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TECHNOLOGY IN AC TION™
Beginning Robotics
with Raspberry Pi
and Arduino
Using Python and OpenCV
—
Second Edition
—
Jeff Cicolani
Beginning Robotics
with Raspberry Pi
and Arduino
Using Python and OpenCV
Second Edition
Jeff Cicolani
Beginning Robotics with Raspberry Pi and Arduino: Using Python
and OpenCV
Jeff Cicolani
Pflugerville, TX, USA
v
Table of Contents
vi
Table of Contents
vii
Table of Contents
viii
Table of Contents
ix
Table of Contents
Index�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������349
x
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About the Author
Jeff Cicolani currently lives in the Austin,
Texas, area with his wife, two dogs, and
dozen or so robots. He is currently working
as an embedded systems engineer, building
robotic and automated platforms for an AI
(artificial intelligence) company in Austin.
His journey to robotics was circuitous, taking
him through an odd career path that included
systems analysis and design and database
programming. In 2012, he joined The Robot
Group in Austin, where he joined a group of
robotics enthusiasts and began building robots as a hobby. In 2016, he
became president of The Robot Group. In this role, he leads the group in
their mission to promote STEM (science, technology, engineering, and
mathematics) education through robotics. He is currently working to
develop a better understanding of advanced robotics through ROS
(Robot Operating System) and machine learning.
xi
About the Technical Reviewer
Massimo Nardone has more than 22 years
of experience in security, web/mobile
development, cloud, and IT architecture. His
true IT passions are security and Android.
He has been programming and teaching
how to program with Android, Perl, PHP, Java,
VB, Python, C/C++, and MySQL for more than
20 years.
He holds a Master of Science degree in
Computing Science from the University of
Salerno, Italy.
He has worked as a project manager, software engineer, research
engineer, chief security architect, information security manager, PCI/
SCADA auditor, and senior lead IT security/cloud/SCADA architect for
many years.
xiii
Introduction
Robotics does not have to be difficult. In this book, I introduce you to the
field of robotics. The journey will be challenging; it’s intended to be. But
by the end of the book, you will have hands-on exposure to many of the
fundamental—and not so fundamental—aspects of robotics. You will work
with hardware, assemble and solder a circuit board, write code in two
programming languages, install and configure a Linux environment, and
work with computer vision. Everything else you do with robots will be an
extension of the lessons learned in this book.
xv
Introduction
This book is also for the student who wants to take their robot-building
experience beyond bricks and puzzle-piece programming, someone who
wants to work with hardware and software that more closely resembles
what they might see in college or in the professional world.
No assumptions are made about experience or background in
technology. As you go through the chapters, you may find parts that you
are already familiar with and you can skip ahead. But if you are new to
these topics, I try to provide you with a quick but easy introduction.
C
hapter Overview
You start by learning about the Raspberry Pi and how to work with it.
You download and install the Raspbian operating system (OS) and then
configure the Pi for our project. The goal is to set up your system to be able
to easily access your robot and write your code directly on it.
Once you are able to access your Pi remotely, in Chapter 3, you delve
into programming with Python. I show you how to write simple programs
on the Raspberry Pi. I also take you beyond the basics and cover some
intermediate topics, such as modules and classes. This is one of the longest
chapters since there is a lot of material to cover.
From there, you learn how to interface the Raspberry Pi with external
electronics, such as sensors and LEDs, through the Pi’s GPIO (general-
purpose input/output) header. Chapter 4 discusses the different ways
of addressing the pins on the header, some of the functionality exposed
through the header, and how to use an ultrasonic rangefinder to detect
objects. This gets you ready for the next chapter, which introduces the
Arduino.
In Chapter 5, you connect the Arduino to the Raspberry Pi. I discuss
some of the reasons you want to do this. I show you how to work with the
Arduino IDE (integrated development environment) to write programs.
xvi
Introduction
I cover serial communication between the two boards and how to pass
information back and forth between them. We do this using the same
ultrasonic rangefinder used in the previous chapter.
Chapter 6 has you turning motors with your Raspberry Pi. You use a
special board called a hat, or plate, to control the motors. This is where I
introduce another skill that you will inevitably need in robotics: soldering.
