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with many of the doings of the convulsionists,, of their own selection. Hence it happens that admits the exalted character of these declama- occasionally their most beautiful discourses are tions. He says: Their discourses on religion marred by ill-chosen and incorrect expressions, are spirited, touching, profound-delivered with and by phrases obscure and badly turned; so an eloquence and a dignity which our greatest that the beauty of some of these consists rather masters cannot approach, and with a grace and in the depth of thought, the grandeur of the appropriateness of gesture rivalling that of our subjects treated, and the magnificence of the best actors..... One of the girls who pro- images presented, than in the language in which nounced such discourses was but thirteen years the whole is rendered. It is evident, that, when and a-half old; and most of them were utterly they are thus left to clothe in their own language incompetent, in their natural state, thus to treat the ideas given them, they are also at liberty to subjects far beyond their capacity." add to them, if they will. And, in fact, most of them declare that they perceive within themselves the power to mix in their own ideas with those supernaturally communicated, which suddenly seize their minds; and they are obliged to be extremely careful not to confound their

Colbert, already quoted, bears testimony to the same effect. Writing to Madame de Coetquen, he says: "I have read extracts from these discourses, and have been greatly struck with them. The expressions are noble, the views grand, the theology exact. It is impos-own thoughts with those which they receive sible that the imagination, and especially the imagination of a child, should originate such beautiful things. Sublimity full of eloquence reigns throughout these productions."

To judge fairly of this phenomenon, we must consider the previous condition and acquirements of those who pronounced such discourses. Montgéron, while declaring that among the convulsionists there were occasionally to be found persons of respectable standing, adds: "But it must be confessed that in general God has chosen the convulsionists among the common people; that they were chiefly young children, especially girls; that almost all of them had lived till then in ignorance and obscurity; that several of them were deformed, and some, in their natural state, even exhibited imbecility. Of such, for the most part, it was that God made choice, to show forth to us His power."

The staple of these discourses-wild and fantastic enough-may be gathered from the following: "The Almighty thus raised up, all of a sudden, a number of persons, the greater part without any instruction; He opened the mouths of a number of young girls, some of whom could not read; and He caused them to announce, in terms the most magnificent, that the times had now arrived; that in a few years the Prophet Elias would appear; that he would be despised and treated with outrage by the Catholics; that he would even be put to death, together with several of those who had expected his coming and had become his disciples and followers; that God would employ this Prophet to convert all the Jews; that they, when thus converted, would 'immediately carry the light unto all nations; that they would re-establish Christianity throughout the world, and that they would preach the morality of the gospel in all its purity, and cause it to spread over the whole earth."

Montgéron, commenting (as he expresses it) upon "the manner in which the convulsionists are supernaturally enlightened, and in which they deliver their discourses and predictions," says: "Ordinarily, the words are not dictated to them; it is only the ideas that are presented to their minds by a supernatural instinct, and they are left to express these thoughts in terms

from a superior intelligence. This is sometimes the more difficult, inasmuch as the ideas thus coming to them do not always come with equal clearness. Sometimes, however, the terms are dictated to them internally, but without their being forced to pronounce them, nor hindered from adding to them, if they choose to do so. Finally, in regard to certain subjects for example, the lights which illumine their minds, and oblige them to announce the second coming of the Prophet Elias, and all that has reference to that great event-their lips pronounce a succession of words wholly independently of their will; so that they themselves listen like the auditors, having no knowledge of what they say, except only as, word for word, it is pronounced."

Montgéron appears, however, to admit that the exaltation of intelligence which is apparent during the state of ecstasy may, to some extent, be accounted for on natural principles. Starting from the fact that during the convulsion external objects produce much less effect upon the senses than in the natural state, he argues that "the more the soul is disembarrassed of external impressions, the greater is its activity, the greater its power to frame thoughts, and the greater its lucidity." He admits, further:

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Although most of the convulsionists have, when in convulsion, much more intelligence than in their ordinary state, that intelligence is not always supernatural, but may be the mere effect of the mental activity which results when the soul is disengaged from sense. Nay, there are examples of convulsionists availing themselves of the superior intelligence which they have in convulsion to make out dissertations on mere temporal affairs. This intelligence, also, may at times fail to subjugate their passions; and I am convinced that they may occasionally make a bad use of it."

