Unfortunately this belief is not confined to Catholics and boors, but is

held by Protestants, who are considered persons of education and superior

culture. Dr. Lyman Abbott asserted in a sermon preached in Plymouth

Church, that “what we call the impulses of our lower nature are the

whispered suggestions of fiend-like natures, watching for our fall and

exultant if they can accomplish it.” But while affirming that “evil

spirits exercise an influence over mankind,” and that cranks like Guiteau,

the assassin of President Garfield, are diabolically possessed, the

reverend divine would hardly risk his reputation for sanity by attempting

to exorcise the supposed demon. The Catholic priest holds the same view,

but has the courage of his convictions and goes solemnly to work with

bell, book and candle to effect the expulsion of the indwelling fiend.

The fact that such methods of healing are sometimes successful is adduced

as conclusive proof of their miraculous character; but this inference is

wholly incorrect. Professor Dr. Hoppe, in an essay on _Der Teufels- und

Geisterglaube und die psychologische Erklärung des Besessenseins_

(_Allgemeine Zeitschrift für Psychiatrie_, Bd. LV. p. 290), gives a

psychological explanation of these puzzling phenomena. “The priest,” he

says, “exerts a salutary influence upon the brain through the respect and

dignity which he inspires, just as Christ in his day wrought upon those

who were sick and possessed with devils.” Indeed, it is expressly stated

by the evangelist that Jesus did not attempt to do wonderful works among

people who did not believe. According to this theory the exorcism effects

a cure by its powerful action on the imagination, just as there are

frequent ailments, for which a wise physician administers bread pills and

a weak solution of powdered sugar as the safest and best medicaments.

Professor Hoppe, therefore, approves of “priestly conjurations for the

expulsion of devils as a psychical means of healing,” and thinks that the

more ceremoniously the rite can be performed in the presence of grave and

venerable witnesses, the more effective it will be. This opinion is

endorsed by a Catholic priest, Friedrich Jaskowski, in a pamphlet entitled

_Der Trierer Rock und seine Patienten vom Jahre 1891_ (Saarbrücken: Carl

Schmidtke, 1894). The author belongs to the diocese of Trier and is

therefore under the jurisdiction of the bishop, Dr. Felix Korum, whose

statements concerning the miracles wrought and the evidences of divine

mercy manifested during the exhibition of the “holy coat” in 1891 he

courageously reviews and conclusively refutes. The bishop had printed what

he called “documentary proofs,” consisting of certificates issued by

obscure curates and country doctors, that certain persons suffering

chiefly from diseases of the nervous system had been healed, and sought to

discover in these cures the working of divine agencies. Jaskowski shows

that in several instances the persons said to have found relief died

shortly afterwards, and maintains that where cures actually occurred they

“were not due to a miracle or any direct interference of God with the

established order of things, but happened in a purely natural manner.” He

quotes the late Professor Charcot, Dr. Forel, and other neuropathologists

to establish the fact that hetero-suggestion emanating from a physician or

priest, or auto-suggestion originating in the person’s own mind, may

often be the most effective remedy for neurotic disorders of every kind.

In auto-suggestion the patient is possessed with the fixed idea that the

doing of a certain thing, which may be in itself absolutely indifferent,

will afford relief. As an example of this faith-cure Jaskowski refers to

the woman who was diseased with an issue of blood, and approaching Jesus

said within herself: “If I may but touch his garment, I shall be whole.”

This is precisely the position taken by Jesus himself, who turned to the

woman and said: “Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee

whole.” Jaskowski also quotes the declaration of the evangelist referred

to above, that in a certain place the people’s lack of faith prevented

Jesus from doing many wondrous works, and does not deny that on this

principle, which is now recognized by the most eminent physicians, some

few of the hundreds of pilgrims may have been restored to health by

touching the holy coat of Trier; and there is no doubt that the popular

belief in Bishop Korum’s assertion that it is the same garment which Jesus

wore and the woman touched, would greatly increase its healing efficacy

through the force of auto-suggestion (see my article on “Recent

Recrudescence of Superstition” in Appleton’s _Popular Science Monthly_ for

Oct. 1895, pp. 762-66).

The Bishop of Bamberg in Bavaria has been stigmatized as a hypocrite

because he sends the infirm of his flock on a pilgrimage to Lourdes or

Laas or some other holy shrine, while he prefers for himself the profane

waters of Karlsbad or Kissingen. But in so doing he is not guilty of any

inconsistency, since a journey to sacred places and contact with sacred

relics would not act upon him with the same force as upon the ignorant and

superstitious masses of his diocese. His conduct only evinces his

disbelief in the supernatural character of the remedies he prescribes. The

distinguished French physician, Professor Charcot, as already mentioned,

recognized the curative power of faith under certain circumstances, and

occasionally found it eminently successful in hysterical and other purely

nervous affections. In some cases he did not hesitate to prescribe a

pilgrimage to the shrine of any saint for whom the patient may have had a

peculiar reverence; but in no instance in his experience did faith or

exorcism or hagiolatry heal an organic disease, set a dislocated joint or

restore an amputated limb. What Falstaff says of honour is equally true of

faith, it “hath no skill in surgery.”

But to return from this digression, Père Bougeant’s theory of the

diabolical possession of pagans and unbaptized persons would provide for

comparatively few devils, and the gradual diffusion of Christianity would

constantly diminish the supply of human beings available as their proper

habitations. The ultimate conversion of the whole world and the custom of

baptizing infants as soon as they are born would, therefore, produce

serious domiciliary destitution and distress among the evil spirits and

set immense numbers of them hopelessly adrift as vagabonds, and thus

create an extremely undesirable diabolical proletariat. This difficulty is

avoided by assuming that the vast majority of devils are incarnate in the

billions of beasts of all kinds, which dwell upon the earth or fly in the

air or fill the waters of the rivers and the seas. This hypothesis, he

adds, “enables me to ascribe to the lower animals thought, knowledge,

feeling, and a spiritual principle or soul without running counter to the

truths of religion. Indeed, so far from being astonished at their

manifestations of intelligence, foresight, memory and reason, I am rather

surprised that they do not display these qualities in a higher degree,

since their soul is probably far more perfect than ours. Their defects

are, as I have discovered, owing to the fact that in brute as in us, the

mind works through material organs, and inasmuch as these organs are

grosser and less perfect in the lower animals than in man, it follows that

their exhibitions of intelligence, their thoughts and all their mental

operations must be less perfect; and, if these proud spirits are conscious

of their condition, how humiliating it must be for them to see themselves

thus embruted! Whether they are conscious of it or not, this deep

degradation is the first act of God’s vengeance executed on his foes. It

is a foretaste of hell.”

Only by such an assumption, as our author proceeds to show, is it possible

to justify the ways of man to the lower animals and to reconcile his cruel

treatment of them with the goodness of an all-wise and all-powerful maker

and ruler of the universe. For this reason, he goes on to explain, the

Christian Church has never deemed it a duty to take the lower animals

under its protection or to inculcate ordinary natural kindness towards

them. Hence in countries, like Italy and Spain, where the influence of

Catholicism has been supreme for centuries, not only are wild birds and

beasts of chase relentlessly slaughtered and exterminated, but even useful

domestic animals, asses, sumpter-mules and pack-horses, are subjected to a

supererogation of suffering at the hands of ruthless man. As the pious

Parsi conscientiously comes up to the help of Ahuramazda against the

malevolent Angrô-mainyush by killing as many as possible of the creatures

which the latter has made, so the good Catholic becomes an efficient

co-worker with God by maltreating brutes and thus aiding the Almighty in

punishing the devils, of which they are the visible and bruisable forms.

Whatever pain is inflicted is felt, not by the physical organism, but by

the animated spirit. It is the embodied demon that really suffers, howling

in the beaten dog and squealing in the butchered pig.

There are doubtless many persons of tender susceptibilities, who cannot

bear to think that the animals, whose daily companionship we enjoy, the

parrot we feed with sugar, the pretty pug we caress and the noble horse,

which ministers to our comfort and convenience, are nothing but devils

predestined to everlasting torture. But these purely sentimental

considerations are of no weight in the scale of reason. “What matters it,”

replies the Jesuit Father, “whether it is a devil or another kind of

creature that is in our service or contributes to our amusement? For my

part, this idea pleases rather than repels me; and I recognize with

gratitude the beneficence of the Creator in having provided me with so

many little devils for my use and entertainment. If it be said that these

poor creatures, which we have learned to love and so fondly cherish, are

fore-ordained to eternal torments, I can only adore the decrees of God,

but do not hold myself responsible for the terrible sentence; I leave the

execution of the dread decision to the sovereign judge and continue to

live with my little devils, as I live pleasantly with a multitude of

persons, of whom, according to the teachings of our holy religion, the

great majority will be damned.” The crafty disciple of Loyola, elusive of

disagreeable deductions, is content to accept the poodle in its phenomenal

form and to make the most of it, without troubling himself about “des

Pudels Kern.”

