EDITOR'S TABLE. 



273 



pelled by a spirit to acts of incendia- 

 rism ; ... or that distressed chemist, of 

 a naturally amiable character, who went 

 to an asylum that he might be pre- 

 vented from indulging in a propensity 

 to kill some one; or that respectable old 

 lady who endeavored to strangle her 

 own daughter ? " etc., etc. 



But, if these are types of devil pos- 

 session, what becomes of the theory re- 

 cently advanced by Dr. Abbott that a 

 devil " never becomes the possessor of a 

 human soul except by its own gradual 

 and voluntary subjection to his hateful 

 despotism"? As an honest man, the 

 doctor will have to admit that the facts 

 marshaled in his article of twenty years 

 ago were destined to support a view 

 the direct opposite of that which we criti- 

 cised — the view, namely, that diabolical 

 agency may be most reasonably assumed 

 when, the general character being sound, 

 some morbid or criminal propensity for 

 which no natural cause can be assigned 

 is manifested in one particular direction. 

 He says he holds the same views now ; 

 and yet, the other day, he took up the 

 entirely irreconcilable position that, be- 

 fore the fiend could do anything with a 

 human being, there had to be a " gradu- 

 al, voluntary" yielding to his infernal 

 suggestions. Dr. Abbott says that he 

 does not "maintain the doctrine of de- 

 moniacal possession upon theological 

 grounds " ; but surely if he maintained 

 it at all as a sincere, independent con- 

 viction, he could hardly put forward 

 two so directly contradictory views 

 without being aware of the contradic- 

 tion. Will not the doctor say which of 

 the two theories it is he really holds? 

 Is the presence of the devil to be argued 

 from the general excellence of character 

 of those who, in some one respect, are 

 urged by an inexplicable impulse to 

 crime? Or is it the other way — does 

 the fiend simply in the end claim, as 

 it were, his due from those who have 

 " gradually and voluntarily " surren- 

 dered themselves into his hands? 



Leaving our respected opponent to 



VOL, XXXV. — 18 



make his election between the above 

 two views, both of which he singularly 

 professes to maintain, let us, from our 

 own point of view, briefly inquire what 

 light the devil - theory throws either 

 upon the phenomenon of morbid im- 

 pulses or upon that of hardened, ha- 

 bitual iniquity. If it is a devil who be- 

 sets an amiable chemist or a respectable 

 old lady, when one or the other wishes 

 to commit some senseless act of vio- 

 lence, the only remedy would seem to 

 be exorcism, which, however, there is 

 reason to fear, is a lost art — outside, at 

 least, of the Roman Catholic Church. 

 But it is perfectly known to Dr. Ab- 

 bott, as to every one else, that these 

 morbid influences do, more or less, yield 

 to various curative measures in which 

 exorcism has no part whatever. If evi- 

 dence on this point is wanting it is sup- 

 plied in the further article we print in 

 our present number from the pen of Dr. 

 Andrew D. "White. To know the cause 

 of an evil ought to be a great help to the 

 discovery of a cure, provided the cause 

 is a natural one ; but of what assistance 

 would it be to any one to know that 

 his friend or neighbor was afflicted with 

 a devil, if there were no devil-chaser 

 accessible? On the other hand, what 

 mischief might not be wrought by the 

 assumption of a supernatural cause, if 

 the cause were really natural, and there- 

 fore, possibly, removable by natural 

 means ? "We doubt very much whether 

 Dr. Abbott has sufficiently reflected on 

 the mischief he may be doing in en- 

 couraging people to believe in devils, in- 

 stead of urging them to a patient, untir- 

 ing search after the natural causes and 

 appropriate remedies of all ills, bodily 

 and mental. In this great controversy 

 a man of Dr. Abbott's intelligence ought 

 to be on our side. "We would respect- 

 fully call upon him to probe his con- 

 science, and ask 'whether he is really be- 

 ing just to himself, or doing the world a 

 service, by inciting his readers and hear- 

 ers to attribute to Satanic agency every 

 manifestation of evil that they can not 



