrinus, Synesius and Chalcidius, all believed in it;» — la lista de padres y gnósticos que *Isis Unveiled* alinea con la metempsicosis; la frase sigue en la plana siguiente y por eso la cita se corta aquí.

«Materialism has been, and will ever be blind to spiritual truths.» — la sentencia con que *Isis Unveiled* despacha al materialismo de cualquier época.

«They taught that men have two souls, of separate and quite different natures: the one perishable--the Astral Soul, or the inner, fluidic body--the other incorruptible and immortal--the Augoeides, or portion of the Divine Spirit;» — la doctrina de las dos almas que *Isis Unveiled* adjudica a esos filósofos; el alma astral perece y el augoeides no.

«It was his belief that human souls are emanations of God, that are finally re-absorbed into Divinity.» — *Isis Unveiled* atribuye a Aristóteles la emanación y reabsorción del alma, pese al silencio prudente que le imputa.

«For lack of comprehension of this great philosophical principle, the methods of modern science, however exact, must end in nullity.» — el reproche de método que *Isis Unveiled* hace a la ciencia de su siglo.

«Not so did Plato and his disciples. With him the lower types were but the concrete images of the higher abstract ones.» — *Isis Unveiled* invierte para Platón el orden evolutivo: lo bajo es imagen concreta de lo alto.

«The fundamental geometrical figure of the Kabala--that figure which tradition and the esoteric doctrines tell us was given by the Deity itself to Moses on Mount Sinai -contains in its grandiose, because simple combination, the key to the universal problem.» — *Isis Unveiled* consigna la tradición de la figura entregada a Moisés en el Sinaí; la adjudicación va como la trae la doctrina esotérica que cita.

«No earthly microscope can be compared with the keenness of the spiritual perception.» — *Isis Unveiled* cierra el capítulo oponiendo la percepción espiritual al instrumento.

«If we accept Darwin's theory of the development of species, we find that his starting-point is placed in front of an open door.» — *Isis Unveiled* concede a Darwin la puerta abierta y le niega el cierre.

«Not so with Professor Huxley's theory of the "Physical Basis of Life."» — y opone a esa concesión el rechazo del protoplasma universal de Huxley.

«We will be bold enough to contradict this assertion, and say that they lie a great deal more within such inquiry than Mr. Huxley's protoplasm.» — *Isis Unveiled* contesta a Huxley que las doctrinas espiritistas caben en la indagación filosófica más que su protoplasma.

«The ancient Kabalist rested upon no hypothesis till he could lay its basis upon the firm rock of recorded experiment.» — *Isis Unveiled* reclama método experimental para el kabalista antiguo.

«The time predicted by the great Hermes in his dialogue with &Ælig;sculapius had indeed come; the time when impious foreigners would accuse Egypt of adoring monsters, and naught but the letters engraved in stone upon her monuments would survive--enigmas incredible to posterity.» — *Isis Unveiled* trae la profecía hermética del *Asclepio* como cumplida; el nombre sale de la capa de texto con la entidad html sin resolver.

«Obliged from fear of a profanation of the sacred mysteries to seek refuge among the Hermetic fraternities-- known later as the Essenes--their esoteric knowledge was buried deeper than ever.» — y hace de los esenios la fraternidad hermética que acogió a los escribas egipcios dispersos.

«As well as those who lived in the days of the Psammetics, our present-day philosophers "lift the Veil of Isis"--for Isis is but the symbol of nature.» — *Isis Unveiled* explica su propio título: Isis es el símbolo de la naturaleza, y levantarle el velo es lo que también hacen los anatomistas.

«There are anatomists, who, uncovering to sight no indwelling spirit under the layers of muscles, the network of nerves, or the cineritious matter, which they lift with the point of the scalpel, assert that man has no soul.» — el reproche de *Isis Unveiled* a la anatomía que concluye del bisturí.

«Our modern science acknowledges a Supreme Power, an Invisible Principle, but denies a Supreme Being, or Personal God.» — *Isis Unveiled* consigna esa posición de la ciencia y no la rechaza sin más.

«But the kabalists have never looked upon the invisible EN-SOPH otherwise than as a Power.» — y la empareja con el En-Soph de los kabalistas, que tampoco sería un ser personal.

«What the hermetic adept claims to demonstrate is, that simple common sense precludes the possibility that the universe is the result of mere chance.» — *Isis Unveiled* pone la tesis en boca del adepto hermético, con verbo de reclamo.

«It is an insult to human nature to brand magic and the occult science with the name of imposture.» — el argumento de *Isis Unveiled* contra la acusación de impostura.

«To believe that for so many thousands of years, one-half of mankind practiced deception and fraud on the other half, is equivalent to saying that the human race was composed only of knaves and incurable idiots.» — y su forma extrema: la impostura milenaria exigiría una humanidad de bellacos e idiotas.

«In the oldest documents now in our possession--the Vedas and the older laws of Manu--we find many magical rites practiced and permitted by the Brahmans.» — *Isis Unveiled* apoya la antigüedad de la magia en los Vedas y en las leyes de Manu.

«It is as impossible to name the time when it sprang into existence as to indicate on what day the first man himself was born.» — *Isis Unveiled* declina fechar el origen de la magia.

«Odin, the Scandinavian priest and monarch, was thought by many to have originated the practice of magic some seventy years B.C.» — y descarta la atribución a Odín por anterioridad de las Valas.

«In the West we find magic of as high an antiquity as in the East.» — *Isis Unveiled* niega que la magia sea cosa oriental; el tercer volumen de la *Secret Doctrine* reimprime esta plana entera en la p. 3232.

«The Druids of Great Britain practised it in the silent crypts of their deep caves; and Pliny devotes many a chapter to the "wisdom" of the leaders of the Celts.» — *Isis Unveiled* invoca a Plinio para la sabiduría de los jefes celtas; misma reimpresión en la p. 3232.

«They taught the secrets of the universe, the harmonious progress of the heavenly bodies, the formation of the earth, and above all--the immortality of the soul.» — lo que *Isis Unveiled* atribuye a los Semotheos, druidas de la Galia; reimpreso en la p. 3233.

«Eliphas Levi points out the great resemblance which exists between King Hiarchas and the fabulous Hiram, of whom Solomon procured the cedars of Lebanon and the gold of Ophir. We would like to know whether modern Masons, even "Grand Lecturers" and the most intelligent craftsmen belonging to important lodges, understand who the Hiram is whose death they combine together to avenge?» — *Isis Unveiled* toma de Éliphas Lévi el parecido entre Hiarcas e Hiram y pregunta si los masones modernos saben a quién vengan.

«The explorers of old medical literature, from the time of Hippocrates to that of Paracelsus and Van Helmont, will find a vast number of well-attested physiological and psychological facts and of measures or medicines for healing the sick which modern physicians superciliously refuse to employ.» — *Isis Unveiled* reclama para la medicina antigua, de Hipócrates a Paracelso y Van Helmont, hechos que la de su siglo desecha.

«Even with respect to surgery, modern practitioners have humbly and publicly confessed the total impossibility of their approximating to anything like the marvellous skill displayed in the art of bandaging by ancient Egyptians.» — *Isis Unveiled* opone el vendaje egipcio a la cirugía moderna, con la confesión pública de ésta.

«The New York Tribune, reviewing the contents of the Ebers Papyrus, says:--"Verily, there is no new thing under the sun. . . . Chapters 65, 66, 79, and 89 show that hair invigorators, hair dyes, pain-killers, and flea-powders were desiderata 3,400 years ago."» — *Isis Unveiled* cita la reseña del papiro Ebers como aval periodístico de su tesis de que nada es nuevo.

«As Prof. Draper truly remarks: "Long-continued and close observations were necessary before some of these astronomical results that have reached our times could have been ascertained.» — Draper citado por *Isis Unveiled* sobre lo que exige la astronomía babilonia.

«Thus, the Babylonians had fixed the length of a tropical year within twenty-five seconds of the truth; their estimate of the sidereal year was barely two minutes in excess.» — sigue la cita: las cifras con que *Isis Unveiled* mide la precisión babilonia.

«The former is derived from the latter strictly through analogy according to the hermetic formula--"as below, so it is above."» — *Isis Unveiled* imprime aquí la fórmula hermética en ese orden, de abajo hacia arriba.

«In our own times, an American, Mr. George H. Felt, of New York, who, if he continues as he has begun, may one day be recognized as the greatest geometer of the age, has been enabled, by the sole help of the premises established by the ancient Egyptians, to arrive at results which we will give in his own language.» — *Isis Unveiled* presenta a George H. Felt y su recuperación del diagrama egipcio; el elogio va en condicional.

«to prove by ocular demonstrations that the Egyptian sculptors and architects obtained the models for the quaint figures which adorn the facades and vestibules of their temples, not in the disordered fantasies of their own brains, but from the "viewless races of the air," and other kingdoms of nature, whom he, like them, claims to make visible by resort to their own chemical and kabalistical processes.» — lo que *Isis Unveiled* le adjudica a Felt sobre el origen de las figuras de los templos egipcios.

«Schweigger proves that the symbols of all the mythologies have a scientific foundation and substance.» — autoridad que *Isis Unveiled* invoca para el fondo científico de las mitologías.

«Schweigger is of the same opinion, and demonstrates that the phenomena of ancient Theurgy were produced by magnetic powers "under the guidance of spirits."» — y para los poderes magnéticos de la teurgia antigua.

«Despite their apparent Polytheism, the ancients--those of the educated class at all events--were entirely monotheistical; and this, too, ages upon ages before the days of Moses.» — *Isis Unveiled* sostiene el monoteísmo de las clases instruidas de la antigüedad, anterior a Moisés.

«In the Ebers Papyrus this fact is shown conclusively in the following words, translated from the first four lines of Plate I.: "I came from Heliopolis» — y lo apoya en las primeras cuatro líneas del papiro Ebers; la cita se corta antes del topónimo porque la fuente lo imprime partido por el renglón, Het-aat.

«The deification of mortal men and supposititious gods is no more a proof against their monotheism than the monument-building of modern Christians, who erect statues to their heroes, is proof of their polytheism.» — el argumento con que *Isis Unveiled* desactiva la objeción politeísta.

«Volney asserted that the ancient peoples worshipped their gross material symbols as divine in themselves; whereas these were only considered as representing esoteric principles.» — *Isis Unveiled* corrige a Volney: los símbolos serían representación, no objeto de culto.

«Dupuis, also, after devoting many years of study to the problem, mistook the symbolic circle, and attributed their religion solely to astronomy.» — y a Dupuis, por reducir la religión antigua a astronomía.

«He declares that everything demonstrates the ancient Egyptians to have been profoundly monotheistical.» — Champollion invocado por *Isis Unveiled* a favor del monoteísmo egipcio.

«Ennemoser also says: "Into Egypt and the East went Herodotus, Thales, Parmenides, Empedocles, Orpheus, and Pythagoras, to instruct themselves in Natural Philosophy and Theology.» — Ennemoser citado por *Isis Unveiled* para la peregrinación de los griegos a Egipto.

«The answer is that it is owing to the universally strict silence of the initiated.» — *Isis Unveiled* explica por el silencio iniciático la falta de rastro escrito.

«Magic was considered a divine science which led to a participation in the attributes of Divinity itself.» — la definición de magia que *Isis Unveiled* atribuye a la antigüedad.

«"It unveils the operations of nature," says Philo Judaeus, "and leads to the contemplation of celestial powers.» — Filón citado por *Isis Unveiled* para esa misma definición.

«Cassien mentions a treatise, well-known in the fourth and fifth centuries, which was accredited to Ham, the son of Noah, who in his turn was reputed to have received it from Jared, the fourth generation from Seth, the son of Adam.» — la genealogía del saber mágico que *Isis Unveiled* recoge de Casiano, sin arbitrarla.

«It was not the sacerdotal class in ancient Persia that established magic, as it is commonly thought, but the Magi, who derive their name from it.» — *Isis Unveiled* invierte la relación corriente: los magos toman su nombre de la magia, no al revés.

«Moses was indebted for his knowledge to the mother of the Egyptian princess, Thermuthis, who saved him from the waters of the Nile.» — *Isis Unveiled* adjudica a una iniciada egipcia el saber de Moisés.

«the learned Franz von Baader remarks that "not only our salvation and wisdom, but our science itself came to us from the Jews.» — von Baader citado por *Isis Unveiled* dentro de su repaso de la transmisión del saber oculto.

«Origen, who had belonged to the Alexandrian school of Platonists, declares that Moses, besides the teachings of the covenant, communicated some very important secrets "from the hidden depths of the law" to the seventy elders.» — Orígenes invocado por *Isis Unveiled* para la enseñanza secreta de Moisés a los setenta ancianos.

«Ennemoser expresses a strong opinion that "the writings of Dionysius Areopagita have palpably been grounded on the Jewish Kabala.» — *Isis Unveiled* consigna la opinión de Ennemoser sobre el Areopagita, como opinión.

«The clergy of the three most prominent Christian bodies, the Greek, Roman Catholic, and Protestant, discountenance every spiritual phenomenon manifesting itself through the so-called "mediums."» — *Isis Unveiled* imputa a los tres cleros cristianos el mismo rechazo del fenómeno mediúmnico.

«They have in the most impudent manner possible arrogated to themselves jurisdiction not only over the countries within the Greek communion but also over all Protestants as well.» — la acusación de *Isis Unveiled* a la jurisdicción que Roma se arroga.

«In 1864, the culmination of absurdity was attained when Pius IX. excommunicated and fulminated publicly his anathemas against the Russian Emperor, as a "schismatic cast out from the bosom of the Holy Mother Church.» — el episodio con que *Isis Unveiled* ilustra esa pretensión.

«Inside the Vatican they are termed Divine visions; outside, physicians call them epileptic fits; and popular rumor attributes them to an obsession by the ghosts of Peruggia, Castelfidardo, and Mentana!» — *Isis Unveiled* pone las tres lecturas del mismo hecho una junto a otra, sin arbitrar.

«The Prince of Hohenlohe, so famous during the first quarter of our century for his healing powers, was himself a great medium.» — *Isis Unveiled* reclama para la mediumnidad a un sanador católico célebre.

«They form a portion of the psychological attributes of man--the Microcosmos.» — *Isis Unveiled* remite los fenómenos al microcosmos humano, no a agentes externos.

«But these miserable creatures--who are mediums, for they prophesy and see visions sometimes, when the fit is genuine --are never molested because of their misfortune.» — la observación de *Isis Unveiled* sobre el trato al poseído en otras tierras.

«Common sense and justice surely suggest that if any are to be punished it is certainly not the victims who cannot help themselves, but the demon who is alleged to control their actions.» — el argumento de *Isis Unveiled* contra castigar al médium.

«Superstitious and blind as it is, a faith conducted on such principles certainly deserves some respect, and can never be offensive, either to man or the true God.» — *Isis Unveiled* concede respeto a la fe popular que exceptúa de su polémica.

«Not so with that of the Roman Catholics; and hence, it is they, and secondarily, the Protestant clergy--with the exception of some foremost thinkers among them--that we purpose questioning in this work.» — y declara a quién sí interroga el libro.

«Far from us be the thought of the slightest irreverence--let alone blasphemy--toward the Divine Power which called into being all things, visible and invisible.» — *Isis Unveiled* acota el alcance de su polémica: no alcanza al Poder divino mismo.

«The supreme power whom we revere is the boundless and endless one--the grand "CENTRAL SPIRITUAL SUN"» — *Isis Unveiled* nombra Sol Espiritual Central al poder que reverencia; la frase sigue en la plana siguiente, donde lo llama el Dios de los videntes antiguos y de los modernos.

«His nature can be studied only in the worlds called forth by his mighty FIAT.» — y sitúa el estudio de esa naturaleza en los mundos, no en la especulación.

«His revelation is traced with his own finger in imperishable figures of universal harmony upon the face of the Cosmos. It is the only INFALLIBLE gospel we recognize.» — *Isis Unveiled* declara el cosmos único evangelio infalible que reconoce.

«They may "shed tears at the grave of their respectable Master, Hiram Abiff "; but vainly will they search for the true locality, "where the sprig of myrtle was placed."» — *Isis Unveiled* reprocha a los masones conservar el rito y haber perdido su clave.

«But these are all empty words so long as they neglect their mother Magic, and turn their backs upon its twin sister, Spiritualism.» — y les imputa dar la espalda a la magia y al espiritismo, que llama hermanas gemelas.

«Since Philippe le Bel destroyed the Knights-Templars, not one has appeared to clear up your doubts notwithstanding all claims to the contrary.» — *Isis Unveiled* niega continuidad templaria a las órdenes que la reclaman.

«In order to demonstrate that the notions which the ancients entertained about dividing human history into cycles were not utterly» — *Isis Unveiled* anuncia el argumento con que va a defender la división cíclica de la historia.

«This change of climate is necessarily attended by cataclysms, earthquakes, and other cosmical throes.» — los cataclismos como acompañamiento necesario del cambio cíclico, en la exposición de *Isis Unveiled*.

«This year was called the Heliacal by the Greeks; but no one outside the sanctuary knew anything certain either as to its duration or particulars.» — *Isis Unveiled* consigna que la duración del gran año quedaba dentro del santuario.

«The Neroses, the Vrihaspati, or the periods called yugas or kalpas, are life-problems to solve.» — *Isis Unveiled* deja los grandes ciclos como problema abierto, no como dato cerrado.

«The Maha-kalpa embraces an untold number of periods far back in the antediluvian ages.» — la escala del maha-kalpa según *Isis Unveiled*.

«These ciphers are not fanciful, but founded upon actual astronomical calculations, as has been demonstrated by S. Davis.» — *Isis Unveiled* remite el cálculo a S. Davis para sostener que las cifras no son fantasía.

«Bunsen has demonstrated that the Egyptian priests, who made the cyclic notations, kept them always in the profoundest mystery.» — Bunsen invocado por *Isis Unveiled* para el secreto de la notación cíclica egipcia.

«Higgins justly believed that the cycle of the Indian system, of 432,000, is the true key of the secret cycle.» — *Isis Unveiled* acompaña a Higgins en la clave y no en el desciframiento.

«But his failure in trying to decipher it was made apparent; for as it pertained to the mystery of the creation, this cycle was the most inviolable of all.» — y declara fallido su intento por ser ese ciclo el más inviolable.

«It was repeated in symbolic figures only in the Chaldean Book of Numbers, the original of which, if now extant, is certainly not to be found in libraries, as it formed one of the most ancient Books of Hermes, the number of which is at present undetermined.» — *Isis Unveiled* remite el ciclo al Libro Caldeo de los Números, que declara ilocalizable en biblioteca alguna.

«Thus we see in history a regular alternation of ebb and flow in the tide of human progress.» — la ley cíclica que *Isis Unveiled* lee en la historia entera; la *Secret Doctrine* repite la frase en la p. 1963.

«There is no prominent character in all the annals of sacred or profane history whose prototype we cannot find in the half-fictitious and half-real traditions of bygone religions and mythologies.» — *Isis Unveiled* hace de toda figura histórica la réplica de un prototipo anterior; el tercer volumen de la *Secret Doctrine* reimprime el pasaje en la p. 3286.

«As the star, glimmering at an immeasurable distance above our heads, in the boundless immensity of the sky, reflects itself in the smooth waters of a lake, so does the imagery of men of the antediluvian ages reflect itself in the periods we can embrace in an historical retrospect.» — la imagen de la estrella reflejada en el lago con que *Isis Unveiled* explica esa repetición de tipos; también reimpresa en la p. 3286.

«The division of the history of mankind into Golden, Silver, Copper and Iron Ages, is not a fiction.» — *Isis Unveiled* reclama valor histórico para las cuatro edades.

«Florence has built a statue to Galileo, but hardly even mentions Pythagoras.» — el reproche de ingratitud que *Isis Unveiled* hace a los modernos.

«"The numerals of Pythagoras," says Porphyry, "were hieroglyphical symbols, by means whereof he explained all ideas concerning the nature of all things.» — Porfirio citado por *Isis Unveiled* sobre el carácter jeroglífico de los números pitagóricos.

«That Magic is indeed possible is the moral of this book.» — *Isis Unveiled* declara en una línea la tesis del libro.

«There is a personal God, and there is a personal Devil!" thunders the Christian preacher. "Let him be anathema who dares say nay!" "There is no personal God, except the gray matter in our brain," contemptuously replies the materialist.» — *Isis Unveiled* pone frente a frente al predicador y al materialista, y no se alinea con ninguno.

«Our human reason, the emanation of our finite mind, is certainly incapable of comprehending a divine intelligence, an endless and infinite entity; and, according to strict logic, that which transcends our understanding and would remain thoroughly incomprehensible to our senses cannot exist for us; hence, it does not exist.» — *Isis Unveiled* concede el límite de la razón antes de sacar su propia conclusión.

«It knows that there exists a God in nature, for the sole and invincible Artificer of all lives in us as we live in Him.» — y la conclusión: la intuición, no la razón, es la que sabe.

«Without a God, the cosmos would seem to it but like a soulless corpse.» — *Isis Unveiled* argumenta desde el horror al vacío de la naturaleza humana.

«Many a Christian divine has been forced to acknowledge that there is no authentic source whence the assurance of a future state could have been derived by man.» — *Isis Unveiled* recoge la concesión de teólogos cristianos sobre el origen de la creencia en el más allá.

«It is for philology and psychology to find the end of the thread.» — *Isis Unveiled* reparte la tarea entre filología y psicología.

«The neglect and withholding of these proofs have driven such eminent minds as Hare and Wallace, and other men of power, into the fold of modern spiritualism.» — *Isis Unveiled* explica por esa negativa la conversión de Hare y de Wallace al espiritismo.

«Physical science has already reached its limits of exploration; dogmatic theology sees the springs of its inspiration dry.» — el diagnóstico con que *Isis Unveiled* cierra el capítulo.

«Unless we mistake the signs, the day is approaching when the world will receive the proofs that only ancient religions were in harmony with nature, and ancient science embraced all that can be known.» — *Isis Unveiled* anuncia ese vuelco futuro con la reserva de que puede equivocarse en las señales.

«An era of disenchantment and rebuilding will soon begin--nay, has already begun.» — y la data ya comenzada.

«Modern scientists may doubt and reject the assertion. They cannot prove it false.» — *Isis Unveiled* pone del otro lado la carga de desmentir.

«Clement of Alexandria asserted that in his day the Egyptian priests possessed forty-two Canonical Books.» — Clemente de Alejandría citado por *Isis Unveiled* para los cuarenta y dos libros canónicos egipcios.

«It is our decided impression and conviction, that to become a genuine spiritual entity, which that designation implies, man must first create himself anew, so to speak--i.e., thoroughly eliminate from his mind and spirit, not only the dominating influence of selfishness and other impurity, but also the infection of superstition and prejudice» — la voz de *Isis Unveiled* pone la condición de entrada al asunto entero: no basta con existir ni con haber nacido humano, hay que rehacerse eliminando el egoísmo y además la superstición y el prejuicio.

«We are at first irresistibly or unwittingly drawn within its dark circle by that peculiar influence, that powerful current of magnetism which emanates from ideas as well as from physical bodies. By this we are surrounded, and finally prevented through moral cowardice--fear of public opinion--from stepping out of it» — explica el prejuicio como una corriente magnética que emana lo mismo de las ideas que de los cuerpos, y la cobardía moral —el miedo a la opinión pública— como lo que impide salir de su círculo.

«Learned men ought to be free from preconceptions and prejudices of every kind; yet, although thought and opinion are now free, scientists are still the same men as of old» — sostiene que la libertad de pensamiento no ha cambiado a los hombres de ciencia, y llama utopista a quien crea que el hombre cambia con las ideas nuevas.

«The soil may be well fertilized and made to yield with every year a greater and better variety of fruit; but, dig a little deeper than the stratum required for the crop, and the same earth will be found in the subsoil as was there before the first furrow was turned» — el símil agrícola con que niega ese cambio de fondo: el subsuelo sigue siendo el mismo bajo cualquier cosecha.

«Science has conquered. But in its turn the victor claims the same infallibility, though it equally fails to prove its right» — traslada a la ciencia el reproche que antes recibía la teología: la infalibilidad cambió de dueño sin cambiar de naturaleza, y tampoco está probada.

«it is at least proved that, in proportion as the psychological manifestations increase in frequency and variety, the darkness surrounding their origin becomes more impenetrable» — la conclusión que atribuye a los espiritistas heterodoxos que intentaron sondear los fenómenos, no a sí misma: cuanto más abundan, más impenetrable se vuelve la oscuridad sobre su origen.

«Unquestionably, the burden of proof rests upon those who assert the agency of spirits» — concede a los científicos que la carga de la prueba recae en quien afirma la agencia de los espíritus, y dice que a esa posición poco se le puede objetar.

«During the past twenty years we have received through various mediums messages purporting to be from Shakespere, Byron, Franklin, Peter the Great, Napoleon and Josephine, and even from Voltaire. The general impression made upon us was that the French conqueror and his consort seemed to have forgotten how to spell words correctly; Shakespere and Byron had become chronic inebriates; and Voltaire had turned an imbecile» — el juicio propio sobre las comunicaciones mediúmnicas que dice haber recibido ella misma; la grafía *Shakespere* es la que imprime la fuente y va sin corregir.

«Therefore, if on one hand we cannot very well blame them for stepping back at the first sight of what seems really repulsive, we do, and have a right to censure them for their unwillingness to explore deeper» — separa lo que disculpa —el asco ante lo que se ve en la superficie— de lo que censura, que es la negativa a bajar más hondo.

«very pointedly remarks M. A. N. Aksakof in an able article on Mediumism and the St. Petersburg Scientific Committee. The attitude of this body of professors toward the subject which they had pledged themselves to investigate was throughout simply disgraceful» — la frase de que los fenómenos persiguen a los científicos mientras estos huyen es de A. N. Aksakof; *Isis Unveiled* la toma de su artículo sobre el comité científico de San Petersburgo y pone de su parte el juicio sobre la conducta de ese cuerpo de profesores. La cita arranca en la plana anterior y aquí se recoge desde donde la corta el troceo.

«Their premature and prearranged report was so evidently partial and inconclusive as to call out a scornful protest even from unbelievers» — el informe del comité le parece parcial y amañado de antemano, y hace notar que hasta los incrédulos protestaron.

«When conceived in this way, the belief in the future life is without scientific support, but at the same time it is placed beyond the need of scientific support and the range of scientific criticism» — habla John Fisk, no la obra: la creencia en la vida futura queda sin apoyo científico y a la vez fuera del alcance de la crítica científica. *Isis Unveiled* lo trae como golpe de un científico contra los suyos.

«No other claim is advanced for a hearing of the opinions contained in the present work than that they are based upon many years' study of both ancient magic and its modern form, Spiritualism» — la única credencial que el libro reclama para sí mismo: años de estudio de la magia antigua y del espiritismo como su forma moderna.

«We have associated with the fakirs, the holy men of India, and seen them when in intercourse with the Pitris. We have watched the proceedings and modus operandi of the howling and dancing dervishes; held friendly communications with the marabouts of European and Asiatic Turkey» — funda su competencia en el trato directo con fakires, derviches y marabutes, y dice haber visto a los primeros en comercio con los *pitris*.

«Because such men as Huxley and Tyndall denominate spiritualism "a degrading belief" and oriental magic "jugglery," they cannot thereby take from truth its verity» — contesta a Huxley y a Tyndall que el desprecio no le quita su verdad a lo despreciado; el abuso, dice en el renglón anterior, no es argumento.

«Skepticism, whether it proceeds from a scientific or an ignorant brain, is unable to overturn the immortality of our souls--if such immortality is a fact--and plunge them into post-mortem annihilation» — la reserva va dentro de la propia frase: el escepticismo no puede derribar la inmortalidad del alma *si esa inmortalidad es un hecho*, y ahí la obra no da el condicional por resuelto.

«This courageous gentleman was the first to introduce to the public one of those alleged "materialized" sentries that guard the forbidden gates» — presenta a William Crookes como el primero en llevar al público una de esas centinelas materializadas que guardan las puertas prohibidas.

«But, alas! although the spirit, indeed, was willing, the mortal flesh proved weak. Ridicule was more than the majority of them could bear; and so, the heaviest burden was thrown upon the shoulders of Mr. Crookes» — su explicación de por qué los demás científicos se retiraron: no pudieron con el ridículo, y el peso entero quedó sobre Crookes.

«1st. That the phenomena which they, at least, had witnessed, were genuine, and impossible to simulate; thus showing that manifestations produced by some unknown force, could and did happen» — lo que la obra presenta como confesión arrancada al comité de la Dialectical Society y a Crookes por un público impaciente: los fenómenos que presenciaron son genuinos e imposibles de simular.

«2d. That, whether the phenomena were produced by disembodied spirits or other analogous entities, they could not tell; but that manifestations, thoroughly upsetting many preconceived theories as to natural laws, did happen and were undeniable. Several of these occurred in their own families» — la segunda parte de esa misma confesión, con su límite dentro: los investigadores no pudieron decir si el agente eran espíritus desencarnados u otras entidades análogas.

«It was taken for granted that the results of my experiments would be in accordance with their preconceptions. What they really desired was not the truth, but an additional witness in favor of their own foregone conclusions. When they found the facts which that investigation established could not be made to fit those opinions, why, . . . so much the worse for the facts» — habla Crookes en su folleto sobre la fuerza psíquica, no la obra: lo que sus colegas querían no era la verdad sino un testigo más de sus conclusiones ya tomadas.

«I am attacked by two very opposite sects--the scientists and the know-nothings, yet I know that I have discovered one of the greatest forces in nature» — el epígrafe es de Galvani, y *Isis Unveiled* lo recoge porque Crookes encabezó con él su folleto.

«After expending their energy on such puerile theories as "unconscious cerebration," "involuntary muscular contraction," and the sublimely ridiculous one of the "cracking knee-joints" (le muscle craqueur); after meeting ignominious failures by the obstinate survival of the new force, and finally, after every desperate effort to compass its obliteration, these filii diffidentiae--as St. Paul calls their class--thought best to give up the whole thing in disgust» — enumera las explicaciones que la ciencia ensayó —cerebración inconsciente, contracción muscular involuntaria, el chasquido de las rodillas— y las llama pueriles antes de decir que sus autores abandonaron el asunto.

«They fear that as soon as they concede one step, they will have to yield the whole ground. Time-honored principles, the contemplative speculations of a whole life, of a long line of generations, are all staked on a single card» — es Aksakof quien dice que los casos de Hare, Crookes, de Morgan, Varley, Wallace y Butleroff provocan pánico, porque conceder un paso obligaría a ceder el terreno entero.

«Although we claim no honor for this new discovery, we nevertheless propose to recognize it under the name of scientific psychophobia» — bautiza así lo que llama otra enfermedad psicológica, tan misteriosa y contagiosa como la hidrofobia; el *we* es plural de autor.

«so long as there remains one single unexplained mystery in nature, the word "impossible" is a dangerous word for them to pronounce» — el límite que le fija a las ciencias positivas: mientras quede un solo misterio sin explicar, *impossible* es palabra peligrosa.

«Sixth Theory.--The actions of a separate order of beings living on this earth, but invisible and immaterial to us. Able, however, occasionally to manifest their presence, known in almost all countries and ages as demons (not necessarily bad), gnomes, fairies, kobolds, elves, goblins, Puck, etc. (One of the claims of the kabalists.)» — la sexta de las ocho teorías que Crookes ofrece a elección del lector; la acotación entre paréntesis, que reclama esa teoría para los kabalistas, viaja dentro de la lista tal como la imprime la obra.

«Theories the second and the third are the last crumbling entrenchments of the guerilla of skeptics and materialists, and remain, as lawyers say, "Adhuc sub judice lis est» — descarta la primera teoría de Crookes por válida solo en casos excepcionales y deja la segunda y la tercera como trincheras que se desmoronan; con las cuatro restantes dice que trabajará el libro.

«the increased employment of scientific methods will promote exact observations and greater love of truths among inquirers, and will produce a race of observers who will drive the worthless residuum of spiritualism hence into the unknown limbo of magic and necromancy» — es el Crookes de 1870, citado para contrastarlo con el de 1875: entonces esperaba que el método científico echara el residuo del espiritismo al limbo de la magia y la nigromancia.

«But Mr. Crookes denies that he ever took Katie King for a disembodied spirit. What was it then? If it was not Miss Florence Cook, and his word is our sufficient guarantee for it--then it was either the spirit of one who had lived on earth, or one of those that come directly under the sixth theory of the eight the eminent scientist offers to the public choice. It must have been one of the classes named: Fairies, Kobolds, Gnomes, Elves, Goblins, or a Puck» — el argumento con que encierra a Crookes en su propia lista: si negó que Katie King fuera un espíritu desencarnado, y no era la médium, tiene que ser una de las clases de su sexta teoría.

«Yes; Katie King must have been a fairy--a Titania» — la conclusión irónica que saca de ese encierro, y el nombre con que la obra la remata.

«To imagine, I say, the Katie King of the last three years to be the result of imposture does more violence to one's reason and common sense than to believe her to be what she herself affirms» — es Crookes en 1875, con su firma, cerrando la carta que la obra pone junto a su sentencia de 1870.

«the eminent investigator still did not abandon to the last his skeptical attitude toward the question. In short, he firmly believes in the phenomenon, but cannot accept the idea of its being the human spirit of a departed somebody» — la obra fija la contradicción sin resolverla a favor de nadie: Crookes cree firmemente en el fenómeno y a la vez rechaza que el agente sea el espíritu de un difunto.

«It seems to us, that, as far as public prejudice goes, Mr. Crookes solves one mystery by creating a still deeper one: the obscurum per obscurius. In other words, rejecting "the worthless residuum of spiritualism," the courageous scientist fearlessly plunges into his own "unknown limbo of magic and necromancy!» — el reproche es de método, no de fe: al rechazar el residuo del espiritismo, Crookes se zambulle en el mismo limbo de magia que él había señalado, y resuelve un misterio creando otro.

«They must go as deeply into the study of the triple nature of man--physiological, psychological, and divine--as did their predecessors, the magicians, theurgists, and thaumaturgists of old» — la receta que le da a la ciencia: estudiar la naturaleza triple del hombre —fisiológica, psicológica y divina— como hicieron magos, teúrgos y taumaturgos.

«Their course has been as unwise as that of a man who should attempt to discover the sources of a river by exploring toward its mouth» — el símil con que denuncia que los investigadores dejan de lado la causa y se quedan en los efectos.

«If scientists had studied the so-called "miracles" instead of denying them, many secret laws of nature comprehended by the ancients would have been again discovered» — lo dice en condicional contrafactual: negar los milagros, y no estudiarlos, es lo que dejó sin redescubrir las leyes secretas que los antiguos comprendían.

«They tried to penetrate the secrets of nature in the same way as our modern naturalists, and by the only method by which this object can be obtained, namely: by experimental researches and reason» — reclama para los astrólogos caldeos y los magos el mismo método que la ciencia moderna dice suyo: investigación experimental y razón.

«The chemistry of the most ancient period had reached a point which we have never even approached» — la frase es de Wendell Phillips en su conferencia sobre las artes perdidas, citada por la obra como apoyo externo.

«nay, there are persons who claim that they can make the same by virtue of their knowledge of the much-ridiculed and ever-doubted alkahest--the universal solvent» — atribuye a personas vivas de Samarcanda y de algunos monasterios del Tíbet el conocimiento del alkahest, y lo presenta como reclamación de ellas, no como hecho verificado por ella.

«capable of reducing all sublunary bodies, as well homogeneous as mixed, into their ens primum, or the original matter of which they are composed; or into an uniform, equable, and potable liquor, that will unite with water, and the juices of all bodies, and yet retain its own radical virtues; and, if again mixed with itself will thereby be converted into pure elementary water» — la definición del alkahest la da citando a Paracelso y a Van Helmont: un fluido que reduce todo cuerpo sublunar a su *ens primum*.

«But surely it may be conceived without any great effort of imagination that all bodies must have originally come from some first matter, and that this matter, according to the lessons of astronomy, geology and physics, must have been a fluid» — el argumento por el que pide crédito para esa doctrina: si todo cuerpo vino de una materia primera, la astronomía, la geología y la física obligan a pensarla fluida.

«A foreign correspondent of the Theosophical Society, a well-known medical practitioner, and one who has studied the occult sciences for upward of thirty years, has succeeded in obtaining what he terms the "true oil of gold," i.e., the primal element. Chemists and physicists have seen and examined it, and were driven to confess that they neither knew how it was obtained nor could they do the same» — el testimonio del aceite verdadero de oro lo apoya en un corresponsal anónimo de la Sociedad Teosófica, y explica el anonimato por el ridículo público, más peligroso a veces que la inquisición de antaño.

