The next circumstance to be observed is, that the fact here related, happened when _there was a feast of the jews_, that is, the pentecost. And we learn from Eusebius, that this method of curing prevailed but once in a year.[102] But it is well known that this feast was celebrated in the month of May or beginning of June: which is a very proper season for the virtues of medicinal waters. Upon which account the patients flock’d thither the more eagerly, that they might catch a medicine, which they could make use of but once a year. [102] _Loco citato._ Lastly, with relation to the angel, who is said _to have_ troubled the water at a certain season; those who contend for a miracle, attribute the sanative quality of the pool to him. But we have already taken notice, that whenever any thing uncommon or surprizing happened, of which the jews could not investigate the cause, they were accustomed to say, it was done _by the angel of the Lord_. Yet it is possible, that God might have added this miraculous circumstance to natural effects, that this pool should be sanative, at one certain time of the year only, and that too, when the whole nation were assembled to celebrate their solemn festival; and to him only, who first went into it. The reason of which proceeding (if it be allowed to form a conjecture on the divine counsels) might perhaps have been, that God was pleased to testify by so manifest a sign, that he would not, as he had promised, entirely abandon his chosen people; before the coming of the Messias. Wherefore upon the whole, this salutary virtue of the water, which might be medicinal by nature, seems to be so regulated by God, as at the same time to afford the jews a token of his presence. But the power of Christ, administered to this infirm man, a more noble remedy than that water, his _evil-chasing_[103] word. And this power was the more seasonable in this case, because the disease was of so many years standing, that it could not be removed by a natural remedy: whence his divine virtue shone forth the more brightly. [103] Αλεξικακον. CHAPTER IX. _Of Demoniacs._ That the Dæmoniacs, δαιμονιζομένοι, mentioned in the gospels, laboured under a disease really natural, tho’ of an obstinate and difficult kind, appears to me very probable from the accounts given of them. They were indeed affected various ways. For sometimes, they rent their garments, and ran about naked; striking terror into all those whom they met, and even wounding their own bodies; so very furious, that tho’ bound with chains and fetters, they broke their bonds, and rambled in the most lonely places, and among the sepulchres of the dead. Sometimes also they cried out, that they were possessed by many devils, which they imagined could pass out of themselves into other bodies.[104] At other times, either they were worried, and made a hideous noise;[105] or were thrown on the ground, without being hurt, and the devil went out of them.[106]