The header and terminals need to be soldered onto the board that was
selected for this purpose. The nice thing about soldering headers and
terminal blocks is that it’s hard to damage anything, and you will get plenty
of practice.
Chapter 7 is where we bring it all together. You build the robot, and I
discuss some of the physical characteristics of robotics. I cover some of
the design considerations that you will need to keep in mind when you
design your own chassis. Although I am listing a specific chassis kit for this
project, you do not need to use the same one. In fact, I encourage you to
explore other options to find the one that is right for you.
In Chapter 8, I introduce another type of sensor—the IR sensor—and
I show you how to use a very common control algorithm called a PID
(proportional, integral, and derivative) controller. I talk about the various
types of IR sensors and where you want to use them. This chapter also
discusses what PID control is and why you want to use it.
Chapter 9 is about computer vision, where you see the true power of
the Raspberry Pi. In this chapter, I cover an open source package called
OpenCV. By the end of this chapter, your little robot will be chasing a ball
around the table.
I leave you with some parting thoughts in Chapter 10. I provide a few
tips that I picked up, and I give you a glimpse into my workflow and tools.
After that, you will be ready to begin your own adventures in robotics.
xvii
Introduction
xviii
CHAPTER 1
Introduction
to Robotics
The word robotics can mean a lot of things. For some people, it is anything
that moves by itself; kinetic art is robotics. To other people, robotics means
something that is mobile or something that can move itself from place to
place. There is actually a field called mobile robotics; automatic vacuum
cleaners, such as a Roomba or a Neato, fall into this category. To me,
robotics falls somewhere in between kinetic art and mobile robotics.
A robot is technology that applies logic to perform a task in an
automated manner. This is a fairly broad definition, but robotics is a fairly
broad field. It can cover everything from a child’s toy to the automatic
parallel parking capabilities in some automobiles. We build a small mobile
robot in this book.
Many of the principles that you are exposed to in this book are easily
transferable to other areas. In fact, we will go through the entire process
of building a robot from beginning to end. A little later in this chapter, I go
over the project that we will build. At that time, I will provide a list of the
parts used in this book. These parts include sensors, drivers, motors, and
so forth. You are welcome to use whatever you have on hand because, for
the most part, everything we go through in this book can be applied to
other projects.
Robotics Basics
I like to tell people who are new to robotics, or are just robotics curious,
that a robot consists of three elements:
2
Chapter 1 Introduction to Robotics
3
Chapter 1 Introduction to Robotics
S
ensors and GPIO
GPIO stands for general-purpose input/output. It represents all the various
connections to devices. The Raspberry Pi has a lot of GPIO options: HDMI,
USB, audio, and so forth. However, when I talk about GPIO in this book, I’m
generally referring to the 40-pin GPIO header. This header provides direct
access to most of the board’s functionality. I discuss this in Chapter 2.
Arduino also has GPIO. In fact, one could argue that Arduino is all
GPIO and nothing else. This isn’t far from the truth given that all the other
connections are there to allow you to communicate with and power the
AVR chip at the heart of the Arduino.
4
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Chapter 1 Introduction to Robotics
All of these headers and GPIO connections are there so we can access
sensors outside the boards themselves. A sensor is a device that gathers
data. There are many different types of sensors, and all serve a purpose.
Sensors can be used for detecting light levels, the range to an object,
temperature, speed, and so forth. In particular, we will use GPIO headers
with an ultrasonic rangefinder and an IR detector.
M
otion and Control
One thing that most definitions of a robot have in common is that it needs
to be able to move. Sure, you can have a robot that doesn’t actually move,
but this type of device generally falls under the moniker of IoT, the Internet
of Things.
There are many ways to add motion to your project. The most common
is the use of motors. But you can also use solenoids, air, or water pressure.
I discuss motors more in Chapter 6.
Although it is possible to drive a motor directly off a Raspberry Pi
or an Arduino board, it is strongly discouraged. Motors tend to draw
more current than the processors on the boards can handle. Instead,
it is recommended that you use a motor controller. Like motors, motor
controllers come in many forms. The motor control board that we will use
is accessed through the Raspberry Pi’s header. I also discuss how to drive
motors with an L298N dual motor controller.