«This "Adamic earth" is next-door neighbor to the alkahest, and one of the most important secrets of the alchemists» — empareja la tierra adámica con el alkahest y la declara secreto que ningún kabalista revelará, porque explicaría la jerga de las águilas de los alquimistas y de sus alas cortadas.

«As the dawn of physical science broke into a glaring day-light, the spiritual sciences merged deeper and deeper into night, and in their turn they were denied» — su diagnóstico del intercambio: a medida que amanecía la ciencia física, las ciencias espirituales se hundieron en la noche y acabaron negadas.

«But their traducers forget that the sun of to-day will seem dark by comparison with the luminary of to-morrow, whether justly or not; and as the men of our century think their ancestors ignorant, so will perhaps their descendants count them for know-nothings» — devuelve el argumento del progreso contra quien lo usa: si los antiguos parecen ignorantes hoy, los modernos lo parecerán mañana.

«what man has ever taken more comprehensive views of nature than Paracelsus? He was the bold creator of chemical medicines; the founder of courageous parties; victorious in controversy, belonging to those spirits who have created amongst us a new mode of thinking on the natural existence of things. What he scattered through his writings on the philosopher's stone, on pigmies and spirits of the mines; on signs, on homunculi, and the elixir of life, and which are employed by many to lower his estimation, cannot extinguish our grateful remembrance of his general works, nor our admiration of his free, bold exertions, and his noble, intellectual life» — habla Pfaff, citado por la obra: la piedra filosofal, los pigmeos, los homúnculos y el elixir de vida que se le echan en cara a Paracelso no borran su obra general.

«Frederick Hufeland got his theoretical doctrines on infection from this mediaeval "quack," as Sprengel delights in calling one who was immeasurably higher than himself» — contabiliza la deuda de la medicina moderna con el que Sprengel llama charlatán medieval, y se pone del lado de Hemman, Molitor y Ennemoser al llamarlo el mayor químico de su tiempo.

«We are quite ready to concede to skeptics that one-half, and even more, of seeming phenomena, are but more or less clever fraud» — concede de entrada que la mitad o más de los fenómenos aparentes son fraude, y anuncia que seguirá habiendo denuncias mientras los espiritistas no exijan pruebas mejores.

«There were apparitions before modern spiritualism, and phenomena like ours in every previous age. If modern manifestations are a reality and palpable facts, so must have been the so-called "miracles" and thaumaturgic exploits of old; or if the latter are but fictions of superstition so must be the former, for they rest on no better testimony» — su argumento de simetría: o los milagros antiguos y las manifestaciones modernas son ambos hechos, o ambos son ficción, porque el testimonio que los sostiene es el mismo.

«Often, through young children, and simple-minded ignorant persons, we receive philosophical teachings and precepts, poetry and inspirational orations, music and paintings that are fully worthy of the reputations of their alleged authors» — del tercio que da por genuino destaca lo que llega por niños y por gente iletrada, y matiza que las disquisiciones morales benéficas son lo más raro.

«Who are those spirits, what those powers or intelligences which are evidently outside of the medium proper and entities per se? These intelligences deserve the appellation; and they differ as widely from the generality of spooks and goblins that hover around the cabinets for physical manifestations, as day from night» — formula la pregunta que organiza el libro y separa a esas inteligencias de los duendes que rondan los gabinetes de manifestación física.

«We venture the prediction that unless spiritualists set about the study of ancient philosophy, so as to learn to discriminate between spirits and to guard themselves against the baser sort, twenty-five years more will not elapse before they will have to fly to the Romish communion to escape these "guides" and "controls" that they have fondled so long» — la predicción va con su condición: si los espiritistas no estudian la filosofía antigua para aprender a discriminar entre espíritus, en veinticinco años tendrán que refugiarse en la comunión romana.

«They cannot escape the dilemma; they must choose between Porphyry and Pio Nono» — reduce el dilema a dos nombres: el neoplatónico o el papa.

«While men of genuine science, such as Wallace, Crookes, Wagner, Butlerof, Varley, Buchanan, Hare, Reichenbach, Thury, Perty, de Morgan, Hoffmann, Goldschmidt, W. Gregory, Flammarion, Sergeant Cox and many others, firmly believe in the current phenomena, many of the above named reject the theory of departed spirits» — registra el corte que le interesa: muchos de los científicos que sí creen en los fenómenos rechazan que el agente sean los difuntos.

«But what is it? What is this something which thinks and even speaks but yet is not human; that is impalpable and yet not a disembodied spirit; that simulates affection, passion, remorse, fear, joy, but yet feels neither? What is this canting creature which rejoices in cheating the truthful inquirer and mocking at sacred human feeling» — la descripción del agente por lo que hace y no por lo que es: piensa y habla sin ser humano, simula afecto y remordimiento sin sentirlos.

«Who can fathom the mystery? The true psychologist alone. And where should he go for his text-books but to the neglected alcoves of libraries where the works of despised hermetists and theurgists have been gathering dust these many years» — manda al psicólogo verdadero a los estantes olvidados donde duermen los herméticos y los teúrgos, y ahí pone los libros de texto del asunto.

«yet I am clear for the appearing of the soul of Samuel, and as clear that in other necromancies, it may be such kinds of spirits, as Porphyrius above describes, 'that change themselves into omnifarious forms and shapes, and one while act the parts of daemons, another while of angels or gods, and another while of the souls of the departed» — habla Henry More contra Webster, y dentro de su respuesta cita a Porfirio: muchas apariciones nigrománticas serían espíritus burlones que toman forma de démones, de ángeles o de difuntos, pero la de Samuel él la da por real.

«Thus, with Mr. Crookes and Sergeant Cox, it is the "psychic force." Professor Thury of Geneva calls it the "psychode" or ectenic force; Professor Balfour Stewart, the "electro-biological power"; Faraday, the "great master of experimental philosophy in physics," but apparently a novice in psychology, superciliously termed it an "unconscious muscular action," an "unconscious cerebration," and what not? Sir William Hamilton, a "latent thought"; Dr. Carpenter, "the ideo-motor principle," etc., etc. So many scientists--so many names» — el catálogo con que muestra que la ciencia inventa nombres nuevos para una cosa vieja, y la pulla a Faraday, gran maestro en física y novato en psicología.

«Schopenhauer's doctrine is that the universe is but the manifestation of the will. Every force in nature is also an effect of will, representing a higher or lower degree of its objectiveness» — resume a Schopenhauer y enseguida lo remite a Platón, que ya habría dicho que todo lo visible se evoluciona de la Voluntad invisible y eterna.

«these latter appellations are identical with the Universal Soul, or Anima Mundi, and the Astral Light of the theurgists and kabalists» — la identificación que atraviesa el capítulo: el Alma del Mundo de los griegos, el Maha-Atma del Katakopanisad y la luz astral de teúrgos y kabalistas serían la misma cosa nombrada de tres maneras.

«for in the Æther they placed the Eternal Idea pervading the Universe, or the Will which becomes Force, and creates or organizes matter» — la fórmula con que enlaza éter, Idea y voluntad: en el éter los antiguos sacerdotes ponían la Idea eterna, o la Voluntad que se hace Fuerza y organiza la materia.

«The opposing power alone of unbelief and skepticism, if projected in a current of equal force, can check the other, and sometimes completely neutralize it» — de esa doctrina de la voluntad saca la explicación de los fracasos en presencia de escépticos: una corriente contraria de igual fuerza neutraliza la otra.

«Professors Faraday and Tyndall boasted that their presence at a circle would stop at once every manifestation. This fact alone ought to have proved to the eminent scientists that there was some force in these phenomena worthy to arrest their attention» — le devuelve a Faraday y a Tyndall su propia jactancia como prueba en contra: si el fraude fuera bastante hábil para engañar a los demás, no se habría detenido por ellos.

«is the first of all powers. For through the will of the Creator all things were made and put in motion. . . . The will is the property of all spiritual beings, and displays itself in them the more actively the more they are freed from matter» — habla Van Helmont: la voluntad es propiedad de todo ser espiritual y actúa tanto más cuanto más libre está de la materia.

«And Paracelsus, "the divine," as he was called, adds in the same strain: "Faith must confirm the imagination, for faith establishes the will. . . . Determined will is a beginning of all magical operations. . . . Because men do not perfectly imagine and believe the result, is that the arts are uncertain, while they might be perfectly certain» — habla Paracelso, y su tesis explica por qué las artes fallan: no porque sean inciertas, sino porque los hombres no imaginan ni creen del todo el resultado. La misma frase vuelve a imprimirse más adelante en el volumen.

«In short, every particle of the so-called spirit, we can replace with an equivalent of matter, and every particle of matter replace with spirit. . . . Thus, it is not the Cartesian division of all things into matter and spirit that can ever be found philosophically exact; but only if we divide them into will and manifestation, which form of division has naught to do with the former, for it spiritualizes every thing: all that, which is in the first instance real and objective--body and matter--it transforms into a representation, and every manifestation into will» — sigue Schopenhauer: contra la división cartesiana en materia y espíritu propone la de voluntad y manifestación, que espiritualiza todo lo real y objetivo.

«These views corroborate what we have expressed about the various names given to the same thing. The disputants are battling about mere words» — toma a Schopenhauer como confirmación de su propia tesis sobre los nombres: la disputa entre las escuelas es de vocabulario.

«Call the phenomena force, energy, electricity or magnetism, will, or spirit-power, it will ever be the partial manifestation of the soul, whether disembodied or imprisoned for a while in its body--of a portion of that intelligent, omnipotent, and individual WILL, pervading all nature, and known, through the insufficiency of human language to express correctly psychological images, as--GOD» — nombra el término último de la serie y declara por qué usa esa palabra: la insuficiencia del lenguaje humano para las imágenes psicológicas.

«He concludes thereby, that that which is now called matter is nothing but the aggregation of atomic forces, to express which the word matter is used: outside of that, for science matter is but a word void of sense» — resume a Hartmann, para quien ningún experimentador toca la materia sino las fuerzas en que la divide.

«Notwithstanding many an honest confession on the part of our specialists--physicists, physiologists and chemists--that they know nothing whatever of matter, they deify it. Every new phenomenon which they find themselves unable to explain, is triturated, compounded into incense, and burned on the altar of the goddess who patronizes modern scientists» — el reproche de culto: los especialistas confiesan no saber qué es la materia y aun así la endiosan, y cada fenómeno que no explican lo queman como incienso ante ella.

«Such an action at a distance is just what constitutes the fundamental character of what is called magical; for such is the immediate action of our will, an action liberated from the causal conditions of physical action, viz., contact» — habla Schopenhauer en sus *Parerga*: la acción a distancia, liberada del contacto, es lo que constituye el carácter fundamental de lo mágico. *Isis Unveiled* lo cita como definición filosófica ajena y no la discute.

«Therefore, it is the duty of every scientist to acquaint himself with them» — el cierre de la cita de Schopenhauer, que la obra usa como mandato dirigido a los académicos de su siglo.

«As to the movements and oscillations alleged to happen with certain tables, they can have no cause other than the invisible and involuntary vibrations of the experimenter's muscular system; the extended contraction of the muscles manifesting itself at such time by a series of vibrations, and becoming thus a visible tremor which communicates to the object a circumrotary motion. This rotation is thus enabled to manifest itself with a considerable energy, by a gradually quickening motion, or by a strong resistance, whenever it is required to stop. Hence the physical explanation of the phenomenon becomes clear and does not offer the slightest difficulty» — la explicación mecánica de las mesas giratorias, reproducida *verbatim* por la obra: son vibraciones musculares involuntarias del experimentador. Es la memoria de Babinet y Boussingault ante la Academia, no la voz de la obra.

«And still, clear as it may be, it lacks an important feature, i.e., common sense» — la réplica entera cabe en esa frase, después de comparar la claridad de esa hipótesis con una nebulosa de Babinet vista en noche de niebla.

«Thus, we must first ascertain whether the "involuntary vibrations of the experimenter's muscular system," which are but "actions of matter," are influenced by a will within the experimenter or without» — señala lo que la explicación mecánica deja sin decidir: de quién es la voluntad que mueve esas vibraciones musculares.

«In its kabalistic sense, the vacuum means in this instance the latent Deity, or latent force, which at its first manifestation became WILL, and thus communicated the first impulse to these atoms--whose agglomeration, is matter» — relee el vacío de Demócrito y Leucipo en clave kabalística: es la Deidad latente que al manifestarse se hace Voluntad y da el primer impulso a los átomos.

«Movers gives a definition of the Phoenician idea of the ideal sun-light as a spiritual influence issuing from the highest God, IAO, "the light conceivable only by intellect--the physical and spiritual Principle of all things; out of which the soul emanates» — cita a Movers para el IAO fenicio, luz concebible solo por el intelecto y principio a la vez físico y espiritual de todas las cosas.

«But it is in the denial of the boundless and endless Entity, possessor of that invisible Will which we for lack of a better term call GOD, that lies the powerlessness of every materialistic science to explain the occult phenomena» — localiza ahí la impotencia de la ciencia materialista: no en su método, sino en negar de antemano la Entidad sin límites poseedora de esa Voluntad invisible.

«As that Intelligent Idea, which, by directing its sole will-power toward a centre of localized forces called objective forms into being, so can man, the microcosm of the great Macrocosm, do the same in proportion with the development of his will-power» — el paso de la cosmogonía a la magia: si la Idea Inteligente llamó a existir las formas objetivas dirigiendo su voluntad a un centro de fuerzas, el hombre puede hacer lo mismo en proporción a la suya.

«The plan of the structure to be erected is in the brain of the Architect, and reflects his will; abstract as yet, from the instant of the conception it becomes concrete through these atoms which follow faithfully every line, point and figure traced in the imagination of the Divine Geometer» — el símil del arquitecto con que explica cómo lo abstracto se hace concreto: los átomos siguen la línea trazada en la imaginación del Geómetra Divino.

«They will find therein many a strange hypothesis founded on old ideas, speculations on the "new" phenomena, which may prove as reasonable as any, and be saved the useless trouble of inventing new theories. The psychic and ectenic forces, the "ideo-motor" and "electro-biological powers"; "latent thought" and even "unconscious cerebration" theories, can be condensed in two words: the kabalistic ASTRAL LIGHT» — manda a los científicos investigadores a leer a Schopenhauer y propone la reducción: todas las fuerzas y principios que la ciencia bautizó de nuevo caben en dos palabras kabalísticas.

«there is neither matter nor spirit. The tendency to gravitation in a stone is as unexplainable as thought in human brain» — habla Schopenhauer, citado por la obra: la tendencia de la piedra a caer es tan inexplicable como el pensamiento en el cerebro humano.

«Given a more intense and intelligent concentration of this will, and the form becomes concrete, visible, objective; the man has learned the secret of secrets; he is a MAGICIAN» — la definición operativa del mago que da el capítulo: la diferencia con la alucinación es solo el grado de concentración de la voluntad, hasta que la forma se hace concreta y objetiva.

«The materialist should not object to this logic, for he regards thought as matter. Conceding it to be so, the cunning mechanism contrived by the inventor; the fairy scenes born in the poet's brain; the gorgeous painting limned by the artist's fancy; the peerless statue chiselled in ether by the sculptor; the palaces and castles built in air by the architect--all these, though invisible and subjective, must exist, for they are matter, shaped and moulded» — el argumento *ad hominem* contra el materialista: si el pensamiento es materia, entonces los palacios que el arquitecto levanta en el aire existen como materia moldeada.

«Who shall say, then, that there are not some men of such imperial will as to be able to drag these air-drawn fancies into view, enveloped in the hard casing of gross substance to make them tangible» — y la conclusión que saca de esa concesión, formulada como pregunta y no como afirmación.

«Faraday, who "blushed" for having published his researches upon such a degrading belief, is now proved on good authority to have never sat at a tipping table himself at all» — el cargo documental contra Faraday: que nunca se sentó a una mesa, apoyado en el doctor Foucault desde el *Journal des Débats*.

«as they were found to have gradually displaced themselves by slipping in the same direction as the table, it thus became an unquestionable proof that the experimenters had pushed the tables themselves» — describe el experimento de los discos de cartón encolados con que Faraday quiso probar el empujón involuntario de los experimentadores.

«This needle which betrayed the active motion proved but one thing, viz.: the action of a force which either emanated from the sitters or controlled them. And who has ever said that there is no such force? Every one admits so much, whether this force passes through the operator, as it is generally shown, or acts independently of him, as is so often the case» — le concede a Faraday el hecho y le disputa la conclusión: la aguja prueba que hay una fuerza, no de quién es.

«The whole mystery consisted in the disproportion of the force employed by the operators, who pushed because they were forced to push, with certain effects of rotation, or rather, of a really marvellous race. In the presence of such prodigious effects, how could any one imagine that the Lilliputian experiments of that kind could have any value in this newly discovered Land of Giants» — la objeción de escala, que la obra recoge entrecomillada: los experimentos liliputienses no miden efectos desproporcionados respecto de la fuerza empleada.

«For, of all other men, Professor Agassiz ought to believe in a phenomenon to which he had been a subject himself» — el reproche a Agassiz se apoya en J. R. Buchanan, y su punta es que el propio Agassiz había sido sujeto del fenómeno que negaba.

«Apollonius and Iamblichus held that it was not "in the knowledge of things without, but in the perfection of the soul within, that lies the empire of man, aspiring to be more than men» — atribuye a Apolonio y a Jámblico el desplazamiento del imperio del hombre desde el conocimiento de lo externo a la perfección del alma interior.

«Thus, on the dark firmament of the mediaeval ages began appearing the mysterious Brothers of the Rosie Cross. They formed no associations, they built no colleges; for, hunted up and down like so many wild beasts, when caught by the Christian Church, they were unceremoniously roasted» — sitúa a los Hermanos de la Rosa Cruz sin asociaciones ni colegios, y explica esa ausencia por la persecución.

«to elude the maxim, Ecclesia non novit sanguinem, they burned human beings, as burning a man does not shed his blood» — la explicación de la hoguera como rodeo jurídico es de Bayle, citado por la obra.

«Roger Bacon belonged by right if not by fact to that Brotherhood which includes all those who study the occult sciences» — la adscripción va con su matiz: por derecho, aunque no de hecho, y a una hermandad definida por el estudio de las ciencias ocultas.

«This may be taken as a sort of exemplification of the class of exhibitions which were probably the result of a superior knowledge of natural sciences» — la frase es del historiador moderno que comenta las maravillas atribuidas a Bacon; la obra la acepta y añade que los herméticos nunca reclamaron otra cosa.

«In view of the atrocious tortures provided by the Inquisition for all suspected of either black or white magic, it is not strange that these philosophers neither boasted nor even acknowledged the fact of such an intercourse» — explica por el miedo a la Inquisición el silencio de los filósofos sobre cualquier comercio con espíritus, y no por inexistencia del comercio.

«no more than the application of natural active causes to passive things or subjects; by means thereof, many tremendously surprising but yet natural effects are produced» — la definición de magia que dice tomar de los escritos de esos mismos filósofos: aplicación de causas naturales activas a cosas pasivas.

«we are informed by English correspondents of the Theosophical Society that they have heard strains of the most ravishing music, coming from no visible instrument, and inhaled a succession of delightful odors produced, as they believed, by spirit-agency» — pone los olores y la música de Roger Bacon al lado de lo que dicen sus corresponsales ingleses, y marca la atribución como creencia de ellos.

«The antediluvian children--who perhaps played with it, using it as the boys in Bulwer-Lytton's Coming Race, use the tremendous "vril"--called it the "Water of Phtha"; their descendants named it the Anima Mundi, the soul of the universe; and still later the mediaeval hermetists termed it "sidereal light," or the "Milk of the Celestial Virgin,"» — la serie de nombres de una misma fuerza, con el *vril* de Bulwer-Lytton al frente y el agua de Phtha, el Anima Mundi y la luz sideral detrás; la enumeración sigue en la plana siguiente con el *Magnes*, y ahí dice que la ciencia no la reconoce bajo ninguno de esos nombres porque pertenece a la magia.

«Many of these mystics, by following what they were taught by some treatises, secretly preserved from one generation to another, achieved discoveries which would not be despised even in our modern days of exact sciences. Roger Bacon, the friar, was laughed at as a quack, and is now generally numbered among "pretenders" to magic art; but his discoveries were nevertheless accepted, and are now used by those who ridicule him the most» — el caso Roger Bacon como prueba de la deuda no reconocida: se le tuvo por charlatán y hoy usan sus descubrimientos quienes más se burlan de él. La *Secret Doctrine* reimprime este párrafo citándolo por su nombre; la ocurrencia de aquí es la primera del volumen.

«Although the "magicians" believed as firmly as our spiritualists in a world of invisible spirits, none of them claimed to produce his effects under their control or through their sole help. They knew too well how difficult it is to keep away the elementary creatures when they have once found the door wide open» — la distinción que le importa: los magos creían en los espíritus invisibles pero no atribuían a ellos sus efectos, y sabían lo difícil que es echar a las criaturas elementales una vez abierta la puerta.

«Even the magic of the ancient Chaldeans was but a profound knowledge of the powers of simples and minerals» — reduce la magia caldea a conocimiento de simples y minerales, y reserva el trato con seres espirituales puros para cuando el teúrgo buscaba ayuda divina.

«With them, even, those spirits who remain invisible and communicate with mortals through their awakened inner senses, as in clairvoyance, clairaudience and trance, could only be evoked subjectively and as a result of purity of life and prayer» — pone la condición moral por delante de la técnica: incluso esos espíritus solo podían evocarse subjetivamente y por pureza de vida y oración.

«Men possessed of such knowledge and exercising such powers patiently toiled for something better than the vain glory of a passing fame. Seeking it not, they became immortal, as do all who labor for the good of the race, forgetful of mean self» — el retrato del alquimista que la obra opone al ilusionista: no buscaban la fama, y por eso mismo dice que se hicieron inmortales.

«Illuminated with the light of eternal truth, these rich-poor alchemists fixed their attention upon the things that lie beyond the common ken, recognizing nothing inscrutable but the First Cause, and finding no question unsolvable» — la única cosa que reconocían por inescrutable era la Primera Causa; todo lo demás lo tenían por soluble.

«To dare, to know, to will, and REMAIN SILENT, was their constant rule; to be beneficent, unselfish, and unpretending, were, with them, spontaneous impulses» — la divisa de las cuatro palabras, que la obra da como regla constante de esos filósofos.

«If spiritualists are anxious to keep strictly dogmatic in their notions of the "spirit-world," they must not set scientists to investigate their phenomena in the true experimental spirit. The attempt would most surely result in a partial re-discovery of the magic of old--that of Moses and Paracelsus» — el aviso a los espiritistas: si dejan que los científicos investiguen de veras, lo que aparecerá será la magia antigua, la de Moisés y la de Paracelso.

«Under the deceptive beauty of some of their apparitions, they might find some day the sylphs and fair Undines of the Rosicrucians playing in the currents of psychic and odic force» — y lo que encontrarían bajo la belleza engañosa de las apariciones: las sílfides y las ondinas de los rosacruces.

«And the learned authors of The Unseen Universe, abandoning their "electro-biological" theory, begin to perceive in the universal ether the possibility that it is a photographic album of EN-SOPH--the Boundless» — a los autores de *The Unseen Universe* les adjudica el paso del éter como teoría electrobiológica al éter como álbum fotográfico del En-Soph.

«We are far from believing that all the spirits that communicate at circles are of the classes called "Elemental," and "Elementary." Many-- especially among those who control the medium subjectively to speak, write, and otherwise act in various ways--are human, disembodied spirits» — marca el límite de su propia tesis: no dice que todos los comunicantes sean elementales, y concede que muchos son espíritus humanos desencarnados.

«But, in any case, human spirits can never materialize themselves in propria persona. These can never appear to the investigator clothed with warm, solid flesh, sweating hands and faces, and grossly-material bodies. The most they can do is to project their aethereal reflection on the atmospheric waves, and if the touch of their hands and clothing can become upon rare occasions objective to the senses of a living mortal, it will be felt as a passing breeze gently sweeping over the touched spot, not as a human hand or material body» — la tesis dura del capítulo: lo más que un espíritu humano puede hacer es proyectar su reflejo etéreo, y su tacto se siente como una brisa, no como carne.

«This is not our philosophy, but that of the numberless generations of theurgists and magicians, and based upon their practical experience» — declara ajena la doctrina que acaba de exponer y la remite a la experiencia práctica de teúrgos y magos.

«The spirit-voice consists of a series of sounds which conveys the impression of a column of compressed air ascending from beneath upward, and spreading around the living interlocutor» — la descripción física de la voz espiritual con que glosa el testimonio antiguo de que las voces de los démones no son articuladas.

«The many eye-witnesses who testified in the case of Elizabeth Eslinger, namely: the deputy-governor of the prison of Weinsberg, Mayer, Eckhart, Theurer, and Knorr (sworn evidence), Duttenhofer, and Kapff, the mathematician, testified that they saw the apparition like a pillar of clouds» — el caso de Elizabeth Eslinger en la prisión de Weinsberg lo trae por su lista de testigos jurados, y por lo que vieron: una columna de nubes, no un cuerpo.

«During the time it lasted, the prisoner Elizabeth prayed with a loud voice uninterruptedly; therefore, as the "spirit" was talking at the same time, it could be no ventriloquism; and that voice, they say, "had nothing human in it; no one could imitate its sounds» — el argumento contra la explicación ventrílocua es de los propios testigos: la presa rezaba en voz alta mientras la voz hablaba.

«We will now only again assert that no spirit claimed by the spiritualists to be human was ever proved to be such on sufficient testimony» — la afirmación negativa que sostiene: ningún espíritu declarado humano ha sido probado tal con testimonio suficiente.

«One of the most powerful attractions of our departed ones is their strong affection for those whom they have left on earth. It draws them irresistibly, by degrees, into the current of the Astral Light vibrating between the person sympathetic to them and the Universal Soul. Another very important condition is harmony, and the magnetic purity of the persons present» — las dos condiciones que pone para atraer espíritus humanos: el afecto que los arrastra por la corriente de la Luz Astral, y la armonía y pureza magnética de los presentes.

«Who ever heard of the apparitions, unrestful "souls," hovering about the spots where they were murdered, or coming back for some other mysterious reasons of their own, with "warm hands" feeling like living flesh, and but that they are known to be dead and buried, not distinguishable from living mortals» — el argumento por contraste: los aparecidos espontáneos de siempre nunca tuvieron manos calientes ni carne, y eso solo empezó con la era de las materializaciones.

«it was, as every respectable shadow should be, visible but impalpable, or if palpable at all, communicating to the feeling of touch the sensation of a mass of water suddenly clasped in the hand, or of condensed but cold steam» — la fenomenología de la sombra que da por buena, a propósito de una carta publicada en *The Medium and Day Break* sobre una casa embrujada.

«The writer has publicly certified to having seen such materialized forms. We have most assuredly done so, and are ready to repeat the testimony. We have recognized such figures as the visible representations of acquaintances, friends, and even relatives» — no se exceptúa a sí misma del testimonio que va a reinterpretar: dice haber visto esas formas y haber reconocido en ellas a conocidos y parientes.

«But, nevertheless, these figures were not the forms of the persons they appeared to be. They were simply their portrait statues, constructed, animated and operated by the elementaries» — y la reinterpretación: eran estatuas retrato construidas y movidas por los elementarios, aunque las lenguas orientales que oyó las siga dando por prueba de la mediumnidad del granjero de Vermont.

«Pausanias writes that four hundred years after the battle of Marathon, there were still heard in the place where it was fought, the neighing of horses and the shouts of shadowy soldiers» — toma de Pausanias los relinchos y los gritos oídos en Maratón cuatro siglos después, y de ahí saca su pregunta: quién produce el relincho si los caballos no tienen espíritu.

«we have either to admit that animals have surviving spirits and souls as well as ourselves, or hold with Porphyry that there are in the invisible world a» — plantea la disyuntiva sin resolverla a favor propio, y la segunda rama la firma Porfirio; la frase se corta aquí porque el troceo parte la plana.

«suffered themselves to die in hospitals and by the wayside, rather than debase their souls and allow the profane cupidity of those who tempted them to triumph over their sacred vows. The lives of Paracelsus, Cornelius Agrippa, and Philalethes are too well known to repeat the old, sad story» — pone a Paracelso, Cornelio Agrippa y Philalethes como ejemplos de esa renuncia y da sus vidas por sabidas; la frase arranca en la plana anterior, donde dice que pudieron haber dormido en lechos de terciopelo.

«That of a pure spirit is like the tremulous murmur of an Æolian harp echoed from a distance» — la escala de voces con que separa al espíritu puro del impuro; el timbre, y no el contenido, es lo que adjudica. La comparación de la voz impura con un barril vacío queda del otro lado de la costura de plana.

«Before venturing to decide the question whether the spectral animal forms so frequently seen and attested are the returning spirits of dead beasts, we must carefully consider their reported behavior. Do these spectres act according to the habits and display the same instincts, as the animals during life? Do the spectral beasts of prey lie in wait for victims, and timid animals flee before the presence of man; or do the latter show a malevolence and disposition to annoy, quite foreign to their natures» — el criterio que propone para decidir si los animales espectrales son espíritus de bestias muertas: mirar la conducta, no la forma.

«Many victims of these obsessions--notably, the afflicted persons of Salem and other historical witchcrafts--testify to having seen dogs, cats, pigs, and other animals, entering their rooms, biting them, trampling upon their sleeping bodies, and talking to them; often inciting them to suicide and other crimes» — junta los testimonios de Salem y de otras brujerías históricas, donde los animales muerden, pisan a los durmientes y hablan.

«In the well-attested case of Elizabeth Eslinger, mentioned by Dr. Kerner, the apparition of the ancient priest of Wimmenthal was accompanied by a large black dog, which he called his father, and which dog in the presence of numerous witnesses jumped on all the beds of the prisoners» — del caso de Weinsberg le interesa el perro negro que el sacerdote aparecido llamaba su padre, y que los testigos vieron saltar sobre las camas.

«And unless we discredit the testimony of thousands of witnesses, in all parts of the world, and in all ages, and allow a monopoly of seership to modern mediums, spectre-animals do appear and manifest all the worst traits of depraved human nature, without themselves being human. What, then, can they be but elementals» — la disyuntiva con que cierra: o se descarta el testimonio de miles de testigos de todas las épocas, o esos espectros que muestran los peores rasgos humanos sin ser humanos son elementales.

«Descartes was one of the few who believed and dared say that to occult medicine we shall owe discoveries "destined to extend the domain of philosophy» — reclama a Descartes para la medicina oculta por esa frase, y lo pone entre los pocos que se atrevieron a decirlo.

«It is in vain that modern reason, which, notwithstanding its positivism, cannot explain the intimate cause of any phenomena, rejects the supernatural; it is universal, and at the root of all hearts. The most elevated minds are frequently its most ardent disciples» — habla Brierre de Boismont, apoyándose en Guizot: la razón moderna rechaza lo sobrenatural sin poder explicar la causa íntima de ningún fenómeno.

«Theophrastus Paracelsus rediscovered the occult properties of the magnet--"the bone of Horus" which, twelve centuries before his time, had played such an important part in the theurgic mysteries--and he very naturally became the founder of the school of magnetism and of mediaeval magico-theurgy» — le adjudica a Paracelso el redescubrimiento del imán —el hueso de Horus de los misterios teúrgicos— y la fundación de la escuela del magnetismo.

«We believe that few of those physical phenomena which are genuine are caused by disembodied human spirits» — la tesis del capítulo III dicha en una línea, y en primera persona del plural de autor.

«Still, even those that are produced by occult forces of nature, such as happen through a few genuine mediums, and are consciously employed by the so-called "jugglers" of India and Egypt, deserve a careful and serious investigation by science; especially now that a number of respected authorities have testified that in many cases the hypothesis of fraud does not hold» — pide investigación seria para lo que ella misma atribuye a fuerzas ocultas de la naturaleza, y apoya el pedido en que varias autoridades ya descartaron el fraude en muchos casos.

«Robert Houdin unquestionably could, but this did not prevent his laughing outright in the face of the academicians, when they desired him to assert in the newspapers, that he could make a table move, or rap answers to questions, without contact of hands, unless the table was a prepared one» — usa al propio ilusionista contra los académicos: Houdin se rió de que le pidieran declarar que podía mover una mesa sin contacto.

«To transform a rupee--firmly clasped in the hand of a skeptic--into a living cobra, the bite of which would prove fatal, as an examination of its fangs would show. 2. To cause a seed chosen at random by the spectators, and planted in the first semblance of a flower-pot, furnished by the same skeptics, to grow, mature, and bear fruit in less than a quarter of an hour» — los dos primeros de los tres desafíos con que reta a los prestidigitadores europeos, y que dice exhibidos ante gente del séquito del Príncipe de Gales.

«To stretch himself on three swords, stuck perpendicularly in the ground at their hilts, the sharp points upward; after that, to have removed first one of the swords, then the other, and, after an interval of a few seconds, the last one, the juggler remaining, finally, lying on nothing--on the air, miraculously suspended at about one yard from the ground» — el tercero, la suspensión en el aire tras retirar las tres espadas; la condición previa que impone es la desnudez del juglar y la elección del sitio por los investigadores.

«We assert again, in full confidence, that there does not exist a professional wizard, either of the North, South or West, who can compete with anything approaching success, with these untutored, naked sons of the East» — la comparación no le sirve para negar el ilusionismo sino para separarlo: el juglar oriental no necesita preparativos ni sala.

«I look upon it as a special piece of Providence that . . . fresh examples of apparitions may awaken our benumbed and lethargic minds into an assurance that there are other intelligent beings besides those that are clothed in heavy earth or clay . . . for this evidence, showing that there are bad spirits, will necessarily open a door to the belief that there are good ones, and lastly, that there is a God» — habla Henry More: la cadena que va de las apariciones a los malos espíritus, de ahí a los buenos y de ahí a Dios es suya, no de la obra.

«The development of psychological science has been retarded far more by the ridicule of this class of pretenders, than by the inherent difficulties of its study. The empty laugh of the scientific nursling or of the fools of fashion, has done more to keep man ignorant of his imperial psychical powers, than the obscurities, the obstacles and the dangers that cluster about the subject» — su diagnóstico de por qué la psicología no avanza: pesa más el ridículo de los impostores que las dificultades propias del asunto.

«That their investigation has been so largely confined to incapables, is due to the fact that men of science, who might and would have studied them, have been frightened off by the boasted exposures, the paltry jokes, and the impertinent clamor of those who are not worthy to tie their shoes» — y el mecanismo concreto: los hombres de ciencia capaces se retiraron espantados por las burlas, y quedaron los incapaces. *Hay cobardes morales incluso en las cátedras universitarias*, añade en el renglón siguiente.

«These are the pretenders to science of young America--a mongrel class of pseudo-philosophers, mentioned at the opening of this chapter, with sometimes no better right to be regarded as scholars than the possession of an electrical machine, or the delivery of a puerile lecture on insanity and mediomania» — así presenta a los positivistas norteamericanos que serán el blanco del capítulo, y les niega credenciales de eruditos.

«Mesmer, who lived nearly three hundred years after him, and as a disciple of his school brought the magnetic wonders before the public, reaped the glory that was due to the fire-philosopher, while the great master died in a hospital» — el reparto injusto de la gloria que denuncia: Mesmer, discípulo de esa escuela, se llevó lo que era del filósofo del fuego, que murió en un hospital.

«that Mr. Williams dressed up and personified John King and Peter. Nobody can prove that it wasn't so» — cita al desenmascarador londinense con su propia palabra —él llama *theory* a lo suyo— para devolverle la carga de la prueba.

«Auguste Comte--a pupil of the Ecole Polytechnique, who had remained for years at that establishment as a repetiteur of Transcendant Analysis and Rationalistic Mechanics--awoke one fine morning with the very irrational idea of becoming a prophet» — presenta a Comte por su oficio previo —repetidor de análisis trascendente y mecánica racionalista— antes de darle el título con que lo va a tratar todo el capítulo.

«and so infectious is fashion, sometimes, that even in sober England he was considered, for a certain time, the Newton of the nineteenth century» — mide el positivismo por su moda, no por su doctrina: hasta en Inglaterra se le tuvo por el Newton del siglo.

«It was the famous philologist Littre, a member of the French Institute, and a would-be member of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, but whom the archbishop of Orleans maliciously prevented from becoming one of the "Immortals."» — de todos los apóstoles de Comte salva a uno solo, el filólogo Littré, y anota que el arzobispo de Orleans le impidió entrar a la Academia.

«A longing for some kind of divinity, a craving for the "unknown," is a feeling congenital in man; hence the worst atheists seem not to be exempt from it» — su explicación de por qué racionalistas y materialistas cayeron en la nueva religión: el anhelo de divinidad es congénito y ni los ateos se libran.