This doctrine, he thinks, is amply illustrated and confirmed by an appeal

to the consentient opinion of mankind or the argument from universal

belief, which has been so often and so effectively urged in proof of the

existence of God. If the maxim _universitas non delinquit_ has the same

validity in the province of philosophy as in that of law, then we are

justified in assuming that the whole human race cannot go wrong even in

purely metaphysical speculation and that unanimity in error is a

psychological impossibility. The criterion of truth, _quod semper, quod

ubique, quod ab omnibus_, by which the Roman hierarchy is willing to have

its claims to ecclesiastical catholicity and doctrinal orthodoxy tested,

is confined to Christendom in its application and does not consider the

views of persons outside of the body of believers. In the question under

discussion the argument is not subject to such limitations, but gathers

testimony from all races and religions, showing that there is not a

civilized nation or savage tribe on the face of the earth, which does not

regard or has not regarded the lower animals as embodiments of evil

spirits and sought to propitiate them. That “the devil is an ass” is a

truth so palpable that it has passed into a proverb. Baal-zebub means

fly-god; and the Christian Satan betrays his presence by the cloven foot

of the goat or the solid hoof of the horse. In folk-lore, which is the

_débris_ of exploded mythologies adrift on the stream of popular

tradition, cats, dogs, otters, apes, ravens, blackcocks, capercailzies,

rabbits, hedgehogs, wolves, were-wolves, foxes, polecats, swine, serpents,

toads, and countless varieties of insects, reptiles and vermin figure as

incarnations and instruments of the devil; and Mephistopheles reveals

himself to Faust as

“Der Herr der Ratten und der Mäuse,

Der Fliegen, Frösche, Wanzen, Läuse.”

“The Lord of rats and of the mice,

Of flies and frogs, bed-bugs and lice.”

The worship of animals originates in the belief that they are embodiments

of devils, so that zoölatry, which holds such a prominent place in

primitive religions, is only a specific form of demonolatry. The objection

that a flea or a fly, a mite or a mosquito is too small a creature to

furnish fit lodgment for a demon, Father Bougeant dismisses with an

indulgent smile and disparaging shrug as implying a gross misconception of

the nature and properties of spirit, which is without extension or

dimension and therefore capable of animating the most diminutive particle

of organized matter. Large and little are purely relative terms. God, he

says, could have made man as small as the tiniest puceron without any

decrease of his spiritual powers. “It is, therefore, no more difficult to

believe that a devil may be incorporated in the delicate body of a gnat

than in the huge bulk of an elephant.” The size of the physical

habitation, in which spirits take up their temporary abode, is a thing of

no consequence. In fact, devils in the forms of gnats and tiny insects

were thought to be especially dangerous, since one might swallow them

unawares and thus become diabolically possessed. The demon, liberated by

the death and dissolution of the insect, was supposed to make a tenement

of the unfortunate person’s stomach, producing gripes and playing

ventriloquous tricks. Thus it is recorded in the _Dies Caniculuares_ of

Majolus (Meyer: _Der Aberglaube des Mittelalters_, p. 296-7) that a young

maiden in the Erzgebirge near Joachimsthal, in 1559, swallowed a fly,

while drinking beer. The evil spirit, incarnate in the fly, took

possession of the maiden and began to speak out of her, thus attracting

crowds of people, who put questions to the devil and tried to drive him

out by prayers, in which the unhappy girl sometimes joined, greatly to her

discomfort, since the devil waxed exceeding wroth and unruly and caused

her much suffering, whenever she uttered the name of Christ. Finally the

parish priest had her brought into the church, where he succeeded with

considerable difficulty in exorcising her. The stubborn demon resisted for

two years all efforts to cast him out; he even tried to compromise with

the girl, promising to be content with a finger nail or a single hair of

her head, but she declined all overtures, and he was at last expelled by

means of a potent conjuration, which lasted from midnight till midday.

As the human soul is released by death, so the extinction of life in any

animal sets its devil free, who, instead of entering upon a spiritual

state of existence, goes into the egg or embryo of another animal and

resumes his penal bondage to the flesh. “Thus a devil, after having been a

cat or a goat, may pass, not by choice, but by constraint, into the embryo

of a bird, a fish or a butterfly. Happy are those who make a lucky hit and

become household pets, instead of beasts of burden or of slaughter. The

lottery of destiny bars them the right of voluntary choosing.” The

doctrine of transmigration, continues our author, “which Pythagoras taught

of yore and some Indian sages hold to-day, is untenable in its application

to men and contrary to religion, but it fits admirably into the system

already set forth concerning the nature of beasts, and shocks neither our

faith nor our reason.” Furthermore, it explains why “all species of

animals produce many more eggs or embryos than are necessary to propagate

their kind and to provide for a normal increase.” Of the millions of

germs, of which “great creating nature” is so prolific, comparatively few

ever develop into living creatures; only those which are vivified by a

devil are evolved into complete organisms; the others perish. This seeming

superfluity and waste can be most easily reconciled with the careful

economy and wise frugality of nature by viewing it as a manifestation of

the bountiful and beneficent providence of God in preventing “any lack of

occupation or abode on the part of the devils,” which are being constantly

disembodied and re-embodied. “This accounts for the prodigious clouds of

locusts and countless hosts of caterpillars, which suddenly desolate our

fields and gardens. The cause of these astonishing multiplications has

been sought in cold, heat, rain and wind, but the real reason is that, at

the time of their appearance, extraordinary quantities of animals have

died or their embryos been destroyed, so that the devils that animated

them were compelled to avail themselves at once of whatever species they

found most ready to receive them, which would naturally be the

superabundant eggs of insects.” The more profoundly this subject is

investigated, he concludes, and the more light our observations and

researches throw upon it from all sides, the more probable does the

hypothesis here suggested in explanation of the puzzling phenomena of

animal life and intelligence appear.

Father Bougeant calls his lucubration “a new system of philosophy”; but

this is not strictly true. He has only given a fuller and more facetious

exposition of a doctrine taught by many of the greatest lights of the

Catholic Church, among others by Thomas Aquinas, whose authority as a

thinker Pope Leo XIII. distinctly recognized and earnestly sought to

restore to its former prestige. Bougeant’s ingenious dissertation has a

vein of irony or at least a strain of jocundity in it, approaching at

times so perilously near the fatal brink of persiflage, that one cannot

help surmising an intention to render the whole thing ridiculous in a

witty and underhand way eminently compatible with Jesuitical habits of

mind; but whether serious or satirical, his treatise is an excellent

example and illustration of the kind of dialectic hair-splitting and

syllogistic rubbish, which passed for reasoning in the early and middle

ages of the Christian era, and which the greatest scholars and acutest

intellects of those days fondly indulged in and seem to have been fully

satisfied with. Here, too, we come upon the metaphysical and theological

groundwork, upon which was reared by a strictly logical process a vast

superstructure of ecclesiastical excommunication and criminal prosecution

against bugs and beasts. He protests with never-tiring and needless

iteration his absolute devotion to the precepts of religion; indeed, like

the lady in the play, he “protests too much, methinks.” In all humbleness

and submission he bows to the authority of the Church, and would not touch

the ark of the covenant even with the tip of his finger, but his easy

acquiescence has an air of perfunctoriness, and in his assenting lips

there lurks a secret, semi-sarcastic leer, which casts suspicion on his

words and looks like poking fun at the principles he professes and turning

them into raillery.

Indeed, such covert derision would have been a suitable way of ridiculing

the gross popular superstition of his time, which saw a diabolical

incarnation in every unfamiliar form of animal life. During the latter

half of the sixteenth century a Swiss naturalist named Thurneysser, who

held the position of physician in ordinary to the Elector Johann Georg von

Brandenburg, kept some scorpions bottled in olive oil, which were feared

by the common people as terrible devils endowed with magic power

(_fürchterliche Zauberteufel_). Thurneysser presented also to Basel, his

native city, a large elk, which had been given to him by Prince Radziwil;

but the good Baselers looked upon the strange animal as a most dangerous

demon, and a pious old woman finally rid the town of the dreaded beast by

feeding it with an apple stuck full of broken needles.