5
Chapter 1 Introduction to Robotics
6
Chapter 1 Introduction to Robotics
there are a few places where it does not excel. One area is interfacing with
external devices. It can work with sensors and external devices, but the
Arduino does this much better.
Arduino is another small processing device that is readily available and
easy to use. Unlike a Raspberry Pi, however, it does not have the capacity
for a full operating system. Rather than running a microprocessor like the
ARM, it uses a different type of chip called a microcontroller. The difference
is that a microcontroller is specifically designed to interact with sensors,
motors, lights, and all kinds of devices. It directly interacts with these
external devices. The Pi works through many layers of processing before it
ever reaches the pins that a device is connected to.
By combining the Raspberry Pi and the Arduino, we are able to
leverage what each does best. The Raspberry Pi offers the high-level
processing power of a full computer. Arduino provides the raw control over
external devices. The Pi allows us to process a video stream from a simple
USB camera, whereas the Arduino allows us to gather the information
from the various sensors and apply logic to make sense of all that data and
then return concise findings to the Pi.
You will learn more about the Raspberry Pi in Chapter 2. Later on, you
will connect an Arduino to the Pi and learn about programming it, as well
as how to pass information back and forth between the Arduino and the Pi.
P
roject Overview
In this book, we will build a small mobile robot. The robot is designed to
demonstrate the lessons that you learn in each chapter. However, before
we can actually build the robot, we need to cover a lot of material and lay
the foundation for future lessons.
7
Chapter 1 Introduction to Robotics
T he Robot
The robot that we will build is a small two- or four-wheeled autonomous
rover. It will be able to detect obstacles and the edge of a table and to
follow a line. The chassis that I selected is a four-wheeled robot, but there
are other designs suitable for this project (see Figures 1-3 and 1-4).
Figure 1-3. The front of our robot shows the ultrasonic sensors and Pi
T-Cobbler on a breadboard
Figure 1-4. The back of our robot shows the Raspberry Pi and motor
control board
8
Chapter 1 Introduction to Robotics
Although I provide a list of the parts that I used for the project, you are
welcome to use whatever parts you wish. The important thing is that they
behave in a similar manner as those I have listed.
9
Random documents with unrelated
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of Mountain
Paths
This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United
States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away
or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License
included with this ebook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you
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eBook.
Language: English
ESSAYS
PLAYS
HOLIDAY EDITIONS
BY
MAURICE MAETERLINCK
Translated by
ALEXANDER TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS
NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
1919
Copyright, 1919
By DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, Inc.
All rights reserved
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I THE POWER OF THE DEAD 3
II MESSAGES FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE 15
III BAD NEWS 31
IV THE SOUL OF NATIONS 41
V THE MOTHERS 51
VI THREE UNKNOWN HEROES 59
VII WASTED BEAUTIES 77
VIII THE INSECT WORLD 87
IX EVIL-SPEAKING 123
X OF GAMBLING 133
XI THE RIDDLE OF PROGRESS 165
XII THE TWO LOBES 179
XIII HOPE AND DESPAIR 191
XIV MACROCOSM AND MICROCOSM 201
XV HEREDITY AND PREEXISTENCE 213
XVI THE GREAT REVELATION 229
XVII THE NECESSARY SILENCE 271
XVIII KARMA 281
THE POWER OF THE DEAD
MOUNTAIN PATHS
I
THE POWER OF THE DEAD
1
IN that curious little masterpiece A Beleagured City, Mrs. Oliphant
shows us the dead of a provincial town suddenly waxing indignant
over the conduct and the morals of those inhabiting the town which
they founded. They rise up in rebellion, invest the houses, the
streets, the market-places and, by the pressure of their innumerable
multitude, all-powerful though invisible, repulse the living, thrust
them out of doors and, setting a strict watch, permit them to return
to their roof-trees only after a treaty of peace and penitence has
purified their hearts, atoned for their offences and ensured a more
worthy future.
