“We find indications of these superstitions throughout the Gospels.” To this observation I invite the reader’s attention. Is it meant to be affirmed that any indication can be found in the Gospels that the writers believed that a demon inhabited every private closet in the world? Two instances only are referred to in the text, in one of which the demoniac of Gadara is represented as dwelling among the tombs, and as having been driven into the wilderness; and the other the parable of the unclean spirit going out of the man, and finding no rest when walking through dry places. Do these two cases prove the truth of the sweeping assertions above referred to? Does the parabolic representation that the expelled demon found no rest in dry or clean places prove that the disciples of Jesus believed that they took especial delight in foul or offensive ones? Does the fact that the demoniac of Gadara had been driven by the evil spirit into the wilderness prove that it was a universal belief that deserts and graves were haunted by demons? In proof also of these assertions we are referred in a note to five passages in the Gospels, viz. Matt. viii. 28; xii. 43; Mark v. 3‐5; Luke viii. 27‐29; xi. 24. Five passages are very few to justify the assertion that we find indications of these superstitions throughout the Gospels. On examining them, however, the five references are reduced to two, three belong to the account of the demoniac at Gadara, reported by each of the Synoptics; and two to the twofold report of the same parable as given by Matthew and Luke! This is a very slender foundation on which to ground the assertion that the followers of Jesus believed that “demons took especial delight in foul and offensive places, that they inhabited every private closet in the world, and that they haunted deserted places, graves, ruins, and certain kinds of trees, and that we find indications of these superstitions _throughout the Gospels_.” Still more extraordinary is the next reference. “Demons haunted springs and fountains,” says the author. To this he adds, “the episode of the angel who was said to descend at certain seasons and trouble the water of the pool of Bethesda, so that he who first stepped in was cured of whatsoever disease he had, may be mentioned in passing.” Why, I ask, mention it at all? Is the visit of an angel to this particular pool for the purpose of working a miracle, a proof that the followers of our Lord believed that demons inhabited springs and fountains? But our astonishment at the author’s reference to it is increased when we read the following words: “_Although the passage is not found in the oldest manuscripts of the Fourth Gospel, and it is certainly a late interpolation_.”