There is reafon therefore fufficient to prefume, that the epileptic youth whose cafe is fo particularly described in the New Teftament', muft have been thus affected. That he really was fo, appears in the fullest manner from the feveral particulars mentioned concerning him by the evangelifts. For they reprefent him as making grievous out-cries, foaming at the mouth, gnashing with his teeth, being convulfed, thrown violently on the ground, and often falling into the fire, and into the water. These symptoms are a full proof, that under the paroxyfms of his diforder, he had no ufe of his understanding, nor any command over the organs of his body. Nay, the foregoing fymptoms of infanity were regarded as the proofs of his being poffeffed. This appears from the language of his

Mat. xvii. 15. Mark ix. 18. Luke ix. 33.

father:

and fore vexed with a demon: FOR s he falleth into the fire, and oft water. In the interval of his

demon was fuppofed to depart im. These intervals were of ontinuance, and he fcarce reco-om one fit, before he was feized other on which account it is e fpirit hardly departed from him. feveral circumftances concerning th related in the evangelic history, illuftrate the fentiments of the concerning poffeffions. a new proof, that when the patient ed by a demon, he was no longer fhimself, and had no use of his unng; and that he came to himfelf hen the demon departed. They

They

ferve to fhew, that demons

xvii. 15. σεληνιάζεται, καὶ κακῶς πάχει, description of him is fully explained by taking him, and tearing him, &c. 17, 18. Luke ix. 39.

were

derstandings of the patients.

For the fa

ther faid, My fon hath a dumb Spirit ; and Christ calls the fpirit both dumb and deaf. From this language it appears, that the youth was not dumb and deaf at all times, and from a defect in the organs of speech and hearing, but only during the time of his fuppofed poffeffion, that is, under the paroxyfms of his epilepfy, which the ancients afcribed to the incurfion of demons.

From the whole of what hath been hitherto offered in this fection, it is, I apprehend, evident, that the demoniacs spoken of in the New Teftament, (like those we meet with in all other writings of equal antiquity,) were fuppofed to have demons (that is, the fouls of wicked men) refiding in them, and to act entirely under their malignant influence: that these demoniacs were either mad men of one kind or other, or subject to

of fenfe, and a fufpenfion of lar exercise of the understandd that it was from the fymptoms diforders, that it was inferred the were poffeffed by demons. When a person acting as if he was in a ancholy, which the Jews thought e Baptift was, because he denied the pleasures of society, and the reshments of nature; when they any speaking and behaving irraand strangely bent upon doing to themselves and others, as are apt to be; or having no d over themselves, not even over nbers of their own bodies, like s; it was from hence concluded, patient had a demon. If at the e, the patient loft his fight, his or hearing, when there was no efect in the organs; the patient to have a demon that was blind, or deaf.

To

ing either maniacs or epileptics, le objections have been raised, which it will be neceffary for us to examine.

And he

m

The very accurate and judicious Dr. Lardner' contends, "that all thofe faid "to have evil fpirits, were not difcom66 pofed in their mind." And he confiders the cafe of the epileptic youth, just now explained, as a proof of this affertion. But it hath been already shewn, that the symptoms of his diforder which are fo particularly recorded, and which are exprefly affigned as the reafon of their fuppofing him to be poffeffed, are an incontestable demonftration, that he did not, during the paroxyfms of his disorder, enjoy the fober use of his reason.

In will be neceffary to take notice of the other inftances which Dr. Lardner

Cafe of the Demoniacs, p. 98. Comparc p. 25.

201

- P. 98, 57.

hath