Undoubtedly a great truth underlies this fiction, which appears to us
far-fetched because we perceive only material and ephemeral
realities. The dead life and move in our midst far more really and
effectually than the most venturesome imagination could depict. It is
very doubtful whether they remain in their graves. It even seems
increasingly certain that they never allowed themselves to be
confined there. Under the tombstones where we believe them to lie
imprisoned there are only a few ashes, which are no longer theirs,
which they have abandoned without regret and which in all
probability they no longer deign to remember. All that was
themselves continues to have its being in our midst. How and under
what aspect? After all these thousands, perhaps millions of years,
we do not yet know; and no religion has been able to tell us with
satisfying certainty, though all have striven to do so; but we may, by
means of certain tokens, hope to learn.
2
Without further considering a mighty but obscure truth, which it is
for the moment impossible to state precisely or to render palpable,
let us concern ourselves with one which cannot be disputed. As I
have said elsewhere, whatever our religious faith may be, there is at
any rate one place where our dead cannot perish, where they
continue to exist as really as when they were in the flesh and often
more actively; and this living abiding-place, this consecrated spot,
which for those whom we have lost becomes Heaven or Hell
according as we draw nearer to or travel farther from their thoughts
and their desires, is within ourselves.
And their thoughts and their desires are always higher than our own.
It is, therefore, by uplifting ourselves that we approach them. It is
we who must take the first steps, for they can no longer descend,
whereas it is always possible for us to rise; for the dead, whatever
they may have been in life, become better than the best of us. The
least worthy of them, in shedding the body, have shed its vices, its
littlenesses, its weaknesses, which soon pass from our memory as
well; and the spirit alone remains, which is pure in every man and
able to desire only what is good. There are no wicked dead, because
there are no wicked souls. This is why, as we purify ourselves, we
restore life to those who were no more and transform our memory,
which they inhabit, into Heaven.
3
And what was always true of all the dead is far more true to-day,
when only the best are chosen for the tomb. In the region which we
believe to be under the earth, which we call the Kingdom of the
Shades and which in reality is the ethereal region and the Kingdom
of Light, there are at this moment disturbances no less profound
than those which we have experienced on the surface of the earth.
The young dead have invaded it from every side; and since the
beginning of this world they have never been so numerous, so full of
energy and zeal. Whereas in the customary sequence of the years
the dwelling-place of those who leave us receives only weary and
exhausted lives, there is not one in this incomparable host who, to
borrow Pericles’ expression, “has not departed from life at the height
of glory.” Not one of them but has gone up, not down, to his death
clad in the greatest sacrifice that man can make for an idea that
cannot die. All that we have hitherto believed, all that we have
striven to attain beyond ourselves, all that has lifted us to the level
at which we stand, all that has overcome the evil days and the evil
instincts of human nature: all this could have been no more than lies
and illusions if such men as these, such a mass of merit and of glory,
were really annihilated, had for ever disappeared, were for ever
useless and voiceless, for ever without influence in a world to which
they have given life.
4
It is hardly possible that this could be so as regards the external
survival of the dead; but it is absolutely certain that it is not so as
regards their survival in ourselves. Here nothing is lost and no one
perishes. Our memories are to-day peopled by a multitude of heroes
struck down in the flower of their youth and very different from the
pale and languid cohort of the past, composed almost wholly of the
sick and the old, who had already ceased to exist before leaving the
earth. We must tell ourselves that now, in every one of our homes,
both in our cities and in the country-side, both in the palace and in
the meanest hovel, there lives and reigns a young dead man in the
glory of his strength. He fills the poorest, darkest dwelling with a
splendour of which it had never ventured to dream. His constant
presence, imperious and inevitable, diffuses and maintains a religion
and ideas which it had never known before, hallows everything
around it, makes the eyes look higher, prevents the spirit from
descending, purifies the air that is breathed and the speech that is
held and the thoughts that are mustered there and, little by little,
ennobles and uplifts the whole people on a scale of unexampled
vastness.
5
Such dead as these have a power as profound, as fruitful as life and
less precarious. It is terrible that this experience should have been
made, for it is the most pitiless and the first in such enormous
masses that mankind has undergone; but, now that the ordeal is
over, we shall soon gather the most unexpected fruits. It will not be
long before we see the differences widen and the destinies diverge
between the nations which have acquired all these dead and all this
glory and those which were deprived of them; and we shall perceive
with amazement that the nations which have lost the most are those
which have kept their riches and their men. There are losses which
are inestimable gains; and there are gains whereby the future is lost.