In another place, Montgéron says plainly, that "persons accustomed to receive revelations, but not raised to the state of the Prophets, may readily imagine things to be revealed to them which are but the promptings of their own minds"-and that this has happened, not only to the convulsionists, but (by the confession of many of the ancient fathers, including St.

Augustine, St. Thomas, and St. Gregory) also to the greatest saints. But he protests against the conclusion, as illogical, that the convulsionists never speak by the spirit of God, because they do not always do so. He admits, however, that it is extremely difficult to distinguish between what ought to be received as divinely revealed and what ought to be rejected as originating in the convulsionist's own mind; nor does he give any rule by which this may be done. The knowledge necessary to the "discerning of spirits" he thinks can be obtained only by humble prayer.

The power of prophecy is one of the gifts claimed by Montgéron as having been bestowed on various convulsionists during their ecstatic state. Yet he gives no detailed proofs of prophecies touching temporal matters having been literally fulfilled, unless it be prophecies by convulsionist patients in regard to the future crises of their diseases. And he admits that false predictions were not infrequent, and that false interpretations of visions touching the future were of common occurrence. He says: "It is sometimes revealed to a convulsionist, for example, that there is to happen to some person not named a certain accident, every detail of which is minutely given; and the convulsionist is ordered to declare what has been communicated to him, that the hand of God may be recognized in its fulfilment. But, at the same time, the convulsionist receiving this vision believes it to apply to a certain person, whom he designates by name. The prediction, however, is not verified in the case of the person named, so that those who heard it delivered conclude that it is false; but it is verified in the case of another person, to whom the accident happens, attended by all the minutely-detailed particulars." If this be correctly given, it is what animal magnetizers would call a case of imperfect lucidity.

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The case as to the gift of tongues is still less satisfactorily made out. A few, Montgéron says, translate, after the ecstasy, what they have declaimed, during its continuance, in an unknown tongue; but for this, of course, we have their word only. The greater part know nothing of what they have said, when the ecstasy has passed. As to these, he admits: "The only proof we have that they understand the words at the time they pronounce them is that they often express, in the most lively manner, the various sentiments contained in their discourse, not only by their gestures, but also by the attitudes the body assumes, and by the expression of the countenance, on which the different sentiments are painted, by turns, in a manner the most expressive, so that one is able, up to a certain point, to detect the feelings by which they are moved; and it has been easy for the attentive observer to perceive that most of these discourses were detailed predictions as to the coming of the Prophet Elias," &c.

If it be presumptuous, considering the marvels which modern observations disclose, to pronounce that the alleged unknown languages

were unmeaning sounds only, it is evident, at | least, that the above is inconclusive as to their true character.

Much more trustworthy appears to be the evidence touching the phenomenon of thoughtreading.

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The fact that many of the convulsionists were able to discover the secrets of the heart" is admitted by their principal opponents. The Abbé d'Asfeld himself adduces examples of it. M. Poncet admits its reality. The provincial ecclesiastic whom I have already quoted says that he "found examples without number of convulsionists who discovered the secrets of the heart in the most minute detail: for example, to disclose to a person that at such a period of his life he did such or such a thing; to another that he had done so and so before coming hither," &c. The author of the "Recherche de la Vérité," a pamphlet on the phenomena of the convulsions, which seems very candidly written, acknowledges as one of these "the manifestation of the thoughts and the discovery of secret things."

