The Criminal Prosecution and Capital Punishment of AnimalsEvans, E. P. (Edward Payson)
History
The Criminal Prosecution and Capital Punishment of Animals
Evans, E. P. (Edward Payson)
Animals -- Law and legislation -- History; Animals, Prosecution and punishment of -- History; Trials -- Europe
The Catholic Church, on the contrary, still holds that men, women and
cattle may be possessed by devils and prescribes the means of their
expulsion. In a work entitled _Rituale ecclesiasticum ad usum clericorum
S. Fransisci_ by Pater Franz Xaver Lohbauer (Munich, 1851), there is a
chapter on the mode of helping those who are afflicted by demons (_Modus
juvandi afflictos a daemone_). The author maintains that nearly all
so-called nervous diseases, hysteria, epilepsy, insanity, and milder forms
of mental alienation, are either the direct result of diabolical agencies
or attended and greatly aggravated by them. A sound mind in a sound body
may make a man devil-proof, but Satan is quick to take advantage of his
infirmities in order to get possession of his person. The adversary is
constantly lying in wait watching for and trying to produce physical
derangements as breaches in the wall, through which he may rush in and
capture the citadel of the soul. In all cases of this sort the priest is
to be called in with the physician, and the medicines are to be blessed
and sprinkled with holy water before being administered. Exorcisms and
conjurations are not only to be spoken over the patient, but also to be
written on slips of consecrated paper and applied, like a plaster, to the
parts especially affected. The physician should keep himself supplied with
these written exorcisms, to be used when it is impossible for a priest to
be present. As with patent medicines, the public is warned against
counterfeits, and no exorcism is genuine unless it is stamped with the
seal and bears the signature of the bishop of the diocese. According to
Father Lohbauer, the demon is the efficient cause of the malady, and there
can be no cure until the evil one is cast out. This is the office of the
priest; the physician then heals the physical disorder, repairing the
damage done to the body, and, as it were, stopping the gaps with his drugs
so as to prevent the demon from getting in again. Thus science and
religion are reconciled and work together harmoniously for the healing of
mankind.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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