There are dead whom the living cannot replace and the mere
thought of whom accomplishes things which our bodies cannot
perform. There are dead whose energy surpasses death and
recovers life; and we are almost every one of us at this moment the
mandataries of a being greater, nobler, graver, wiser and more truly
living than ourselves. With all those who accompany him, he will be
our judge, if it be true that the dead weigh the soul of the living and
that our happiness depends on their verdict. He will be our guide
and our protector, for it is the first time, since history has revealed
its misfortunes to us, that man has felt so great a host of such
mighty dead soaring above his head and speaking within his heart.
We shall live henceforward under their laws, which will be more just
but not more severe nor more cheerless than ours; for it is a mistake
to suppose that the dead love nothing but gloom: they love only that
justice and that truth which are the eternal forms of happiness.
From the depths of this justice and this truth in which they are all
immersed, they will help us to destroy the great falsehoods of
existence; for war and death, if they sow innumerable miseries and
misfortunes, have at least the merit of destroying as many lives as
they occasion evils. And all the sacrifices which they have made for
us will have been in vain—and this is not possible—if they do not
first of all bring about the fall of the lies on which we live and which
it is not necessary to name, for each of us knows his own and is
ashamed of them and will be eager to make an end of them.
They will teach us, before all else, from the depths of our hearts
which are their living tombs, to love those who outlive them, since it
is in them alone that they wholly exist.
MESSAGES FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE
II
MESSAGES FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE
1
SIR OLIVER LODGE is one of the most distinguished men of learning
in our day. He is also one of the oldest, most active and most
prominent members of that well-known Society for Psychical
Research which, founded in 1882, has ever since striven to study
with irreproachable scientific precision all the wonderful,
inexplicable, occult and supernatural phenomena which have always
baffled and still elude the comprehension of mankind. In addition to
his purely scientific works, of which, not being qualified to judge, I
do not speak, he is the author of some extremely remarkable books,
such as Man and the Universe, The Ether of Space and The Survival
of Man, in which the loftiest and most daring metaphysical
speculations are constantly controlled by the most prudent, wise and
steadfast common sense.
Sir Oliver Lodge, therefore, is at the same time a philosopher and a
practical, working scientist, accustomed to scientific methods which
do not readily allow him to go astray; he has, in a word, one of the
best-balanced brains that we could hope to meet; and he is
convinced that the dead do not die and that they are able to
communicate with us. He has tried to make us share his conviction
in The Survival of Man. I am not sure that he has quite succeeded.
True, he gives us a certain number of extraordinary facts, but they
are facts which, in the last resort, can be explained by the
unconscious intervention of intelligences other than those of the
dead. He does not bring us the irrefutable proof, such as we should
consider, for instance, the revelation of an incident, a detail, a piece
of information so absolutely unknown to any living creature that it
could come only from a spirit no longer of this world. We must
admit, however, that such a proof is, as he says, as difficult to
conceive as to provide.
2
Sir Oliver’s youngest son, Raymond, was born in 1889, became an
engineer and enlisted for the duration of the war in September,
1914. He was sent out to Flanders early in the spring of 1915; and,
on the 14th of September of the same year, before Ypres, while the
company under his command was leaving the front-line trench, he
was hit in the left side by a splinter of a shell; and he died a few
hours later.
He was, as a photograph shows us, one of those admirable young
British soldiers who are the perfect type of a robust, fresh, joyous
humanity, clean and bright, and whose death seems the more cruel
and the more incredible as it annihilates a greater aggregate of
strength, hope and beauty.
His father has dedicated to his memory a volume entitled, Raymond,
or Life and Death; and we are at first somewhat bewildered at
seeing that it is not, as one might expect, a book of lamentation,
regrets and tears, but the accurate, deliberately impassive and at
times almost cheerful report of a man of learning who thrusts aside
his sorrow so that he may see clearly before him, wrestles with the
thought of death and beholds the rising dawn of an immense and
very strange hope.
3
I will not linger over the first part of the volume, which aims at
making us acquainted with Raymond Lodge. It contains some forty
letters written in the trenches, the testimony of his brother-officers’
devotion to him, details of his death and so on. The letters, I may
say in passing, are charmingly vivid and marked by a delicate and
delightful humour whose only object is to reassure those who are
not themselves in danger. I have not time to dwell upon them; and
they are not what most interests us here.
