The modern Spiritualist is only too forward to avow his understanding
with the unseen powers; but he will have it that the spirits that he
deals with are good and harmless. We must prove the spirits by the
general effects of their communications--whether they be in accordance
with the known laws of morality, and the assured teachings of
religion, natural and revealed. Also we must consider, from what we
know from approved sources concerning God, and His holy angels, and
the spirits of the just, either already made perfect, or still
suffering for a time, whether they are likely to respond to such signs
as Spiritualists commonly employ. Also we must not ignore, what
revelation tells us, of an "enemy," a "father of lies," who "changes
himself into an angel of light," and who is ever ready, so far as it
is permitted him, to eke out curiosity, folly, and credulity, such as
he found in Eve.

_Readings_.--St. Thos., 2a 2a, q. 93; _ib_., q. 95, art. 4, in corp.


SECTION III.--_Of the duty of knowing God_.


1. Religious worship is bound to its object, and cannot possibly be
fixed in the hearts of men and the institutions of society, if the
object be doubtful and fluctuating. False religion has often been set
off with elaborate and gorgeous ceremonial, which has been kept up
even after the performers had come to see in all that light and lustre
a mere vain and unsubstantial show. Such were the rites of Roman
polytheism, as enacted by augurs and pontiffs, the colleagues of
Cicero and Casar. But though that worship was maintained, and even