88 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



piece of pastry in the form of a madonna made of flour and the 

 water of Lourdes by the Order of Kedemptorists at Cortona, in 

 Tuscany. Quantities of these new-baked fetiches are manufac- 

 tured and exported every year with the approval of His Holiness 

 Leo XIII, by whom they are especially commended as a specific 

 for demoniacal infestations. 



In 1887, when the phenomena of hypnotism began to excite 

 general interest and to be discussed by the press, La Civitta" Cat- 

 tolica, the official organ of the Vatican, published an article 

 ascribing these strange manifestations to diabolical agencies, and 

 asserting them to be desperate attempts of Satan to recover the 

 sovereignty of this world, which the Church is gradually wrest- 

 ing from his grasp. 



Unfortunately for the progress of knowledge and the general 

 diffusion of enlightenment, this explanation of hypnotism is a 

 fair example and illustration of the attitude of the papacy toward 

 every puzzling problem which presents itself to the human mind 

 for investigation. There is only one solution : the devil is to pay. 

 The same opinion is held and taught by the Greek Church, as 

 well as by conservative Lutheranism and many other rigidly 

 orthodox sects of Protestantism. Luther asserted that "if a man 

 loses an eye or hand, falls into the fire and is burned to death, or 

 into the water and is drowned, mounts a ladder and breaks his 

 neck, tumbles down without knowing why or how, or incurs daily 

 unforeseen accidents, all these things are mere tricks and onsets 

 of the devil" (eitel Teufelswurf' und Schlag'). If a big blue- 

 bottle buzzed about in his study and happened to light on his 

 pen, he was sure that it was an emissary of Satan endeavoring to 

 hinder him in his work. Even the refined and scholarly Melanch- 

 thon relates similar experiences : " When I was in Tubingen," he 

 says, " I saw every night flames which burned a long time and 

 then vanished in a dense cloud of smoke. Likewise in Heidel- 

 berg, forms like falling stars appeared to me every night. They 

 were undoubtedly devils, which are constantly roving about 

 among men." This belief in the omnipresence of satanic satel- 

 lites, embodied in animate and inanimate objects, was easily con- 

 firmed by the citation and frequent perversion of scriptural texts. 

 Thus the words of the Psalmist, " Set a watch, Lord, before my 

 mouth : keep the doors of my lips," was interpreted, not as en- 

 treaty to be saved from the sin of evil-speaking, but as a prayer 

 for protection against evil spirits, who might take advantage of 

 the act of oscitation to enter into and get possession of the human 

 body. It was formerly believed that the devil drowzed people 

 and thus incited them to yawn for this express purpose ; hence 

 the custom, once generally prevalent and still practiced in Spain 

 and Italy, of making the sign of the cross over the mouth in 