But the second part, which Sir Oliver Lodge calls Supernormal
Portion, passes from the life that exists on the surface of our earth
and introduces us into a very different world.
In the very first lines, the author reminds us that he has “made no
secret of his conviction, not merely that personality persists, but that
its continued existence is more entwined with the life of every day
than has been generally imagined; that there is no real breach of
continuity between the dead and the living; and that methods of
intercommunion across what has seemed to be a gulf can be set
going in response to the urgent demand of affection; that in fact, as
Diotima told Socrates (Symposium, 202 and 203), ‘Love bridges the
Chasm.’”
Sir Oliver Lodge, then, is persuaded that his son, though dead, has
not ceased to exist and that he has not gone far from those who
love him. Raymond, in fact, seeks to communicate with his father as
early as eleven days after his death. We know that these
communications or so-called communications from beyond the grave
—let us not prejudge the issue for the moment—are made through
the agency of a medium who is or believes himself to be inspired or
possessed by the deceased or by a familiar spirit speaking in his
name and repeating what the latter reveals to him. The medium
conveys his information either orally or by automatic writing, or
again, although this is very rare in the present instance, by table-
turning. But I will pass over these preliminaries, which would carry
us too far, and come straight to the communication which is, I think,
the most astonishing of all and perhaps the only one that cannot be
explained, or at least is exceedingly difficult to explain, by the
intervention of the living.
About the end of August, 1915, that is to say, not many days before
his death, Raymond, who, as we have seen, was near Ypres, had
been photographed with the officers of his battalion by a travelling
photographer. On the 27th of September following, in the course of
a sitting with the medium Peters, the spirit speaking by Peters’
mouth said, suddenly:
“You have several portraits of this boy. Before he went away you had
a good portrait of him—two, no, three. Two where he is alone and
one where he is in a group of other men. He is particular that I
should tell you of this. In one you see his walking-stick.”
Now at that time the members of Sir Oliver Lodge’s family did not
know of the existence of this group. They attached no great
importance, however, to the revelations but in subsequent sittings,
notably on the 3rd of December, before the photographs had
arrived, before they were seen, more detailed information was
received. According to the spirit’s statements, the photograph was of
a dozen officers or more, taken out of doors, in front of a sort of
shelter (the medium kept drawing vertical lines in the air). Some
were sitting down and some were standing up at the back. Raymond
was sitting; somebody was leaning on him. There were several
photographs taken.
On the 7th of December, the photographs arrived at Mariemont, Sir
Oliver’s house near Edgbaston. There were three copies, all differing
slightly, of the same group of twenty-one officers, those in the back
row standing up, the others seated. The group was taken outside a
sort of temporary wooden structure, such as might be a hospital
shed, with six conspicuous nearly vertical lines on the roof. Raymond
was one of those sitting on the ground in front; his walking-stick,
mentioned in the first revelation, was lying across his feet. And a
striking piece of evidence is that his is the only instance where one
man is leaning or resting his hand on the shoulder of another, in two
of the photographs, or, in the third, his leg.
This manifestation is one of the most remarkable that have hitherto
been obtained, because it eliminates almost entirely any telepathic
interference, that is to say, any subconscious intercommunication
between the persons present at the sitting, all of whom were
absolutely unaware of the existence of the photographs. If we refuse
to admit the intervention of the deceased—which should, I agree, be
admitted only in the last resort—we must, in order to explain the
revelation, suppose that the subconsciousness of the medium or of
one of those present entered into communication, through the vast
mazes and deserts of space and amid millions of strange souls, with
the subconsciousness of one of the officers or of one of the people
who had seen these photographs whose existence there was no
reason for suspecting. This is possible; but it is so fortuitous, so
prodigious that the survival and intervention of the deceased would,
in the circumstances, seem almost less supernatural and more
probable.
