256 NATURE AND MAN. 



omission of a single letter from a writing, and the arrival of guests 

 at the monastery. He cured nurhbers of people afflicted with 

 inveterate diseases, accorded safety to storm-tossed vessels, himself 

 walked across the sea to his island home, drove demons out of 

 milk-pails, outwitted sorcerers, and gave supernatural powers to 

 domestic implements. Like other saints, he had his visions of 

 angels and apparitions of heavenly light, which comforted and 

 encouraged him at many a trying juncture, — lasting, on one 

 occasion, for three days and nights. 



Now it seems to me beyond all reasonable doubt, that St. 

 Columba was one of those men of extraordinary energy of cha- 

 racter and earnest religious nature, who have the power of strongly 

 impressing most of those with whom they come into contact, 

 moulding their wills and awakening their religious sympathies, so 

 as to acquire a wonderful influence over them \ this being aided 

 by the commanding personal " presence " he is recorded to have 

 possessed. And it is not surprising that when themselves the 

 subjects of what they regarded as "supernatural" power, they should 

 attribute to him the exercise of the same power in other ways. 

 In fact, to their unscientific minds it seemed quite "natural" that he 

 should so exert it ; its possession being, in their belief, a normal 

 attribute of his saintship. That he himself believed in his gifts, 

 and that many wonders were actually worked by the concurrent 

 action of his own faith in himself and his followers' faith in him, 

 will not seem unlikely to any one who has carefully studied the 

 action of mental states upon the bodily organism. And that round 

 a nucleus of truth there should have gathered a large accretion of 

 error, under the influence of the mental preconception whose 

 modus operandi I have endeavoured to elucidate, is accordant with 

 the teachings of our own recent experience, in such cases as that 

 of Dr. Newton and the Zouave Jacob. In these and similar 

 phenomena, a strong conviction of the possession of the power on 

 the part ot the healer seems to be necessary for the excitement of 

 the faith ot those operated on ; and the healer recognizes, by a 

 kind of intuition, the existence of that faith on the part of the 

 patient. Do not several phrases in the gospel narratives point to 

 the same relations as existing between Jesus and the sufferers who 

 sought his aid ? The cure is constantly attributed to the " faith " 