Montgéron testifies to the fact, from repeated personal observation, that they revealed to him things known to himself alone; and after adducing the admissions above alluded to, and some others, he adds: "But it would be superfluous further to multiply testimony in proof of a fact admitted by all the world, even by the avowed adversaries of the convulsions, who have found no other method of explaining it than by doing Satan the honour to proclaim him the author of these revelations."

Besides these gifts, real or alleged, there was occasionally observed, during ecstasy, an extraordinary development of the musical faculty. Montgéron tells us: "Mademoiselle Dancogné, who, as was well known, had no voice whatever in her natural state, sings in the most perfect manner canticles in an unknown tongue, and that to the admiration of all those who hear her."

As to the general character of these psychological phenomena, the theologians of that day were, with few exceptions, agreed that they were of a supernatural character, the usual question mooted between them being whether they were due to a divine or to a Satanic influence. The medical opponents of the movement sometimes took the ground that the state of ecstasy was allied to delirium or insanity, and that it was a degraded condition, inasmuch as the patient abandoned the exercise of his freewill-an argument similar to that which has been made in our day, against somewhat analogous phenomena, by an American (Mr. E. C. Rogers, of Boston), who argues that, in as far as persons become 'mediums,' they are mere automatons," surrendering all mental control, and resigning their manhood.

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In concluding a sketch, in which, though it be necessarily a brief one, I have taken pains to set forth with strict accuracy all the essential features which mark the character of this extraordinary epidemic, it is proper I should state

that the opponents of Jansenism concur in bringing against the convulsionists the charge that many of them were not only ignorant and illiterate girls, but persons of bad character, occasionally of notoriously immoral habits-nay, that some of them justified the vicious courses in which they indulged by declaring these to be a representation of a religious tendency, emblematic of that degradation through which the church must pass, before, recalled by the voice of Elias, it regained its pristine purity.

Montgéron, while admitting that such charges may justly be brought against some of the convulsionists, denies the general truth of the allegation, yet after such a fashion that one sees plainly he considers it necessary, in establishing the character and divine source of the discourses and predictions delivered in the state of ecstasy, to do so without reference to the moral standing of the ecstatics. When one of his opponents (the physician who addressed to him the satirical letter already referred to) ascribes to him the position, that one must decide the divine or diabolical state of a person alleged to be inspired by reference to that person's morals and conduct, he replies, "God forbid that I should advance so false a proposition!" And he proceeds to argue that the Deity often avails himself, as a medium for expressing his will, of unworthy subjects. He says: "Who does not know that the Holy Spirit, whose divine rays are never stained, let them shine where they will, 'bloweth where it listeth,' and distributes its gifts to whom best it seems, without always causing these to be accompanied by internal virtues? Does not scripture inform us that God caused miracles to be wrought and great prophecies to be delivered by very vicious persons, as Judas, Caiaphas, Balaam, and others? Jesus Christ himself teaches us that there will be workers of iniquity among the number of those who prophesy and of those who will work miracles in his name, declaring that on the day of judgment many will say unto him, 'Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name, and in thy name done many wonderful works?' and that he will reply to them, "Depart from me, ye that work iniquity."" And he proceeds thus: "If, therefore, all that our enemies allege against the convulsionists were true, it does not follow that God would not employ such persons as the ministers of his miracles and his prophecies, provided, always, that these miracles and these prophecies have a worthy object, and tend to a knowledge of the truth, to the spread of charity, and to the reformation of the morals of mankind."

Such are the alleged facts, physical and mental, connected with this extraordinary episode in the history of mental epidemics. To what extent can we rationally attach credit to it? And, if true, what is the explanation of phenomena apparently so incredible?

As to the first, the admission of a distinguished contemporary historian, noted for his sceptical tendencies, in regard to the evidence for these alleged miracles, is noteworthy. "Many of them were immediately proved on the spot before judges of unquestioned integrity, attested by witnesses of credit and distinction, in a learned age, and on the most eminent theatre that is now in the world. Nor were the Jesuits, though a learned body, supported by the civil magistrate, and determined enemies to those opinions in whose favour the miracles were supposed to have been wrought, ever able distinctly to refute or detect them."