A distinguished Spanish theologian of the sixteenth century, Martin

Azpilcueta, commonly known as Dr. Navarre, refers, in his work on

excommunication, to a case in which anathemas were fulminated against

certain large sea-creatures called terones, which infested the waters of

Sorrento and destroyed the nets of the fishermen. He speaks of them as

“fish or cacodemons” (_pisces seu cacodemones_), and maintains that they

are subject to anathematization, not as fish, but only as devils. In his

Five Counsels and other tractates on this subject (Opera, Lyons, 1589;

reprinted at Venice, 1601-2, and at Cologne, 1616) he often takes issue

with Chassenée on minor points, but the French jurist and the Spanish

divine agree on the main question.

In this connection it may be a matter of interest to add, that a German

neuropathologist of our own day, Herr von Bodelschwingh, ascribes epilepsy

to what he calls “demonic infection” due to the presence of the _bacillus

infernalis_ in the blood of those who are subject to this disease. The

microbe, to which the jocose scientist has been pleased to give this name,

differs from all other bacilli hitherto discovered in having two horns and

a tail, although the most powerful lenses have not yet revealed any traces

of a cloven foot. An additional indication of its infernal qualities is

the fact that it liquefies the gelatine, with which it comes in contact,

and turns it black, emitting at the same time a pestilential stench.

Doubtless this discovery will be hailed by theologians as a striking

confirmation of divine revelation by modern science, proving that our

forefathers were right in attributing the falling-sickness to diabolical

agencies. We know now that it was a legion of _bacilli infernales_ which

went out of the tomb-haunting man into the Gadarene swine and drove them

tumultuously over a precipice into the sea. In fact, who can tell what

microbes really are! Père Bougeant would certainly have regarded them as

nothing less than microscopic devils.

The Savoyan jurist, Gaspard Bailly, in the second part of the disquisition

entitled _Traité des Monitoires_, already mentioned, treats “Of the

Excellence of Monitories” and discusses the main points touching the

criminal prosecution and punishment of insects. He begins by saying that

“one should not contemn monitories (a general term for anathemas, bans and

excommunications), seeing that they are matters of great importance,

inasmuch as they bear with them the deadliest sword, wielded by our holy

mother, the Church, to wit, the power of excommunication, which cutteth

the dry wood and the green, sparing neither the quick nor the dead, and

smiting not only rational beings, but turning its edge also against

irrational creatures; since it hath been shown at sundry times and in

divers places, that worms and insects, which were devouring the fruits of

the earth, have been excommunicated and, in obedience to the commands of

the Church, have withdrawn from the cultivated fields to the places

prescribed by the bishop who had been appointed to adjudge and to adjure

them.”

M. Bailly then cites numerous instances of this kind, in which a writer on

logic would find ample illustrations of the fallacy known as _post hoc,

ergo propter hoc_. Thus in the latter half of the fifteenth century,

during the reign of Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, a plague of

locusts threatened the province of Mantua in Northern Italy with famine,

but were dispersed by excommunication. He quotes some florid lines from

the poet Altiat descriptive of these devastating swarms, which “came,

after so many other woes, under the leadership of Eurus (_i.e._ brought by

the east wind), more destructive than the hordes of Attila or the camps of

Corsicans, devouring the hay, the millet and the corn, and leaving only

vain wishes, where the hopes of August stood.” Again in 1541, a cloud of

locusts fell upon Lombardy, and by destroying the crops, caused many

persons to perish with hunger. These insects “were as long as a man’s

finger, with large heads and bellies filled with vileness; and when dead

they infected the air and gave forth a stench, which even carrion kites

and carnivorous beasts could not endure.” Another instance is given, in

which swarms of four-winged insects came from Tartary, identified in the

popular mind with Tartarus, obscuring the sun in their flight and covering

the plains of Poland a cubit deep. In the year 1338, on St. Bartholomew’s

Day, these creatures began to devastate the region round Botzen in the

Tyrol, consuming the crops and laying eggs and leaving a numerous progeny,

which seemed destined to continue the work of destruction indefinitely. A

prosecution was therefore instituted against them before the

ecclesiastical court at Kaltern, a large market-town about ten miles south

of Botzen, then as now famous for its wines, and the parish priest

instructed to proceed against them with the sentence of excommunication in

accordance with the verdict of the tribunal. This he did by the solemn

ceremony of “inch of candle,” and anathematized them “in the name of the

Blessed Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Ghost.” Owing to the sins of the

people and their remissness in the matter of tithes the devouring insects

resisted for a time the power of the Church, but finally disappeared.

Under the reign of Lotharius II., early in the twelfth century, enormous

quantities of locusts, “having six wings with two teeth harder than flint”

and “darkening the sky and whitening the air like a snowstorm,” laid waste

the most fertile provinces of France. Many of them perished in the rivers

and the sea, and being washed ashore sent forth a putrescent smell and

produced a fearful pestilence. Precisely the same phenomenon, with like

disastrous results, is described by St. Augustine in the last book of _De

Civitate Dei_ as having occurred in Africa and caused the death of 800,000

persons.

In the majority of cases adduced there is no evidence that the Church

intervened at all with its fulminations, and, even when the anathema was

pronounced, the insects appear to have departed of their own free-will

after having eaten up every green thing and reduced the inhabitants to

the verge of starvation; and yet M. Bailly, supposed to be a man of

judicial mind, disciplined by study, accustomed to reason and to know what

sound reasoning is, goes on giving accounts of such scourges, as though

they proved in some mysterious way the effectiveness of ecclesiastical

excommunications and formed a cumulative argument in support of such

claims.

The most important portion of M. Bailly’s work is that in which he shows

how actions of this kind should be brought and conducted, with specimens

of plaints, pleas, replications, rejoinders, and decisions. First in order

comes the petition of the inhabitants seeking redress (_requeste des

habitans_), which is followed in regular succession by the declaration or

plea of the inhabitants (_plaidoyer des habitans_), the defensive

allegation or plea for the insects (_plaidoyer pour les insectes_), the

replication of the inhabitants (_réplique des habitans_), the rejoinder of

the defendant (_réplique du defendeur_), the conclusions of the bishop’s

proctor (_conclusions du procureur episcopal_), and the sentence of the

ecclesiastical judge (_sentence du juge d’église_), which is solemnly

pronounced in Latin. The pleadings on both sides are delivered in French

and richly interlarded with classical allusions and Latin quotations,

being even more heavily weighted with the spoils of erudition than the set

speech of a member of the British Parliament.

The following abridgment of the plea, in which the prosecuting attorney

sets forth the cause of complaint, is a fair specimen of the forensic

eloquence displayed on such occasions:

“Gentlemen, these poor people on their knees and with tearful eyes, appeal

to your sense of justice, as the inhabitants of the islands Majorica and

Minorica formerly sent an embassy to Augustus Cæsar, praying him for a

cohort of soldiers to exterminate the rabbits, which were burrowing in

their fields and consuming their crops. In the power of excommunication

you have a weapon more effective than any wielded by that emperor to save

these poor suppliants from impending famine produced by the ravages of

little beasts, which spare neither the corn nor the vines, ravages like

those of the boar that laid waste the environs of Calydon, as related by

Homer in the first book of the _Iliad_, or those of the foxes sent by

Themis to Thebes, which destroyed the fruits of the earth and the cattle

and assailed even the husbandmen themselves. You know how great are the

evils which famine brings with it, and you have too much kindness and

compassion to permit my clients to be involved in such distress, thus

constraining them to perpetrate cruel and unlawful deeds; _nec enim

rationem patitur, nec ulla aequitate mitigatur, nec prece ulla flectitur

esuriens populus_: for a starving people is not amenable to reason, nor

tempered by equity, nor moved by any prayer. Witness the mothers, of whom

it is recorded in the Fourth Book of the Kings, that they ate their own

children, the one saying to the other: ‘Give thy son that we may eat him

to-day, and we will eat my son tomorrow.’” The advocate then discourses at

length of the horrors of hunger and its disastrous effects upon the

individual and the community, lugging in what Milton calls a “horse-load

of citations” from Arianus Marcellinus, Ovid and other Latin prosaists and

poets, introduces an utterly irrelevant allusion to Joshua and the crafty

Gibeonites, and concludes as follows: “The full reports received as the

result of an examination of the fields, made at your command, suffice for

your information concerning the damage done by these animals. It remains,

therefore, after complying with the usual forms, only to adjudicate upon

the case in accordance with the facts stated in the Petition of the

Plaintiffs, which is right and reasonable, and, to this effect, to enjoin

these animals from continuing their devastations, ordering them to quit

the aforesaid fields and to withdraw to the place assigned them,

pronouncing the necessary anathemas and execrations prescribed by our Holy

Mother, the Church, for which your petitioners do ever pray.”

It is doubtful whether any speaking for Buncombe in the halls of Congress

or any spouting of an ignorant bumpkin in the moot-court of an American

law-school ever produced such a rhetorical hotchpotch of “matter and

impertinency mixed” as the earnest plea, of which the above is a brief

abstract.

