The Spirits' Book

Allan Kardec

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262. As a spirit is simple, unaware, and has no experience at birth, how can it intelligently choose an existence, and how can it be responsible for such a choice?
“God supplies what the spirit lacks due to inexperience by tracing out the road that it must follow, as you do for an infant in its cradle. God allows it to become the master of its choice little by little as its free will develops, and it is then that it often loses its way and takes the wrong road if it ignores the guidance of the good spirits, who try their best to guide it. This is what is called the downfall of humanity.”


a) When a spirit has free will, does the choice of its corporeal existence always depend solely on its own volition? Does God sometimes force this existence as atonement?
“God is patient, God never rushes atonement. Nevertheless, God can impose an existence upon a spirit sometimes when due to its ignorance or stubbornness the spirit is incapable of distinguishing what would be most useful, and when God sees that such existence may help advance its purifcation, and serve as atonement.”

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