Demoniacal epidemic of Savoy.

— Some time ago the newspapers spoke of an epidemic monomania that manifested itself in a part of Upper Savoy and against which all the aids of medicine and of religion failed. The only means that produced more or less satisfactory results was the dispersion of the individuals into different towns. In this regard, we received from Captain B…, a member of the Spiritist Society of Paris, presently at Annecy, the following letter: [see Suicide prevented by Spiritism.]

“Annecy, March 7, 1862.

“Mr. President, “Wishing to be useful to the Society, I have the honor of forwarding to you a brochure that was sent to me by one of my friends, Dr. Caille, charged by the Minister with following the inquiry conducted by Mr. Constant, inspector of the asylums for the insane, into the very numerous cases of demonomania observed in the commune of Morzine, district of Thonon (Haute-Savoie). To this day, this unfortunate population finds itself under the influence of obsession, despite the exorcisms, the medical treatments, the measures taken by the authorities, and the commitments to the hospitals of the Department. The cases have diminished somewhat but have not ceased, the evil remaining, so to speak, in a latent state. Wishing to exorcise these unfortunates, most of them children, the curate had them brought to the church, led by vigorous men. Scarcely had he pronounced the first Latin words when a horrifying scene took place: cries, furious leaps, convulsions, etc., to such a degree that they sent for the soldiers and a company of infantry to restore order. “I have not been able to obtain all the information that I should like to be able to give you today, but the facts seem to me grave enough to merit your examination. Dr. Arthaud, of Lyon, an alienist physician, read the report of the medical Society of that city, which was published by the Gazette médicale de Lyon and which you will be able to obtain through your correspondent. In the hospital of this city we have two women from Morzine who are under treatment. Dr. Caille concluded that it was an epidemic nervous affliction, which escapes every kind of treatment and of exorcism. Isolation alone produced good results. During the crises, all these unfortunate obsessed persons pronounce obscene words; they make prodigious leaps over the tables, climb into trees, onto the rooftops, and sometimes prophesy. “If these facts presented themselves in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, in the convents and in the fields, it is nonetheless certain that in our nineteenth century they offer, to us Spiritists, a subject of study, from the point of view of an epidemic obsession, becoming generalized and persisting for years, for it is about five years since the first case was observed. “I shall have the honor of sending you all the documents and information that I am able to obtain.

“Accept, etc.

B…”

— The two communications that follow were given to us on this subject, at the Spiritist Society of Paris, by our habitual Spirits.

“It is not physicians, but magnetizers, spiritualists, or Spiritists who ought to be sent to dispel the legion of wicked Spirits, gone astray on your planet. I say gone astray because they will only be passing through. But for a long time still, the unfortunate population will suffer from the moral and physical point of view. Where is the remedy? you ask. It will arise out of the evil, because men, terrified by these manifestations, will welcome with rapture the beneficent contact of the good Spirits who will succeed them, as the dawn succeeds the night. This poor population, ignorant of all intellectual work, would have failed to recognize the intelligent communications of the Spirits or, rather, would not even have perceived them. The initiation and the evils provoked by this impure throng open closed eyes, and the disorders, the acts of dementia, are but a prelude to initiation, since all must partake of the great Spiritist light. Do not be scandalized by this cruel manner of proceeding: everything has an end, and the sufferings must be fruitful, as the storms are, which destroy the harvest of one region while fertilizing others.” Georges.

(Medium: Mrs. Costel.)

— The cases of demonomania that now occur in Savoy also occurred formerly in many other countries, notably in Germany, but principally in the Orient. This abnormal fact is more characteristic than you think. Indeed, to the attentive observer it reveals a situation analogous to that which manifested itself in the last years of paganism. No one is unaware that when the Christ, our most beloved Master, incarnated in Judea, under the features of the carpenter Jesus, that region had been invaded by legions of malevolent Spirits who, as today, took hold, by possession, of the most ignorant social classes, of the weakest and least advanced incarnate Spirits — in a word, of the individuals who tended the flocks or wandered about in the occupations of rural life. Do you not perceive a great analogy in the reproduction of these identical phenomena of possession? Ah! therein lies a very profound teaching! and from it you must conclude that the predicted times draw nearer and nearer, and that the Son of Man will soon come again to drive out this throng of impure Spirits who have descended upon the Earth, and to revive the Christian faith, giving his high and divine sanction to the consoling revelations and to the regenerating teachings of Spiritism. Returning to the present cases of demonomania, it must be remembered that the learned, that the physicians of the age of Augustus treated, according to the Hippocratic methods, the unfortunate possessed of Palestine, and that all their science was annihilated before that unknown power. Well then! still today all your inspectors of epidemics, all your most distinguished alienists, learned doctors in pure materialism, fail in the same way before this exclusively moral malady, before this purely spiritual epidemic. But what does it matter, my friends! you who have been touched by the new grace know how curable these passing evils are by those who have faith. Await, then, with confidence, the coming of him who has already redeemed Humanity. The hour approaches; the precursor Spirit is already incarnate [Allan Kardec]. Soon we shall see the complete development of this doctrine, which has taken for its motto: “Outside charity there is no salvation.” Erastus. n (Medium: Mr. d’Ambel.)

