But further: the Gospels mention a certain number of possessions, and their cures effected by our Lord. Here then we are in the very presence of a demonology such as was actually believed in by the followers of Jesus. Here, therefore, is the very condition of mind and outward circumstances where, if they had been a prey to the phantastic and disgusting beliefs about demons above referred to, such beliefs would certainly have made their appearance in their pages. But, as I have shown, the demonology of the Gospels stands in marked contrast to that of the Talmud, of Josephus, and of the Christian Fathers. We have no fumigations of demoniacs with the liver of a fish, we hear nothing of a demon drawn out of a man’s nose, and overturning a basin of water, nothing of a demon inhabiting every private closet. On the contrary, their action is described as mental, and, through the mind, affecting the body, with the exception of a few doubtful cases. I am not here arguing whether a belief in the reality of demoniacal possession is a superstition or not. But I affirm that if the writers of the New Testament had been a prey to the superstitions with which they are charged, these are the narratives in which they could not have failed to make their appearance. Again: It has been affirmed that they held a monstrous angelology. I reply that although angels are unquestionably stated to have appeared, and their existence is affirmed by the writers of the New Testament, still their recorded appearances are rare. They are confined to a few very remarkable occasions, viz.: the Annunciation and birth of our Lord, the temptation, the agony in the garden, and the resurrection. Surely this does not look as if the authors of the Gospels thought that they were always interfering with the course of nature or the events of life. In the Acts of the Apostles, they appear at the Ascension; once to liberate St. Peter, and at another time the Apostles, from prison; to direct Philip to preach to the eunuch; twice in a vision to St. Paul; and Herod Agrippa is also said to have been smitten by the ministry of an angel. There were certainly many occasions when, if the writers had believed in the habitual intervention of angels, we should have found them introduced. Thus an angel is not sent to deliver Paul from prison, or to still the tempest, but simply to assure him of his safety. St. Paul enumerates in a passage of some length the various dangers which beset him in his missions, especially mentioning the perils he encountered in travel. But neither he nor St. Luke once refers to an angelic intervention in his favour. In numerous passages he refers to dangers and persecutions which he encountered. But it is our Lord, and not angels, who delivered him. Is this consistent with a belief in their habitual intervention in nature? If he was the visionary which he has been asserted to have been, would he not have been continually seeing visions of angels for his protection?