4
I will not enter into the details of the numerous sittings which
preceded or followed this one; nor will I even undertake to
summarize them. To share the emotion aroused, we must read the
reports which faithfully reproduce these strange dialogues between
the living and the dead. We receive the impression that the departed
son comes daily closer and closer to life and converses more and
more easily, more and more familiarly with all those who loved him
before he was overtaken by the shadows of the grave. He recalls to
each of them a thousand little forgotten incidents. He remains
among his own kindred as though he had never left them. He is
always present and prepared to answer. He mingles so completely in
their whole life that no one any longer thinks of mourning his loss.
They question him about his present state, ask him where he is,
what he is, what he is doing. He needs no pressing; he at once
declares himself astonished at the incredible reality of that new
world. He is very happy there, reforming himself, condensing
himself, so to speak, and gradually finding himself again. The
existence of the intelligence and of the will, disencumbered of the
body, is freer, lighter, of greater range and diffusion, but continues
very like what it was in the flesh. The environment is no longer
physical but spiritual; and there is a translation to another plane
rather than the break, the complete overthrow, the extraordinary
transitions which we are pleased to imagine. After all, is it not fairly
plausible? And are we not wrong in believing that death changes
everything, from one day to the next, and that there is a sudden and
inconceivable abyss between the hour which precedes decease and
that which follows it? Is it in conformity with the habits of nature? Is
the life-force which we carry within ourselves and which doubtless
cannot be extinguished, is that force to so great a degree crippled
and cramped by our body that, when it leaves this body, it becomes,
then and there, entirely different and unrecognizable?
But I must set a limit to speculation and, lest I exceed the limits of
this essay, I must pass by two or three revelations less striking than
that of the photograph, but pretty strange notwithstanding.
Obviously, it is not the first time that such manifestations have
occurred; but these are really of a higher quality than those which
crowd several volumes of the Proceedings. Do they furnish the proof
for which we ask? I do not think so; but will any one ever be able to
supply us with that compelling proof? What can the discarnate spirit
do when trying to establish that it continues to exist? If it speak to
us of the most secret, the most private incidents of a common past,
we reply that it is we who are reviving those memories within
ourselves. If it aim at convincing us by its description of the world
beyond the grave, not all the most glorious and unexpected pictures
of that world which it might trace are worth anything as evidence,
for they cannot be controlled. If we seek a proof by asking it to
foretell the future, it confesses that it does not know the future
much better than we do, which is likely enough, seeing that any
knowledge of this kind implies a sort of omniscience and
consequently omnipotence which can hardly be acquired in a
moment. All that remains to it, therefore, is such little snatches of
evidence and uncertain attempts at proof as we find here. It is not
enough, I admit; for psychometry, that is to say, a similar
manifestation of clairvoyance between one living subconsciousness
and another, gives almost equally astonishing results. But here as
there these results show at least that we have around us wandering
intelligences, already enfranchised from the narrow and burdensome
laws of space and matter, that sometimes know things which we do
not know or no longer know. Do they emanate from ourselves, are
they only manifestations of faculties as yet unknown, or are they
external, objective and independent of ourselves? Are they merely
alive in the sense in which we speak of our bodies, or do they
belong to bodies which have ceased to exist? That is what we
cannot yet decide; but it must be acknowledged that, once we admit
their existence, which at this date is hardly contestable, it becomes
much less difficult to agree that they belong to the dead.
This at least may be said: if experiments such as these do not
demonstrate positively that the dead are able directly, manifestly and
almost materially to mingle with our existence and to remain in
touch with us, they prove that they continue to live in us much more
ardently, profoundly, personally and passionately than had hitherto
been believed; and that in itself is more than we dared hope.
BAD NEWS
III
BAD NEWS
1
FOR more than four years, evil tidings passed night and day over
almost half the world of men. Never since our earth came into being
were they known to spread in crowds so dense and busy and
commanding. In the happy days of peace, we would come upon the
gloomy visitants here and there, travelling over hill and dale, nearly
always alone, sometimes in couples, rarely in companies of three,
timid and shy, seeking to pass unnoticed and humbly undertaking
the smallest messages of sorrow that destiny confided to their
charge. Now they go with heads erect; they are almost arrogant;
and swollen with their importance, they neglect any misfortunes that
are not deathly. They encumber the roads, cross the seas and rivers,
invade the streets, do not forget the by-ways and climb the most
rugged and stony tracks. There is not a hovel cowering in the
dingiest and most obscure suburb of a great city, not a cottage
hidden in the recesses of the poorest hamlet of the most
inaccessible mountain, which escapes their search and towards
which one of them, detached from the sinister band, does not
hasten with its little footstep, eager, pitiless and sure. Each has its
goal whence nothing can divert it. Through time and space, over
rocks and walls they press onward, swift and determined, blind and
deaf to all that would retard them, thinking only of fulfilling their
duty, which is to announce as soon as may be to the most sensitive
and defenceless heart the greatest sorrow that can fall upon it.
