NEW CHAPTERS IN THE WARFARE OF SCIENCE. 445 



The especial point to be noted is that from the miracle-play of 

 the present day Satan and his works have disappeared. The writer 

 of this article was unable to detect, in a representation of the 

 passion-play at Ober-Ammergau, in 1881, the slightest reference 

 to diabolic interference with the course of events as represented 

 from the Old Testament, or from the New, in a series of tableaux 

 lasting, with a slight intermission, from nine in the morning until 

 after four in the afternoon. With the most thorough exhibition 

 of miniite events relating the life of Christ, and at times with 

 hundreds of figures on the stage, there was not a person or a word 

 which recalled that main feature in the mediaeval Church plays. 

 The writer also made a full collection of photographs of tableaux, 

 of engravings of music, and of works bearing upon these repre- 

 sentations for twenty years before, and in none of these was there 

 an apparent survival of the old belief. This would certainly seem 

 to indicate that even the child-like faith of the Tyrolese has arrived 

 at a point, under modern influences, which would make a repre- 

 sentation of Satan and his minions incongruous ; and that, while 

 they believe that they believe, diabolism as a belief to be openly 

 professed has become a thing to provoke derision.* 



Not only the popular art, but all the popular legends embodied 

 these ideas. The stories of the chroniclers are full of them ; the 

 " Lives of the Saints " abound in them ; sermons enforced them 

 from every pulpit. What wonder, then, that soon men and 

 women had vivid dreams of Satanic influence, that dread of "pos- 

 session " was like dread of the plague, and that this terror spread 

 the disease enormously, until we hear of convents, villages, and 

 even large districts ravaged by epidemics of diabolical possession ! f 



And this terror naturally bred not only active cruelty toward 

 those supposed to be possessed, but cold indifference to the suffer- 

 ings of those acknowledged to be lunatics. As we have already 

 seen, while ample and beautiful provision was made for every 

 other form of human suffering, for this there was comparatively 

 little ; and, indeed, what provision was made was generally worse 

 than none. Of this indifference and cruelty we have a striking 

 monument in a single English word — a word originally significant 



sum of money paid for keeping a fire burning in hell's mouth. Says Hase (as above, p. 42) : 

 " In wonderful satyr-like masquerade, in which neither horns, tail, nor hoofs were ever . , . 

 wanting, the devil prosecuted on the stage his business of fetching souls," which left the 

 mouths of the dying " in the form of small images." 



* Speaking of the part played by Satan at Ober-Ammergau, Hase says : " Formerly, 

 seated on his infernal throne, surrounded by his hosts with Sin and Death, he opened the 

 play, . . . and . . . retained throughout a considerable part ; but he has been surrendered 

 to the progress of that enlightenment which even the Bavarian highlands have not been 

 able to escape " (p. 80). 



f I shall discuss these epidemics of possession, which form a somewhat distinct class of 

 phenomena, in the second part of this chapter. 



