9 Sermon Illustrations on Demonology

St. Thomas Aquinas used to hold that angels and devils made the atmosphere their battle-ground--the angels that live in the calm upper spheres, the devils that fill the immensity of space; and thus he accounted for the injurious changes of weather to be experienced in certain countries. For the mortification and the rout of these demons bells were consecrated and hung in the church-spires, usually inscribed, “_Vivos voco, mortuos plango, fulgura frango_” (I summon the living, I mourn the dead, I scatter the thunder-storm); and their ringing was thenceforth considered to be one of the potent means of dispelling evil influences and of abating tempests. These evil powers, according to medieval legend and belief, were able to produce hail, thunder, and storms at their will, and those among them called witches took aerial voyages exactly as the witches of much later days were held to do, altho more particular detail is given of their operations, as it is known that they smeared their broomsticks with witch-salve, after which mounting them, they could sail where they would through so much of this atmosphere as was within their jurisdiction. “The air,” says Rydberg, speaking of those days of the Dark Ages, “was saturated with demoniacal vapors,” and specters, ghosts, and vampires multitudinous added their horrors to the fertile imaginations of the people.--_Harper’s Bazar_.

Mr. Sconten, writing from Kambui, East Central Africa, was an eye-witness of the following treatment for malarial fever of a lad and a girl, by a native medicine doctor:

A hole in the ground was lined with banana-leaves and some water brought. Part of the water was poured on the ground beside the patients, and the rest was poured into the hole. The intestines of a sheep were emptied of their filth and the foreheads and palms of the sufferers and their relations smeared with it. The lad and girl were tied together by the feet with a vine, while the man mixed some colored powders in the water. The stomach of the sheep was then brought, and through a hole in the side the patients were made to suck in the fluid contents, and cast the rest into the colored water. Then, taking a bunch of herbs, the doctor lifted a good portion of the concoction and placed it in the mouth of each patient with a singsong monotone, saying: “By this I take away all the evil effects of whatever is troubling you, the attacks of evil spirits, whatever poison you may have eaten, whatever harm has been inflicted upon you by blacksmiths, whatever evil has come to you in the path, whatever disease has been brought upon you through your friends, whatever has been inflicted upon you by your enemies, and all disease with which God has afflicted you.” This was not all that he said, and he repeated it three times, all the while dipping from the nauseating mixture and putting it into the patients’ mouths. A foot of the sheep was then dipt into the remaining fluid and the ground sprinkled all around them, and their bodies sprinkled. Lastly, noses, thumbs and great toes were painted with white paint and they were untied, and told to go and get well. Both patients were in a dying condition the next day, while the medicine-man was feasting upon the good flesh of the slaughtered sheep.

See BIRTH CEREMONIES; DEMONOLOGY.

EXPECTORATING

The father of President Hadley, of Yale, is reported to have said to certain members of one of his Greek classes who were guilty of a filthy habit:

Gentlemen, those of you who expect to rate high in my esteem must not expectorate on the floor. This matter of expectoration is a very serious problem. If you do it in China, you should not do so toward the north. In certain sections of Africa, you may, if you like, expectorate upon a person, because in that particular language, the Benga, the word for bless and spit are precisely the same. It is the way in which you bless a person. But one must know the customs; for there are few places where men deem themselves blest when spit upon, no matter how sincere may be the missionary’s desire to bless everybody.--H. P. BEACH, “Student Volunteer Movement,” 1906.

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The rude and unread of past ages have always connected natural phenomena with supernatural agencies, adoring the sun and the moon with altar fires on high places and in groves, of which the witches’ Sabbath was a fancied descendant; and even in the twelfth century there were remnants of these forms in the fire-worship supposed to be led by old women, one of whom was called the night-queen, and who, as old women will, cherished traditions and forms to such an extent that the bishops were finally ordered to have them watched. It was but a little more than three hundred years ago when it was generally believed that the appearance of a huge comet was the work of Satan, and its disappearance was the work of the Church. Perhaps we have not left all these follies quite behind us yet. People who nowadays make a wish at the first sight of the evening star, expecting to receive the thing wished for, who are particular about seeing the new moon, not through glass, and with silver in their pockets, and who hold that the position of the slender horn signifies either a dry month or a wet one, as it may be--such people have hardly any right to call in question the demonology believed in by the people of the Middle Ages and the old dames of later days.--_Harper’s Bazar._