Rather more to the point, but equally overburdened with legal lore and

literary pedantry, is the rejoinder of the counsel for the insects:

“Gentlemen, inasmuch as you have chosen me to defend these little beasts

(_bestioles_), I shall, an it please you, endeavour to right them and to

show that the manner of proceeding against them is invalid and void. I

confess that I am greatly astonished at the treatment they have been

subjected to and at the charges brought against them, as though they had

committed some crime. Thus information has been procured touching the

damage said to have been done by them; they have been summoned to appear

before this court to answer for their conduct, and, since they are

notoriously dumb, the judge, wishing that they should not suffer wrong on

account of this defect, has appointed an advocate to speak in their behalf

and to set forth in conformity with right and justice the reasons, which

they themselves are unable to allege.

“Since you have permitted me to appear in defence of these poor animals, I

will state, in the first place, that the summons served on them is null

and void, having been issued against beasts, which cannot and ought not to

be cited before this judgment seat, inasmuch as such a procedure implies

that the parties summoned are endowed with reason and volition and are

therefore capable of committing crime. That this is not the case with

these creatures is clear from the paragraph _Si quadrupes_, etc., in the

first book of the Pandects, where we find these words: _Nec enim potest

animal injuriam fecisse, quod sensu caret_.

“The second ground, on which I base the defence of my clients, is that no

one can be judicially summoned without cause, and whoever has had such a

summons served renders himself liable to the penalty prescribed by the

statute _De poen. tem. litig._ As regards these animals there is no _causa

justa litigandi_; they are not bound in any manner, _non tenentur ex

contractu_, being incompetent to make contracts or to enter into any

compact or covenant whatsoever, _neque ex quasi contractu_, _neque ex

stipulatione_, _neque ex pacto_, and still less _ex delicto seu quasi_,

can there be any question of a delict or any semblance thereof, since, as

has just been shown, the rational faculties essential to the capability of

committing criminal actions are wanting.

“Furthermore, it is illicit to do that which is nugatory and of non-effect

(_qui ne porte coup_); in this respect justice is like nature, which, as

the philosopher affirms, does nothing _mal à propos_ or in vain: _Deus

enim et Natura nihil operantur frustra_. Now I leave it to you to decide

whether anything could be more futile than to summon these irrational

creatures, which can neither speak for themselves, nor appoint proxies to

defend their cause; still less are they able to present memorials stating

grounds of their justification. If then, as I have shown, the summons,

which is the basis of all judicial action, is null and void, the

proceedings dependent upon it will not be able to stand: _cum enim

principalis causa non consistat, neque ea quae consequuntur locum

habent_.”

The counsel for the defence rests his argument, of which the extract just

given may suffice as a sample, upon the irrationality and consequent

irresponsibility of his clients. For this reason he maintains that the

judge cannot appoint a procurator to represent them, and cites legal

authorities to show that the incompetency of the principal implies the

incompetency of the proxy, in conformity with the maxim: _quod directe

fieri prohibetur, per indirectum concedi non debet_. In like manner the

invalidity of the summons bars any charge of contempt of court and

condemnation for contumacy. Furthermore, the very nature of

excommunication is such that it cannot be pronounced against them, since

it is defined as _extra ecclesiam positio, vel è qualibet communione, vel

quolibet legitimo actu separatio_. But these animals cannot be expelled

from the Church, because they are not members of it and do not fall under

its jurisdiction, as the apostle Paul says: “Ye judge them that are

within and not them also that are without.” _Excommunicatio afficit

animam, non corpus, nisi per quandam consequentiam, cujus medicina est._

The animal soul, not being immortal, cannot be affected by such sentence,

which involves the loss of eternal salvation (_quae vergit in dispendium

aeternae salutis_).

A still more important consideration is that these insects are only

exercising an innate right conferred upon them at their creation, when God

expressly gave them “every green herb for meat,” a right which cannot be

curtailed or abrogated, simply because it may be offensive to man. In

support of this view he quotes passages from Cicero’s treatise _De

Officiis_, the Epistle of Jude and the works of Thomas Aquinas. Finally,

he maintains that his clients are agents of the Almighty sent to punish us

for our sins, and to hurl anathemas against them would be to fight against

God (_s’en prendre à Dieu_), who has said: “I will send wild beasts among

you, which shall destroy you and your cattle and make you few in number.”

That all flesh has corrupted its way upon the earth, he thinks is as true

now as before the deluge, and cites about a dozen lines from the

_Metamorphoses_ of Ovid in confirmation of this fact. In conclusion he

demands the acquittal of the defendants and their exemption from all

further prosecution.

The prosecuting attorney in his replication answers these objections in

regular order, showing, in the first place, that, while the law may not

punish an irrational creature for a crime already committed, it may

intervene, as in the case of an insane person, to prevent the commission

of a crime by putting the madman in a strait-jacket or throwing him into

prison. He elucidates this principle by a rather far-fetched illustration

from the legal enactments concerning betrothal and breach of promise of

marriage. “It follows then inferentially that the aforesaid animals can be

properly summoned to appear and that the summons is valid, inasmuch as

this is done in order to prevent them from causing damage henceforth

(_d’ores en avant_) and only incidentally to punish them for injuries

already inflicted.”

“To affirm that such animals cannot be anathematized and excommunicated is

to doubt the authority conferred by God upon his dear spouse, the Church,

whom he has made the sovereign of the whole world, having, in the words of

the Psalmist, put all things under her feet, all sheep and oxen, the

beasts of the field, the fowl of the air, the fish of the sea and

whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas. Guided by the Holy

Spirit she does nothing unwisely; and if there is anything in which she

should show forth her power it is in protecting and preserving the most

perfect work of her heavenly husband, to wit, man, who was made in the

divine image and likeness.” The orator then dilates on the grandeur and

glory of man and interlards his harangue with quotations from sacred and

profane writers, Moses, Paul, Pliny, Ovid, Silius Italicus and Pico di

Mirandola, and declares that nothing could be more absurd than to deprive

such a being of the fruits of the earth for the sake of “vile and paltry

vermin.” In reply to the statement of Thomas Aquinas, quoted by the

counsel for the defence, that it is futile to curse animals as such, the

plaintiffs’ advocate says that they are not viewed merely as animals, but

as creatures doing harm to man by eating and wasting the products of the

soil designed for human sustenance; in other words he ascribes to them a

certain diabolical character. “But why dwell upon this point, since

besides the instances recorded in Holy Writ, in which God curses inanimate

things and irrational creatures, we have an infinite number of examples of

holy men, who have excommunicated noxious animals. It will suffice to

mention one familiar to us all and constantly before our eyes in the town

of Aix, where St. Hugon, Bishop of Grenoble, excommunicated the serpents,

which infested the warm baths and killed many of the inhabitants by biting

them. Now it is well known, that if the serpents in that place or in the

immediate vicinity bite any one, the bite is no longer fatal. The venom of

the reptile was stayed and annulled by virtue of the excommunication, so

that no hurt ensues from the bite, although the bite of the same kind of

serpent outside of the region affected by the ban, is followed by death.”

That serpents and other poisonous reptiles could be deprived of their

venom by enchantment and thus rendered harmless is in accord with the

teachings of the Bible. Thus we read in Ecclesiastes (x. 11): “Surely the

serpent will bite without enchantment,” _i.e._ unless it be enchanted and

its bite disenvenomed. A curious superstition concerning the adder is

referred to in the Psalms (lviii. 4, 5), where the wicked are said to be

“like the deaf adder that stoppeth her ear; which will not hearken to the

voice of charmers, charming never so wisely.” The Lord is also represented

by Jeremiah (viii. 17) as threatening to “send serpents, cockatrices,

among you, which will not be charmed, and they shall bite you.” It does

not seem to have occurred to the prosecutor that the defendants might be

locusts, which would not be excommunicated.

The objection that God has sent these insects as a scourge, and that to

anathematize them would be to fight against him, is met by saying that to

have recourse to the offices of the Church is an act of religion, which

does not resist, but humbly recognizes the divine will and makes use of

the means appointed for averting the divine wrath and securing the divine

favour.

