364 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



the " clear light of scientific investigation " to which Hebra's case was 

 subjected. 



With regard to the so-called bloody sweat of our Saviour, such an 

 undoubted article of faith to many, and so familiar to our ears in the 

 pathetic invocation of the Litany of the Episcopal Church, " By thine 

 agony and bloody sweat," the once celebrated Dr. Mead makes the 

 following observations in his ''Medica Sacra" : "Saint Luke relates 

 of Christ himself that, when he was in an agony by the fervency of 

 his prayers, his sweat was like drops of blood falling down on the 

 ground. This passage is generally understood as if the Saviour of 

 mankind had sweated real blood. But the text does not say so much. 

 The sweat was only hosoi tJiromhoi aimatos, as it were, or like drops 

 of blood ; that is, the drops of sweat were so large, thick, and viscid, 

 that they trickled to the ground like drops of blood. Thus were the 

 words understood by Justin Martyr, Theophylactus, and Euthymius." 



Beza's Latin Testament renders the words, "Erat autem sudor 

 ejus quasi grumi sanguinis descendentes in terram." (But his sweat 

 was as drops of blood falling upon the earth.) 



Luther's German version has, "Es ward aber sein Schweisz wie 

 Blutstropfen die fielen auf die Erde." (But his sweat was as drops of 

 blood that fell upon the earth.) 



The Rhemish Testament, from the Vulgate of Jerome, gives in 

 the translation recognized by the Catholic Church in this country, 

 " And his sweat became as drops of blood trickling down upon the 

 ground." 



Our authorized version, "And his sweat was as it were great 

 drops of blood falling down to the ground." 



The recent revision changes only a single word, making it, " And 

 his sweat became as it were great drops of blood falling down upon 

 the ground." 



Among modern commentators some agree with "Whitby, who says, 

 " I own that these words do not certainly signify that the matter of 

 this sweat was blood, but only that it was like to blood, being in such 

 large drops." But the majority hold with Alford, that it was a veri- 

 table bloody sweat. 



Adam Clarke contends that the passage must be interpreted ac- 

 cording as the emjDhasis is made to rest on thromboi, or aimatos, and 

 unhesitatingly declares for the latter. 



Perhaps it would be better not to add anything to the judicious 

 and non-committal remarks of Dr. Mead, but still I will hazard the fol- 

 lowing considerations : It is difficult to understand why, if Luke, a 

 clear writer and said to be a physician, wished to state the fact of a 

 bloody sweat, he could not have done so in plain, straightforward lan- 

 guage, with no ambiguity about it. If he was, as it is said, a physi- 

 cian, the simile of dropping blood, not an unnatural one in any case 

 for profuse sweat, would be all the more natural and likely to be used. 