«Attacking it at its weakest side, they make the most of its lack of an inductive method, and of the exaggerations that are to be found in the transcendental doctrines of its propagandists. Taking advantage of its unpopularity, and displaying a courage as furious and out of place as that of the errant knight of La Mancha, they claim recognition as philanthropists and benefactors who would crush out a monstrous superstition» — reconoce el flanco por donde el positivismo ataca al espiritismo —la falta de método inductivo y las exageraciones de sus propagandistas— antes de contraatacar.

«Before beginning, let us call attention to the fact that three-fourths of the disgraceful features exhibited in modern Spiritualism are directly traceable to the materialistic adventurers pretending to be spiritualists» — la concesión que hace antes de pelear: tres cuartas partes de lo vergonzoso del espiritismo moderno viene de aventureros materialistas disfrazados de espiritistas.

«Plato, in the fifth book of the Republic, suggests a method for improving the human race by the elimination of the unhealthy or deformed individuals, and by coupling the better specimens of both sexes» — remonta a la *República* de Platón la idea eugenésica que le atribuye a Comte, para negarle la novedad.

«Comte was a mathematician. Cleverly combining several old utopias, he colored the whole, and, improving on Plato's idea, materialized it, and presented the world with the greatest monstrosity that ever emanated from a human mind» — el veredicto sobre el positivismo como refrito materializado de utopías viejas.

«We beg the reader to keep in view, that we do not attack Comte as a philosopher, but as a professed reformer» — acota su propio ataque, y en la plana siguiente concede que sus obras darían un volumen de aforismos originales sobre los males sociales.

«but it would be vain to seek, either through the tedious circumlocution of the six volumes of his Cours de Philosophie Positive, or in that parody on priesthood, in the form of a dialogue--The Catechism of the Religion of Positivism--any idea suggestive of even provisional remedies for such evils» — lo que le reprocha no es el diagnóstico sino la ausencia de remedio, ni siquiera provisional, en los seis volúmenes del *Cours* y en el *Catecismo*.

«while the theory of the positivist legislators on marriage and the family, chiefly consists in making the woman the "mere companion of man by ridding her of every maternal function» — así resume la doctrina positivista sobre la mujer, y le opone que mientras el sumo sacerdote predica eso, algunos de sus sacerdotes laicos predican abiertamente la poligamia.

«M. Comte not only thought that he found the principles, traced the outlines, and furnished the method, but that he had deduced the consequences and constructed the social and religious edifice of the future. It is in this second division that we make our reservations, declaring, at the same time, that we accept as an inheritance, the whole of the first» — habla Littré en 1859, y su reserva es la que a la obra le importa: acepta la primera división de Comte y no la segunda, la del edificio social y religioso.

«Indeed the whole system of Comte appears to us to have been built on a play of words. When they say "Positivism," read Nihilism; when you hear the word chastity, know that it means impudicity; and so on» — la acusación de fondo es de vocabulario: donde el sistema dice positivismo hay que leer nihilismo, y donde dice castidad, impudicia.

«Comte attained to the apotheosis of absurdity and inconsistency when, after inventing his philosophy, he named it a "Religion."» — sitúa la contradicción exacta que le imputa: haber llamado religión a una filosofía construida sobre la negación.

«It rejects completely all forms of theological and metaphysical belief; all forms of supernaturalism, and thus--Spiritualism. The true positive spirit consists in substituting the study of the invariable laws of phenomena for that of their so-called causes, whether proximate or primary. On this ground it equally rejects atheism; for the atheist is at bottom a theologian," he adds, plagiarizing sentences from Littre's works: "the atheist does not reject the problems of theology, only the solution of these, and so he is illogical. We Positivists reject the problem in our turn on the ground that it is utterly inaccessible to the intellect, and we would only waste our strength in a vain search for first and final causes» — habla un positivista, citado por la obra: el positivismo sustituye el estudio de las causas por el de las leyes invariables, y rechaza también el ateísmo.

«In short, Positivism proposes to itself to destroy Theology, Metaphysics, Spiritualism, Atheism, Materialism, Pantheism, and Science, and it must finally end in destroying itself» — su conclusión sobre el sistema: la lista de lo que se propone destruir termina incluyéndolo a él mismo.

«There are some minds which were brought up and fed on exact and positive sciences, but which feel nevertheless, a sort of instinctive impulse for philosophy. They can satisfy this instinct but with elements that they have already on hand. Ignorant in psychological sciences, having studied only the rudiments of metaphysics, they nevertheless are determined to fight these same metaphysics as well as psychology, of which they know as little as of the other. After this is done, they will imagine themselves to have founded a Positive Science, while the truth is that they have only built up a new mutilated and incomplete metaphysical theory» — habla Paul Janet, del Instituto, en 1864: quienes combaten la metafísica y la psicología sin conocerlas acaban levantando otra metafísica, mutilada.

«does not accept atheism, for the atheist is not a really-emancipated mind, but is, in his own way, a theologian still; he gives his explanation about the essence of things; he knows how they began! . . . Atheism is Pantheism; this system is quite theological yet, and thus belongs to the ancient party» — habla Littré: el ateo no es un espíritu emancipado sino un teólogo a su manera, porque explica la esencia de las cosas y sabe cómo empezaron.

«after all, is merely negative. It is admitted by Comte, that he knows nothing of the sources and causes of nature's laws; that their origination is so perfectly inscrutable as to make it idle to take up time in any scrutiny for that purpose» — habla el profesor Hare, que la obra invoca como científico de verdad frente al sistema: la filosofía positiva es, al cabo, negativa.

«The Positivists of America have joined hands in their untiring efforts to overthrow Spiritualism. To show their impartiality, though, they propound such novel queries as follows: " . . . how much rationality is there in the dogmas of the Immaculate Conception, the Trinity and Transubstantiation, if submitted to the tests of physiology, mathematics, and chemistry?" and they "undertake to say, that the vagaries of Spiritualism do not surpass in absurdity these eminently respectable beliefs» — les reconoce la simetría del ataque —que ponen la Inmaculada Concepción, la Trinidad y la transubstanciación al mismo nivel que el espiritismo— antes de negarles el terreno.

«But there is neither theological absurdity nor spiritualistic delusion that can match in depravity and imbecility that positivist notion of "artificial fecundation."» — su respuesta a esa simetría: la fecundación artificial positivista supera en absurdo a cualquier dogma o delirio de los otros dos bandos.

«My eyes are dazzled;--they open each day more and more to the increasing coincidence between the social advent of the feminine mystery, and the mental decadence of the eucharistical sacrament. Already the Virgin has dethroned God in the minds of Southern Catholics! Positivism realizes the Utopia of the mediaeval ages, by representing all the members of the great family as the issue of a virgin mother without a husband» — habla Comte por su propia boca, citado por la obra: el positivismo realizaría la utopía medieval haciendo a todos los miembros de la gran familia hijos de una madre virgen sin esposo.

«The development of the new process would soon cause to spring up a caste without heredity, better adapted than vulgar procreation to the recruitment of spiritual chiefs, or even temporal ones, whose authority would then rest upon an origin truly superior, which would not shrink from an investigation» — la continuación de esa cita: una casta sin herencia, mejor adaptada que la procreación vulgar para reclutar jefes espirituales.

«How natural that a philosophy which could engender such a caste of didactic incubi, should express through the pen of one of its most garrulous essayists, the following sentiments: "This is a sad, a very sad age, full of dead and dying faiths; full of idle prayers sent out in vain search for the departing gods. But oh! it is a glorious age, full of the golden light which streams from the ascending sun of science! What shall we do for those who are shipwrecked in faith, bankrupt in intellect, but . . . who seek comfort in the mirage of spiritualism, the delusions of transcendentalism, or the will o' the wisp of mesmerism» — cita al ensayista positivista que llama espejismo al espiritismo y fuego fatuo al mesmerismo, para volverle la imagen en contra.

«It is not so long since the now familiar phenomenon was stoutly denied by a correspondent of the London Times, whose assertions carried weight, till the work of Dr. Phipson, supported by the testimony of Beccaria, Humboldt, and other naturalists, set the question at rest» — y el vuelco del argumento: el propio fuego fatuo fue negado por la ciencia hasta que Phipson, Beccaria y Humboldt lo asentaron.

«As to mesmerism, it has been adopted in many parts of Germany, and is publicly used with undeniable success in more than one hospital; its occult properties have been proved and are believed in by physicians» — apoya el mesmerismo en su uso hospitalario público en Alemania y en la creencia de médicos, no en testimonio de médiums.

«We have found Positivists particularly happy in the delusion that the greatest scientists of Europe were Comtists. How far their claims may be just, as regards other savants, we do not know, but Huxley, whom all Europe considers one of her greatest scientists, most decidedly declines that honor, and Dr. Maudsley, of London, follows suit» — desmonta la nómina que los positivistas se atribuyen mostrando que Huxley y Maudsley rechazan esa filiación.

«In fact, Comte's philosophy in practice might be compendiously described as Catholicism minus Christianity» — la fórmula con que Huxley cierra ese juicio, y que la obra recoge sin añadirle nada.

«We are happy to remark that, while Positivism loudly proclaims itself a religion, Spiritualism has never pretended to be anything more than a science, a growing philosophy, or rather a research in hidden and as yet unexplained forces in nature» — marca la asimetría que le importa: el positivismo se proclama religión y el espiritismo no ha pretendido ser más que ciencia o investigación de fuerzas todavía no explicadas.

«The cautiousness bred of a fixed habit of experimental research, the tentative advance from opinion to opinion, the weight accorded to recognized authorities--all foster a conservatism of thought which naturally runs into dogmatism» — deriva el dogmatismo científico de las propias virtudes del método: la cautela, el avance tentativo y el peso de las autoridades reconocidas.

«Knowledge does increase apace, but the great body of scientists are not entitled to the credit. In every instance they have done their best to shipwreck the new discovery, together with the discoverer» — separa el progreso del conocimiento del mérito del cuerpo científico, y adjudica la palma al coraje individual del descubridor.

«these very discoverers too often became the opponents and oppressors, in their turn, of still more recent explorers in the domain of natural law» — el ciclo que describe no perdona a los suyos: el descubridor negado se vuelve después opresor del que viene detrás.

«Shall we point to mediaeval scholars conniving with the clergy to deny the Heliocentric theory, for fear of hurting an ecclesiastical dogma» — la lista de precedentes con que arma su argumento histórico: la teoría heliocéntrica negada por miedo al dogma, y los fósiles negados por casi un siglo.

«It is a book published by Flourens, the Perpetual Secretary of the French Academy, called Histoire des Recherches de Buffon. The author shows in it how the great naturalist combated and finally conquered the advocates of the fac-simile theory; and how they still went on denying everything under the sun, until at times the learned body fell into a fury, an epidemic of negation» — recomienda la *Histoire des Recherches de Buffon* de Flourens como lectura para escépticos, y llama epidemia de negación a lo que ahí se documenta.

«It denied Franklin and his refined electricity; laughed at Fulton and his concentrated steam; voted the engineer Perdormet a strait-jacket for his offer to build railroads; stared Harvey out of countenance; and proclaimed Bernard de Palissy "as stupid as one of his own pots» — la lista de negaciones académicas que saca de ese libro, de Franklin y Fulton a Harvey y Palissy.

«In so far as my study of what specially characterizes the positive philosophy has led me, I find, therein, little or nothing of any scientific value, and a great deal which is as thoroughly antagonistic to the very essence of science as anything» — habla Huxley en su conferencia de Edimburgo de 1868: poco o nada de valor científico, y mucho de antagónico a la esencia misma de la ciencia. La frase se completa en la plana siguiente comparándolo con el catolicismo ultramontano.

«to make David Hume turn in his grave, that here, almost within earshot of his house, an interested audience should have listened, without a murmur, whilst his most characteristic doctrines were attributed to a French writer of fifty years later date, in whose dreary and verbose pages we miss alike the vigor of thought and the clearness of style» — sigue Huxley, que reclama para Hume la doctrina atribuida a Comte y le niega al francés vigor de pensamiento y claridad de estilo.

«But while theology is kept in the background, the scientists have seized the sceptre of despotism with both hands, and they use it, like the cherubim and flaming sword of Eden, to keep the people away from the tree of immortal life and within this world of perishable matter» — su cargo contra Draper y su *Conflict between Religion and Science*: el clero ya está callado, y quien empuña ahora el cetro despótico es la ciencia.

«In every case he denounces the bitter resistance on the part of the clergy, and keeps silent on the like opposition invariably experienced by every new discoverer at the hands of science» — el reproche concreto a Draper es de omisión, no de falsedad: cuenta la resistencia clerical y calla la que todo descubridor encontró entre científicos.

«We believe that the recent Lankester-Donkin-Slade prosecution in London ought at last to open the eyes of hopeful spiritualists, and show them that stubborn materialism is often more stupidly bigoted than religious fanaticism itself» — toma el proceso Lankester-Donkin-Slade como prueba de que el materialismo terco puede ser más fanático que el fanatismo religioso.

«This chasm, as impassable to Professor Tyndall as the fire-mist where the scientist is confronted with his unknowable cause, is a barrier only to men without spiritual intuitions» — acepta el abismo de Tyndall y le disputa su universalidad: es barrera solo para quien carece de intuición espiritual, y remite a Buchanan para el puente.

«But the edifice of materialism is based entirely upon that gross sub-structure--the reason. When they have stretched its capabilities to their utmost limits, its teachers can at best only disclose to us an universe of molecules animated by an occult impulse» — el límite que le fija al materialismo: estirada la razón hasta el tope, lo más que puede mostrar es un universo de moléculas animado por un impulso oculto.

«For "spiritual guides" read "scientists," for "prescientific past" substitute "materialistic present," say "spirit" for "science,"» — la operación de sustitución con que devuelve a Tyndall su propio retrato del clero ultramontano; la frase que cierra la maniobra es que el ocultista le pone el espejo a la ciencia.

«Since history recorded the first laws established by man, there never was yet a people, whose code did not hang the issues of the life and death of its citizens upon the testimony of two or three credible witnesses» — funda su exigencia probatoria en el derecho, no en la fe, y la apoya en Moisés como primer legislador y en Montesquieu.

«But the scientists will not accept the evidence of the million against one. In vain do hundreds of thousands of men testify to facts. Oculos habent et non vident! They are determined to remain blind and deaf» — y el contraste que saca de ahí: la misma regla que decide sobre la vida y la muerte de un ciudadano no vale para los hechos que ella defiende.

«Toward science as a whole, as a divine goal, the whole civilized world ought to look with respect and veneration; for science alone can enable man to understand the Deity by the true appreciation of his works» — la reverencia por la ciencia como tal queda dicha antes del reproche: solo ella permitiría entender a la Deidad por sus obras.

«Alas! that in questioning nature so many men of science should daintily sort over her facts and choose only such for study as best bolster their prejudices» — el defecto que denuncia es de selección, no de método: escogen entre los hechos de la naturaleza los que sostienen sus prejuicios.

«Psychology has no worse enemies than the medical school denominated allopathists. It is in vain to remind them that of the so-called exact sciences, medicine, confessedly, least deserves the name» — nombra al enemigo principal de la psicología y le disputa su credencial: de las llamadas ciencias exactas, la medicina es la que menos merece el nombre.

«The least dissent from their promulgated doctrines is resented as a heresy, and though an unpopular and unrecognized curative method should be shown to save thousands, they seem, as a body, disposed to cling to accepted hypotheses and prescriptions, and decry both innovator and innovation until they get the mint-stamp of regularity» — describe el mecanismo corporativo con el vocabulario de la herejía, y le pone su costo: pacientes muertos mientras se salva el honor profesional.

«Bleeding, by leeching, cupping, and the lancet, had its epidemic of popularity, but at last fell into merited disgrace; water, now freely given to fevered patients, was once denied them, warm baths were superseded by cold water, and for a while hydropathy was a mania» — la serie de modas médicas con que ilustra el vaivén: la sangría, el agua negada y luego dada a los febriles, los baños.

«He also shows that most of the new discoveries in medicine have turned out to be no more than "the revival and readoption of very ancient practices» — la tesis que toma de la *Demonologia*: casi todo descubrimiento médico nuevo es reactivación de una práctica antiquísima.

«The secret was bought by Louis XV. for a large sum of money; after which the physicians discovered that it was recommended and administered in that disease by Galen» — el caso del helecho macho contra la tenia, comprado como secreto por Luis XV y ya recetado por Galeno.

«His proposed remedy against consumption, namely, the use of prussic acid, may be found in the works of Linnaeus, Amenitates Academicae, vol. iv., in which he shows distilled laurel water to have been used with great profit in pulmonary consumption» — el caso Magendie: su ácido prúsico contra la tisis ya estaba en Linneo, y el extracto de almendras y huesos de cereza en Plinio.

«The passage from the physics of the brain to the corresponding facts of consciousness is unthinkable. Granted that a definite thought and a molecular action in the brain occur simultaneously; we do not possess the intellectual organ nor apparently any rudiments of the organ, which would enable us to pass by a process of reasoning from one to the other. They appear together, but we do not know why. Were our minds and senses so expanded, strengthened and illuminated, as to enable us to see and feel the very molecules of the brain; were we capable of following all their motions, all their groupings, all their electric discharges, if such there be; and were we intimately acquainted with the corresponding states of thought and feeling, we should be as far as ever from the solution of the problem, 'How are these physical processes connected with the facts of consciousness?' The chasm between the two classes of phenomena would still remain intellectually impassable» — habla Tyndall, y su concesión es la que la obra necesita: aun conociendo cada molécula y cada descarga del cerebro, el abismo entre proceso físico y hecho de conciencia seguiría siendo intelectualmente infranqueable. El volumen reimprime este pasaje en otro lugar; ésta es su primera aparición.

«Not even in Egypt were botany and mineralogy so extensively studied as by the savants of archaic Middle Asia. Sprengel, unjust and prejudiced as he shows himself in everything else, confesses this much in his Histoire de la Medicine» — la primacía oriental la apoya en Sprengel, a quien llama injusto y prejuicioso en todo lo demás; el reconocimiento cuenta justamente por venir de un adversario.

«With the Hindus it was and is more esoteric, if possible, than it was even among the Egyptian priests. So sacred was it deemed that its existence was only half admitted, and it was only practiced in public emergencies» — explica por qué la magia india es la menos conocida: más esotérica que la egipcia, y practicada solo en emergencias públicas.

«While the miracles recorded in the Bible have become accepted facts with the Christians, to disbelieve which is regarded as infidelity, the narratives of wonders and prodigies found in the Atharva-Veda, either provoke their contempt or are viewed as evidences of diabolism» — el doble rasero que denuncia: los prodigios bíblicos son hechos y los del Atharva-Veda, desprecio o diablura.

«Moreover, as the Vedas have now been proved by scholars to antedate the Jewish Bible by many ages, the inference is an easy one that if one of them has borrowed from the other, the Hindu sacred books are not to be charged with plagiarism» — el argumento cronológico con que decide la dirección del préstamo, apoyado en lo que dice establecido por los eruditos.

«First of all, their cosmogony shows how erroneous has been the opinion prevalent among the civilized nations that Brahma was ever considered by the Hindus their chief or Supreme God. Brahma is a secondary deity, and like Jehovah is "a mover of the waters." He is the creating god, and has in his allegorical representations four heads, answering to the four cardinal points. He is the demiurgos, the architect of the world» — corrige lo que da por creencia extendida en Occidente: Brahma no es el dios supremo de los hindúes sino una deidad secundaria, demiurgo y arquitecto.

«This is as identical as possible with the Egyptian cosmogony, which shows in its opening sentences Athtor or Mother Night (which represents illimitable darkness) as the primeval element which covered the infinite abyss, animated by water and the universal spirit of the Eternal, dwelling alone in Chaos» — empareja esa escena con la Athtor o Noche Madre egipcia y con el espíritu de Dios del Génesis, y de ahí saca la identidad de las tres.

«The sprig of lilies placed in the hand of the archangel, who offers them to the Virgin Mary, in the pictures of the "Annunciation," have in their esoteric symbolism precisely the same meaning» — lleva la lectura simbólica hasta la Anunciación cristiana: el ramo de lirios del arcángel tendría el mismo sentido esotérico que el loto.

«With the Hindus, the lotus is the emblem of the productive power of nature, through the agency of fire and water (spirit and matter)» — la clave del símbolo: fuego y agua, espíritu y materia, y por eso lo llama emblema del poder productor de la naturaleza.

«Wherever the mystic water-lily (lotus) is employed, it signifies the emanation of the objective from the concealed, or subjective--the eternal thought of the ever-invisible Deity passing from the abstract into the concrete or visible form» — generaliza el símbolo a las tres tradiciones: dondequiera que aparece, significa el paso de lo oculto a lo objetivo, del pensamiento eterno a la forma visible.

«At this first stage of action, Brahma had not yet become the architect, the builder of the universe, for he had, like the architect, to first acquaint himself with the plan, and realize the ideal forms which were buried in the bosom of the Eternal One, as the future lotus-leaves are concealed within the seed of that plant» — el símil del arquitecto que aún no conoce el plano, con las hojas del loto ya formadas dentro de la semilla como imagen de las formas arquetípicas.

«but the universe is itself Brahma, and he is the universe. This is the philosophy of Spinoza, which he derived from that of Pythagoras; and it is the same for which Bruno died a martyr» — enlaza el panteísmo que lee en Brahma con Spinoza, y a Spinoza con Pitágoras, y pone la muerte de Bruno al final de esa misma cadena.

«Bruno was slaughtered for the exegesis of a symbol that was adopted by the earliest Christians, and expounded by the apostles» — su lectura del caso Bruno: lo mataron por interpretar un símbolo que los primeros cristianos ya habían adoptado.

«With them, God is an Entity totally per se, an Infinite Spirit, and the only Being utterly free and independent of either effects or other causes; who, through that same Will which produced all things and gave the first impulse to every cosmic law, perpetually keeps in existence and order everything in the universe» — resume lo que Bruno y Spinoza tendrían en común sobre la Primera Causa, y anota que Bruno confiesa a Pitágoras por fuente mientras Spinoza no lo reconoce.

«both Spinoza and Bruno were led to the conclusion that God is to be sought for within nature and not without» — la conclusión compartida, que empareja con los *swabhavikas* hindúes a los que dice que se llama ateos por error.

«Professor Draper asserts most positively that Bruno did not believe in the immortality of the soul» — registra la posición de Draper antes de disputarla: para él, Bruno murió sin creer en la inmortalidad del alma.

«The Egyptian hierophants, notwithstanding the practice of a stern and pure morality, could not be compared for one moment with the ascetical Gymnosophists, either in holiness of life or miraculous powers developed in them by the supernatural adjuration of everything earthly. By those who knew them well they were held in still greater reverence than the magians of Chaldea» — pone a los gimnosofistas por encima de los hierofantes egipcios y de los magos caldeos, y funda la comparación en la santidad de vida y en la renuncia, no en el rito; el pasaje se reimprime más adelante en el volumen.

«To attempt to say whether these Gymnosophists were the real founders of magic in India, or whether they only practiced what had passed to them as an inheritance from the earliest Rishis --the seven primeval sages--would be regarded as a mere speculation by exact scholars» — marca ella misma el límite de lo que puede afirmar sobre el origen: si fundaron la magia india o la heredaron de los siete Rishis primitivos sería, para el erudito exacto, mera especulación.

«To these men no secret power of either plant or mineral was unknown. They had fathomed nature to its depths, while psychology and physiology were to them open books» — lo que reclama para esos hombres: haber sondeado la naturaleza hasta el fondo, con la psicología y la fisiología por libros abiertos. La frase remata en la plana siguiente llamando *machagiotia* a esa ciencia, con esa grafía.

«the rudimental universe, submerged in water, reposed in the bosom of the Eternal. Sprang from this chaos and darkness, Brahma, the architect of the world, poised on a lotus-leaf floated (moved?) upon the waters, unable to discern anything but water and darkness» — la cosmogonía hindú la cita de la *Mythologie des Indous* de Polier, con Brahma flotando sobre una hoja de loto y sin ver más que agua y tinieblas.

«His thought made visible; and before the Christian era, from the Trimurti of the Hindus down to the three kabalistic heads of the Jewish-explained scriptures, the triune godhead of each nation was fully defined and substantiated in its allegories» — generaliza la tríada a todas las religiones primitivas, de la Trimurti hindú a las tres cabezas kabalísticas, y en el renglón siguiente deja al credo cristiano como injerto tardío sobre el tronco viejo.

«But Professor Draper seems to have a very superficial knowledge of the true belief of the philosophers» — la réplica a Draper es de competencia: no le disputa el dato sino el conocimiento de lo que esos filósofos creían.

«But as for Giordano Bruno, if he adhered to the doctrines of Pythagoras he must have believed in another life, hence, he could not have been an atheist whose philosophy offered him no such "consolation."» — el argumento es condicional y ella lo deja así: si Bruno era pitagórico, tuvo que creer en otra vida, y entonces no fue el ateo sin consuelo que describe Draper.

«In common with the Alexandrian Platonists, and the later Kabalists, he held that Jesus was a magician in the sense given to this appellation by Porphyry and Cicero, who call it the divina sapientia (divine knowledge), and by Philo Judaes, who described the Magi as the most wonderful inquirers into the hidden mysteries of nature, not in the degrading sense given to the word magic in our century» — la adjudicación que le hace a Bruno: Jesús como mago en el sentido que Porfirio y Cicerón llamaban *divina sapientia*, no en el sentido degradado del siglo XIX.

«In his noble conception, the Magi were holy men, who, setting themselves apart from everything else on this earth, contemplated the divine virtues and understood the divine nature of the gods and spirits, the more clearly; and so, initiated others into the same mysteries, which consist in one holding an uninterrupted intercourse with these invisible beings during life» — y la definición de mago que le atribuye: hombres santos apartados de todo, que contemplan las virtudes divinas y mantienen trato ininterrumpido con seres invisibles.

«I, Zuane Mocenigo, son of the most illustrious Ser Marcantonio, denounce to your very reverend fathership, by constraint of my conscience and by order of my confessor, that I have heard say by Giordano Bruno, several times when he discoursed with me in my house, that it is great blasphemy in Catholics to say that the bread transubstantiates itself into flesh; that he is opposed to the Mass; that no religion pleases him» — habla el acusador Mocenigo, no Bruno: la denuncia veneciana la trae la obra íntegra y por su valor documental.

«that there is no punishment of sin, and that souls created by the operation of nature pass from one animal to another, and that as the brute animals are born of corruption, so also are men when after dissolution they come to be born again» — el cargo que a la obra le sirve: aun en boca hostil, la metempsicosis atribuida a Bruno indica que creía en la supervivencia bajo alguna forma.

«Perfidious as they are, the above words plainly indicate the belief of Bruno in the Pythagorean metempsychosis, which, misunderstood as it is, still shows a belief in the survival of man in one shape or another» — lo dice con su reserva puesta: las palabras son pérfidas y la metempsicosis está mal entendida, y aun así muestran creencia en la supervivencia.

«He has shown indications of wishing to make himself the author of a new sect, under the name of 'New Philosophy.' He has said that the Virgin could not have brought forth, and that our Catholic faith is all full of blasphemies against the majesty of God; that the monks ought to be deprived of the right of disputation and their revenues, because they pollute the world; that they are all asses, and that our opinions are doctrines of asses; that we have no proof that our faith has merit with God, and that not to do to others what we would not have done to ourselves suffices for a good life, and that he laughs at all other sins, and wonders how God can endure so many heresies in Catholics. He says that he means to apply himself to the art of divination, and make all the world run after him; that St. Thomas and all the Doctors knew nothing to compare with him, and that he could ask questions of all the first theologians of the world that they could not answer» — sigue la denuncia de Mocenigo, con el proyecto de la Nueva Filosofía y el propósito de dedicarse al arte de la adivinación.

«I hold, in brief, to an infinite universe, that is, an effect of infinite divine power, because I esteemed it a thing unworthy of divine goodness and power, that being able to produce besides this world another and infinite others, it should produce a finite world» — habla Bruno en su confesión: el universo infinito se sigue de que sería indigno del poder divino producir uno finito pudiendo producir infinitos.

«Thus I have declared that there are infinite particular worlds similar to this of the earth, which, with Pythagoras, I understand to be a star similar in nature with the moon, the other planets, and the other stars, which are infinite; and that all those bodies are worlds, and without number, which thus constitute the infinite universality in an infinite space, and this is called the infinite universe, in which are innumerable worlds, so that there is a double kind of infinite greatness in the universe, and of a multitude of worlds» — la pluralidad de mundos, que Bruno declara tomada de Pitágoras: la tierra es una estrella de la misma naturaleza que la luna y los planetas.

«Moreover, I place in this universe a universal Providence, by virtue of which everything lives, vegetates and moves, and stands in its perfection, and I understand it in two ways; one, in the mode in which the whole soul is present in the whole and every part of the body, and this I call nature, the shadow and footprint of divinity; the other, the ineffable mode in which God, by essence, presence, and power, is in all and above all, not as part, not as soul, but in mode inexplicable» — Bruno distingue dos modos de la providencia: uno que llama naturaleza, sombra y huella de la divinidad, y otro inefable.

«Together with the theologians and great philosophers, I apprehend three attributes, power, wisdom, and goodness, or, rather, mind, intellect, love, with which things have first, being, through the mind; next, ordered and distinct being, through the intellect; and third, concord and symmetry, through love» — los tres atributos con que Bruno ordena su metafísica —mente, intelecto, amor— y lo que cada uno aporta al ser.

«Thus, in regard to the Holy Spirit in a third person, I have not been able to comprehend, as ought to be believed, but, according to the Pythagoric manner, in conformity to the manner shown by Solomon, I have understood it as the soul of the universe, or adjoined to the universe» — Bruno confiesa no comprender la tercera persona como se le pide creerla, y la entiende a la manera pitagórica como alma del universo, apoyándose en Salomón y en un pasaje de la *Eneida*.

«From this spirit, then, which is called the life of the universe, I understand, in my philosophy, proceeds life and soul to everything which has life and soul, which, moreover, I understand to be immortal, as also to bodies, which, as to their substance, are all immortal, there being no other death than division and congregation» — la inmortalidad que Bruno afirma alcanza también a los cuerpos: no hay más muerte que división y congregación.

«Furthermore, Bruno confesses his inability to comprehend the doctrine of three persons in the godhead, and his doubts of the incarnation of God in Jesus, but firmly pronounces his belief in the miracles of Christ» — la obra resume el saldo de la confesión y lo explica por su pitagorismo: creer en los milagros le resultaba obligado.

«If, under the merciless constraint of the Inquisition, he, like Galileo, subsequently recanted, and threw himself upon the clemency of his ecclesiastical persecutors, we must remember that he spoke like a man standing between the rack and the fagot, and human nature cannot always be heroic when the corporeal frame is debilitated by torture and imprisonment» — la retractación no la esconde ni la excusa del todo: la sitúa entre el potro y la hoguera y recuerda que la naturaleza humana no siempre es heroica.

«But now we see that their hero of an hour is neither atheist, materialist, nor positivist, but simply a Pythagorean who taught the philosophy of Upper Asia, and claimed to possess the powers of the magicians, so despised by Draper's own school» — el saldo que le saca al libro de Berti: el héroe de la ciencia exacta resulta un pitagórico que enseñaba la filosofía del Alto Asia y reclamaba poderes de mago.

«Thus, search where we may through the archives of history, we find that there is no fragment of modern philosophy--whether Newtonian, Cartesian, Huxleyian or any other--but has been dug from the Oriental mines» — la tesis general del capítulo, dicha sin excepciones: ningún fragmento de la filosofía moderna deja de venir de las minas orientales.

«Even Positivism and Nihilism find their prototype in the exoteric portion of Kapila's philosophy, as is well remarked by Max Muller» — y el ejemplo con que la remata, apoyado en Max Müller: el positivismo y el nihilismo tendrían su prototipo en la parte exotérica de la filosofía de Kapila.

«Two volumes of over fifteen hundred pages are the result, proving the effects, denying the cause, and employing superhuman efforts to invent every other possible explanation that could be suggested rather than the true one» — el juicio sobre de Gasparin: prueba los efectos y niega la causa, y gasta esfuerzos sobrehumanos en inventar cualquier explicación menos la verdadera.

«the representatives of the exact sciences are on their way to become . . . the Inquisitors of our days. . . . Facts are stronger than Academies. Rejected, denied, mocked, they nevertheless are facts, and do exist» — habla de Gasparin contestando al *Journal des Débats*, que había propuesto mandar al manicomio a quien siguiera creyendo tras el análisis de Faraday.

«The experimenters have often seen the legs of the table glued, so to say, to the floor, and, notwithstanding the excitement of those present, refuse to be moved from their place. On other occasions they have seen the tables levitated in quite an energetic way. They heard, with their own ears, loud as well as gentle raps, the former threatening to shatter the table to pieces on account of their violence, the latter so soft as to become hardly perceptible» — habla de Gasparin describiendo lo que él y el profesor Thury presenciaron; la obra lo cita como testimonio ajeno y verificable, no como doctrina propia.

«As to LEVITATIONS WITHOUT CONTACT, we found means to produce them easily, and with success. . . . And such levitations do not pertain to isolated results. We have reproduced them over THIRTY times» — el dato que la obra subraya de ese testimonio: la repetición, treinta veces, es lo que lo saca del caso aislado.

«On one occasion we willed it to turn upside down, and it turned over, with its legs in the air, notwithstanding that our fingers never touched it once» — y el detalle que a de Gasparin le importa: la mesa obedeció a la voluntad sin que los dedos la tocaran.

«Since 1850, des Mousseaux and de Mirville, uncompromising Roman Catholics, have published many volumes whose titles are cleverly contrived to attract public attention. They betray on the part of the authors a very serious alarm, which, moreover, they take no pains to conceal» — lee la alarma de los autores católicos como síntoma, y de ahí saca su argumento: si los fenómenos fueran espurios, Roma no se habría molestado tanto en reprimirlos.

«Both sides having agreed upon the facts, leaving skeptics out of the question, people could divide themselves into but two parties: the believers in the direct agency of the devil, and the believers in disembodied and other spirits» — fija el mapa del debate una vez descartados los escépticos: solo quedan dos partidos, el del diablo y el de los espíritus.

«The fact alone, that theology dreaded a great deal more the revelations which might come through this mysterious agency than all the threatening "conflicts" with Science and the categorical denials of the latter, ought to have opened the eyes of the most skeptical» — el argumento por el miedo: la teología temía más a esas revelaciones que a todos los conflictos con la ciencia.

«Robert Houdin, Comte, Hamilton and Bosco, slept secure in their beds, while she persecuted such men as Paracelsus, Cagliostro, and Mesmer, the Hermetic philosophers and mystics--and effectually stopped every genuine manifestation of an occult nature by killing the mediums» — el contraste con que sostiene que la Iglesia distinguía perfectamente: dejó dormir a los prestidigitadores y persiguió a Paracelso, Cagliostro y Mesmer.

«who, upon being called as an expert by the Academy to witness the wonderful clairvoyant powers and occasional mistakes of a table, said: "We jugglers never make mistakes, and my second-sight never failed me yet» — habla Robert Houdin, el rey de los ilusionistas, llamado como perito: la obra usa su frase como el mejor testimonio a favor de la realidad de la fuerza.

«Comte, if we may believe the witnesses, laughed in the face of Babinet at the bare suggestion that the raps were produced by "unconscious ventriloquism!" The latter theory, worthy twin-sister of "unconscious cerebration," caused many of the most skeptical academicians to blush. Its absurdity was too apparent» — y el segundo perito le sale igual de mal a la Academia: el ventrílocuo Comte se rió de la teoría del ventriloquismo inconsciente.

«The number of facts which claim their place in the broad daylight of truth, has so much increased of late, that of two consequences one is henceforth inevitable: either the domain of natural sciences must consent to expand itself, or the domain of the supernatural will become so enlarged as to have no bounds» — habla de Gasparin, y su disyuntiva es la que la obra hace suya: o el dominio de las ciencias naturales se ensancha, o el de lo sobrenatural crece sin límite.

«According to the authors, he who was "a liar and murderer from the beginning," was also the principal motor of spiritual phenomena. He had been for thousands of years at the head of pagan theurgy; and it was he, again, who, encouraged by the increase of heresies, infidelity, and atheism, had reappeared in our century» — resume la tesis de de Mirville y des Mousseaux: el mismo agente que dirigió la teurgia pagana durante milenios habría reaparecido en el siglo XIX.

«The work of M. de Mirville is a real manifesto. . . . I would be glad to see in it the expression of a strictly individual opinion, but, in truth, it is impossible. The success of the work, these solemn adhesions, the faithful reproduction of its theses by the journals and writers of the party, the solidarity established throughout between them and the whole body of catholicity . . . everything goes to show a work which is essentially an act, and has the value of a collective labor» — habla de Gasparin: lo que le obliga a responder no es la opinión individual sino la adhesión colectiva de la prensa y del cuerpo del catolicismo.