After the advocates had finished their pleadings, the case was summed up

by the episcopal procurator substantially as follows:

“The arguments offered by the counsel for the defence against the

proceedings instituted by the inhabitants as complainants are worthy of

careful consideration and deserve to be examined soberly and maturely,

because the bolt of excommunication should not be hurled recklessly and at

random (_à la volée_), being a weapon of such peculiar energy and activity

that, if it fails to strike the object against which it is hurled, it

returns to smite him, who hurled it.” [This notion that an anathema is a

dangerous missile to him who hurls it unlawfully or for an unjust purpose,

retroacting like an Australian boomerang, survives in the homely proverb:

“Curses, like chickens, come home to roost.”] The bishop’s proctor reviews

the speeches of the lawyers, but seems to have his brains somewhat muddled

by them. “It is truly a deep sea,” he says, “in which it is impossible to

touch bottom. We cannot tell why God has sent these animals to devour the

fruits of the earth; this is for us a sealed book (_lettres closes_).” He

suggests it may be “because the people turn a deaf ear to the poor begging

at their doors,” and goes off into a long eulogy on the beauty of charity,

with an anthology of extracts from various writers in praise of

alms-giving, among which is one from Eusebius descriptive of hell as a

cold region, where the wailing and gnashing of teeth are attributed to

the torments of eternal frost instead of everlasting fire (_liberaberis ab

illo frigore, in quo erit fletus et stridor dentium_). Again, the plague

of insects may be due to irreverence shown in the churches, which, he

declares, have been changed from the house of God into houses of

assignation. On this point he quotes from Tertullian, Augustine, and Numa

Pompilius, and concludes by recommending that sentence of excommunication

be pronounced upon the insects, and that the prayers and penances,

customary in such cases, be imposed upon the inhabitants.

After this discourse, which reads more like a homily from the pulpit than

a plea at the bar and in the mouth of the bishop’s proctor is simply an

_oratio pro domo_, the official gave judgment in favour of the plaintiffs.

The sentence, which was pronounced in Latin befitting the dignity and

solemnity of the occasion, condemned the defendants to vacate the premises

within six days on pain of anathema.

The official begins by stating the case as that of “The People _versus_

Locusts,” declaring that the guilt of the accused has been clearly proved

“by the testimony of worthy witnesses and, as it were, by public rumour,”

and inasmuch as the people have humbled themselves before God and

supplicated the Church to succour them in their distress, it is not

fitting to refuse them help and solace. “Walking in the footsteps of the

fathers, sitting on the judgment-seat, having the fear of God before our

eyes and confiding in his mercy, relying on the counsel of experts, we

pronounce and publish our sentence as follows:

“In the name and by virtue of God, the omnipotent, Father, Son and Holy

Spirit, and of Mary, the most blessed Mother of our Lord Jesus Christ, and

by the authority of the holy apostles Peter and Paul, as well as by that

which has made us a functionary in this case, we admonish by these

presents the aforesaid locusts and grasshoppers and other animals by

whatsoever name they may be called, under pain of malediction and anathema

to depart from the vineyards and fields of this district within six days

from the publication of this sentence and to do no further damage there or

elsewhere.” If, on the expiration of this period, the animals have refused

to obey this injunction, then they are to be anathematized and accursed,

and the inhabitants of all classes are to beseech “Almighty God, the

dispenser of all good gifts and the dispeller of all evils,” to deliver

them from so great a calamity, not forgetting to join with devout

supplications the performance of all good works and especially “the

payment of tithes without fraud according to the approved custom of the

parish, and to abstain from blasphemies and such other sins as are of a

public and particularly offensive character.” (_Vide_ Appendix B.)

It is doubtful whether one could find in the ponderous tomes of scholastic

divinity anything surpassing in comical _non sequiturs_ and sheer nonsense

the forensic eloquence of eminent lawyers as transmitted to us in the

records of legal proceedings of this kind. Although the counsel for the

defendants, as we have seen, ventured to question the propriety and

validity of such prosecutions, his scepticism does not seem to have been

taken seriously, but was evidently smiled at as the trick of a pettifogger

bound to use every artifice to clear his clients. In the writings of

mediæval jurisprudents the right and fitness of inflicting judicial

punishment upon animals appear to have been generally admitted. Thus Guy

Pape, in his _Decisions of the Parliament of Grenoble_ (Qu. 238), raises

the query, whether a brute beast, if it commit a crime, as pigs sometimes

do in devouring children, ought to suffer death, and answers the question

unhesitatingly in the affirmative: “_si animal brutum delinquat, sicut

quandoque faciunt porci qui comedunt pueros, an debeat mori? Dico quod

sic._” Jean Duret, in his elaborate Treatise on Pains and Penalties

(_Traicté des Peines et des Amendes_, p. 250; cf. _Thémis Jurisconsulte_,

VIII. p. 57), takes the same view, declaring that “if beasts not only

wound, but kill and eat any person, as experience has shown to happen

frequently in cases of little children being eaten by pigs, they should

pay the forfeit of their lives and be condemned to be hanged and

strangled, in order to efface the memory of the enormity of the deed.” The

distinguished Belgian jurist, Jodocus Damhouder, discusses this question

in his _Rerum Criminalium Praxis_ (cap. CXLII.), and holds that the beast

is punishable, if it commits the crime through natural malice, and not

through the instigation of others, but that the owner can redeem it by

paying for the damage done; nevertheless he is not permitted to keep

ferocious or malicious beasts and let them run at large, so as to be a

constant peril to the community. Occasionally a more enlightened jurist

had the common-sense and courage to protest against such perversions and

travesties of justice. Thus Pierre Ayrault, _lieutenant-criminel au siége

présidial d’Angers_, published at Angers, in 1591, a small quarto

entitled: _Des Procez faicts au Cadaver, aux Cendres, à la Mémoire, aux

Bestes brutes, aux Choses inanimées et aux Contumax_, in which he argued

that corpses, the ashes and the memory of the dead, brute beasts and

inanimate things are not legal persons (_legales homines_) and therefore

do not come within the jurisdiction of a court. Curiously enough a case

somewhat analogous to those discussed by Pierre Ayrault was adjudicated

upon only a few years ago. A Frenchman bequeathed his property to his own

corpse, in behalf of which his entire estate was to be administered, the

income to be expended for the preservation of his mortal remains and the

adornment of the magnificent mausoleum in which they were sepulchred. His

heirs-at-law contested the will, which was declared null and void by the

court on the ground that “a subject deprived of individuality or of civil

personality” could not inherit. The same principle would apply to the

infliction of penalties upon such subjects. The only kind of legacy that

will cause a man’s memory to be cherished is the form of bequest which

makes the public weal his legatee. The Chinese still hold to the barbarous

custom of bringing corpses to trial and passing sentence upon them. On the

6th of August, 1888, the cadaver of a salt-smuggler, who was wounded in

the capture and died in prison, was brought before the criminal court in

Shanghai and condemned to be beheaded. This sentence was carried out by

the proper officers on the place of execution outside of the west gate of

the city.

Felix Hemmerlein, better known as Malleolus, a distinguished doctor of

canon law and proto-martyr of religious reform in Switzerland, states in

his _Tractatus de Exorcismis_, that in the fourteenth century the peasants

of the Electorate of Mayence brought a complaint against some Spanish

flies, which were accordingly cited to appear at a specified time and

answer for their conduct; but “in consideration of their small size and

the fact that they had not yet reached their majority,” the judge

appointed for them a curator, who “defended them with great dignity”; and,

although he was unable to prevent the banishment of his wards, he obtained

for them the use of a piece of land, to which they were permitted

peaceably to retire. How they were induced to go into this insect

reservation and to remain there we are not informed. The Church, as

already stated, claimed to possess the power of effecting the desired

migration by means of her ban. If the insects disappeared, she received

full credit for accomplishing it; if not, the failure was due to the sins

of the people; in either case the prestige of the Church was preserved and

her authority left unimpaired.

In 1519, the commune of Stelvio, in Western Tyrol, instituted criminal

proceedings against the moles or field-mice,[3] which damaged the crops

“by burrowing and throwing up the earth, so that neither grass nor green

thing could grow.” But “in order that the said mice may be able to show

cause for their conduct by pleading their exigencies and distress,” a

procurator, Hans Grinebner by name, was charged with their defence, “to

the end that they may have nothing to complain of in these proceedings.”

Schwarz Mining was the prosecuting attorney, and a long list of witnesses

is given, who testified that the serious injury done by these creatures

rendered it quite impossible for tenants to pay their rents. The counsel

for the defendants urged in favour of his clients the many benefits which

they conferred upon the community, and especially upon the agricultural

class by destroying noxious insects and larvæ and by stirring up and

enriching the soil, and concluded by expressing the hope that, if they

should be sentenced to depart, some other suitable place of abode might be

assigned to them. He demanded, furthermore, that they should be provided

with a safe conduct securing them against harm or annoyance from dog, cat

or other foe. The judge recognized the reasonableness of the latter

request, in its application to the weaker and more defenceless of the

culprits, and mitigated the sentence of perpetual banishment by ordering

that “a free safe-conduct and an additional respite of fourteen days be

granted to all those which are with young and to such as are yet in their

infancy; but on the expiration of this reprieve each and every must be

gone, irrespective of age or previous condition of pregnancy.” (_Vide_

Appendix C.)

