•266 THOMAS CHAPLIN^ ESQ.^ M.D., ON 



have been looked upon as a type of impurity, perhaps of sin, 

 and was, in certain instances, the immediate result of the 

 divine displeasure, as in the case of Miriam (Numb, xii., 10). 

 Gehazi (2 Kings v., 27), Azariah (2 Kings xv., 4, 5), and 

 Uzziah (2 Chr. xxvii., 19). 



8. Lunacy. — No doubt, as already remarked under " demo- 

 niacal possession," many who were "possessed with devils" 

 manifested symptoms of lunacy or insanity. The child 

 mentioned in Matt, xvii., 15, is thought by some to have 

 been " epileptic," that being the commonly accepted signifi- 

 cation of the Greek word employed. But " lunatic " is a 

 literal translation of it ; epileptics being su]3posed to be 

 influenced by the moon. King Saul appears to have 

 suffered for many years from intermittent attacks of the 

 form of insanity known as melancholia, and seems to have 

 •ended his life by suicide, as such sufferers often do. King- 

 Nebuchadnezzar was afflicted with an aberration of intellect 

 well known to those who make insanity their study. His 

 pride and haughtiness ; his delusion when he (probably) 

 fancied himself an ox and ate grass ; his neglect of his 

 23erson, until " his hairs were grown like eagles' feathers, and 

 his nails like birds' claws " ; his slow recovery during a 

 period of seclusion and freedom from care, resemble pheno- 

 mena constantly observed among the iusane at the present 

 day. 



9. Palsy or Paralysis is in its various forms the same every- 

 where, and only one or two cases mentioned in the Bible 

 lequire a word of comment. The drying up of Jeroboam's 

 arm was miraculous and supernatural. In ordinary cases of 

 paralysis the muscles waste from inaction, but the process is 

 gradual, whereas the Avicked king's arm seems to have dried 

 up suddenly and to have been as suddenly restored. 



The impotent man who lay at the Pool of Bethesda and 

 was healed by our Lord (John v., 2, 9) may have been 

 suffering from a well-known disease in which there is pro- 

 gressive wasting of the muscles, producing inability to walk 

 or stand, and eventually even to lift the hand to the mouth. 

 !Such cases often last many years. They are perhaps more 

 frequent in Palestine than in the more northern regions of the 

 temperate zone. The fact that this man's infirmity had 

 existed for thirty-eight years accounts for his being more 

 helpless than even the other impotent folk, and renders his 

 sudden restoration to health and strength the more striking, 

 The admonition given to this man : " sin no more lest a 