«The Devil is the chief pillar of Faith. He is one of the grand personages whose life is closely allied to that of the church; and without his speech which issued out so triumphantly from the mouth of the Serpent, his medium, the fall of man could not have taken place. Thus, if it was not for him, the Saviour, the Crucified, the Redeemer, would be but the most ridiculous of supernumeraries, and the Cross an insult to good sense» — habla des Mousseaux ante la Academia, y la obra lo cita entero porque la consecuencia la firma él: sin el diablo, el Redentor sería un comparsa ridículo.

«This writer, be it remembered, is only the faithful echo of the church, which anathematizes equally the one who denies God and him who doubts the objective existence of Satan» — y el comentario que le pone: la Iglesia anatematiza por igual a quien niega a Dios y a quien duda de la existencia objetiva de Satán.

«These mysterious apparitions have invariably indicated the chastening hand of God on earth» — la ley es de Goerres y la cita de Mirville para leer las apariciones de 1853 como presagio de catástrofe.

«Evidently science has neither completely conquered nor muzzled theology. She will master her only on that day when she will condescend to see in the spiritual phenomenon something besides mere hallucination and charlatanry» — la condición que le pone a la ciencia para vencer a la teología, y la pregunta que sigue: cómo hacerlo sin investigar el fenómeno a fondo.

«des Mousseaux, de Mirville and other fanatics who laid the whole of the spiritual phenomena at the door of Satan, was long and fierce» — presenta el pleito por sus bandos confesionales antes que por sus argumentos: el protestante de Gasparin contra los católicos que atribuían todo el fenómeno espiritual a Satán. La frase arranca del otro lado de la costura de plana.

«to say that the whole of the trick consisted simply in the reiterated displacement of one of the muscular tendons of the legs. Great demonstration of the system in full sitting of the Institute--and on the spot . . . expressions of Academical gratitude for this interesting communication, and, a few days later, a full assurance given to the public by a professor of the medical faculty, that, scientists having pronounced their opinion, the mystery was at last unravelled» — habla de Mirville sobre la explicación por el desplazamiento de un tendón presentada al Instituto, y sobre la gratitud académica que siguió.

«all muscular movements are determined over bodies by levers of the third order, in which the fulcrum is very near to the point where the force acts. This, consequently, communicates a great speed to the mobile parts for the very little distance which the motor force has to run. . . . Some persons are astonished to see a table subjected to the action of several well-disposed individuals in a fair way to conquer powerful obstacles, even break its legs, when suddenly stopped; but that is very simple if we consider the power of the little concordant actions. . . . Once more, the physical explanation offers no difficulty» — habla Babinet, con su mecánica de palancas de tercer orden; la obra lo cita entero para que el argumento se sostenga o caiga por sí solo.

«In this dissertation, two results are clearly shown: the reality of the phenomena proved, and the scientific explanation made ridiculous» — el saldo que le saca a esa explicación: deja en pie el hecho mientras se desacredita a sí misma.

«There is one thing, though, that Babinet has always stoutly denied, viz.: the levitation of furniture without contact. De Mirville catches him proclaiming that such levitation is impossible: "simply impossible," he says, "as impossible as perpetual motion» — aísla la negación absoluta de Babinet sobre la levitación sin contacto, y la equipara al movimiento perpetuo tal como él la formuló.

«Who can take upon himself, after such a declaration, to maintain that the word impossible pronounced by science is infallible» — la pregunta con que convierte esa negación en argumento propio contra la infalibilidad de la palabra *imposible*.

«What can we finally say of all these facts brought under our observation? Are there such raps produced? Yes. Do such raps answer questions? Yes. Who produces these sounds? The mediums. By what means? By the ordinary acoustic method of the ventriloquists. But we were given to suppose that these sounds might result from the cracking of the toes and fingers? No; for then they would always proceed from the same point, and such is not the fact» — el diálogo que Babinet publicó consigo mismo en la *Revue des Deux Mondes*: admite los golpes y las respuestas, y los atribuye al método acústico de los ventrílocuos.

«and thus according to our great physicist, the tables turn very quickly, very energetically, resist likewise, and, as M. de Gasparin has proved, they levitate without contact» — habla de Mirville, resumiendo lo que el propio Babinet concedió: las mesas giran, resisten y —según sostuvo de Gasparin— levitan sin contacto. A Babinet le reprocha enseguida no haber sugerido al menos, como aquél, alguna ley o fuerza todavía desconocida.

«At the precise moment predicted by a sorcerer"--case of revenge--"a violent clap of thunder was heard above one of the chimneys of the presbytery, after which the fluid descended with a formidable noise through that passage, threw down believers as well as skeptics (as to the power of the sorcerer) who were warming themselves by the fire; and, having filled the room with a multitude of fantastic animals, returned to the chimney, and having reascended it, disappeared, after producing the same terrible noise» — el prodigio de Cideville, autenticado ante la justicia, del que el propio de Mirville dice haber retrocedido por enorme; la obra lo trae por lo que vendrá después.

«But Babinet, who in common with his learned colleagues had made such fun of the two writers on demonology, and who was determined, moreover, to prove the absurdity of all like stories, felt himself obliged to discredit the above-mentioned fact of the Cideville phenomena, by presenting one still more incredible» — la maniobra que le imputa a Babinet: para desacreditar el prodigio de Cideville, presentó otro más increíble todavía.

«Immediately after that he perceived a globe of fire, as large as the head of a child, come out quietly and softly from within the grate and slowly move about the room, without touching the bricks of the floor. The aspect of this fire-globe was that of a young cat, of middle size . . . moving itself without the use of its paws» — habla Babinet ante la Academia de Ciencias en 1852, y la obra lo reproduce *verbatim* desde las *Œuvres de F. Arago*: el globo de fuego con aspecto de gato.

«The fire-globe went directly to that hole, unglued the paper without damaging it, and reasscended the chimney . . . when it arrived at the top, which it did very slowly . . . at least sixty feet above ground . . . it produced a most frightful explosion, which partly destroyed the chimney» — el remate del relato de Babinet, con el papel despegado sin daño y la explosión sesenta pies más arriba.

«that we could apply to M. Babinet the following remark made by a very witty woman to Raynal, 'If you are not a Christian, it is not for lack of faith» — la pulla es de Mirville y la obra la recoge: si Babinet no es cristiano, no será por falta de fe.

«However, we leave it to others to explain, if they can, the essence of a fire-globe emitting no sensation of heat, having the aspect of a cat, slowly promenading in a room, which finds means to escape by reascending the chimney through an aperture in the wall covered over with a paper which it unglues without damaging» — habla el doctor Boudin en su obra sobre el rayo: acepta el relato porque lo admiten Babinet y Arago, y por eso mismo le niega el nombre de rayo esférico.

«and we do not see why we should not have in future lightning in the shape of a dog, of a monkey, etc., etc. One shudders at the bare idea of a whole meteorological menagerie, which, thanks to thunder, might come down to our rooms to promenade themselves at will» — la ironía de la casa de fieras meteorológica es de de Mirville, y la obra la usa para cerrar el caso.

«In questions of testimony, certitude must absolutely cease the moment we cross the borders of the supernatural» — habla de Gasparin, y su regla es la que la obra va a desmontar: la certeza del testimonio se acabaría justo al cruzar la frontera de lo sobrenatural.

«Which of the two is better entitled to become the public arbiter? Is it the party of superstition, which is supported in its testimony by the evidence of many thousands of people» — la pregunta que le devuelve: entre miles de testigos de Cideville y el sastre único del globo de fuego, cuál de los dos testimonios funda ciencia.

«Suppose, moreover, that the professor had heard much of certain superstitious people who used that kind of magnetized needles to converse with unseen intelligences. That they received signals and even held correct conversations with them by means of the tippings of such a needle, and that in consequence he suddenly felt a scientific horror and disgust for such an ignorant belief, and refused, point-blank, to have anything to do with such a needle. What would have been the result? Electro-magnetism might not have been discovered till now, and our experimentalists would have been the principal losers thereby» — la parábola de Oersted con que argumenta el costo de la fobia: si el descubridor del electromagnetismo hubiera repudiado la aguja magnetizada por el uso supersticioso que otros le daban, el hallazgo se habría perdido.

«the author finally arrived at the conclusion that all these phenomena are to be accounted for by the action of natural causes, and do not require the supposition of miracles, nor the intervention of spirits and diabolical influences» — habla Crookes en el *Quarterly Journal of Science*, resumiendo a de Gasparin: los fenómenos se explicarían por causas naturales, sin milagro ni espíritus.

«Gasparin considers it as a fact fully established by his experiments, that the will, in certain states of organism, can act at a distance on inert matter, and most of his work is devoted to ascertaining the laws and conditions under which this action manifests itself» — sigue Crookes: para de Gasparin queda establecido que la voluntad, en ciertos estados del organismo, actúa a distancia sobre materia inerte.

«it was then demonstrated by his own work that as he was a Protestant, in point of religious fanaticism, he was as little to be relied upon as des Mousseaux and de Mirville» — aplica el mismo descuento a los dos bandos: el calvinista de Gasparin no es más fiable que los católicos a los que refuta, porque los tres escriben desde un fanatismo.

«In such matters as the nature of the so-called spiritual phenomena, no evidence can be relied upon, except the disinterested testimony of cold unprejudiced witnesses and science» — y de ahí su criterio de prueba, que excluye a los tres: solo vale el testimonio desinteresado y frío.

«The above proves only that de Gasparin makes no difference between phenomena purely magnetic, produced by the persevering will of the sitters among whom there may be not even a single medium, developed or undeveloped, and the so-called spiritual ones» — su objeción es de clasificación: de Gasparin confunde los fenómenos magnéticos, que produce la voluntad perseverante del círculo, con los espirituales.

«The mesmerizer wills a thing, and if he is powerful enough, that thing is done. The medium, even if he had an honest purpose to succeed, may get no manifestations at all; the less he exercises his will, the better the phenomena: the more he feels anxious, the less he is likely to get anything; to mesmerize requires a positive nature, to be a medium a perfectly passive one» — la regla que opone, y que dice sabida por cualquier médium: mesmerizar pide naturaleza positiva y la mediumnidad, una pasiva; cuanto menos voluntad ejerce el médium, mejores los fenómenos.

«of wills other than those of men and animals» — el punto del *memoire* de Thury que escandalizó a su amigo religioso: la posible intervención de voluntades que no son de hombres ni de animales.

«I feel, sir, the justness of your observations in relation to the last pages of this memoire: they may provoke a very bad feeling for me on the part of scientists in general. I regret it the more as my determination seems to affect you so much; nevertheless, I persist in my resolution, because I think it a duty, to shirk which would be a kind of treason» — habla Thury en su carta de 1854 a de Gasparin: reconoce que su tesis le hará mal entre los científicos y aun así se niega a retirarla.

«If, against all expectations, there were some truth in Spiritualism, by abstaining from saying on the part of science, as I conceive it to be, that the absurdity of the belief in the intervention of spirits is not as yet demonstrated scientifically (for such is the resume, and the thesis of the past pages of my memoire), by abstaining from saying it to those who, after having read my work, will feel inclined to experiment with the phenomena, I might risk to entice such persons on a path many issues of which are very equivocal» — la reserva de Thury va dentro de su propia frase: no afirma el espiritismo, solo dice que su absurdo no está científicamente demostrado, y teme empujar a otros a un camino equívoco callándolo.

«If I wanted to sustain now the theory of the intervention of disembodied spirits, I would have no power for it, for the facts which are made known are not sufficient for the demonstration of such a hypothesis» — Thury marca su propio límite: los hechos conocidos no bastan para sostener la hipótesis de los espíritus desencarnados.

«Willingly or not, all the scientists must learn, through experience and their own errors, to suspend their judgment as to things which they have not sufficiently examined» — y su conclusión, que es la lección que la obra quiere: suspender el juicio sobre lo que no se ha examinado bastante.

«It explains all, and the table resists pressure and guidance! It explains all, and a piece of furniture which nobody touches follows the fingers pointed at it; it levitates (without contact), and it turns itself upside down» — habla de Gasparin contra los seguidores de Faraday, y la obra lo aprovecha: la presión inconsciente no explica que la mesa resista, siga al dedo que la señala y se dé la vuelta.

«People will be advocating miracles, you say--magic! Every new law appears to them as a prodigy. Calm yourselves; I take upon myself the task to quiet those who are alarmed. In the face of such phenomena, we do not cross at all the boundaries of natural law» — habla de Gasparin, tranquilizando a los alarmados: ante esos fenómenos no se cruza en absoluto la frontera de la ley natural. La obra suscribe esa frase y le disputa que él tenga la llave de esa ley.

«Suppose a fluid, emanating from the experimenters, and chiefly from some of them; suppose that the will determined the direction taken by the fluid, and you will readily understand the rotation and levitation of that one of the legs of the table toward which is ejected with every action of the will an excess of fluid. Suppose that the glass causes the fluid to escape, and you will understand how a tumbler placed on the table can interrupt its rotation, and that the tumbler, placed on one of its sides, causes the accumulation of the fluid in the opposite side, which, in consequence of that, is lifted» — la hipótesis del fluido dirigido por la voluntad, que de Gasparin ofrece como interpretación conforme a las leyes ordinarias de la ciencia.

«But how about the intelligence exhibited by the table? What explanation does he give as to answers obtained through the agency of this table to questions? answers which could not possibly have been the "reflections of the brain" of those present (one of the favorite theories of de Gasparin), for their own ideas were quite the reverse of the very liberal philosophy given by this wonderful table? On this he is silent» — la objeción que le deja sin respuesta: las contestaciones de la mesa contradecían las ideas de los presentes, así que no pudieron ser reflejo de sus cerebros.

«As to the announced phenomena, such as the levitation without contact, and the displacement of furniture by invisible hands--unable to demonstrate their impossibility, a priori, no one has the right to treat as absurd the serious evidences which affirm their occurrence» — habla Thury en su libro: no pudiendo demostrar *a priori* la imposibilidad de esos hechos, nadie tiene derecho a tratar de absurdas las evidencias serias que los afirman.

«M. de Gasparin presents us with crude facts, and the explanations following he offers for what they are worth. Breathe on them, and not many will be found standing after this. No, very little, if anything, will remain of his explanations. As to facts, they are henceforth demonstrated» — el veredicto de Thury sobre su colega, separando lo que sobrevive de lo que no: los hechos quedan demostrados, las explicaciones no aguantan un soplo.

«is the will of the experimenter; without the will, one would obtain nothing; you can form the chain (the circle) for twenty-four hours consecutively, without obtaining the least movement» — habla de Gasparin: sin voluntad del experimentador no se obtiene nada, aunque se forme la cadena veinticuatro horas seguidas.

«we may predict beforehand that the thousand and one theories of science will prove of no avail until they will confess that this force, far from being a projection of the accumulated wills of the circle, is, on the contrary, a force which is abnormal, foreign to themselves» — aquí la obra pone su propia tesis, en primera persona del plural: la fuerza no es proyección de las voluntades del círculo, sino ajena a ellas. El adjetivo que sigue, *supra-inteligente*, va partido por el guion de fin de renglón y queda fuera de la cita para no pegar la palabra.

«or agent, pervading in a manner similar to the luminiferous ether of the scientists, all matter, nervous, organic or inorganic, which he terms psychode. He enters into full discussion as to the properties of this state, or form, or matter, and proposes the term ectenic force . . . for the power exerted when the mind acts at a distance through the influence of the psychode» — Crookes resume a Thury: una sustancia que penetra toda materia, nerviosa, orgánica o inorgánica, a la que llama *psychode*, y la fuerza que la mente ejerce a distancia por su medio, la fuerza ecténica.

«We certainly could very easily demonstrate that the two forces are identical, moreover, the astral or sidereal light as explained by the alchemists and Eliphas Levi, in his Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie; and that, under the name of AKASA, or life-principle, this all-pervading force was known to the gymnosophists, Hindu magicians, and adepts of all countries, thousands of years ago; and, that it is still known to them, and used at present by the Thibetan lamas, fakirs, thaumaturgists of all nationalities, and even by many of the Hindu "jugglers."» — la ecuación central del capítulo, dicha como algo que ella podría demostrar: la fuerza psíquica de Crookes, la ecténica de Thury, la luz astral de los alquimistas y de Éliphas Lévi, y el AKASA de los gimnosofistas serían una sola.

«But, if the medium remains conscious, and psycho-physical phenomena occur which indicate a directing intelligence, then, unless it be conceded that he is a "magician," and can project his double, physical exhaustion can signify nothing more than nervous prostration» — la condición que separa un caso del otro: si el médium sigue consciente y hay inteligencia dirigiendo, la explicación por agotamiento nervioso no alcanza, a menos que se le conceda ser mago y proyectar su doble.

«while Professor Thury candidly admits that the phenomena are often produced by "wills not human," and so, of course, gives a qualified endorsement to Mr. Crookes's theory No. 6, the latter, admitting the genuineness of the phenomena, has as yet pronounced no definite opinion as to their cause» — marca la diferencia entre los dos investigadores: Thury admite voluntades no humanas y Crookes acepta los hechos sin pronunciarse sobre la causa.

«That, hampered by the weight of their materialism, and the insufficiency of what they name "the exact sciences" to demonstrate to them tangibly the existence of a spiritual universe, peopled and inhabited much more than our visible one, they are doomed forever to creep around inside that circle, unwilling rather than unable to penetrate beyond its enchanted ring, and explore it in its length and breadth» — el diagnóstico del *cercle vicieux*: no es que no puedan salir del círculo, es que no quieren, y por eso propone la alianza con magnetizadores expertos como Du Potet y Regazzoni.

«A disturbance is created on the invisible waves of the shoreless ocean of space, and the vibration is never wholly lost. Its energy being once carried from the world of matter into the immaterial world will live for ever» — el argumento por continuidad: si la vibración de una nota no se pierde nunca, lo que se llevó del mundo material al inmaterial vive para siempre.

«Would the principle of continuity which exists even for the so-called inorganic matter, for a floating atom, be denied to the spirit, whose attributes are consciousness, memory, mind, LOVE» — y su aplicación al hombre, formulada como pregunta: negarle al espíritu la continuidad que se le concede a un átomo flotante.

«But for a man of science, acquainted with the characteristics of the universal energy, to maintain that life is merely a phenomenon of matter, a species of energy, amounts simply to a confession of his own incapability of analyzing and properly understanding the alpha and the omega even of that--matter» — distingue dos ateísmos: el del ignorante, que le parece comprensible, y el del hombre de ciencia, que le parece confesión de no entender ni siquiera la materia.

«But it is quite another feeling which makes them reject the possibility of spiritual and magical phenomena. The true name for that feeling is--vanity. "We can neither produce nor explain it--hence, it does not exist, and moreover, could never have existed» — le pone nombre al motivo del rechazo, y lo formula como el silogismo que atribuye a los filósofos de su día.

«The book claimed to unveil the whole of the miracles of the Bible as well as those of the Pagan sanctuaries. Its resume ran thus: Long ages of observation; a great knowledge (for those days of ignorance) of natural sciences and philosophy; imposture; legerdemain; optics; phantasmagoria; exaggeration. Final and logical conclusion: Thaumaturgists, prophets, magicians, rascals, and knaves; the rest of the world, fools» — resume así *The Philosophy of Magic* de Salverte, y le imputa una conclusión que reparte a la humanidad entre bribones y tontos.

«The enthusiastic disciples of Iamblichus affirmed that when he prayed, he was raised to the height of ten cubits from the ground; and dupes to the same metaphor, although Christians, have had the simplicity to attribute a similar miracle to St. Clare, and St. Francis of Assisi» — habla Salverte, que trata la levitación de Jámblico como metáfora malentendida; la obra la trae para volvérsela en contra.

«Hundreds of travellers claimed to have seen fakirs produce the same phenomena, and they were all thought either liars or hallucinated. But it was but yesterday that the same phenomenon was witnessed and endorsed by a well-known scientist; it was produced under test conditions; declared by Mr. Crookes to be genuine, and to be beyond the possibility of an illusion or a trick» — y el vuelco: el mismo fenómeno que se le negó a cientos de viajeros lo endosó un científico conocido bajo condiciones de prueba.

«The only difficulty is, to realize the fact that surrounding space is not an empty void, but a reservoir filled to repletion with the models of all things that ever were, that are, and that will be; and with beings of countless races, unlike our own» — su cosmología dicha en una frase: el espacio no es un vacío sino un depósito lleno de los modelos de todo lo que fue, es y será, y de razas de seres distintas de la nuestra.

«Every one who has dared to investigate with thoroughness has found himself compelled to admit their existence; only in their unsuccessful efforts to account for the phenomena on theories based on the laws of such forces as were already known, some of the highest representatives of science have involved themselves in inextricable difficulties» — separa el hecho de la explicación: todos los que investigaron a fondo tuvieron que admitir los fenómenos, y se enredaron al querer explicarlos con las fuerzas ya conocidas.

«First distraction: that of Faraday, who explains the table phenomenon, by the table which pushes you "in consequence of the resistance which pushes it back» — la primera de las cinco *distracciones* que de Mirville cuenta entre los adversarios del espiritismo, y que la obra reproduce con su numeración.

«Fourth distraction: that of the French Institute and its members, who consent to accept the miracles, on condition that the latter will not contradict in any way those natural laws with which they are acquainted» — la cuarta de esa lista, y la que mejor le sirve: aceptar los milagros a condición de que no contradigan las leyes naturales ya conocidas.

«Can the soul, since it is immortal, be anything else than imperishable?" The "seed cannot develop unless it is in part consumed," says Prof. Lecomte; "it is not quickened unless it die» — junta la pregunta de Sócrates a Cebes, al profesor Lecomte sobre la semilla que no se aviva si no muere y a san Pablo, y los usa como una sola cadena de autoridades.

«Truly, no sane man would so sweepingly charge insanity upon four hundred and forty-six millions of people in various parts of the world, who believe in the intercourse of spirits with ourselves» — el argumento de escala con que contesta al patólogo que declara lunáticos a los creyentes.

«The Congress of the United States, at the demand of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, enacts statutes for organization of National Insect Commissions; chemists are busying themselves in boiling frogs and bugs; geologists amuse their leisure by osteological surveys of armor-plated ganoids, and discuss the odontology of the various species of dinichtys; and entomologists suffer their enthusiasm to carry them to the length of supping on grasshoppers boiled, fried, and in soup» — el contraste con que mide la atención pública: comisiones nacionales para los insectos mientras millones de personas quedan sin estudio.

«After eight sittings, upon a shallow pretext, and just when the manifestations were becoming interesting, the commission prejudged the case, and published a decision adverse to the claims of mediumism. Instead of pursuing dignified, scientific methods, they set spies to peep through the key-holes» — y cómo terminó: ocho sesiones, un pretexto endeble, una conclusión adelantada y espías mirando por las cerraduras.

«After such a public exhibition of ignorance and prejudice, Mr. Butlerof, Professor of Chemistry at the St. Petersburg University, and Mr. Aksakof, Counsellor of State in the same city, who had been invited to assist on the committee for mediums, became so disgusted that they withdrew» — registra la retirada de Butlerof y de Aksakof de la comisión, y anota que la prensa mayoritaria los respaldó.

«One hundred and thirty names, of the most influential persons of the best society of St. Petersburg, many of them no spiritualists at all, but simply investigators, added their signatures to the well-deserved protest» — le importa la composición de los firmantes: muchos no eran espiritistas sino investigadores, y por eso cuenta la firma.

«The inevitable result of such a procedure followed; universal attention was drawn to the question of spiritualism; private circles were organized throughout the empire; some of the most liberal journals began to discuss the subject; and, as we write, a new commission is being organized to finish the interrupted task» — el efecto contrario que le atribuye a la condena: círculos privados por todo el imperio y una comisión nueva.

«It is really a pure superstition and nothing else to assume that we are so fully acquainted with the laws of nature, that even carefully examined facts, attested by an experienced observer, ought to be cast aside as utterly unworthy of credit, only because they do not, at first sight, seem to be in keeping with what is most clearly known already» — habla el *London Spectator*: llamar superstición a lo contrario de lo sabido es la superstición verdadera.

«To assume, as Professor Lankester appears to do, that because there are fraud and credulity in plenty to be found in connection with these facts--as there is, no doubt, in connection with all nervous diseases--fraud and credulity will account for all the carefully attested statements of accurate and conscientious observers, is to saw away at the very branch of the tree of knowledge on which inductive science necessarily rests, and to bring the whole structure toppling to the ground» — sigue el *Spectator* contra Lankester: generalizar del fraude probado a todo testimonio atento es serrar la rama sobre la que se apoya la ciencia inductiva.

«Increase of skepticism has developed of late a like increase of credulity. The champions of the Bible "divine" miracles rival the panegyrist's mediumistic phenomena, and the middle ages revive in the nineteenth century» — su lectura del momento: escepticismo y credulidad crecen juntos, y las dos partes en pugna se dan la mano sin saberlo.

«The shrine of Notre Dame de Lourdes has turned into a spiritualistic cabinet for "materializations," while the cabinets of popular American mediums are transformed into sacred shrines, into which Mohammed, Bishop Polk, Joan of Arc and other aristocratic spirits from over the "dark river," having descended, "materialize" in full light» — la simetría con que trata los dos campos, sin salvar a ninguno: el santuario convertido en gabinete y el gabinete en santuario.

«Either both "miracles" are possible, or both kinds of these manifestations, the "divine" as well as the "spiritual," are arrant impostures» — la disyuntiva que impone y que no resuelve aquí: o valen las dos clases de manifestación o ninguna, y dice que solo el tiempo lo dirá.

«I am convinced that, if facts are to be received on human testimony, then has the apparition at Lourdes every claim to be received as an undeniable fact» — habla monseñor Capel, y ésta es la frase que la obra subraya: la Iglesia acepta el milagro divino sobre testimonio humano.

«This makes it clear that the Catholic Church, despite her infallibility and her liberal postage convention with the Kingdom of Heaven, is content to accept even the validity of divine miracles upon human testimony» — y el uso que le da: si la infalibilidad se apoya en testimonio humano, la regla queda abierta para todos.

«Here we have a representative materialist, and a representative Catholic prelate, enunciating an identical view of the sufficiency of human testimony to prove facts that it suits the prejudices of each to believe» — cierra la maniobra: los dos aceptan el testimonio humano cuando les conviene, y por eso no pueden negárselo al ocultista.

«From Kapila, the Hindu philosopher, who many centuries before Christ demurred to the claim of the mystic Yogins, that in ecstasy a man has the power of seeing Deity face to face and conversing with the "highest" beings, down to the Voltaireans of the eighteenth century, who laughed at everything that was held sacred by other people, each age had its unbelieving Thomases» — traza la línea de la incredulidad de Kapila a los volterianos y le niega efecto, como los jueces de Galileo no detuvieron la rotación de la tierra.

«The advertised programme provided for a series of forty seances to test mediums, and invitations were extended to all of this class who chose to come to the Russian capital and submit their powers to examination» — el programa de la comisión de Mendeleyeff en la Universidad Imperial de San Petersburgo, con invitación abierta a los médiums; la obra añade que casi todos se negaron, por presentir la trampa.

«Professor Mendeleyeff declared in a public lecture that spiritualism, or any such belief in our souls' immortality, was a mixture of superstition, delusion, and fraud» — la sentencia de Mendeleyeff en conferencia pública; la frase sigue en la plana siguiente atribuyéndolo todo a aparatos escondidos bajo la ropa de los médiums.

«that these cures effected at the Sanctuary of Lourdes by means of the water of the fountain, have established their supernatural character in the eyes of men of good faith» — habla el doctor Dozous en *La Grotte de Lourdes*, citado por monseñor Capel en el *Times*; la obra lo reproduce por el uso que va a darle, no porque lo suscriba.

«we find him saying that it is upon "human historical evidence that we depend for the greater part of our knowledge for the doings of the past» — habla Huxley en sus conferencias de Nueva York sobre evolución, y la obra lo pone junto al prelado por decir lo mismo sobre el testimonio humano. La comilla de cierre falta en la capa de texto y la cita va como la imprime la fuente.

«In any case, we are for admitting spiritualism to a place among tolerated beliefs, and letting it alone accordingly," says the London Daily News, in 1876. "It has many votaries who are as intelligent as most of us, and to whom any obvious and palpable defect in the evidence meant to convince must have been obvious and palpable long ago. Some of the wisest men in the world believed in ghosts» — habla el *London Daily News* de 1876, que la obra recoge como muestra del vuelco liberal de la prensa secular. La cita se corta aquí porque lo que sigue trae *half-a-dozen* partido por el guion de fin de renglón.

«Whence that identity of primitive conceptions which, fables and legends though they are termed now, contain in them nevertheless the kernel of historical facts, of a truth thickly overgrown with the husks of popular embellishment, but still a truth» — su criterio de lectura de las leyendas: dentro de la envoltura popular hay un núcleo de hecho histórico.

«Provoked at such ingratitude, the eternal gave Brahman a wife of the race of the Daints, or giants, from whom all the Brahmans maternally descend» — el paralelo védico del Génesis vi: el sacerdocio hindú descendería por línea paterna de los espíritus superiores y por la materna de los gigantes.

«In the Edda is given the description to Gangler by Har, one of the three informants (Har, Jafuhar, and Tredi) of the first man, called Bur, "the father of Bor, who took for wife Besla, a daughter of the giant Bolthara, of the race of the primitive giants» — el tercer testigo del mismo patrón, tomado de la *Prose Edda* por Mallett: Bur, Bor y la giganta Besla.

«The same groundwork underlies the Grecian fables about the Titans; and may be found in the legend of the Mexicans--the four successive races of Popol-Vuh» — cierra la serie con los titanes griegos y las cuatro razas del Popol-Vuh, y llama a esa coincidencia uno de los cabos del ovillo psicológico de la humanidad.

«Because spiritualists have committed themselves to many absurdities, that is no reason why the phenomena to which they appeal should be scouted as unworthy of examination. They may be mesmeric, or clairvoyant, or something else. But let our wise men tell us what they are, and not snub us, as ignorant people too often snub inquiring youth, by the easy but unsatisfactory apothegm, 'Little children should not ask questions» — habla *The Christian World*, un periódico religioso, y la obra lo cita porque el argumento le sirve viniendo de donde viene: los absurdos de los espiritistas no descalifican los fenómenos.

«What psychology has long lacked to make its mysterious laws better understood and applied to the ordinary as well as extraordinary affairs of life, is not facts. These it has had in abundance» — su diagnóstico de la carencia: a la psicología no le faltan hechos sino registro, clasificación, observadores entrenados y analistas competentes.

«There has been an infinite confusion of names to express one and the same thing» — la frase que abre el capítulo V y organiza la lista que sigue.

«the Sidereal light of the Rosicrucians; the AKASA of the Hindu adepts; the Astral light of Eliphas Levi; the nerve-aura and the fluid of the magnetists; the od of Reichenbach; the fire-globe, or meteor-cat of Babinet; the Psychod and ectenic force of Thury; the psychic force of Sergeant Cox and Mr. Crookes; the atmospheric magnetism of some naturalists; galvanism; and finally, electricity» — el tramo final de esa lista, donde pone en una misma serie la luz sideral rosacruz, el akasa, la luz astral de Lévi, el od de Reichenbach, el gato meteoro de Babinet, la fuerza psíquica de Crookes y la electricidad.

«but various names for many different manifestations, or effects of the same mysterious, all-pervading cause--the Greek Archeus» — y el nombre único bajo el que los reúne todos: el Arqueo griego, causa que todo lo penetra.

«I have long held an opinion, almost amounting to a conviction, in common, I believe, with many other lovers of natural knowledge, that the various forms under which the forces of matter are made manifest, HAVE ONE COMMON ORIGIN; or, in other words, are so directly related and naturally dependent, that they are convertible, as it were, into one another, and possess equivalents of power in their action» — habla Faraday, citado por Bulwer-Lytton y por la obra: las diversas formas de la fuerza tendrían un origen común y serían convertibles unas en otras.

«Absurd and unscientific as may appear our comparison of a fictitious vril invented by the great novelist, and the primal force of the equally great experimentalist, with the kabalistic astral light, it is nevertheless the true definition of this force» — asume por adelantado el cargo de absurdo y sostiene la comparación: el vril novelesco, la fuerza primordial del experimentador y la luz astral kabalística serían lo mismo.

«an announcement has been made in a number of papers of the supposed discovery of a new force by Mr. Edison, the electrician, of Newark, New Jersey, which force seems to have little in common with electricity, or galvanism, except the principle of conductivity. If demonstrated, it may remain for a long time under some pseudonymous scientific name; but, nevertheless, it will be but one of the numerous family of children brought forth from the commencement of time by our kabalistic mother, the Astral Virgin» — la nueva fuerza de Edison la trata como suposición ajena —*supposed discovery*— y a la vez la anexa a su genealogía.

«Another of the most startling of recent discoveries, is the possibility of annihilating distance between human voices--by means of the telephone (distance-sounder), an instrument invented by Professor A. Graham Bell. This possibility, first suggested by the little "lovers' telegraph," consisting of small tin cups with vellum and drug-twine apparatus, by which a conversation can be carried on at a distance of two hundred feet, has developed into the telephone, which will become the wonder of this age» — registra el teléfono de Graham Bell en el momento de su novedad, con el pequeño telégrafo de amantes como antecedente.

«we may, perhaps, well remind our readers of the many hints to be found in the ancient histories as to a certain secret in the possession of the Egyptian priesthood, who could instantly communicate, during the celebration of the Mysteries, from one temple to another, even though the former were at Thebes» — junto a esos inventos pone el secreto que atribuye al sacerdocio egipcio: comunicarse de templo a templo durante los Misterios; la frase sigue del otro lado de la costura de plana.

«The author of Pre-Adamite Man quotes an instance, which being given merely on his own authority, and he seeming uncertain whether the story comes from Macrinus or some other writer, may be taken for what it is worth» — marca ella misma el descuento que hay que hacerle a la anécdota del hilo de Cleopatra: la da por lo que valga, y anota que el autor ni siquiera está seguro de su fuente.

«It is in these ridiculously expressed fables that science will have to look for her "missing links."» — la promesa metodológica del capítulo: es en esas fábulas ridículas, dice, donde la ciencia tendrá que buscar sus eslabones perdidos.

«but merely as an empty fancy, would be to utter as great an absurdity as the theological doctrine that the universe sprang into creation out of nothing» — el argumento con que niega que la creencia en lo sobrenatural haya crecido sin causa: sería tan absurdo como la doctrina teológica de la creación a partir de nada.

«If error has prevailed and superstition run riot these many centuries throughout Christendom, it is the misfortune of the common people» — el reparto de responsabilidades: la desgracia es del pueblo llano y —según remata en la plana siguiente— el reproche, de la ciencia.

«The vapors of certain nitrites, iodides, and acids are subjected to the action of the light in an experimental tube, lying horizontally, and so arranged that the axis of the tube and that of the parallel beams issuing from the lamp are coincident. The vapors form clouds of gorgeous tints, and arrange themselves into the shapes of vases, of bottles and cones, in nests of six or more; of shells, of tulips, roses, sunflowers, leaves, and of involved scrolls» — habla Tyndall describiendo su experimento con vapores bajo luz concentrada; la obra lo cita entero antes de usarlo.

«once it positively assumed the form of a fish, with eyes, gills, and feelers. The twoness of the animal form was displayed throughout, and no disk, coil, or speck existed on one side that did not exist on the other» — el detalle del experimento de Tyndall que a la obra le interesa: la simetría del pez formado por el vapor.

«But how account for the fish, the serpent's head, the vases, the flowers of different varieties, the shells? This seems to offer a dilemma to science as baffling as the meteor-cat of Babinet» — le devuelve a la ciencia su propio dilema, y le reconoce a Tyndall no haber inventado una explicación tan absurda como la del francés.

«The so-called miracles, to begin with Moses and end with Cagliostro, when genuine, were as de Gasparin very justly insinuates in his work on the phenomena, "perfectly in accordance with natural law"; hence--no miracles» — la primera de sus dos proposiciones categóricas, apoyada en de Gasparin: los prodigios genuinos serían conformes a la ley natural, y por eso no hay milagro.

«The phenomena of natural magic to be witnessed in Siam, India, Egypt, and other Oriental countries, bear no relationship whatever to sleight of hand; the one being an absolute physical effect, due to the action of occult natural forces, the other, a mere deceptive result obtained by dexterous manipulations supplemented with confederacy» — la segunda proposición: la magia natural de Oriente es efecto físico de fuerzas ocultas y no tiene relación con la prestidigitación.

«The thaumaturgists of all periods, schools, and countries, produced their wonders, because they were perfectly familiar with the imponderable--in their effects--but otherwise perfectly tangible waves of the astral light. They controlled the currents by guiding them with their will-power» — la explicación única que da para todos los taumaturgos: familiaridad con las ondas de la luz astral y control de sus corrientes por la voluntad.