An old Swiss chronicler named Schilling gives a full account of the

prosecution and anathematization of a species of vermin called inger,

which seems to have been a coleopterous insect of the genus Brychus and

very destructive to the crops. The case occurred in 1478 and the trial was

conducted before the Bishop of Lausanne by the authority and under the

jurisdiction of Berne. The first document recorded is a long and earnest

declaration and admonition delivered from the pulpit by a Bernese

parish-priest, Bernhard Schmid, who begins by stating that his “dearly

beloved” are doubtless aware of the serious injury done by the inger and

of the suffering which they have caused. The Leutpriester, as he is

termed, gives a brief history of the matter and of the measures taken to

procure relief. The mayor and common council of Berne were besought in

their wisdom to devise some means of staying the plague, and after much

earnest deliberation they held counsel with the Bishop of Lausanne, who

“with fatherly feeling took to heart so great affliction and harm” and by

an episcopal mandate enjoined the inger from committing further

depredations. After exhorting the people to entreat God by “a common

prayer from house to house” to remove the scourge, he proceeds to warn and

threaten the vermin in the following manner: “Thou irrational and

imperfect creature, the inger, called imperfect because there was none of

thy species in Noah’s ark at the time of the great bane and ruin of the

deluge, thou art now come in numerous bands and hast done immense damage

in the ground and above the ground to the perceptible diminution of food

for men and animals; and to the end that such things may cease, my

gracious Lord and Bishop of Lausanne has commanded me in his name to

admonish you to withdraw and to abstain; therefore by his command and in

his name and also by virtue of the high and holy trinity and through the

merits of the Redeemer of mankind, our Saviour Jesus Christ, and in virtue

of and obedience to the Holy Church, I do command and admonish you, each

and all, to depart within the next six days from all places where you have

secretly or openly done or might still do damage, also to depart from all

fields, meadows, gardens, pastures, trees, herbs, and spots, where things

nutritious to men and to beasts spring up and grow, and to betake

yourselves to the spots and places, where you and your bands shall not be

able to do any harm secretly or openly to the fruits and aliments

nourishing to men and beasts. In case, however, you do not heed this

admonition or obey this command, and think you have some reason for not

complying with them, I admonish, notify and summon you in virtue of and

obedience to the Holy Church to appear on the sixth day after this

execution at precisely one o’clock after midday at Wifflisburg, there to

justify yourselves or to answer for your conduct through your advocate

before His Grace the Bishop of Lausanne or his vicar and deputy. Thereupon

my Lord of Lausanne or his deputy will proceed against you according to

the rules of justice with curses and other exorcisms, as is proper in such

cases in accordance with legal form and established practice.” The priest

then exhorts his “dear children” devoutly to beg and to pray on their

knees with Paternosters and Ave Marias to the praise and honour of the

high and holy trinity, and to invoke and crave the divine mercy and help

in order that the inger may be driven away. (_Vide_ Appendix D.)

There is no further record of proceedings at this time, and it is highly

probable that the detection of some technical error rendered it necessary

to postpone the case, since this pettifogger’s trick was almost always

resorted to and proved generally successful in procuring an adjournment.

At any rate either this or a precisely similar trial occurred in the

following year. Early in May 1479, the mayor and common council of Berne

sent copies of the monitorium and citation issued by the Bishop of

Lausanne to their representative for distribution among the priests of the

afflicted parishes, in order that it might be promulgated from their

respective pulpits and thus brought to the knowledge of the delinquents.

About a week later, on May 15, the same authorities sent also a letter to

the Bishop of Lausanne asking for new instructions in the matter, as they

were not certain how they should proceed, urging that immediate steps

should be taken, as the further delay would be “utterly intolerable.” This

impatience would seem to imply that the anathema had been hanging fire for

some time and that the prosecution was identical with that of the

preceding year.

The appointed term having elapsed and the inger still persisting in their

obduracy, the mayor and common council of Berne issued the following

document conferring plenipotentiary power of attorney on Thüring Fricker

to prosecute the case: “We, the mayor, council and commune of the city of

Berne, to all those of the bishopric of Lausanne, who see, read, or hear

this letter. We make known that after mature deliberation we have

appointed, chosen and deputed and by virtue of the present letter do

appoint, choose and depute the excellent Thüring Fricker, doctor of the

liberal arts and of laws, our now chancellor, to be our legal delegate and

agent and that of our commune, as well as of all the lands and places of

the bishopric of Lausanne, which are directly or indirectly subject and

appurtenant to us and of which a complete list is herein contained. And

indeed he has assumed this general and special attorneyship, whereof the

one shall not be prejudicial to the other, in the case which we have

undertaken and prosecute and have determined to prosecute before the court

of the right reverend in Christ Benedict de Montferrand, Bishop of

Lausanne, Count and our most worthy Superior, against the noxious host of

the inger (_brucorum_), which creeping secretly in the earth devastate the

fields, meadows and all kinds of grain, whereby with grievous wrong they

do detriment to the ever-living God, to whom the tithes belong, and to

men, who are nourished therewith and owe obedience to him. In this cause

he shall act in our stead, and in the name of all of us collectively and

severally shall plead, demur, reply, prove by witnesses, hear judgment or

judgments, appoint other defenders and in general and specially do each

and every thing which the importance of the cause may demand and which we

ourselves in case of our presence would be able to do. We solemnly promise

in good faith that all and the whole of what may be transacted, performed,

provided, pledged, and ordained in this cause by our aforesaid attorney or

by the proxy appointed by him shall be firmly and gratefully observed by

us, with the express renunciation of each and every thing that might

either by right or actually, in any wise, either wholly or partially

impair, weaken or assail our ordainment, conclusion and determination,

also over against any reservation of right, which permits a general

renunciation, even if no special reservation has preceded, with the

exclusion of every fraud and every deceit. In corroboration and

confirmation of the aforesaid we ratify this letter with the warranty of

our seal. Given on the twenty-second of May 1479.”

The trial began a couple of days later and was conducted with less “of the

law’s delay” than usual, inasmuch as it ended on the twenty-ninth day of

the same month. The defender of the insects was a certain Jean Perrodet of

Freiburg, who according to all accounts was a very inefficient advocate

and does not appear to have contested the case with the ability and energy

which the interests of his clients required. The sentence of the court

with the appended anathema of the bishop was as follows: “Ye accursed

uncleanness of the inger, which shall not be called animals nor mentioned

as such, ye have been heretofore by virtue of the appeal and admonition of

our Lord of Lausanne enjoined to withdraw from all fields, grounds and

estates of the bishopric of Lausanne, or within the next six days to

appear at Lausanne, through your proctor, to set forth and to hear the

cause of your procedure, and to act with just judgment either for or

against you, pursuant to the said citation. Thereupon our gracious Lords

of Berne solicited by their mandate such a day in court at Lausanne, and

there before the tribunal renewed their plaint in their name and in that

of all the provinces of the said bishopric, and your reply thereto through

your proctor has been fully heard, and the legal terms have been justly

observed by both parties, and a lawful decision pronounced word for word

in this wise:

“We, Benedict of Montferrand, Bishop of Lausanne, etc., having heard the

entreaty of the high and mighty lords of Berne against the inger and the

ineffectual and rejectable answer of the latter, and having thereupon

fortified ourselves with the Holy Cross, and having before our eyes the

fear of God, from whom alone all just judgments proceed, and being advised

in this cause by a council of men learned in the law, do therefore

acknowledge and avow in this our writing that the appeal against the

detestable vermin and inger, which are harmful to herbs, vines, meadows,

grain and other fruits, is valid, and that they be exorcised in the person

of Jean Perrodet, their defender. In conformity therewith we charge and

burden them with our curse, and command them to be obedient and

anathematize them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost,

that they turn away from all fields, grounds, enclosures, seeds, fruits

and produce, and depart. By virtue of the same sentence I declare and

affirm that you are banned and exorcised, and through the power of

Almighty God shall be called accursed and shall daily decrease

whithersoever you may go, to the end that of you nothing shall remain save

for the use and profit of man. _Adiungendo aliquid in devotionem populi._”

The phrase _das si beswärt werden in die person Johannis Perrodeti irs

beschirmers_ does not imply that the vermin or the devils, of which they

were supposed to be incarnations, were to be conjured into him, but refer

to him merely as their proctor and legal representative. The results of

the prosecution, which had been awaited with intense and anxious interest

by the people, were received with great joy, and the Bernese government

ordered a full report of the proceedings to be made. The ecclesiastical

anathema, however, proved to be _brutum fulmen_; nothing more came of it,

says Schilling, “owing to our sins.” Another chronicler adds that God

permitted the inger to remain as a plague and a punishment until the

people repented of their wickedness and gave evidence of their love and

gratitude to Him, namely, by giving to the Church tithes of what the

insects had not destroyed.

