Buffon’s response to the Viscount de Launay You invite me back to a debate in which I had a short participation in order to avoid repeating myself. I confess that I would rather stay in the peaceful environment where I was than to be exposed to this kind of agitation. In my day, we used to exchange some pleasantries like Athenians but today, nuisance! You are bludgeoned with whipping blows. Thank you! I retire. I’ve had more than enough for me; because I am stilled marked by the blows from the Viscount. You must agree that although applied by the kind hand of a lady, they are not less painful. Ah! Madam, you remind me of charity in a not much charitable way. Viscount! You are too strong. I lay my weapons and humbly acknowledge my mistakes. I agree that Bernardin de Saint-Pierre was a great Philosopher. What am I saying? He found the philosophical stone and I am as I have been an indigestible compiler! Are you happier now? Now, be kind and no longer humiliate me like that or you will force a kind-man, friend of our Parisian group, to leave his post, something that he would do with great sadness for he insists on learning from the spiritist teachings and to follow with interest what happens here.
And look: Today I heard the report of phenomena that was so strange, that in my time the players or even the reporters of the events would have been burnt at the stake. Between us, are they really spiritist phenomena? How about the influence of their imagination on one side and some interests on the other? I would not bet on it. What is the opinion of the witty Viscount? As for myself, I wash my hands. In fact, if I believe in my sense of Naturalist, regardless of how much I am called an office of Naturalist, phenomena of that kind may only occur very rarely. Do you want my opinion about the Havana case? Well! There is a gang of bad guys there interested in discrediting the property so that it can be sold for nothing, and also some coward and shy owners who are scared of a well plotted phantasmagoria. Regarding the lizard, I remember well having written about it but I must confess that I have never found any of them graduating at the medical school. That is a weak medium influenced by his imagination about events that were not real.
Buffon
NOTE: This last paragraph refers to two events that were reported during the same session, to be published in another issue of The Review for lack of space. Buffon gave his spontaneous opinion about them.