«Mesmerism is the most important branch of magic; and its phenomena are the effects of the universal agent which underlies all magic and has produced at all ages the so-called miracles» — la jerarquía que fija: el mesmerismo como rama principal de la magia, y sus fenómenos como efectos del agente universal.

«This last appellation indicates its magnetic properties and shows its magical nature. For, as truly expressed by one of its enemies--μαγος and μαγνες are two branches growing from the same trunk, and shooting forth the same resultants» — la etimología con que enlaza magia y magnetismo, y que declara tomada de un adversario: *magos* y *magnes* serían dos ramas de un mismo tronco.

«The word Magh, magus, is derived from the Sanskrit Mahaji, the great or wise (the anointed by the divine wisdom» — la etimología que prefiere a la geográfica: contra quienes derivan el imán de la ciudad de Magnesia, ella deriva *magus* del sánscrito.

«It was the country and stone which were called after the Magi, not the Magi after one or the other» — invierte la dirección de la derivación y apoya la distinción de nombres en Sócrates, que atribuye a Eurípides la piedra magnesia y al vulgo la heraclea.

«Pliny informs us that the wedding-ring among the Romans was magnetized by the priests before the ceremony» — el dato lo atribuye a Plinio, y a continuación anota que los historiadores paganos callaban sobre los misterios de los Magos.

«Modern science, after having ineffectually denied animal magnetism, has found herself forced to accept it as a fact. It is now a recognized property of human and animal organization; as to its psychological, occult influence, the Academies battle with it, in our century, more ferociously than ever» — separa las dos batallas: el magnetismo animal ya fue aceptado como propiedad del organismo, y lo que las academias siguen peleando es su influencia oculta.

«It is the more to be regretted and even wondered at, as the representatives of "exact science" are unable to either explain or even offer us anything like a reasonable hypothesis for the undeniable mysterious potency contained in a simple magnet» — el argumento de coherencia: la ciencia que niega esa influencia tampoco sabe explicar la potencia de un imán simple.

«Pythagoras taught his disciples that God is the universal mind diffused through all things, and that this mind by the sole virtue of its universal sameness could be communicated from one object to another and be made to create all things by the sole will-power of man» — lo que atribuye a Pitágoras: la mente universal se comunica de un objeto a otro por su propia identidad, y crea por la sola voluntad del hombre.

«Hercules is the magnetic light which, when having made its way through the "opened eye of heaven," enters into the regions of our planet and thus becomes the Creator» — la lectura magnética del mito solar, y el dato que la ata al tema: el imán se llamaba hueso de Horus y el hierro, hueso de Tifón.

«All the sun-gods, with their symbol, the visible sun, are the creators of physical nature only. The spiritual is the work of the Highest God--the Concealed, the Central, Spiritual SUN, and of his Demiurge--the Divine Mind of Plato, and the Divine Wisdom of Hermes Trismegistus» — el reparto que hace entre los dos órdenes: los dioses solares crean la naturaleza física, y lo espiritual queda del lado del Sol Central oculto y su Demiurgo.

«but now, the same as then, they are put in requisition by every sensitive, who is made to use unconsciously these powers» — la continuación de esa proposición, con su matiz: el sensitivo pone en juego esas fuerzas sin saberlo, por la naturaleza conductora de su organismo.

«The ancients called it Chaos; Plato and the Pythagoreans named it the Soul of the World. According to the Hindus, the Deity in the shape of Æther pervades all things. It is the invisible, but, as we have said before, too tangible Fluid. Among other names this universal Proteus--or "the nebulous Almighty," as de Mirville calls it in derision--was termed by the theurgists "the living fire," the "Spirit of Light," and Magnes» — la nómina antigua del mismo agente, con el *Magnes* de los teúrgos al final; el apodo burlón de *nebulous Almighty* que aparece en medio es de de Mirville.

«a thing incredible, indeed, by the gods, but true. I made a proficiency when I associated with you, even if I was only in the same house, though not in the same room; but more so, when I was in the same room . . . and much more when I looked at you. . . . But I made by far the greatest proficiency when I sat near you and touched you» — habla Arístides en el *Teages*, citado por la obra: el aprovechamiento crecía con la cercanía física a Sócrates, hasta el máximo con el contacto.

«In the original text, instead of "dead things," it is written dead Rephaim (giants, or mighty primitive men), from whom "Evolution" may one day trace our present race» — lee Job xxvi 5 contra su traducción corriente y pone en su lugar a los Refaím, los hombres primitivos poderosos, con la evolución por posible heredera de ese linaje.

«In the Egyptian mythology, Kneph the Eternal unrevealed God is represented by a snake-emblem of eternity encircling a water-urn, with his head hovering over the waters, which it incubates with his breath. In this case the serpent is the Agathodaimon, the good spirit; in its opposite aspect it is the Kakodaimon--the bad one» — el emblema de Kneph incubando las aguas le sirve para separar las dos caras de la serpiente: agathodaimon y kakodaimon.

«this dew is the astral light in one of its combinations and possesses creative as well as destructive properties» — así lee el rocío de miel de las Eddas: una combinación de la luz astral, creadora y destructora a la vez.

«Alchemists claim that primordial or pre-Adamic earth when reduced to its first substance is in its second stage of transformation like clear-water, the first being the alkahest proper» — la doctrina la adjudica a los alquimistas: la tierra preadámica reducida a su primera sustancia queda como agua clara en su segunda transformación.

«What is the primordial Chaos but Æther? The modern Ether; not such as is recognized by our scientists, but such as it was known to the ancient philosophers, long before the time of Moses; Ether, with all its mysterious and occult properties, containing in itself the germs of universal creation» — distingue expresamente su éter del de los científicos de su siglo y lo remite al de los filósofos anteriores a Moisés.

«Ether, the celestial virgin, the spiritual mother of every existing form and being, from whose bosom as soon as "incubated" by the Divine Spirit, are called into existence Matter and Life, Force and Action» — la figura con que lo personifica, y la cadena que hace salir de él: materia y vida, fuerza y acción.

«If they talked less of the Silurian age slowly developing into the Mammalian, and if the Cenozoic time was only recorded by various allegories of the primitive man--the Adam of our race--it is but a negative proof after all that their "wise men" and leaders did not know of these successive periods as well as we do now» — el argumento va con su reserva puesta: que no nombraran las eras geológicas es prueba negativa, no prueba de ignorancia.

«Furthermore, they might have been perfectly acquainted with the physical history of our globe without publishing their knowledge to the ignorant masses in those ages of religious Mysteries» — la hipótesis del secreto como explicación del silencio: pudieron conocer la historia física del globo sin publicarla a las masas.

«Even the oldest of all sciences, their kabalistic "secret doctrine," may be traced in each detail to its primeval source, Upper India, or Turkestan, far before the time of a distinct separation between the Aryan and Semitic nations» — remonta la Kabala judía a la India superior o el Turkestán, antes de la separación entre arios y semitas.

«The King Solomon so celebrated by posterity, as Josephus the historian says, for his magical skill, got his secret learning from India through Hiram, the king of Ophir, and perhaps Sheba. His ring, commonly known as "Solomon's seal," so celebrated for the potency of its sway over the various kinds of genii and demons, in all the popular legends, is equally of Hindu origin» — le adjudica origen hindú al saber mágico de Salomón y a su sello, con Hiram y quizá Seba como intermediarios.

«To remove trembling arising from demoniacal possession--write this figure on a plant that has milky juice, and drive a nail through it; the trembling will cease» — el conjuro malayalam lo toma del reverendo Samuel Mateer, de la London Missionary Society, que lo publica para condenarlo; a la obra le sirve porque la figura del amuleto es el sello de Salomón.

«Did the Hindu get it from the Jewish kabalist, or the latter from India, by inheritance from their great king-kabalist, the wise Solomon» — deja la pregunta abierta y la llama disputa menor frente a lo que le interesa, que es la luz astral.

«Herschel's doctrine, that the intensity of light, in effect of each undulation, "is inversely as the square of the distance from the luminous body," if correct, damages a good deal if it does not kill the undulatory theory. That he is right, was proved repeatedly by experiments with photometers; and, though it begins to be much doubted, the undulatory theory is still alive» — reúne a Hunt, Brewster y Cooke contra la teoría ondulatoria de la luz y anota que, aun dañada, sigue en pie.

«This primordial substance is said to contain within itself the essence of all that goes to make up man; it has not only all the elements of his physical being, but even the "breath of life" itself in a latent state, ready to be awakened» — lo dice en voz reportada —*is said to*— y con su límite: el aliento de vida estaría ahí en estado latente, y de ahí sacaba Paracelso sus homúnculos y Tales su principio universal. El volumen reimprime el pasaje más adelante.

«With the old philosophers, evolution was a universal theorem, a doctrine embracing the whole, and an established principle; while our modern evolutionists are enabled to present us merely with speculative theoretics; with particular, if not wholly negative theorems» — la comparación que le importa: la evolución antigua era doctrina del todo y principio establecido, y la moderna, teoremas particulares y hasta negativos. El pasaje vuelve a imprimirse en otro punto del volumen.

«there is not a cosmogonical fragment, to whatever nation it may belong, but proves by this universal allegory of» — la alegoría universal del agua y el espíritu incubándola: ninguna cosmogonía hace salir el universo de la nada, y en eso coinciden con los físicos modernos. La frase se completa del otro lado del corte de plana.

«And still we see that under the blue ray both vegetable and animal life manifest an inordinate development, while under the yellow ray it is proportionately arrested» — del experimento de Robert Hunt sobre los rayos solares saca su hipótesis: la vida vegetal y animal serían fenómenos electromagnéticos modificados de distinto modo, y la pregunta que lo remata queda del otro lado del corte de plana.

«We have said that to acquire magical power, two things are necessary: to disengage the will from all servitude, and to exercise it in control» — habla Éliphas Lévi: las dos condiciones del poder mágico son desligar la voluntad de toda servidumbre y ejercitarla en el mando.

«the great magical agent, the dual current of light, the living and astral fire of the earth, has been represented in the ancient theogonies by the serpent with the head of a bull, a ram, or a dog» — sigue Lévi: el gran agente mágico es corriente doble, y las teogonías antiguas lo figuraron como serpiente con cabeza de toro, carnero o perro.

«It is the double serpent of the caduceus, it is the Old Serpent of the Genesis, but it is also the brazen serpent of Moses entwined around the tau, that is to say, the generative lingha. It is also the goat of the witch-sabbath, and the Baphomet of the Templars; it is the Hyle of the Gnostics; it is the double-tail of serpent which forms the legs of the solar cock of the Abraxas; finally, it is the Devil of M. Eudes de Mirville» — la serie de identificaciones es de Lévi: caduceo, serpiente del Génesis, serpiente de bronce de Moisés, Baphomet de los templarios, Hyle de los gnósticos y, al final, el Diablo de de Mirville.

«This last kabalistic figure of speech, notwithstanding its strange phraseology, is precisely the one used by Jesus; and in his mind it could have had no other significance than the one attributed to it by the Gnostics and the Kabalists. Later the Christian theologians interpreted it differently, and with them it became the doctrine of Hell» — aquí habla la obra, no Lévi: la figura del fuego central que absorbe a las almas sería la misma que usó Jesús, y solo después los teólogos la volvieron doctrina del infierno.

«Literally, though, it simply means what it says--the astral light, or the generator and destroyer of all forms» — y la lectura que propone en su lugar, dicha en una línea.

«I will not fall down, but thou shalt crouch at my feet; thou wilt give me nothing, but I will make use of thee and take whatever I wish. For I am thy Lord and Master» — la respuesta que Lévi pone en boca del iniciado ante la tentación evangélica, y que él llama el sentido real de la respuesta ambigua de Jesús.

«Thus, the Devil is not an Entity. It is an errant force, as the name signifies. An odic or magnetic current formed by a chain (a circle) of pernicious wills must create this evil spirit which the Gospel calls legion» — la definición de Lévi: el Diablo no es entidad sino fuerza errante, corriente ódica formada por una cadena de voluntades perniciosas.

«Under his extended palms, a seed, unknown to him (for Jacolliot has chosen it at random among a variety of seeds, from a bag, and planted it himself, after marking it, in a flower pot), will germinate instantly, and push its way through the soil» — el experimento de la semilla, con el control que a la obra le importa: Jacolliot la eligió al azar, la marcó y la plantó él mismo.

«Is this a miracle? By no means; it may be one, perhaps, if we take Webster's definition, that a miracle is "every event contrary to the established constitution and course of things--a deviation from the known laws of nature» — niega el milagro salvo por definición de diccionario, y devuelve la pregunta: ¿está probado que lo establecido por observación sea infalible?.

«It attracted and concentrated the akasa, or life-principle, on the germ. His magnetism, obeying his will, drew up the akasa in a concentrated current through the plant towards his hands, and by keeping up an unintermitted flow for the requisite space of time, the life-principle of the plant built up cell after cell, layer after layer, with preternatural activity, until the work was done» — su explicación mecánica del prodigio: el magnetismo del fakir, obedeciendo a la voluntad, atrae el akasa en corriente concentrada y la planta construye célula sobre célula.

«The life-principle is but a blind force obeying a controlling influence. In the ordinary course of nature the plant-protoplasm would have concentrated and directed it at a certain established rate. This rate would have been controlled by the prevalent atmospheric conditions; its growth being rapid or slow, and, in stalk or head, in proportion to the amount of light, heat, and moisture of the season» — el principio de vida queda del lado de la fuerza ciega, y en el curso ordinario lo gobiernan la luz, el calor y la humedad de la estación.

«The will of the fakir-conjurer forms an invisible but yet, to it, perfectly objective matrix, in which the vegetable matter is caused to deposit itself and assume the fixed shape. The will creates; for the will in motion is force, and force produces matter» — la doctrina en su forma más apretada: la voluntad forma una matriz objetiva donde la materia vegetal se deposita, porque la voluntad en movimiento es fuerza y la fuerza produce materia.

«While in his natural state the fakir did not, and could not know whether it was a melon-seed, or seed of any other plant; once entranced, i.e., bodily dead to all outward appearance-- the spirit, for which there exist neither distance, material obstacle, nor space of time, experienced no difficulty in perceiving the melon-seed, whether as it lay deeply buried in the mud of the flower-pot, or reflected in the faithful picture-gallery of Jacolliot's brain» — contesta la objeción del desconocimiento de la semilla con su doctrina del espíritu omnisciente en esencia: ya en trance, el espíritu la vería en el barro o en el cerebro del experimentador.

«Undoubtedly so; and moreover these strolling jugglers are neither pure in their modes of living nor considered holy by any one; neither by foreigners nor their own people. They are generally FEARED and despised by the natives, for they are sorcerers; men practising the black art» — concede el hecho a los juglares ambulantes y le cambia el signo: los propios hindúes los temen y desprecian como hechiceros.

«Like attracts like; and greed for money, impure purposes, and selfish views, cannot attract any other spirits than those that the Hebrew kabalists know as the klippoth, dwellers of Asiah, the fourth world, and the Eastern magicians as the afrits, or elementary spirits of error, or the devs» — la ley que separa a un operador del otro, con los nombres de los espíritus que atrae el interesado: klippoth para los kabalistas hebreos, afrits o devs para los magos orientales.

«We may add to this, that we have witnessed the same experiment in India and Thibet, and that more than once we provided the flower-pot ourselves, by emptying an old tin box of some Liebig extracts. We filled it with earth with our own hands, and planted in it a small root handed to us by the conjurer, and until the experiment was ended never once removed our eyes from the pot» — pone su propio testimonio junto al relato del periódico inglés, y enumera los controles que dice haber puesto: su bote, su tierra, su cuarto.

«consist in freeing one's self from the coils of the Ancient Serpent; then to place the foot on its head, and lead it according to the operator's will» — habla Lévi: toda operación mágica consiste en librarse de los anillos de la Serpiente Antigua, ponerle el pie encima y conducirla a voluntad.

«partially repose on quite another order of things than the nature in which we are acquainted with time, space, and causality; these manifestations can be experimented with but little; they cannot be called out at our bidding, but may be observed and carefully followed whenever they occur in our presence; we can only group them by analogy under certain divisions, and deduce from them general principles and laws» — habla Maximilian Perty en el prefacio de su obra: esas manifestaciones no se dejan provocar a voluntad, solo observar y agrupar por analogía.

«system has attained to that state of purification at which the spirit becomes nearly freed from its prison, and can produce wonders» — así explica al fakir Kavindasami que describe Jacolliot: la subyugación entera de la materia corporal libera casi del todo al espíritu. La frase arranca en la plana anterior.

«arrest wild bulls and horses at headlong speed, and suspend in its flight the arrow which cleaves the air." Thomas Bartholini affirms the same» — habla Orioli, del Instituto de Francia, y Bartholini afirma lo mismo: simples palabras detendrían animales lanzados y la flecha en el aire.

«When I trace upon the floor with chalk or charcoal this figure . . . a fire, a light fixes itself on it. Soon it attracts to itself the person who approaches it: it detains and fascinates him . . . and it is useless for him to try to cross the line. A magic power compels him to stand still. At the end of a few moments he yields, uttering sobs. . . . The cause is not in me, it is in this entirely kabalistic sign; in vain would you employ violence» — habla Du Potet de su signo kabalístico trazado en el suelo, y él mismo desplaza la causa fuera de sí: no está en mí, está en el signo.

«It was agreed that the mesmeric subjects, selected by the investigators and the committee for the experiments, and all strangers to him, should be brought blindfold into the room, and caused to walk toward the line, without a word being spoken to indicate what was expected of them» — describe el control de la prueba de Regazzoni ante médicos parisinos en 1856: sujetos ajenos, con los ojos vendados y sin instrucción verbal.

«their feet, as if they had been suddenly seized and riveted, adhere to the ground, while their bodies, carried forward by the rapid impulse of the motion, fall and strike the floor. The sudden rigidity of their limbs was like that of a frozen corpse, and their heels were rooted with mathematical precision upon the fatal line» — el resultado de esa prueba, en las palabras del relato: los talones clavados con precisión sobre la línea invisible.

«Do not touch her! Let her fall; a magnetized subject is never hurt by falling." Des Mousseaux, who tells the story, says that "marble is not more rigid than was her body; her head did not touch the ground; one of her arms remained stretched in the air; one of her legs was raised and the other horizontal. She remained in this unnatural posture an indefinite time. Less rigid is a statue of bronze» — la escena la cuenta des Mousseaux, testigo adverso, y por eso la obra la usa: la orden de Regazzoni y la rigidez del cuerpo caído.

«Directions whispered by the committee in Regazzoni's ear were immediately obeyed by the subjects, whose ears were stuffed with cotton, and whose eyes were bandaged. Nay, in some cases it was not even necessary for them to express to the magnetizer what they desired, for their own mental requests were complied with with perfect fidelity» — el detalle que cierra el argumento contra la sugestión verbal: los sujetos tenían algodón en los oídos y venda en los ojos, y hasta las peticiones mentales se cumplían.

«The jettatura, or evil eye, is nothing but the direction of this invisible fluid, charged with malicious will and hatred, from one person to another, and sent out with the intention of harming him. It may equally be employed for a good or evil purpose. In the former case it is magic; in the latter, sorcery» — define el mal de ojo como dirección del fluido cargada de intención, y hace del propósito —no de la técnica— lo que separa magia de hechicería.

«What is the WILL? Can "exact science" tell? What is the nature of that intelligent, intangible, and powerful something which reigns supreme over all inert matter» — la pregunta que organiza el capítulo, dirigida a la ciencia exacta.

«I will, and, my thought traversing space, which does not exist for it, envelops the body of another individual who is not a part of myself, penetrates through his pores, and, superseding his own faculties, if they are weaker, forces him to a predetermined action» — la descripción en primera persona de la acción de la voluntad sobre otro cuerpo, con su condición dentro: solo si las facultades del otro son más débiles.

«The mysterious effects of attraction and repulsion are the unconscious agents of that will; fascination, such as we see exercised by some animals, by serpents over birds, for instance, is a conscious action of it, and the result of thought» — gradúa la misma fuerza en dos niveles: inconsciente en la atracción física, consciente en la fascinación que ejerce la serpiente sobre el pájaro.

«for inorganic as well as organic matter possesses a particle of the divine essence in itself, however infinitesimally small it may be. And how could it be otherwise? Notwithstanding that in the progress of its evolution it may from beginning to end have passed through millions of various forms, it must ever retain its germ-point of that preexistent matter, which is the first manifestation and emanation of the Deity itself» — la razón por la que extiende la voluntad hasta la materia inorgánica: hasta el ámbar frotado retendría su punto germinal de materia preexistente.

«What is then this inexplicable power of attraction but an atomical portion of that essence that scientists and kabalists equally recognize as the "principle of life"--the akasa» — la identificación que le importa: lo que la ciencia llama principio de vida y el kabalista akasa serían la misma cosa.

«Man, the most perfect of organized beings on earth, in whom matter and spirit--i.e., will--are the most developed and powerful, is alone allowed to give a conscious impulse to that principle which emanates from him; and only he can impart to the magnetic fluid opposite and various impulses without limit as to the direction» — el privilegio que le reserva al hombre: solo él da impulso consciente a ese principio y puede dirigirlo sin límite; *quiere, y la materia organizada obedece*, cita a Du Potet en el renglón siguiente.

«But if the latter announces the visit of a person, miles away, and this person arrives at the very moment predicted by the seer, then his vision was no more subjective, but on the contrary perfectly objective, for he saw that person in the act of coming» — la objeción de vocabulario que le hace: si la visión se cumple, deja de ser subjetiva y por tanto no es alucinación.

«Arrived at certain stages of physical prostration, when mind and the reasoning faculties seem paralyzed through weakness and bodily exhaustion, instinct--the spiritual unity of the five senses--sees, hears, feels, tastes, and smells, unimpaired by either time or space» — la ley que propone: cuanto más postrado el cuerpo, más libre el instinto, que ve y oye sin traba de tiempo ni de espacio.

«It was discovered (?) by Baron Reichenbach and called OD, whether intentionally or otherwise we cannot say, but it is singular that a name should have been chosen which is mentioned in the most ancient books of the Kabala» — el signo de interrogación es de la obra: le disputa a Reichenbach la novedad del descubrimiento y anota que el nombre ya está en los libros más antiguos de la Kabala.

«Emepht, the supreme, first principle, produced an egg; by brooding over which, and permeating the substance of it with its own vivifying essence, the germ contained within was developed; and Phtha, the active creative principle proceeded from it, and began his work» — la cosmogonía egipcia de Emepht y Phtha, con el huevo incubado y el principio creador activo saliendo de él.

«that in certain diseases we see developed a great surexcitation of sensibility, which lends to the senses a prodigious acuteness of perception. Thus, some individuals will perceive at considerable distances, others will announce the approach of persons who are really on their way, although those present can neither hear nor see them coming» — habla Brierre de Boismont en su libro sobre las alucinaciones, y concede lo que a la obra le sirve: en ciertas enfermedades la sensibilidad se sobreexcita hasta la percepción a distancia.

«who saw in Cimmerian darkness as well as in a lighted room; . . ." others "who followed persons, tracing them out like dogs, and recognizing by the smell objects belonging to such persons or even such as had been only touched by them, with a sagacity which was hitherto observed only in animals» — habla Cabanis sobre sujetos que veían en la oscuridad y rastreaban por el olfato; la obra lo usa para su tesis del instinto como unidad espiritual de los cinco sentidos.

«In the ancient Eastern mythologies, the cosmogonic myth states that there was but water (the father) and the prolific slime (the mother, Ilus or Hyle), from which crept forth the mundane snake-matter. It was the god Phanes, the revealed one, the Word, or logos» — la cosmogonía oriental que resume: del agua padre y el limo prolífico —Ilus o Hyle— sale la serpiente mundana, que identifica con Fanes, el Verbo.

«The heads relate to the zodiac, and typify the four seasons of the year, for the mundane serpent is the mundane year, while the serpent itself is the symbol of Kneph, the hidden, or unrevealed deity--God the Father» — la clave de las cuatro cabezas del protógono: el zodiaco y las estaciones, con la serpiente misma como emblema de Kneph, la deidad no revelada.

«If we remember that each of the four evangelists is represented as having near him one of the described animals--grouped together in Solomon's triangle in the pentacle of Ezekiel, and to be found in the four cherubs or sphinxes of the sacred arch--we will perhaps understand the secret meaning, as well as the reason why the early Christians adopted this symbol; and how it is that the present Roman Catholics and the Greeks of the Oriental Church still represent these animals in the pictures of their evangelists which sometimes accompany the four Gospels» — lleva el emblema hasta la iconografía cristiana: los cuatro vivientes de los evangelistas serían los mismos del triángulo de Salomón y del pentáculo de Ezequiel.

«We will also understand why Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons, had so insisted upon the necessity of the fourth gospel; giving as a reason that there could not be less than four of them, as there were four zones in the world, and four principal winds coming from the four cardinal points» — y el argumento de Ireneo sobre el número de los evangelios, que ella lee como resto del mismo esquema cuaternario.

«the phantom-germ of the universe is represented as lying in the Ginnungagap--or the cup of illusion, a boundless and void abyss» — así traduce el abismo de la *Völuspá*: la copa de la ilusión, matriz del mundo.

«With him was created the cow, Audhumla (female principle), from whose udder flowed four streams of milk, which diffused themselves throughout space (the astral light in its purest emanation» — la lectura que hace del mito: los cuatro ríos de leche de la vaca serían la luz astral en su emanación más pura, y Ymir el principio masculino.

«Now, if we take into consideration that this mineral was universally regarded by ancient philosophers as one of the chief formative principles in organic creation; by the alchemists as the universal menstruum, which, they said, was to be wrought from water; and by every one else, even as it is regarded now by science as well as in the popular ideas, to be an indispensable ingredient for man and beast; we may readily comprehend the hidden wisdom of this allegory of the creation of man» — la sal como bisagra del argumento: principio formativo para los filósofos antiguos, menstruo universal para los alquimistas e ingrediente indispensable para la ciencia y el sentido común.

«Paracelsus calls salt "the centre of water, wherein metals ought to die," etc., and Van Helmont terms the Alkahest, "summum et felicissimum omnium salium," the most successful of all salts» — las dos autoridades alquímicas que apila sobre la sal: Paracelso y el Alkahest de Van Helmont.

«This is more than an allegory; these words point to a direct and unequivocal meaning in relation to the spiritual and physical organisms of man in his dual nature» — su lectura de la sal de la tierra y la luz del mundo en Mateo: no alegoría sino referencia al organismo doble del hombre.

«Thus, while the mythic "cow" gives being to a race of superior spiritual men, the giant Ymir begets a race of evil and depraved men, the Hrimthursen, or frost-giants» — el doble linaje del mito escandinavo: la vaca engendra hombres espirituales y el sudor del gigante, la raza depravada de los gigantes de escarcha.

«While in the Scandinavian legend Bur (the son of the cow Audhumla), a superior being, marries Besla, a daughter of the depraved race of giants, in the Hindu tradition the first Brahman marries Daintary, also a daughter of the race of the giants; and in Genesis we see the sons of God taking for wives the daughters of men, and likewise producing mighty men of old; the whole establishing an unquestionable identity of origin between the Christian inspired Book, and the heathen "fables" of Scandinavia and Hindustan» — junta las tres versiones —Bur y Besla, el primer brahmán y Daintary, los hijos de Dios y las hijas de los hombres— y saca de ahí una identidad de origen entre el libro inspirado y las fábulas paganas.

«Here we have, in this creature, the whole philosophy of the universe: matter vivified by spirit, and the two conjointly evolving out of chaos (Force) everything that was to be» — lo que lee en la serpiente egipcia mordiéndose la cola: materia vivificada por espíritu, y los dos evolucionando del caos.

«As the reptile upon casting his coat becomes freed from a casing of gross matter, which cramped a body grown too large for it, and resumes its existence with renewed activity, so man, by casting off the gross material body, enters upon the next stage of his existence with enlarged powers and quickened vitality» — el emblema de la muda que dice no haber visto anotado por ningún simbolista: el hombre que deja el cuerpo material entra en la etapa siguiente con poderes ampliados.

«the Chaldean Kabalists tell us that primeval man, who, contrary to the Darwinian theory was purer, wiser, and far more spiritual, as shown by the myths of the Scandinavian Bur, the Hindu Dejotas, and the Mosaic "sons of God,"--in short, of a far higher nature than the man of the present Adamic race, became despiritualized or tainted with matter, and then, for the first time, was given the fleshly body» — la doctrina que atribuye a los kabalistas caldeos y que declara contraria a Darwin: el hombre primitivo era más puro y espiritual, y solo al contaminarse de materia recibió cuerpo de carne.

«Unless the commentators would make of the First Cause a celestial tailor, what else can the apparently absurd words mean, but that the spiritual man had reached, through the progress of involution, to that point where matter, predominating over and conquering spirit, had transformed him into the physical man, or the second Adam, of the second chapter of Genesis» — la ironía con que fuerza su lectura de las túnicas de pieles del Génesis, y el término que emplea para el proceso: involución, no evolución.

«This kabalistical doctrine is much more elaborated in the Book of Jasher. In chapter vii., these garments of skin are taken by Noah into the ark, he having obtained them by inheritance from Methuselah and Enoch, who had them from Adam and his wife. Ham steals them from his father Noah; gives them "in secret" to Cush, who conceals them from his sons and brothers, and passes them to Nimrod» — la cadena de las túnicas de pieles, del Libro de Jasher: de Adán a Matusalén y Enoc, al arca de Noé, y de ahí robadas por Cam hasta Nimrod.

«Others explain that between Adam and Noah there intervened several cycles. That is to say, that every one of the antediluvian patriarchs stood as the representative of a race which had its place in a succession of cycles; and each of which races was less spiritual than its predecessor» — consigna las dos lecturas sin arbitrar: para unos kabalistas Adán, Enoc y Noé son la misma persona divina; para otros, cada patriarca representa una raza de un ciclo menos espiritual que el anterior.

«The coat of skin worn by Cush "in secret,"--i.e., when his spiritual nature began to be tainted by the material--is placed on Nimrod, the most powerful and strongest of physical men on this side of the flood--the last remnant of the antediluvian giants» — cierra la alegoría en Nimrod, el más fuerte de los hombres físicos y último resto de los gigantes antediluvianos.

«In the Scandinavian legend, Ymir, the giant, is slain by the sons of Bur, and the streams of blood flowing from his wounds were so copious that the flood drowned the whole race of ice and frost giants, and Bergelmir alone of that race was saved, with his wife, by taking refuge in a bark; which fact permitted him to transmit a new branch of giants from the old stock. But all the sons of Bur remained untouched by the flood» — el diluvio escandinavo, con Bergelmir salvándose en una barca y los hijos de Bur intactos.

«The giant Ymir typifies the primitive rude organic matter, the blind cosmical forces, in their chaotic state, before they received the intelligent impulse of the Divine Spirit which set them into a regular motion dependent on immovable laws» — su desciframiento de la alegoría: Ymir es la materia orgánica ruda y las fuerzas ciegas antes del impulso inteligente.

«The progeny of Bur are the "sons of God," or the minor gods mentioned by Plato in the Timaeus, and who were intrusted, as he expresses it, with the creation of men» — y del otro lado, la progenie de Bur emparejada con los dioses menores del *Timeo*, encargados de crear a los hombres.

«His blood goes to form oceans and rivers; his bones, the mountains; his teeth, the rocks and cliffs; his hair, the trees, etc.; while his skull forms the heavenly vault, supported by four pillars representing the four cardinal points» — el desmembramiento de Ymir como cosmogonía material, con la bóveda celeste sostenida por cuatro pilares.

«This abode (the earth), says the Edda, in order to be correctly described in all its minute particulars, must be conceived as round as a ring, or as a disk, floating in the midst of the Celestial Ocean (Ether). It is encircled by Yormungand, the gigantic Midgard or Earth Serpent, holding its tail in its mouth» — la Edda describe Midgard como disco flotando en el Océano Celeste y ceñido por la serpiente que se muerde la cola.

«This emanation is the astral light of the Kabalists, and the as yet problematical, and hardly known, aether, or the "hypothetical agent of great elasticity" of our physicists» — la ecuación que cierra el mito: la serpiente mundana es la luz astral kabalística y el éter apenas conocido de los físicos.

«Odin breathed in them the breath of life; Honir endowed them with soul and motion; and Lodur with beauty, speech, sight, and» — el reparto trinitario en la creación del primer hombre y la primera mujer según la *Völuspá*, hallados como dos palos flotando sin destino; la enumeración se completa del otro lado del corte de plana.

«These first men are placed in Midgard (mid-garden, or Eden) and thus inherit, from their creators, matter or inorganic life; mind, or soul; and pure spirit; the first corresponding to that part of their organism which sprung from the remains of Ymir, the giant-matter, the second from the &Ælig;sir, or gods, the descendants of Bur, and the third from the Vanr, or the representative of pure spirit» — y la conclusión que le saca: materia, alma y espíritu puro heredados de tres creadores distintos. La grafía *&Ælig;sir*, con la entidad html sin resolver, es la que trae la capa de texto y va sin corregir.

«Another version of the Edda makes our visible universe spring from beneath the luxuriant branches of the mundane tree--the Yggdrasill, the tree with the three roots» — la segunda versión del mismo mito, con el Yggdrasill y sus tres raíces por eje del universo visible.

«Odin, the Alfadir, asks for a draught of this water; he gets it, but finds himself obliged to pledge one of his eyes for it; the eye being in this case the symbol of the Deity revealing itself in the wisdom of its own creation; for Odin leaves it at the bottom of the deep well» — la prenda del ojo de Odín leída como símbolo: la Deidad que se revela en la sabiduría de su propia creación.

«This tree is the symbol of the universal Life, organic as well as inorganic; its emanations represent the spirit which vivifies every form of creation; and of its three roots, one extends to heaven, the second to the dwelling of the magicians--giants, inhabitants of the lofty mountains--and at the third, under which is the spring Hvergelmir, gnaws the monster Nidhogg, who constantly leads mankind into evil» — la lectura del Yggdrasill: árbol de la vida universal, con una raíz al cielo, otra a la morada de los gigantes magos y la tercera roída por Nidhogg.

«The Thibetans have also their mundane tree, and the legend is of an untold antiquity. With them it is called Zampun. The first of its three roots also extends to heaven, to the top of the highest mountains; the second passes down to the lower region; the third remains midway, and reaches the east. The mundane tree of the Hindus is the Aswatha. Its branches are the components of the visible world; and its leaves the Mantras of the Vedas, symbols of the universe in its intellectual or moral character» — junta el Zampun tibetano y el Aswatha hindú al mismo esquema de tres raíces, con los Mantras de los Vedas por hojas.

«Who can study carefully the ancient religious and cosmogonic myths without perceiving that this striking similitude of conceptions, in their exoteric form and esoteric spirit, is the result of no mere coincidence, but manifests a concurrent design? It shows that already in those ages which are shut out from our sight by the impenetrable mist of tradition, human religious thought developed in uniform sympathy in every portion of the globe» — el argumento del diseño concurrente: la semejanza de las cosmogonías no sería coincidencia sino desarrollo simpático del pensamiento religioso en todo el globo.

«Christians call this adoration of nature in her most concealed verities--Pantheism. But if the latter, which worships and reveals to us God in space in His only possible objective form--that of visible nature--perpetually reminds humanity of Him who created it, and a religion of theological dogmatism only serves to conceal Him the more from our sight, which is the better adapted to the needs of mankind» — acepta el cargo de panteísmo y lo devuelve como pregunta: cuál de las dos, la adoración de la naturaleza o el dogmatismo teológico, oculta más a Dios.

«Modern science insists upon the doctrine of evolution; so do human reason and the "secret doctrine," and the idea is corroborated by the ancient legends and myths, and even by the Bible itself when it is read between the lines» — suscribe la evolución y le pone tres avales más: la razón, la doctrina secreta y la Biblia leída entre líneas.

«While it is positively absurd to believe the "transformation of species" to have taken place according to some of the more materialistic views of the evolutionists, it is but natural to think that each genus, beginning with the mollusks and ending with monkey-man, has modified from its own primordial and distinctive form» — su versión de la evolución, dicha contra las dos orillas: rechaza la transformación de especies en clave materialista y acepta que cada género se modificó desde su forma primordial.

«Physical man, as a product of evolution, may be left in the hands of the man of exact science. None but he can throw light upon the physical origin of the race. But, we must positively deny the materialist the same privilege as to the question of man's psychical and spiritual evolution, for he and his highest faculties cannot be proved on any conclusive evidence to be "as much products of evolution as the humblest plant or the lowest worm» — el reparto de jurisdicciones que propone: el hombre físico para la ciencia exacta, y la evolución psíquica y espiritual negada al materialista.