The Swiss priest in his malediction declares that the inger were not in

Noah’s ark and even denies that they are animals properly speaking,

stigmatizing them as living corruption, products of spontaneous generation

perhaps, or more probably creations of the devil. This position was

assumed in order to escape the gross impropriety and glaring incongruity

of having the Church of God curse the creatures which God had made and

pronounced very good, and afterwards took pains to preserve from

destruction by the deluge. This difficulty, always a serious one, was, as

we have seen, one of the chief points urged by the counsel for the defence

in favour of his clients.

Malleolus gives the following formula for banning serpents and expelling

them from human habitations, inculcating incidentally the iniquity of

perjury and judicial injustice: “By virtue of this ban and conjuration I

command you to depart from this house and cause it to be as hateful and

intolerable to you, as the man, who knowingly bears false witness or

pronounces an unjust sentence, is to God.” Sometimes the exorcism was in

the form of a prayer, as, for example, in that used for the purgation and

disinfection of springs and water-courses: “O Lord Jesus, thou who didst

bless the river Jordan and wast baptized in it and hast purified and

cleansed it to the end that it might be a healing element for the

redemption from sin, bless, sanctify and purify this water, so that there

may be left in it nothing noxious, nothing pestiferous or contagious,

nothing pernicious, but that everything in it may be pure and immaculate,

in order that we may use whatever is created in it for our welfare and to

thy glory, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.”

In a Latin protocol of legal proceedings in Crollolanza’s _Storia del

Contado di Chiavenna_ it is recorded that on June 26, 1659, Capt. J. B.

Pestalozzi came, in behalf of the communes of Chiavenna, Mese, Gordona,

Prada and Samolico, before the commissioner Hartmann Planta and brought

complaint against certain caterpillars on account of the devastations

committed by them, demanding that these hurtful creatures should be

summoned by the proper sheriff to appear in court on June 28 at a

specified hour in order to have a curator and defender appointed, who

should answer for them to the plaintiffs. A second document, dated June

28, 1659, and signed by the notary Battista Visconti, certifies that the

said summons had been duly issued and five copies of the same been posted

each on a tree in the five forests in the territory of the aforesaid five

communes. A third document of the same date required the advocate of the

accused, Cesare de Peverello, to appear before the court on the following

Tuesday, July 1, in behalf of his recusant clients, who were charged with

trespassing upon the fields, gardens and orchards and doing great damage

therein, instead of remaining in their habitat, the forest. The

prosecutors required that they should seek their food in wild and wooded

places and cease from ravaging cultivated grounds. A fourth document

contains an account of the trial; the pleadings of the respective parties,

so far as they are preserved, do not differ essentially from those already

quoted. In the fifth and final document the court recognizes the right of

the caterpillars to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, provided

the exercise of this right “does not destroy or impair the happiness of

man, to whom all lower animals are subject.” Accordingly a definite place

of abode is to be assigned to them and various places are proposed. The

protocol is incomplete, so that we are left in ignorance of the ultimate

decision. The whole is written in execrable Latin quite worthy of the

subject.

More than half-a-century later the Franciscan friars of the cloister of

St. Anthony in the province of Piedade no Maranhão, Brazil, were greatly

annoyed by termites, which devoured their food, destroyed their furniture,

and even threatened to undermine the walls of the monastery. Application

was made to the bishop for an act of interdiction and excommunication, and

the accused were summoned to appear before an ecclesiastical tribunal to

give account of their conduct. The lawyer appointed to defend them urged

the usual plea about their being God’s creatures and therefore entitled to

sustenance, and made a good point in the form of an _argumentum ad

monachum_ by praising the industry of his clients, the white ants, and

declaring them to be in this respect far superior to their prosecutors,

the Gray Friars. He also maintained that the termites were not guilty of

criminal aggression, but were justified in appropriating the fruits of the

fields by the right derived from priority of possession, inasmuch as they

had occupied the land long before the monks came and encroached upon their

domain. The trial lasted for some time and called forth remarkable

displays of legal learning and forensic eloquence, with numerous citations

of sacred and profane authorities on both sides, and ended in a

compromise, by the terms of which the plaintiffs were obliged to provide a

suitable reservation for the defendants, who were commanded to go thither

and to remain henceforth within the prescribed limits. In the chronicles

of the cloister it is recorded, under date of Jan. 1713, that no sooner

was the order of the prelatic judge promulgated by being read officially

before the hills of the termites than they all came out and marched in

columns to the place assigned. The monkish annalist regards this prompt

obedience as conclusive proof that the Almighty endorsed the decision of

the court. [Cited by Emile Angel on the authority of Manoel Bernardes’

_Nova Floresta, ou Sylva de varios apophthegmas e ditos sentencios

espirituaes e moraes_, etc. Vol. V., Lisboá, 1747.]

About the middle of the sixteenth century the inhabitants of several

villages in Aargau were greatly annoyed by swarms of gadflies and

petitioned the Bishop of Constance for relief. In the episcopal rescript,

written and signed by the vidame Georg Winterstetter, the people are

enjoined to abstain from dancing on Sundays and feast days, from all forms

of libidinousness, gambling with cards or dice and other frivolities.

These injunctions are followed by prayer and the usual formulas of

conjuration and exorcism. The original document was written in Latin and

preserved in the archives of Baden in Switzerland, but is now lost. In

1566 the Landamman of Unterwalden, Johannes Wirz, took a German

translation of it home with him to be used in case of need against the

“vergifteten Würmer,” and deposited it in the archives of Obwalden, where

it still remains. It was published in 1898 by Dr. Merz.

In Protestant communities, the priest as exorcist has been superseded, to

a considerable extent, by the professional conjurer, who in some portions

of Europe is still employed to save crops from devouring insects and

similar plagues. A curious instance of this kind is recorded in Görres’

_Historisch-Politische Blätter_ for 1845 (Heft VII. p. 516). A Protestant

gentleman in Westphalia, whose garden was devastated by worms, after

having tried divers vermicidal remedies in vain, resolved to have recourse

to a conjurer. The wizard came and walked about among the vegetables,

touching them with a wand and muttering enchantments. Some workmen, who

were repairing the roof of a stable near by, made fun of this hocus-pocus

and began to throw bits of lime at the conjurer. He requested them to

desist, and finally said: “If you don’t leave me in peace, I shall send

all the worms up on the roof.” This threat only excited the hilarity of

the scoffers, who continued to ridicule and disturb him in his

incantations. Thereupon he went to the nearest hedge, cut a number of

twigs, each about a finger in length, and placed them against the wall of

the stable. Soon the vermin began to abandon the plants and, crawling in

countless numbers over the twigs and up the wall, took complete possession

of the roof. In less than an hour the men were obliged to stop working and

stood in the court below covered with confusion and cabbage-worms.

The writer, who relates this strange incident, fully believes that it

actually occurred, and ascribes it to “the force of human faith and the

magnetic power of a firm will over nature.” This, too, is the theory held

by Paracelsus, who maintained that the effectiveness of a curse lay in the

energy of the will, by which the wish, so to speak, concretes into a deed,

just as anger directs the arm and actualizes itself in a blow. By “fervent

desire” merely, without any physical effort or aggressive act, he deemed

it possible to wound a man’s body or to pierce it through as with a sword.

He also held that brutes are more easily exorcised or accursed than men,

“for the spirit of man resists more than that of the brute.” Similar

notions were entertained nearly a century later by Jacob Boehme, who

defines magic as “doing in the spirit of the will,” an idea which finds

more recent and more scientific expression in Schopenhauer’s doctrine of

“the objectivation of the will.” Indeed, Schopenhauer’s postulate of the

will as the sole energy and actuality in the universe is only the

philosophic statement of an assumption, upon which magicians and

medicine-men, enchanters, exorcists and anathematizers have acted more or

less in all ages. We have a striking illustration of the workings of some

such mysterious, quasi-hyperphysical force in hypnotism, the reality of

which it is no longer possible to deny, however wonderful and

incomprehensible its manifestations may appear.