Similar is the admission of another celebrated author, at least as sceptical as Hume, and writing at the very time, and on the very spot where these marvellous events were occurring. Diderot, speaking of the St. Médard manifestations, says: "We have of these pretended miracles a vast collection, which may brave the most determined incredulity. Its author, Carré de Montgéron, is a magistrate, a man of gravity, who up to that time had been a professed materialist-on insufficient grounds it is true, but yet a man who certainly had no expectation of making his fortune by becoming a Jansenist. An eye-witness of the facts he relates, and of which he had an opportunity of judging dispassionately and disinterestedly, his testimony is endorsed by that of a thousand others. All relate what they have seen, and their depositions have every possible mark of authenticity, the originals being recorded and preserved in the public archives."

Even in the very denunciations of opponents we find corroboratory evidence of the main facts in question. Witness the terms in which the Bishop of Bethlehem declaims against the scenes of St. Médard: "What! we find ecclesiastics, priests, in the midst of numerous assemblies composed of persons of every rank and of both sexes, doffing their cassocks, habiting themselves in shirt and trousers, the better to be able to act the part of executioners, casting on the ground young girls, dragging them, facedownward, along the earth, and then discharging on their bodies innumerable blows, till they themselves, the dealers of these blows, are reduced to such a state of exhaustion that they are obliged to have water poured on their These accusations of immorality are, pro- heads! What! we find men pretending to senbably, greatly exaggerated by the enemies of the timents of religion and humanity dealing, with Jansenists; yet one may gather, even from the the full swing of their arms, thirty or forty tenor of Montgéron's defence, that there was thousand blows, with heavy clubs, on the arms, more or less truth in the charges brought on the legs, on the heads of young girls, and against the conduct of some of the convulsion-making other desperate efforts capable of crushists, and that the state of ecstasy, whatever its true nature, was by no means confined to persons of good moral character,

ing the skulls of the sufferers! What! we find cultivated ladies, pious and of high rank, doctors of law, civil and canonical, laymen of cha

racter, even curates, daily witnessing this spec- | weapons of stone, with bars of iron? Yet the tacle of fanaticism and horror in silence, instead of opposing it with all their force-nay, they applaud it by their presence, even by their countenance and their conversation! Was ever, throughout all history, such another example of excesses thus scandalous, thus multiplied?"

Montgéron expressly tells us, that, in the case of Marguerite Catherine Turpin, her limbs were drawn, by means of strong bands, "with such extreme violence that the bones of her knees and thighs cracked with a loud noise."

De Lan, another opponent, thus sketches the same scenes: "Young girls, bare-headed, dashed their heads against a wall or against a marble slab, they caused their limbs to be drawn by strong men, even to the extent of dislocation; they caused blows to be given them that would kill the most robust, and in such numbers that one is terrified. I know one person who counted four thousand at a single sitting; they were given sometimes with the palm of the hand, sometimes with the fist; sometimes on the back, sometimes on the stomach. Occasionally heavy cudgels or clubs were emSome convulsionployed instead.

ists ran pins into their heads, without suffering any pain; others would have thrown themselves from the windows, had they not been prevented. Others, again, carried their zeal so far as to cause themselves to be hanged up by a hook," &c.

theomaniacs of St. Médard braved all these tests, sometimes as proofs that God had rendered them invulnerable, sometimes to demonstrate that God could cure them by means calculated to kill them, had they not been the objects of His special protection; sometimes to show that blows usually painful only caused to them pleasant relief. The picture of the punishments to which the convulsionists submitted, as if by inspiration, so that no one might doubt, as Montgéron has it, that it was easy for the Almighty to render invulnerable and insensible bodies the most frail and delicate, would induce us to believe, if the contrary were not so con. clusively established, that a rage for homicide and suicide had taken possession of the greater part of the sect of the Appellants."