«It is described by them as growing in a reversed position, the branches extending downward and the roots upward; the former typifying the external world of sense, i.e., the visible cosmical universe, and the latter the invisible world of spirit, because the roots have their genesis in the heavenly regions where, from the world's creation, humanity has placed its invisible deity» — la diferencia que anota entre el árbol hindú y el escandinavo: el Aswatha crece invertido, con las raíces arriba en el mundo del espíritu.

«It conveys the idea that all things had their origin in spirit--evolution having originally begun from above and proceeded downward, instead of the reverse, as taught in the Darwinian theory» — su tesis sobre la pirámide egipcia y sobre la dirección de la evolución: de arriba hacia abajo, al revés de Darwin, hasta un límite de degradación.

«We may believe man evolved "by gradual modification of a mammal of ape-like organization" still easier when we remember that (though in a more condensed and less elegant, but still as comprehensible, phraseology) the same theory was said by Berosus to have been taught many thousands of years before his time by the man-fish Oannes or Dagon, the semi-demon of Babylonia» — acerca la antropogenia de Haeckel a la doctrina que Beroso atribuye al hombre pez Oannes, y con eso reclama antigüedad para la idea.

«He does not attempt to show us who these "few beings" were. But it answers our purpose quite as well, for in the admission of their existence at all, resort to the ancients for corroboration and elaboration of the idea receives the stamp of scientific approbation» — el hueco que le encuentra a Darwin y el uso que le da: admitidos esos pocos seres, recurrir a los antiguos para elaborarlos queda avalado.

«The flint-axes first found by Boucher de Perthes, in the valley of the Somme, prove that men must have existed at a period so remote as to be beyond calculation» — apoya la antigüedad del hombre en las hachas de sílex del Somme y en Buchner, y cierra el punto con una pregunta sobre lo que traerá el próximo hallazgo.

«If those who believe in the evolution of spirit as firmly as the materialists believe in that of matter are charged with teaching "unverifiable hypotheses," how readily can they retort upon their accusers by saying that, by their own confession, their physical evolution is still "an unverified, if not actually an unverifiable hypothesis» — la simetría que le devuelve a la acusación: la evolución física también es, por confesión propia, hipótesis no verificada.

«The former have at least the inferential proof of legendary myth, the vast antiquity of which is admitted by both philologists and archaeologists; while their antagonists have nothing of a similar nature, unless they help themselves to a portion of the ancient picture-writings, and suppress the rest» — y la ventaja que reclama para su lado: la antigüedad del mito, admitida por filólogos y arqueólogos.

«In the recent work of Mr. Alfred R. Wallace, The Geographical Distribution of Animals, we find the author seriously favoring the idea of "some slow process of development" of the present species from others which have preceded them, his idea extending back over an innumerable series of cycles» — toma a Wallace como confirmación parcial y de ahí salta a su pregunta: si los animales, por qué no un hombre animal precedido de uno espiritual.

«Mithras is the son of Bordj, the Persian mundane mountain from which he flashes out as a radiant ray of light. Brahma, the fire-god, and his prolific consort; and the Hindu Unghi, the refulgent deity, from whose body issue a thousand streams of glory and seven tongues of flame, and in whose honor the Sagniku Brahmans preserve to this day a perpetual fire» — el desfile de deidades dobles con que arma la serie: Mithras y la montaña mundana persa, Brahma y su consorte, el Unghi hindú con sus siete lenguas de llama.

«And what can these dual myths mean but the physico-chemical principle of primordial creation? The first revelation of the Supreme Cause in its triple manifestation of spirit, force, and matter; the divine correlation, at its startingpoint of evolution, allegorized as the marriage of fire and water, products of electrifying spirit, union of the male active principle with the female passive element, which become the parents of their tellurian child, cosmic matter, the prima materia, whose spirit is ether, the ASTRAL LIGHT» — la clave única que propone para todos ellos: la boda del fuego y el agua como alegoría de la correlación divina en su punto de partida, cuyo hijo es la materia cósmica y cuyo espíritu es la luz astral.

«Within the mysterious recesses of the mountain--the matrix of the universe--the gods (powers) prepare the atomic germs of organic life, and at the same time the life-drink, which, when tasted, awakens in man-matter the man-spirit» — lo que pasa dentro de la montaña: los gérmenes atómicos de la vida orgánica y la bebida que despierta al hombre espíritu dentro del hombre materia.

«The soma, the sacrificial drink of the Hindus, is that sacred beverage. For, at the creation of the prima materia, while the grossest portions of it were used for the physical embryo-world, the more divine essence of it pervaded the universe, invisibly permeating and enclosing within its ethereal waves the newly-born infant, developing and stimulating it to activity as it slowly evolved out of the eternal chaos» — identifica esa bebida con el soma, y con la parte más divina de la *prima materia*, que envuelve al mundo recién nacido mientras se desprende del caos.

«The snake, which plays such a prominent part in the imagery of the ancients, was degraded by the absurd interpretation of the serpent of the Book of Genesis into a synonym of Satan, the Prince of Darkness, whereas it is the most ingenious of all the myths in its various symbolisms» — su queja sobre la lectura corriente de la serpiente del Génesis: degradada a sinónimo de Satán, cuando sería el más ingenioso de los mitos.

«For one, as agathodaimon, it is the emblem of the healing art and of the immortality of man. It encircles the images of most of the sanitary or hygienic gods. The cup of health, in the Egyptian Mysteries, was entwined by serpents» — la primera de sus caras: emblema del arte de curar y de la inmortalidad, enroscada en las imágenes de los dioses sanitarios.

«As evil can only arise from an extreme in good, the serpent, under some other aspects, became typical of matter; which, the more it recedes from its primal spiritual source, the more it becomes subject of evil» — la segunda cara, y la regla que la explica: el mal solo nace de un extremo del bien, y la materia se hace mala al alejarse de su fuente espiritual.

«When the serpent represents eternity and immortality, it encircles the world, biting its tail, and thus offering no solution of continuity. It then becomes the astral light» — el tercer sentido, el del uróboros, y su identificación con la luz astral.

«The disciples of the school of Pherecydes taught that ether (Zeus or Zen) is the highest empyrean heaven, which encloses the supernal world, and its light (the astral) is the concentrated primordial element» — la doctrina de la escuela de Ferécides sobre el éter como cielo empíreo más alto y su luz como elemento primordial concentrado.

«It becomes the Od, as soon as it is vivified by the conscious efflux of an immortal soul; for then the astral currents are acting under the guidance of either an adept, a pure spirit, or an able mesmerizer, who is pure himself and knows how to direct the blind forces» — y el otro estado, el Od, que exige guía consciente: un adepto, un espíritu puro o un mesmerizador él mismo puro.

«The author of the Homoiomerian system of philosophy, Anaxagoras of Clazomene, firmly believed that the spiritual prototypes of all things, as well as their elements, were to be found in the boundless ether, where they were generated, whence they evolved, and whither they returned from earth» — reclama a Anaxágoras para su doctrina del éter como sede de los prototipos espirituales de todas las cosas.

«In common with the Hindus who had personified their Akas'a (sky or ether) and made of it a deific entity, the Greeks and Latins had deified Æther. Virgil calls Zeus, pater omnipotens aether; Magnus, the great god, Ether» — la divinización del éter en la India, Grecia y Roma, con Virgilio llamando a Zeus *pater omnipotens aether*.

«And now that we have learned so much of the mental labors of the holy fathers and their achievements in astral anthropology, need we be surprised at all, if, in the zeal of their spiritual explorations, they have so far neglected their own planet as at times to deny not only its right to motion but even its sphericity» — la ironía con que enlaza la demonología patrística con la negación del movimiento y la esfericidad de la tierra.

«It is the union of the male Logos, or wisdom, the revealed Deity, with the female Aura or Anima Mundi--"the holy Pneuma," which is the Sephira of the Kabalists and the Sophia of the refined Gnostics--that produced all things visible and invisible» — la tríada universal que le atribuye a todas las naciones antiguas, con el Logos masculino y el Aura o Anima Mundi femenina —la Sefirá kabalística, la Sophia gnóstica— por padres de todo.

«nay, they even went so far as to transfer the jolly god into St. Bacchus, and actually show his coffin and relics at Rome. The festival of the two "blessed saints," Aura and Placida, occurs on the 5th of October, close to the festival of St. Bacchus» — el ejemplo con que Godfrey Higgins ilustra el paso del mito al santoral: la brisa Aura Placida convertida en dos santos y Baco en san Baco con reliquias en Roma.

«But there are myths which speak for themselves. In this class we may include the double-sexed first creators, of every cosmogony» — la clase de mitos que dice legible sin clave: los primeros creadores de doble sexo de toda cosmogonía. El pasaje se reimprime en otro punto del volumen.

«drawn within its current, the astral light is the Ob, or Python» — el primero de los dos estados del mismo agente: en estado pasivo, arrastrando al que cae sin saberlo en su corriente, es el Ob.

«centre of the universe; and Plutarch, speaking on the subject, remarks of the Pythagoreans that "the earth they suppose not to be without motion, nor situated in the centre of the world, but to make its revolution round the sphere of fire, being neither one of the most valuable, nor principal parts of the great machine." Plato, too, is reported to have been of the same opinion. It appears, therefore, that the Pythagoreans anticipated Galileo's discovery» — la reivindicación pitagórica que toma de Plutarco: la tierra no estaría inmóvil ni en el centro, sino girando en torno a la esfera de fuego, y en eso adelantaron a Galileo.

«hieroglyphical system of the Egyptians, he must first of all learn to sift their records. He has to assure himself, compasses and rule in hand, that the picture-writing he is examining fits, to a line, certain fixed geometrical figures which are the hidden keys to such records, before he ventures on an interpretation» — la condición previa que le pone al intérprete de jeroglíficos: comprobar con compás y regla que la escritura figurada encaja en ciertas figuras geométricas, que son la clave oculta de esos registros. El pasaje se reimprime en otro lugar del volumen.

«the mundane trees, that of subsequent evolution of spirit and matter; the mundane snakes and pillars, symbolical memorials of the various attributes of this double» — el reparto de los tres emblemas: los árboles guardan la evolución del espíritu y la materia, y las serpientes y pilares los atributos de esa doble evolución, que la frase completa del otro lado del corte de plana.

«Whenever this Hercules of the North would grasp the handle of his terrible weapon, the thunderbolt or electric hammer, he is obliged to put on his iron gantlets. He also wears a magical belt known as the "girdle of strength," which, whenever girded about his person, greatly augments his celestial power» — empieza el desciframiento de Thor por los objetos: los guantes de hierro y el cinturón de fuerza.

«He walks, for fear that in crossing Bifrost (the rainbow), the many-hued Æsirbridge, he might set it on fire with his thunder-car, at the same time causing the Urdar waters to boil» — el detalle del mito que a la obra le sirve de prueba: Thor va a pie al Urdar por miedo a incendiar el puente y a hervir las aguas.

«the two rams which serve as his coursers are the familiar ancient symbols of the male or generative power; their silver bridles typify the female principle, for silver is the metal of Luna, Astarte, Diana» — sigue el desciframiento: los carneros como principio masculino y las bridas de plata como femenino, por ser la plata el metal de la luna.

«With the electricity supplying the impulse, and the male and female principle combining and recombining in endless correlation, the result is--evolution of visible nature, the crown-glory of which is the planetary system, which in the mythic Thor is allegorized by the circlet of glittering orbs which bedeck his brow» — y el resultado que saca de la combinación: la evolución de la naturaleza visible, coronada por el sistema planetario que figura la diadema de estrellas.

«The ancient philosophers believed that not only volcanos, but boiling springs were caused by concentrations of underground electric currents, and that this same cause produced mineral deposits of various natures, which form curative springs» — la doctrina que atribuye a los antiguos sobre corrientes eléctricas subterráneas como causa de volcanes y de manantiales curativos.

«If it be objected that this fact is not distinctly stated by the ancient authors, who, in the opinion of our century were hardly acquainted with electricity, we may simply answer that not all the works embodying ancient wisdom are now extant among our scientists» — contesta de antemano la objeción documental con un argumento de pérdida: no todas las obras de la sabiduría antigua están hoy a la mano.

«Such examples as the above will support the ancient claim of the philosophers that there is a logos in every mythos, or a ground-work of truth in every fiction» — la regla de lectura que este capítulo quiere establecer: hay un *logos* en cada *mythos*.

«The history of Science shows that the age must be prepared before scientific truths can take root and grow. The barren premonitions of science have been barren because these seeds of truth fell upon unfruitful soil; and, as soon as the fulness of the time has come, the seed has taken root and the fruit has ripened . . . every student is surprised to find how very little is the share of new truth which even the greatest genius has added to the previous stock» — habla el profesor Cooke en su *New Chemistry*, y la obra lo llama de las cosas más verdaderas dichas por un hombre de ciencia: la semilla de verdad necesita suelo preparado.

«To bridge over the narrow gulf which now separates the new chemistry from old alchemy, is little, if any harder than what they have done in going from dualism to the law of Avogadro» — la apuesta del capítulo: el salto de la química nueva a la alquimia vieja no sería mayor que el que ya dio la química del dualismo a la ley de Avogadro.

«Electro-magnetism, the so-called discovery of Professor Oersted, had been used by Paracelsus three centuries before. This may be demonstrated by examining critically his mode of curing disease» — le disputa a Oersted la primicia del electromagnetismo y remite la prueba al modo de curar de Paracelso.

«This utter scorn for established laws and scientific formulas, this aspiration of mortal clay to commingle with the spirit of nature, and look to it alone for health, and help, and the light of truth, was the cause of the inveterate hatred shown by the contemporary pigmies to the fire-philosopher and alchemist. No wonder that he was accused of charlatanry and even drunkenness» — explica el odio de sus contemporáneos por ese desprecio a las autoridades, y anota que Hemmann lo exonera del cargo de borracho atribuyéndolo a Oporinus.

«Rendered into plain English, how can this myth be interpreted but as showing that the Norse legend-makers were thoroughly acquainted with electricity? Thor, the euhemerization of electricity, handles his peculiar element only when protected by gloves of iron, which is its natural conductor» — la conclusión, dicha como pregunta retórica: Thor sería la euhemerización de la electricidad, que solo se maneja con guantes de hierro.

«His belt of strength is a closed circuit, around which the isolated current is compelled to run instead of diffusing itself through space» — y la lectura del cinturón como circuito cerrado que obliga a la corriente aislada a no dispersarse.

«chemists, so Reichenbach will perhaps one day be found to have paved the way with his OD for the just appreciation of Paracelsus» — la analogía con que anticipa la rehabilitación de Paracelso por la vía del OD de Reichenbach, como Ampère sirvió para introducir a Avogadro.

«that the magnet is that spirit of life in man which the infected seeks, as both unite themselves with chaos from without. And thus the healthy are infected by the unhealthy through magnetic attraction» — habla Paracelso: el imán es el espíritu de vida en el hombre, y por atracción magnética el enfermo contagia al sano. La obra lo pone junto a su propia advertencia sobre los médiums sanadores.

«I considered with myself that if there were no teachers of medicine in this world, how would I set to learn the art? No otherwise than in the great open book of nature, written with the finger of God. . . . I am accused and denounced for not having entered in at the right door of art. But which is the right one? Galen, Avicenna, Mesue, Rhasis, or honest nature? I believe, the last! Through this door I entered, and the light of nature, and no apothecary's lamp directed me on my way» — habla Paracelso: entre Galeno, Avicena, Mesué, Rhazes y la naturaleza honesta, dice haber elegido la última, y por esa puerta entró.

«He was the founder of the School of Animal Magnetism and the discoverer of the occult properties of the magnet. He was branded by his age as a sorcerer, because the cures he made were marvellous» — la doble atribución a Paracelso, y el motivo del cargo de hechicería: la eficacia misma de sus curas.

«Three centuries later, Baron Du Potet was also accused of sorcery and demonolatry by the Church of Rome, and of charlatanry by the academicians of Europe» — empareja los dos casos y los dos acusadores: la Iglesia con la hechicería y las academias con la charlatanería.

«Let us peruse with care and caution the old papers now mouldering in the Academy of Sciences of that capital, for there we will find that, after having rejected in its turn every discovery that was ever made since Galileo, the Immortals capped the climax by turning their backs upon magnetism and mesmerism» — su lectura de los archivos de la Academia de París: tras rechazar cada descubrimiento desde Galileo, el remate fue dar la espalda al magnetismo.

«Still it is true that, beyond the limits of direct observation, our science (chemistry) is not infallible, and our theories and systems, although they may all contain a kernel of truth, undergo frequent changes, and are often revolutionized» — la confesión de la química que la obra recoge cien años después: fuera de los límites de la observación directa, las teorías cambian con frecuencia.

«To assert so dogmatically that mesmerism and animal magnetism are but hallucinations, implies that it can be proved. But where are these proofs, which alone ought to have authority in science? Thousands of times the chance was given to the academicians to assure themselves of its truth; but, they have invariably declined» — invierte la carga: quien afirma dogmáticamente la alucinación debe probarla, y las ocasiones de comprobarlo se rechazaron una y otra vez.

«The famous clairvoyante, Madame Roger, was charged with obtaining money under false pretenses, in company with her mesmerist, Dr. Fortin. On May 18th, 1876, she was arraigned before the Tribunal Correctionnel of the Seine. Her witness was Baron Du Potet, the grand master of mesmerism in France for the last fifty years; her advocate, the no less famous Jules Favre. Truth for once triumphed--the accusation was abandoned» — el caso judicial de mayo de 1876, con Du Potet de testigo y Jules Favre de abogado, que la obra usa como reconocimiento tácito de los tribunales franceses.

«To this there is but one answer--the magistrates dared not question the facts of mesmerism» — su explicación del desenlace, contra la de la elocuencia del orador, y apoyada en el contraste con la condena de Leymarie pese a sus cien testigos.

«Spirit-photography, spirit-rapping, writing, moving, talking, and even spirit-materializations can be simulated; there is hardly a physical phenomenon now in Europe and America but could be imitated--with apparatus--by a clever juggler. The wonders of mesmerism and subjective phenomena alone defy tricksters, skepticism, stern science, and dishonest mediums; the cataleptic state it is impossible to feign» — la razón por la que prefiere el mesmerismo como campo de prueba: todo fenómeno físico se puede imitar con aparatos, y el estado cataléptico no.

«Place on the stage of Egyptian Hall a somnambulist plunged in a deep mesmeric sleep. Let her mesmerist send her freed spirit to all the places the public may suggest; test her clairvoyance and clairaudience; stick pins into any part of her body which the mesmerist may have made his passes over; thrust needles through the skin below her eyelids; burn her flesh and lacerate it with a sharp instrument» — el protocolo de prueba que propone, con su reto final: que el prestidigitador someta su propio cuerpo a lo mismo.

«We are in the presence of a phenomenon which science admits without attempting to explain. The public may smile at it, but our most illustrious physicians regard it with gravity. Justice can no longer ignore what science has acknowledged» — habla Jules Favre cerrando su alegato; la obra recoge la frase y la declara prematura y errónea, porque la ciencia no ha reconocido tal cosa.

«The public is a docile and pious child, and readily goes whither the nurse leads it. It chooses its idols and fetishes, and worships them in proportion to the noise they make; and then turns round with a timid look of adulation to see whether the nurse, old Mrs. Public Opinion, is satisfied» — su explicación de por qué el público se ríe: elige sus ídolos por el ruido que hacen y consulta con la mirada a la opinión pública.

«His incomprehensible, though lively style must be read like the biblio-rolls of Ezekiel, "within and without." The peril of propounding heterodox theories was great in those days; the Church was powerful, and sorcerers were burnt by the dozens» — la instrucción de lectura para Paracelso —por dentro y por fuera— y su explicación de las declaraciones piadosas de él, de Agrippa y de Philalethes.

«He demonstrates further that in man lies hidden a "sidereal force," which is that emanation from the stars and celestial bodies of which the spiritual form of man--the astral spirit--is composed. This identity of essence, which we may term the spirit of cometary matter, always stands in direct relation with the stars from which it was drawn, and thus there exists a mutual attraction between the two, both being magnets» — la doctrina de la fuerza sideral: el espíritu astral del hombre se compone de la emanación de los astros y por eso queda en atracción mutua con ellos.

«The body comes from the elements, the [astral] spirit from the stars. . . . Man eats and drinks of the elements, for the sustenance of his blood and flesh; from the stars are the intellect and thoughts sustained in his spirit» — habla Paracelso otra vez, con el corchete editorial dentro de la cita tal como lo imprime la fuente: del elemento la carne, del astro el intelecto.

«Of the substances known to compose the body of man, there have been discovered in the stars already, hydrogen, sodium, calcium, magnesium and iron. In all the stars observed, numbering many hundreds, hydrogen was found, except in two» — el dato espectroscópico con que dice vindicada al menos una de las tesis de Paracelso, y de ahí su pregunta sobre las demás.

«We must bear in mind, moreover, that Paracelsus was the discoverer of hydrogen, and knew well all its properties and composition long before any of the orthodox academicians ever thought of it; that he had studied astrology and astronomy, as all the fire-philosophers did; and that, if he did assert that man is in a direct affinity with the stars, he knew well what he asserted» — la credencial con que respalda la afinidad entre el hombre y los astros: le adjudica a Paracelso el descubrimiento del hidrógeno mucho antes que a las academias.

«but also imperceptibly through the magnetic force, which resides in all nature and by which every individual member draws its specific nourishment to itself» — la proposición que le deja a los fisiólogos por verificar: el cuerpo se nutriría también por la fuerza magnética, no solo por el estómago.

«The sun and the stars attract from us to themselves, and we again from them to us." What objection can science offer to this? What it is that we give off, is shown in Baron Reichenbach's discovery of the odic emanations of man, which are identical with flames from magnets, crystals, and in fact from all vegetable organisms» — cierra el círculo con las emanaciones ódicas de Reichenbach como respuesta a qué es lo que el hombre emite.

«In our sleep the astral body is free and can, by the elasticity of its nature, either hover round in proximity with its sleeping vehicle, or soar higher to hold converse with its starry parents, or even communicate with its brothers» — habla Paracelso sobre el sueño: el cuerpo astral queda libre y puede rondar el cuerpo dormido, subir a sus padres estelares o comunicarse a distancia.

«The full views of Paracelsus on the occult properties of the magnet are explained partially in his famous book, Archidaxarum, in which he describes the wonderful tincture» — localiza la doctrina en el *Archidaxarum*, con su tintura extraída del imán; la enumeración sigue en la plana siguiente con el *De Ente Dei* y el *De Ente Astrorum*, y con la advertencia de que la dicción es impenetrable para el profano.

«that a magnet will attract iron, but a wise man must inquire for himself. . . . I have discovered that the magnet, besides this visible power, that of attracting iron, possesses another and concealed power» — habla Paracelso: bajo el poder visible del imán habría otro oculto, y ver como ve el campesino no basta.

«they say that "the spirit is everywhere diffused; and the spirit is the medium of magnetism"; that pure primeval magic does not consist in superstitious practices and vain ceremonies but in the imperial will of man» — lo que Van Helmont y Paracelso tienen en común según la obra: la magia primitiva no está en ceremonias vanas sino en la voluntad imperial del hombre.

«It is the more important because, to the neglect of the committee of the French Academy of 1784 is probably due the present materialistic drift of the public mind; and certainly the gaps in the atomic philosophy which we have seen its most devoted teachers confessing to exist» — le imputa al desdén del comité de 1784 nada menos que la deriva materialista del espíritu público y los huecos de la filosofía atómica.

«There can be no doubt of two things, viz.: that the committee began their work under strong prejudices and only because peremptorily ordered to do it by the king; and that their manner of observing the delicate facts of mesmerism was injudicious and illiberal» — los dos cargos concretos contra el comité: trabajó con prejuicio y solo por orden del rey, y observó mal unos hechos delicados.

«Ant. L. de Jussieu, an academician of the highest rank, who had thoroughly investigated the subject with the eminent court-physician, d'Eslon, published a counter-report drawn with minute exactness, in which he advocated the careful observation by the medical faculty of the therapeutic effects of the magnetic fluid and insisted upon the immediate publication of their discoveries and observations» — al informe de Bailly le opone el contrainforme de Jussieu, que pedía observación cuidadosa de los efectos terapéuticos y publicación inmediata.

«The doctrine of Mesmer was simply a restatement of the doctrines of Paracelsus, Van Helmont, Santanelli, and Maxwell, the Scotchman; and he was even guilty of copying texts from the work of Bertrand, and enunciating them as his own principles» — le niega a Mesmer la originalidad y hasta le imputa copia de textos de Bertrand; la deuda la remite a Paracelso, Van Helmont, Santanelli y el escocés Maxwell.

«A fluid, universally diffused and continued, so as to admit no vacuum, whose subtility is beyond all comparison, and which, from its nature, is capable of receiving, propagating, and communicating all the impressions of motion, is the medium of this influence» — la segunda proposición de Mesmer en su *Carta a un médico extranjero* de 1775, que la obra pone junto a la máquina física de Balfour Stewart para negarle modernidad a ésta.

«This reciprocal action is subject to mechanical laws, unknown up to the present time» — la tercera proposición de Mesmer, con su reserva incluida: leyes mecánicas todavía desconocidas.

«Professor Mayer, reaffirming Gilbert's doctrine that the earth is a great magnet, remarks that the mysterious variations in the intensity of its force seem to be in subjection to emanations from the sun, "changing with the apparent daily and yearly revolutions of that orb, and pulsating in sympathy with the huge waves of fire which sweep over its surface." He speaks of "the constant fluctuation, the ebb and flow of the earth's directive influence» — la coincidencia que subraya: el flujo y reflujo de la influencia directriz de la tierra que describe Mayer sería la cuarta proposición de Mesmer.

«The animal body experiences the alternate effects of this agent; and it is by insinuating itself into the substance of the nerves, that it immediately affects them» — la octava proposición de Mesmer, con su mecanismo: el agente se insinúa en la sustancia de los nervios.

«In 1820 the Prussian government instructed the Academy of Berlin to offer a prize of three hundred ducats in gold for the best thesis on mesmerism. The Royal Scientific Society of Paris, under the presidency of His Royal Highness the Duc d'Angouleme, offered a gold medal for the same purpose» — registra los premios oficiales prusiano y francés sobre el mesmerismo, como prueba de que el asunto no era marginal.

«Of all the instruments that we can employ to know the imperceptible agents of nature, the most sensitive are the nerves, especially when exceptional influences increase their sensibility» — habla el marqués de Laplace: de los instrumentos para conocer los agentes imperceptibles, los nervios son el más sensible.

«We are so far from knowing all the agents of nature and their various modes of action that it would be hardly philosophical to deny the phenomena, simply because they are inexplicable, in the actual state of our information. It is simply our duty to examine them with an attention as much more scrupulous as it seems difficult to admit them» — sigue Laplace, y su regla es la que la obra hace suya: negar un fenómeno por inexplicable no sería filosófico, y cuanto más difícil de admitir, más escrupuloso el examen.

«The experiments of Mesmer were vastly improved upon by the Marquis de Puysegur, who entirely dispensed with apparatus and produced remarkable cures among the tenants of his estate at Busancy» — el paso siguiente que registra: Puységur prescinde del aparato y cura entre sus arrendatarios.

«the experiments on which this judgment was founded appeared to have been conducted without the simultaneous and necessary assembling together of all the commissioners, and also with moral predispositions, which, according to the principles of the fact which they were appointed to examine, must cause their complete failure» — el desmontaje del informe Franklin de 1784 lo firma el propio comité posterior: comisarios que no se reunían juntos y predisposiciones morales que garantizaban el fracaso.

«It is the duty of the Academy to study it, to subject it to trials; finally, to take away the use and practice of it from persons quite strangers to the art, who abuse this means, and make it an object of lucre and speculation» — la petición del comité, que la obra dice repetida por los mejores escritores del espiritismo: estudiarlo para quitárselo a los que lo explotan.

«They assert that neither contact of the hands, frictions, nor passes are invariably needed, since, on several occasions, the will, fixedness of stare, have sufficed to produce magnetic phenomena, even without the knowledge of the magnetized» — el primer hallazgo del comité de 1826: bastaron la voluntad y la mirada fija, y hasta sin que el magnetizado lo supiera.

«The state of somnambulism exists and "occasions the development of new faculties, which have received the denominations of clairvoyance, intuition, internal prevision» — el segundo: el sonambulismo existe y trae facultades nuevas, que el propio comité nombra.

«pinch their skin so as to produce ecchymosis, prick it under the nails with pins plunged to a considerable depth, without the evincing of any pain, or by sign of being at all aware of it. In a word, we have seen one person who was insensible to one of the most painful operations of surgery, and whose countenance, pulse, or respiration did not manifest the slightest emotion» — las pruebas de insensibilidad que el comité declara haber hecho, hasta una operación quirúrgica dolorosa sin alteración del pulso ni de la respiración.

«and therefore the ideas attract each other. . . . Influences only go forth through the help of the spirit; but this spirit is diffused through the whole universe and is in full accord with the human spirits. The magician who would acquire supernatural powers must possess faith, love, and hope. . . . In all things there is a secret power concealed, and thence come the miraculous powers of magic» — habla Cornelio Agrippa: las influencias solo salen con ayuda del espíritu difundido por el universo, y el mago que quiera poderes sobrenaturales necesita fe, amor y esperanza.

«their magnetism is either passive or active; that is, positive or negative. If the emanations which they send out are broken or thrown back, there arises antipathy. But when the emanations pass through each other from both sides, then there is positive magnetism, for the rays proceed from the centre to the circumference. In this case they not only affect sicknesses but also moral sentiments. This magnetism or sympathy is found not only among animals but also in plants and in minerals» — habla Robert Fludd, gran maestro de los rosacruces de Inglaterra: si las emanaciones se rompen hay antipatía, y si se atraviesan, magnetismo positivo, que alcanza también a las plantas y los minerales.

«They make the manly avowal that "in science no decision whatever is absolute and» — la frase con que el comité de 1825 se libra del veredicto de 1784; la palabra que la cierra, *irrevocable*, queda del otro lado del corte de plana.

«We have seen two somnambulists distinguish, width their eyes shut, the objects placed before them; they have told, without touching them, the color and value of the cards; they have read words traced with the hand, or some lines of books opened by mere chance» — lo que el comité de 1826 declara haber visto en la percepción sin vista; la grafía *width* por *with* es la que trae la capa de texto y va sin corregir.

«One of them announced several days, nay, several months beforehand, the day, the hour, and the minute when epileptic fits would come on and return; the other declared the time of the cure. Their previsions were realized with remarkable exactness» — el caso de previsión que el comité consigna: el anuncio del día, la hora y el minuto de los ataques epilépticos.

«it has collected and communicated facts sufficiently important to induce it to think that the Academy should encourage the researches on magnetism as a very curious branch of psychology and natural history» — la conclusión medida del comité: no que la Academia deba creerlo, sino que debe alentar la investigación como rama curiosa de la psicología.

«Their fears were fully justified by the conduct of at least one member of their own number, who had absented himself from the experiments, and, as M. Husson tells us, "did not deem it right to sign the report» — el miembro que se ausentó de los experimentos y luego se negó a firmar; la obra guarda el nombre para el párrafo siguiente.

«Self-respect and the dignity of the profession demand circumspection on these points. He [the well-informed physician] will remember how readily mystery glides into charlatanry, and how apt the profession is to become degraded even by its semblance when countenanced by respectable practitioners» — habla Magendie en su *Human Physiology*, dedicándole cuatro páginas al mesmerismo tras haber faltado a los experimentos que debía juzgar.

«No word in the context lets his readers into the secret that he had been duly appointed by the Academy to serve on the commission of 1826; had absented himself from its sittings; had so failed to learn the truth about mesmeric phenomena, and was now pronouncing judgment ex parte» — el cargo exacto que le hace: no la opinión, sino haberla emitido callando que fue nombrado, faltó y no supo.

«When the opportunity offered to investigate the spiritualistic phenomena, and aid in taking it out of the hands of ignorant or dishonest investigators, Professor John Tyndall avoided the subject; but in his Fragments of Science, he was guilty of the ungentlemanly expressions which we have quoted in another place» — pone a Tyndall treinta y ocho años después en la misma conducta que a Magendie: rehuir el asunto y luego opinar.

«He tells us, in the Fragments, that he once got under a table, to see how the raps were made, and arose with a despair for humanity, such as he never felt before» — el único intento de Tyndall, contado por él mismo: se metió bajo una mesa y salió desesperando de la humanidad.

«No one could question the veracity of the commissioners, whose good faith as well as great knowledge were undeniable, but they were suspected of having been dupes. In fact, there are certain unfortunate truths which compromise those who believe in them, and those especially who are so candid as to avow them publicly» — habla el doctor Alphonse Teste sobre el efecto del informe: no se dudó de la buena fe de los comisarios, se los tuvo por engañados. Y su ley general: hay verdades que comprometen a quien cree en ellas.

«When he proved that he was not, he was charged with having fallen into dotage; the Harvard professors denouncing "his insane adherence to the gigantic humbug» — la escalada de descalificaciones contra Robert Hare, hasta el dictamen de los profesores de Harvard.

«felt called upon, as an act of duty to his fellow-creatures, to bring whatever influence he possessed to the attempt to stem the tide of popular madness, which, in defiance of reason and science, was fast setting in favor of the gross delusion called Spiritualism» — el punto de partida declarado de Hare en 1853, que la obra subraya: entró a investigar para frenar lo que tenía por locura popular.

«he had been engaged in scientific pursuits for upwards of half a century, and his accuracy and precision had never been questioned, until he had become a spiritualist; while his integrity as a man had never in his life been assailed, until the Harvard professors fulminated their report against that which he knew to be true, and which they did not know to be false» — habla Hare en Nueva York en 1854: su precisión nunca se cuestionó hasta que se hizo espiritista, ni su integridad hasta el informe de Harvard.

«In the first rank stands Isaac Newton, "the light of science," who was a thorough believer in magnetism, as taught by Paracelsus, Van Helmont, and by the fire-philosophers in general» — reclama a Newton para el magnetismo tal como lo enseñaron Paracelso, Van Helmont y los filósofos del fuego.

«No one will presume to deny that his doctrine of universal space and attraction is purely a theory of magnetism. If his own words mean anything at all, they mean that he based all his speculations upon the "soul of the world," the great universal, magnetic agent, which he called the divine sensorium» — y la lectura fuerte que hace de él: su doctrina del espacio y la atracción sería teoría de magnetismo, fundada en lo que él llamó el sensorio divino.

«is of a very subtile spirit which penetrates through all, even the hardest bodies, and which is concealed in their substance. Through the strength and activity of this spirit, bodies attract each other, and adhere together when brought into contact. Through it, electrical bodies operate at the remotest distance, as well as near at hand, attracting and repelling; through this spirit the light also flows, and is refracted and reflected, and warms bodies. All senses are excited by this spirit, and through it the animals move their limbs» — habla Newton de ese espíritu sutil que penetra los cuerpos y por el cual atraen, se adhieren, refractan la luz y mueven sus miembros los animales.

«But these things cannot be explained in few words, and we have not yet sufficient experience to determine fully the laws by which this universal spirit operates» — y el límite que el propio Newton le pone a esa doctrina, que la obra reproduce en vez de suprimirlo.

«There are two kinds of magnetization; the first is purely animal, the other transcendent, and depending on the will and knowledge of the mesmerizer, as well as on the degree of spirituality of the subject, and his capacity to receive the impressions of the astral light» — la distinción que introduce: magnetización animal y trascendente, y la segunda depende de la voluntad y el saber del mesmerizador tanto como de la espiritualidad del sujeto.

«It keeps an unmutilated record of all that was, that is, or ever will be. The minutest acts of our lives are imprinted on it, and even our thoughts rest photographed on its eternal tablets. It is the book which we see opened by the angel in the Revelation, "which is the Book of life, and out of which the dead are judged according to their works." It is, in short, the MEMORY of GOD» — la definición de la luz astral como registro total, cerrada con la identificación que le da nombre.

«The oracles assert that the impression of thoughts, characters, men, and other divine visions, appear in the aether. . . . In this the things without figure are figured» — la cita es de un fragmento de los Oráculos caldeos, y la obra la usa como aval antiguo de la misma doctrina.

«That flash of memory which is traditionally supposed to show a drowning man every long-forgotten scene of his mortal life--as the landscape is revealed to the traveller by intermittent flashes of lightning--is simply the sudden glimpse which the struggling soul gets into the silent galleries where his history is depicted in imperishable colors» — el relámpago del ahogado leído dentro de esa doctrina: no recuerdo cerebral sino vislumbre de la galería donde está pintada su historia.

«Believers in reincarnation adduce this as an additional proof of our antecedent existence in other bodies. This recognition of men, countries, and things that we have never seen, is attributed by them to flashes of soul-memory of anterior experiences. But the men of old, in common with mediaeval philosophers, firmly held to a contrary opinion» — consigna la lectura reencarnacionista del *déjà vu* y la de los antiguos sin fundirlas: el alma tendría memoria individual aparte del cerebro, y eso no prueba reencarnación.