It is natural that a religion of individual initiative and personal

responsibility, like Protestantism, should put less confidence in theurgic

machinery and formularies of ex-cathedral execration than a religion like

Catholicism, in which man’s spiritual concerns are entrusted to a

hierarchical corporation to be managed according to traditional and

infallible methods. This tendency crops out in a decree published at

Dresden, in 1559, by “Augustus Duke and Elector,” wherein he commends the

“Christian zeal of the worthy and pious parson, Daniel Greysser,” for

having “put under ban the sparrows, on account of their unceasing and

extremely vexatious chatterings and scandalous unchastity during the

sermon, to the hindrance of God’s word and of Christian devotion.” But the

Saxon parson, unlike the Bishop of Trier, did not expect that his ban

would cause the offending birds to avoid the church or to fall dead on

entering it. He relied less on the directly coercive or withering action

of the curse than on the human agencies, which he might thereby set at

work for the accomplishment of his purpose. By his proscription he put the

culprits out of the pale of public sympathy and protection and gave them

over as a prey to the spoiler, who was persuaded that he was doing a pious

work by exterminating them. It was solemnly enjoined upon the hunter and

the fowler to lie in wait for the anathematized sparrows with guns and

with snares (_durch mancherlei visirliche und listige Wege_); and the

Elector issued his decree in order to enforce this duty on all good

Christians. (See Appendix E.)

A faded and somewhat droll survival of ecclesiastical excommunication and

exorcism is the custom, still prevailing in European countries and some

portions of the United States, of serving a writ of ejectment on rats or

simply sending them a friendly letter of advice in order to induce them to

quit any house, in which their presence is deemed undesirable. Lest the

rats should overlook and thus fail to read the epistle, it is rubbed with

grease, so as to attract their attention, rolled up and thrust into their

holes. Mr. William Wells Newell, in a paper on “Conjuring Rats,” printed

in _The Journal of American Folk-Lore_ (Jan.-March, 1892), gives a

specimen of such a letter, dated, “Maine, Oct. 31, 1888,” and addressed in

business style to “Messrs. Rats and Co.” The writer begins by expressing

his deep interest in the welfare of said rats as well as his fears lest

they should find their winter quarters in No. 1, Seaview Street,

uncomfortable and poorly supplied with suitable food, since it is only a

summer residence and is also about to undergo repairs. He then suggests

that they migrate to No. 6, Incubator Street, where they “can live snug

and happy” in a splendid cellar well stored with vegetables of all kinds

and can pass easily through a shed leading to a barn containing much

grain. He concludes by stating that he will do them no harm if they heed

his advice, otherwise he shall be forced to use “Rough on Rats.” This

threat of resorting to rat poison in case of the refusal to accept his

kind counsel is all that remains of the once formidable anathema of the

Church.

In Scotland, when these domestic rodents became too troublesome, people of

the lower classes are wont to post the following notice on the walls of

their houses:

“Ratton and mouse,

Lea’ the puir woman’s house,

Gang awa’ owre by to ’e mill,

And there ane and a’ ye’ll get your fill.”

In order to make the conjuration effective some particular abode must be

assigned to them; it is not sufficient to bid them begone, but they are to

be told to go to a definite place. The fact that they are usually sent

across a river or brook may indicate a lingering tradition of their

demoniacal character, since, according to a widespread popular

superstition, a water-course is a barrier to hobgoblins and evil spirits:

“A running stream they dare na cross.”

In this case the rats, as imps of Satan, having reached their destination,

would find it impossible to return.

It was in Ireland, the native realm of bulls and like incongruities, that

conjuring or “rhyming” rats seems to have been most common, if we may

judge from the manner in which it is alluded to by the Elizabethan poets.

Thus in _As you Like It_ Rosalind says in reference to Orlando’s verses:

“I was never so be-rhymed since Pythagoras’ time, that I was an Irish rat,

which I can hardly remember.” Randolph declares:

“My poets

Shall with a satire, steep’d in gall and vinegar,

Rhime ’em to death, as they do rats in Ireland.”

Ben Jonson is still more specific:

“Rhime ’em to death, as they do Irish rats,

In drumming tunes.”

From this reference to the mode of conjuring it appears that the repeating

of the rhymes was accompanied with the beating of a drum, as is still the

usage in France. From the very earliest times a peculiar magical potency

has been ascribed to words woven into rhythmic form. The fascination which

metrical expression, even as a mere jingle and jargon, still retains for

the youth of the individual was yet far more strongly felt in the youth of

the race. The simple song was intoned as a spell and the rude chant

mumbled as a charm.

In France the conjuration of field-mice bears a more distinctly religious

stamp. On the first Sunday in Lent, the so-called Feast of the Torches

(_la Fête des Brandons ou des Bures_), the peasants wander in all

directions through the fields and orchards with lighted torches of twisted

straw, uttering the following incantation, which not only threatens to

burn the whiskers of obdurate mice, but also hints at the wine-bibbing

propensities of the curate:

“Sortez, sortez d’ici, mulots!

Ou je vais vous bruler les crocs!

Quittez, quittez ces blés!

Allez, vous trouverez

Dans la cave du curé

Plus à boire qu’à manger.”

The form of imprecation varies in different provinces, but usually

includes some threat of breaking the bones or burning the beards of the

refractory rodents, in case they refuse to quit the close, as in the

following summons:

“Taupes et mulots,

Sors de mon clos,

Ou je te casse les os;

Barbassione! Si tu viens dans non clos,

Je te brûle la barbe jusqu’aux os.”

The utterance of these words is emphasized by loud and discordant noises

of cat-calls, tin horns, and similar instruments of “Callithumpian” music.

Gregory, who was Bishop of Tours in the latter half of the sixth century,

states in his _History of the Franks_ (VIII. 35) that bronze talismans

representing dormice and serpents were used in Paris to protect the city

against the ravages of these creatures; and when the town of Le Mans was

rebuilt after its destruction by fire in 1145, a toad with a gold chain

round its neck, was enclosed in a block of stone as a preservative against

venomous reptiles. (Le Corvasier: _Hist, des Évêques du Mans_, 1648, p.

441. Cf. Desnoyers: _Recherches_, etc., p. 7.)

The use of the above-mentioned means of conjuration is unquestionably of

very ancient date. Thus in a treatise on agriculture entitled τὰ γεωπονικά

and consisting of twenty books, written in the tenth century by the

Bithynian Byzantine, Kassianos Bassos, the following prescription is given

for getting rid of field-mice:

“Take a slip of paper and write on it these words: I adjure you, O mice,

who dwell here not to injure me yourselves nor to permit any other mouse

to do so; and I make over to you this field (describing it). But should I

find you staying here after having been warned, with the help of the

mother of the gods I will cut you in seven pieces.” The author quotes this

recipe, in order, as he says, that nothing may remain unrecorded, but

expressly declares that he has no confidence in its efficiency and advises

the husbandman to put his trust in good rat-bane. Bassos derived the

materials for his popular encyclopædia chiefly from the “Geoponics”

composed by Anatolios and Didymos some six centuries earlier, and even

most of his citations of classical writers are taken from the same

sources. That the above-mentioned exorcism is pagan in its origin is

evident from the invocation of the aid of Cybele for the destruction of

disobedient vermin. In a Christian conjuration the Mother of God would

have been substituted for the mother of the gods, whom the Greeks revered

as the personification of all-creating and all-sustaining nature. The

resemblance of this formula, which the Greeks may have borrowed with the

worship of Cybele from the Phrygians, to the Yankee’s letter of advice is

peculiarly interesting.

In the ancient conjuration the harmful or undesirable animals were

commanded to go to a certain locality, set apart for them, and this

injunction was accompanied with dire threats in case of disobedience; the

milder epistolary form of the present day is more advisory and persuasive

and offers them inducements to migrate and to take up their abode

elsewhere. Sometimes this kind counsel is given verbally, as, for example,

in Thuringia, where it is customary to get rid of cabbage-worms by going

into the garden, requesting them to depart, and calling out: “In yonder

village is church-ale (_Kirmes_)”; thus implying that they will find

better entertainment at this festival. (Witzschel: _Sagen, Sitten und

Gebräuche aus Thüringen_. Wien, 1878, p. 217.) The willingness of peasant

communities to ward off evil from themselves at the expense of their

neighbours is a survival of the primitive ethics, which recognizes only

the rights of the family or tribe and treats all aliens as foes. It is the

same feeling that causes the inhabitants of the Alps to erect so-called

weather-crosses (_Wetterkreuze_) for the purpose of averting

thunder-storms and hailstones from themselves by diverting them into an

adjacent valley. This method of protection is based upon the theory that

tempests, hurricanes, and all violent commotions of nature are the work of

demons or witches, who avoid the symbol of Christ’s death and the world’s

redemption and direct their fury elsewhere. A like egotism is expressed in

the inscription on many houses of peasants entreating St. Florian to

preserve their habitation from flames and to set fire to others, as though

the holy man must indulge his incendiary passion by pouring out upon some

human abode the blazing vessel, which he is represented as bearing in his

hand. The inscription is the same as that with which Reynard the Fox

adorned his castle Malepartus, and which might be translated:

“Saint Florian, thou martyr blessed,

Protect this house and burn the rest.”