2
We watch them pass as emissaries of destiny. To us they seem as
fatal as the very misfortune of which they are but the heralds; and
no one dreams of barring the way before them. So soon as one of
them arrives, all unexpected, in our midst, we leave everything, we
rush forward, we gather round it. Almost a religious fear compasses
it about; we whisper reverently; and we should bow no lower in the
presence of a messenger of God. Not only would no one dare to
contradict it, or advise it, or beg it to be patient, to grant a few
hours of respite, to hide in the darkness or to arrive by a longer
road; on the contrary, all compete in offering it zealous if humble
service. The most compassionate, the most pitiful are the most
assiduous and obsequious, as though there were no duty more
unmistakable, no act of charity more meritorious than to lead the
dark envoy by the shortest and the quickest way to the heart which
it is to strike.
3
Once again, we are here confounding that which belongs to destiny
with that which belongs to ourselves. The misfortune was perhaps
not to be avoided; but a great part of the sorrows that attend it
remain in our power. It is for us to be careful of them, to direct
them, to subdue them, disarm them, delay them, turn them aside
and sometimes even to stop them altogether.
In effect, we hardly yet know the psychology of sorrow, which is as
deep, as complex and as worthy of study as the passions to which
we devote so much of our time. In everyday life, it is true, great
sorrows, though not so rare as we could have wished, were
nevertheless too widely scattered for us to study them easily, step by
step. To-day, alas, they are the ground of all our thoughts; and we
are learning at last that, even as love or happiness or vanity, they
have their secrets, their habits, their illusions, their sophistries, their
dark corners, their baffling mazes and their unforeseen abysses; for
man, whether he love or rejoice or weep, remains ever constant to
himself!
It is not true, as we too willingly agree, that, since unhappiness
must be known sooner or later, our only duty is to reveal it at the
earliest moment, for the sorrow that is yet green is very different
from the sorrow that is already fading. It is not true, as we admit
without question, that anything is better than ignorance or
uncertainty and that there is a sort of cowardice in not forthwith
announcing the bad news which we know to those whom it must
prostrate in the dust. On the contrary, cowardice lies in ridding
ourselves of the bad news as quickly as we may and in not bearing
its whole burden, secretly and alone, as long as we are able. When
the bad news arrives, our first duty is to set it apart, to prevent it
from spreading, to master it as we would a malefactor or a stalking
pestilence, to close all means of escape, to mount guard over it, so
that it cannot break forth and do harm. Our duty is not merely, as
the best of us and the most prudent seem to believe, to usher in the
bad news with a thousand precautions, with short and muffled,
sidelong and measured steps, by the back-door, into the dwelling
which it is to devastate; rather is it our duty definitely to forbid its
entrance and to have the courage to chain it in our own dwelling,
which it will fill with unjust and insupportable reproaches and
upbraidings. Instead of making ourselves the easy echo of its cries,
we should think only of stifling its voice. Each hour that we thus
pass in restless and painful intimacy with the hateful prisoner is an
hour of suffering which we accept for ourselves and which we spare
the victim of fate. It is almost certain that the malignant recluse will
end by escaping our vigilance; but here the very minutes have their
value and there is no gain, however small, that we are entitled to
neglect. The hour-glass that measures the phases of sorrow is much
finer and truer than that which marks the stages of pleasure. The
time that passes between the death of one whom we love and the
moment when we hear of his death is as full of pain as it is of days.
Most to be feared of all is the first blow of misfortune; it is then that
the heart is smitten and torn with a wound that will never heal. But
this blow has not its shattering and sometimes mortal force unless it
strike its victim at once and, so to speak, fresh from the event. Every
hour that is interposed deadens the sting and lessens its virulence. A