«nature shuts the door after everything that passes, and pushes life onward" in more perfected forms» — la frase es de Éliphas Lévi y le sirve para cerrar el punto: la crisálida se hace mariposa y la mariposa no vuelve a ser gusano.

«Memory--the despair of the materialist, the enigma of the psychologist, the sphinx of science--is to the student of old philosophies merely a name to express that power which man unconsciously exerts, and shares with many of the inferior animals--to look with inner sight into the astral light» — su definición de la memoria contra las tres escuelas que nombra: no facultad cerebral sino poder de mirar con vista interior a la luz astral, compartido con muchos animales inferiores.

«In the stillness of the night-hours, when our bodily senses are fast locked in the fetters of sleep, and our elementary body rests, the astral form becomes free. It then oozes out of its earthly prison, and as Paracelsus has it--"confabulates with the outward world," and travels round the visible as well as the invisible worlds» — la doctrina del viaje nocturno: mientras el cuerpo elemental descansa, la forma astral rezuma de su prisión terrestre y recorre los dos mundos.

«Dreams, forebodings, prescience, prognostications and presentiments are impressions left by our astral spirit on our brain, which receives them more or less distinctly, according to the proportion of blood with which it is supplied during the hours of sleep» — la condición fisiológica que le pone a esas impresiones: el cerebro las recibe con más o menos nitidez según la sangre que lo irrigue durante el sueño.

«But the impressions of scenes and landscapes which the astral body saw in its peregrinations are still there, though lying latent under the pressure of matter» — explica el sueño sin recuerdo sin renunciar a la tesis: la impresión sigue ahí, latente bajo la presión de la materia.

«Blumenbach assures us that in the state of sleep, all intercourse between mind and body is suspended; an assertion which is denied by Dr. Richardson, F. R. S., who honestly reminds the German scientist that "the precise limits and connections of mind and body being unknown" it is more than should be said» — registra la objeción de Blumenbach y la réplica de Richardson, que le recuerda que los límites entre mente y cuerpo son desconocidos.

«of all scientific pursuits which practically concern the community, there is none perhaps which rests upon so uncertain and insecure a basis as medicine» — habla el doctor Allchin ante estudiantes de Londres, y la obra usa esa confesión para nivelar el terreno entre las hipótesis antiguas y las modernas.

«No man, however gross and material he may be, can avoid leading a double existence; one in the visible universe, the other in the invisible. The life-principle which animates his physical frame is chiefly in the astral body; and while the more animal portions of him rest, the more spiritual ones know neither limits nor obstacles» — la tesis en su forma más apretada: la doble existencia no es privilegio del místico, y el principio de vida reside sobre todo en el cuerpo astral.

«for theologians as well as laymen labor under the erroneous impression that soul and spirit are one and the same thing» — localiza el error que hace de barrera: confundir alma y espíritu, y remite la distinción a Platón y al hebreo.

«the "irrational soul," by which Plato meant our astral body, or the more ethereal representation of ourselves, can have at best only a more or less prolonged continuity of existence beyond the grave; the divine spirit--wrongly termed soul, by the Church--is immortal by its very essence» — la distinción que sostiene: el alma irracional dura a lo sumo un tiempo después de la tumba, y solo el espíritu divino —al que la Iglesia llama alma, dice, mal— es inmortal por esencia.

«The deeper the trance, the less signs of life the body shows, the clearer become the spiritual perceptions, and the more powerful are the soul's visions» — la proporción inversa que ofrece como prueba, apoyada en Brierre de Boismont: a menos vida corporal, más agudas las percepciones espirituales.

«when a thought of good or evil import is begotten in our brain, it draws to it impulses of like nature as irresistibly as the magnet attracts iron filings» — la mecánica del pensamiento: atrae impulsos de su misma naturaleza en proporción a su intensidad, y así un hombre puede marcar su época y las siguientes.

«It is sufficient for our purpose to know from what the ether certainly does, that it is capable of vastly more than any has yet ventured to say» — hablan los autores del *Unseen Universe*, y la obra lee en esa frase una reticencia: no han dicho todo lo que piensan.

«One of the most interesting discoveries of modern times, is that of the faculty which enables a certain class of sensitive persons to receive from any object held in the hand or against the forehead impressions of the character or appearance of the individual, or any other object with which it has previously been in contact» — así presenta la psicometría: la facultad de recibir de un objeto la impresión de quien lo tocó.

«This faculty is called by its discoverer--Professor J. R. Buchanan, of Louisville, Kentucky-- psychometry. To him, the world is indebted for this most important addition to Psychological Sciences; and to him, perhaps, when skepticism is found felled to the ground by such accumulation of facts, posterity will have to elevate a statue» — nombra al descubridor y le augura estatua, poniendo la psicometría entre las adiciones importantes a las ciencias psicológicas.

«The mental and physiological influence imparted to writing appears to be imperishable, as the oldest specimens I have investigated gave their impressions with a distinctness and force, little impaired by time. Old manuscripts, requiring an antiquary to decipher their strange old penmanship, were easily interpreted by the psychometric power» — habla Buchanan al anunciar su descubrimiento, y acota su alcance a la delineación del carácter: la impresión no se borraría con el tiempo.

«The property of retaining the impress of mind is not limited to writing. Drawings, paintings, everything upon which human contact, thought, and volition have been expended, may become linked with that thought and life, so as to recall them to the mind of another when in contact» — sigue Buchanan, extendiendo la propiedad a todo aquello en que se hayan gastado contacto, pensamiento y voluntad humanos.

«It proves that every occurrence in nature--no matter how minute or unimportant--leaves its indelible impress upon physical nature; and, as there has been no appreciable molecular disturbance, the only inference possible is, that these images have been produced by that invisible, universal force--Ether, or astral light» — la inferencia que saca de la verificación por mil psicómetros: sin perturbación molecular apreciable, la impresión solo puede venir del éter.

«A fragment of Cicero's house, at Tusculum, enabled her to describe, without the slightest intimation as to the nature of the object placed on her forehead, not only the great orator's surroundings, but also the previous owner of the building, Cornelius Sulla Felix, or, as he is usually called, Sulla the Dictator» — el caso que toma de *The Soul of Things* de Denton, con el control declarado: la señora Denton no sabía qué objeto le habían puesto en la frente.

«In many cases Professor Denton verified the statements by reference to historical records. More than this, a bit of the skeleton, or a fragment of the tooth of some antediluvian animal, caused the seeress to perceive the creature as it was when alive, and even live for a few brief moments its life, and experience its sensations» — anota la verificación documental de Denton y el alcance mayor que reclama: revivir por momentos la vida de un animal antediluviano a partir de un fragmento de hueso.

«Not a leaf waves, not an insect crawls, not a ripple moves, but each motion is recorded by a thousand faithful scribes in infallible and indelible scripture. This is just as true of all past time. From the dawn of light upon this infant globe, when round its cradle the steamy curtains hung, to this moment, nature has been busy photographing everything. What a picture-gallery is hers» — habla Denton: la naturaleza fotografiándolo todo desde el amanecer de la luz sobre el globo.

«It appears to us the height of impossibility to imagine that scenes in ancient Thebes, or in some temple of prehistoric times should be photographed only upon the substance of certain atoms. The images of the events are imbedded in that all-permeating» — aquí la obra corrige a Denton: las escenas de la antigua Tebas no estarían fotografiadas solo en la sustancia de ciertos átomos sino en ese medio que todo lo penetra. El adjetivo que sigue, *ever-retaining*, va partido por el guion de fin de renglón y queda fuera de la cita.

«When the psychometer examines his specimen, he is brought in contact with the current of the astral light, connected with that specimen, and which retains pictures of the events associated with its history» — la explicación mecánica de la psicometría: el contacto pone al operador en la corriente de luz astral ligada a esa muestra.

«The psychometer is clairvoyant; that is, he sees with the inner eye. Unless his will-power is very strong, unless he has thoroughly trained himself to that particular phenomenon, and his knowledge of the capabilities of his sight are profound, his perceptions of places, persons, and events, must necessarily be very confused» — marca el límite del psicómetro espontáneo: sin voluntad fuerte ni entrenamiento, sus percepciones salen confusas.

«But in the case of mesmerization, in which this same clairvoyant faculty is developed, the operator, whose will holds that of the subject under control, can force him to concentrate his attention upon a given picture long enough to observe all its minute details» — y la ventaja del mesmerismo sobre la psicometría espontánea: la voluntad del operador fija la imagen el tiempo necesario para describirla.

«And to those who might object to the possibility of perceiving that which "yet is not," we may put the question: Why is it more impossible to see that which will be, than to bring back to sight that which is gone, and is no more» — la pregunta con que contesta a quien niegue la previsión: por qué habría de ser más imposible ver lo que será que traer a la vista lo que ya no es.

«According to the kabalistic doctrine, the future exists in the astral light in embryo, as the present existed in embryo in the past» — la doctrina que hace posible esa previsión, adjudicada a los kabalistas y no a sí misma.

«While man is free to act as he pleases, the manner in which he will act was foreknown from all time; not on the ground of fatalism or destiny, but simply on the principle of universal, unchangeable harmony» — la reserva que salva el libre albedrío dentro de esa doctrina: no fatalismo ni destino, sino armonía inmutable, como la nota que al ser pulsada no puede vibrar como otra.

«Besides, eternity can have neither past nor future, but only the present; as boundless space, in its strictly literal sense, can have neither distant nor proximate places» — el argumento por la eternidad y el espacio, que le sirve para desactivar la objeción temporal.

«The past no more exists than the future, as we have said, only our memories survive; and our memories are but the glimpses that we catch of the reflections of this past in the currents of» — y su consecuencia sobre la memoria: no sobrevive el pasado sino sus reflejos, atrapados como los atrapa el psicómetro. La frase se completa del otro lado del corte de plana.

«It seems, then, that this photographic influence pervades all nature; nor can we say where it stops. We do not know but it may imprint upon the world around us our features, as they are modified by various passions, and thus fill nature with daguerreotype impressions of all our actions; . . . it may be, too, that there are tests by which nature, more skilful than any photographist, can bring out and fix these portraits, so that acuter senses than ours shall see them as on a great canvas, spread over the material universe. Perhaps, too, they may never fade from that canvas, but become specimens in the great picture-gallery of eternity» — habla el profesor E. Hitchcock, con sus dos *perhaps* dentro: la influencia fotográfica podría llenar la naturaleza de impresiones de todos nuestros actos.

«The "perhaps" of Professor Hitchcock is henceforth changed by the demonstration of psychometry into a triumphant certitude» — convierte la conjetura de Hitchcock en certeza por la vía de la psicometría, y le corrige un punto: no harían falta sentidos más agudos que los nuestros, sino dejar los sentidos externos.

«The human spirit, being of the Divine, immortal Spirit, appreciates neither past nor future, but sees all things as in the present» — la razón por la que le disputa a Hitchcock esa limitación: el espíritu humano ve todo como presente.

«Evidently the scientists are probing the insecure ground of materialism, and, feeling it trembling under their feet, are preparing for a less dishonorable surrender of arms in case of defeat» — su lectura de las especulaciones sobre mundos invisibles de los autores del *Unseen Universe* y de Fiske: preparan una rendición menos deshonrosa.

«Jevons confirms Babbage, and both firmly believe that every thought, displacing the particles of the brain and setting them in motion, scatters them throughout the universe, and think that "each particle of the existing matter must be a register of all that has happened» — reúne a Jevons y a Babbage en la misma tesis: cada partícula de la materia existente sería registro de todo lo ocurrido.

«If scientists, proceeding from a strictly scientific point of view, such as the possibility of energy being transferred into the invisible universe-- and on the principle of continuity, indulge in such speculations, why should occultists and spiritualists be refused the same privilege» — el argumento de reciprocidad: si la ciencia especula con la transferencia de energía al universo invisible, no puede negarle el mismo permiso al ocultista.

«In our opinion, if psychometry is one of the grandest proofs of the indestructibility of matter, retaining eternally the impressions of the outward world, the possession of that faculty by our inner sight is a still greater one in favor of the immortality of man's individual spirit» — aquí la obra pone su propia inferencia y la gradúa: la psicometría probaría la indestructibilidad de la materia, y la posesión de esa facultad por la vista interior probaría más, la inmortalidad del espíritu individual.

«We have driven the operation of that mystery called Life out of the objective universe. The mistake made, lies in imagining that by this process they completely get rid of a thing so driven before them, and that it disappears from the universe altogether. It does no such thing. It only disappears from that small circle of light which we may call the universe of scientific perception. Call it the trinity of mystery: mystery of matter, the mystery of life and--the mystery of God--and these three are One» — hablan los autores del *Unseen Universe*: expulsar el misterio del universo de la percepción científica no lo saca del universo, y su trinidad es materia, vida y Dios.

«if the visible universe is all that exists then the first abrupt manifestation of it is as truly a break of continuity as its final overthrow» — el argumento de continuidad de esos mismos autores, que la obra recoge entero: el comienzo abrupto sería tan rupturista como el fin.

«May we not at once say that when energy is carried from matter into Ether, it is carried from the visible into the invisible; and that when it is carried from Ether to matter it is carried from the invisible into the visible» — la formulación final del *Unseen Universe*, que la obra suscribe: el éter no sería un puente sino el paso mismo de lo visible a lo invisible.

«Ether--light, heat, electricity, and motion--they have rejoiced over their good fortune, counted its vibrations in producing the colors of the spectrum; and, proud of their achievements, refuse to see any further» — llama purgaciones groseras del éter, con el término kabalístico que queda en la plana anterior, a la luz, el calor, la electricidad y el movimiento, y ahí sitúa el punto donde la ciencia se detiene satisfecha.

«speculate with freedom on the possibility of independent worlds; some existing in different parts, others pervading each other» — habla Thomas Young en sus lecciones de filosofía natural, invitando a especular con mundos independientes que se penetran unos a otros; la frase sigue en la plana siguiente, con esos mundos invisibles en el mismo espacio.

«never falls upon a wall without leaving thereupon a permanent trace, a trace which might be made visible by resorting to proper processes. . . . The portraits of our friends, or landscape-views, may be hidden on the sensitive surface from the eye, but they are ready to make their appearance, as soon as proper developers are resorted to. A spectre is concealed on a silver or glassy surface, until, by our necromancy, we make it come forth into the visible world. Upon the walls of our most private apartments, where we think the eye of intrusion is altogether shut out, and our retirement can never be profaned, there exist the vestiges of all our acts, silhouettes of whatever we have done» — habla Draper, y la obra celebra la forma poética: en los muros de las habitaciones más privadas quedarían las siluetas de todo lo hecho. El pasaje se reimprime en otro punto del volumen.

«I hold a discovery which frightens me. There are two kinds of electricity; one, brute and blind, is produced by the contact of metals and acids"; (the gross purgation) . . . "the other is intelligent and CLAIRVOYANT» — habla el doctor Jobard de París en 1856: una electricidad bruta y ciega y otra inteligente y clarividente; la obra le pone al lado su propio término, la purgación grosera.

«The electric ball or globular electricity contains a thought which disobeys Newton and Mariotte to follow its own freaks. . . . We have, in the annals of the Academy, thousands of proofs of the INTELLIGENCE of the electric bolt . . . But I remark that I am permitting myself to become indiscreet. A little more and I should have disclosed to you the key which is about to discover to us the universal spirit» — sigue Jobard, que se interrumpe él mismo por indiscreto; la obra recoge esa reticencia como parte del testimonio.

«It states that from aether have come all things, and to it all will return; that the images of all things are indelibly impressed upon it; and that it is the store-house of the germs or of the remains of all visible forms, and even ideas» — así resume el Oráculo caldeo que trae la traducción de Cory de los *Ancient Fragments*, y lo pone en línea con los autores del *Unseen Universe*.

«At the point at which we are now arrived, the attitude assumed by the materialists toward psychical phenomena being perfectly defined, we may assert with safety that were this key lying loose on the threshold of the "chasm" not one of our Tyndalls would stoop to pick it up» — la imagen con que cierra su juicio sobre los materialistas: aunque la llave estuviera suelta en el umbral del abismo, no se agacharían a recogerla.

«To them ether was not merely a bridge connecting the seen and unseen sides of the universe, but across its span their daring feet followed the road that led through the mysterious gates which modern speculators either will not or cannot unlock» — la diferencia que marca entre los especuladores modernos y los maestros de la filosofía hermética: para éstos el éter era camino transitado, no solo puente.

«Do we demand of distinguished technologists, what are the most recent discoveries in regard to the origin of the metalliferous deposits? We hear one of them, Professor Sterry Hunt, in showing us how water is a universal solvent, enunciating the doctrine held and taught by the old Thales, more than two dozen centuries ago, that water was the principle of all things» — el ejemplo con que sostiene su tesis de la anticipación: Sterry Hunt mostrando el agua como disolvente universal enunciaría la doctrina de Tales.

«The poor, honest primordial elements have long been exiled, and our ambitious men of science run races to determine who shall add one more to the fledgling brood of the sixty-three or more elementary substances» — su ironía sobre la carrera por añadir un elemento más a la lista, frente a los elementos primordiales desterrados.

«experimental science will have "nothing to do with any kind of essences except those which it can see, smell, or taste." It must have those that can be put in the eye, the nose, or the mouth! It leaves others to the metaphysicians» — cita al profesor Cooke para fijar el criterio que la ciencia experimental se impone, y lo comenta con sorna: esencias que quepan en el ojo, la nariz o la boca.

«Therefore, when Van Helmont tells us that, "though a homogeneal part of elementary earth may be artfully (artificially) converted into water," though he still denies "that the same can be done by nature alone; for no natural agent is able to transmute one element into another» — la posición de Van Helmont sobre la transmutación, con su límite dentro: concede la conversión artificial y niega que la naturaleza sola pueda hacerla.

«by no chemical process whatever can we obtain from iron a substance weighing less than the metal used in its production. In a word, we can extract from iron nothing but iron» — cita la química más reciente sobre la conservación del peso, y la pone al lado de las virtudes seminales de Van Helmont para mostrar que no dicen cosas tan distintas.

«Is Professor Cooke, so eminent in modern chemistry, equally proficient in the knowledge of what the alchemists did or did not know? Is he quite sure that he understands the meaning of the alchemical diction? We are not» — la duda que le opone a Cooke no es sobre química sino sobre lectura: si entiende la dicción alquímica.

«The alkahest never destroys the seminal virtues of the bodies thereby dissolved: for instance, gold, by its action, is reduced to a salt of gold, antimony to a salt of antimony, etc., of the same seminal virtues, or characters with the original concrete» — la primera de las tres propiedades del alkahest que dice tomada de las propias admisiones de Van Helmont y Paracelso: el oro se reduce a sal de oro, con sus mismas virtudes seminales.

«The subject exposed to its operation is converted into its three principles, salt, sulphur, and mercury, and afterwards into salt alone, which then becomes volatile, and at length is wholly turned into clear water» — la segunda propiedad: la reducción a sal, azufre y mercurio, luego a sal sola y al fin a agua clara.

«This salt, by being several times cohobated with Paracelsus' sal circulatum, loses all its fixedness, and at length becomes an insipid water, equal in quantity to the salt it was made from» — habla Van Helmont el viejo, y la obra subraya la conservación de la cantidad como el punto que la química moderna cree suyo.

«The objection that might be made by Professor Cooke, in behalf of modern science, to the hermetic expressions, would equally apply to the Egyptian hieratic writings--they hide that which was meant to be concealed. If he would profit by the labors of the past, he must employ the cryptographer, and not the satirist» — su instrucción de método para leer a los alquimistas: hacen lo mismo que la escritura hierática egipcia, y piden criptógrafo, no satírico.

«Paracelsus, like the rest, exhausted his ingenuity in transpositions of letters and abbreviations of words and sentences. For example, when he wrote sutratur he meant tartar, and mutrin meant nitrum, and so on» — da la clave concreta de esa criptografía con dos ejemplos de anagrama de Paracelso.

«It requires no little hardihood to assert that Paracelsus and his colleagues were ignorant of the natures of elementary and compound substances; they may not be called by the same names as are now in fashion, but that they were known is proved by the results attained» — el argumento por resultados: los nombres serán otros, y de lo obtenido infiere que conocían las sustancias.

«When chemists learn what he meant by aurum potabile, alkahest, salt, and seminal virtues--what he really meant, not what he said he meant, nor what was thought he meant--then, and not before, can our chemists safely assume such airs toward the fire-philosophers and those ancient masters whose mystic teachings they reverently studied» — la condición que les pone a los químicos antes de darse aires con los filósofos del fuego: entender lo que Van Helmont quiso decir, no lo que dijo que quería decir.

«Still we are, in many respects, approximating the phenomena of the organic world to those of the mineral kingdom; and we at the same time learn that these so far interest and depend upon each other that we begin to see a certain truth underlying the notion of those old philosophers, who extended to the» — habla Sterry Hunt, y la obra celebra la concesión: empieza a verse cierta verdad bajo la noción de los viejos filósofos, que en la plana siguiente resulta ser la de la tierra como gran organismo vivo.

«We are denied the right to call these substances "chemical elements," for they are not "primordial principles or self-existing essences out of which the universe was fashioned» — registra la objeción terminológica de la química de su tiempo: elemento ya no significa principio primordial ni esencia autoexistente. El pasaje se reimprime en otro punto del volumen.

«The alchemists sought in vain for a universal solvent; but we now know that water, aided in some cases by heat, pressure, and the presence of certain widely-distributed substances, such as carbonic acid and alkaline carbonates and sulphides, will dissolve the most insoluble bodies; so that it may, after all, be looked upon as the long-sought for alkahest or universal menstruum» — habla Sterry Hunt en una de sus conferencias, y la obra le contesta que eso es casi una paráfrasis de Van Helmont.

«It may throw some light to observe, that Van Helmont, as well as Paracelsus, took water for the universal instrument (agent?) of chymistry and natural philosophy; and earth for the unchangeable basis of all things--that fire was assigned as the sufficient cause of all things--that Seminal impressions were lodged in the mechanism of the earth--that water, by dissolving and fermenting with this earth, as it does by means of fire, brings forth everything; whence originally proceeded animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms» — la cita viene de una sátira de 1820 contra los alquimistas, y le sirve igual: el agua por instrumento universal, la tierra por base inmutable y el fuego por causa suficiente.

«In the works of Paracelsus, Van Helmont, Philalethes, Pantatem, Tachenius, and even Boyle, "the great characteristic of the alkahest," "to dissolve and change all sublunary bodies--water alone excepted," is explicitly stated» — la nómina de alquimistas que enuncian expresamente la propiedad del alkahest, con Boyle entre ellos, y con el agua excluida de lo disoluble.

«And is it possible to believe that Van Helmont, whose private character was unimpeachable, and whose great learning was universally recognized, should most solemnly declare himself possessed of the secret, were it but a vain boast» — el argumento de carácter con que defiende la declaración de Van Helmont sobre el secreto, planteado como pregunta.

«One of them is human testimony in its various shapes--all testimony of eye-witnesses, traditional testimony from the lips of those who have been eye-witnesses, and the testimony of those who have put their impressions into writing and into print» — habla Huxley en Nashville, fijando la regla de validez del testimonio humano que la obra se dispone a aplicarle.

«If you read Caesar's Commentaries, wherever he gives an account of his battles with the Gauls, you place a certain amount of confidence in his statements. You take his testimony upon this. You feel that Caesar would not have made these statements unless he had believed them to be true» — el ejemplo del propio Huxley, que la obra va a usar contra él.

«So with Herodotus, and all other ancient authorities, unless they were by nature men of truth, they should not be believed even about civil or military affairs. Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus» — la extiende a Heródoto y a toda la autoridad antigua, con el brocardo latino por regla.

«Men of intellect and conscience did not lie for the pleasure of bewildering or disgusting posterity» — el argumento de motivo que cierra el punto, apoyado en la propia frase de Huxley sobre la naturaleza humana de siempre.

«Deleuze, though finding in the works of the former many "mythic, illusory ideas"--perhaps only because he could not understand them-- credits him nevertheless with a vast knowledge, "an acute judgment," and at the same time with having given to the world "great truths." "He was the first," he adds, "to give the name of gas to aerial fluids. Without him it is probable that steel would have given no new impulse to science» — la deuda que Deleuze reconoce a Van Helmont: le adjudica el nombre *gas* para los fluidos aéreos, y la obra anota su propia sospecha sobre por qué lo tenía por mítico.

«By what application of the doctrine of chances could we discover the likelihood that experimentalists, capable of resolving and recombining chemical substances, as they are admitted to have done, were ignorant of the nature of elementary substances, their combining energies, and the solvent or solvents, that would disintegrate them when wanted» — el argumento probabilístico: quien resuelve y recompone sustancias no puede ignorar su naturaleza ni sus disolventes.

«If they had the reputation only of theorists the case would stand differently and our argument would lose its force, but the chemical discoveries grudgingly accorded to them, by their worst enemies, form the basis for much stronger language than we have permitted ourselves, from a fear of being deemed over partial» — marca el punto donde su argumento sería débil y por qué no lo es: son descubrimientos concedidos por sus peores enemigos.

«we do not hesitate to reaffirm that since Van Helmont asserted, "most solemnly," that he was possessed of the secret of the alkahest, no modern critic has a right to set him down as either a liar or a visionary, until something more certain is known about the nature of this alleged universal menstruum» — la conclusión, y su condición: mientras no se sepa algo más cierto sobre ese menstruo, ningún crítico moderno puede llamarlo mentiroso ni visionario.

«The authors of the Unseen Universe have scientifically demonstrated the possibility of certain alleged psychological phenomena through the medium of the universal ether» — reparte los avales que va a usar: la posibilidad demostrada por el *Unseen Universe*, la lógica de Wallace contra Hume y los tres años de experimentos de Crookes.

«I do not hesitate to affirm my conviction, based on a personal examination of the subject, that any scientific man who declares the phenomena denominated 'magnetic,' 'somnambulic,' 'mediumic,' and others not yet explained by science, to be impossible, is one who speaks without knowing what he is talking about» — habla Camille Flammarion, astrónomo, que la obra pone junto a Wallace, Crookes y Hare.

«which consists in imagining that the laws of Nature are already known to us, and that everything which appears to overstep the limit of our present formulas is impossible» — sigue Flammarion, nombrando la ilusión contraria a la credulidad: creer que las leyes de la naturaleza ya se conocen.

«As the organism is itself moved and directed within the structure by a force--which either is, or is not controlled by--the soul, spirit, or mind . . . which constitutes the individual being we term 'the man,' it is an equally reasonable conclusion that the force which causes the motions beyond the limits of the body is the same force that produces motion within the limits of the body. And, as the external force is often directed by intelligence, it is an equally reasonable conclusion that the directing intelligence of the external force is the same intelligence that directs the force internally» — habla el sargento Cox, citado por Crookes: la fuerza que mueve fuera del cuerpo sería la misma que mueve dentro, y la inteligencia que la dirige, la misma.

«That the force which produces physical phenomena proceeds from (consequently is generated in) the medium» — la primera de las cuatro proposiciones en que la obra descompone la tesis de Cox, con el paréntesis aclaratorio que ella misma añade.

«He strongly disputes the spiritualistic theory, or rather assertion, that "spirits of the dead are the sole agents in the production of all the phenomena» — la cuarta proposición de Cox, la que lo enfrenta con los espiritistas.

«we must remind the reader that we find ourselves placed between two extreme opposites represented by two parties--the believers and unbelievers in this agency of human spirits. Neither seem capable of deciding the point raised by Mr. Cox; for while the spiritualists are so omnivorous in their credulity as to believe every sound and movement in a circle to be produced by disembodied human beings, their antagonists dogmatically deny that anything can be produced by "spirits," for there are none. Hence, neither class is in a position to examine the subject without bias» — su propia posición declarada: entre la credulidad omnívora de los espiritistas y la negación dogmática de sus adversarios, y ninguno de los dos en condiciones de examinar sin sesgo.

«They knew the properties of water as a solvent as well as» — su objeción al *alkahest* de Sterry Hunt arranca aquí: los alquimistas conocían esa propiedad del agua tan bien como los químicos modernos y no hacían secreto de ella, luego no era ése su disolvente universal. La frase se completa en la plana siguiente.

«naturally truthful or a natural liar; and since Mr. Huxley has settled that point to his own satisfaction as regards the facts of military history in his favor, we insist that Caesar is also a competent witness as to augurs, diviners, and psychological facts» — la aplicación de la regla de Huxley: no se puede admitir a César como testigo de historia militar y rechazarlo como testigo de augures y adivinos.

«If such were the fact, the medium would be a conscious magician, and all pretense for being a passive instrument in the hands of invisible intelligences would become useless» — la contradicción que le encuentra a la tesis de Cox: si la fuerza saliera del médium y actuara con inteligencia, el médium sería un mago consciente y no un instrumento pasivo.

«As well plead that a quantity of steam sufficient to fill, without bursting, a boiler, will raise the boiler; or a Leyden jar, full of electricity, overcome the inertia of the jar, as such a mechanical absurdity» — los dos símiles con que llama absurdo mecánico a que la fuerza generada dentro levante su propio recipiente.

«and though identical in its essence with the astral spirit of the medium, it cannot be his spirit only, for the latter remains all the while in a kind of cataleptic torpor, when the mediumship is genuine» — la distinción fina de su propia tesis: la fuerza es de la misma esencia que el espíritu astral del médium y aun así no puede ser solo suya, porque él queda en torpor cataléptico.

«On the contrary there is such an abundance of testimony to show that the mind of the medium, in a majority of cases, has nothing to do with the phenomena, that we cannot be content to let Mr. Cox's bold assertion go unchallenged» — su respuesta al segundo punto de Cox: contra la supuesta insuficiencia de pruebas, dice que abundan los casos en que la mente del médium no interviene.

«The philosophers, and especially those who were initiated into the Mysteries, held that the astral soul is the impalpable duplicate of the gross external form which we call body. It is the perisprit of the Kardecists and the spirit-form of the spiritualists» — nombra las tres versiones del mismo objeto —alma astral de los iniciados, *perisprit* de los kardecistas, forma espiritual de los espiritistas— y las declara una sola.

«The astral perisprit is contained and confined within the physical body as ether in a bottle, or magnetism in magnetized iron. It is a centre and engine of force, fed from the universal supply of force, and moved by the same general laws which pervade all nature and produce all cosmical phenomena» — la definición física que da del perispíritu: centro y motor de fuerza alimentado del suministro universal, y sujeto a las mismas leyes generales.

«Its inherent activity causes the incessant physical operations of the animal organism and ultimately results in the destruction of the latter by overuse and its own escape. It is the prisoner, not the voluntary tenant, of the body» — la consecuencia que saca: es su propia actividad la que desgasta el organismo y acaba liberándolo, porque es prisionero y no inquilino.

«Those who do this consciously, and at will, are termed magicians, hierophants, seers, adepts; those who are made to do it, either through the fluid of the mesmerizer or of "spirits," are "mediums."» — la línea que separa al mago del médium, y que no es de facultad sino de voluntad: hacerlo conscientemente o ser hecho hacerlo.

«Every objective manifestation, whether it be the motion of a living limb, or the movement of some inorganic body, requires two conditions: will and force--plus matter, or that which makes the object so moved visible to our eye; and these three are all convertible forces, or the force-correlation of the scientists» — las tres condiciones que exige toda manifestación objetiva, y su equivalencia declarada con la correlación de fuerzas de los científicos.

«In their turn they are directed or rather overshadowed by the Divine intelligence which these men so studiously leave out of the account, but without which not even the crawling of the smallest earth-worm could ever take place» — y el cuarto término que dice omitido por la ciencia, sin el cual no se movería ni una lombriz.

«Behind these laws we must search for the intelligent cause, which once having created and set these laws in motion, has infused into them the essence of its own consciousness. Whether we call this the first cause, the universal will, or God, it must always bear intelligence» — acepta el nombre de leyes cósmicas y pide ir detrás: la causa inteligente habría infundido en ellas la esencia de su propia conciencia.

«Consciousness is a quality of the sentient principle, or, in other words, the soul; and the latter often displays activity even while the body is asleep or paralyzed» — su definición de la conciencia como cualidad del principio sensible, con el argumento de que sigue activa mientras el cuerpo duerme.

«When we lift our arm mechanically, we may imagine that we do it unconsciously because our superficial senses cannot appreciate the interval between the formulation of the purpose and its execution. Latent as it seemed to us, our vigilant will evolved force, and set our matter in motion» — el ejemplo del brazo levantado contra la idea de una voluntad inconsciente: lo que falta no es conciencia sino percepción del intervalo.

«Mr. Crookes himself tells us of cases where the intelligence could not have emanated from any one in the room; as in the instance where the word "however," covered by his finger and unknown even to himself, was correctly written by planchette» — el caso que le opone a Cox: la palabra tapada por el dedo de Crookes y desconocida por él mismo, escrita correctamente.

«But scientists deny clairvoyance; and if, to escape the unwelcome alternative of accrediting the phenomena to a spiritual source, they concede to us the fact of clairvoyance, it then devolves upon them to either accept the kabalistic explanation of what this faculty is, or achieve the task hitherto impracticable of making a new theory to fit the facts» — la tenaza que arma con ese caso: negar la clarividencia deja el hecho sin explicación, y concederla obliga a explicarla.

«Does any theory of mediumistic impulse account for the ability to foretell events beyond the possible knowledge of both speaker and listener» — la segunda dificultad que le pone: la profecía queda fuera del alcance de cualquier teoría del impulso mediúmnico.

«As the air is necessary for the mutual exchange of audible sounds, so are certain currents of astral light, or ether directed by an Intelligence, necessary for the production of the phenomena called spiritual» — el símil del aire y el diálogo con que separa el agente de las inteligencias: dos que hablan usan un mismo aire y no por eso son uno.

«And who art thou? without a God who creates and ripens thee; without a daemon [spirit] who, acting under the orders of God, directs and governs thee; thou canst do nothing, thou art nothing but a vain breath» — habla Plutarco, sacerdote de Apolo, dirigiéndose al vapor oracular; la obra usa esa apóstrofe para decir que sin el alma que la habita la fuerza psíquica también sería vano aliento.

«Aristotle maintains that this gas, or astral emanation, escaping from inside the earth, is the sole sufficient cause, acting from within outwardly for the vivification of every living being and plant upon the external crust» — le adjudica a Aristóteles la doctrina de la emanación subterránea como causa suficiente de la vida sobre la corteza.

«And what can be more divine than the exhalations of the earth, which affect the human soul so as to enable her to predict the future? And could the hand of time evaporate such a virtue? Do you suppose you are talking of some kind of wine or salted meat» — habla Cicerón contra los negadores de su siglo, y la obra le devuelve la pregunta a los experimentadores modernos.

«Prophecies are delivered in two ways--consciously, by magicians who are able to look into the astral light; and unconsciously, by those who act under what is called inspiration. To the latter class belonged and belong the Biblical prophets and the modern trance-speakers» — la clasificación que propone: el mago que mira la luz astral y el inspirado que no sabe lo que hace, y en esta segunda clase pone a los profetas bíblicos.

«No man, when in his senses, attains prophetic truth and inspiration . . . but only when demented by some distemper or possession . . ." (by a daimonion or spirit). "Some persons call them prophets; they do not know that they are only repeaters . . . and are not to be called prophets at all, but only transmitters of vision and prophecy» — habla Platón, y su distinción es la que la obra hace suya: no son profetas sino transmisores de visión y de profecía.

«The most ardent spiritualists practically admit the existence of psychic force, under the very inappropriate name of magnetism (to which it has no affinity whatever), for they assert that the spirits of the dead can only do the acts attributed to them by using the magnetism (that is, the psychic force) of the mediums» — habla el sargento Cox, con su reproche terminológico a los espiritistas por llamar magnetismo a lo que él llama fuerza psíquica.

«Because electricity did not become a science till the eighteenth century, no one will presume to say that this force has not existed since the creation» — la analogía con que le contesta: el nombre tardío de una fuerza no fecha su existencia, y añade que se dispone a probar que los hebreos ya la conocían.

«If a bar of iron can be endowed with magnetic properties, by passing a current of voltaic electricity over some conductor placed in a certain way close to the bar, why not accept, as a provisional theory, that a medium may also be a conductor, and nothing more, at a seance» — la hipótesis provisional que propone en su lugar, y la declara como tal: el médium como conductor y nada más.

«Is it unscientific to say that the intelligence of "psychic force," drawing currents of electricity from the waves of the ether, and employing the medium as a conductor, develops and calls into action the latent magnetism with which the atmosphere of the seance-room is saturated, so as to produce the desired effects» — su propia versión de la mecánica de la sesión, formulada como pregunta al lector: la inteligencia extrae corrientes del éter y usa al médium para despertar el magnetismo latente del cuarto.