Though I am acquainted with no class of the "Great Succors" of St. Médard, yet we phenomena occurring elsewhere that will match find occasional glimpses of instincts somewhat analogous to those claimed for the convulsionists, in other examples.

In Hecker's "Epidemics of the Middle Ages" there is a chapter devoted to what he calls the thus introduces: "So early as the year 1374, "Dancing Mania," the account of which he Aix-la-Chapelle, who had come out of Germany, assemblages of men and women were seen at and who, united by one common delusion, exhibited to the public, both in the streets and in the churches, the following strange spectacle. Modern medical writers of reputation usually They formed circles hand in hand, and, apadmit the main facts, and seek a natural ex-pearing to have lost all control over their senses, planation of them. In the article, "Convulsions," in the great "Dictionnaire des Sciences Médicales" (published in 1812-22), which article is from the pen of an able physiologist, Dr. Montègre, we find the following, in regard to the St.-Médard phenomena: Carré de Montgéron surrounded these prodigies with depositions so numerous and so authentic, that, after having examined them, no doubt can remain. However great my reluctance to admit such facts, it is impossible for me to refuse to receive them." As to the succors (so-called) he frankly confesses that they seem to him as fully proved as the rest,

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Dr. Calmeil, in his well-known work on Insanity, while regarding this epidemic as one of the most striking examples of religious mania, accepts the relation of Montgéron as in the main true. "From various motives," says he, "these theomaniacs sought out the most frightful bodily tortures. Would it be credible, if it were not that the entire population of Paris concurred in testifying to the fact, that more than five hundred women pushed the rage of fanatcism or the perversion of sensibility to such a point, that they exposed themselves to burning fires, that they had their heads compressed between boards, that they caused to be administered on the abdomen, on the breast, on the stomach, on every part of the body, blows of clubs, stampings of the feet, blows with

continued dancing, regardless of the bystanders, for hours together, in wild delirium, until at length they fell to the ground in a state of ex haustion. They then complained of extreme oppression, and groaned as if in the agonies of death, until they were swathed in cloths bound tightly round their waists; upon which they recovered, and remained free from complaint until the next attack. This practice of swathing was resorted to on account of the tympany which followed these spasmodic ravings (Tympany being defined, by Johnson, as "A kind of obstructed flatulence that swells the body like a drum"); but the bystanders frequently relieved patients in a less artificial manner, by thumping and trampling upon the parts affected. While dancing they neither saw nor heard, being insensible to external impressions through the senses, but were haunted by visions." And again : "In Liege, Utrecht, Tongres, and many other towns of Belgium, the dancers appeared with garlands in their hair, and their waists girt with cloths, that they might, as soon as the paroxysm was over, receive immediate relief from the attack of tympany. This bandage, by the insertion of a stick, was easily twisted tight; many, however, obtained more relief from kicks and blows, which they found numbers of persons ready to administer." The same work supplies other points of analogy between this epidemic and that of St. Médard; for example: "Where the

disease was completely developed, the attack commenced with epileptic convulsions." Physicians of our own day, while magnetizing, have occasionally encountered not dissimilar phenomena. Dr. Bertrand tells us that the first patient he ever magnetized, being attacked by a disease of an hysterical character, became subject to convulsions of so long duration, and so violent in character, that he had never, in all his practice, seen the like; and that she suffered horribly. He adds, "Here is what happened during her first convulsion-fits: This unhappy girl, whose instinct was perverted by intensity of pain, earnestly entreated the persons present to press upon her with such force as at any other time would have produced the most serious injury. I had the greatest difficulty to prevent those around her from acceding to her urgent requests that they would kneel upon her with all their weight, that they would exert with their bands the utmost pressure on the pit of her stomach, even on her throat, with the view of driving off the imaginary hysterical ball of which she complained. Though at any other time such treatment would have produced severe pain, she declared that it relieved her; and when the fit passed off, she did not seem to suffer the least inconvenience from it."