— We must conclude, from the foregoing, that it is not a matter of an organic affliction, but rather of an occult influence. It costs us all the less to believe this, since we have had numerous identical isolated cases, due to the same cause; and what proves it is that the means taught by Spiritism were sufficient to make the obsession cease. It is demonstrated by experience that ill-intentioned Spirits act not only upon the thought, but also upon the body, with which they identify themselves and of which they make use as though it were their own; that they provoke ridiculous acts, cries, disordered movements presenting all the appearances of madness or of monomania. Its explanation will be found in our The Mediums' Book, in the chapter on obsession, and in a forthcoming article we shall cite several facts that demonstrate it in an incontestable manner. Indeed, it is truly a kind of madness, since this name may be given to every abnormal state in which the Spirit does not act freely. From this point of view, it is a true accidental madness. It is necessary, then, to distinguish pathological madness from obsessive madness. The first results from a disorder in the organs of the manifestation of thought. Let us note that, in this state of things, it is not the Spirit that is mad; it preserves the plenitude of its faculties, as observation demonstrates; only, the instrument of which it makes use to manifest itself being disorganized, the thought, or rather the expression of the thought, is incoherent.

In obsessive madness there is no organic lesion; it is the Spirit itself that finds itself affected by the subjugation of a foreign Spirit, which dominates and subjugates it. In the first case, one must try to cure the diseased organ; in the second, it suffices to free the sick Spirit from the importunate guest, in order to restore its liberty to it. Such cases are very frequent, and often what is but obsession is taken for madness, for which moral means ought to be employed, and not cold showers. Through physical treatment and, above all, through contact with the truly insane, a true madness has often been induced where it did not exist.

Opening new horizons to all the sciences, Spiritism comes, also, to elucidate the question, so obscure, of mental illnesses, by pointing out for them a cause that, until today, had not been taken into consideration — a real cause, evident, proved by experience, and whose truth will later be recognized. But how to make such a cause be admitted by those who are always disposed to send to the asylum whoever has the weakness to believe that we have a soul, and that this soul plays a role in the vital functions, survives the body, and can act upon the living? Thanks be to God, and for the good of Humanity, Spiritist ideas make more progress among physicians than could have been hoped for, and everything leads us to foresee that, in a not very distant future, Medicine will at last emerge from the materialist routine. Some isolated cases of physical obsession, or of obsession, being proved, it is easy to understand that, similar to a cloud of locusts, a band of malefic Spirits can hurl itself upon a certain number of individuals, take hold of them, and produce a kind of moral epidemic. Ignorance, weakness of the faculties, the absence of intellectual culture naturally grant them greater influence. That is why they harm, by preference, certain classes, although intelligent and educated persons are not always exempt. As Erastus says, it was probably an epidemic of this kind that prevailed in the time of the Christ, so often mentioned in the Gospel. But why did his word alone suffice to drive out the so-called demons? This proves that the evil could not be cured save by a moral influence. Now, who can deny the moral influence of the Christ? Yet — it will be said — did they not employ exorcism, which is a kind of moral remedy, and was nothing obtained? If it produced nothing, it is that the remedy is worth nothing and that another must be sought: this is evident. Study Spiritism and you will understand the reason. Spiritism alone, by pointing out the true cause of the evil, can give the means of combating scourges of this nature. But when we say to study it, we understand by this a serious study, and not in the hope of finding in it a banal recipe, for the use of the first comer. What is happening in Savoy, by drawing attention, will possibly hasten the moment when the share of action of the invisible world in the phenomena of Nature will be recognized. Once it has entered upon this path, Science will possess the key to many mysteries and will see the most formidable barrier that holds back progress fall: materialism, which restricts the circle of observation instead of enlarging it. [see Studies on the possessed of Morzine.]

[1]

[see Erastus.]