«we contend that there is as yet insufficient proof of any other directing agent than the intelligence of the medium, and no proof whatever of the agency of the 'spirits' of the dead» — habla Cox definiendo la diferencia con los espiritistas; la obra le concede la segunda mitad y le disputa la primera.

«We fully agree with Mr. Cox as to the lack of proof that the agency is that of the spirits of the dead; as for the rest, it is a very extraordinary deduction from "a wealth of facts," according to the expression of Mr. Crookes» — marca exactamente dónde coincide con Cox y dónde no, y le opone la riqueza de hechos que reporta Crookes.

«1st. The movement of heavy bodies with contact, but without mechanical exertion. 2d. The phenomena of percussive and other sounds. 3d. The alteration of weight of bodies. 4th. Movements of heavy substances when at a distance from the medium. 5th. The rising of tables and chairs off the ground, without contact with any person. 6th. THE LEVITATION OF HUMAN BEINGS» — los seis primeros de los diez fenómenos que Crookes declara comprobados, con la levitación humana al final de la serie.

«Under the strictest conditions, I have seen a solid self - luminous body, the size and nearly the shape of a turkey's egg, float noiselessly about the room, at one time higher than any one could reach on tiptoe, and then gently descend to the floor. It was visible for more than ten minutes, and before it faded away it struck the table three times with a sound like that of a hard, solid body» — habla Crookes describiendo la aparición luminosa; la obra le pone al lado, entre paréntesis, la comparación con el gato meteoro de Babinet, que Arago clasificó entre los fenómenos naturales.

«In this instance, the psychic force comes "from a corner of the room" as a "phantom form," takes an accordeon in its hand, and then glides about the room, playing the instrument; Home, the medium, being in full view at the time» — la ironía con que aplica el término de Cox al décimo fenómeno: una fuerza psíquica que sale de un rincón, toma un acordeón y recorre el cuarto tocándolo.

«having assured himself scientifically of the genuineness of the phenomenon, reported it to the Royal Society. Was he welcomed as the discoverer of natural phenomena of a new and important character? Let the reader consult his work for the answer» — deja la pregunta sobre la acogida de la Royal Society sin responderla ella misma, y remite al lector a la obra de Crookes.

«gave him "a telegraphic message through the Morse alphabet, by taps on my hand" (the Morse code being quite unknown to any other person present, and but imperfectly to himself), "and," adds Mr. Crookes, "it convinced me that there was a good Morse operator at the other end of the line, WHEREVER THAT MIGHT BE» — el caso del listón telegrafista, con el código Morse desconocido para los presentes y mal sabido por el propio Crookes; las mayúsculas de la última frase son suyas.

«After a third trial the lath gave it up, and moved back to its place; the pencil lay as it fell across the paper, and an alphabetic message told us: "We have tried to do as you asked, but our power is exhausted» — el episodio del lápiz y el listón; la obra se detiene en el plural del mensaje para preguntar si entonces había dos fuerzas psíquicas presentes.

«In all this, is there any proof that the directing agent was "the intelligence of the medium"? Is there not, on the contrary, every indication that the movements of the lath and pencil were directed by spirits "of the dead," or at least of those of some other unseen intelligent entities» — la conclusión que saca de esos casos, planteada como pregunta doble y sin cerrar la identidad del agente.

«As strong men have often found it impossible to raise a small table weighing a few pounds, and broken it to pieces in the effort, so a dozen of experimenters, among them sometimes, academicians, were utterly unable to step across a chalk-line drawn on the floor by Du Potet» — el paralelo que arma entre la mesa que no se levanta y la raya de tiza que no se cruza, y el caso del general ruso escéptico que insistió hasta caer en convulsiones.

«If they produce the same psychological and physiological effects, there is good reason to believe them more or less identical» — la inferencia, dicha con su grado: identidad más o menos, por identidad de efectos, y con la advertencia de que negarla no bastaría para refutarla.

«Once upon a time, all the Academies in Christendom had agreed to deny that there were any mountains in the moon; and there was a certain time when, if any one had been so bold as to affirm that there was life in the superior regions of the atmosphere as well as in the fathomless depths of the ocean, he would have been set down as a fool or an ignoramus» — los dos precedentes con que desactiva el argumento de autoridad: las montañas de la luna y la vida en las alturas y en las simas del mar.

«We will soon be warranted in paraphrasing the sentence and making it read--"Scientists deny--then it must be true» — la paráfrasis del dicho del abate como cierre del capítulo; la obra la da por próxima a merecerse, no por establecida.

«Almost without exception, ancient and mediaeval scholars believed in the arcane doctrines of wisdom. These included Alchemy, the Chaldeo-Jewish Kabala, the esoteric systems of Pythagoras and the old Magi, and those of the later Platonic philosophers and theurgists» — el inventario de lo que entiende por doctrinas arcanas de sabiduría, con la alquimia, la Kabala caldeo-judía y los sistemas esotéricos de Pitágoras y los Magos.

«We must not forget that what is now called Necromancy by the Church, and Spiritualism by modern believers, and that includes the evoking of departed spirits, is a science which has, from remote antiquity, been almost universally diffused over the face of the globe» — reclama para la evocación de los muertos el estatuto de ciencia difundida por todo el globo desde la antigüedad remota, bajo los dos nombres que le dan sus adversarios y sus creyentes.

«He divided the astral spirit of man after its exit from the body into two distinct entities: the "aerial" and the "aethereal vehicle."» — la distinción de Henry More entre los dos vehículos del espíritu astral tras la muerte.

«During the time that a disembodied man moves in its aerial clothing, he is subject to Fate--i.e., evil and temptation, attached to its earthly interests, and therefore is not utterly pure; it is only when he casts off this garb of the first spheres and becomes ethereal that he becomes sure of his immortality» — y el estatuto de cada uno: en el vehículo aéreo el desencarnado sigue sujeto al destino y a la tentación; solo al hacerse etéreo queda seguro de su inmortalidad.

«with Miss Fox when she has been writing a message automatically to one person present, whilst a message to another person, on another subject, was being given alphabetically by means of 'raps,' and the whole time she was conversing freely with a third person, on a subject totally different from either» — habla Crookes describiendo tres canales simultáneos —escritura automática, golpes alfabéticos y conversación—, que él pone entre las instancias especiales que apuntan a una inteligencia exterior.

«Most certainly the word magnetism explains in this case as little as the term psychic force; howbeit, there is more reason to use the former» — no defiende su término como explicación sino como preferible al de Cox; la razón, que el magnetismo trascendente produce efectos idénticos a los del espiritismo, se completa en la plana siguiente.

«We may define this kind of spirit we speak of to be a substance indiscernible, that can move itself, that can penetrate, contract, and dilate itself, and can also penetrate, move, and alter matter," which is the third emanation» — la definición de espíritu de Henry More, y su cadena de emanaciones: Dios como sustancia primaria, el espíritu como segunda y la materia como tercera.

«our new inspired saints . . . sworn advocates of the witches, who thus madly and boldly, against all sense and reason, against all antiquity, all interpreters, and against the Scripture itself, will have even no Samuel in the scene, but a confederate knave! Whether the Scripture, or these inblown buffoons, puffed up with nothing but ignorance, vanity, and stupid infidelity, are to be believed, let any one judge» — habla Henry More contra Scot, Adie y Webster; la obra reproduce el insulto entero y se pregunta qué habría dicho contra los escépticos del siglo XIX.

«Descartes, although a worshipper of matter, was one of the most devoted teachers of the magnetic doctrine and, in a certain sense, even of Alchemy» — la adscripción que le hace a Descartes, con la salvedad del materialismo por delante.

«The magnet-streams of Mesmer are disguised by him into the Cartesian vortices, and both rest on the same principle» — la identificación de los torbellinos cartesianos con las corrientes magnéticas de Mesmer, apoyada en Ennemoser.

«The esteemed philosopher, Pierre Poiret Naude, was the warmest defender of the doctrines of occult magnetism and its first propounders, in 1679. The magico-theosophical philosophy is fully vindicated in his works» — registra a ese defensor del magnetismo oculto en 1679; el nombre va con la grafía que imprime la fuente y sin cotejo.

«The well-known Dr. Hufeland has written a work on magic in which he propounds the theory of the universal magnetic sympathy between men, animals, plants, and even minerals» — la simpatía magnética universal de Hufeland, extendida hasta los minerales y respaldada por Campanella, Van Helmont y Servius.

«he demonstrates, on the ground of the later-accepted fact of universal attraction and repulsion--now called "gravitation"--that the whole nature is ensouled» — la tesis de Tenzel Wirdig en su *New Spiritual Medicine*: de la gravitación misma deduce que la naturaleza entera está animada.

«Out of this sympathy and antipathy arises a constant movement in the whole world, and in all its parts, and uninterrupted communion between heaven and earth, which produces universal harmony» — lo que Wirdig llama la concordancia de los espíritus, y su efecto: comunión ininterrumpida entre cielo y tierra.

«gives the account of a nose which had been cut from the back of a porter, but which, when the porter died, died too and fell off from its artificial position. A piece of skin," adds Hufeland, "taken from a living head, had its hair turn gray at the same time as that on the head from which it was taken» — los dos casos de simpatía a distancia que Ennemoser toma de Hufeland: la nariz injertada que muere con su donante y la piel que encanece con la cabeza de origen.

«Kepler, the forerunner of Newton in many great truths, even in that of the universal "gravitation" which he very justly attributed to magnetic attraction, notwithstanding that he terms astrology "the insane daughter» — le adjudica a Kepler la atribución de la gravitación a la atracción magnética, sin ocultar que llamaba a la astrología hija demente de una madre sabísima.

«He firmly believes that each planet is the seat of an intelligent principle, and that they are all inhabited by spiritual beings, who exercise influences over other beings inhabiting more gross and material spheres than their own and especially our earth» — la creencia de Kepler que a la obra le interesa: cada planeta como sede de un principio inteligente que influye sobre esferas más groseras.

«so the vortices of the latter and his astronomical doctrines may some day give place to the intelligent magnetic streams which are directed by the Anima Mundi» — su pronóstico simétrico: si los torbellinos de Descartes desplazaron a las influencias estelares de Kepler, algún día cederán ellos a las corrientes magnéticas del Alma del Mundo.

«This celebrated alchemist left a work on Natural Magic, in which he bases all of the occult phenomena possible to man upon the world-soul which binds all with all» — la tesis de la *Magia natural* de Giambattista della Porta: todo fenómeno oculto posible al hombre se funda en el alma del mundo.

«He shows that the astral light acts in harmony and sympathy with all nature; that it is the essence out of which our spirits are formed; and that by acting in unison with their parent-source, our sidereal bodies are rendered capable of producing magic wonders» — y su consecuencia práctica: el secreto entero dependería del conocimiento de los elementos afines.

«He asserted that although every particle of matter, and even the intangible invisible "powers" were magnetic, they did not themselves constitute a magnet. There is but one MAGNET in the universe, and from it proceeds the magnetization of everything existing» — la doctrina de Kircher, que contradice a Gilbert: no hay muchos imanes sino uno solo, del que procede toda magnetización.

«This magnet is of course what the kabalists term the central Spiritual Sun, or God. The sun, moon, planets, and stars he affirmed are highly magnetic; but they have become so by induction from living in the universal magnetic fluid--the Spiritual light» — la identificación de ese imán único con el Sol Espiritual central de los kabalistas, y la explicación de que sol, luna y estrellas sean magnéticos por inducción.

«A needle can be magnetized by simply being held in the hand of a strong-willed man, and amber develops its powers more by the friction of the human hand than by any other object; therefore man can impart his own life, and, to a certain degree, animate inorganic objects. This, "in the eyes of the foolish, is sorcery» — el argumento de Kircher para separar magnetismo mineral de animal, y su remate: eso es lo que el necio llama hechicería.

«The plant known as the Githymal, faithfully follows its sovereign, even when it is invisible on account of the fog. The acacia uncloses its petals at its rising, and closes them at its setting. So does the Egyptian lotos and the common sunflower. The nightshade exhibits the same predilection for the moon» — los ejemplos vegetales de esa atracción, con la belladona del lado de la luna; los nombres van tal como los imprime la fuente.

«As examples of antipathies or sympathies among plants, he instances the aversion which the vine feels for the cabbage, and its fondness toward the olive-tree; the love of the ranunculus for the water-lily, and of the rue for the fig. The antipathy which sometimes exists even among kindred substances is clearly demonstrated in the case of the Mexican pomegranate, whose shoots, when cut to pieces, repel each other with the "most extraordinary ferocity» — la serie de simpatías y antipatías vegetales de Kircher, hasta los brotes del granado mexicano que se repelen entre sí.

«Kircher accounts for every feeling in human nature as results of changes in our magnetic condition. Anger, jealousy, friendship, love, and hatred, are all modifications of the magnetic atmosphere which is developed in us and constantly emanates from us» — la extensión del sistema a la vida afectiva: ira, celos, amistad, amor y odio como modificaciones de la atmósfera magnética propia.

«There are two kinds of magnetic attraction: sympathy and fascination; the one holy and natural, the other evil and unnatural» — la distinción que ordena el resto: simpatía santa y natural frente a fascinación, con el sapo venenoso y la boa por ejemplos de la segunda.

«To exercise such a power for beneficent purposes, man requires three conditions: 1, nobility of soul; 2, strong will and imaginative faculty; 3, a subject weaker than the magnetizer; otherwise he will resist» — las tres condiciones de Kircher para el uso benéfico de ese poder, con la tercera dicha sin adorno: un sujeto más débil que el magnetizador.

«De la Loubere experimented with this fish for a long time, together with a government engineer, named Vincent, and, therefore, vouches for the truth of this assertion, which at first had been dismissed as an idle fable. So powerful is this mysterious attraction that it affected the fishes even when their bodies became totally rotten and fell to pieces» — el caso de los peces salados de Siam que siguen el flujo y reflujo del mar, reportado al rey de Francia por su embajador; la obra subraya que de la Loubère lo verificó con un ingeniero del gobierno tras haberlo descartado como fábula.

«faith in immortality and able arguments in demonstration of the survival of man's spirit after death are all based on the Pythagorean system, adopted by Cardan, Van Helmont, and other mystics» — filia los argumentos de Henry More sobre la supervivencia en el sistema pitagórico, y lo pone en la misma línea que Cardano y Van Helmont.

«but have at all times perceived that the sun's emanations were binding all things to itself, and that it imparts this binding power to everything falling under its direct rays» — habla Kircher sobre el sol como el más magnético de los cuerpos, y la obra anota que se adelanta más de dos siglos a la teoría del general Pleasonton.

«Once salted and placed uncut (whole) in the pot, they are found to exactly follow the flux and reflux of the sea, growing higher and lower in the pot as the sea ebbs or flows» — el caso de los peces salados de Siam que suben y bajan en la olla con la marea, tal como lo reporta al rey de Francia su embajador de la Loubère; el nombre del segundo pez, *pla-cadi*, queda fuera de la cita porque la fuente lo parte con guion de fin de renglón.

«It is especially in the countries unblessed with civilization that we should seek for an explanation of the nature, and observe the effects of that subtile power, which ancient philosophers called the "world's soul."» — su regla de método geográfica, con la razón que da enseguida: la atmósfera de las ciudades populosas está viciada y la naturaleza depende de condiciones para trabajar.

«Not only climate, but also occult influences daily felt not only modify the physio-psychological nature of man, but even alter the constitution of so-called inorganic matter in a degree not fairly realized by European science» — la tesis del capítulo: las influencias ocultas alterarían la constitución de la materia llamada inorgánica, no solo la naturaleza fisiopsicológica del hombre.

«Thus the London Medical and Surgical Journal advises surgeons not to carry lancets to Calcutta, because it has been found by personal experience "that English steel could not bear the atmosphere of India"; so a bunch of English or American keys will be completely covered with rust twenty-four hours after having been brought to Egypt; while objects made of native steel in those countries remain unoxidized» — los dos ejemplos materiales que aduce: el acero inglés que no soporta la atmósfera de la India y las llaves oxidadas en Egipto junto al acero nativo intacto.

«So, too, it has been found that a Siberian Shaman who has given stupendous proofs of his occult powers among his native Tschuktschen, is gradually and often completely deprived of such powers when coming into smoky and foggy London» — el caso del chamán siberiano que pierde sus poderes en Londres, y la pregunta que la obra saca de ahí: si el acero se altera con el clima, por qué no el organismo interno.

«why should we cast doubt upon the testimony of travellers who may have seen the Shaman, day after day, exhibit phenomena of the most astounding character in his native country, and deny the possibility of such powers and such phenomena, only because he cannot do as much in London or Paris» — y la consecuencia probatoria: la falla en Europa no desmiente el testimonio recogido en el país del chamán.

«they will show him (the dyer of Lyons) three hundred distinct colors, which he not only cannot make, but cannot even distinguish» — habla Wendell Phillips en su conferencia sobre las artes perdidas, con los tintoreros de Lyon y las muchachas de Cachemira; el paréntesis aclaratorio es de la obra.

«Moreover, the eye of a Cashmere girl is able to see objectively a color which does exist, but which being inappreciable by the European, is therefore non-existent for him» — la formulación que le importa: el color existe y para el europeo no existe, y esa asimetría es el modelo de su argumento sobre la segunda vista.

«Why then not concede, that some peculiarly-endowed organisms, which are thought to be possessed of that mysterious faculty called second sight, see their pictures as objectively as the girl sees the colors; and that therefore the former, instead of mere objective hallucinations called forth by imagination are, on the contrary, reflections of real things and persons impressed upon the astral ether» — y la analogía completa: las visiones no serían alucinaciones objetivas de la imaginación sino reflejos de cosas reales impresos en el éter astral.

«we may readily accept the tendency of modern scientific research "to regard the processes of both animal and vegetable life as simply physical and chemical» — acepta la tendencia científica sobre los procesos vitales y la lee como corroboración del polvo del Génesis, con la salvedad en verso de que eso no se dijo del alma.

«Man is a little world--a microcosm inside the great universe. Like a foetus, he is suspended, by all his three spirits, in the matrix of the macrocosmos; and while his terrestrial body is in constant sympathy with its parent earth, his astral soul lives in unison with the sidereal anima mundi» — la imagen del feto suspendido en la matriz del macrocosmos, con el cuerpo terrestre en simpatía con la tierra y el alma astral al unísono con el anima mundi.

«As to his third spirit, the divine, what is it but an infinitesimal ray, one of the countless radiations proceeding directly from the Highest Cause--the Spiritual Light of the World» — el tercer término de la tríada, dicho como pregunta: rayo infinitesimal que procede directamente de la Causa Altísima.

«The first monad is the Eternal God; the second, eternity; the third, the paradigm, or pattern of the universe"; the three constituting the Intelligible Triad» — habla Proclo, y la obra usa su tríada inteligible como aval antiguo de la suya.

«The Pythagorean Monad, which lives "in solitude and darkness," may remain on this earth forever invisible, impalpable, and undemonstrated by experimental science» — concede de antemano que su Mónada quedará sin demostrar por la ciencia experimental, y sostiene igual que el universo gravita en torno a ella.

«It depends on the proportion of matter in him whether he will exercise its magical faculty with more or less success. Sharing this divine potency in common with every inorganic atom, he exercises it through the course of his whole life, whether consciously or otherwise» — la condición que pone al ejercicio de esa facultad mágica: la proporción de materia, y el ejercicio ocurre de todos modos, con o sin conciencia.

«In the cases of animals, plants, minerals, and even of the average of humanity, this ethereal fluid which pervades all things, finding no resistance, and being left to itself, moves them as its impulse directs» — lo que pasa cuando el fluido no encuentra resistencia ni gobierno: mueve a los seres según su propio impulso.

«And if we call this a magic power, the uninstructed only can be terrified by the expression. But, if you prefer it, you can call it a spiritual power--spirituale robur vocitaveris» — habla Van Helmont, ofreciendo cambiar el nombre para quien se asuste: llámese fuerza espiritual si se prefiere.

«The tigers, elephants, and rhinoceroses--with which the neighborhood abounds--respect him; and travellers placed in secure ambuscade have often seen these wild beasts lick the hands and feet of the sleeping Talapoin» — lo que el pueblo tiene por milagro y lo que dicen haber visto los viajeros escondidos; la obra lo trae como caso de dominio sobre los animales.

«would force the Chinese to shave their hair after the Tartarian fashion, several of them chose rather to suffer death than to go, they said, into the other world and appear before their ancestors without hair; imagining that they shaved the head of the soul also» — la anécdota china que escandaliza al embajador y que la obra reproduce entera: la creencia de que el alma conserva la figura humana.

«Without enlightening his reader as to the particular shape these benighted Orientals ought to select for their disembodied souls, de la Loubere proceeds to pour out his wrath on these "savages."» — le devuelve al embajador su propia perplejidad como pregunta: qué otra forma habrían de elegir para el alma desencarnada.

«The master-problems of both life and death are still unsolved by occidental physiologists. Even sleep is a phenomenon about whose cause there is a great divergence of opinion among them. How, then, can they pretend to set limits to the possible, and define the impossible» — y la razón de fondo: ni el sueño está explicado, así que la fisiología occidental no está en posición de fijar los límites de lo posible.

«Kircher recommends it, having experienced its good effects in himself, and he gives an elaborate description of the instrument he employed. It was a harmonica composed of five tumblers of a very thin glass, placed in a row. In two of them were two different varieties of wine; in the third, brandy; in the fourth, oil; in the fifth, water. He extracted five melodious sounds from them in the usual way, by merely rubbing his finger on the edges of the tumblers. The sound has an attractive property; it draws out disease, which streams out to encounter the musical wave, and the two, blending together, disappear in space» — la armónica de cinco vasos de Kircher, con su vino, su aguardiente, su aceite y su agua, y la doctrina que la explica: el sonido atrae la enfermedad y ambos se disipan.

«three worlds pour their beams upon him; but all three only as the image and echo of one and the same all-constructing and uniting principle of production. The first is the spirit of the elements (terrestrial body and vital force in its brute condition); the second, the spirit of the stars (sidereal or astral body--the soul); the third is the Divine spirit (Augoeides)» — habla Paracelso, y ésta es la tríada que organiza el resto del capítulo: espíritu de los elementos, espíritu de los astros y espíritu divino.

«is the mirror of the universe, and his triple nature stands in relationship to all things» — habla Van Helmont: el hombre como espejo del universo por su naturaleza triple.

«and think all nature animated (ensouled); they believe in tutelar geniuses» — el testimonio adverso del embajador sobre las creencias siamesas, con el paréntesis aclaratorio que la obra le añade.

«If Descartes, a Frenchman and a scientist, could, in the midst of civilization, firmly believe that such a universal remedy had been found, and that if possessed of it he could live at least five hundred years» — el argumento de simetría con que cierra el punto: si el remedio universal era creíble en Descartes, no puede ser ridículo en un oriental. La pregunta que lo remata queda del otro lado del corte de plana.

«pass whole weeks in the dense woods under a small awning of branches and palm leaves, and never make a fire in the night to scare away the wild beasts, as all other people do who travel through the woods of this country» — habla de la Loubère sobre los monjes budistas de Siam, que duermen entre fieras sin encender fuego para espantarlas.

«Asclepiades employed music for the same purpose, some twenty centuries ago; he blew a trumpet to cure sciatica, and its prolonged sound making the fibres of the nerves to palpitate, the pain invariably subsided. Democritus in like manner affirmed that many diseases could be cured by the melodious sounds of a flute» — la genealogía de la curación por el sonido, de Asclepíades y su trompeta contra la ciática a la flauta de Demócrito.

«The celebrated Scotchman, Maxwell, offered to prove to various medical faculties that with certain magnetic means at his disposal, he would cure any of the diseases abandoned by them as incurable; such as epilepsy, impotence, insanity, lameness, dropsy, and the most obstinate fevers» — el desafío de Maxwell a las facultades de medicina, con la lista de males dados por incurables que ofrecía curar.

«That which men call the world-soul, is a life, as fire, spiritual, fleet, light, and ethereal as light itself. It is a life-spirit everywhere; and everywhere the same» — habla Maxwell en su *Medicina Magnetica*, y la obra declara que sus proposiciones son las mismas de alquimistas y kabalistas.

«All matter is destitute of action, except as it is ensouled by this spirit. This spirit maintains all things in their peculiar condition» — sigue Maxwell: la materia no actúa sino animada por ese espíritu, que mantiene cada cosa en su condición propia.

«If thou canst avail thyself of this spirit and fix it on some particular body thou wilt perform the mystery of magic» — la fórmula operativa de Maxwell: fijar el espíritu universal en un cuerpo particular sería obrar el misterio de la magia.

«He who knows how to operate on men by this universal spirit, can heal, and this at any distance that he pleases» — la curación a distancia queda dicha por Maxwell, no por la obra.

«There is a blending together of spirits, or of emanations, even when they are far separated from each other. And what is this blending together? It is an eternal and incessant outpouring of the rays of one body into another» — la definición de esa mezcla que da el propio Maxwell, y que la obra recoge como doctrina de las emanaciones.

«Healing, to deserve the name, requires either faith in the patient, or robust health united with a strong will, in the operator» — la disyuntiva con que ordena el asunto: fe en el paciente o salud robusta y voluntad fuerte en el operador.

«The tomb of a saint; a holy relic; a talisman; a bit of paper or a garment that has been handled by the supposed healer; a nostrum; a penance, or a ceremonial; the laying on of hands, or a few words impressively pronounced--either will do. It is a question of temperament, imagination, self-cure» — iguala todos los vehículos de la curación por expectativa —reliquia, talismán, penitencia, imposición de manos— y adjudica el efecto al enfermo.

«In thousands of instances, the doctor, the priest, or the relic has had credit for healings that were solely and simply due to the patient's unconscious will» — el crédito mal repartido, y el caso evangélico con que lo apoya: a la mujer del flujo de sangre se le dijo que su fe la había sanado.

«How many unhoped-for, sudden, and prodigious cures have been effected by imagination," says Salverte. "Our medical books are filled with facts of this nature which would easily pass for miracles» — habla Salverte, escéptico, y por eso mismo le sirve: los libros de medicina están llenos de curas que pasarían por milagros.

«In all these instances, the cure is radical and real, and without secondary ill-effects. But, when one who is himself physically diseased, attempts healing, he not only fails of that, but often imparts his illness to his patient, and robs him of what strength he may have» — marca el reverso: quien está él mismo enfermo no cura, transmite su mal y roba fuerza al paciente.

«The decrepit King David reinforced his failing vigor with the healthy magnetism of the young Abishag; and the medical works tell us of an aged lady of Bath, England, who broke down the constitutions of two maids in succession, in the same way» — los dos casos con que ilustra esa transferencia, uno bíblico y otro de la literatura médica inglesa.

«If a diseased person--medium or not--attempts to heal, his force may be sufficiently robust to displace the disease, to disturb it in the present place, and cause it to shift to another, where shortly it will appear; the patient, meanwhile, thinking himself cured» — la descripción del falso alivio: el mal se desplaza de sitio y reaparece, mientras el paciente se cree curado.

«But, what if the healer be morally diseased? The consequences may be infinitely more mischievous; for it is easier to cure a bodily disease than cleanse a constitution infected with moral turpitude» — el peligro que le parece mayor, y su razón: es más fácil curar un mal del cuerpo que limpiar una constitución infectada de torpeza moral.

«If the gift of prophecy, as well as hysteria and convulsions, can be imparted by "infection," why not every vice» — el argumento por contagio, apoyado en Morzine, las Cevenas y los jansenistas, que declara misterio todavía para fisiólogos y psicólogos.

«Against this insidious taint, there is no protection for the passively-receptive subject. The healer holds him under his power, spell-bound and powerless, as the serpent holds a poor, weak bird» — la falta de defensa del sujeto pasivo, dicha con la imagen de la serpiente y el pájaro.

«from Pythagoras down to Eliphas Levi, from highest to humblest, every one teaches that the magical power is never possessed by those addicted to vicious indulgences» — la regla en que dice coincidir toda la tradición: el poder mágico no lo tiene quien vive en el vicio.

«While phenomena of a physical nature may have their value as a means of arousing the interest of materialists, and confirming, if not wholly, at least inferentially, our belief in the survival of our souls and spirits, it is questionable whether, under their present aspect, the modern phenomena are not doing more harm than good» — la reserva que pone sobre los fenómenos de su propio siglo: sirven para despertar al materialista y, tal como se presentan, quizá hagan más daño que bien.

«Undoubtedly, believers in the modern phenomena can claim for themselves a diversity of endowments, but the "discerning of spirits" is evidently absent from this catalogue of "spiritual" gifts» — el don que echa de menos entre los espiritistas, y que es justamente el que su libro reclama: el discernimiento de espíritus.

«It is with the direct help of these bad demons, that every kind of sorcery is accomplished . . . it is the result of their operations, and men who injure their fellow-creatures by enchantments, usually pay great honors to these bad demons, and especially to their chief. These spirits pass their time in deceiving us, with a great display of cheap prodigies and illusions; their ambition is to be taken for gods, and their leader demands to be recognized as the supreme god» — habla Porfirio, y ésa es la maniobra: los Diakka redescubiertos en el siglo XIX ya estaban descritos en un autor cuyas obras, dice, se dan por trastos antiguos.

«when we find Iamblichus, the expositor of spiritualistic theurgy, strictly forbidding all endeavors to procure such phenomenal manifestations; unless, after a long preparation of moral and physical purification, and under the guidance of experienced theurgists» — la prohibición de Jámblico, que la obra invoca contra la búsqueda de fenómenos sin purificación previa.

«When, furthermore, he declares that, with very few exceptions, for a person "to appear elongated or thicker, or be borne aloft in the air," is a sure mark of obsession by bad demons» — y el criterio de Jámblico que golpea de lleno a la levitación de los espiritistas: salvo pocas excepciones, es marca de obsesión por malos démones.

«it is not without danger to treat of this. Many abominable abuses of this may take place» — la advertencia con que Maxwell cierra el punto, y que la obra usa de bisagra para hablar de los abusos de los médiums sanadores.

«But, if the patient has no faith, what then? If he is physically negative and receptive, and the healer strong, healthy, positive, determined, the disease may be extirpated by the imperative will of the operator» — el segundo camino de la curación, sin fe del paciente: la voluntad imperativa del operador, que —según remata en la plana siguiente— se refuerza con el espíritu universal y restaura el aura.

«it is a science, and even the power of "casting out devils" was a branch of it, of which the Initiates made a special study. "That skill which expels demons out of human bodies, is a science useful and sanative to men," says Josephus» — la definición que sostiene contra las dos orillas: la magia no tiene nada de sobrenatural, es ciencia, y la expulsión de demonios una rama que los iniciados estudiaban; el aval es de Josefo.

«A Diakka is one who takes insane delight in playing parts, in juggling tricks, in personating opposite characters; to whom prayer and profane utterances are of equi-value; surcharged with a passion for lyrical» — habla A. J. Davis, el vidente norteamericano, describiendo a los *Diakka* que dice haber hallado en un rincón sombrío de la Tierra del Verano; la descripción sigue del otro lado del corte de plana.

«Everything in this world has its time, and truth, however based upon unimpeachable evidence, will not root or grow, unless, like a plant, it is thrown into soil in its proper season» — la regla de oportunidad con que explica por qué su propio libro no habría podido escribirse treinta años antes.

«Unfortunately, if the manifestations increase in power daily, there is no corresponding improvement in philosophy. The discernment of spirits is still as wanting as ever» — su balance del espiritismo contemporáneo: crecen los fenómenos y no crece la filosofía.

«The power of spirits to reproduce simulacra of persons who have passed from the earth-life, suggests the question--How far can we be assured of the identity of any spirit, let the tests be what they may» — habla Epes Sargent, a quien la obra tiene por el escritor más estimado del movimiento, planteando la pregunta de la identidad.

«We have not yet arrived at that stage of enlightenment that would enable us to reply confidently to this inquiry. . . . There is much that is yet a puzzle in the language and action of this class of materialized spirits» — y la respuesta de Sargent, que la obra subraya por ser una abstención: no está en condiciones de contestar con confianza.

«the great majority, as in this world, are of the unintellectual sort» — el juicio de Sargent sobre el calibre intelectual de los espíritus que hay detrás de los fenómenos físicos.

«Either intelligent human spirits cannot materialize, or, the spirits that do materialize have not human intelligence, and, therefore, by Mr. Sargent's own showing, they may just as well be "elementary" spirits, who have ceased to be human altogether, or those demons, which, according to the Persian Magi and Plato, hold a middle rank between gods and disembodied men» — la disyuntiva que le construye con sus propias palabras: si son tan poco inteligentes, pueden ser elementarios o esos démones intermedios de los Magos persas y de Platón.

«Now, we have shown, on the testimony of ancients, that the voice of human spirits is not and cannot be articulated; being, as Emanuel Swedenborg declares, "a deep suspiration» — contrapone el testimonio de Crookes sobre las voces audibles al de la antigüedad y al de Swedenborg, y deja la contradicción planteada como pregunta sobre a quién creer.

«If a spirit can speak at all, and if the way is opened to intelligent as well as to unintellectual beings, why should they not sometimes give us addresses in some remote degree approximating in quality to the communications we receive through the "direct writing"» — la pregunta que le hace al espiritismo desde dentro de sus propias premisas: por qué las voces nunca alcanzan la calidad de la escritura directa.

«How far they are limited in their mental operations and in their recollections by the act of materialization, or how far by the intellectual horizon of the medium is still a question» — habla Sargent, y la obra le devuelve su propia pregunta: si el horizonte del médium fuera el límite, no se entendería que la escritura directa dé filosofía sublime.

«The history of psychology teems with examples in illustration of this point, among which that of Boehme, the inspired but ignorant shoemaker, and our own Davis, are conspicuous» — los contraejemplos con que desmonta la explicación por incultura del médium: el zapatero Boehme y el propio Davis.

«As to Mr. Sargent's hopeful remark, that "the science of Spiritualism being still in its infancy, we may hope for more light on this question," we fear we must reply, that it is not through "dark cabinets" that this light will ever break» — su respuesta a la esperanza de Sargent, dicha sin rodeos: la luz no vendrá de los gabinetes oscuros.

«It is simply ridiculous and absurd to require from every investigator who comes forward as a witness to the marvels of the day and psychological phenomena the diploma of a master of arts and sciences» — le disputa a la ciencia el monopolio del testimonio, y apoya el reclamo en cuarenta años de experiencia.

«The experience of the past forty years is an evidence that it is not always the minds which are the most "scientifically trained" that are the best in matters of simple common sense and honest truth» — y la razón que da: las mentes mejor entrenadas científicamente no son siempre las mejores en sentido común y honradez.

«They have affirmed that the phenomena exhibited by them were in contravention of all the known laws of science, and thus tended to prove the existence of many yet unknown occult potencies in nature, seemingly directed by preterhuman intelligences» — lo que dicen miles de viajeros sobre fakires, jeques, derviches y lamas, y lo que de ahí se seguiría: potencias ocultas dirigidas por inteligencias prehumanas.

«Did the investigations of Professors Hare and de Morgan, of Crookes and Wallace, de Gasparin and Thury, Wagner and Butlerof, etc., shake for one moment their skepticism? How were the personal experiences of Jacolliot with the fakirs of India received, or the psychological elucidations of Professor Perty, of Geneva, viewed» — la serie de preguntas con que mide el efecto nulo de todos esos testimonios sobre el escepticismo científico.

«They pull down and destroy every vestige of spiritual things, but they erect nothing. "We cannot get such signs with either retorts or crucibles," they say; "hence, it's all but a delusion» — el cargo central contra la ciencia de su siglo: demuele y no levanta, y funda su negación en que el crisol no da esos signos.

«Creeds built on sand, and high-towering but rootless dogmas, crumble down under the cold breath of research, and pull down true religion in their fall» — y el daño colateral que registra sin defender a la Iglesia: los credos sin raíz arrastran consigo a la religión verdadera.

«Science is bound by the everlasting law of honor to face fearlessly every problem which can fairly be presented to it» — habla Sir William Thomson en Edimburgo en 1871; la obra alinea esta frase con las de Huxley y Humboldt para decir enseguida que los tres faltaron a sus propias enseñanzas.

«a presumptuous skepticism that rejects facts without examination of their truth is, in some respects, more injurious than unquestioning credulity» — habla Humboldt, y su juicio es el que la obra necesita: el escepticismo presuntuoso sería en algunos aspectos más dañino que la credulidad.

«It is not to be expected that the principal Academicians of Europe and America should undertake a joint journey to Thibet and India, and investigate the fakir marvel on the spot! And were one of them to go as a solitary pilgrim and witness all the miracles of creation, in that land of wonders, who, of his colleagues, could be expected to believe his testimony» — la trampa que describe: nadie irá en comisión al Tíbet, y al que vaya solo no le creerán sus colegas.