The above, connecting as it does the phenomena exhibited during the St.-Médard epidemic with those observed by animal magnetizers, brings us to the second query, namely, as to the cause of these phenomena.

And here we find physicians, not mesmerists, comparing these phenomena, and others of the same class, with the effects observed by animal magnetizers. Dr. Montègre says: "The phenomena of magnetism, and those presented by cases of possession and of fascination, connect themselves with those observed among the convulsionists, not only by the most complete resemblance, but also by the cause which determines them. There is not a single phenomenon observed in the one case that has not its counterpart in the others."

Calmeil, while admitting that the "nervous effects produced by animal magnetizers bear a close resemblance to those which have been observed at Loudun, at Louviers, and during other convulsive epidemics," offers the following, in explanation of the physical phenomena connected with the "Great Succors":

"The energetic resistance, which, in the case of the convulsionists, the skin, the cellular tissue, and the surface of the body and limbs offered to the shock of blows, is certainly calculated to excite surprise. But many of these fanatics greatly deceived themselves, when they imagined that they were invulnerable; for it has been repeatedly proved that several of them, as a consequent of the cruel trials they solicited, suffered from large ecchymoses on the integuments, and numerous contusions on those portions of the surface which were exposed to the rudest attacks. For the rest, the blows were never administered except during the torments

of convulsion; and at that time the tympany (météorisme) of the abdomen, the state of spasm of the uterus in women and of the alimentary canal in both sexes, the state of contraction, of orgasm, of turgescence in the fleshy envelopes, in the muscular layers which protect and enclose the abdomen, the thorax, the principal vascular trunks, and the bony surfaces, must essentially contribute to weaken, to deaden, to nullify the effect of the blows. Is it not by means of an analogous state of orgasm, which an overexcited will produces, that boxers and athletes find themselves in a condition to brave, to a certain point, the dangers of their profession? In fine, it is to be remarked that, when dealing blows on the bodies of the convulsionists, the assistants employed weapons of considerable volume, having flat or rounded surfaces, cylindrical or blunted. But the action of such physical agents is not to be compared, as regards its danger, with that of thongs, switches, or other supple and flexible instruments with distinct edges. Finally, the contact and the repeated impression of the blows produced on the convulsionists the effect of a sort of salutary pounding, and rendered less poignant and less sensible the tortures of hysteria. It would have been preferable, doubtless, to make use of less murderous succours; the rage for distinction as the possessor of a miraculous gift, even more perhaps than the instinctive need of immediate relief, prompting these convulsionary theomaniacs to make choice of means calculated to act on the imagination of a populace, whose interest could be kept awake only by a constant repetition of wonders."

Calmeil, of all the medical authors I have consulted, appears to have the most closely studied the various phases of the St.-Médard epidemic. Yet the explanations above given seem to me quite incommensurate with the phenomena admitted,

No wonder that De Gasparin, with all his aversion for the supernatural, and all his disinclination to admit anything which he cannot explain, after quoting from Calmeil the above explanation, feels its insufficiency, and seeks another. These are his words: "How does it happen that, after being struck with the justice of these observations, one still retains a sort of intellectual uneasiness, a certain suspicion of the disproportion between the explanation and the phenomena it seeks to explain? How does it happen that, under the influence of such an impression, many suffer themselves to be seduced into an admission of diabolical or miraculous agency? It happens because Dr. Calmeil, faithful to the countersign of all learned bodies in England and France, refuses to admit fluidic action, or to make a single step in advance of the ordinary theory of nervous excitement. Now it is in vain to talk of contractions, of spasms, of turgescence; all this evidently fails to reach the case of the St. Médard succors. To reach it we need the intervention of a peculiar force, of a fluid which is disengaged,

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