s to pick up some
money. What's the use of speaking of them when they _don't even exist_!
Really it must be admitted that only in England and America is there
anybody who knows how to establish the genethliac theme and construct a
horoscope."

"I am very much afraid," said Des Hermies, "that not only these
so-called astrologers, but also all the mages, theosophists, occultists,
and cabalists of the present day, know absolutely nothing--those with
whom I am acquainted are indubitably, incontestably, ignorant imbeciles.
And that is the pure truth, messieurs. These people are, for the most
part, down-and-out journalists or broken spendthrifts seeking to exploit
the taste of a public weary of positivism. They plagiarize Eliphas Levi,
steal from Fabre d'Olivet, and write treatises of which they themselves
are incapable of making head or tail. It's a real pity, when you come to
think of it."

"The more so as they discredit sciences which certainly contain verities
omitted in their jumble," said Durtal.

"Then another lamentable thing," said Des Hermies, "is that in addition
to the dupes and simpletons, these little sects harbour some frightful
charlatans and windbags."

"Peladan, among others. Who does not know that shoddy mage,
commercialized to his fingertips?" cried Durtal.

"Oh, yes, that fellow--"

"Briefly, messieurs," resumed Gevingey, "all these people are incapable
of obtaining in practise any effect whatever. The only man in this
century who, without being either a saint or a diabolist, has penetrated
the mysteries, is William Crookes." And as Durtal, who appeared to doubt
the apparitions sworn to by this Englishman, declared that no theory
could explain them, Gevingey perorated, "Permit me, messieurs. We have
the choice between two diverse, and I venture to say, very clear-cut
doctrines. Either the apparition is formed by the fluid disengaged by
the medium in trance to combine with the fluid of the persons present;
or else there are in the air immaterial beings, elementals as they are
called, which manifest themselves under very nearly determinable
conditions; or else, and this is the theory of pure spiritism, the
phenomena are produced by souls evoked from the dead."

"I know it," Durtal said, "and that horrifies me. I know also the Hindu
dogma of the migrations of souls after death. These disembodied souls
stray until they are reincarnated or until they attain, from avatar to
avatar, to complete purity.