Superiors and Subordinates

Authority, as much as wealth, is a trust for which those who have been vested with it will have to render an accounting. Do not think that it is given to them to provide them with the vain pleasure of command, nor should you be like most of the power-holders of the earth who wrongly believe that it is a right, a property. God, meanwhile, provides them with proof enough that it is neither, for he takes it from them at will. If it were a privilege inherent to them, it would be inalienable. However, no one can say that something belongs to them when it can be taken from them without their consent. God gives authority either as a mission or a trial when he deems it appropriate, and takes it away in the same manner.

All those who are trustees of authority to whatever extent – from masters over their servants to sovereigns over their people – should not forget the fact that it is souls who are under their charge; that they will answer for the good or bad guidance they have given to their subordinates, and that the wrongs their subalterns might commit and the vices to which they might yield as a result of such guidance or bad examples will fall upon them, whereas they will reap the fruits of their kindness for leading them to the good. All people on earth have a mission, great or small; whatever it may be, it is always given for the purpose of goodness; to deviate it from its principle, therefore, is to fail in fulfilling it.

If God asks the wealthy, “What did you do with the wealth that  in  your hands should have been a source for spreading prosperity all around you?” he will ask of those who possessed some degree of authority, “What did you do with that authority? What evils did you prevent? What progress did you foster? If I gave you subordinates, it was not so that you could make them slaves to your will or tame instruments for your whims or your greed. I made you strong and entrusted you with those who were weak in order to uphold them and help them ascend to me.”

Superiors who conform to the words of Christ despise none of those who are beneath them, for they know that social distinctions mean nothing before God. Spiritism teaches them that  if their subordinates obey them today, they might have commanded them in the past or might do so in the future, and that they will then be treated according to how they have treated their subalterns.

If superiors have duties to fulfill, subordinates, on their part, have theirs also, and they are no less sacred. If the latter are Spiritists, their conscience will tell them even more strongly that they are not exempted from their duties, even when their superiors fail to fulfill theirs, because Spiritists know that one must not repay evil with evil and that the wrongs of some do not authorize the wrongs of others. If their position entails suffering, they tell themselves that they most assuredly must have warranted it because they perhaps abused their authority in the past and must in turn feel the improprieties they made others suffer. If they are forced to endure such a position because they cannot find a better one, Spiritism teaches them to resign themselves to it as a trial for the humility needed for their advancement. Their belief guides their conduct; they act as they would want their subordinates to act toward them if they were their boss. For this reason they are more scrupulous in fulfilling their obligations, since they understand that any negligence in the work that has been entrusted to them is harmful to those who pay them and to whom they owe their time and efforts. In other words, Spiritists are guided by the sentiment of duty that their faith gives them, along with the certainty that any detour from the straight and narrow will be a debt that will have to be paid sooner or later.

François-Nicholas-Madeleine, Cardinal Morlot (Paris, 1863)